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A moment of silence fell in which I could feel those eyes of molten ice peering right through my protective shell, reading me for what I really was, seeing into my soul. “I think that some people are stronger than we could possibly imagine. Some people survive everything.”
I could feel my hands shaking, but I had no control over them. “I think you’re right,” I whispered.
His eyes softened, turning warm and sad. Cautiously, as if afraid I would either run away or break, he raised a hand and ever-so-gently touched my cheek with his warm fingertips, brushing away the remnants of tears. “Poe…” he whispered softly.
I swallowed hard, trying to no avail to steady my quivering voice. “I met you at Starbucks yesterday. I don’t even know your first name.”
“It’s Caleb.”
“Caleb, then. But, still, you don’t know my name either.”
“It’s Poe. Elenora Allison Poe,” he muttered softly. “Remember? I stalked you.”
I chuckled grimly. “Ah, yes. Very reassuring.” I hesitated, staring into those eyes and wishing to God that I could just fall into them. “Frost, I don’t trust people. Not just people I don’t know, but anyone.”
“Why not?”
His thumb stroked my cheekbone softly and I shivered at the all-too welcome touch. “Because in my life, I’ve learned that people are almost never worthy of trust. You’re a cop. There are terrible people everywhere and you know it.”
“Do you think I’m terrible, Poe?”
I hesitated and looked down at my still-clenched fists in shame, the color rising in my cheeks. “I don’t know. I’ve never known any good people. My foster-mother came close, but she was never strong enough to be good.”
Frost sighed softly, his breath warm on my face. “There’s more to life than running from nightmares.”
“That depends on the nightmares you have,” I whispered, my voice like broken glass. I stood up from the couch and turned away from him, wrapping my arms around myself as I had in the library the day before, holding the pieces of me together as the tears returned to my eyes. I heard Frost ease to a stand from the couch, then take several slow, measured steps towards me. As my body shuddered with pent-up emotion, Frost rested his warm hand on my upper arm, standing a step or two behind me. My face contorted into a grimace he couldn’t see. “Promise me something?” he asked quietly, sadly.
“I don’t make promises,” I gasped, my emotions like a tidal wave ready to break down a dam.
“This one will never hurt you.”
The words cut through me like a knife and I looked over my shoulder at him, composing my features as much as I could beforehand. I shuddered at the overwhelming understanding, concern and…something unidentifiable in his eyes. “What?” I asked, the question coming out like a surrender.
Frost handed me a tiny scrap of paper with his name and cellphone number scrawled on it. “Call me if you need help. I will answer and I will come if you ever need me. For anything.”
I took the number and studied him in confusion. “Why are you doing this?”
His thumb softly stroked my arm once, then he withdrew his hand and replied, “Because you’re worth helping, Poe.”
I didn’t have anything to say to that. I stood there in numb, frozen shock as Frost stepped around me to the door, looking back to me as he opened it. “I mean it,” he said, the full honesty and urgency in his eyes more powerful than any other measure he’d taken to help me.
The door fell shut after him and in the overwhelming silence of the tiny apartment, I stared down at the phone number in shock and awe.
THREE
By the next day I had fully recovered from the embarrassing incident with my muscles, but not from how I had handled Frost. There was so much more to him than he let on. I had seen it in his eyes yesterday when he’d told me that some people survive everything. That depth, that darkness, that pain and undying understanding in his icy blue eyes held the weight of the world. There were few people out there that knew the darker sides of the world that well. I was one of them. And, it seemed, Frost was another.
The problem was that the dark pieces of the world could build some people up and tear others down. I still wasn’t sure which had been done to me. Some people grew stronger as a result of the trials they faced, but others were broken by them, even driven insane by them.
Nina Faucett was of the sort that I suspected had a medical condition causing her madness. She had been deranged and cruel as long as I’d known her, dating back to preschool. I remembered rumors circling in high school that she took pills and most people had assumed she did drugs, but my guess was that they were prescriptions for a psychological disorder. Other people, though, became mad because of the awful things they saw.
I’d known one victim of acquired madness.
Lex Rydenor, my boyfriend of about two weeks in my junior year of high school, had been horrifically abused by his mother as a child. He had never told me or anyone else that, but I could infer it. From my experience delving into characters with my writing, I had a good understanding of how people worked. The way she had treated him as a child had driven him not only to hate women, but to become physically violent. Lex’s mother had turned him into a monster.
I shook my head violently to clear it as I walked down the cold Baltimore street, trying desperately to rid my brain of Lex. He was the last thing I needed on my mind right then.
I took a turn into a subdivision, a rare high-class section of the city, complete with fancy streetlamps, cobblestone sidewalks, and monstrous rowhouses with tiny lawns groomed to perfection. The Heights was the sort of neighborhood that egotistical businessmen, like Jonathan Aaron, adored and flaunted their houses in. It was also the sort of neighborhood that was eerily quiet during the day like this, when virtually every inhabitant save my foster-mother was off at work.
