“You carried me?”
“More like dragged.”Chad looked away.“I got your keys out of your jeans, was going to run, but then I saw all the stuff on the backseat ...and in the trunk,” he gestured to Romeo.“Help me put the pieces back together?That’s what you said you wanted to do—”
“I do—”
“That involves chains and padlocks does it?”
“It does,” Romeo replied.
He stroked the chain around his neck.Then he laughed, he laughed until Chad frowned, and shook his head.
“What’s so funny?”
“You’ve had a chain around the monster metaphorically for a long time, but now it’s around me, too.Now it’s physical.”
“I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about.”
Romeo sobered.“You tricked me.You pretended you were hurt.”
Chad didn’t respond.
“Stupid,” Romeo hissed at himself.“Stupid emotions.You tricked me and I fell for it.That’s what love does.It makes you do foolish things.”
“You don’t love me.”
“I do, Chad.”
Chad shook his head.“You’re a psychopath, and psychopaths can’t love.”
“Says who?”Romeo asked.
Chad blinked.
“Whether I am a psychopath or not...”he shot a sad smile at Chad, “it’s just not important.”
“You’re crazier than I thought you would be.”
This Chad wasn’t his Chad, nor was he the Chad he’d spoken to at Ally’s house.Romeo could see it in the way Chad studied him from the other side of the room, like he was a specimen.
ThisChad was different.
He was in control.
“What now?”Romeo asked.
Chad stared at him.
Romeo flicked his chin in the direction of the door.“There’s no sirens—”
“Doesn’t mean there won’t be.”
“You haven’t called them, though,” Romeo reached for the length of chain that connected him to the gym.Chad had given him roughly four meters.He eyed the space between them.
“You can’t reach me,” Chad said coldly.“And just because I haven’t yet called the police doesn’t mean I won’t.”
“You have a serial killer chained up in your outhouse and you’ve not called them?”Romeo raised an eyebrow.“What are you waiting for?Me to escape?”
“You can’t escape.Not without the key.”
