Page 28 of The Woman with the Handcuffs

I opened, let her slip in the fork, and nipped the noodles out, my gaze on hers.

Sure, I could have reminded her she could free one of my hands and I could feed myself. I didn’t do that right then, though. And I decided I could go ahead and analyze that later. Right then, some part of me was enjoying the attention for some reason.

It made even less sense when you knew I was one of those people who got nauseated when I saw someone feeding another person when they were capable of feeding themselves. Or when couples sat on the same side of the booth. Or made out in public. Wore matching outfits. Used cutesy nicknames. Had couple social media accounts.

Basically, I was the exact opposite of a hopeless romantic.

Did I like it in my books? In years or decades-long yearning, in long looks and barely-there touches, in grand gestures and romantic declarations? Sure. I wasn’t a fucking robot. But the real-life shit? That just wasn’t for me.

So, no, I shouldn’t have enjoyed being fed.

But here we were.

It didn’t help that Caitlin flushed and tucked her hair behind her ear when I gave her too much eye contact while it happened.

It wasn’t long before the lo mein was half gone, as was the sweet and sour chicken. Which she plunged into the sauce with reckless fucking abandon.

When she was full, she put the cartons into the fridge and came back with two glasses of water. When she held mine to my lips to sip, she watched my throat as I swallowed. Then swallowed hard herself.

Seeming to sense what was happening, she put the glass down hard, making herself jerk, then reached for her pharmacy bag, grabbed her bottle, and shook one pill into her hand before taking it.

“You should take the ibuprofen again for the swelling. Your fingers look a little fat. You don’t want to have to go back tomorrow to get them to cut it off when your fingers go blue.”

She looked down at her hand, sighed, then took her glass with her back to my bedroom.

Five minutes passed.

Ten.

Twenty.

I didn’t move, not yet. Maybe she was just having another panic attack. Or wanted a few minutes to try to shrug off the scared, anxious, in-pain version of her and adopt the abductor.

When nearly an hour passed without a single sound from that end of the apartment, though, I started to free myself.

Then I carefully made my way down the hallway, peeking around the corner of my room.

That’s exactly where I found her.

Passed out at the foot of my bed, her fucked-up wrist cradled carefully to her chest, her breathing deep and even.

I went to the head of the bed, pulling the comforter down and over her, lowered the light, then made my way out of the room.

I figured she was out for the long haul.

So I washed the forks and the coffee cups from earlier, then made a fresh pot and sat sipping it and reading one of my books while she slept.

But for maybe the first time in my life, I couldn’t get sucked into the story. I kept just staring at the page, rereading the same lines over and over without retaining anything.

I got up, went into my office to grab my phone, and checked to see if I had any messages or missed calls from my brother, who might have some insight on Caitlin’s father. But there was nothing except a text from one of the wives asking me to swing by for family dinner over the weekend.

Not having Zeno’s tech experience, I was useless when it came to figuring something out about Daniel.

Eventually, with nothing left to do, I made my way back to the kitchen, set myself up, then waited and waited and waited.

Eventually, I must have nodded off because something made me jerk awake.

And there she was.