I didn’t know.
Tobias did not look away from me.
“I need you to stay calm,” he implored, taking another step down, then another, and another.
That was the wrong thing to say.
It was the worst thing to say.
Because those words meant there was something not to be calm about.
The fear hit all at once, so sharp and total that for a moment I couldn’t see.
As I tried to blindly back up, the sole of my shoe slid out from under me on the damp floor. I fell from the loss of balance, crashing down on my butt.
Pain shot up my spine, but it barely registered beneath the terror already flooding my system.
I tried to push myself back up, but my hand slipped. The floor was wet from the tank, slick beneath my palm, and the moment my fingers skidded through the thin layer of water, something animal inside me, something instinctual, reared up.
I scrambled backward, heels dragging against the floor, one hand braced behind me as I tried to move away from him.
Away from the tank.
Away from the body.
Away from Tobias.
The thought of that—of needing distance from Tobias—hurt so intensely I almost couldn’t breathe around it.
He stopped halfway down the steps.
His gloved hand tightened around the railing, water still dripping from his wrist and striking the metal step below in slow, precise taps.
“Cove,” he said, softer now. “Please.”
I shook my head, still scooting back.
“No.” The word broke when it left me.
Tobias flinched.
It was small, but I saw it. I saw the way his mouth tightened, the way his eyes flicked over my face as if trying to calculate which part of him had frightened me most and finding too many answers to isolate one.
He came down another step.
I moved back again, faster this time, my shoulder hitting the curve of a tank stand hard enough to send a dull ache through my arm.
“Don’t,” I said.
Tobias stopped.
Quietly, he promised, “I won’t hurt you.”
I wanted to believe him.
God, I wanted to believe him so badly it made me nauseous.
But there was a dead man behind him.
