As if that was the part that mattered.
“How does that makeanyof this any better?”
“I’m not trying to make things any better. I’m trying to tell you the only reasonable things I can. Like the fact that I am just here for my medication, and as soon as I get it I swear to god I will be out of here.”
“Yeah, but that does not sound reasonable at all. It sounds likemedication is a polite way of describing something completely weird or illegal or possibly terrifying. Like maybe a great big bunch of cocaine.”
“You can’t possibly believe that your grandmother was a coke dealer.”
“Well, I didn’t five seconds ago. But I’m sure starting to rethink that now.”
Another exasperated sound came out of him. Only there was an edge to it this time. A desperate sort of edge that she didn’t like. Especially when it only got keener in his words.
“Cassie, she was eighty-seven years old. Her favorite show was a crafting thing about making macramé toys to give to a dog she doesn’t have. The very idea of her doing anything like that is impossible and ridiculous.”
“Yeah, but until right now I thought it was ridiculous that Seth Brubaker would know my grandmother’s first name and all of her hobbies and then break into her house at three in the morning. And yet here you are. Doing just that. Probably to torture me, again.”
“Cassie, I’m not trying to torture you. I have never tried to tor ture you. The torturing just keeps happening, against every bit of my will and sense,” he groaned, and god he sounded sincere.
Hell, helookedsincere. His brows had drawn together into a fraught peak over the bridge of his nose. There was actual anguish in his caramel eyes. And the hand he had out—well, it was very convincing. If he’d been any other person, it would have been enough to assure her that his motives were pure.
But he wasn’t anybody else.
He was the guy—or at least one of the guys—who made her have to be homeschooled for the remainder of her last high school year. The guy who had proven that wanting anything good in your life—that believing in anything good—was just courting disaster.
And that meant he got this, instead.
“So get ahold of your will and stop. Leave now, before this gets any worse,” she said, and oh the terror she got in response. He practically clutched himself.
“I can’t do that. Not without what I need.”
“Then you had better explain exactly what that needed thing is.”
“I swear to you, it’s nothing. It’s not illegal, it’s not horrible, it won’t make you want to kill me. It just might improve my… condition.”
Condition, her brain moaned despairingly.
Probably because her brain knew this was one more thing that would make her lower her guard. And sure enough, she could feel herself letting the hatstand drop a little. She took two more steps down the stairs. She was almost on the earthen floor now. Plus she was saying things. Things that sounded too sympathetic and helpful. “And what exactly is this something?”
“Just a kind of herbal remedy. Or maybe the recipe book your grandmother used to make it. Though I would need that last one fast, because you know the longer I go without it the more likely it is that I’ll get… that things will be… that I might just—”
“You might just what? Do something wilder than sweat through a leather jacket?” she asked, and was pleased at the level of sarcasm in her voice. But less pleased about it when his hands immediately fisted into his hair.
“Oh fuck. Oh Christ. Please tell me I’m not at that stage already.”
“Honestly I kind of want to, but your soaked clothes are making it hard.”
“Okay cool. Cool cool cool cool. But nothing else is wrong, though. Right?”
He gave her such a hopeful look on that last word. So hopeful, in fact, that it was hard to say yes. Instead, she found herself wincing. And prevaricating.
“Uh. Well. That depends on what you mean by nothing else.”
“I mean, like. My face is a normal color.”
Fuck, she thought.
Though she went with the truth anyway.
