Guilt tugs in my chest all afternoon.
Wynn cried again this morning during the music session, and while that’s good from a therapy standpoint, it still hurts to see. I thought if she heard me play again, it’d make her happy—I thought it would inspire her to play too.
Maybe I should stop playing. It’s not like I even enjoy it anymore. It’s just a cold reminder of the life I used to have. Of before.
I hardly remember what it was like on the outside of these walls. It’s been, what… two years now? Time jumbles together here. All I know is I’m far more content in the walls of Harlow than I ever was on the outside.
My time in the army haunts me. I watched all my short-term friends die until I learned to stop connecting with others. It’s easier that way. It always has been. The pain I felt watching them bleed and cry, begging for their mothers and for me to help them, is a feeling I’ve lost over the years.
The punishment I self-inflict has remained the same, if not worsened.
If I could go back in time, I’d tell my seventeen-year-old self that the car accident with my brothers was just the first tragic scene of my unfortunate play. I’d tell him that it gets much worse before he ends up in an institution.
Before he finds her.
I look at Wynn.
Lanston laughs at something she says but I only hear their muffled sounds. I glance down at my hands.
That itch pulls beneath my skin, the desire to feel pain, to hurt myself. I want to hurt as much as she and Lanston do; I want to feel the pain they experience. I want to punish myself for not being a better man… for not being good enough.
For being so mean to her… My thoughts muddle as the warmth in my chest ignites like it did when she crawled into my bed and let me hold her.
I know it’s wrong. I know they worry. But it makes the weight in my chest evaporate every time.
It’s euphoric.
My thumb brushes over the edge of my room key. Dull things take longer to break skin, but the wounds they leave last longer. They fester worse and keep the edge away.
The last remnants of the garden are dying, the orange and yellow mums bend in the breeze, and the green vines that climb the stones of Harlow curl with slumber. I shut my eyes and take a deep breath of the fresh air, telling myself I don’t need to do this.
I don’t need to hurt myself.
That’s why I’m here; I have to get better.
The key lifts from my hand and warmth replaces it. My eyes open in surprise as I look down at Wynn. Her beautiful pale-pink hair shifts with the wind’s grace and her honey-brown eyes scorch me. Her lips turn up as she grasps my hand tighter; the smile fills her soul completely and… I think my heart stops.
She doesn’t want to die—I can see the tendrils of hope in her eyes.
When did they appear?
It’s only been a few weeks and she’s already healing. What’s wrong with me? She and Lanston are pulling ahead and leaving me in their wake.
“I have a session with Dr. Prestin. See you guys later.” Lanston heads back inside, leaving me and Wynn sitting silently.
“Do you get upset when I play?” I ask.
“What?”
“When I play the piano. Does it upset you?”
Wynn raises a brow as she grins. “No… It’s actually really nice to listen to.” Her tone is genuine and her eyes glint with curiosity. “Is that why you’ve been gloomy all afternoon?”
I shrug. “I didn’t mean to make you sad earlier—you cry every single time I play.”
Her eyes widen and before I can say anything else, she pulls me into a tight hug, my face pressed into her soft sweater as she wraps her arms around me.
It robs all the breath from my lungs. She’s embracing me so delicately, and for the first time, I feel as broken as I perceived her to be.
No one’s ever hugged me so desperately with their entire heart.
“You didn’t make me sad, Liam… You opened up old wounds. I felt the music coming from your soul, and I felt the pain and sorrow that I’ve locked away for such a long time. I’m happy that I cried—and that it was you who broke my walls down enough to do so.”
My arms instinctively coil around her small body. I try to ignore the trembling in my hands, but I’m sure she feels it.
“I’d like to hear you play someday,” I murmur as I inhale her intoxicating lilac scent.
She pulls away and a somber smile crosses her lips. “I’d like that too.”
We stare at one another in silence for a moment. The damp fall air makes me want to wrap her up in a blanket and read all day. Or research the missing people she’s so interested in.
“Coldfox, Waters—get inside. Forecast says heavy rain soon.” Jericho holds the garden door open as we walk past him. He inspects us with a little too much interest. “Happy to see you two are getting along so well.”
I rub my onyx forefinger ring with my thumb, a nervous tick I have. “Well, yeah, we’re roommates.” I try to guide the conversation in a different direction. “Are we still going to the Fall Festival next weekend?”
“Yes, I actually finished up the paperwork this morning. I’ll have the schedule soon with the odd jobs they need help with.” Jericho waves dismissively as he continues on without us to his office down the hall. His dark suit is pressed and professional. I wonder if a guy like him ever cuts loose.
We stop by our room on our way to the common area; Wynn grabs her blue fluffy blanket and her notebook. The common area is much like a hotel lobby, filled with furniture and tables, a little coffee bar for the addicts. And what great foyer doesn’t have an outrageously large fireplace? The stones are tan and cream, the fire roaring all hours of the day and night.
Keeping ghosts out, maybe.
We say hi to Mrs. Abett, the front desk lady, and she nods at us. Cold old woman, that one. She’s the one staff member who rubs me the wrong way. Maybe she could use some therapy too.
The fire warms my cold skin. Wynn settles on the couch closest to the mantle, cozying up in her blanket as I sit next to her. I’m one hundred percent certain the air between us has changed. The way she stares longingly at me—it’s undeniable. I think about last night and how she came to my bedside to calm me from my nightmares. How we fucked in the spa room, so much more than hate-fucking. The fear in her eyes told me everything I needed to know about her feelings toward me.
My thoughts drift to our personal sessions. Her breasts were so warm and soft. The taste of her soaking wet pussy still sweetens my dreams at night.
I open my arms, my black hoodie pulling up and showing my stomach a bit. I don’t miss her eyes dipping down and heat filling her gaze.
“Come here, Wynn.”
She watches me for a moment. I’m about to lean up and snatch her when she smiles and crawls over. Her lilac aroma fills the space around me. I’m in my own heaven with her this close. She snuggles up to me like she did last night.
Just me and her. It’s not often we get time away from Lanston. I wonder if she’s told him about what we do after dark. We’ve been keeping things strictly business and pleasure, but I’m curious if she wants more like I do.
Wynn pulls the blanket around us and I wrap my arms around her, our bodies instantly warming and that comfort I’ve yearned for all day consumes me. Her breaths are as short and uneven as my own.
The blood flows to my dick and it’s a feat in itself that she doesn’t make any sort of comment because there’s no way she doesn’t feel the press of my swollen cock along her lower back.
She opens her notebook and flips to the section on the missing patients. I dip my head forward and press my lips to her neck, brushing a kiss on her perfect olive skin. It’s surprising that someone like me could find a familiar soul, one that I am finding it harder by the day to exist without. I’ve kissed her body countless times and I’ll do it countless more. The way she tilts her neck so I can nuzzle in closer makes my dick throb uncomfortably in my sweatpants.
“What was Charlie doing in the basement?” she asks.
How on God’s green earth does she expect me to know? I’ve read the same articles that she has. There’s no answer to why that patient was in the basement as often as he was. The reporter thoroughly interviewed many of the staff; one woman in particular mentioned that she always found him down there, acting odd and afraid.
“No clue. I thought it was weird too though.”
She shifts in my hold and smiles. “We should go look. What if he was hiding something down there? Or maybe the killer was?”
Sure, she has a point, but this was ten years ago. Is she suggesting that we investigate this? I school my amused expression. “Detective Coldfox, I don’t think it’s for us to find. Can’t we simply enjoy this rainy day for what it is?”
She slumps back into my embrace and laughs a few times. “For a little bit, then promise you’ll help me check out the basement?”
An uneasy sensation prickles at the back of my neck, thinking of the basement. But my answer is steady and sure.
“How could I ever resist helping you?”
All right, I made a promise, so here I am.
But what I did not agree to was inspecting the basement at fucking two a.m. Lanston was really on the fence about coming down here too, but I’ve watched enough horror films to know that three people are less likely to get ax murdered or possessed by ghosts than two.
Wynn is basically coming out of her skin with excitement, not an ounce of fear in those damning eyes of hers.
Goosebumps crawl up my arms as I look down the cold cement stairs that lead beneath the earth. Who doesn’t hate basements? I firmly believe that my fear is rational. Lanston’s might be irrational, based on how he’s begging Wynn not to go down there.
She laughs, the sound of it tugging at my heartstrings as she walks down the steps easily. She waits for us at the bottom with her brow raised. “Don’t tell me you two are scared.”
I can’t even pretend to be tough, and Lanston’s way past pretending.
“Look, everyone’s afraid of something.” I steel my spine and start walking down toward her. “I’m like everyone else in the world who knows better than to do this at night. Haven’t you watched horror films? This is how the movie starts—we’re the dumbasses who die in the intro scene. We literally wouldn’t even be the main characters, that’s how stupid this is.” I give the old wooden door a once-over and frown.
Lanston nods. “Yeah, this is giving me really bad vibes, Wynn. Maybe we should head back up.”
The wood has water damage and an odd dusty smell. Stale air emanates from it. I’m about to grab her arm and force her back to our room, but she takes out a key ring and smirks slyly at me.
Little minx.
“Snatched these from Jericho earlier,” she mutters, trying a few before one clicks and the door opens.
“Noted, you’re a thief too,” I grumble as the three of us step through the doorway.
