in the same prone position in which he left me when he unlocks the door, yawning into the back of his hand.
“You’re up early,” he remarks.
I have to pee badly, but a pressing new issue has arisen. “Why is there a lock on my door?”
He runs his fingers through his hair. It’s sticking up on one side, flat on the other. If I hadn’t just learned he was nuts, I’d think it was cute.
“It’s to keep you inside,” he says. “So you can’t come out in the middle of the night and maim me.”
I try not to look scheming. “Where did you sleep?”
I use the guest room for my shrine, and since I never have guests, I didn’t bother getting a pull-out couch. The one I have is more for appearances than comfort.
“On the floor in front of your door,” he says. “Curled up like a dog.”
“Good.”
“I slept on the couch, like a normal person.”
“Don’t get ahead of yourself.”
“It’s good to see you’ve maintained your sense of humor.”
“And men. I have to pee. Hurry up and uncuff me.”
He pulls the key from his pocket and reaches for the headboard. “Don’t try anything.”
I don’t. My bladder is screeching, and the worst I could do right now is pee on his foot. I get up and start for the en suite, but he stops me.
“Use the one in the hall.”
“What? Why? My stuff is in this one.”
“Exactly.”
I don’t keep weapons in the bathroom, and my motives here are purely sanitary, so I proceed down the hall, Chris’s fingers looped lightly around my cuffed wrist. I stop in shock when I see that the doorknob is missing from the bathroom door.
“Where the fuck is the knob?”
“Jesus, Reese. Language. It’s not even seven.”
“Where’s the doorknob?!”
“It’s gone, obviously. In you go.” He nudges the small of my back, and I stumble into the bathroom, wincing at the too-bright light. I hardly ever come in here, but I know there was hand soap and a roll of toilet paper. Now there’s just a folded wad of paper on the edge of the counter. Even the toilet paper holder is missing. I wouldn’t know how to kill someone with a three-inch plastic spring, but I’m bitter to learn that the option has been taken away.
“Are you going to listen while I pee?” I ask, eyeballing the hole in the door.
“Yep.” He leans against the wall on the opposite side of the hall. “I get off on it.”
“I wouldn’t be surprised.”
He winks.
I stomp inside and shut the door, which makes very little difference since the two-inch hole removes any illusion of privacy. I turn the cold water tap all the way up and do my business, washing my hands and drying them with the small towel Chris was kind enough to leave behind. How many people has he held prisoner before? And where are they now?
I stare at myself in the mirror, mascara smudged around my eyes, my face pale. I look like I normally do, and suddenly that’s a bad thing. That’s a girl nobody sees and who nobody’s supposed to see. It’s a girl nobody will miss.
Chris pushes open the door. “Come have breakfast. You’ll need your energy.”
“I don’t eat breakfast.”
“Then starve.” He herds me down the hall and cuffs me to the chair again, then rounds the island into the kitchen and opens the refrigerator. He’d seen it last night when he put away the food, but now that he’s hungry, it finally dawns on him that my cupboards are bare.
“Why don’t you have any food?”
“I don’t cook a lot.”
“But it’s empty.”
“Well, I wasn’t expecting a hostage situation.”
He shoots a vexed look over his shoulder. “I told you my story,” he says. “Why don’t you tell me yours?” He snags the remaining half of last night’s bread, hunts for butter, finds none, and aims another irritated glare my way.
“Sure,” I say. “One night I was driving home from visiting my father in prison, and I met this guy on the side of the road. He’d staged the whole thing like a stalker, and I fucked him because I didn’t care enough about myself not to. Fortunately, he cared enough to continue stalking me, and now I’m held hostage in my own apartment.”
“It’s not stalking. It’s investigating.”
“It’s delusional. You’re a criminal.”
“So are you.”
“Am not.”
“Are too.”
He takes the seat opposite and cuts off slices of bread. There was an old jar of jam in the cupboard, and he smears two pieces and passes me one. I said