Page 44 of Gravehouse

Not a single piece of art hangs on the walls. No photos, no trophies, no signed basketball insignia. There’s absolutely no hint at who it is that lives here. It’s oddly strange, since Asher has too much personality to not spread out.

He clucks his tongue, dragging me out of my observations. “Finally, you’re taking in your surroundings. A little slow with that one, aren’t you?” He pauses, studying me. “You’rewondering how I know who you are, when it’s the biggest secret. The only people who know are the likewise ones, true?”

His words die in the back of my mind.

I need something. Anything at all that can give me even a hint as to who I’m dealing with.

Books line a single shelf behind his chair and above an open fireplace, but I can’t make out the titles from here.

Glass windows on either side of the wall display the backyard playground found in every man’s wet dream.

There’s nothing.

Not a single damn thing that gives anything away in here. Not even a computer, or TV, or any form of electronics. Asher is a complete contradiction to everything I thought I knew.

I sigh, bending down to massage the throbbing in my temples.

Who the fuck is he?

“Anything catch your attention, Ivanya?” he asks, using my full name.

It doesn’t add up. None of this adds up.

“So, you were saying you want to leave?” He adds, and I appreciate the switch of subject since I’m pretty sure this one is about to make my head explode. “Why? Tell me what La Journée du Nous is and who the fuck is the ‘us’?”

Keep it simple. Asher prefers things that way.

“We live by a particular set of codes, and one of ours is family. To you, it may sound like just another day, but it’s our day, and we never miss it. It is absolute, Asher. I can’t break tradition because you’ve decided you can’t just kill me and get it over with.”

I push up from the chair, staring directly at the wall of his chest. “Kill me now or we go.”

Silence.

Corded vines spiral around his chest, my eyes tracing them all the way up the side of his neck. Did he add more?

His forefinger and thumb skim over my chin, angling my face up to his.

How. How can the man who ripped my life apart still look like the only safe place left to stand?

“Nah,” he murmurs softly. “I’m not fucking done with you.”

All the air in my lungs evaporates.

“And you and I both know it would be as simple as me locking you in a room to live out the rest of your days if Ireallywanted.”

Electricity sizzles over my lip when his thumb brushes across it.

Seconds.

Minutes.

A damn lifetime.

Neither of us break eye contact, the battle he’s fighting displayed over his face with every twitch of his jaw. Every squint. Every sneer.

He growls, so low I feel it more than I hear it. “If I agree to this, you get two days tops.”

I nod, warmth trickling back through my body with a fragile sense of hope.