Dorian’s lips thin. “You could say that.”
I shrug. “I don’t know. I liked Poe. I liked his unwavering, obsessive love. He knew it would ruin everything—hisrelationship with his family and his brother. But he did it. For Quinn.”
He winces. “Be careful about the toxic men you romanticize.”
“Why? Because I might end up in the back of a van?”
“Something like that.”
“Look, Shawn was…Chernobyl level toxic. He made me feel like there was something wrong with me. Like I had toearnhis affection. Poe was the complete opposite of that. I wanted the fantasy of a man who couldn’t stand to be without me for a second, even if beingwithme was painful. Does any of that make sense?”
He goes quiet. There’s a weight to our silence now.
Did I say something wrong?
“Stay here,” he says. “I’m going to wrap your book, and then we can go meet up with your friends.”
“Okay.”
He leaves for the other room without another word.Weird.I shake it off, turning my attention to the shop. I’ve got a whole bookstore to myself. It’s like being inside a museum after hours; a sacred space, now mine to explore.
I let myself wander. I know all bookstores have, basically, the same layout, but I’m getting a weird sense of déjà vu from this one. Like I’ve been here before. The whole bookstore is horror-themed. The horror section takes up the most space, spines of dark and red checkering the shelves. Dorian’s décor seems to have been outsources mainly from Spirit—plastic skulls and oversized spiders.
“Do you only sell horror?” I call out.
Dorian’s voice replies back from…somewhere deep in the shelves. “Mostly horror,” he corrects. “I do sell other genres. Reluctantly.”
I find a shelf labeled “Til Death do Us Part.” Ah. This must be his romance section. My suspicions are confirmed by Dorian’s choice in decoration. There’s a copy ofDamaged Heartspinned to the shelf with a knife sticking out of the book.
I chuckle. I touch the hilt of the knife.How dramatic.
A black cat—which I’d assumed was one of his decorations—stirs to lifein the shelf. She leaps off the shelf, startling me. I bump into the display, knockingDamaged Heartsfrom its spot.
“Whoops…”
I pick up the book. The knife is a prop, but the slice in the book is real, the pages torn through. It flutters open when I try to re-position the display, and I notice something odd.
There’s a signature on the front page. I recognize it from my own signed copy. It looks like Quinn’s handwriting. It just says:I’m sorry.
Why would she be sorry…?
Unless…?
I get a strange, creeping feeling. The black cat knocks her head against my legs. She stretches, her paws extending forward, and looks up at me, single snaggletooth curving upwards towards her nose.
I scratch the top of her head. I feel like I even know this cat.The cat’s name is Behemoth, I think to myself.
She meows at me and twitches her ears. I glance at her collar. The tag reads:Behemoth.
My heart is pounding.Pounding.
Dorian comes back. The book is tightly wrapped in nice, crisp wrapping paper. He sets it on the table in front of me with a heavy thud.
“Merry Christmas. Don’t say I never did anything for you.”
But I’m staring at him. Really, genuinely looking at him. Passages from the novel come back to me, flashing through my head.
I gripped Poe’s hips, feeling the bones underneath sharply against my palms.
