Page 19 of Late Bloomer
“And, uh, just to like, confirm and stuff… you aren’t a serial killer or anything, right?”
My head jerks back. “Excuse me?”
“I’m not saying you give off that vibe,” Opal says, waving her hands frantically in front of her. “I just thought I should double-check. Since we’ll be like… in the same house and stuff. And like… I mean I guess I just don’t want to get… well. Murdered. Or anything.”
I scan this bizarre woman from the top of her head to the bottom of her cuffed jeans. Was she sent from my personal seventh circle of hell just to torture me here on earth?
“I’m not murdering anyone tonight,” I say with a sigh. “But now you have me super freaked out so I’ll be sleeping with my door locked and pepper spray close if it turns out you’re the actual murderer.”
“Let’s just agree on a mutual no-murder situation,” Opal says, stepping through the door and into the cabin’s warm kitchen. “See, another problem solved. We’re on a roll.”
“Right. I’m sure everything else we have to figure out will be as easily handled as agreeing not to kill each other.” I maneuver around Opal in the small kitchen, blowing out the candles on the table as I go.
“We’ll find a happy ending to all of this. Just you wait.”
Today has been filled with so many curveballs and upheavals, there’s one thing I know, beyond reasonable doubt, to be true: there is no happy ending that could ever,ever,come from this nightmare.
Chapter 7PEPPER
“Good morning!”
I need to make something very clear: I am, above all else, a creature of habit. A stage-five clinger to my routine. Every morning at six thirty I wake up, roll out of bed, brush my teeth, wiggle into my slippers, and am downstairs by six thirty-five sipping coffee and staring out the window over the kitchen sink as I run through a mental checklist of my tasks for the day.
I do not willingly talk to anyone before eight thirty (at the very earliest), and when I am eventually forced to make human contact, it’s usually Diksha calling to check on me.
My world revolves around this routine. It’s sacred. Special. And any disruptions to it set my entire day spinning off course.
Which is why my bloodcurdling scream of surprise and the sloshing of hot coffee onto the counter at the sound of Opal’s far too cheerful and startling greeting is a totally reasonable reaction.
“Fuck, you scared me,” I say, running my burned hand under the tap, then wiping off the counters. I’d convinced myself it had all been a nightmare, that there wasn’t a cotton-candy-haired stranger sleeping in the spare room across from mine claiming to own this place. That the stress of Grandma Lou’s passing was wearing on my psyche and the whole thing had been an awful hallucination.
“Someone’s a morning person,” Opal croons, shooting me a tragically lovely smile as she moves farther into the kitchen.
“This is the world’s most prolonged home invasion,” I mumble.
Opal’s smile falters, her wide eyes looking down at the floor with something close to regret. “I’m sorry,” she whispers, cracking her fingers. “I didn’t mean to…” She gestures vaguely with her hand.
And, damn her, she does sound sincere. Which makes it so much harder to be mad at her, that barely there wobble in her voice tugging at my heartstrings.
“Would you like some coffee?” I begrudgingly offer, refilling my own cup.
“In an IV drip if you have it.”
I attempt a brief courtesy laugh.
“I’m serious,” Opal says, leaning toward me with a glint in her eyes. “More than once after an all-nighter in school, I took like seven shots of espresso through a beer bong.”
I blink. “That sounds… disastrously hot.”
“I’ve been known to turn a head or two.” She shoots me a gratuitous wink, her face back in that unfettered smile thatseems to be her default setting, those round cheeks and full lips creating a feeling in my chest that’s bizarrely… comforting.
A gentle tickle of awareness travels down the back of my neck, and I clear my throat, looking away before offering Opal a steaming mug, taking a scorching gulp from my own. I don’t need comfort from this chaos demon. What I need is my routine to be restored and this whole thing to turn out to be a sick joke.
“Ah, nothing like that first sip,” Opal says, bringing the rim of the mug to her mouth, the corners still ticked up in that decadent smile. She lets out a soft groan of pleasure as she takes a swig of coffee, and something about that noise coupled with Opal’s eyes closed and lips parted in bliss sends a violent rush of heat to my cheeks.
Bewildered, I whip back around to the counter, spilling even more coffee as I go. I bite back a string of curse words as I slam the mug down.
Everything about Opal is disruptive and invasive and… and… and just somuch. I’ve only known her for twelve hours and she’s already driven me half-mad. What am I supposed to do?
