He’s wet. His shirt and pants cling to him. This is unsurprising, considering the weather.
Where they’re exposed by the short shirt sleeves, his armsshow signs of surgery. Scars from sutures circumnavigate one forearm. His face looks like it’s been reconstructed after some devastating injury. Old suture lines crisscross, bisecting his nose and puckering his mouth. His eye sockets are shadows, but shimmering blueness shows within, on the irises at the edges.
My mouth falls open. That must be the whisky talking.
His shirt collar shifts and since buttons have been torn away or undone, I can see some of his chest.
“Fuck me,” I whisper.
His exposed skin is just as messed up as his face, with scars and left-over staples.
Who. What surgeon.I gulp.What surgeon leaves the fricking staples in place?
None.
Overcome by horror, the cold, or a combination of the two, I start to shake and shiver with chaotic muscle spasms.
Am I seeing things? I blink the moisture from my eyes. Suture marks show all over this Goliath of a human male. He looms over me, reaching close to seven feet.
A tear in his shirt suggests a wound beneath, because when the next lightning bolt flashes, I see a hint of red wetness. He doesn’t seem bothered. Despite my alcoholically hobbled state, a fact sorts itself out. Before me, eclipsing the churning sky, stands a man who could smear me into the floor.
The rain intensifies and bounces off the railing, splattering in beneath the roof, making more puddles on my balcony. As if to emphasize the scene’s grimness, another flash cracks the sky and flares a brilliant blue around the silhouette of this strange man.
He takes a step forward.
On shaky legs, I go backward. Another step by him, and I retreat again.
If I turn and run, he might pounce. My back hits the wall, and where the fuck is the doorway? Blindly, I scrabble my hand along the wall and feel no sign of the frame. A glance shows it two yards to my right.Do not panic.My hand freezes on the wall then I drag the stupid limb to my side.
“Who are you. What the fuck are you?” Inhaling, I press the back of my hand to my mouth.
The question stops his advance.
I hug myself, shivering uncontrollably as I wait for an answer.
“Do you think…”Shiver.I hug myself even harder.My teeth rattle. “You can talk before I turn to fucking ice? Who are you?”
He delivers another prolonged and silent stare then opens his mouth.
“I am…” Deep voice. His chest heaves, and it’s impossible not to notice the stacked muscle on that rudely built body.
Whatever he is, he’s been working out. Quietly, I snort at myself. I’m an idiot.
“Do not be afraid.” The words are grated out, guttural and coarse, then he opens his arms. He raises them to the side, creating a cross shape with his open palms toward me. “I will not harm you.”
Instead of reassuring, his pose makes him look larger and more menacing. He speaks like the Schwarzenegger terminator, deliberately, with none of the smoothness of a natural speaker of English.
“You think, Mr. Terminator?” I mutter quietly.
“Yes. I do. I heard that, Hailey.”
“How do you know my name?”
“I was sent to find…you.” That pause rings alarm bells. Hegrunts, smirks. “That does sound like him. The Terminator.”
“Only sent tofindme? Are you sure?”
“Instead, I saved you from another.”
