He dropped his head into my neck. “Thank you, Princess.”
“Also, I accidently hit someone with my car once and they died.”
“Um…”
“Does this feel nice?” I asked into his ear. “The hug? Am I doing it right?”
He chuckled. “Yeah, Princess. It feels nice for me. Does it feel nice for you?”
My heart swelled with heat. “Yeah…”
“I'll let go when you let go.”
“I don't feel much like letting go.” The words skipped over in my head.Feel. I felt something. My heart blooming, my skin warm from his.
The code of my life had been to find love.
Dig Graves was my glitch.
“Dig,” I said. “I can’t love you. I don’t know what the feeling is at all.”
His fingers teased through my hair. He rid of his sadness to devote time to tend to my own. “I don’t need your love, Delphine. Just you. Whatever you can give me. I grew up in the gutter, I'm used to scraps. To me, scraps are a fucking five-star buffet.”
I think…he deserved more than just scraps.
I squeezed him tight one last time before opening my arms, releasing him.
“Come on,” he said. “Let’s go save Tommy the Tank Engine.”
“You don’t have to Dig. You can just go back to your apartment and wait out the Battle.”
“Get that idea out of your beautiful, stupid head.I’m a monster, but I’m your monster.”
“But Dig, you don’t have to do that for me. I don’t think I’d do anything like that for you.” The words made guilt fill up in my chest. But they were true, I wanted to be honest.
If I couldn't be what he needed, at least I could be honest.
“You don't have to do anything for me,” he said deeply. “You just focus on staying alive. That’s all I want from you.”
My heart rose up in my throat.
“I’m going to get Tomster for you,” he said, brow furrowing on the arches on his heart-shaped glasses. “I’d pull the Tom-cat out of hell if I had to.”
“He’s not in hell, just somewhere in the city.”
“I’d burn people alive for you, record their screams and make it my ringtone. For you Delphine, I’d do anything.” He got on his knees in front of me, his sunglasses catching vines of sunlight. His black hair licked over his forehead as he looked up at me. “You are the wreath of flowers around the rot in my soul, and from the decay in my heart I offer you the type of devotion Gods covet from a disbeliever. I want to create statues of you and elevate them into the ocean of stars, showing the world their new Goddess, and whoever does not bow down to you, they will suffer under the torture of my hand.”
“Maybe tomorrow.”
In the suburbs each home was identical in various pastel shades with lawn ornaments and welcome mats. A severed head sat proud on a mailbox and a bloody sock blanketed over a window box of tulips.
We found Fiona and Tommy in a little pink split-level home. Dig recognised one of the traps that had been set at the front door that was similar to Fred’s, and we snaked our way inside carefully.
A sweet home, with beige carpet, matching floral couches, an L-shaped kitchen with farmhouse style cupboards. The dining table was crafted from oak and on top of it, Fiona bent over while Tommy thrust into her from behind.
I waved. “Hello!”
Tommy screeched.
