Chapter 3

There are few things in life that are worth waking up to: sex, the dark spices of freshly brewed coffee, and bacon.

Sex didn’t wake me up.

I smacked my lips, rousing from my sleep with an eager stretch. The bacon smelled delicious and I couldn’t wait. I was starving.

Maybe it was the feel of the mattress, or the one hundred thread count on those sheets that tipped me off, but at some point in that dreamy state, I jolted awake. The sheets were battleship grey, but not my sheets.

Not my bed.

The décor gave off a very masculine feeling with its light grey walls—empty of decorative items except for a single photograph of two children standing in front of a cabin in the snow. The sun bled into the room, leaving a heavy veil of light across the bed.

I touched the long white T-shirt I was wearing that smelled like sunshine. Where the hell was I ?

Pulling myself out of the bed, I went into the adjacent bathroom and felt for the light switch. When it flipped on—I couldn’t believe it.

I didn’t recognize my own reflection. Inky hair spilled past my broad shoulders; green eyes the color of polished glass swallowed me up with their gaze.

So there I stood, for I couldn’t count how many minutes—staring, waiting—as if by some magical spell I would reappear or wake up.

But nothing happened.

I don’t know how long a person can hold their breath, but I couldn’t remember in that moment ever taking one. Sure enough, the hair was real—smooth and silky like a newborn. Was it possible I was dead and this was the afterlife? Maybe when I was running down that road I was a ghost escaping from my body.

Yet, how could I be a ghost? I could touch things, feel things, I even slipped on a red baseball cap I found on a hook by the wall and tucked in my hair. Ghosts can’t wear baseball caps.

Can they?

I continued staring at my eyes, waving my hand as if I would catch the figure in the mirror as an imposter. They were vibrant and intoxicating… yet strangely familiar.

“You’re awake.”

I jumped and gripped the sink with my left hand.

A male figure framed the door, flushed in the cheek. He was strikingly handsome; a strong, charismatic face lurked behind some of the unshaven stubble that shadowed the lines of his square jaw. His dark brown hair was a thick and luscious length, the kind you wanted to curl your fingers in. A heavy brow lowered with concern over his earthy brown eyes. I never saw a man who looked equally boyish and stern.

I looked down the length of his weathered jeans to his bare feet and his posture relaxed with a near hint of a smile.

Grabbing a pair of scissors, I held them out defensively. “Who are you?”

“Adam,” he politely replied.

I was three seconds from going batshit after catching my reflection again.

“You don’t have anything to be afraid of.”

It was the kind of thing you would idly say to someone. But it was the way he said it—the conviction in his tone told me that his words were a fact that no one should doubt.

“Take all the time you need. I have food ready when you’re hungry. This is my home and I brought you here, remember?”

“How come I’m not at a hospital?”

It was a stupid question because there was no trace of a wound on my neck.

“If you want me to take you, I will.” He closed the door without another word and left me to spend more quality time questioning my sanity.

The sound of my hands brushing along my arms caught the attention of the man standing in the kitchen by the sink. He shut the water off and turned around, wiping his large hands on a tiny white dishtowel.

“Sit. I’ll bring you a plate of food.”

He gestured to the oval table surrounded by flimsy chairs with metal legs. It reminded me of something I saw in an Ikea magazine once. The chairs were curiously small for a man of his size and stature. I wrapped my fingers around the back of one as I watched him set down a plate of sausages and toast.

“How long have I been here?”

“Three days.”

“What? That can’t be,” I whispered in disbelief.

A heavy finger wagged at my chair as he went back to pull something from the fridge. “Maybe you need to sit down and eat first.”

I eased into the chair, looking around at the small home. The kitchen was closed off with a row of cabinets that served as a divider between rooms. I faced the sink and stove, the fridge was farther to my left.

His approach was slow and calculated as he leaned forward to set a cold glass of juice on the table before taking the chair across from me. Our proximity was closer than I cared for, so I scooted back. The sausages captivated my attention, taunting me to take a bite, and he reached out, nudging them forward.

“Take all you want.”

“I bet you say that to all the girls,” I mumbled.

One sausage was devoured in roughly five ravenous chews and one giant swallow. He leaned forward on the table with his fingers laced together loosely and his head tilted. I didn’t feel threatened by his demeanor, but I was still on edge. While he took me in and fed me, I still knew nothing about this man named Adam. Our eyes met and he lowered his gaze to allow me privacy to eat. But I could see a smile play across his features as he considered what I said.

After three swallows of juice and another two sausage patties, I eased off when my stomach did a somersault. It was delicious going down, but I didn’t want it to come back up for an encore.

“How did I get clean?”

He bit the inside of his cheek. “I waited a day but you didn’t wake up; it wasn’t right to leave you like that.” He ruffled his fingers through his hair with a look of embarrassment before his eyes hardened. “Who were you running from?”

Before I could think of what to say, he continued with the interrogation.

“Whose blood was it?”

I touched my unscarred neck. “What do you mean whose was it?” I didn’t like the accusation, or the fact I couldn’t appropriately explain how it was mine and yet I had no injuries. “Why don’t we start with introductions before inquisitions? I’m Zoë Merrick.”

“Adam Razor.”

“I’ve been here the whole time?”

Adam scratched his chin and looked like he was considering whether or not it was a good idea. “I carried you here.”

Which as it happens was a fifteen-minute walk. I didn’t say anything about it, but that’s a long walk to have to carry someone in your arms.

“I assumed you slept because you were in shock. I didn’t find any injuries, so I didn’t call a doctor.”

Adam waited three days for me to wake up. On the second day he washed off the blood when something peculiar caught his eye. Adam described waves of movement beneath my skin and to the touch it burned, so he rushed to get a wet cloth from the bathroom. He admitted that he was very close to taking me to the hospital and I didn’t blame him. But after hearing the full story, I was relieved he hadn’t or else I might be in some government lab in Virginia being studied like a science monkey.

Adam had stepped out of the room for no more than twenty seconds. When he returned, my hair had changed from fire to coal. Over the course of twenty-four hours, he observed my body undergoing a gradual transformation.

Now of course, this was a little game of share and tell. Adam gave information in hopes that I would shed some light on where I came from and what happened. Honestly? How the hell do you explain to someone you were murdered and yet you aren’t dead? I couldn’t even explain it to myself. So instead, I said nothing. Adam was no idiot and while he wanted the full story, he saw my unease at discussing it, so he didn’t press. I went into the living room and sat down on the leather sofa.

“Do you want to call anyone?”

“Who?” I frowned. “My voice isn’t even the same.” I pushed up a brow in thought before tucking a strand of hair behind my ear. “You don’t decorate much,” I observed.

Outside of a chair, which Adam sat in on my right, the only other things in the room were a television, coffee table, and a bag of birdseed in the adjacent sunroom.

“You know what I think? That you’re avoiding the topic.”

I straightened my back and peered at him through my lashes.

“Do you live alone?” I asked, ignoring his statement.

“Mmhmm.”

“How long have you been out here? It’s kind of… country.” My eyes focused on the woods only a few feet from outside of the windows.

“Two years. And there’s nothing wrong with country.”

I snapped my head around. By the looks of things, I would have thought he moved in a few months ago. Talk about the basic necessities.

“I don’t need much. Do you want me to drive you home?” His eyes narrowed a fraction, waiting for my answer.

I couldn’t go home. He might be there. Whoever he was. I didn’t have my keys and I couldn’t even go to Sunny for help because she would think I was some crazy lunatic pretending to be her friend.

A friend she thought was missing or dead. I scratched my wrist nervously and bit my lip.

Adam disappeared into the bedroom for a few seconds before returning. “I’m afraid that’s all I’ve got that’ll fit.” A pair of sweats landed on my lap and Adam ran a distracted finger over the top of the leather chair. “What I’ll do is go pick up a few things for you and you’ll stay with me. I can’t have you wandering around in my trousers; people will talk.”

I smiled with gratitude at his humor.

“You would do that?”

“I’ll be back,” he said, twirling a set of keys in his fingers as he went toward the door. I didn’t feel like going on a shopping spree, but I also didn’t feel like being left alone.

“Wait, I’ll go too!”

I shot up out of my seat and rushed forward when my legs wobbled. Adam cleared five feet of space between us in a heartbeat as he reached out and caught my fall. When I stood upright and backed away from him, something didn’t make sense. My legs felt strange and clumsy.

“How tall are you?”

“What?” Adam’s face crinkled.

“How tall are you?” I repeated.

“Six foot two.”

“Can’t be,” I whispered to myself. I remembered in the field how much taller than me he seemed; I might have measured up to his shoulders.

Adam stood motionless as I moved closer; our bodies were just fingertips apart. A smile crept across my face as I leaned forward and bumped his chin with my nose.

“You need a shave.” I smiled. I moved in closer to be sure of the height, sliding the edge of my foot against his.

There’s no way I’d measure up against a guy over six feet tall. I just couldn’t believe something like this was possible; wouldn’t my bones hurt from growing? On the upside, I didn’t need to worry about wearing heels anymore. My eyes centered on his parted mouth and I wondered what my transformation looked like.

His hand slipped around my waist, barely touching—but it was there.

Adam’s breath grazed my cheek with an unsteady rhythm. Our bodies didn’t touch, but it was as if I could feel his energy in the unmistakable friction of heat that was swelling between us. I became dizzy from it. His fingers brushed through that soft, short brown hair that had a slight wave, and he blew out a breath, stepping back.

“I’m sorry.”

“Okay, so we got our first awkward moment out of the way.” To say the least .

“I’m not so sure that was our first.” His fingers worked at tucking his shirt into his jeans and I noticed that men shouldn’t look that good in something so casual.

“It seems like it’s not just my looks, but I’m also taller than I was before.”

His gaze dropped to the pile of sweats on the floor. “Get dressed if you want to go.” He turned around and I slid my legs one at a time into the sweats, pulling the string tight.

I snorted as I grabbed the sides of the pants, pulling them wide.

“I’ve got a pair of Bermuda shorts in there somewhere, if you’d rather.” His beguiling eyebrows rose as he peered over his shoulder.

“I think these will strip enough dignity from me, don’t you think?”

“Spandex?”

“Okay, this conversation is officially straying into the ‘things I really don’t want to know about Adam’ territory.”

Adam’s grin was broad and handsome with a subtle tilt of the chin, and I felt a prick of heat flush my cheeks. Adam didn’t smile with teeth; he gave a sexy pressed-lip smile that crinkled his eyes in a provocative and yet charming way.

I walked past him toward the door. “Let’s go, Razor.”

“Adam,” he corrected.

Adam may have had smoldering good looks, but he gave me the impression he was normally a very serious guy. Too serious, if you ask me.

“I’m calling you Razor.”

“Why’s that?” I heard the sound of his hand rubbing against the back of his neck before I noticed he was doing it.

“You’re sharp, you can figure it out.” He groaned at my pun and despite how bad it was I delighted in every bit of it. I needed a moment to feel normal again.

***

We bobbled down the dark road in Adam’s beat-up Land Rover, circa 1980, that looked like it had been driven straight to Egypt and back—without a car wash, at that. Strange noises rattled from the engine whenever the car rolled to a stop.

“Are you sure there’s not a squirrel in there?”

“I might say the same about your hair,” he teased in the dark interior. My smile faded as I touched my tangled strands and his hand fell across my shoulder.

“Sorry, I can be a mean bastard.”

After a minute, he cleared his throat and turned into the parking lot. “I only use the car for long trips; otherwise I foot it out here. Everything a man needs is within walking distance and I prefer the exercise.”

The engine shut off and a tapping noise from beneath the hood filled the silence.

“You see? Her heart still beats for only me.”

I smiled and shifted my gaze out the window. Just as my fingertips touched the handle of the door, something in the darkness just beyond the parking lot moved. The hairs on my arms rose and it felt like waves of electricity were caressing me. I had never felt anything quite like it before. But just as quick as I felt it, the feeling suddenly disappeared.

“Something’s wrong,” Adam noticed. Not a question, but a statement.

“No, I just got a chill.”

Adam shifted in my direction with his left hand pressed against the dash. “Bullshit. Tell me what’s wrong.” His eyes flicked out toward the bus stop. “Did you see something?”

Shaking my head, I pushed him back and relaxed my voice. “I changed my mind about going inside. I just wanted to… well I didn’t want to be left alone in your house. I’m not fit to be seen in public. All I need is a toothbrush and—”

“I’m on it. Keep the doors locked.”

Before I could finish, he was breezing through the automatic doors.

I didn’t know Adam, but I liked the feeling that he wanted to protect me. I never had siblings and always wished that I had an older brother. I wanted someone to look after me and approve of my boyfriends, beating them up if they were jerks. I used to hear Sunny roll her eyes when she spoke of the car trips she took with her brother, Kane. How he would pinch her relentlessly until she’d cry out and then she would get the spanking. She called childhood “survival of the fittest.” Sunny would say I was lucky that I didn’t have to grow up with a sibling.

But was I? I didn’t feel lucky. I wanted to have someone I could always count on to look out for me. Maybe if I did, I wouldn’t have gotten in so much trouble with Brandon. I only had my mom and she wasn’t the most loving woman. Sometimes I wondered if she just feared losing me and being left all alone.

Ten minutes later, Adam reappeared with bags in tow. I couldn’t help but notice the odd way in which he looked around the parking lot, as if he were constantly on patrol.

“Here,” he said, handing me a smaller bag.

My hands pulled the edges apart to reveal a large chocolate bar in colorful wrapping.

“Oh… you didn’t have to.”

The key slid in the ignition, but he paused before turning it. “You don’t like chocolate?”

I loved chocolate—but his thoughtfulness caught me off guard. “Thanks. I promise I’m going to pay you back for everything.”

“The only payment I’ll accept are answers. Let me know when you’re ready to close out that tab.”

I bit my lip and remained quiet for the trip back. I wasn’t ready to give answers and Adam felt that he was owed them. Maybe he was right.

He had bought a couple of T-shirts, shorts, tank tops, razors, and other odds and ends that I needed. But the price of truth was high. That truth could get me wrapped up in a snug straightjacket.

I claimed the sofa, tossing the bags beside me and crossing my ankles. I felt pitiful, like a lost dog.

Adam eased into his armchair with a bottle of Heineken. “So, what’s your plan?”

He lifted the bottle and took a long sip as my eyes watched the slow movement of his Adam’s apple. The light reflected on the green bottle, imitating the hue of my new eye color. Adam’s lips hovered on the mouth of the bottle as he noticed me noticing him. A tongue swept across and licked them, snapping me out of my haze.

“I’ve thought about it and I don’t have a clue what to do.”

His finger tapped on the bottle as he wedged it between his thighs. “Is there anyone you could call, someone you trust who would believe you?”

“I don’t even believe me.”

“You need money. Without access to your apartment or family, what do you think you can do?”

“Why don’t I just strip for a living, I bet I could wrap these legs around one of those poles pretty good. I doubt they’d ask for my Social Security number.”

“Is that what you want to do, prostitute yourself?” he snapped. I looked up and there was no humor in his face, but a fire lit behind those eyes.

“Kidding, only kidding. I can’t go back to my life anymore. I can’t risk talking about what happened because they’d lock me up in the funny farm.”

“I don’t think you need to worry about that,” he said. “You have to be funny in order to get in.” He took another swig and I realized that Adam had a funny bone after all.

“I just wish I could see Max again.”

“Max?” Adam’s thumbnail scraped the glass bottle as he shifted in his seat. There was an edge in his tone, and a muscle in his jaw ticked. “Your boyfriend?”

“I don’t have a boyfriend.” Nodding at his bottle I asked, “Can I get one of those?”

Perhaps there was none left or he was too tired to get up, so he leaned forward and handed me his.

I took a swig, hoping to drown some of the depression that was settling in my bones. How do you start from square fucking one? Another swallow sent an army of happy bubbles sailing down my throat and I felt miles better.

Relaxed.

“Zoë?”

“What? Sorry, I didn’t hear you.”

Adam rose to his feet, hiking up his jeans a little. I admired his arms as his fingers locked over his head. It wasn’t until they were on display that I could appreciate how beautifully toned they were. And he lived out here alone? It just didn’t make sense. Adam had the kind of body and seductive casualness about him that was extremely attractive. Guys like him I’d met before, and they were always married. I tried to put my finger on what it was—he didn’t have model beauty—but it was charisma. Yeah, that’s the word.

“You want to go to bed?”

I blinked and my heart did a quick ricochet.

Adam chuckled in a deep voice and dropped his arms as if he knew where my mind went. “Christ, Zoë, that’s not what I meant. It’s too late for planning; we’ll talk about visiting your apartment another night. Until we have some answers, you need to lay low. Tell me, who is after you?”

I looked away sheepishly because not telling felt very close to lying. I didn’t like to lie.

“I won’t be able to help you until I know the truth of it.”

Adam had no intention of letting me crash here for a couple of days. He wasn’t even inviting me to stay longer… he was planning on it.

I set the beer on the table and curled up on my side, tucking my arms beneath my head.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Adam’s voice boomed.

Being it was the first time I ever heard him raise his voice that way, I was startled. He intimidated me in a way that propelled me right to my feet as I ran toward the back door.

“Whoa,” he said, holding his arms wide and moving in my direction. “Hey now, I didn’t mean to yell, I’m not… shit, you know I’m not going to hurt you.”

Still didn’t leave me with warm fuzzies, even if I knew I could trust him. He corralled me in against the door and stroked my arms softly. I was shocked by his sudden affection and froze. When I didn’t meet his glance, he lifted my chin with his knuckle.

When he spoke, there was poison on his tongue. “I don’t like men who hurt women.” His fingers weaved through my hair, cradling my head. “What I meant was that I’m not letting you sleep on the sofa.” Emphasis on “sofa,” as if it was a dirty word.

“I don’t care; I’m fine with it.” I gulped, swallowing down that last bit of panic that was doing a crazy dance on my nerves.

He snapped his fingers and pointed at the bedroom. “You bed, me sofa.” That simple phrase snapped the tension in the room and put me at ease. The smile helped, too.

“Nice to know you’re not entirely a caveman,” I said, staring at his bare feet.

“I’m not that prehistoric.”

“Fred Flintstone called and he wants his car back.”

I meant to be funny but it occurred to me I was being rude. Adam broke the awkward moment when he burst out laughing, and it was a rich, deep, and enjoyable laugh that had me smiling again.

“Don’t encourage me,” I said, pushing on his chest. “I know I haven’t gone about this the right way, but thanks—for everything.” My words were weighted and sincere.

Adam scratched the back of his neck, looking as if the gratitude embarrassed him.

“Let’s call it a night.”