“I don’t know. I thought we were going to talk.”
“This is talking. We’re talking.”
“No.” He leaned back against the couch, but did not look relaxed. “Were you outside watching my house because of whatever’s happened in town?”
“Yes.”
“Okay. So this is police business, and even though I am a reserve officer, you’re not going to tell me what’s going on before you ask me to strip?”
“I didn’t ask you to strip. It’s just an arm, Ryder.”
“From the look on your face and your tone of voice, it’s a lot more than just an arm. What happened?”
“Someone was killed.”
“What?” He shot straight off the back of the couch, a look of complete surprise on his face. “Who? When? Here? In Ordinary? Have you caught the killer? No, of course you haven’t, you’re here. Wait. You think I’m the killer? Me?”
The cascade of emotions and reactions he rolled through seemed genuine. If anyone else but my childhood friend were acting the way he was, I’d believe them.
But there was something about the tightness at the edge of his eyes, something about the hard line of his mouth that belied his actions.
Oh, Ryder. This is one time in your life you’re going to regret that you and I were such good friends.
Cop instincts told me to play along, to act like I believed him. To act like he didn’t know anything about Sven’s death. Even though my heart was sinking, and a part of me wanted to find a small room, shut the door and just scream and scream, I instead took a drink of water.
“I need to see your arm. You don’t show it to me, I’ll put you in cuffs, take you into the station and cut the shirt off of you.”
He blinked a couple times as if my words confused him.
“You’re angry.”
“I’m not kidding.”
He opened his mouth and inhaled, then let the breath out in a huff. “I can’t believe you think I’m lying.”
“I didn’t say that.”
He unbuttoned his left cuff but lifted his hand and sort of waved his finger at me. “That face says otherwise.”
“What face?”
“The I-think-you’re-lying face.”
“And you’re not?”
He shook his head and then rolled up the sleeve. “I don’t have anything to hide. Why would I lie?”
His sleeve was rolled up to just below the bend in his elbow. “Happy?” He turned his arm so I could see it. It was a nice forearm. Muscled, tan from whatever spring sun we’d gotten months ago. There were a couple of scars that had healed white beneath the dusting of hair.
But that wasn’t the part of his arm I needed to see.
“The whole thing,” I said.
“My sleeve doesn’t roll up any farther.”
“Then take off your shirt.”
He smiled and there was a hard edge to the grin. “So youaretrying to get me naked.”
