“If you just give me what I want, I promise I’ll leave. That’ll be the end of it. Our secret.”
Rhys’s gaze fixes on me, harder now. Colder. “You don’t know what you want.”
It comes out final. Like there’s nothing to argue. But a flicker of something burns behind his eyes. I can’t name it. But it’s there. Undeniable.
Fear maybe. Hope. Something harder to identify. I can’t name it yet, but my gut tells me it matters. So, I try again. “How long have you been up here?”
He chuckles, leaning his head back against the wall. “What month is it? What year?”
I tell him. He calculates.
“A little over two years.”
“You look disappointed,” I say.
“I was hoping it’d been longer.”
“Why?” I ask.
“More of your deep, probing questions,” he laments sarcastically.
“If you don’t like my questions, why don’t you ask some of your own?”
He inhales through his nose, then lets it out slowly. “What do you want to believe about Phoenix?”
Is he trying to piss me off? Is this question serious?
“Why are you asking me that?”
He tips his head enough to look at me. “Because, yeah, I want you to leave.”
“And I want the truth.”
“Roger that.”
His voice goes flat again, as if he’s shutting this down.
“I’m as stubborn as you are,” I say.
His jaw tightens. “Two years stubborn?”
The blood drains from my face.
He sees it. But he doesn’t smile. Doesn’t register anything except maybe sadness.
“You eat meat?”
An awkward pause follows.
I nod.
He rises to his feet and heads for the door. “Better over the pit.” Then, he disappears outside, and that’s when it hits me.
Something about him doesn’t match the version I came here to confront. And that’s a problem.
Chapter
Eight
