Experiment in Terror 06 Into the Hollow (3 page)

Then he was running toward me and for a moment I thought maybe something was wrong and that I should run too. Then I thought maybe something was right and I should run anyway.

He ran to me and engulfed me in his arms, holding me tight to him, raising me a few inches above the ground. I was caught so off-guard, I could only let him hold me. My breath was gone, squeezed out from the intensity of his hug. I didn’t think I could hug him back even if I wanted to.

He held me like that, my feet dangling, his strong arms keeping me as close to him as possible. His face buried in my neck and his familiar smell draped over me like a comforting blanket while his breath tickled my skin until my hairs stood on end. I decided to ignore my brain for a second and just enjoyed the sense of being completely embraced.

“Perry,” he mumbled, his lips grazing my throat while he spoke. “Perry...”

He never finished his sentence. Instead he eventually pulled his face away, my skin still feeling hot from his contact, and lowered me to the ground. He kept his hands on my arms, keeping me in place, as if he was afraid I’d run away. With his back to the streetlight, his face was encased in shadows but I could still see his eyes glinting. I couldn’t read them except that they looked slightly feverish.

I cleared my throat. “Hi.”

A quick smile flashed across his lips. “I’m sorry for just dropping by like this, I just had to see you. I was worried sick.”

I smiled wryly. “
You
were worried sick about
me
? You got carted off to jail.”

“You got carted off to the hospital,” he said gruffly. I noticed then he was holding my hands in his and squeezing them. I eyed them with uncertainty and he let go, taking a step back from me as he did so, as if he was only just noticing he was intruding in my personal space.

“I got out,” I said reassuringly. “And apparently so did you.”

He glanced briefly over my head at my house then said to me, “Look, can we go in the car and talk? I promise not to keep you long.”

I nodded and followed him back to the car, wondering what it was that he wanted, wondering how his shoulders got so much broader. I hopped in the passenger side and was met with a rush of warmth from the heater.

I don’t know why things felt awkward between us when the last time I had seen him, he was holding onto me, promising that they’d never take me. Of course, that didn’t work and I didn’t fault him for that. But being apart again, even for just a few days, reminded me of how much had changed between us. And sitting in the dark car, only the familiar glow of the console lighting us up, there was a discomfort in my seat. I wondered if he felt the same.

I tried not to study his face but now that I could see it clearly, it was hard not to. There was a line of worry on his forehead and his brown eyes were searching my face, alternating between washes of sorrow and apprehension. He never lost that unnerving way he looked at me – that would always be Dex. I just hoped he wouldn’t look too deep. I felt the walls around me going up slowly, brick by pasted brick.

Finally, I looked away and studied the dashboard as if it were suddenly fascinating.

“I’m surprised the car is still holding up,” I remarked, remembering how it had crashed into a tree only days before, bashing the front side and the headlight. It almost hurt to remember when I was wrapped in duct tape, with a terrible darkness inside me trying to get out.

“I’ll get it fixed when I go back home.”

“When are you going?” I asked, keeping my voice light, still avoiding his eyes.

I felt him pause, growing tense for a second, and I quickly added, “Not that I’m trying to get you to leave.”

His smile was tight. “Tomorrow, probably. I just…wanted to see how you were doing. You look better.”

“Do I?” I looked down. “I thought I looked slimmer in the duct tape.”

Again, that pained smile. “How are you feeling?”

I shrugged. “I’m tired. Sore, still.”

He nodded absently, his thoughts elsewhere. I wanted to tell him what Ada and I had discovered but for some reason I couldn’t find the words. It was ludicrous but Dex was always the one to believe me when no one else would.

I opened my mouth to give it a shot, but he beat me to it and said, “Listen…”

He looked down at his hands and cleared his throat. The atmosphere in the car changed dramatically from the strange awkwardness to full-on jangled nerves. I watched him closely. He did in fact look really nervous, biting his lip, blinking fast and at nothing.

“What?” I asked.

I could hear his breathing intensify.

“You need to get out of that house.”

I shouldn’t have been surprised to find out we were on the same page, but I was. I tried to hide it by eyeing him uncertainly.

“What do you mean?”

He lowered his eyes and voice. “You know what I mean. Perry, you can’t stay there anymore. After everything that’s happened…it’s not safe.”

“The demon is gone.”

“Your parents aren’t. And frankly, my dear, I wouldn’t be surprised if some other supernatural hitchhiker came and found a ride through you. You’re too weak-”

I glared at him. “I am not weak.”

He looked at me steadily. “You’re the strongest woman I have ever known. Ever. But it,
they
, found a way in. I can’t risk that happening again. And like hell I’m going to let you stay in a house where your parents are jonesing to put you away like some animal.”

“I wasn’t aware you had control over my life.”

He sighed and leaned in closer. “I know you’re still angry-”

“Huh!” I exclaimed, folding my arms. But he quickly went on.

“But putting that aside for a moment,” he continued, “you know you can’t stay there. I know you know it. I know your sister knows it. Your grandmother sure knows it. We all do.”

“Well what do you suggest I do then?” I asked carefully.

He bit his lip, a gesture I used to find adorable. Now, it didn’t do anything for me. Not much, anyway. He let his eyes roam out along the empty street. Either he was deep in thought or biding his time.

Finally, he asked, “Did you like Seattle?”

I sucked in my breath. He wasn’t asking me what I thought he was asking me…was he?

His eyes were guarded in the dark but I could read sincerity on his expressive forehead, like part of him was taking a chance that the other part didn’t dare take.

“What?”

There he went, biting his lip again. He ran a hand through his thick hair, giving the ends a bit of a tug. I remembered tugging at that hair, vividly.

“I mean,” he ventured, looking at me with a hint of anxiety, “I think you should come live with me. In my apartment. In Seattle.”

Now, I know it was just what Ada and I had been discussing but I was not prepared to hear the offer come from his own mouth. Dex was asking me to move in with him? What the hell kind of sorcery was this?

He quickly continued, “I don’t mean like you have to be my permanent roommate or anything. Just until you get on your feet. It can be a place for you to stay in the interim. Or longer, you know, if you wanted to.”

I looked away from him, my eyes widening, heartrate speeding up. This was all kinds of right and wrong. Especially wrong. So much wrong.

“Perry?”

I shook my head and struggled for words. “I don’t know what to say.”

“Saying yes would be a start.”

“I need to think about this…”

“Please, don’t think long.” His voice had dropped another register and was laced with a kind of urgency that made my skin feel tight.

He reached over and grabbed my hand and I let him. I looked down at it, at his long, strong fingers wrapping around mine, feeling like his hand was different in some way. But that was crazy. It wasn’t. He was still cocky, self-assured Dex…asking me something I never, ever dreamed possible.

I knew my choices but I didn’t have to like them. If I went with Dex, I knew I’d be safe. But would my heart? How could I ever trust him again? How could I think that living with him, even as his roommate, even for a short while, wouldn’t be emotionally damaging in some way? After everything that had happened to me, I was sick of my heart being stomped on and would do whatever I could to prevent that situation from happening again.

But then there was Maximus. He was less messy for my emotional well-being. But let’s face it, it’s not like there was nothing between us. I had sex with the man. Several times. And no, I wasn’t really in my right mind when I did it, but it still happened. It still made things awkward. It still put another well-hung elephant in the room. Not to mention that I didn’t really trust Maximus. Sure he bailed out Dex, but that only made me question
why?
At times he seemed to be my greatest supporter yet he could rat me out to my parents in a heartbeat. I just didn’t know where I stood – with either of them.

Dex squeezed my hand hard, bringing me back to earth.

“Don’t you dare move in with Maximus,” he warned, his eyes shining dangerously.

“What?” I exclaimed. Could he hear me thinking? “Why did you say that?”

“Because that’s your only other option, unless you have a million bucks hidden in your barista tip-jar.”

“I could go with Rebecca,” I told him, not knowing if that would work either.

He shook his head. “She and Em are having some problems. Otherwise I’d suggest it.”

I narrowed my eyes thoughtfully. “Would you really?”

He sighed and let go of my hand. “Look, I know things are kind of awkward right now.”

I scoffed.

“OK, fine, really fucking awkward. I know that. And I know we have a lot to talk about-”

“We have nothing to talk about,” I shot in.

His nostrils flared and he was trying hard to compose himself. “Fine. I guess we have nothing to talk about either. But for one second can you just accept the fact that despite what has happened between us, I still care about you. More than you’d probably want me to care about you. And that I’m going to do everything in my power to make sure you’re going to be OK. I know I failed many times before…but you just have to believe me when I tell you I’m going to do everything I can now to make things right.”

I studied him carefully, trying to ignore the sincerity in his words. He was buzzing with a sort of energy that I associated with our sexual encounters. I didn’t know what it was, there was nothing really sexual about what he was saying or the way he was acting toward me. But it was there all the same. It was a buzzing, vibrant aura that represented sex and power and something else I couldn’t put my finger on.

“There’s something different about you,” I said, squinting at him.

If he seemed annoyed at my avoidance of the topic, he didn’t show it.

“There’s something different about you,” he replied. “But you’re a woman and you change every five minutes.”

I frowned. “Is that it?”

He returned the look. “I don’t know, is it?”

I threw my hands up and went to go open the door.

“Wait,” he cried out softly, putting his hand on my arm. “Please, please don’t go like this.”

“Like what?”

“Like not making a decision,” he explained. “Can’t you see the urgency?”

“Dex, you’re asking me to move in with you. You. You of all people in this world.”

He looked away, tugging at his hair again.

“I’m sorry,” I went on, “I know it’s urgent. I can feel that too. But this choice for me might end up being just as dangerous as staying here with my parents. I’m sorry.”

Dex continued to look away but I saw the wince. I saw the strange cloud of despair over his eyes. I took in a deep breath, steadying my nerves, and opened the car door. Outside, the street was quiet and cold and my feet echoed loudly when they hit the ground.

“I’ll let you know, OK?” I told him. He wouldn’t even look at me.

I shut the door and walked away feeling like I had shut a window on a lifeline I was going to need desperately. Every step away from the Highlander felt like I was walking knee-deep through mud. And the closer I got to my house, all cheerily lit up against the darkness, the more I felt like I was heading into a dark hole. My pride was soaring inevitably high but as much as I enjoyed saying no to Dex, I knew it would crash-land later in a smoldering wreckage.

I stopped near the driveway and looked up at my bedroom window. It was hard to believe how close I had been to losing my life, to losing my very soul. If it hadn’t been for Dex…I wouldn’t have been burdened with the choice I currently had.

I exhaled, wiggled my fingers anxiously, then turned and jogged back to the Highlander that was still waiting at the roadside.

I rapped on the glass and Dex quickly undid the window.

“Hey,” I said uneasily, peering into the car. “I was wondering if you could stop by here before you leave tomorrow.”

He nodded coolly. “OK. What for?”

I could see the walls going up around him as well. They sure weren’t there before.

I smiled shyly. “I don’t want to be alone when I tell my parents I’m moving to Seattle.”

There was a pause as he took it all in.

Then his grin filled the whole car.

CHAPTER THREE

Even though it was late by the time Dex left, I was on such an adrenaline high that I couldn’t get to sleep even if I tried. And I did try. But after lying there for an hour, my mind going over everything that was suddenly
happening
, I threw off the covers and started packing up my room.

I knew I wasn’t able to take everything I had with me to Seattle. I’d probably need a moving van for that. And who knew what was going to happen to my poor little Put-Put. I guess one day I was going to have to come back and get the motorbike but I knew that day wouldn’t be a fun one. I really felt like if I left with Dex, I wasn’t going to be allowed back in the house for an awful long time.

And that was another reason why I had to be sure I was making the right decision. I still wasn’t 100% about it either, but the more I started gathering my clothes into an empty suitcase and piling shoes and purses and books together, I knew it didn’t have to be forever. The important thing was I was getting away from my parents’ prying eyes and though it was a long time coming, it was better late than never. And who knew, maybe within a week I’d luck out with a new job and be set to move out on my own. Maybe I’d find a house to share with a couple of young people. A whole new world of possibilities awaited me.