Credence

I see you.

“He’s the one who smiles at me and always makes me feel like my lungs are full.”

The wind blows through the attic, creaking through the quiet, dark house, and he’s barely breathing.

“My arms fit around him perfectly, and I love to watch him cook. I just want to stay in the kitchen and watch him all the time.” I smile to myself, breathing in his scent. “He smells good enough to eat, and I didn’t want him to the leave the shower that day before we went fishing. I wanted him to touch me.”

His chest caves, and I look down to see his fists curl into the wooden counter.

I swallow. “I even fantasized about it,” I whisper. “About us in the shower, hiding in there every morning and keeping our secret.”

He whips around, anger straining his face. He grabs me under my arms and lifts me up on my tiptoes.

I gasp as he brings us nose to nose.

“I was so wet for you on the couch the night of my birthday,” I whisper between us. “So wet.”

I do want you.

Something clanks on the floor behind me, and Noah glares down at me, looking like he’s about to lose his mind. He looks like Kaleb when he looks at me like this.

Lifting me up, he plops me down in a tin tub, my toes curling into the rusty surface.

“Don’t talk anymore,” he says.

It sounds like a threat, though. I tense.

“I have to—”

“Shhh.” He releases me, pressing his finger to my mouth. All the air rushes out of me.

His eyes pierce, and I don’t know what he’s going to do, but I know what he wants. This Noah kind of scares me.

My thighs clench. I have to go to the bathroom.

But I’m not leaving. I don’t want to break the spell.

Kaleb stands off to my side, and all I can see are his legs, because I’m too scared to look at his face.

I shift on my feet in the tub.

The tin tub, I think to myself.

The pitchers of hot water.

This is a bath.

Noah lifts the hem of my shirt, pausing just a moment to give me time to stop him, but I just stare at the floor as he finally lifts it over my head.

I hear his intake of breath as the cool air hits my breasts and my shirt falls to the floor. Kaleb’s eyes burn my skin from where he stands in the darkness, and I can barely breathe.

Yes.

The silvery feeling between legs grows heavier, and I rub my thighs together. Slowly, Noah smooths my hair, parting it on the back, and I stand there as he braids it.

“Don’t want to give you a wet head,” he says, strained.

My nipples harden to points as he braids one side and then the other, Kaleb starting to circle me like a shark. I still wear the ribbon I stole from his room.