AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Wondering how much she’d seen and how much I needed to explain, I took a step forward, already prepared to plead and beg. But she whimpered and scrambled backward away from me, crab-crawling in retreat until she ran into the wall.
I pulled up short and swallowed thickly.
She was scared.
Of me.
That was the worst possible scenario, and it made my chest hurt.
The image of her cowering on the floor away from me as if she honestly believed I might hurt her was going to be imprinted on the inside of my brain for the rest of my life. And every time I had a nightmare, it’d be one of the top five scenes to reappear.
Willing to do anything to wipe that fear off her face, I hoarsely rasped, “Oaklynn?”
She shook her head, breathing hard, and it seemed to take all the bravery she had to look up at me. “I—I’m sorry. I snooped. I know I shouldn’t have—”
“No,” I broke in softly. “It’s okay. It’s alright. Don’t even worry about that.” I lifted my hands in the surrender position, hoping to calm her, but she flinched as if I was going to strike.
A sob got caught in my throat, and I sucked in a painful breath, hating this more than I could remember hating anything in the last decade.
Still all the way across the room from her and frozen in the bathroom doorway, I wilted down onto my knees so I could get on her level. “Are you okay?” I asked, my voice shaking.
Oaklynn blurted out an incredulous laugh and shook her head jerkily. “Are you kidding me right now?” she demanded and started to point toward the chest. “I… That… Just what the fuckwasthat?”
“What did it look like?” I diverted elusively.
“I mean, I didn’t stare long enough to get the full picture, but it looked like a snapshot of a dead body—a bloody, naked, mutilated female body—inside some kind of cop or detective case file.”
Okay, then. So she hadn’t seen everything.
And though I strongly knew I shouldtellher everything, I just as strongly knew I wasn’t going to. It would ruin the perfect night we’d had together. And besides, she’d had enough of a surprise with the picture alone. I couldn’t completely terrify her right now with all of it. She’d never talk to me again.
But this…this, I could rectify.
I hoped.
“Well, that’s what it was,” I admitted.
Oaklynn’s eyes flared again in disbelief. She pressed a hand to her chest and shook her head. “But w-whydo you have it?”
“Because…” I started and then took a quick breath before saying, “I’m a forensic psychology major.”
Except my major wasn’t why I had the file.
When Oaklynn sent me a blank look, I nodded my head slowly, hoping to help her connect the dots. I started to crawl toward her, and thankfully, she didn’t shy away this time, so I came in until I was about five feet away before stopping again. “And as a forensic psychology student, I study criminal behavior and case files in the hopes of catching…”
“Murderers,” she said slowly before she exhaled and let her shoulders sag. “Wow.” After another moment, she pressed a hand to her chest. “So that was just a…afakepolice file to help you play mock detective, or whatever? For a class?”
I winced. “Not…exactly. It wasn’t fake. That was a real picture of—”
“Ack! No.” Lifting a hand to stop me, she grimaced and pulled her face back to shake her head. “God. That’s awful! Why in the world would they let you see something so…?”
“Well…” I started slowly. “If it’s the kind of thing I’ll be dealing with after I graduate, I guess I better start preparing to see that kind of stuff now.”
“Dear God,” Oaklynn breathed, setting a hand against her chest. “That is just…” She made a face, letting me know she didn’t understand my choices in career goals at all. But then she let out a breath. “I don’t even want to pretend to know why you would put yourself in that kind of position where you’d be forced to see that kind of stuff daily. Though it does explain all the psychology classes you’re taking.”
I tipped my head curiously. “How do you know I’m taking a lot of psychology classes?”
She waved a hand. “Doesn’t matter.” Looking a lot less scared now, she began to wring her hands. “What I should explain most is whyI was snooping in there in the first place.”
