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“You don’t know that.”
“It isn’t any different than couples who have kinks. A little bit of domination. Fuck me with your socks and shoes on. Tie you up. So what if I let you have a little of my blood?”
“I already learned firsthand that you like tying people up,” says Kyle, shooting him a look.
“Hey, that was just to keep you from running away.”
“Or maybe it’s just another thing that turns you on,” Kyle says back. “You want to tie me up when you feed me, too? You think mere rope can restrain me? I could’ve broken out of your knot easily. Your rope work is level 1 at best.”
“Level 1? I’m at least a 10, don’t sell me too short. I was in Boy Scouts. I know my knots.”
“You can barely tie your shoes. Elias, I’m not going to have another drop of your blood.”
Elias glances down at his shoes, as if to check, then stops at once and takes Kyle by the shoulders. “Didn’t we say we don’t have to hide anything from each other?”
“Actually, I think we said the opposite.” Kyle looks at him. “I don’t ask about who you are, who’s looking for you, what your deal with your mother is, none of it. And you don’t ask me what I really am, where I’m from, or how I got here. Our relationship is literally made out of, supported by, and thriving because of the secrets we’re keeping.”
“I … I didn’t say we …” Elias clenches his teeth and growls in a way that Kyle can best describe as adorable. “Stop using my own words against me, Kyle.”
“I’m Henry,” he snaps.
That’s when he hears it.
Something like a gasp. Choked.
As infinitesimal as a grain of sand settling into place. Or a snowflake landing on the branch of a tree a mile away.
Kyle spins around, eyes wide, listening.
Where did it come from, that sound? What was it?
Elias barely shuffles a foot and Kyle spins around and holds him against the wall at once, pinning him there, pressing a hand to his mouth to stifle whatever he’s about to say.
Unblinking, as silent as stone, Kyle brings a finger to his lips, indicating silence.
Elias, wide-eyed, nods back at Kyle, obeying.
Then Kyle senses something else. It feels like cold fingers at the base of his stomach. He recognizes it. It’s fear. Deep fear. The taste of impending death. Pure, compounding horror.
He has at last found that special connection again.
But it’s not with Elias.
Whose fear is he sensing?
Kyle bolts from the street at once. Regrettably, he can also hear the noisy pursuit of Elias at his back, following. But his full and undivided focus is on finding the source of the fear, not in hushing Elias, who can’t help his lack of stealth.
It’s not even clear to Kyle how he’s able to track the fear. Does he smell it? Does he taste it? Does he feel it?
Then he hears someone cry out.
Kyle picks up his pace now, hurrying toward the shout. Cutting through an empty parking lot and racing across a dirt patch, he spots the front of the pawnshop—and finds its doors ajar.
Without a thought in mind, he plunges into the dark store.
The pawnshop is lined with display cases along every wall, with a maze of cluttered tables in the middle full of knickknacks and confusingly-labeled items. It’s at one of those tables that he sees the shape of a man in a black and grey hoodie. He holds a gun, finger on the trigger, pointed at the face of a teenager in front of the table.
The teenager is Jeremy, the police chief’s son, hands in the air and trembling.
The moment Kyle appears, Jeremy looks at him, then lets out a shriek, likely not recognizing his silhouette in the dark, thinking he is someone else coming to harm him.
Jeremy’s cry has the unfortunate side effect of spooking the gunman, who in one swift motion takes Jeremy into a headlock, presses the gun to his temple, and spins around. “Back away!” screams the man at Kyle. “Back away now!”
Kyle stops at once, right in the doorway.
He sees a single bead of sweat dripping down the gunman’s forehead. He can see it even across the dark room, his enhanced senses sharper than ever right now.
He feels Jeremy shaking, too.
Even down to the rattling of his feet within his sneakers.
Is it his fear Kyle sensed? Jeremy’s? How did Kyle possibly connect to him from all the way across town, of all people? Is that even possible?
“I said back away!” the gunman screams. “Now!”
Kyle sees a second bead of sweat falling from the gunman’s forehead, coming to rest at the tip of his nose, then letting go.
Suddenly, it isn’t fear Kyle senses anymore.
It’s desperation.
And dread.
The emotion feels like an insurmountable heaviness, cold, right at the center of the man’s bowels, pulling downward with no mercy.
