Page 62 of The Catalyst

He tilts his head again before saying, “Do you actually have a death wish?” I guess he’s done with that game.

I mimic his movements. “Are you hiding dead bodies in your room?”

His eyes widen. “What?”

“I thought we were playing Twenty Questions,” I joke. Seriously, if he gets to ask me a random question, why can’t I do the same?

“Hmm.” He rub his chin before muttering, “I’ll make you a deal. If you can beat me, I’ll answer your question, but every time I beat you, you have to answer one of mine.”

Beat him? “Beat you at what?” I swear, if he’s about to challenge me to an arm wrestle with his overpowering strength, I might just scream at him. That wouldn’t be fair at all. It’s not my fault he’s more jacked than Mike Tyson.

He looks around as if he’s taking inventory of everything before he stands up. He walks over to the TV stand before he grabs the massive vase that belonged to my grandmother. It may be big but the opening is tapered to about an inch in diameter.

I swear, if he tries to stick that somewhere it doesn’t belong, my deceased grandmother might just smite me.

“What are you doing with that?” I ask curiously.

He grabs my arm and pulls me off the ottoman before standing the vase on the surface.

What the hell is he doing?

He takes a few steps back before he reaches into his pocket and pulls out the elusive silver coin he rolled over his fingers during that trip to kidnap Tanner Vaughn.

He rolls it over his knuckles before he throws it, tossing it into the narrow opening of the vase, almost as if the move took zero concentration.

Ollie walks back over to the vase and dumps out the coin onto the ottoman before taking it back in his hand. He puts the vase back in its spot before he turns to me.

“You score, you ask me a question. I score, I askyoua question. Deal?”

Okay. This is a much fairer game to play than arm wrestling. It’s a little quirky, but I’m not opposed to it.

I take the coin from his hand before I toss it toward the vase. Luck must be on my side because it lands directly in the pot.

“Well?” I press as I turn to him, a victorious grin playing on my lips.

He rolls his eyes. “No. I donothave dead bodies in my bedroom. You would smell them if I did.”

I cross my arms over my chest. “Then, why are you so damn secretive about your room?” I ask but he shakes his head.

“One score permits one question, princess.”

He retrieves the coin as I groan in frustration. Clearly, we both have a lot of questions about each other or he probably wouldn’t have even thought up this little coin toss. I understand the different ways he is mysterious to me, but I’m a pretty open book. I can’t be that way to him, could I?

Ollie sets back up the vase and takes up the space I had before he tosses the coin directly into the vase.

“Answer anytime,” he mutters.

I scoff. “No.”

His eyes widen. “No?”

“No, I don’t have a death wish. Why would you think that?” His thought process is quite strange.

I’ve never been suicidal or had any reason to want to discover what happens when we die.

“Toss again and find out.”

Ass.

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