Chapter 6
Emersyn
Something is wrong with this man. Big wrong.
I have no idea who he is, but my instincts are screaming that I’m not safe here. Shivering from the cool draft of the open bathroom door, I step out of the shower and wrap my towel around myself. I don’t know his name. I don’t know if I even want to know his name.
I just want to get the fuck out of here.
But the winds continue to howl as I dry off and get dressed, pulling on a pair of jeans and a black sweater. I run a brush through my towel dried locks and ensure the rest of my makeup is gone from my face. I have no desire to be desirable to this man. I just want to be invisible. Maybe that is the ticket to making it out.
Maybe this is how Belle felt in the castle with the beast.
I purse my lips at the elementary analogy, and then hang the damp towel on the rack. I put all of my things back in my bag, ensuring that I leave nothing behind. Maybe he’ll let me stay in a spare room…and then I’ll never come out.
Nodding to myself at that scenario, I sling my bag over my shoulder and take a deep breath. Fear and apprehension pulse through my veins as I emerge from the bathroom, stepping into the dark bedroom. He’s not there, and for some reason, that’s all the more unnerving. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do.
I just wish I wouldn’t have come here at all. But there’s no point in dwelling on the fucking past and my stupid decisions. I’d thought all this time that Adam and I’s holiday getaway might be an actual fix. It was a joke, and really, maybe I knew it all along.
My bare feet creak across the floors as I start down the hallway. I squint in the dim light. My stomach lurches violently as I remember the man seeing me naked through the glass.
Would he hurt me? Well, I mean, beyond shooting my hand and knocking me unconscious.
A chill rolls down my spine, and I continue forward. Lingering in the hallway seems dangerous—like he might jump from the shadows and grab me. I step into the living room, passing what I assume is the back door. The glass is covered with a curtain. All the windows have large blackout curtains. Maybe he’s just paranoid. Or fucking psychotic.
Yeah, I’m going with the latter.
“I’m making dinner.” A voice startles me, and I jump sideways, slamming my shoulder into the wall. He doesn’t react to my jerky movement, and his stone-cold demeanor is fucking terrifying.
“I have the granola bars.” I nod to my bag. “I don’t want to impose. Actually,” I pause, meeting his deep, dark brown eyes. “I was thinking if you have a spare room, I can just stay there. You’ll never know I’m here, then when things clear up, I’ll be out of your hair. Give me a shovel and I’ll dig my way out.” I let out a stilted laugh, and he, once again, doesn’t react in his facial expression.
“Mm,” he grunts. “You can eat dinner.”
I hesitate, tempted to repeat myself but hold off. “Okay. Can I put my things somewhere?”
He nods to the place by the door. “Back where I set them.”
“But it’s blocking the door,” I reason. “I can put them in a spare?—”
“I don’t have a spare room for your use,” he snaps, cutting me off. “Set the bag by the door.” His harsh tone silences me, and I merely nod, ducking away and walking past him.
I set my duffle back on top of my hard suitcase and drop my shoulders as I push the bags against the outer wall. He’s forcing me to be in his sight. All the fucking time. I glance back over my shoulder, noticing the kitchen light is on with a pan on the stove. It gives me a better view of him, and I see his muscular form clad in a worn out henley and black sweats. His physique is attractive, and his dark hair is clean cut, longer on the top with a fade. So, he might be psychotic, but at least he cuts his hair?
He turns to me, and I drop my gaze away. “I don’t have a lot of variety.”
I run my tongue over my bottom lip, forcing myself to meet his eyes. “That’s okay,” I say, assuming he’s talking about food. His expression shifts slightly, and I catch my breath at the almost softness in his gaze. He appears embarrassed or… guilty?
Regardless, it draws out his handsome features. A strong nose and jawline. Deeper set eyes and dark brows. His hair has a tinge of gray, and I wonder how much older than me he is. Not that much. It’s then I notice the ink, scrawled up to his chin. I hadn’t seen it in the shadows. Depictions of violence are everywhere on his skin. I swallow hard, hating how it goes straight to my core.
“You can sit at the table while I finish,” he gestures to a small round breakfast table tucked off the kitchen by windows with more curtains covering them. There are two chairs, and I opt for the one that faces him. I run my fingertips across the smooth dark grain as I try to keep my breaths steady, my heart racing. I’m going to give myself a fucking heart attack if I can’t get control of it.
He returns to the stove and throws two steaks into the pan. He then grabs another pan and a sealed bag from the freezer. I watch him in the plain light, wondering how someone, who appears increasingly more handsome by the moment, could be so incredibly terrifying.
“You’re from Oklahoma?” he asks, not looking at me as he speaks.
“Yeah,” I answer him.
“Never been.”
“Not missing much.” I force a laugh, and he cocks his head in my direction. I instantly shut up, my eyes falling to my clasped hands.
“I’m from Utah originally.”
I nod at the tidbit of information, stealing a glance back up at him. “Never been.”
“Not missing much.” His lip curls up slightly—he’s almost smiling.
I can’t help it. A real laugh slips through, and heat flushes my cheeks. My heart rate slows slightly, but the flutter in my stomach remains. The aroma of the steaks and vegetables fill the cabin, and my body relaxes slightly. He might be batshit crazy and dangerous, but in this moment, I breathe a little easier. Besides, there’s no escaping here… At least for now.
“Why were you coming here?” he asks, surprising me by continuing the conversation. “Not here , but Colorado.”
“Oh,” I pause, the reminder sending a squeeze of heartache through my chest. “I was coming to spend the holiday with my boyfriend at his family’s cabin. We, um, broke up over the phone when I was almost here—er, something like that.” I don’t know why I add it, but there’s no taking it back once it’s out.
His brows furrow as he flips the meat in the pan. “What was the address? There aren’t any other cabins on this road for miles.”
I purse my lips. “I’d have to look at my phone…I don’t remember it.”
“Mm,” he mutters, turning his attention back to the stove. Disappointment rattles my chest at his reaction—like it bothers him I don’t know. But why would he care? Why do I care?
“The visibility started to suck when I turned onto this road,” I clarify, grabbing his attention again. “And my GPS told me I had twelve miles to go when I turned off the highway. It froze, and I couldn’t get it to reload. I somehow ended up in the wrong driveway.”
“There’s no houses on this road,” he says, setting the tongs down on the counter, angling his body to me. “The GPS had to have been leading you to the wrong place. It’s not reliable out here. Your boyfriend should’ve known that.” It’s the most he’s said since I arrived, and I find myself lost in the deep, commanding tone, my body reacting in a way that I don’t like.
I swallow it and tighten my quads beneath the table. “I don’t know. I just copied and pasted the address from his text.”
He nods, shrugging to himself. “Strange.”
Yeah, so is this. I take another deep breath and scan the walls, noticing how bare they are. There’s not a picture in sight, but he’s also an assumably single man living alone. No bachelor pad is ever impressive, but it does prompt me to take a risk.
“What’s your name?” I ask, my heart leaping to my throat. “We never really, um, introduced ourselves and since?—”
“Turner,” he cuts me off before I start to ramble. He doesn’t offer up a last name, and I don’t press. Or maybe Turner is his last name? I don’t know.
“I’m Em.”
“Emersyn,” he corrects me, and continues at my shocked expression. “I saw it on your driver’s license.”
“Right,” I breathe out a sigh, trying to settle my fraying nerves again. “Most people call me Em.”
“Okay.”
Fuck me, this is awkward. I’m just as miserable as I am scared, and I let my mind run in the moment. What would I be doing had I made it to Adam? I frown at the thought. We’d probably be fighting, and I’d be begging for the snow to clear so I could leave.
How fucking ironic.
But at least I’d be safe. I steal a glance back at Turner, who’s expression is downcast suddenly. Is he… upset? I can’t tell, but he has a distant look on his face as he seems to go through the motions of finishing the food. Should I keep talking? I brush my hair out of my face. Why do I always need to keep talking?
“I haven’t ever been stuck in a blizzard like this,” I say, clearing my throat as he reaches into the cabinet, grabbing a couple of plates.
“You’ll be stuck in another one in a couple days.” He sets a steak on either plate, and then splits the mixed vegetables between them. “We’re supposed to get multiple rounds of snow.”
“Guess I might be here for Christmas,” I chuckle.
He shrugs, and then picks up the plates and brings them to the table. He doesn’t sit down though. He returns to the kitchen and grabs two waters, forks, and knives. His movements are almost nervous ? It’s hard to read him as he sets everything down and then pulls out the chair across from me.
“Do you have family around here?”
He stares at his plate, freezing at the question. “No.” He shakes his head in a quick succession, and then begins to eat.
My hands still tremble as I retrieve the utensils and cut into the steak. “I don’t like the holidays all that much anymore.” I don’t know why my mouth is still moving, but I’m desperate to make friends—or something.
“Yeah, happens.” He forks a bite of broccoli into his mouth.
I nod, following suit. “Thank you for dinner,” I say, swallowing.
He looks across the table at me, holding my gaze long enough for my heart to skip a few beats. “You’re welcome, Em.” His voice drops when he says my nickname, I hang on it, staring at his mouth.
I roll my lips together. “What do you like to do for fun?”
“I don’t have fun,” he chuckles, his knife slicing through the meat as he pauses. “But I used to do a lot of things.”
“Yeah?” I don’t press as to why he doesn’t have fun anymore. I just focus on what he’ll give me—like I read once in a book about a woman surviving a serial killer. Not that Turner is one. But he could be. “What did you do?”
“I liked to work out a lot,” he says, shrugging.
“You look like you still do,” I blurt.
He looks up at me, and I swear there’s a brief flicker of amusement, but it fades to something distant. “I also liked music and concerts, trucks, work… Normal shit.”
I smile softly. “You don’t do any of that anymore?”
Turner shakes his head, his Adam’s apple bobbing. “No. I stay here mostly.”
“And you never leave?”
He hesitates, like he’s about to say something first but holds off another few moments. “Not really. I used to though. This was my parents’ cabin, then my brother’s, then mine.”
“I have a sister,” I say, offering up something about myself to help with peeling back the layers of him. Something about him pulls at me, and that distance in his eyes is as alluring as it is unsettling. For some reason, I want to know more about him. Maybe it’s the stereotypical draw of the mysterious stranger—or maybe it’s that self-preservation kicking in. Keeping your enemy close or whatever.
But he’s not an enemy, really. Or is he?
“You can sleep in my room,” his voice interrupts my thoughts. “I shouldn’t make you stay on the couch. I’ll sleep there.”
“You don’t have to do that,” I reason. “You’re way too big for the couch.”
“I’ll sleep on the floor.”
“Seems unfair,” I say, cutting off a piece of steak and popping it in my mouth. It’s definitely venison, based on the gamey flavor. Turner studies me as I chew and swallow. “It’s good,” I tell him, taking a gander that’s what he was waiting for.
“It’s edible.”
I laugh. “Isn’t that all that matters?”
“Yeah, I guess so.”
And then he almost smiles again.