Page 47 of The Butcher

“Indy?” The soft knock raps against the door again. “Uhm.. It’s Nash.”

I roll my eyes as I get ready to let him in but pause when I see a smile break out on my face, a real one that’s become more and more involuntary lately. Genuine, but involuntary.

Maybe I do need to look up Stockholm Syndrome.

I asked Mona what it was after Clayton mumbled something about it a few days ago, something about how that’ll be the only way for this to work, whatever that meant, but she said I didn’t need to worry about that. Not with fate in my corner, or something else ominous the adorable old woman said. I’m starting to wonder if I shouldn’t look it up, though, because I felt like Clay was applying it to me, and I need to know why. Especially if it somehow holds any weight over whether or not I can keep staying here.

Sure, I don’t have anywhere else to go, but I really care for Mona, and I’ve found myself itching to spend more time with Clayton and Nash the second they leave me alone for the night.

“Look, Indy.” Nash clears his throat, the floor on the other side of the door creaking as he no doubt shifts back and forth on his feet. “If you changed your mind… If you don’t want to go into?—“

I spin from the mirror and practically run toward the door, grabbing the knob and twisting before I yank it open and make us both jump. “No.”

Nash blinks wide, grass green eyes, then frowns. “No, you don’t want to go into town?”

“No,” I say, a little out of breath as I shake my head. “No, I want to.”

“So, you do still want to go into town?” I nod as he scrubs a hand over his hair and blows out a breath. “You’re sure? Because I don’t want you to feel like you have to do this for some reason.”

“I don’t.”

He eyes me skeptically. “Clayton didn’t pressure you, did he?”

Nash has asked me that several times since I agreed to this, but Clay had nothing to do with it. They have horses, that’s honestly why I agreed to leave the house but I haven’t told either of them that because I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings.

Which, oddly enough, is a first for me.

I’ve been in some sort of fight or flight mode for so long, the only time I ever thought about someone other than my mother, was when I was worried about how their presence was going to affect me. What they were going to do to me, how I would end up feeling after they left. I felt like I couldn’t think about anyone other than myself for fear of letting my guard down long enough to get hurt.

Even with Scarlett.

She might be the only one I considered a friend up until now, and I can count on one hand the number of times I hugged her, but I wasn’t worried for her until the day they tried to kill me. Before that? Once she got pregnant, when they moved her away from me, I was more concerned about what that meant for me. If I didn’t think of myself, no one else would.

No one else did.

And I can’t remember a time when my fight or flight mode wasn’t active.

Since I woke up in this room, I haven’t felt that way once.

Restless, anxious, nervous, and a little scared, but not because I feel like any of the people I’ve met are going to hurt me. I should probably be concerned about how easily I accepted my new surroundings and the people in them, but that hasn’t really been something I want to get into, either.

If I start analyzing every little thing that’s different about being here, I won’t be able to accept it, and that means it would be a matter of time before I unraveled and somehow found my way back to the Harden’s hell hole. Not intentionally, but I’m not willing to jinx my situation by overthinking any of it, nor am I willing to switch into flight mode right now.

I’m away from the ranch, I’m safe, and I feel cared about for the first time since they took Mom from me. I like that this ismy new and current normal, and I don’t particularly want it to change any time soon.

“He didn’t,” I say as I take a deep breath. “Clay has barely brought it up since I agreed.”

Nash stares at me for a few moments, his eyes soft but definitely searching and when he seems to find what he was looking for, he pushes his glasses up his nose and nods. “Nan left a parka for you.”

He turns from the doorway and walks across the hallway to another, disappearing around the corner, and briefly out of view.

I smooth the front of my sweatshirt as I step into the threshold, stuffing my hands in the pocket and clasping them tightly behind the fleece.

This is the first time I’ve seen more than my room, or the narrow tunnel of vision created when the door is open.

Looking left, I see a window at the end of the hall, the dark curtains parted to let some of the morning sun through. To my right, the hallway seems to run almost the entire length of the house. There are two more openings like the one across from me, all three on that side of the hall, another three doors on the same side as my room, and a staircase at the end.

Everything is made of wood; dark, rich tones between the floor and the walls, and there are small, light fixtures running along the top that I know give off a relatively soft glow from when Mona visited at night.

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