Total pages in book: 117
Estimated words: 113051 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 565(@200wpm)___ 452(@250wpm)___ 377(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 113051 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 565(@200wpm)___ 452(@250wpm)___ 377(@300wpm)
“Something wrong?” I ask. The change in his demeanor is razor-sharp.
He doesn’t say anything. “No. I’m just not fond of him.”
I exhale noisily. “Whew. Well, that makes two of us. He gives me the fucking creeps.”
That brings out a slight smile, though his gaze is still hard. “Good. Stay away from him.”
A thrill runs through me. He really is protective.
“But why? He’s the COO.”
“Just trust me,” he says. “He doesn’t have your best interests at heart. He doesn’t have anyone’s best interests at heart. If it were up to him, I wouldn’t be counseling anyone or teaching. I would be back in the lab. I would be doing something I don’t want to do. That I would have to refuse to do. He doesn’t care about the students, no matter what his speech said. He only cares about profit.”
“And Everly?” I’ve been wondering how she can be married to him when they seem so different.
His expression goes neutral. “Everly cares about more than profit.” He looks away, licking his lips. “It was her idea for the counseling.”
“So who was the first person that died?”
“You’re a morbid one, aren’t you?”
I shrug.
“Farida,” he says quietly, staring down into his coffee. “Farida Shetty. We chalked it up to a troubled mind. She was from India, she’d been missing her home already even before she got here. The isolation made it worse.”
“How did she kill herself?”
His gaze flicks up to mine, reproachful. “She hung herself.”
“My god.”
Then, the image of what I saw when I leaned against the mother cedar flashes across my eyes.
A dark-haired girl in a nightgown, hanging from a tree, her neck broken.
“What was she wearing?” I ask, my voice cracking with fear.
He frowns. “Why?”
“I just want to know,” I say quietly. “When did it happen? In the night?”
The line between his brows deepens. “Yes, in the night. Looped the noose off the branch of a strong cedar.” Each word is a knife to my gut, twisting my reality. “Ms. Shetty was found in her nightgown by Handyman Keith. He was in hysterics, poor guy. Not sure he’s ever really recovered. He’s someone who should have counseling, but he’s as stubborn as a mule.”
I let the information sink in, falling through my skin like melting snow. I stare into my coffee, a black hole.
Nightgown.
Broken.
The girl in the hallway.
“She had dark hair, didn’t she?” I whisper.
He doesn’t say anything, and when I look up at him, he’s staring at me with an expression of quiet horror. That’s a look you never want to see on a psychologist.
“Why do you ask?” he asks, his voice strained.
I finish the dregs of my coffee, though it will only make my racing heart worse. “Just wondering,” I eventually say, putting the empty mug down.
He studies me for a moment, then plucks the empty mug from the table and gets up, stepping up around to the kitchen behind me. “You’re lying to me,” he says calmly as he puts the mug under the Keurig. “As punishment, I’m making you breakfast, and you have to eat it.”
I don’t protest about either one. I really don’t want to lie. He already thinks I’m a special case anyway.
Still, I don’t explain further. I start nervously picking at the tape at the corner of the table and stare at a painting on the wall, a famous painting of a bald eagle by Robert Bateman. I’ve seen it so many times before, and yet it still captures my attention. The eagle, posed in a haunting cry as it perches at the top of a dead tree, wings partially spread, the mist and forest a grey cloak behind it.
The Keurig whirs on, breaking the silence, while Kincaid starts taking stuff out of his fridge, placing it on the counter. I hear the click of a propane stove.
When the coffee is done, he puts the full mug in front of me and sits back down. His sleeves are rolled up now to his forearms, showing the end of his tattoo. Up close, I can clearly see the feathers.
“Thank you,” I say, holding up the mug. I nod at his tattoo. “A raven?”
“Are you trying to get my shirt off?” he muses.
Don’t say yes. Don’t say yes.
“Maybe.”
Damnit, Sydney.
He smirks. “I’ll take my shirt off if you tell me why you asked about Farida’s hair.”
“That’s extortion.”
“Take it or leave it.”
I watch him for a moment, trying to read him at a deeper level, but as usual, his eyes hold so much back. Is he serious about any of this? Are we flirting? Is he aware that this whole exchange would be considered highly inappropriate, especially since he knows why I lost my scholarship?
He might not be a good man, the thought comes to me, bringing awareness into my bones. He might be a bad man.
And yet, who am I to talk, anyway?