21
The gun shot startles me where I lay in bed. My room is dark, my hair still wet from the shower and soaking the pillow beneath my head, but I didn’t have the energy or motivation to dry it.
I knew they were doing something dodgy out in that barn and that shot just confirmed it. He just killed a man. Two in one night.
How many others have there been? How many lives has this one man destroyed. Tens? Hundreds? Thousands?
I swallow down the fresh wave of nausea and roll away from the window.
Silence settles around the house again, so quiet I could hear a pin drop until the door downstairs opens and closes and his footsteps echo through the halls. How fucked up does it make me to hope he comes to my room? How depraved?
Am I as bad as him?
Could I kill a man in cold blood?
The thoughts swirl in my head, I’m lost in them until the creak of my door opening has my eyes shutting tight. I know it’s him. No one else would have the nerve to barge into my room, not because they’re afraid of me but because they’re afraid ofhim.
“I know you’re awake little bird.”
I sigh and turn my back to him, facing the window again. The door clicks shut and for a moment I think he’s left but then the soft pat of his feet echo in the darkness and the other side of the bed dips down as he settles his weight there. I don’t have to wonder for long what he’s doing as he pulls back the sheets and settles his body behind mine.
“What are you doing?” I whisper.
“This is what you do when someone needs comfort, is it not?”
“You want to show me comfort?”
“Shh, little bird.” His arms wrap around me, pulling me close and tight. His chin rests gently on the crown of my head whilst his body molds to the shape of mine.
This is weird.
This man is a monster.
And yet I am finding exactly what he said. Comfort.
Safety.
It makes no sense to feel safe with the devil but that’s exactly what settles over me and drags me into unconsciousness.
When I wake the following morning, my eyes feel like they’re covered in sand and my head is clouded. His body is still a hard pillar behind me. We’re in the same position as we fell asleep in and when I try to move out of his arms, they only band tighter around me.
“No, no,” he grumbles sleepily, an air of boyish innocence lacing his tone, “just a while longer.”
“We need to talk,” I whisper.
“Jesus Christ woman,” he growls, “it’s not even seven.”
“Would you prefer we spoke over morning coffee and breakfast in bed?” My voice drips with honey. Honey that’s poisonous and will make your insides rot.
“Don’t get fucking mouthy with me.”
I swallow when I feel his thickness pressing against the base of my spine.
“I want to know what happened. All of it.”
“I’m not at liberty of sharing those details with you.”
“Then what are you are at liberty of sharing, hm? You killed a man last night. Actually two if you include Lawson.”