Wilder by Christina Dodd Read Free Book Online

be on meds and weren’t, and Charisma thanked them when they brought her reports of weird creatures and demon attacks that no one else believed.
    Although . . . although perfectly respectable people were starting to report such oddities, and they hated when the police doubted
their
sanity.
    The trouble was, of course, that Osgood owned the city, and the police department, and Osgood did not want those reports circulated. He wanted the populace quiet and docile . . . until the seven years were up. Until it was too late.
    So respectable citizens kept quiet when they saw scary things, and Charisma listened to the street people and never feared them.
    But then, she’d never been blindfolded and trapped underground by one before.
    But he seemed to get it. “I’m not violent or anything. As far as I remember. I can’t recall much before I was down here.”
    “You have amnesia.”
    “That’s what Dr. King tells me. He says my mind will release the past when it has healed from its trauma.”
    “Amnesia isn’t so bad.” Really. She hoped.
    “I suppose not, although I do hope I don’t remember
I’m
a serial killer.”
    “Oh, me too.” Except . . . “Why did they operate on your brain? Whoever they are?”
    “They told me they would make me what I was meant to be.” His voice changed, grew deeper, with a growl that sounded ugly and hostile.
    And it seemed death hovered close in the heated air.
    Yet Charisma had never learned to shut her mouth. “What were you meant to be?”
    He yanked his hands away from her grip. He sat up, towering over her. “A monster. A beast. A fiend. A twisted horror worthy of nothing but disgust and terror.”
    Never had she felt so inadequate. He had saved her from certain death, and now his pain was palpable, yet she had no way to help him. “You’re not so bad.”
    “You haven’t seen me!” His voice stripped away any illusion she harbored that he wasn’t dangerous. He sounded . . . angry, a creature on the razor’s edge of violence.
    “No. I haven’t seen you.” She edged back, wondering whether to rip off her blindfold and
run
.
    But slowly he brought his rasping breath under control. “I saved you, Charisma Fangorn. I nursed you. I’m invested in you. I won’t hurt you now.”
    “Reassuring.” Not really. Sounded stalkerish. Perhaps it would be better if she attacked again, knocked him out, and made her escape. If only . . . if only she hadn’t wasted her strength on her first ineffective attack. If only she weren’t so exhausted . . .
    “You’re drooping.” Taking her arms, he pressed them to her sides, lifted her to her feet, picked her up, and placed her on her bed on the floor. “Go to sleep.”
    Alarmed or not, she was almost asleep now.
    “When you wake up again,” he said, “you can take a shower.”
    “A shower.” The faintest spark made her straighten.
    “You’ve been burrowing into the ground for eleven days.”
    “I’m dirty.” She touched one hand to her chest and felt the crust of filth there. “A shower . . .”
    But when she thought about the effort to wash herself, she realized he was right. She was finished. She was . . . exhausted.
    She slithered backward onto the pillow.
    He caught her by the shoulders and eased her flat onto her back.
    And she was asleep.

Chapter 6
     
    G uardian stared at Charisma where she lay lax with fatigue in a thin cotton nightgown, resting in a hollow in the earth. In the days since the attack, she’d lost weight, leaving her painfully thin. Her tan had faded and she’d grown pale. Her black hair had grown out to show strawberry blond roots, and in her delirium, she’d dug herself into the hard-packed ground, pushing dirt under her nails and into the creases of her knuckles.
    Yet . . . yet he liked to look at her. He liked to think about who and what she was. He had grown fond of her.
    Eleven days ago, Taurean had come running to him with a report that one of the Aboves had lost