Delicious - Page 16

He searches my eyes for another moment, head tilted, before letting his eyes flit away once again, to focus on something I can’t see. “So I killed him. And made it hurt, the way my family taught me to. I’m good at that, though I never asked to be.” Casually he shrugs one shoulder, as if it’s the most normal thing in the world to admit your family members are also probably serial killing chainsaw aficionados.

I would be the one to go home against my will with a chainsaw lover.

“Okay.” I don’t mean to repeat the word. But I don’t know what else to say. I feel numb at his declaration. I feel as if the meaning only half-registers, the rest of it sliding off of my outer shell without sinking in. All I can really decipher are the things he’d said about the man. About what he’d done.

But I don’t know whether I can believe him. Certainly he hasn’t hurt me, but he’s definitely kidnapped me, kept me here, wielded a chainsaw and?—

“You could’ve killed me.” I don’t mean to say it, but I can’t help the words as they pour out. “You could’ve killed me like, any time over the past two days.” My stomach twists, nausea threatening to choke me. “But you haven’t. Are you…” I search my mind for a question I can ask. Anything I can say to somehow assure myself of my safety. But how can I trust any of the honeyed words out of his perfect mouth after what I’ve seen?

“I know you don’t trust me.” He sighs, letting the words trail off with disdain. “I wish I’d met you under any other circumstance, Saylor. It would be so much easier to convince you if you hadn’t watched me kill someone. I won’t kill you, and I don’t want to keep you here against your will. But I don’t want to go to jail or risk that for my friends..”

Hisfriends.He’s mentioned them more than once, and it sticks in my mind as something important as I sit gingerly back in my chair.

“Your friends…are they like you? Are they…?” I mime holding and swinging a chainsaw, and his eyes darken with poorly hidden amusement.

“Yeah, you’re not going anywherenearmy chainsaw,” he informs me as I drop my hands. “That’s not the kind of motion you make at all. You’d cut off your own leg, princess—” He freezes, finding my eyes for my reaction, and I realize he thinks he’s fucked up with the nickname. That I’ll be mad or run screaming.

But all I can really do is stare at him and try to remember if anyone, even a man I’ve dated, has called meprincess.

That, and I try to ignore the fact I don’t hate it whatsoever. I should hate it. It should feel awful, or at least weird. But I hope my face doesn’t betray the only confusion I feel is at the timing and the source. Not the intent or the word itself.

“They don’t have chainsaws lying around, but they’re like me,” he adds awkwardly, trying to get the conversation back ontrack. “Just not raised by a family like mine. They just…are.” He shrugs, and I have no idea what in the world those words mean.

But I also don’t have the guts to ask.

“You can’t be sure I won’t tell.” God, why do I say the stupidest things? “Like, I could tell you all the things you want to hear. I could act like I won’t tell.” The stupid words that are going to get me murdered just keep coming, no matter how much I want to stuff them back inside. “Are you going to keep me here forever?”

“Well…” Jed sits back in his chair, eyeing me carefully. “You’re not a very good actor. Especially when you’re afraid. So if you try to come and tell me you won’t tell without meaning it, I’d be incredibly surprised if you can make me believe it. Sorry, Saylor.” His smile really is apologetic, and he loosely crosses his arms over his chest.

“So I’ll just have to trust you when I think you’re telling the truth. You’re right I’ll never know for certain. I’m not a mind reader. And I can’t stop you once you’re gone. But since I’m not willing to kill you, it puts me in a difficult place…unless you get murdered by a coyote, a tree, a stray twig, or a leaf,” he amends quickly.

Am I really so pathetic that he thinks a leaf could take me out? I open my mouth to ask, then close it, realizing I don’t want to know. After the chainsaw safety lectures he seems full of, I’m pretty sure he thinks me capable of any stupidity in the world right now.

“What do I have to do to convince you I won’t tell the police? You know, since if I promise it now and go on about it, I know you won’t believe me?” My words are careful, and I don’t expect a real answer, even as his gaze slants to the side, thoughtful.

“You could stop trying to murder me with my own chainsaw, for one,” he offers, brows raised with gracious intent. “Thatwould be pretty cool. I enjoy carrying you, but not when it’s to stop you from accidentally hurting yourself?—”

“You could just say due to murderous intent,” I mutter, hating hearing, again, how I could’ve offed myself in my attempt to escape.

“Either way. You could stop trying to maim me with my own chainsaw. You could stop acting like I’m going to kill you every time you see me. Or looking for weapons over my shoulders while we talk.” He says it so casually. Like I’d been obvious in my intent.

It’s a blow to my self esteem that I’m not subtle, and I huff. “Aren’t you just bursting all of my bubbles tonight?” I mutter, the words more lighthearted than I expect them to be.

“Sorry.” His smile is wryly apologetic. “Why don’t you…tell me your favorite color?” he asks at last, getting to his feet and snagging my plate from in front of me while picking up his own. It feels wrong for him to cookandclean, and I know my mother is probably glaring at me from the afterlife as I let him scrape our bowls into the trash before running them under hot water.

She’d always been the one to preach good manners, under any circumstance. I’m sure even in this circumstance she’d preach good manners.

“Indigo,” I tell Jed, after a moment’s hesitation to consider the question. “My favorite color is indigo.”

“Why?” he doesn’t stop doing dishes as he asks, but does tap the toe of his shoe against the floor under him.

“I don’t know. I don’t think color preferences are a conscious choice, are they? Though I prefer cool colors, and the colors between other colors, if that makes sense.” I pluck at the napkin in front of me, eyes still fixed on his. “What’s yours?”

“Chartreuse,” he answers instantly.

“Oh, and you questionmycolor choice? You should feel lucky I even know what chartreuse is.” Somehow, it’s easy totalk about things like this. Especially with the rewarding smile he throws my way as if it cost him nothing. Though, I guess it didn’t. He’s not the one watching his every move.

Or who should be, anyway.