ThenormalRex.
But then he goes quiet again. Long enough that I think I've lost him to whatever dark place he goes when the walls slam back down.
"You're going thirty."
His voice is flat. Stripped of everything. But he said it, which means he's here, in this car, on this road, noticing the speedometer instead of whatever terrible memories are playing behind his eyes.
"I know," I say.
"Limit's forty-five. You don't have to gothirty."
"I know that too."
He doesn't push it. Just sits there, one hand resting on his thigh instead of gripping it, watching the fog curl between the trees.
It's not much.
But his breathing has evened out, and his shoulders have come down from his ears, and when I take the next curve he doesn't brace against the door.
"Ireallydon't know why I told you that," he mutters again, quieter this time. Like he's still turning it over. Trying to find the angle, the trap, the reason. Because Rex doesn't do anything without a reason, and the idea that he might have said it simply because he wanted to must be fucking terrifying for him.
"Okay," I say.
He looks at me. "That's it?Okay?"
"What do you want me to say, Rex?"
He opens his mouth. Closes it. His jaw works beneath the mask and he turns back to the windshield.
"Nothing," he says. "I don't want you to say anything."
"Good. Because I wasn't going to. I'm happy we'rebonding."
His visible eye narrows.
I shoot him a grin. "Best friends." I pat his arm.
"Eyes on the road," he growls.
"See? Progress."
"What do you fucking mean,progress?"
"You're letting me touch you. Like a feral cat."
He rolls his eye, but he makes the faintest huff sound. Close enough to a laugh that it gives me the freaking butterflies because I'm losing my damn mind. I'd miss it if I wasn't listening for it, and I'm always listening for it, which is a problem I'll deal with another day.
We drive the rest of the way in silence. But it's a different silence than the one we started with. Lighter, somehow. Like something that had been held too tight finally loosened its grip, just enough to let the blood flow back in.
The stone tower materializes through the fog. I park in the muddy clearing, kill the engine, and look at Rex.
He's staring straight ahead. That hollow look is creeping in around the edges again. The one that means he's already projecting forward to tonight, to the stunt, to the moment when his mask comes off in front of people and he has to trust that the prosthetic underneath will hold.
"You coming in?" I ask.
"No."
I expected that. But I didn't expect his usual flat tone to be totally devoid of even a drop of venom. It was short and brusque, but not as short and brusque as it could've been.