Page 198 of What We Bury

My stomach drops through the floor as I look between them.

How do Amy and Eli know each other?

“Oh. Hey, Amy.” His voice is warm and easy, but his eyes are locked on mine.

Amy’s face cycles through about ten expressions in the space of one inhale. “Oh my God,” she says, turning to me. “How do you know Mr. Ward?”

Mr. Ward.I file that away and try to rearrange my face into something other than a five-alarm panic.

“He’s, um?—”

“Friend of a friend,” Eli says smoothly, stepping inside and shutting the door behind him. “Small town.”

Amy nods like this makes perfect sense. “Eli and I teach at the same school,” she tells me. “Hunter Elementary.” Her smile softens when she looks at him. “How are you enjoying your summer so far?”

“It’s fine. You?”

Amy shrugs. “Making the most of it. Hey, are you planning on doing the butterfly garden again next year?”

“I am. Planted the milkweed for it last week.” Eli smiles, and it’s such a genuine, uncomplicated smile that I almost forget he’s capable of murder.

And stomping on still-beating hearts.

“I love that,” Amy says.

My eyes ping-pong between Eli and Amy, both acting like this is totally normal, which I guess for them it is. For me? It’s like watching two actors on different shows suddenly cross over into the same episode.

They don’t belong.

Eli catches my eye over Amy’s head.

“You’re a teacher?” The words fall out before I can stop them. “I didn’t know that. What grade?”

“Kindergarten.”

My brain stalls out.Kindergarten teacher. Butterfly garden. Mr. Ward. The man who ordered a body off a beach and wrapped me in his jacket is also planting milkweed with children.

“Kindergarten?” I repeat.

“Kindergarten,” he confirms, and there’s the faintest edge of amusement in his voice, like he knows exactly what’s short-circuiting in my brain.

“Not just kindergarten,” Amy says. “He teaches GED prep at the adult learning center too. He’s good at it. Annoyingly good, actually.”

She’s beaming like a proud parent. And I’m just staring at Eli, realizing Amy knows an entire version of him I’ve never touched.

The corner of his mouth lifts.

Amy’s eyes dart between us. Then she glances down the hallway where Knox disappeared and turns slightly away from Eli to hiss at me.

“Wait? Him too?”

“It’s complicated,” I mutter into my wine glass.

Amy lets out a breath that’s half laugh, half disbelief. But she doesn’t look horrified. She looks . . . impressed? Skeptical? Some hybrid emotion that only exists when your roommate turns out to be running a harem out of your shared apartment.

“Okay, well.” She sets her glass in the sink and pushes off the counter, her smile flicking once toward the hallway where Tyler disappeared before it comes back to me. “I’ll leave you to your . . . men.” She says the word like she’s trying it on for size. Then she squeezes my arm as she passes. “We’re talking about this later. In detail. So much freaking detail.”

She disappears down the hallway. Her bedroom door clicks shut.