Page 47 of What We Bury

“Doesn’t matter if they do. The phone’s fried, the clone’s running the trail, and we’re three hours in the opposite direction. Our tracks are clean.” He shrugs, dusts off his hands, and heads for the SUV.

“Breakfast for dinner?”

“Yeah.” I take one last look at the grave. “Breakfast for dinner.”

FOURTEEN

ELI

Igave her my jacket.

Again.

I grip the steering wheel at ten and two and focus on the road. Left on Ocean. Right on Broadhurst. Merge north.

My hands are wrapped around the wheel so tight the leather creaks under my palms.

I ease my grip one finger at a time.

Too much.

I tighten it again.

I told her.

Not everything. I didn’t tell her the whole machinery of it. Didn’t tell her about Odin or the protocols. About every body, every rope, every clean exit. But I did tell her the part I never tell anyone. The beginning. The ugly root. The thing I built the rest of my life around pretending not to be.

My sister. What happened to her. What I did to the man who did it. What I’ve become since.

I never do that.

For years, I’ve kept that shit locked down. Haven’t told a single soul besides Knox. Even Holden doesn’t know all the details.

I used to be proud of that, like secrecy was discipline. Like silence was proof I still had command of myself.

Like I could keep the monster inside its cage if I never admitted I built the cage because something needed locking up.

Then I handed it to Sage.

I sat there in the park and opened my mouth and let the worst parts of me spill out between us, and in return she reached over and held my freaking hand.

That’s the part I can’t get past.

Not the telling. I’ve rehearsed the telling in my head a thousand times, run the variables, imagined the face people would make if they knew. Horror. Disgust. Fear. The little backward shift of the body before the mind remembers to be polite.

I was prepared for all of it.

I wasn’t prepared for her to hold my hand.

I should have pulled away.

That would have been the smart thing. The clean thing. Smile, redirect, get her home, hand her off to Knox, and put every necessary wall back where it belonged.

Instead, I sat there and let her fingers curl around mine like I was something worth touching.

Like I was safe.

My jaw aches from how hard I’m clenching it.