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Only the soft rustle of leaves above us disturbs the stillness as Rico stares down at me in silence for another few seconds. I hold his gaze with eyes full of broken surrender. But on the inside, my heart is pounding, and I’m begging for an entirely different reason.
Come on, fall for it. Come on.
At last, Rico lets out a long breath. Then he jerks his chin. “Get up.”
I pick up the handcuffs from the ground while getting to my feet. Once I’m standing again, I hold out the handcuffs to him. He plucks them from my open palms. I keep my hands out like that, silently offering him my wrists.
He shakes his hand, and hooks the handcuffs to his belt instead.
Smug victory sparkles inside me, and it takes great effort to keep it off my features.
“Let’s go,” Rico says, jerking his chin again.
We walk back to his car, which was apparently parked a short distance down the road, in complete silence. I steal glances at him from the corner of my eye, trying to read his mood. It’s difficult in the dark. But he looks… thoughtful.
The lights flash as Rico unlocks the car. I move to the passenger side while he gets into the driver’s seat. Two thuds sound as we close the doors behind us.
I reach for my seatbelt, and have to suppress a small smile while I buckle it.
This was how I knew that he wouldn’t actually hurt me when he brought me to the woods. Yes, he broke into my apartment, kidnapped me, handcuffed me, and put a bag over my head. But when he got me into the car, heput the seatbelt on me.
It’s such a small detail, but it makes a strange sense of sparkling amusement ripple through me. Like,yes, I have no problems abducting you, but if we’re in a car crash, I don’t want you getting hurt. The thought of it makes me feel unexpectedly warm inside.
I glance over at Rico as he starts the car and begins driving us back to Blackwater. There are so many contradictions to this man. And if I didn’t desperately need to get his attention away from me, I think I would actually enjoy trying to figure them all out.
“What?” he asks.
Crap, he noticed me watching him. Scrambling for something to say, I settle on, “I was just wondering what it is that’s so important about this.”
He casts me a glance from the corner of his eye. “About what?”
“The questions you’re asking me. Whatever it is that happened six years ago.”
His jaw tightens for just a fraction of a second. But when he replies, his voice is neutral. Nonchalant. “I just need some answers to a few things. That’s all.”
My heart squeezes with a sudden surprising burst of pain.Oh, I bet you do.Answers to questions like, why did we murder your parents that night when you had done absolutely nothing to us?
Part of me wishes that I could tell him. It won’t be a satisfying answer, but at least it will be an answer.
When I thought about Rico these past six years, I always imagined him living a great life. The life that I wish I could’ve had. But now that I’m here, now that I’ve studied the way his jaw clenches and his eyes flicker when he talks about that night, I realize what an absolute hell I must have left him in.
We swept in one night, murdered his family but left him alive, and then vanished like ghosts, leaving no trace and no explanation behind. And he has spent every day since then in hiding.
The tiny scrap that still remains of my long since butchered conscience throbs in pain. He really has every reason to hate me. To want me dead. And the only reason why I’m not dead yet is because he desperately wants those answers. Which means that I have to keep them from him at all costs.
He stops the car outside my apartment building but doesn’t turn off the ignition.
To the east, the sun is just barely trying to climb over the horizon. The rest of the residential area around us is silent and still. I glance between Rico and the door.
“You’re letting me go?” I ask hesitantly.
He keeps his eyes on the empty road ahead as he replies, “Yeah.”
“Thank you.”
His eyes remain on the road, and he says nothing.
I unbuckle my seatbelt and then slowly climb out of the car. He doesn’t stop me. Once I have closed the door behind me, he drives away immediately. I release a long exhale.
