She laughs, the sound vibrating in my ribs.
"I have another one." She gestures to her head. "It's not as ugly, but it's a lot bigger. Just call me Scarface. Head. Cranium. ScarCranium is definitely a Swedish death metal band."
I lean in and kiss the top of her head, the scar smooth under my lips.
"We'll have to listen to them someday," I say. She makes a sound halfway between a squeak and a sigh. "Something wrong?"
"N-No. Just...having someone - kiss - um - having someone...doing that - um -"
"You don't like it?"
"No! I - I do. It's really - um, just really, it's nice. It feels nice. Um." She buries her face in my shirt like she's trying to disappear, but I can see the red flush creeping up her forehead.
***
I feel like I'm melting. My insides are warm, and I'm all weirdly relaxed. And I don't ever want it to stop.
I feel safe.
For the first time in a long time, I feel really, really safe. Like nothing can get to me. Like, for once, Nameless can't reach his fingers in and get to me through my memories.
"I was scared," I murmur. "When I was running from those guys. And I'm scared they saw my car."
"You can stay here, if you want," Jack offers. "I can take the couch."
"That'd be rad."
"Alright. I've got work to finish, but feel free to take the bed." He grabs his laptop and sits on the couch. I'm almost sorry for the loss of his warmth, but then I remember he's a nerd. I spot the empty plate of what looks like soy sauce, and my stomach makes a noise like a dying cow. Jack raises an eyebrow, smirking.
"Hungry? Or is that one of the lovely noises your brain makes as it tries so very hard to think?"
"Shut up," I flush. "I've got my fries."
"Those are embalming you from the inside out," he says, and picks up the phone. "Let's get something that doesn't survive radioactive deterioration, shall we?"
I dive under the blankets and try not to think about the fact Jack had sex with some old lady in them. They smell more like him than her, so that's something. And it's so fluffy I might as well be lying on my own flabby belly.
"Hello, yes, this is for Room 1106. I’d like the salmon parmesan, with the spinach salad, and an order of the crème brulee. Yes. Yes, thank you.”
When he hangs up, I raise an eyebrow.
“Yeah? Suddenly rolling in cash?”
“My final client is paying for the room. We could order a dozen lobsters and she’d have to pay it.”
“Ah, the perks of sex-work.” I flop into the pillows. He doesn’t answer, absorbed in his laptop. “Hey, who was that tweed-guy, anyway?”
Jack shrugs. “Going by your description, I think I’ve met him.”
“Oh yeah? Where, at a g*y club?”
“A bar. Where he beat the shit out of me.”
“That’s where you got the beaten-hamburger look?”
Jack nods. “He’s good. Trained, probably. Karate, if I had to guess by his forms and strikes.”
“And you’re just trained in bat, right? Not the billionaire playboy vigilante kind, but the baseball kind.”
“I took taekwondo until high school. He’s much better than me.”
“Someone sent me a picture,” I say. “Of your hand on a baseball bat, and a body –”
“I know. Wren told me about it. More accurately, he screamed it at me. In the library.”
“Wren? Screaming? C’mon, lying isn’t funny. Except when it is.”
“He was very worked up,” Jack ignores me. “Agitated. He’s a lot of things, and we have a complicated history, but he’s surprisingly loyal to the people he considers friends. Not that it mattered when he turned tail and ran that night, but still. It’s the thought now that counts. Reform and second chances and all that drivel.”
“You killed someone,” I say. There’s no fear behind it, now. I’ve shown him my scar, and he didn’t flinch. So if he says yes, I won’t flinch, either. His icy eyes flick up. There’s a long, languid silence in which I’m sure he can hear my thunderous, anticipating heartbeat from ten feet away.
“They staggered off the lakeside cliff to get away from me. I didn’t touch them, but I might as well have killed them. The other three recovered from their injuries.”
The months of pressure the mystery pushed on me lifts all at once. I feel like I can finally breathe again. He’s telling the truth – the guilt in his eyes is obvious. If it was a lie, they’d be clear.
He walked off the cliff. Jack didn’t kill anyone. Not really. But I’m sure he thinks otherwise.
“What…what about the body?”
Jack glares at me. “You’re not concerned? I killed someone. I’m a murderer, Isis.”
“You were defending Sophia. Just like you defended my mom and I from Leo. That’s what you do. You protect people.”
He opens his mouth, then closes it, and stares at the floor.
“Look,” I start. “I’ve done some things I’m not proud of. I know what it feels like to want to kill someone. I really do. I was going to try to kill Leo, when my mom first told me about what happened with her and him. I had it all planned out – I’d drug him with chloroform, and if that didn’t kill him, I’d slice his dick off with a butcher knife, and then his fingers, and then his throat. I dreamed about it sometimes. I wanted it more than anything. I wanted to make him pay for what he did to her.”
Jack looks up at me. I shrug.
“So yeah. I know what it’s like.”
There’s something like gratitude that flickers behind his eyes.
“So c’mon,” I press. “What about the body?”
“You haven’t told me some things. I can’t tell you some things. That’s how it works.”
“Fine. Fine. That’s fair. So the guy in the tweed wants to know where you dumped the body. But why?”
“Because he wants dirt on me,” Jack says slowly. “Blackmail. To, presumably, join his corporation.”
“Because you’re the perfect businessman already.”
“Because I am perfect, period.” He smirks. I throw the extra pillow and it graciously arcs over his laptop and hits him smack in the face.
“Thanks, physics!” I thumb up no one. Jack belligerently coughs out a feather and keeps typing.
“Wow, you’re super dedicated to that computery thing over there. Wow. I can’t stop saying wow.”
“Stop saying wow.”
“What are you wowing? I mean, doing?”
“Tracing the email address that sent you that picture.”
“Oh. Then what? What happens after you find him?”
“Then I blow him up,” Jack growls.
I raise an eyebrow.
“Crash his hard-drive,” He corrects.
“Slightly more legal,” I agree. “Alas, not as fun.”
The food comes, and the maid wheels it in and leaves after Jack gives her a tip, and I inhale everything little thing on the tray in less than five minutes.
“Jesus, woman, you’re going to choke.”
"I have another one." She gestures to her head. "It's not as ugly, but it's a lot bigger. Just call me Scarface. Head. Cranium. ScarCranium is definitely a Swedish death metal band."
I lean in and kiss the top of her head, the scar smooth under my lips.
"We'll have to listen to them someday," I say. She makes a sound halfway between a squeak and a sigh. "Something wrong?"
"N-No. Just...having someone - kiss - um - having someone...doing that - um -"
"You don't like it?"
"No! I - I do. It's really - um, just really, it's nice. It feels nice. Um." She buries her face in my shirt like she's trying to disappear, but I can see the red flush creeping up her forehead.
***
I feel like I'm melting. My insides are warm, and I'm all weirdly relaxed. And I don't ever want it to stop.
I feel safe.
For the first time in a long time, I feel really, really safe. Like nothing can get to me. Like, for once, Nameless can't reach his fingers in and get to me through my memories.
"I was scared," I murmur. "When I was running from those guys. And I'm scared they saw my car."
"You can stay here, if you want," Jack offers. "I can take the couch."
"That'd be rad."
"Alright. I've got work to finish, but feel free to take the bed." He grabs his laptop and sits on the couch. I'm almost sorry for the loss of his warmth, but then I remember he's a nerd. I spot the empty plate of what looks like soy sauce, and my stomach makes a noise like a dying cow. Jack raises an eyebrow, smirking.
"Hungry? Or is that one of the lovely noises your brain makes as it tries so very hard to think?"
"Shut up," I flush. "I've got my fries."
"Those are embalming you from the inside out," he says, and picks up the phone. "Let's get something that doesn't survive radioactive deterioration, shall we?"
I dive under the blankets and try not to think about the fact Jack had sex with some old lady in them. They smell more like him than her, so that's something. And it's so fluffy I might as well be lying on my own flabby belly.
"Hello, yes, this is for Room 1106. I’d like the salmon parmesan, with the spinach salad, and an order of the crème brulee. Yes. Yes, thank you.”
When he hangs up, I raise an eyebrow.
“Yeah? Suddenly rolling in cash?”
“My final client is paying for the room. We could order a dozen lobsters and she’d have to pay it.”
“Ah, the perks of sex-work.” I flop into the pillows. He doesn’t answer, absorbed in his laptop. “Hey, who was that tweed-guy, anyway?”
Jack shrugs. “Going by your description, I think I’ve met him.”
“Oh yeah? Where, at a g*y club?”
“A bar. Where he beat the shit out of me.”
“That’s where you got the beaten-hamburger look?”
Jack nods. “He’s good. Trained, probably. Karate, if I had to guess by his forms and strikes.”
“And you’re just trained in bat, right? Not the billionaire playboy vigilante kind, but the baseball kind.”
“I took taekwondo until high school. He’s much better than me.”
“Someone sent me a picture,” I say. “Of your hand on a baseball bat, and a body –”
“I know. Wren told me about it. More accurately, he screamed it at me. In the library.”
“Wren? Screaming? C’mon, lying isn’t funny. Except when it is.”
“He was very worked up,” Jack ignores me. “Agitated. He’s a lot of things, and we have a complicated history, but he’s surprisingly loyal to the people he considers friends. Not that it mattered when he turned tail and ran that night, but still. It’s the thought now that counts. Reform and second chances and all that drivel.”
“You killed someone,” I say. There’s no fear behind it, now. I’ve shown him my scar, and he didn’t flinch. So if he says yes, I won’t flinch, either. His icy eyes flick up. There’s a long, languid silence in which I’m sure he can hear my thunderous, anticipating heartbeat from ten feet away.
“They staggered off the lakeside cliff to get away from me. I didn’t touch them, but I might as well have killed them. The other three recovered from their injuries.”
The months of pressure the mystery pushed on me lifts all at once. I feel like I can finally breathe again. He’s telling the truth – the guilt in his eyes is obvious. If it was a lie, they’d be clear.
He walked off the cliff. Jack didn’t kill anyone. Not really. But I’m sure he thinks otherwise.
“What…what about the body?”
Jack glares at me. “You’re not concerned? I killed someone. I’m a murderer, Isis.”
“You were defending Sophia. Just like you defended my mom and I from Leo. That’s what you do. You protect people.”
He opens his mouth, then closes it, and stares at the floor.
“Look,” I start. “I’ve done some things I’m not proud of. I know what it feels like to want to kill someone. I really do. I was going to try to kill Leo, when my mom first told me about what happened with her and him. I had it all planned out – I’d drug him with chloroform, and if that didn’t kill him, I’d slice his dick off with a butcher knife, and then his fingers, and then his throat. I dreamed about it sometimes. I wanted it more than anything. I wanted to make him pay for what he did to her.”
Jack looks up at me. I shrug.
“So yeah. I know what it’s like.”
There’s something like gratitude that flickers behind his eyes.
“So c’mon,” I press. “What about the body?”
“You haven’t told me some things. I can’t tell you some things. That’s how it works.”
“Fine. Fine. That’s fair. So the guy in the tweed wants to know where you dumped the body. But why?”
“Because he wants dirt on me,” Jack says slowly. “Blackmail. To, presumably, join his corporation.”
“Because you’re the perfect businessman already.”
“Because I am perfect, period.” He smirks. I throw the extra pillow and it graciously arcs over his laptop and hits him smack in the face.
“Thanks, physics!” I thumb up no one. Jack belligerently coughs out a feather and keeps typing.
“Wow, you’re super dedicated to that computery thing over there. Wow. I can’t stop saying wow.”
“Stop saying wow.”
“What are you wowing? I mean, doing?”
“Tracing the email address that sent you that picture.”
“Oh. Then what? What happens after you find him?”
“Then I blow him up,” Jack growls.
I raise an eyebrow.
“Crash his hard-drive,” He corrects.
“Slightly more legal,” I agree. “Alas, not as fun.”
The food comes, and the maid wheels it in and leaves after Jack gives her a tip, and I inhale everything little thing on the tray in less than five minutes.
“Jesus, woman, you’re going to choke.”
