Ted Dekker - The Bride Collector

She’d never spent time with a man before, even if it was to talk about a killer. But they didn’t talk about the killer. They talked about the center a lot. He wanted to know about her daily routine. Everything about it. How one person could be so interested in the details of what she did every boring day was a surprise in itself.

How she got up at seven most mornings. Had two eggs for breakfast, sunny-side up on wheat toast with hot cocoa and a small glass of orange juice. Usually with Andrea.

How Andrea then followed her back to her room and insisted that she brush her teeth. She showed Brad her teeth and asked him what he thought. He laughed and told her they were surprisingly white and straight, then stumbled all over himself to explain that by surprisingly he didn’t mean he would have expected anything less from her. But straight teeth, especially without braces, were actually quite rare.

He wanted to know more, so she went on through the day, describing her card games with Roudy, who equated everything with codes and espionage and clues and such. She was friends with most of the residents who’d been around for more than a year, but not like she was with Cass, Roudy, and especially Andrea, whom she’d taken under her wing at Allison’s request.

They talked about her connection to the outside world. Yes, they had phones in their rooms and could receive or make calls anytime. And of course they had access to high-speed Internet.

He seemed surprised when she told him about the pictures of naked women that a resident named Carl kept taping to other residents’ doors before Allison removed his privileges. It hadn’t really bothered Paradise. After all a naked body was a naked body. But some of the residents were far too upset, like Andrea, or far too interested, like Cass. She didn’t quite get the way people reacted to nakedness, and Allison said this opinion was part of Paradise’s makeup, as was her general disregard for appearances in general.

She shrugged and he laughed. She had to admit, she liked him. She really did like Brad.

They talked about her family, or what she could remember of it, meaning she only talked about Angie, her half sister, whose real name was Angel. He seemed surprised by that.

She pulled out the old photograph she always kept in her back pocket. “See?”

He took the picture. Then looked at her and the photograph. “I can see the resemblance between you two.” He eyed them both again. “She’s beautiful.”

Paradise didn’t know what to do with that. Had he just called her beautiful? No, that wasn’t right. But he had said they were similar, and everyone said that Angie was beautiful.

His questions weren’t the general kind she got from most. He wanted to know, really know, the details. What does your room look like? Where do you buy your socks? You buy everything online? Which sites are your favorite? So she told him.

His visit had nothing to do with the killer and everything to do with her. Sure, he was doing it all to win her trust, but even knowing that, she still sensed genuine interest from him. He didn’t have the cold eyes of an investigator trying to trick her into answering, or the dead eyes of a psychiatrist listening because it was his job.

His eyes were filled with fascination and focus. They reached deep into her own, wanting to know more, what she was really like. On a few occasions she could swear he looked like he wanted to consume her with those eyes. And twice he touched her shoulder while he was talking.

“No, I didn’t mean it that way!” he said, reaching his hand out and touching her lightly on her shoulder. “I love Hell’s Kitchen, trust me. We all love watching a taskmaster whip a bunch of losers into shape. I just…” His eyes searched hers. She could think of little besides his hand on her shoulder, and when he removed it she missed it.

“You what, can’t imagine me in a kitchen?” she asked.

He grinned wide. “I can, actually.”

They talked and laughed and he touched her one more time.

Then he wanted to know about her writing. Her stories.

“Really? They’re just stories. I don’t tell them to anyone.”

“You’re kidding. They’re you! Now you have to tell me. And I want to know everything, not just the basic plot.”

“Really?”

“Yes, really.”

“We don’t have time.”

“We have all day. Trust me, they know how to find us if they need either one of us. Tell me about your first novel. Who knows, maybe one of these days it will be published and I’ll have been the first person on earth to know the story. I insist!”

Paradise hopped to her feet. “Okay.” Her heart was pumping in her chest. “Okay, but you have to promise not to laugh.”

“I can’t help but laugh with you.”

“Okay, but not at the way my story goes or because you think it’s silly.”

“I promise,” he said, standing. “What’s it called?”

They started walking, and he stayed right by her side. “Horacus,” she said. “It’s about a world two thousand years from now called Horacus.” She told him the plot and he demanded to know more. What the people on Horacus did at night, what they wore, what were their wedding ceremonies like? What did their bedrooms look like, what kind of Internet did they use, what brand of toothpaste did they use?

Delighted beyond her wildest expectations, Paradise told him. Everything. She told him more than she’d ever told anyone about her stories.

By the time she’d finished with Horacus, another hour had passed and she felt embarrassed for hogging so much of the time. So she impulsively grabbed his hand, led him to the closest bench, and sat him down.

“Now,” she said, facing him on the bench. “Tell me about you.”

“Me?”

“Yes, you. If you’re going to earn my trust completely, you have to share your secrets with me.”

He chuckled and shook his head.

“What?” But she was smiling wide, too.

“I can’t trick your mind into coughing up the goods, huh?”

“Well, yes you could try to trick it. It would have to believe, without doubt, that you trust me implicitly so that I, in turn, can trust you implicitly. For that I need secrets. Your deepest, darkest secrets. Maybe not darkest, but, yes… Something like that.”

He laughed and covered his face. “Boy, oh boy…”

“What?”

He just shook his head, still shaking with laughter. So she reached out and pulled his hands away from his face. “What?”

What she saw struck wonder in her mind. His face was red, grinning like a schoolboy’s, and his eyes were bright like the sun. She couldn’t help but chuckle with him. He was delighted.

Brad wasn’t laughing due to humor. He was actually delighted by her. And his face was red because he felt embarrassed by just how much she delighted him.

Could that be right?

They finally gathered themselves, and he leaned back and clasped his hands behind his head. “My, oh my, I haven’t laughed like that for a while.”

“It doesn’t get you off the hook, my stud.” Dear, what had she said? She began to blush. “I say that only as a means to perpetuate our attempt to trick my brain. You know. Make it think we’re close enough to use silly words like that.”

He just grinned like a kid and shook his head as if he couldn’t quite believe this was all happening.

“Tell me about yourself.”

Brad took a deep breath, settled into the bench, and told her.

He spoke about growing up in Austin, Texas, in a family with two sisters, no brothers. His father worked as a criminal defense attorney, which explained why he’d chosen to join the FBI, though on the other side of the case. He spoke about UT football, watching as a child going to the games, then as a student with a tennis scholarship. Drinking on 6th Street and making a fool of himself that first year.