Page 85 of The Cruelest Chaos

I don’t even know why he has a clock.

He doesn’t seem to need to get up at any specific time. Then again, neither do I. I haven’t gotten a call back from any job I’ve applied for. And my mother hasn’t called either.

I baked more cookies while he was out, meeting up with his friends, just like I did last Sunday. I cleaned up the kitchen, although I feel certain he’s got a housekeeper because the place is usually spotless. He’s not messy exactly, but he doesn’t really seem like the cleaning type.

He likes to read.

His office is lined with shelves, each one packed. Psychology, poetry, classics. Many of the pages of his books are dog-eared, and I pulled a few from the shelves. In a Shakespeare collection, he had a line fromRichard IIunderlined: “I wasted time, and now doth time waste me.” The pen had been pressed hard against the page, denting it.

Those are stolen secrets. Things he won’t talk to me about. Much like whatever happened to his brother, he even keeps his appetite for books under wraps.

He doesn’t want to open up.

I stare at him for a long moment. His brow isn’t creased, like it was the first night I watched him sleep. He looks…relaxed. But something is wrong. The man at the bar, the guy with the baseball bat. He’s keeping secrets that concern me. The man knew my name. But he won’t tell me anything.

We’ve fought over it.

He thinks he can keep me in the dark, because at the end of the day, this, between us, is nothing.

He likes using me. I like using him. But neither of us are willing to cross that line. To submit to the other, dig out the glass in our soul and offer up the glittering, bleeding pieces that make us who we are. I let him do anything he wants to me. He does anything I ask.

But bodies are easy.

It seems hearts are far more complicated.

I slip out of bed silently, tiptoe out of his bedroom and down the stairs. I don’t want to wake him with my tossing and turning, but I feel restless. Like I need to move. To think. I have no idea when I’m going to go home, but Tuesday I want to go to The Ark. I missed it last week, but I can’t just hide away in this house for the rest of my life.

He’ll grow bored of me soon.

I’ll need something more soon.

The first floor is warm, and still smells like sugar cookies. I think about heading into the kitchen, popping open the plastic container of them on the counter. But I’m not nearly as hungry anymore as I was just a month ago and to be honest, I’ve gained a few pounds since we’ve been seeing one another.

I put my hands on my belly as I stand at the bottom of the stairs, close my eyes. I like how soft my skin is, howfullit feels. How no one screams at me for being hungry. How he doesn’t leave me for hours on end, never mind days. He would never.

Would he?

I think about Sid and Natalie. About Lucifer and Sid’s marriage, about how the man at the bar taunted her.Who was he?A jilted ex-lover? Maybe Sid was married before. The man,Jeremiah,was possessive and hungry and…he used me to get to her.

I don’t know if it worked. I don’t know if it hurt Sid.

I don’t know why I let him kiss me, except I do.

I do know that.

It’s the same reason I let Shane touch me. The same reason I opened up to him.

I open my eyes, let them adjust once more to the dark. Outside this house, it’s pitch-black through the etched glass in the front door. I turn, my feet cold on the wood floors. I’m wearing Maverick’s t-shirt and my underwear, and I’ve got my hands wrapped up in his shirt.

I head toward the living room, then take a right down a hall with a bathroom, and another door that I haven’t opened yet, but I think it leads to the basement.

Why not scope it out now?

There’s a keypad outside of it and I wonder if it’s an alarm system of some sort. It’s lit green, but it doesn’t have any words. Just numbers, and a smooth, black square beside the numbers.

I have no idea what that’s for.

I reach for the silver handle of the door. It’s locked, and I feel a chill slide down my spine. I shouldn’t be doing this, sneaking around his house this way.