ｃｈｒｙｓｓｉｅ

ｐｈｏｔｏｇｒａｐｈｓ

Grayson was ecstatic.

He hadn't really expected it to work as well as it did, not with all of the capricious factors involved. It could have easily gone sour in so many different ways, yet somehow, it had all sorted itself out in a way that benefitted him. It was perfect, and he couldn't have been happier with it.

Unfortunately, his euphoria was cut tragically short when he read the newspaper that morning.

An investigation was being conducted. An investigation.They were looking for her.

They were trying to take her away from him.

His pulse was rising rapidly, newspaper crumpling in his hand, the overwhelming urge to scream obscenities pressing up against his lungs. Panic and anger and fear and everything mixed together until all he could see was red and -

He was overreacting. He had expected it to happen, albeit later, but it was fine. Those contingency plans that he had drawn up would just have to come into play sooner than he had intended them to.

(Outsmarting a small-town police department with a shitty track record would most likely be the simplest part of the entire operation.)

There were three phases to his contingency plan, and they all involved leading him down a path of perceived normalcy. Phase one was disposing of evidence, which he had already done for the most part, but there were still things to be completed. Things that couldn't be ignored.

He set to work immediately.

He first cleaned the lower-level floors with dish soap and vinegar - no blood, but just in case. His second order of business took much longer - removing fingerprints. He would say he was doing a fine job, but halfway through, the sound shot through his heart for a third time that day.

Her sobbing was unbearable.

Sighing, he shucked his gloves off before making his way up the stairs, finding such conditions unsustainable for important work. The sound make his skin crawl, but as he approached, it stopped abruptly.

She had heard him.

"Chrysanthemum?" he asked, knocking on the door gently.

There was a long silence, and then -

"What?"

(Her voice was angelic, even if tremors did run through it.)

He opened the door, popping his head in to see her huddled up in the corner, head between her legs. The shirt he had given her was wet - evidently, her crying hadn't stopped, only gotten closer to silence.

The sight of her in tears infuriated him.

"Why are you crying?" he asked, sitting down at the edge of the bed, hating the way she flinched.

dontcrydontcrydontcrypleasedontcry -

"Why do you think I'm crying?" she snapped out, and in a flash, he was lacing his fingers through her own.

"You have such tiny hands," he murmured, observing them carefully before looking directly into her eyes. "Did you know that?"

"No," she croaked, her boldness fizzling away at his closeness.

"I like them," he told her sweetly, kissing her knuckles. "They suit you. But that tone didn't. Don't fucking use it again."

She was silent, staring into his eyes like they were that of a cobra. Her hands shook like autumn leaves. He lifted one and kissed it once more before standing up.