In that moment, holding her stomach tourniquet-tight, she must have been thinking about all those conversations between us. She must have been thinking about the way I had told her, warned her, tried to nudge her along so many times. She must have been remembering what I had said in that very bedroom, that very spot, the disgust in my voice as I told her soon, watching from a distance wouldn’t be enough.
Soon, he would want more, crave more, feel entitled to more the way they always do.
“He would,” I said, staring out the window. I was looking at Levi’s house, a single light emanating from his bedroom in the otherwise dead of night. Wondering what he was doing in there with that picture, our picture, Eliza in her bathing suit and Mr. Jefferson and me probably ripped from the edges before being crumpled into a ball and tossed in the trash. And I know I should have walked to her then, held her. Comforted her. Told her it wasn’t her fault. I should have swallowed my pride and simply let her be scared … but I couldn’t help but feel a certain smugness in my chest about being right all along. About knowing there was something wrong with him, something sick, so instead, I crossed my arms, too, reinforcing the wall that was already building between us.
“I told you he would.”
CHAPTER 27
“What were you doing over there?” I ask, standing up from the lawn chair. I look past Levi, through the open shed doors, the dim lights of our living room barely visible through the windows. That first morning with Sloane comes rushing back, the two of us making our way through the shed and the unease in my chest as I thought about how easy it was for us to invade their space like that.
How easy it would be for them to invade ours.
“Answer me,” I say, taking a step forward, though the sudden movement makes me feel abruptly dizzy, everything going straight to my head while all the blood drops in the opposite direction.
I think of Eliza, that unmistakable feeling of someone else in her home, and all at once, I hate myself for thinking Levi and I could coexist like this.
“Nothing,” he says, lifting his hand behind his head. It’s the same gesture he did at Penny Lanes when he was put on the spot by Lucy, rubbing the back of his neck like that. “I was just … getting something. From the shed.”
“What were you getting?” I ask, grabbing my chair for support, handcuffs slapping against the armrest with a metallic clink.
“Lighter fluid.” His eyes dart around, looking at Lucy and me before landing on the flames between us. “For the fire.”
The three of us are quiet—Levi and me upright in a silent standoff while Lucy sits to the side, watching it all. His voice is cautious, careful, but I can’t decide if it’s because he’s hiding something or because he’s confused about this sudden line of questioning; about my voice, urgent and incessant.
I look over at the fire, then down at his hands, noticing they’re empty. Realizing he can’t have anything in his pockets, either; he’s practically naked. He doesn’t even have pockets.
“I couldn’t find any,” he adds.
“Butler!”
We all turn around at the sound of Trevor’s voice interrupting us, echoing across the lawn. He’s shirtless, too, even though the temperature is nearing fifty, and we watch as he walks out the back of the house and approaches us with a manic grin. Danny is behind him, Lucy’s Solo cup clutched in one hand, that gory blue dress seeming even more ridiculous than before. All these people, their costumes, it’s giving everything such a strange edge, like I’m standing in the center of a lifelike dream. Everyone is themselves, but also not—there’s something warped about their features, something wrong, like they’re all caricatures of who they should be, who they were just a few seconds ago, a strange energy emanating from them all.
I reach down and pinch my arm, feeling silly the second I do it, although I really wouldn’t mind if I snapped out of whatever this is and suddenly woke up, sheets damp and skin slick, gasping for air in my pitch-black bedroom.
“You doin’ okay, man?” Trevor asks, slapping his palm against Levi’s shoulder. “You look a little pale.”
“Yeah,” Levi says, a weak smile cracking across his face. “Yeah, I’m okay.”
“I’ve been looking for you.” Trevor winks. “Where you been?”
“I was just—” He gestures to the shed again, the door still hanging open to reveal the back of our empty house. I watch as he looks at Trevor, then me, then Lucy sitting silently in the corner, a little curl to her lip as she watches him squirm. “Trying to bring this fire back to life.”