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“A smart woman wouldn’t,” he said and laughed.
“Luckily for you, asshole, I don’t think anybody has ever accused me of being a smart woman.”
“You’re plenty intelligent, Fancy Face. Just maybe not in the common sense way that usually tells most people when to keep their mouth shut in the presence of dangerous men.”
“Can I have the sweet Jersey back for just a couple more minutes?”
“There’s no such man.”
He sighed when I glared up at him over my shoulder.
“Fine,” he said. “But don’t tell anyone.”
“Can I ask you something then? Before you shift back into shithead Jersey?”
His hand moved up my neck until it was under my jaw so he could tilt my face back toward him.
“I told you that you can be in charge everywhere else, Fancy Face. Everywhere and every time, except when we’re alone. Do I need to remind you of that already?” He leaned down to kiss just the tip of my nose. “What do you want to ask me?”
“What kind of life do you think we get to have now?” I asked.
“What?” He asked and laughed.
“What are we supposed to do now? Do we just hide here forever? Keep Memphis and the others trapped here with us? Die in the cornfields someday? Are we common law married after you keep me here for however many years? Just — what happens next?”
Rather than continue to stare at me, he laid his head back on the edge of the tub to be able to look away from me.
“I don’t know how I’m supposed to answer that yet,” he said and chuckled.
“What do you want life to look like for us?” I asked instead.
“Baby, I can feel you leading up to something here, but I’m really not any good at this game. I can’t see anything ahead right now when the past is blocking my view of everything. Why don’t you tell me what it is that you’re seeing and I’ll figure out a way to make it happen, huh?”
“I never even thought I’d have a boyfriend. I don’t know what we’re supposed to be doing,” I admitted. “Boyfriend sounds weird. Is that what I’m supposed to call you? Aren’t you a little — I don’t know — mature for that? Not in the sense that you act like a mature adult. More in the sense that you’re nearly a hundred.”
“I swear to God, Trista —.”
“I want to go on dates, Jersey. I want to go to dinner. Do things regular people do. Be able to walk fucking anywhere without looking behind me every other step. I just want —.”
“You want stability,” he filled in for me. “Safety. I remember the conversation from our last date, Fancy Face.”
“That did not count as a date, old man.”
“Keep it up with the age jokes, baby. See where it gets you.”
“Underneath you again?” I asked and smiled at him. “Oh no. Please. Not that. Sounds awful, you geriatric—.”
“Hush.”
CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO
jersey
I was starting to believe I’d never sleep again.
Truthfully, I wasn’t even sure how Triss could still sleep at night knowing that I was next to her. I didn’t even trust myself to sleep. How she trusted any version of me was baffling. She managed to look at me, to love me like she couldn’t see the worst parts of me that lurked just beneath the surface of who I was. She knew those things were there. She’d seen firsthand what I was. Whether she chose to ignore it and act like it wasn’t there, or just chose to see it openly and embrace the fucked up parts of me, I guess I might never know. What was purely certain about it was that she decided to love me anyway; broken pieces and all. And she was thinking about a future with me. She was seeing something beyond this house and this mess in which we’d all found ourselves, and now I needed to find a way to offer her whatever it was that she was seeing.
Roaming around our bedroom in the middle of the night to prevent myself from falling asleep didn’t bring the answers I sought though. It usually ended up making things worse. Like it did tonight when I happened to stop at the window that overlooked the pool.
