Page 98 of Second Alarm

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"Cal."

"You stood in my apartment, Brennan. Six years ago. The weekend my father's memorial bench was set up. Three in the morning. I cried on you like a child, and you told me you had my back. You said 'Cal, I have your back.' And you were — you had — three years before that — "

"Cal."

" — while I — "

"Cal, listen — "

"Listen." The word comes out hard. "You want me to listen, Brennan."

"Cal."

"Is THAT why you always make her coffee?"

I freeze.

The kitchen, for one specific second, is the coffee blooming in the cone and the kettle and nothing else.

"Yeah." Because he asked. Because he deserves to have asked. Because if I'm going to stand in this kitchen with Cal Larsen's voice coming at me at the bottom of the worst moment of his friendship, I'm not going to hide behind a grinder. "Yeah, Cal. That's exactly why."

"The coffee at the station every morning. Since she came back."

"Yes."

"That's a code."

"It is."

"You've been — in front of me, Brennan. In front of me you've been — "

"Yes."

"EVERY MORNING."

"Yes."

"Is — " his eyes go wet. Not crying. The pre-cry of a man whose brain is backfilling every memory he has of Ty Brennan with a new layer. "Is that why you — the academy — Hanna, is that why you — "

"Yes," Hanna says, very quietly.

"You went to Portland because of him."

"Yes."

"You told me you went because you wanted to work a big system. Copper Ridge was too small. You said — "

"I lied, Cal." She doesn't move from the counter. "I lied to you. I lied to Mom. I lied to everyone for years because I was nineteen and I couldn't figure out how to be the kind of woman who was in love with my brother's best friend and also still my brother's sister, and I couldn't figure it out, so I ran."

"Ten years, Hanna."

"I know."

"Ten years of my life."

"I know."

"Ten years during which — "

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