Chapter 10
Ican’t pretend to be surprised when he doesn’t protest me following him, because that would require Jed to say more than a few words. And as we walk outside, I can tell that he’s not exactly in a talking mood.
The woods feel different from the city. It’s darker, cooler, and things are quieter than they are in my apartment.
But then again, with a half-deaf landlady always watching Wheel of Fortune at full blast next-door to me and a younger couple who lives to party above me, anywhere is quieter than my apartment.
But the shadows feel deeper as well, and I rub my hands up and down my arms as I follow him down the path I hadn’t tried to escape down yesterday. “Doesn’t this lead to the road?” I ask, when he shows no sign of stopping.
Jed cranes his head back to look at me, eyebrows raising by small increments as his blue eyes remain wide and plaintive. “I know you think so,” he says almost kindly, a small, almost apologetic smile on his face. “But I’m probably going to break your heart.”
That’s a no if I’ve ever heard one. But only part of me believes him. One of the two ways to get to the cabin has to lead to civilization. It’s not like he levitated his car here, or took a magical underground tunnel. No, if he’s not bluffing then…
Well, then I really don’t know what could be at the end of this road.
I don’t realize I’ve fallen into a surly silence, my steps quickening to match Jed’s, until my shoulder unexpectedly bumps against his.
My chin jerks up, eyes slanting toward his.
I find his gaze already waiting like he knows I’m going to look up at those too-blue eyes of his that don’t match any version of a serial killer I’ve created in my head.
It’s unfair of him, really. It’s unfair for him to be so gorgeous and so honest-looking.
And it’s definitely unfair that I can’t look away from him.
Even when his arm brushes mine, his steps are in sync with mine as we walk along the path that’s slowly turning into more dirt, less gravel.
Which, unfortunately, means he might have been honest about the fact this path doesn’t lead to a road.
“You have to have driven here somehow,” I point out, still not looking away from his face. “You didn’t just snap your fingers and bring us here by magic in your Jeep.”
A smile curls along his perfect lips, and he doesn’t attempt to create any space between us. “True,” he agrees, with only a little bit of hesitation. “I’m no magician.”
“So there has to be a road out of here. The trees are too close to drive between.” I glance back behind us, wondering if I’ve missed some side road, somehow, with tire tracks that disappear between the trees. Surely yesterday I would’ve noticed something. But today, when I’m distracted by him?
I feel like I barely notice anything at all.
“Does there?” His eyes glitter when he asks, and he’s unable to stop the start of a slow, dark smirk along his lips.
“Are you sure? Out here?” he spins in a circle as he walks, not stopping but giving the area around us a quick, cursory scan like he’s looking for the road I’ve mentioned.
“Sorry.” The smile doesn’t drop, but he does shrug one shoulder.
“Why are you sorry?” I don’t know why I ask. I don’t know why I can’t look away from him or even move far enough away that my arm doesn’t brush his.
But I know his skin against mine is soft and warm, and part of me wants to slide even closer for some of his warmth.
“Because I don’t mean to tease you,” he drawls in that lazy voice of his. “I don’t want to make this worse, or make you think I’m taunting you with an exit that doesn’t exist. It does exist, by the way. Especially for you. Just not this way. Not…on this path.”
“Then why are we walking this way? Are you like a local forest ranger? Is that why you live out in the middle of nowhere in a way-too-fancy cabin?” My lips move of their own accord, but my curiosity about him is raging today. “Do you like chartreuse because trees are your job?”
“I’m not a forest ranger,” Jed promises in a low laugh. “I like chartreuse because I am who I am.” He shakes his head, and his fingers brush mine once, then again when I don’t jump. “You’re not quite so afraid of me today,” he remarks, without answering my other questions.
“You’re not so frightening today,” I fire back, before I can lose my nerve. I wonder if it’s me that’s changed, and not him.
“I think it’s the other way,” is his quiet response, and challengingly he hooks his pinkie finger around mine, just tightly enough that I know he’s there, but loosely enough to leave me with an escape.
“You can always walk away from me, Saylor,” he promises, going suddenly serious and wordy.
“I’ll never force you into a situation you don’t want. ”
“Except being here,” I remind him, a rueful half-smirk curling my lips.
“Except that,” he acquiesces. “Come on.” His steps pick up, and he hooks another finger around mine so he has a better grip. Jed tugs me along the path, dragging me further into thicker woods of the, presumably Ohio, wilderness.
“I like to come this way every few days,” he admits, still walking at his aggressively long-legged pace that requires me to walk faster than normal to keep up with him. “Just to make sure there aren’t any poachers.”
“Poachers?” I question the word, surprised at it. Where the hell are there poachers in Ohio? “Like, actual poachers? Invaders of land, hunters of illegal animal poachers?”
“Well, we are on the edge of a nature preserve,” Jed drawls without looking back.
“Look.” His steps slow as we reach a large, flat dirt area of the path.
“No, you still won’t find the road from here unless you want to walk for a few days,” he adds, before I can ask.
“But…” He gestures at old tire treads that look too small to be actual, full-size vehicles.
Now I see why he says I wouldn’t find the road from here.
If the only way to get here is a four-wheeler, not a car, then how the hell do I find where an actual road might be?
He must sense that I’m getting lost in my thoughts, because Jed pulls me closer, steps slowing as he desperately clutches more of my fingers gently in his.
I should pull away.
My stomach flutters, butterflies taking flight somewhere under my ribs when I look at him, then at our hands. Something has clearly happened to me, because overnight I’ve gone from petrified of him to, well, definitely less.
The fear is still there. It bubbles and seethes under my skin, but now there’s something bubbling and seething along with it.
Something I’m not sure I’m willing to name.
Jed isn’t like anyone I’ve ever met before.
Even apart from the chainsaw wielding, bloody-skinned killer I’d met a few nights ago at the marsh.
And before I know it, my fingers curl in his, almost without me willing them to.
I see Jed’s eyes look down to our hands once more, and a small look of surprise flits across his features before he squares his shoulders and looks away.
Maybe he’s decided ignoring it will make it not as big of a deal. Or make me think it isn’t.
I can’t help that his words flit through my head on repeat. Why he’d done it. What the man had done. How he felt bad about me seeing it and us meeting this way.
How he isn’t sad or regretful that he met me.
In any other circumstance, I would be thrilled to meet Jed.
Though, realistically, I don’t know in what other circumstance we would’ve met.
He’s everything all the men I’ve ever met could never be.
Including the amazing chef my life so desperately needs, since he can boil water without setting the house on fire.
My heart flutters when he slows again, brain drifting back to the warmth of his skin on mine. “Jed?” It’s times like these that my brain runs away with itself, and my mouth doesn’t know how to stop.
He comes to a halt, and over his shoulder I see something through the trees that looks man made instead of natural.
When he searches my gaze, however, his brow furrows and he sighs.
“You’re going to ask me something you don’t like,” he assumes correctly.
“Can you wait? Just for a few seconds so I can show you something?”
I mull that thought over in my head before tilting my chin forward in agreement. “Okay. Does that mean you’ll answer what I ask you?”
His stare lasts a few more seconds, eyes seeming to lighten to a ghostly, ethereal blue. “Yes.” The word is simple, honest, and seems to echo in the woods. Jed gently tugs on my arm again, pulling me down the path until the structure fully comes into view.
It’s a bridge. A wooden bridge, starting a few feet from where the ground drops away from under the now-grassy path. I want to stop, to stare at it, to take it in as I wish I had my camera, but Jed pulls me along with him, onto the wooden planks of the bridge and up.
My hand goes out, fingers trailing along the wooden railing as we walk, until a sharp jolt of pain makes me hiss between my teeth, jerking my arm away from it as it burns.
Naturally, I’ve cut myself on something. The scrape is shallow and long, stretching from the underside of my wrist up towards my elbow, though stopping halfway.
Wonderful. Now I’m probably going to get Ebola or wood-tetanus.
Still, the view of the gentle river below is worth it.
Jed stops and drops my hand, having not noticed my cut just yet as he leans his arms on the bridge’s rail to stare at the water as well.
“I like coming here,” he admits. “There are trails on the other side, but they aren’t used much anymore.
I don’t keep going unless I see signs of someone being here.
” His words are thoughtful, explanation easy and sensible.