I push my hair behind my ear. “Uh … better, I think.”
“Good.” The smile that follows reminds me of the old Liam. The one I used to share so many memories with … now turned into a ghost of his former self.
“It’s nice not to smell like moss and forest gunk,” I add, not knowing where to look.
He snorts. “Yeah, you did kind of smell awful.”
I make a face. “You did not just say that.”
He approaches me, getting all up close in my aura without giving a shit, and I’m too stunned by his sudden closeness to even speak, let alone flinch. He leans in, closes his eyes, and sniffs. The groan that follows sets my body on fire. “Much better.”
“Uhh …” I don’t even know how to respond to that.
His hand reaches for my face, and it catches me off guard when he touches me so gently I almost melt right in front of him.
Why does he affect me so much? I don’t understand. I swore off men long ago. And here he is, making me feel things I don’t want to feel.
Suddenly, he grabs my hand and pulls me to the fireplace, planting me down in a big, brown, hairy chair right in front of it. “Sit.”
Okay, well, it’s not like I have a choice anyway.
He grabs a blanket from a basket in the corner and throws it over me. “You’re cold.”
“How did you…?”
Then I remember his calloused hand delicately caressing my cheek, and suddenly, I don’t feel so cold anymore.
Stop. Focus on the task at hand.
“So are we on speaking terms now?” I ask as he cleans some dishes in the kitchen.
“We were never not speaking,” he replies.
“Well, I mean, you refuse to tell me why you’re keeping me here.”
He places down the plate a little too hesitantly. “I told you … I don’t enjoy talking about my memories.”
“Why not? What’s wrong with them?”
“Nothing,” he says, a little too quickly. “But there are far too few of them.”
My heart flutters in my chest.
Fuck.
I shiver and hold my hands up to the fire. “What do you mean?”
He closes his eyes. “I’ve tried plenty of times to remember more than I do now, but the memories of most of my childhood keep evading me.”
“Well, you got some of your memories back, right? I’m sure you can get more.”
The intense look he throws me makes me cower into the chair.
“You make it sound easy,” he growls. “But you don’t know what I’ve been through.”
The snarky little bitch in me wants to respond with “you don’t know what I’ve been through either” … but that wouldn’t be helpful when trying to escape. At least, that’s what I tell myself is the reason for me asking all these questions.
“Then tell me,” I say. “Tell me what these last three years have been like for you.”