“Sloane?”
She visibly shivers as she walks through the front door onto the porch.
Sniffles again too.
Fuck.
I curl my fingers so tightly into my palms that my short nails dig into my skin to keep from reaching for her.
“So you’re right.” Her voice is dull. “Someone’s taking this treasure hunt very seriously.”
Her gaze swings sharply to me as she abruptly halts halfway down the porch stairs. “Or someone wants it to look like someone’s taking this treasure hunt very seriously.”
I probably deserve that kind of suspicion. “Spent the morning at my place. Beck came out. He left. Saw you at the bakery. Spent the rest of the afternoon at Crusty Nut.”
“Quick alibi.”
“You ever been in trouble?”
She blinks.
I watch her, waiting, wondering what has her surprised by the question.
Or if she relates to it.
Huh. Is she a recovering troublemaker too? I repeat my question, softer. “Haveyou been in trouble?”
“Have you?” she fires back.
“Yep.”
“Real trouble, or you just did something normal and human that people had a bad reaction to because it wasn’t what they wanted you to do, so you justfeltlike you were always in trouble?”
“That’s a very specific question.”
“I’ve lived a very specific life. How much trouble have you been in? Do you have a criminal record?”
“No, but only because I had money.”
Usually I’m the one watching someone until they crack.
Not right now.
And right now, the back of my neck is getting hot.
I’m not normally that forward with practical strangers.
It’s sympathy for her being in a shitty situation that likely isn’t her fault and nearly certainly is related to Thorny Rock’s treasure.
Tell me what you had in your house.
She had something here.
Her body language is incredibly easy to read, and I hit a nerve when I asked her if she was storing something for the museum here.
I look at her, silently telegraphing the demand that I know better than to put into words.
Don’t need to look like a dick by ordering her to confess it to me out loud.
