Chapter 25
W ho the hell is in Crue’s room? He pleasures me, then sneaks someone in here immediately after?
She’s short, shorter than me. And judging by her hair, which has some kind of knot at the top with strands sticking out all over, she just got fucked. Really fucked. The kind of fucked Crue was supposed to do to me but didn’t because… I don’t know why he refused to fuck me.
Maybe so he could come home—to my home—and fuck her .
Jealousy seizes me, overtaking every rational thought, even the ones reminding me to stay hidden, and I storm across Crue’s room and grab her by that ugly hair to—
Ah! Her head! It’s off her shoulders! Oh my fucking Goddess, I beheaded someone.
I wasn’t even trying to. I just wanted to pull her hair a little. A lot. But I didn’t grab her that hard, did I? Enough to rip her head off?
Oh shit. Oh shit. Oh shit. What do I do? I literally have someone’s head in my hand.
Why am I still holding it?
I release the wiry-feeling hair, letting the head fall to the floor with a thump .
That’s weird. I thought it’d sound squishier.
Gross.
Now what? Should I slip back out like nothing happened? What will Crue think when he wakes up and finds a decapitated body, as well as its detached head, in the middle of his floor?
Hopefully he takes it as a lesson. Don’t sneak women into your room.
Not that I meant to remove her head from her body. Her body that was just—
Wait…her body. Where is it? There was only one thud. Shouldn’t her headless body have fallen, too?
I glance around, straining my eyes in the dark. It was easier to decipher outlines of things from the wall. This close it’s much harder to identify objects. Isn’t this his desk though? Was she sitting on it?
Ever so slowly I pivot toward Crue’s bed. No lump whatsoever, it’s clear he’s not even in it.
Okay, well, where is he? Every other night I’ve snuck in here he’s been asleep in his bed.
But now he’s missing and there’s a head on his…
If she was on his desk, she would’ve been much shorter than I originally assumed. Too short to even have a torso…
That can’t be right. That’s…
What the hell am I talking about? It was just a head, already on the desk. I didn’t decapitate anyone.
Did Crue? I can’t really see him doing that, especially the leaving-the-head-on-his-desk-like-a-psychopath part.
But who else would’ve?
There’s only three other people currently in the manor—my father, his valet, and the chef.
Fear overtakes my body, burning up the jealousy in an instant. Where is Crue?
The door to his room flies open, spraying the room in harsh light. My shirtless bodyguard stands at the threshold.
“Where have you been?” I demand.
“How’d you get in here?” He checks his phone.
I blindly thrust a hand toward the floor. “Who is this?”
Crue barely eyes what has to be a gruesome scene before saying matter-of-factly, “I don’t know. I didn’t name her yet.”
That sounds like a psychopath to me. Damn it.
After a sigh, I ask, “Where’s her body?” As long as he didn’t fuck her, I’ll help him get rid of the evidence. If he did fuck her, he’s so on his own.
“She didn’t come with one. At least not one that Chloe offered up.”
Chloe? My hairstylist?
For the first time, I look down at the head, finding it doesn’t belong to my hairstylist, or even a human. It belongs to a mannequin.
I didn’t decapitate anybody. My bodyguard didn’t decapitate anybody.
The biggest relief of all though? He didn’t fuck anybody.
“Why did Chloe give that to you?”
Shaking his head, he closes the door behind him. “To learn how to do hair.”
He’s worth burying a body—or head—for. Unless…
“Do you two talk now?”
“Talk? We had one conversation and it ended the moment I…”
“The moment you what?”
“Told her to give it to Edwin because we wouldn’t be home.”
“So it was before the gala?”
“Yes. When you were in the bathroom, getting dressed.”
That’s what they had their heads together about when I came out?
Now that I think about it, I’m not sure Chloe’s the best fit for me anymore.
“How’d you get in my room?”
“Your door doesn’t have a lock.”
With a wave of his illuminated phone, he says, “There’s no history of you leaving yours.”
Using that little bit of light, I busy myself retrieving the mannequin. “Maybe you missed it.”
“I didn’t.”
“Must’ve malfunctioned then. I don’t know what to tell you.” Certainly not the truth.
The room goes pitch black.
“Why are you in here?”
“I was…” I set the head on the desk, heavily contemplating burying it still so Crue has to practice on my hair instead. “Just seeing if you’d died yet.”
“You care? I’m touched.”
I can tell he’s holding his heart before he falls on his bed, face down…nothing like what a person with a concussion would do.
“Only about the smell. It’d be a terrible inconvenience to wake up to the odor of your rotting corpse.”
Head turned to the side, he says, “Happy to disappoint. You can leave.”
I stare at the door to the hall. I don’t have the key to my room on me.
“But…” What’s a good excuse? “You never answered my question. Where were you?”
“Why does it matter?”
“I could’ve needed you.”
His head pops up. “Did you?”
Always.
“No.”
He drops his head back down. “Ryan wanted me to check something for him.”
Chef Ryan?
“Did you run into him in the kitchen or something?”
“Just because he works in the kitchen doesn’t mean he lives in it.” After a minute, he adds, “He was up here. Is that what woke you up?”
“When?”
“When he knocked on your door.”
He was at my door? Fucking knocking on it?
He’s getting brave. Too brave.
Instead of answering, I ask, “What’d he need?”
Even his chuckle is exhausted. “He was scared someone was trying to open his window.”
“Were they?”
“Not that I saw. It was probably just a bug hitting the glass.” After a pause, he says, “Or one of your bats.”
“Yeah,” I breathe while falling into the armchair.
“Are you just gonna watch me sleep?”
That’s what I usually do. That’s why I’m in here. That’s why I have an alarm on my phone to wake me up at three a.m.
“No,” I say with a touch too much attitude. “I just…was…wondering…” I don’t have a reason for staying, at least not one I can tell Crue. But I don’t have a way to get back in my room without that hidden door and I’m not taking my chances in any other part of the manor.
“Were you wanting to fuck or something?” he asks.
“You know me…super horny. All the time.”
Appalled at how desperate I’m making myself look, my entire body cringes all the way down to my toes. I’ll look more desperate if he finds out the truth though.
There’s some shuffling around on his mattress and I can just make out him flipping to his back, his head lifted to see me.
“That’s really why you came in here?”
The real reason I came in here is because lying with Crue while he’s asleep is the only time I get him wholly, without judgement.
“Sure?”
More shuffling as he relaxes, then, “Draw me something. I think there’s a pen in the desk.”
“Is that another one of your stipulations for having sex with—”
“Just draw me something. We’re not having sex tonight.”
I remove my shoulders from my ears, letting them hang normally, but argue, “It’s morning and I can’t draw in the dark.”
“Turn on the lamp.”
“Won’t that bother you?”
“There you go again.”
I scowl. “What?”
“Caring about me.”
If only he knew.
“Maybe I just don’t want you to see the pillow coming when I cover your face with it.”
Another deep, sleepy chuckle, this one pulling a smile from me.
“If you think I’m up your ass now, wait until I haunt you in the afterlife.”
“What’s your unfinished business?”
“My what?” comes out muffled.
“Only people with unfinished business become ghosts.” I shrug even though he can’t see it. “At least that’s what the movies always say.”
Crue doesn’t respond for so long I assume he fell asleep, until finally, he says, “Everything.”
I think about that for a while and about how true it feels for me, too. How do you leave life if you’ve never really lived one? I can see why some choose not to.
“What should I draw on?”
My only answer is heavy breathing, and when I turn on the lamp, Crue’s eyes are shut, his face serene. In my afterlife, I hope I’ll get the freedom I so desperately crave in this life. An eternity of watching Crue sleep wouldn’t be enough, but I’d savor every minute of it just like I do now.