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Before he can stop me, I throw the covers off of my legs, half-surprised to see I’m no longer wearing my jacket or shoes. I don’t look for them, however, before taking off across the room, to the railing that my brain doesn’t quite register that sits on the open side of the space.

“Wait! Saylor, no!” I hear him get up as well, but I don’t stop running. Whatever is on the other side of that railing could be my chance at freedom, and no amount of him yelling or the shakiness of my muscles is going to stop me.

I hit the railing hard and scream, my vision finding the gap on the other side and the terrifying distance between me and the living room below. “Fuck!” I wail, trying to teeter backwards on unsteady legs and failing. This was an absolute mistake. If I fall here, I’m going to hit the glass coffee table. I’ll break every bone in my body and?—

Strong hands tow me back up, arms curling around me as I collapse back into them dizzily. This little excursion has made it clear I can’t trust my body or brain yet, and I suck in deep breaths as my heart pounds out a morbid, frightened tempo in my chest.

How am I ever going to get out of here if I’m on the verge of killing myself with my own stupidity?

“That’s what I was trying to warn you about,” Jed sighs in my ear, walking backward until he can set me down on the bed once more. “You don’t have to stay here, in bed, or even in this room. But you can’t just jump off the balcony, either.”

“What do you mean, I don’t have to stay here?” I look up at him hopefully, barely realizing my hands are clutching his wrists that are still hugging me to him. “You’ll let me?—”

“I mean that we’re so deep in the forest that you’ll never find your way home without my help,” he tells me flatly, his eyesdeadly serious for the first time since I’d had the unfortunate pleasure of meeting him. “You’re barely even awake, and don't know what’s going on.” Firmly he pushes me back down onto the bed, my head back on the fluffy pillow from before. “You’re going to hurt yourself if you aren’t careful, Saylor. And if you get yourself lost in the woods, even I might not be able to save you from the wild animals.”

Wild animals?

Where the hell are we?

“I just want to go home,” I tell him, capturing his blue gaze with my hazel one. “Please,please. People will be looking for me, and?—”

“You don’t need to lie to me, okay?” His smile is sweetly apologetic, and he runs a hand up my shoulder until he can lightly grasp my throat. “I looked through your phone. I messaged the preserve. There’s no one coming for you, princess. No one’s missing you, and there’s definitely, most certainly, no one coming to save you.”

I want to reply. I want to tell him he’s wrong, that I have friends and a family that gives a damn. But he’s right, and the rush of adrenaline has kicked exhaustion back into my system. My lips part, and I feel his fingers on my neck more keenly than I should.

“I want to go home,” I say again, voice a whisper. “I don’t want to die.”

“Yeah…” He looks away, eyebrows drawn together like he’s arguing silently with his own mind. “I don’t want you to die, either. But the problem is, I also want to keep you.” The words ring in my ears as I fade out of consciousness, silently begging that I’d made them up in my drug-induced haze as I go.

Chapter

Five

Waking up for the second time isn’t nearly as awful, or as confusing, as the first. I feel almostnormalas I find myself staring at the rise of a black pillowcase beside me. My arm is tucked under the pillow my head rests on and knees drawn partway up to my chest, just like how I’d sleep at home.

But I’m not at home.

I’m lucid enough this time to realize that.

But my brain still isn’t working quite right. Things click in sections. Like I’m watching a movie, or just running down a list of things.

I’m in a killer’s cabin.

He killed a man with a chainsaw.

I’m in his bed.

He licked blood off of my arms like a fucking psycho.

There’s a railing that opens to the living room below, and if I try to jump it, I will break every bone in my body.

He killed a man with a chainsaw and then proceeded to lick blood off of my arms like a fucking psycho.

Yeah, that feels like the gist of it. At least as much of it as I need to understand right now, and all of what my brain can handle. I lay where I am, eyes closing, but my ears remain alert for any sound in the cabin.

But if Jed is here, then he’s moving more quietly than I ever could—or he’s not moving at all—because I don’t hear a damn thing from anywhere. Not even from the windows on either side of the bed, though hearing him outside would probably be a long shot since they’re barely cracked.

“Fuck,” I breathe, finding that I don’t want to open my eyes to my current reality. I’ve never, not once, wanted to star in my own horror movie. But it’s starting to feel like I don’t have much of a choice.