Page 24 of Dangerous Silence
Once I turned back to him, his arms were crossed over his chest. He handed me a bottle of water, and I hesitated. I still wasn’t going to take anything from him, but I knew I needed water. I drank the entire thing, the sudden fullness giving me sharp pains in my stomach, making me forget about my cut tongue. He sighed deeply, then pointed to the cage.
“You can’t,” I started, but then I stopped. My tongue was heavy, but I tried again. “You can’t keep me in there forever.”
“I’m not,” he said. Then he grabbed my hair, shoving me into the cage. Pulled up the wooden slats.
Then he locked it tight.
His boots pounded around the room like a slow heartbeat. Then, after a while, he switched off the light, but the door never opened and closed. Had he left? Once my eyes adjusted, I peeked through the hole.
His back was against the ground, right beside the cage. His eyes closed. His hands resting on his stomach.
He was trying to sleep.
He was trying to sleep?
I sucked in a breath, trying to figure out what was going on. In an attempt to get comfortable, I squirmed in the cage. The wooden slats creaked. Axe shifted. What was the point of sleeping beside me? There were so many locks on the cage. He knew, better than anyone, that I wasn’t going anywhere.
Then his breathing calmed, steadying to a slow rhythm. He was asleep. He was comfortable then, not worried about me escaping and killing him in his sleep. His apartment was close. I knew that. He could have easily been sleeping on his mattress or in that sleeping bag at that moment. So why was he still here?
I closed my eyes, listening to his breath, finding comfort in it. The pain in my tongue throbbed, but I let his breath wash over me. Let him lull me to sleep.
CHAPTER 7
Axe
I rubbed the back of my head. My shoulders ached. My entire back was tight. I took a deep breath, stretching as I stood. Demi stirred in her crate. She needed something to eat.
Outside, a woodpecker was knocking into a tree, and the overcast sky let thin beams of light leak through the trees. I headed back toward the Adler House, stomping through the woods. A spider web, glistening with dew, sparkled in the light. The spider waited on the edge, a wrapped and bundled meal waiting on the opposite side.
I let myself in through the back door quietly. I preferred this time of the day when no one was out yet. After taking a piss and washing my face, I scouted the kitchen. In the refrigerator, there was a container full of my mother’s tomato and basil soup, a cold bottle of water, some diced fruit, and a store-bought slice of cheesecake. I took an apple from the counter for myself, the hard crunch breaking through the quiet of the house. I didn’t know anything about Demi, nor did I care to know. But I knew she had to eat.
The best item for her tongue was the soup, so I grabbed it, heated it up in the microwave, then went back to the workroom. The wood slats creaked; she must have been stretching—as much as she could, anyway.
I unlocked the wooden slats, then moved the soup next to the cage. Her skin was clammy, her cheeks pale. Still, she turned her chin.
“Not hungry.”
I took a deep breath. “You haven’t eaten since before the funeral.”
“So?”
“You need to eat.”
I opened the door, shoving the plastic container inside, but she put up her hands, pushing it back out.
“I said, I’m not hungry.”
She smacked it away, some of it spilling to the side. I jerked it around, trying to make sure that more of it wouldn’t fall. My heartrate spiked. Why was this tiny woman refusing to eat, when I could have killed her right then? When Ishould havekilled her right then.
Maybe that’s what it took. A gun to her head. Maybe then she would eat a damn bite.
I sat down on the chair to the side, putting my head in my hands. The only reason I wanted to keep that promise to Shep, was because he had saved my life. That was the only time you owed a man. All I had to do was keep her alive, but that meant she had to eat.
She put up the back of her hand to her forehead, her eyelids fluttering. “I don’t feel good.”
You don’t say.
I stared at the half-eaten apple, wondering if she’d eat that instead. But screw that; it was mine. If she wasn’t going to eat, then fine, but that wasn’t going to stop me. The crunch of the fruit’s flesh interrupted the silence, and Demi perked up, looking over at it.
