What’s my excuse for screaming about my parents?
“How?” he asks.
I wave a hand. “It doesn’t matter.”
“It does to me,” he says firmly.
“Why?”
A dark look passes across his face, but then he smirks. “I’m interested. Isn’t that enough of a reason?”
I sigh. I have brought it up now.
“When I was seven, they died… it was, well, it wasn’t something I like to….”
He says nothing, just looks at me briefly. And that’s so much sweeter than if he leaped on me, asking a bunch of questions. The supportiveness in his steely blues, softening for a moment, as though he’s ready to help me in any way and time I need it.
We drive in silence for a time.
“It was a murder-suicide,” I say eventually.
Without a word, Felix pulls up into a motel parking lot. At first, I thought he was going to drag me inside. Not that what I said is in any way sexual, but it seems such a random place to stop.
Panic flutters in my chest, and a thought twists through me.
I can’t do this, not so soon, not now. He doesn’t even know yet.
But then I realize he parked here because it was the closest spot, that’s all.
He turns to me, watching.
“Yeah.” I shrug, picking at my dress. “I didn’t know it at the time, but my dad was very ill. Unstable. He thought a demon had possessed my mom and that to keep me safe, they both had to die. I didn’t find them, thank God. One of our neighbors did. I was on a trip with Rachel, my best friend, and her family took me in. They adopted me. Technically, we’re sisters, but we think of each other as best friends more than anything. Weirdly, I think that makes us closer.”
I’m rambling, my words rushing out, but it’s difficult to know how best to talk about this.
“I’m sorry,” Felix says. “That’s awful.”
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have mentioned it. It’s such a buzzkill, and it was like a million years ago anyway.”
He reaches over, laying his hand on mine again. Familiar – yet exciting – electricity shimmers from his fingertips. My heart picks up its pace. I feel like I’m coated in sweat, slathered in it, and my panties are just as wet. It’s emotion and lust all bundled together, inextricable, so I want him to hold and ravage me at the same time.
“I know how painful childhood trauma can be,” he says.
“You do?”
He flinches, withdrawing a little. “It can be tough. I’m so sorry, Fiona.”
I want to press him for more details. It feels like he’s holding something back.
He looks around the motel, an ironic twist to his lips. It’s like he’s silently saying, Hell, how did we end up here?
I giggle as I read the look on his face, then he grins, somehow pushing away all the tension and the sadness.
Normally, whenever I talk about mom and dad, I feel like all the negative emotions a person can feel are rising inside of me. Like they’re trying to choke me, to kill any positivity, which is why I rarely think about it, let alone discuss it.
But with Felix, it’s like we can switch from the sad lane to the happy lane as easily as in a car.
He turns to me, his eyes glassy. Every time he looks like that, part of me whispers that he’s trying to hold himself back. He’s so obsessed and hungry he can’t take it, and so he has to detach, to distance himself from his lust.
Yet it could easily be boredom. Or empathy. Or a million other things.
I wish I could reach into his silver-haired head and access his thoughts.
“Something happened to me when I was a kid, too,” he says after a pause. “But honestly, Fiona, I don’t think I can talk about it. I don’t even want to. I don’t want to spoil this.”
“You wouldn’t,” I say quickly. “But I understand if you’d rather wait.”
I cringe the second the words are out of my mouth.
Telling him, I’m happy to wait implies that we’re going to have more than one date.
He chuckles. “I’ll tell you after ten dates…sound like a good deal?”
“Three.”
He laughs again. The sound makes my hands relax a little, and it does the same to my heart. I don’t have to keep such a tight hold on everything when I’m able to make him laugh.
Maybe I can let go in more ways than emotional.
“That’s not how bargaining works,” he says. “You can’t counter so low.”
“Nuh-uh,” I say. “You started way too high. Three is fair.”
He smirks. “If it means you’re going to keep wearing outfits like that, I agree.”
My cheeks flush. I feel the heat moving down my body, through my neck, and over my breasts. It’s like it’s traveling through every part of me, trying to warm me up as much as possible.