Unravel Me: The Juliette Chronicles Book 2

help.
    Which means I have to talk to Warner again.
    I have to treat him just like the prisoner that he is. No more side conversations. No falling for his efforts to confuse me. Not again and again and again. I’m going to be better. Smarter.
    And I want my notebook back.
    The guards are unlocking his room for me and I’m marching in, I’m sealing the door shut behind me and I’m getting ready to give him the speech I’ve already prepared when I stop in place.
    I don’t know what I was expecting.
    Maybe I thought I’d catch him trying to break a hole in the wall or maybe he’d be plotting the demise of every person at Omega Point or I don’t know I don’t know I don’t know anything because I only know how to fight an angry body, an insolent creature, an arrogant monster, and I do not know what to do with this.
    He’s sleeping.
    Someone put a mattress in here, a simple rectangle of average quality, thin and worn but better than the ground, at least, and he’s lying on top of it in nothing but a pair of black boxer briefs.
    His clothes are on the floor.
    His pants, his shirts, his socks are slightly damp, wrinkled, obviously hand-washed and laid out to dry; his coat is folded neatly over his boots, and his gloves are resting right next to each other on top of his coat.
    He hasn’t moved an inch since I stepped into this room.
    He’s resting on his side, his back to the wall, his left arm tucked under his face, his right arm against his torso, his entire body perfect bare, strong, smooth, and smelling faintly of soap. I don’t know why I can’t stop staring at him. I don’t know what it is about sleep that makes our faces appear so soft and innocent, so peaceful and vulnerable, but I’m trying to look away and I can’t. I’m losing sight of my own purpose, forgetting all the brave things I said to myself before I stepped in here. Because there’s something about him—there’s always been something about him that’s intrigued me and I don’t understand it. I wish I could ignore it but I can’t.
    Because I look at him and wonder if maybe it’s just me? Maybe I’m naive?
    But I see layers, shades of gold and green and a person who’s never been given a chance to be human and I wonder if I’m just as cruel as my own oppressors if I decide that society is right, that some people are too far gone, that sometimes you can’t turn back, that there are people in this world who don’t deserve a second chance and I can’t I can’t I can’t
    I can’t help but disagree.
    I can’t help but think that 19 is too young to give up on someone, that 19 years old is just the beginning, that it’s too soon to tell anyone they will never amount to anything but evil in this world.
    I can’t help but wonder what my life would’ve been like if someone had taken a chance on me.
    So I back away. I turn to leave.
    I let him sleep.
    I stop in place.
    I catch a glimpse of my notebook lying on the mattress next to his outstretched hand, his fingers looking as if they’ve only just let go. It’s the perfect opportunity to steal it back if I can be stealthy enough.
    I tiptoe forward, forever grateful that these boots I wear are designed to make no sound at all. But the closer I inch toward his body, the more my attention is caught by something on his back.
    A little rectangular blur of black.
    I creep closer.
    Blink.
    Squint.
    Lean in.
    It’s a tattoo.
    No pictures. Just 1 word. 1 word, typed into the very center of his upper back. In ink.
    IGNITE
    And his skin is shredded with scars.
    Blood is rushing to my head so quickly I’m beginning to feel faint. I feel sick. Like I might actually, truly upturn the contents of my stomach right now. I want to panic, I want to shake someone, I want to know how to understand the emotions choking me because I can’t even imagine, can’t even imagine, can’t even imagine what he must’ve endured to carry such suffering on his skin.
    His entire back is a map of pain.
    Thick and thin and uneven and terrible. Scars like roads that lead to nowhere. They’re gashes and ragged slices I can’t understand, marks of torture I never could have expected. They’re the only imperfections on his entire body, imperfections hidden away and hiding secrets of their own.
    And I realize, not for the first time, that I have no idea who Warner really is.
    “Juliette?”
    I freeze.
    “What are you doing here?” His eyes are wide, alert.
    “I—I came to talk to you—”
    “Jesus,”