I’d cut too deep, the knife skating up the side of my wrist with startling speed. It was just supposed to be a few drops. Liv had screamed. I’d started panicking.
Cass, though, stayed calm. She wrapped her jacket around it tight and we ran to my house, where we could be sure no one would be paying attention. Cass cleaned it with hydrogen peroxide, then sewed it up with a needle and fishing line while I bit down on a dishrag. Liv hovered on the other side of the room, hands pressed over her ears, trying not to retch. She hated blood.
Cass bandaged it up, and I’d hidden it under my sleeve while it healed. At first Cass had said she and Liv would do their cuts later, but eventually she declared that my sacrifice was enough to complete the ritual.
Part of me had wondered, later, if that was where things had gone wrong. We owed the Goddesses our blood, and if we didn’t give it willingly, they would claim it.
But there had been no Goddesses. No Persephone. Only a girl, long lost.
I shut the computer and its image of Jessi Walker. I jolted out of my chair. My fingers skimmed over my skin, bumping over scar tissue, a half-conscious inventory of old wounds. I combed my hand through my hair, pulling hard enough to hurt, and there was relief in the pain. It was simple. Stimulus and response, a clarity of causation that was better than the mire of my mind.
I gulped down a breath. This was the point at which I should call someone, but I had no one to call. My therapist, I supposed, but I hadn’t talked to her since Stahl died, and the idea of explaining everything made me feel ill. I wanted Liv.
I pressed the heels of my hands to my eyes. I couldn’t breathe.
I dropped my hands and strode to the door, my thoughts half-formed and wild. I walked the few steps to room 4 and knocked before I could think better of it.
Ethan answered the door, looking concerned. “Naomi. Are you okay? What’s up?” He’d lost the cozy sweater he usually wore and was down to an undershirt and jeans. The sweater had hidden a surprisingly muscular build and a tattoo on his left shoulder—a solid black ring about four inches across. He rubbed a thumb across it absently as he spoke.
“Can I come in?” I asked.
He glanced behind him. “Uh. Sure,” he said. He opened the door farther and stepped backward, letting me enter without putting my back to him. I shut the door behind me and stood there, fingers resting against the cold door.
His dirty clothes were heaped in an open suitcase at the end of the bed. Recording equipment was stored more neatly by the desk, and his laptop was open, with sound-editing software up and running. I wondered if he was editing my “interview.” I walked over, trying to decode the tangle of sound waves and icons.
“Naomi?” His fingers brushed my elbow. I dragged my eyes back to his face. “What’s going on?”
“I don’t want to be alone,” I said. His fingertips were still on my elbow, barely touching me, like he was afraid of what would happen if he made real contact. Or if he let go.
“Do you want to talk?” he asked.
Did I? I needed to tell someone. I needed to speak the words to ease the aching pressure in my chest, but I had no one to tell.
“Tell me what’s happening,” he said. His voice was so painfully gentle, so kind. His touch as tender as he’d been when he lifted Liv from the water.
“I can’t,” I said. I stepped toward him.
Some people reach for a bottle. I have never been able to silence my thoughts with alcohol. It only ever blunts my defenses, lets loose all the creeping things in the corners of my mind. I’ve found other ways to cope. I stepped into him and he let out a startled breath, eyes widening. I rested a hand on his chest. His heart beat rapidly under my palm, and I thought of the rush of blood, of how easily it escapes the skin.
“Naomi,” he said.
“Ethan,” I replied. I leaned into him, almost touching, not quite. A gap that was easy to close, if he wanted to.
He wanted to. But he didn’t. His hand skimmed up my arm, over my shoulder, until his fingers rested at the back of my neck. “What are you doing?” he asked me.
“I told you. I don’t want to be alone.” I didn’t want to be alone, and he was beautiful, and he was alive, and he had been kind to me, and that was more reason than I’d ever needed.
“I don’t want to take advantage of you,” he said, voice rough.
“I’m not the one being taken advantage of here,” I assured him. My fingers slipped under the hem of his shirt, fingernails nicking skin, and he took a sharp breath. “Tell me to leave, and I will.”
“I don’t want you to leave,” he said softly.
“Good.”
He kissed me, his kiss as hungry as mine, and we tumbled toward oblivion.
We lay with the motel sheets tangled under us, breath still quick, pulses settling. Ethan’s hand rested on my thigh. I rolled away, sitting up at the edge of the bed and snatching my clothes from where they’d fallen.
“In a hurry to leave?” Ethan asked, and I could hear him trying to figure out if he should be hurt.
I pulled my shirt over my head and looked back at him. He didn’t have a single scar on his body. Just that tattoo and a look in his eyes I couldn’t quite read. “Should I be?” Most people were happy when I didn’t try to stick around. Most of them could tell I was more trouble than I was worth.
He didn’t answer at first. He sat up and pulled on his pants. “Why did you come over here?”
“I told you. I didn’t want to be alone,” I said. I stood, crossing my arms against a chill.
“And now? Do you want to be alone?” He turned, half facing me.
“No,” I said. One word and still my voice cracked it down the middle. I rubbed my upper arms. I couldn’t seem to get warm.
“I can help you, you know. If you’re looking into Stahl, I mean. I’ve done a lot of research into the quiet summer already. If you’re trying to find a missing victim—”
“I found her,” I said, cutting him off. He looked startled.
“How? The number of women that go missing every year—even just narrowing it down to a few possibilities is next to impossible. And without a body, there’s no way to be sure it’s one of Stahl’s victims.”
I drew aside the curtain, looking out at the nearly empty lot. I should leave. I’d gotten what I came for, and I had no reason to rely on Ethan Schreiber for more than that.
I watched him approach in the reflection in the window, quelling the little shiver of fear at the sensation of someone at my back. I closed my eyes. His palms ghosted over my shoulders. His lips brushed against my hair, not quite a kiss. It was as if he was afraid that if he actually touched me, I would vanish.
“Whatever you’re doing, whatever you’re holding on to, you don’t have to do it alone,” he told me.
I’d come to Ethan’s door to make a mistake. It was what I always did. If I knew what mistake I was making, I wouldn’t be surprised when it hurt me. I’d needed this. Needed him.
Maybe I still did.
“I have to know that if I tell you, it’s going to stay between us,” I said. “At least for now. Until I know all of it.”
“All right,” he said easily.