“I don’t care. Ignore them.”
He was serious.
“Don’t,” Alexander hissed.
I gulped.
Sugary-white hair crowned the woman’s head. Her neck and most of her face were covered by a colorful, red scarf. She waved as soon as she spotted us. I tensed.
“Gracie, don’t,” he repeated under his breath.
The man with the chain raised his free hand and waved it too. He was smiling.
Shit.
I tensed even more.
The muscles pressed against my chest did too.
And maybe I hesitated for about two seconds before I quickly lifted my hand and waved back.
Alex growled.
I ignored him.
“How is your day going?” the woman called out as we approached their property.
Alexander grunted, irritation vibrating through his skin and straight into me.
I still ignored him.
“Fine, ma’am, how is yours?” I hollered back, knowing he wanted to kill me, but I couldn’t stop myself.
They seemed so nice, and they were older. I was a sucker for older people.
“I’m letting the Bogeyman in tonight,” he threatened just loud enough for me to hear him.
Was that… a joke?
Was he fucking joking?
I leaned forward to peek at his face.
He was already shooting me a dirty look that made me really, really grateful we’d agreed to be friends. Or “friends.”
Friends didn’t kill friends.
“Dandy. Here dealing with this old stump,” she said with a shake of her head and another bright smile. “Are you staying at the Akita place?”
“Yes, ma’am.” It was Alexander who replied easily, his own tone almost as friendly, and not like he’d been shooting me imaginary murder daggers a second ago.
She smiled like that explained everything. “Y’all be safe now. Make sure your car is in four-wheel drive if that storm comes down this weekend. Those ditches have gotten us all,” the woman said.
“Yes, ma’am, I’ll be sure to keep that in mind,” the man I was clinging to replied.
I glanced at the back of his head, at all that dark hair that I’d had my cheek pressed against for countless hours, surprised at his acting skills.
“Someone I know has driven into it once or twice,” the man said with the most adorable chuckle.
The woman gasped. “You said you would stop telling everyone about that!”
“It’s nothing to be ashamed of, sweetheart.”
She muttered something I couldn’t hear that made him chuckle. He smiled back at her with so much affection, it made my little heart yearn. My grandparents had loved each other, but they hadn’t been too playful. Every once in a while, I’d gotten a glimpse of a sweet, wonderful relationship, but more often than not, things had been quiet, but I’d always thought it was more that they were just tired.
But they’d had a lot hanging in the balance.
I think in a different lifetime, before I’d been born, they had to have been a lot different.
Before me.
Or more like, before my parents had lost their minds.
“Have a nice day!” the man called out.
“You too!” I hollered back, snapping out of it, trying not to feel guilty over things I hadn’t asked for.
I waited until we’d gotten farther down the road before I sighed.
“I thought I told you not to talk?” the man carrying me muttered.
“They were so polite. We couldn’t just ignore them.”
He snickered. “Yes, we could have.”
I swear… “Do you not have any manners?”
“I have manners.”
“In your dreams maybe,” I muttered.
That got me another murder-glare that wasn’t all that scary.
Neither one of us said anything else as he kept going, until he stopped in front of a mailbox on the road. It was black and heavy-duty just like all the rest we’d gone past. But he peered down the overgrown driveway with two huge, downed trees across it.
Was there a house back there? If there was, it had to be set pretty far back.
Alexander looked down one side of the road, then the other, and started walking again. We’d made it about thirty feet away from the abandoned driveway before he turned right and started trekking his way back toward the house? To hide our trail?
Soon enough, we were going around the back of a small, dark house, and he was going up the steps of a well-maintained deck. Alexander patted my calf, and I slid off before he suddenly bent over. He flipped a rock upside down and plucked a key from what was apparently not a rock but a hide-a-key. Then, easy-peasy, he unlocked the door and took a step back, gesturing me in.
That was… convenient.
Breaking into someone’s home. Again.
I went in, looking around for cameras but not seeing any. The house was cold. I could instantly tell it was bigger than the place we’d been in last night. He stomped in too, flipping on lights and locking the door.
It was really nice, and bigger than I’d first thought.
I toed off my shoes, rubbing my arms as I wobbled into the kitchen.
I yelled, or I tried to. It came out like more of a squeak.
“There’s a phone!” I croaked.
A real house phone!
I picked it up from where it was set beside a black refrigerator and paused as something bitter set up shop in my throat.
It wasn’t like he hadn’t figured it out already. He already knew all the worst, saddest parts of me, didn’t he?
I thrust the phone toward him, trying to keep my voice steady as I forced myself to meet his eyes instead of his chin. “Are you done pretending you don’t have someone we can call for help, or are you finally going to give me a number we can call?”
His bottom lip dropped maybe a millimeter, but I noticed it.
And if I hadn’t felt like shit and been so sad about the fact I had no one to reach out to, I might have enjoyed it.
He wasn’t the only observant one. Sucker.
“You know a bunch of different languages, you remember everything, and you pay attention. I wouldn’t be surprised if you have an eidetic memory. There’s no way you forget phone numbers. Something broke your back, not your brain.”
To give him credit, his lip snapped back into place instantly. But it was his glowing eyes that almost made me smile as he narrowed them at me. “Yes, I know a fucking phone number.”
Aha! I’d known it. The idea had been in my head since before I’d gotten sick. But the thing was, it made no sense. If he had someone to call, why hadn’t he from the beginning? Why had he stayed with me instead?
Those questions led to an even bigger one that I hadn’t been willing to poke at more than I already had—what was strong enough to hurt him? He’d said nothing on this planet, so… There was only one answer that I’d come to, and it was a terrifying one. And also possibly the reason why I didn’t want to think about it too much.
I was scared to.
Alexander flicked his gaze toward the phone. “Are you going to dial the number next week or…？” He trailed off.
I blinked. “Did God give you strong bones because he knew you were going to have a personality people wanted to hurt?” I snapped. “What’s the number?”
He huffed.
Did his lip tilt up a little?