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“I dunno.” Jude stifles a yawn. “Thought you were sleepwalking or something.”
“I don’t sleepwalk.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I was awake the whole time! I heard the piano—“
“What piano?” Jude says. “All I heard was smashing.”
“Before that.” I struggle to speak calmly. “The piano was playing again before.”
“It was?” Jude glances at me. “I didn’t hear that.”
“It wasn’t as loud. I mean, it was louder than the first time but not as loud as the dishes…”
“Okay,” Jude says. “I believe you.”
Somehow that makes me feel worse, like there was a chance he wouldn’t believe me. Like he’s doing me a favor ‘cause my story sounds crazy.
It does sound crazy.
Itiscrazy. What the fuck is going on here?
I shut off the sink then wade across the kitchen to check the door that leads out to the backyard—it’s locked and deadbolted. All the windows on the main floor are locked or boarded up; I checked and double-checked after the last time.
“Wait here,” I say to Jude, and I dash back to the front door, though there’s no way somebody could have gone out that way—or at least, I don’t think so. I guess they could have snuck past me through the old ballroom; it connects on both sides. But the front door’s bolted, too.
Jude joins me in the entryway, looking a bit like Charon as he carries his lantern across the dark water.
“Still locked?”
“Yeah.”
He watches my face. “You think it’s the creepy doctor?”
I hesitate. “No. Well…I’m not sure.”
Breaking into my house to smash my dishes doesn’t feel like Dane somehow. But based off what? I barely know him, and he’s fully capable of doing something just to fuck with me.
“He’s not creepy,” I add lamely.
That was stupid. Now Jude’s fully awake and giving me his sharpest stare.
“Do you like him or something?”
“No!” God, I hope Jude can’t tell how red I am in this light. “I mean, I don’t dislike him. The more I get to know him, he’s, uh…”
I really wish I wouldn’t start sentences I don’t know how to finish.
Dane’s intense and provoking, and he says things that have me wondering for an hour afterward exactly what he meant. And when he kisses me…
Well, then it’s not really a question oflikinghim. It’s more like he shot me up to space and I need the air from his lungs just to breathe. It’s like I’m composed of a trillion atoms and he’s the force holding me together.
That’s how I feel when I’m around him.
The rest of the time I’m wondering if I should forget this impossible project, pack up my shit, and never see Grimstone again.
I came here for peace and stability, a fresh start, a shot at a better life.
