I feel sick. I want to vomit, scream, anything, but I can’t move. My vision tunnels down to the point of the blade, the way the flesh on June’s knuckle tightens when Blitz leans on it. She’s sobbing now, little animal noises through her nose, her eyes never leaving mine.
Blitz lines up the knife, the blade angled to take the finger at the joint. The knife dips, and the tip cuts a thin red seam across the top of her hand. She jerks, tries to pull back, but Cyclone’s grip is unbreakable. The little cut beads up, a single perfect drop of blood.
Midnight lets the moment hang, lets the blood glisten. Then he dabs it with the tip of his finger and pops it between his grinning lips. “She’s sweet. Now, do you see, Gator? We’re patient. But patience isn’t the same as mercy.”
He leans back, satisfied, and points at me with the hand that once wore a wedding ring, now just a dented circle of pale skin. “You have a week. Seven days. If I don’t have what I want by then, we start with the fingers, we work our way up, and I promise you — by the time I'm done, you won't be able to put her back together.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Molly
The smell of garlic and butter has no business in my apartment.
Yet, here it is. Present, even though it doesn’t belong.
Neither, frankly, does the fact that I’m wearing clean black leggings and one of my “nice” tank tops — the one with the little mesh panel up top that shows just enough collarbone to count as effort. The one I’ve specifically never worn to the Fir, because it migrates from “approachable” to “interested” and that, everyone knows, is a dangerous slope. It’s a weekday, for fuck’s sake. A day for leftovers, for cheap whiskey, for being scalded by a shower that, thankfully, now works on demand. Not for slaving over a skillet and pretending to be a person who might ever invite trouble into her home on purpose.
I stir the skillet and pretend I’m not doing something reckless. Stupid. Caring.
No, I’m not that. Not caring. I’m just a normal person, making normal chicken in her normal kitchen for a normal neighbor. No one would suspect a thing, unless they noticed the trembling in my hands or the fact that I’ve cleaned every visible surface in the past ten minutes. Or maybe that the chicken is actually close to getting a little overdone, because my attention keeps ping-ponging from the pan to my phone to the door — like I’m expecting someone to barge in and catch me doing something illegal.
I turn down the heat.
The oven timer dings. I pull out the bread — one of those take-and-bake loaves I bought for myself as a treat. It’s loaded with rosemary, slathered in pre-made garlic butter, and now it’s bubbling, glistening, the crust golden enough to make my mouth water. I resist the urge to tear off a piece and instead cut two slices, plating them with a little more care than absolutely necessary. Next, I spoon the chicken onto two plates, arranging the roasted broccolini and potatoes along the side like I’m on some Food Network show for people who were raised by wolves and then shamed into domesticity.
I tell myself this is repayment. For the shower. For the water heater. For the study help. For the way he makes me feel like… No, not that. I tell myself I’m not doing this for the look on his face when he eats good food, or the way his shoulders unclench after the first sip of wine. This is not caring. This is not domestic. This is not, under any circumstances, a date.
Just food. Just a normal night.
Normal.
And yet, here I am. With two plates, two forks, and two glasses set next to a bottle of wine I drove clear across town to buy, because if I am going to lose a battle with myself, I am going to lose it spectacularly.
I hate how good it feels to lose.
The urge to pace is overwhelming. I wipe my hands on a dish towel, then wipe the counters again, then rinse out the sink even though it’s already empty. I check the hallway through the peephole and see nothing but the yellowed light of our apartment corridor, the same scuffed linoleum, the same battered table by the elevator that’s always stacked with old pizza flyers. I go back to the kitchen and stare at the plates. I could hide them, I think. I could put one away. Eat alone like Ialways do, and no one would ever know I almost did something soft.
But then, what’s the point?
I grab one plate and march across the hall. I knock before I can second-guess myself. Three sharp raps that sound way too assertive for how I actually feel.
There’s a pause, and then the door opens. Evan Wilder stands on the other side, hair still damp from a shower, in a black T-shirt and jeans that look both new and completely at home on him. He blinks at the plate in my hand, then at my face.
“Hey,” he says, voice warm, and I hate how much it hits me right in the solar plexus. “Are you okay?”
I thrust the plate forward. “I made you food. So shut up and come on over.”
His mouth twitches. “You cooked?”
“Dinner,” I say, and it comes out more like an accusation than an invitation. “Yes. Don’t make it weird.”
“You’re doing a pretty good job of that yourself.” He takes the plate carefully, like he thinks it might explode. “Since when do you cook?”
“I know how to use fire,” I say, and the sarcasm comes out a little too fast. “It’s not a miracle.”
He looks at me, and for a moment the whole hallway feels too narrow, too close. His gaze moves over my face, and then he reaches out and brushes a tiny smear of flour from my cheek. I didn’t even know it was there, and the touch is so gentle, so deliberate, it short-circuits my ability to breathe.
He doesn’t say anything cute, or make a joke out of it. He just lets his hand drop, and when our eyes meet, something inside me goes soft. Because he’s looking at me like I’m not a bartender who keeps a blade next to her toaster. Like I’m… something worth being careful with.
