Page 19 of Ho Ho Homicidal Mania
“So first he won’t let you go to a regular high school, and then he sets you loose at a gay nightclub?” Nico raises his eyebrows but clinks his own glass of water with mine.
I stall. “I mean, I’m eighteen now. I know better. He thinks I’m ready,” I say and dig in, humming in pleasure as I try the juicy meat. Nico is an excellent cook, I’ll give him that.
“Doyou know better?” he asks with a devilish glint in his eyes, reminding me that he’s a predator. And yet the atmosphere around us is so cozy I’m relaxed. Maybe too relaxed.
Maybe this is a trap, and he’s trying to fatten me up a bit for next year’s Christmas?
Still, when I see the spark in his eye, heat flashes down my body, and I shrug. “Probably not, considering I accepted a drink from a perfect stranger. What doyouthink?”
“I think we need to find out who is trying to kill you so you can enjoy the life you deserve, and I hope I’ll be a part of that life.”
Uh-oh.That’s crazy, passes through my head, but I force my features to remain unchanged as I listen. He focuses on the plate in front of him and flushes as if he were getting to spend time with his favorite celebrity.
With no input from me, Nico goes on, “You… you’ve been with me for a while now. As in, your podcast. I really love how much attention you pay to detail and how much you dig into a killer’s psyche. I might have discovered a few things about myself that way. When you recounted some of my kills, the ones of known criminals, I got a bit of a thrill from how much you seemed to enjoy the righteous justice.”
A shiver runs down my spine, because he’s right. I never say it openly, because I don’t want to deal with haters claiming I’m a bad person like a certain colleague of mine, but I’m not entirely against someone taking out people who are evil to the bone.
Many would say it’s not up to me to decide who deserves death and who does not, but the way I see it, someone who tortures, kills, or hurts others for some kind of self-gratification should not be treated asa person. They’re beasts that deserve being put down. So yes, I might not outright say that, but Nico must have read that between the lines and understood, because it’s an opinion he shares.
Knowing that every single person he killed was an evil creature without a shred of humanity deep in their heartoffers me a new perspective on the Christmas Killer, and I almost want to reveal it to the world. “Why don’t you make it clear why they died? Your victims, I mean.”
He sighs over his last piece of turkey. “I worry the evidence might be tracked to my cameras. Speaking of which…” he goes on to tell me about something he accidentally witnessed.
A man was notoriously cheating on his wife, but one day, she came home early so the husband hid the other guy in the garage before accidentally locking himself out in the cold. As he circled the house to return inside, he ran into a bear busy eating from trash cans. As Nico later learned from a newspaper, the husband survived but lost a leg. And his wife.
He promised to show me the footage, as he’s never gotten to share it with anyone, and maybe it’s messed up, but it made me feel kinda special.
“Nobody likes cheaters, right?” I quipped, and we shared a little laugh at the man’s deserved misfortune.
I spent the rest of dinner entertained by my charming (if deadly) host, and I did end up eating pumpkin pie for dessert because why the fuck not? I’m an adult, and nobody can stop me!
We brush our teeth together, and by the time we’re done, my eyelids feel heavy. The clock on the wall tells me it’s almost three in the morning, but as I enter Nico’s bedroom and face its cozy interior, with a sloped roof on either side of me, I’m reminded that he warned me about there being only one bed. I’d ignored that fact, too focused on trying to get out of the basement prison, but seeing the large wooden frame with piles of snowflake-patterned pillows makes my situation all too real.
“Cozy,” I say as strings of fairy lights illuminate the ceiling, providing mood lighting. “And not messy at all.”
“I just want it to be perfect for you.” He bites his lip, but things get serious when he starts unbuttoning his shirt.
Oh, fuck.
Was the dinner date a trap, and he never intended to wait for my invitation after all?
A shiver makes its way up my back, because when I imagine him forcing himself on me, my heart beats faster for all the wrong reasons. I have a few messed-up fantasies he doesn’t need to know about. I don’t want any of them to really come to life, of course, but I’m the one controlling what goes on in the scenarios I imagine, and the vision of him on top, pushing me down hard, does… things to my body. I steady myself and watch him, because if he really wants me to, he’s going to make it happen anyway. Better not to prod the bear.
Or at least that’s what I’m telling myself as I watch his fingers descend down his chest, popping button after button. I can already see some of his chest hair and find myself wondering how it would feel against my back while a body just like this moves on top of me in a hypnotic rhythm.
“Thank you, that’s very considerate.”
“I’m so stuffed!” Nico pats his rock-hard stomach, and I’ve got no doubt this is his way to tease me and humblebrag, because he’s ridiculously fit. He pulls the band out of his hair, letting it loose. With the skylight behind him, the gentle lights caressing his skin, his attractiveness seems unreal.
And hewantsme. I know it. If I said the word, I could be getting my dick sucked tonight.
But then, I’d entangle myself more with a killer. Which is not only morally wrong (debatable), but also dangerous (certainly).
“You’re staring, sweetie.” Nico winks at me with his fingers on his belt. “If you’re feeling shy, you can change in the bathroom.” He points to the door behind me.
I definitely should not be getting a boner, but he is tall, and built, and has such pretty blue eyes.
“What if I am staring?” I ask and face the window, looking out into the small town street to calm down. It is in my best interest to slide under the covers, because if I do go into the bathroom now, I might be tempted to get relief from my right hand.
