No punctuation. No threat. No question.
My pulse kicked anyway.
Brewster was already watching my face. “That’s direct.”
“He wants to know I’m still here,” I said, too fast. I heard it myself as soon as it left my mouth.
“He’s skipping the buffer,” Brewster said. “That’s not nothing.”
“He’s curious,” I pushed back. “Curiosity isn’t the problem.”
“No,” he said quietly. “But your proximity to him is.”
I stared at the screen. He hadn’t asked me anything. He hadn’t told me to do anything. He was just… checking the distance.
Seeing if I’d moved.
Seeing if I’d answer.
Leaving the message unread, I locked the screen and slid the phone face-down on the table.
“I’m not responding,” I said.
“I know.” Brewster paused. I waited for the usual—guidance, caution, a plan. Instead, he asked, “What do you think your silence says to him now?”
I didn’t hesitate. “Discipline.”
“Control?”
“Yes.”
He nodded once. “Has it occurred to you he might hear consent?”
I stiffened. “That’s a stretch.”
“Is it?” Brewster asked. “He’s matching your language. Your values. Your timing.”
“That doesn’t mean?—”
“It means,” he cut in softly, “that he thinks you’re working together.”
The word settled between us.
Together.
Irritation flickered through me at the implication. One I definitely didn’t appreciate. “I’mobserving,” I said flatly.
Brewster held my gaze, that neutral expression of his doing nothing to hide how much he saw. Or how much it irritated me that he did. “Maybe,” he said, “he doesn’t know the difference.”
I looked away first. Outside, the light had dimmed further, the glass now reflecting us back at ourselves. Two figures standing just apart. Watching.
“I’m still ahead of this,” I said. I needed that to be true.
“For the moment,” Brewster replied.
The agreement didn’t reassure me the way it should have.
My phone buzzed again. This time it wasn’t a text. It was an image.
