Page 76 of Grave Love

I dream of her delight.

Chapter28

Ren

Light streamsin through the blinds; dust particles floating in the air, reflecting the light back. The acrid scent of roasting beans fills my nostrils.

I squint, piecing it together.

A nightstand. The bed. Blank walls. Most of the room is in shadows. And on the nightstand, a gun and a mug of steaming coffee.

Blaze’s house.

I jerk up, pulling the comforter with me.

Blaze leans against the doorframe, his pale eyes on me. The side of his lips pull up in a smirk. A coffee mug in his hand.

There are two mugs. One in his hands. One on the nightstand.

He got a mug for me.

“I thought you were dead,” he says dryly.

I lick my lips, my tongue skating over the dried, peeling skin. On the surface, his words are a simple joke about heavy sleeping, but it’s more than that. Hesitation prickles in my arms, daring me to understand what he means. To acknowledge that we both know our arrangement is about to dissolve.

I stare at the black mug on the nightstand. When people get you things—whether it’s a leftover teriyaki bowl or a simple cup of coffee—it’s supposed to make you feel good. But the story goes that my mother bought me an expensive doll right before she died. After her death, my grandmother took it away from me. Told me my mother only bought it for me out of guilt, that I shouldn’t want a present like that. Since then, kindness in the form of a gift, has symbolized danger to me. And while Blaze isn’t taking his own life like my mother did, anything can change. You can’t rely on anything, or anyone.

Everything can be destroyed.

“Not dead yet,” I say quietly.

A chain hangs around my neck, looping through an o-ring and connecting to a similarly weighty leash. My neck is sore, and the chain brings me down, like a bucket full of seashells and sand. I don’t remove the chain though; I keep it with me, attached like an umbilical cord.

“What time is it?” I ask.

“Almost noon.”

I’m supposed to work today.

I flick the comforter off. “Shit—”

“Denise knows we’re not coming in today.”

My mind fixates on those words. I turn slowly toward him.

“We?” I ask.

“I assumed you wouldn’t be up to burning bodies today,” he says. “You seem rather exhausted.”

Affection pinches his cheeks, smothering his condescension. An eerie tension floats between us, a strange mix of apprehension and comfort, both of us waiting for the next step.

Last night—eating pizza, the gun, the sex, and literally sleeping together—was strange, even for him. And now he’s calling in to work for me?

“You called her for me,” I say. “Forus?”

“I told her to fire you. She wasn’t having it.”

My hand wraps around the chain hanging from my neck. The collar—or choke chain, whatever you want to call it—is loose. For a second, despite the heavy metal, I feel weightless. Like anything is possible. Like I’d float to the sky if I wasn’t chained to the ground.