24. Blake
BLAKE
I guide Aspen into the kitchen and press her into a seat at the table.
She’s somehow still got her sketch pad clamped under one arm. As though surprised she still has it, she places it on the table. Then she reaches into her pocket, searching for something.
“What’s wrong?”
Her eyes shimmer with fresh tears and she twirls her hair around her finger so hard it’s like she might yank it straight out of her scalp. “I lost my pencils. They must have fallen out of my pocket when I was climbing the hedge.”
“Hey, don’t worry. They’re only pencils.”
But she shakes her head. “No, they’re not. They’re special ones I use for drawing. They’re expensive. I can’t afford to replace them.”
“Well, I can. Just tell me what brand they are and I’ll buy you some new ones.”
She gulps back a sob. “You don’t have to do that.”
“Seriously, Pen, they’re fucking pencils. I can afford to buy you new ones, so let me, okay? I want to.”
A wobbly smile touches her pretty lips. “Thanks,” she says, her voice barely a whisper.
She’s still visibly shaken by what happened in the maze. Had someone been following her? It is possible, but equally possible she let her imagination get away with her.
I wonder where Levi is now. I haven’t seen him since I spoke to him earlier, but that’s not unusual. He spends hours, and sometimes even days, roaming through the mountains. When he was younger, I used to worry, but he’s more than capable of taking care of himself.
I hope he hasn’t been tormenting Aspen for his own entertainment.
I go to the cupboard and take down a tumbler, then go to the liquor cabinet to retrieve a bottle of scotch. I’m not a big drinker, but sometimes we all need a little pick me up. Aspen isn’t twenty-one yet, but it’s not like the fucking police are going to turn up.
I pour her a nip of amber liquid and slide it across the table toward her.
“Thanks,” she says, lifting the glass to her lips, her hand still shaking.
“I’m going to get the first aid kit for your face.”
She’s still bleeding. The cut doesn’t need stitches, but it does need cleaning up.
Her poor hands and arms are covered in scratches, too.
I’m annoyed with her for not listening to me when I said the maze was impassable, but me being angry isn’t going to help.
She’s clearly still upset, and her wounds need attention.
I leave her nursing the scotch and return with cotton pads and antiseptic. I take the seat beside her, wet the cotton pad with the antiseptic, and scoot my chair a little closer.
“This is probably going to sting,” I warn her.
She nods her understanding and sucks air in over her teeth as I dab the antiseptic to her face. She’d said she gotten injured trying to climb through the hedges, and my heart aches at how distressed and afraid she must have been.
“Why do you never talk about him?” she says suddenly.
I pause in my dabbing. “Talk about who?”
“My dad. You’ve barely mentioned him since I’ve been here. Any time I try to bring him up, you change the subject.”
My muscles tense. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to. I guess it’s guilt. I feel like shit that I wasn’t there for you guys.”
She twists her lips and fiddles with her glass. “You’ve never asked about my sister either.”
I pause again, wondering how to tackle this one. I really wish she’d change the subject. “I figured if there had been any developments, you’d have let me know.”
“Right.” She sighs. “I wonder, sometimes, if she’s being held by someone and there’s still a chance she might escape and try to come home. I hate that she doesn’t have a home to come back to now. What if that happens and I’m not there? How will anyone know how to contact me to tell me she’s safe?”
I reach out and cover her hand, careful of the cuts and scratches. “Pen, if that happened, it would be all over the news and social media. A missing teenage girl returning after all that time. We’d hear about it.”
“But we don’t have a television here, and there’s no cell service either.”
“We’d hear about it,” I repeat, only this time with more force. “The police would be involved. They’d track you down.”
I make a mental note not to mention anything like this to Levi. He’d lose his fucking mind if he thought there was any possibility Aspen would bring the cops here.
I wonder if she’ll press me again for when the Wi-Fi will be fixed so she can stay in touch with the outside world.
But she doesn’t ask. Her mind has moved on to something else already.
“When I was lost in the maze, I was calling out for help, but I had this crazy idea that I didn’t exist in this world anymore so no one could hear me.” She shakes her head at herself. “It’s nuts, I know, but it made me wonder if it was possible.”
I arch my brow. “For us to exist on different planes of reality?”
“Like, what if there are multiple versions of this life happening all at the same time, only in other versions my sister never went missing, and so my mom is still alive. Or ones where my dad doesn’t get cancer and I’m not here now.”
“Anything is possible.”
She holds my gaze. “Do you mean that?”
I think for a moment. “Yeah, I do, but Pen, it doesn’t mean I would want you to be in one of those different worlds.
I know you’ve been through hell, and I couldn’t possibly understand, but right now I wouldn’t have wanted anything to happen any differently, because if it had, you wouldn’t be sitting here at this table with me right now. ”
The words escape my lips before I’ve really thought them through. How fucking selfish of me. That I’d be willing to put her through so much trauma just to bring her to me now. Does she see it that way, too? That I’m a complete asshole?
But she isn’t looking at me that way. Quite the opposite. She’s staring at me with tears shimmering in her light blue eyes, and she takes hold of my fingers and squeezes.
“Thank you, Blake. For everything, I mean. I don’t know what I’d be doing right now if it wasn’t for you.”
“Not getting lost in overgrown box mazes,” I only half-joke, trying to relieve the tension.
She cracks a smile. “Well, yes, but I still want you to understand how much I appreciate your support. You’ve given me a home, and family, when I no longer had one.”
I glance down at the table, where her poor, scratched hand still clutches mine.
I clear my throat and pull away, getting to my feet.
She’s gotten to me, and I don’t want her to see that.
I can’t afford to catch feelings for this girl.
When the snow starts to fall, she’ll be exposed to all the madness that takes over Windridge Hall.
“Anyway, I’m glad you’re okay,” I blurt, “but I really should get on.”
“Oh, of course.” She frowns slightly at my sudden change of demeanor.
I wrestle with my feelings. Should I send her away before anything can happen to her? Tell her that she’s no longer welcome here? I’d be doing it to save her, wouldn’t I?
But what then? Could she handle being sent away?
She’d get over it, eventually, wouldn’t she?
I could give her some money to make up for it.
But I get the feeling she doesn’t care about money.
All she wants is a home and people to love and to be able to create her art.
It’s not a lot to ask. But how will her feelings change when the snow falls and the truth about this place is revealed?
Will she wish I’d taken the opportunity to send her away when I could?