Experiment in Terror 06 Into the Hollow (10 page)

I smiled shyly, glad I put some effort into my appearance that morning and looked at the clock on the wall. “It’s after noon, is that allowed?”

He grinned and grabbed a jug. “You seem like a girl who makes her own rules, so sure why not. What will it be?”

I picked an amber ale, even though I really hadn’t planned on drinking half a liter of beer before my gynecologist appointment. Oh well, it felt good to be out and meeting the neighbors.

“I haven’t seen you around before,” he said as he pulled back on the tap, keeping his eyes on me yet somehow not spilling a drop.

“I just moved to the city,” I told him, fidgeting with my plaid scarf.

“Where did you move from?”

“Portland.”

“Well, welcome to Seattle.” He put down the jug and wiped his hand on a dishtowel. He held it out for me with a big, dimple-inducing smile. “I’m Paul.”

I shook his hand. “Perry.”

“Pretty name for a pretty girl,” he said, and cranked a cap on the beer bottle. “Hope you enjoy the beer. If you do, come back here and let me know. I could take you to the brewery where they make these puppies.”

“Speaking of puppies,” a voice called out from behind us.

I whirled around to see Dex had strolled in the store. My palms immediately felt sweaty.

“Hey Dex,” Paul greeted him casually.

“Hey,” he said, his eyes narrowing on him for a split second. Then he brought them to me. “I was just going to get the car from the shop when I saw my poor dog tied outside, looking like he just ran a marathon.”

“Sorry,” I said, looking for my wallet. “I ended up talking to my parents. Took longer than I thought.”

“And getting beer,” he remarked. He smiled at Paul. “She’s a troublemaker, this one.”

Paul looked between us both as he placed the jug on the counter. “You know Perry?”

I could have sworn Dex winced. “Yes, I know Perry. And it seems like you know Perry now too. She just moved in with me.”

Paul’s face reddened. “Oh, I’m sorry, I-”

“I’m his new roommate,” I said quickly.

“She’s my partner,” said Dex.

“Work partner,” I clarified to Paul with a smile.

“But we live together,” Dex shot back.

I tried not to glare at him. “For now.”

“Right,” said Paul in that
I’m going to back away slowly
kind of voice. “Well, Dex. Here’s your beer, uh, Perry. It’s on the house. A welcome to Seattle thing.”

“Thank you, that’s mighty kind,” Dex said with a slight bow and plucked the beer off the counter and headed out the door.

I shot Paul an apologetic look and ran after Dex, out of the store and onto the frigid street.

“Hey,” I said, pulling on his coat for him to stop.

He turned and cocked his head. “Yes?”

“What was that about?”

“What? Oh right, here’s your beer.”

Dex shoved the cold jug into my hands. Then he undid Fat Rabbit’s leash and handed that to me too.

“No,” I said, trying to juggle the items. “The cockblocking.”

He burst out laughing, his brows raised as he looked at me. “Cockblocking? What? You have a cock now?”

I stamped my foot. “No, Paul. He was flirting with me and you totally shot him down.”

His chin lowered and pulled back against his neck. “I don’t even know what you’re talking about. You were just chatting, from what I saw.”

“He was flirting and you know it. You wanted to make it look like we were together.”

“Why would I do a thing like that?”

“Because you’re a jerk.” I said the first thing that came to mind.

He looked around him, as if for backup. “Wow. Maybe we should add a no name-calling clause to the house rules.”

“Enough with the damn rules already.”

“Hey,” he growled, coming right up to me, chest against mine. “If it weren’t for those damn rules, we’d already be having dirty sex all over that apartment.”

Whoa.
Whoa.

Either it was the words “dirty sex” or the way he was looking down at me so intensely, or the fact that he might have been telling the truth or how damn confident he sounded, I was stunned and at a loss for words. My cheeks immediately flushed.

He kept his shining, dark eyes on mine until I had to look away, while my brain struggled to come up with something other than playing images of us having dirty sex together.

“That’s right,” he continued, voice low and velvet smooth. “
You
know it’s true. I’m not saying I agree with the rules though, but you know, you started them.”

I cleared my throat, finding my footing. “And I’m glad I did. Man, you are way too confident for someone who keeps getting shot down.”

His eyes widened humorously. “Shot down? And who’s doing the shooting, you?”

I opened my mouth then realized how egotistical I would have sounded.

“No, you’re not shooting me down, kiddo,” Dex went on. “Because I’m not really trying. When I do try, you’ll know it. And then you’ll throw the whole damn rulebook out the window.”

He flashed me a smile and then turned and strolled down the street with wide, powerful strides. I watched him go, my brain still on the fritz, until Fat Rabbit started anxiously pulling at the collar. In a daze that made my heart feel like it was on spin cycle, I let the dog lead me across the street and back home.

CHAPTER SEVEN

The days leading up to our trip North went by quickly. Which was both a good and bad thing. Ever since our altercation and sexual threats outside the convenience store things were kind of strained between us. Well, they were to me. Dex seemed completely fine and at ease, despite dropping some suggestive comments here and there. They never went further than that, which meant Dex wasn’t really trying and just teasing instead. I could live with that…for now.

Of course, I felt a lot better now that I had the IUD inside me. Not that I got it because of Dex, because really, I didn’t, but it was nice knowing it was there for protection in case something happened. I couldn’t go down that road again and I had to play it safe.

Rebecca was so sweet to take me and I apologized profusely to her, feeling bad for dismissing her problems and for ragging on Dex so much. She understood, cuz she’s made of awesome, and I made a promise to myself not to put him down when I was around her. Besides, the longer I was living with him, the more I was warming up to him. Maybe not my heart - I liked to keep that in the deep freezer - but definitely my body. Sleeping in the room next to him, hearing him in the shower, sneaking around for moments with his shirt off just so I could get a glimpse of what his tattoo was (regrettably, he’s remained clothed around me) was making me a bit crazy and my libido was off the charts. I couldn’t even masturbate without fearing I’d cry out his name and scare the damn dog.

Hence why the IUD seemed smarter with every waking second.

We had to rise early on the day we left for the shoot since the drive to the town of Snow Crest, BC, was at least eight hours away. We were still in Washington, just passing the snow-covered town of Ellensburg, when I noticed Dex’s eyes weren’t quite on the road but on my chest.

I sunk back into my seat a bit and lowered my scarf over my V-neck. “Can I help you?”

He grinned and popped a piece of gum in his mouth. For once, it wasn’t Nicorette.

“Just wondering why your breasts are on display when we’re heading up to the Canadian Rockies at the end of winter. That’s all.”

I grunted and pulled my cardigan around me. “I’m running out of clothes. This was the only clean shirt left.”

“You know we could make a clothing optional rule around each other. That way we’d always be naked and never have to do laundry.”

The way he said it made me shift in my seat uncomfortably.

“All right, Dex, quit it. You’re beating a dead horse.”

“I’m beating something horse-sized, that’s for sure.”

I shot him an unimpressed look. “Do you really think you’ll win me over by having sex with me?”

He scratched at the side of his chin. “Well, they say the way to a woman’s heart is through her vagina.”

I almost laughed and stopped myself just in time. I shook my head instead and looked out the window at the rolling white, treeless hills. I thought that now that we were on our way to do the show, he would have simmered down a bit and gotten distracted by the Sasquatch project, but that didn’t seem to be the case. It made me wonder if perhaps he needed to up his meds, perhaps down some Ritalin. Maybe I needed that too.

“I forget, are you going to get hassled for bringing your medication across the border?” I asked, having a hard time remembering if we got hassled the last time we went to BC.

“What medication?” he asked.

I had to look at him. He was looking back at me with an open expression.

“Your medication…you know. The…”

“The pills you switched on me without telling me?” he filled in. His voice had a flinty edge to it which made me cringe internally.

“Uh, yeah those.”

“I’m not on medication anymore, kiddo. I quit the day you left. And I never looked back.”

I was dumbstruck. And impressed. “But…the ghosts. Haven’t they come back?”

He shrugged and sucked on his lip before speaking. “Sometimes they do. They did at first. The first month was the roughest. But things have been fine since. I think maybe all the working out has been helping too, somehow. Maybe it’s a body-mind thing.”

Shit. I had seen Dex on withdrawal from his meds. He was making it sound easy but I couldn’t imagine how he must have been after I left, to go through all of that on his own, with only friends who didn’t really understand the way I did. No wonder he never came after me right away. He was probably too afraid to leave the house.

I looked down at my hands, feeling small. The guilt over the pill-switching was swarming over me with hot flashes.

“I’m OK,” he said after he shot me a reassuring look. “I feel great. If you can believe it, my sex drive is much higher now.”

“What a surprise,” I muttered softly. I raised my eyes to meet him. “Listen, I’m so sorry about the pill-switching, I didn’t know what I was doing, I-”

“Perry, it’s all right.”

“No, it’s not. That was a terrible thing for me to do. I totally broke your trust.”

“Yeah, you did,” he sniped, eyes flashing. A beat later he relaxed. “But I understand too. I know why you did it. It didn’t mean I wasn’t angry as all hell but I know why. I’m over it. Remember, like you said, it’s in the past. It’s done.”

I squinted at him. “You’re really not mad?”

He smiled, his eyes soft. “Do I look mad?”

I shook my head, hoping he’d always look like that to me. Open and trusting in ways I could never be.

We sat in silence for a few moments, lost in our thoughts.

“We are really fucked up,” I finally remarked.

“Yeah, kiddo, we are. Now come on, let’s go hunt Sasquatch.”

~~~

The drive to the small town of Snow Crest took most of the day, passing through the dry, arid landscapes of Eastern Washington and the panhandle of Idaho before we reached the winding, snow-capped peaks of the Canadian Rockies. By the time we got to our vintage motel with its antler-motif and mint-green coloring scheme, it was dark out and I was an unfortunate combination of feeling cagey and hungry.

Compared to all the other times Dex and I had gone “hunting” for our show, I was completely at ease. I wasn’t nervous. I didn’t feel any trepidation about our subject. This so-called Sasquatch would be the perfect way to sink back into Experiment in Terror and there was practically no research to be done. What could really be said about the beast that didn’t exist?

Dex, on the other hand, seemed a bit more serious about the whole ordeal and was pensive for a lot of the car ride, making only the occasional small talk and changing songs on the mp3 player. Maybe it was because he was going to be on camera for once.

There just wasn’t all that much to go on. A man called Rigby Adams ran an outfitters company out of the mountains surrounding Snow Crest, taking tourists out on week-long hiking expeditions. Sometimes on horseback, but recently with llamas, who handled all the gear as people towed them along. He also ran hunting trips on the side. According to Jimmy, he’d always been seeing glimpses of this supposed creature in the woods and had evidence of the extra-large footprints it left behind. The reports had made the local news and attracted some explorers over the winter but nothing had turned up. That was until last week, when a member of his staff, a woman named Christina, was reportedly attacked by the creature and needed to get treatment for lacerations to her leg.

Christina was better now and would be meeting Dex and I for breakfast in the morning. The thought of it made my stomach rumble as we checked into the motel, the mountain air chilling me to my core. Even though we were in a bastion of civilization, the sky was black against the ghostly white peaks, looking faded in the darkness like old photographs.

Inside, the motel clerk was a smiling woman with a ton of turquoise jewelry around her neck and wild grey hair.

“Here are your keys.” She passed them over the counter to Dex, who gave her a wink of thanks.

As we walked toward our rooms, my fingers growing numb from the cold, I had to remark, “I’m surprised you got me my own room.”

“Well, you’re right next door to me, as usual. Wouldn’t want to break any of the rules, even on vacation.”

My room was, in fact, right next to his and even had one of those locked doors that joined the rooms from the inside. I had just put my bag on the ground and tested the bed for firmness when there was an abrupt rap at the inner door, making my heart jump.

I got up and stood anxiously beside it.

“Who is it?” I asked teasingly.

“Bigfoot,” Dex answered from his room.

“What do you want, Mr. Foot?”

“Please, just call me Big.”

I snorted. “You wish.”

“You
know
.”

I really didn’t need to picture his dick at that moment.

“Dex?” I prodded.