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“Not really.”
“Yes really. What can you learn out here that you didn’t study in school?”
“You tell me, and then we’ll both know.”
And there it is. The answer that proves he’s just as deranged as the rest of them. Would it kill anyone here to be forthcoming? To answer an actual question with an actual answer? “Why is everyone in this town so damn secretive?”
“We don’t ask.”
“You don’t want to know why they’re secretive?”
“No. We don’t want to know their secrets. Their backstories. None of that matters once you come to the End.”
My attention falls back on him as I turn the words over. “You don’t care about what anyone did before they came here?”
“No.”
That’s not smart. Hell, Wilde could be a serial killer for all anyone knows. Though I guess it’s not something he’d admit anyway. “You just … don’t ask?”
“Ever.”
Given what I’m running from, that sounds refreshing. I don’t have to hide my past if I can forget it happened at all, but with us only being hours from Wayward, I can’t trust that my past won’t catch up to me here anyway. “So this town is a fresh start?”
“For most people. Others drag their nightmares here with them.”
Wilde’s End is the nightmare. “Are you one of those people?”
“No, but I bet you could guess who.”
I don’t know anywhere enough about Wilde to guess at his story, but there is one person who acts haunted by just about everything. “Lynx.” It makes a lot of sense that something has damaged him, with his whole predator and prey thing, but him seeing the world in such a black-and-white way is going to backfire. “What nightmares does he have?”
Booker tsks his tongue against his teeth and taps the side of his nose.
“Right,” I say flatly. “Don’t ask.”
“Precisely.”
“Maybe I’ll ask him.”
Booker laughs. “Oh, please do. My work is always so quiet around here without Peril matches on.”
“Are you saying he’d hurt me?”
There’s an off-putting twinkle in Booker’s eyes. “Are you assuming he wouldn’t?”
I’m not going to tell him about our conversation today and how I walked away with a smidge more—well, not trust, but maybe understanding—of the guy. Lynx is reactive. If I want to stay off his radar, I just have to do as I’m told.
The problem is that I’m not sure I want to stay off his radar.
“Tell me, little rabbit—”
I cut a glare his way. “Did Lynx tell you to call me that?”
“Not at all, but it does suit you, wouldn’t you say?”
I know I shouldn’t deny it and go on letting people think I’m weak and innocent, but something tells me that Booker would love to know the truth. I meet his creepy stare head-on. “No. I wouldn’t.”
There’s a long beat of silence between us.
