The Cunning

31

Madison was curled up on the bed when Jase joined her upstairs. Every time she was uncomfortable, Jase noticed, she made herself smaller. As if she could disappear if she tried hard enough. He closed the door with a quiet click.

"That shouldn't have happened," he said.

Madison raised her head. The handprint was still glaringly bright. "You're not mad at me?" she replied.

Jase opened the bottles. "He shouldn't have hit you, even if you did something wrong." He handed her a drink and sat on the edge of the bed. Madison uncurled and shuffled to his side.

"What did you do?" she asked. Not long after she bolted upstairs, there was a smash.

"Don't worry about it," he mumbled.

"Are you going to get in trouble because of me?"

Jase scrunched his face up and laid on his back, hooking one arm beneath his head, his feet still on the floor.

"Who am I going to get in trouble with?"

"Benny?" she said.

There was a small upwards twist at the corners of his lips. "I won't get in trouble with Benny. He can't tell me off."

Madison lay on her side, facing him.

"If Benny can't tell you off... why don't you want me saying anything about the time I got out, or when you let me go in the alleyway?"

Jase studied her. She was still wired but was definitely on her way to a comedown. He licked his lower lip, conscious that he was also still on a high. Regardless of the substances they had been abusing all evening, there was no denying something about the night had shifted their dynamic. There was something between them that was more than a side effect of cocaine and alcohol. He looked back up at the ceiling.

"It was a sloppy mistake on my part," he replied. He didn't need to tell her that if she had reported them and been able to identify him, the whole house would have been at risk.

"You're human too," she said.

Jase smiled at her innocence. "Madison," he sighed, "I can't put everyone here on the line like that. I owe it to Benny to handle shit properly."

"Why do you owe Benny?" she asked with an incredulous edge. She was pushing her luck, asking so many questions, but neither of them felt like their normal selves. Usually, she would be digging for information but more than anything in that moment, she just wanted to have a conversation. She had learned more about him in the last half hour than the whole time she had been there. She'd seen a piece of who he could be, both the good and the bad.

"He took me in when I was eighteen, helped me get on my feet. Without this place, I'd have nothing," Jase replied. It struck Madison that Jase had a life before the house, before the drugs and girls. Maybe he hadn't exactly chosen this path for himself. Maybe he was pushed into it. She lifted her hand, removing a stray curl from his face.

"What happened?" she asked, unsure if she was ready to take the step with Jase that made him look like a human rather than an obstacle. She didn't know if she could handle seeing him as more than the animalistic misogynist she knew him as, it could interfere with her plans. The last thing she needed was an emotional attachment to such an unpredictable man.

"That's a story for another time. It's been a long night," Jase replied quietly. It was the nicest way he'd refused to answer a question. Like Madison wasn't ready to hear it, Jase wasn't prepared to talk about it, so she didn't insist. Instead, she changed the subject. The underlying tones of their conversation left a greyness between them. There was so much insinuation, yet so little said. She wanted to steer the energy back to something less heady.