Page 146 of What We Bury

“I’m a public servant.”

I snort, and his eyes flick to my mouth again like he can’t help himself. It should annoy me. Instead it lights something low in my belly—all the ways this man can ruin me without ever touching me.

He pushes off the counter first, like he knows if he stays there much longer one of us is going to say something reckless.

“Let’s sit,” he says.

I hate how immediately my body moves to follow him.

We move to the couch. I take one end while he takes the other. There’s enough space between us for good decisions and bad fantasies. He pulls a small notepad from his back pocket, then his phone, setting it face down on the coffee table.

“Relax,” he says.

“I am relaxed.”

He looks at my crossed arms, my pointedly straight spine, my bare toes curled into the rug.

“Sure you are.”

I glare at him. He uncaps a pen.

“Do you have to write it down like I’m onLaw and Order?”

“I can go get a tape recorder from my car if you want the full experience.”

“That’s not funny.”

“It is a little bit.”

He opens the notepad and walks me through it slowly. It’s more of an ironing-out-the-details conversation than a genuine statement. Like he’s checking to make sure I have my story straight and we’re all on the same page. Where the party was. When I arrived. Who I came with. Brock’s mood. When we left. The walk home. The route. Any cars or people I noticed. What time we said goodbye. He asks the questions a few times, in slightly different ways, and the whole time he’s writing in the notebook in his neat, surprisingly small handwriting.

He flips the page, and I watch his hand move.

His fingers are long. A faint scar across one knuckle. His forearms flex every time he writes, the pushed-up sleeve catching just below the elbow, and I hate that I notice any of that. I hate that I notice all of it.

“Anything else?” I ask, because if I don’t put words in the room, I’m going to drown in the silence.

His pen stills.

Then his gaze lifts to mine. “Yeah.”

Something in my stomach drops.

He leans back against the couch cushion, not relaxed exactly—more like controlled to the point of violence. “Tell me about Stephen.”

I blink. “Stephen?”

“Mm. Was there anyone at the party with that name?”

I think back. The party. Brock’s friends. The blur of faces I’d been trying to keep clear of all night. “No. I don’t think so. Why?”

“One of Brock’s friends has been making noise. Pushing. Asking questions.” He closes the notepad and sets it on the table. “Sometimes the name attached is Stephen.”

I wet my lips before I can stop myself.

His gaze catches on the movement. Holds.

The room goes thick. Hot. Too small. Three feet of couch cushion between us suddenly feels like a dare. He looks like he wants to drag me into his lap and interrogate me with his mouth. I look at his hands and think about those same hands braced on either side of me, pinning me still while he forces me to spill my darkest secrets.