Page 215 of What We Bury

“That’s my cue.”

I turn to say something, and when I look back, his stool is empty. The glass sits on the bar with a cocktail napkin tucked neatly beneath it. There’s no sign of him. It’s like he evaporated.

I blink. How does a man that size disappear that fast?

But I don’t have time to wonder, because the stage door has swung wide and Eli is the first one through.

He sees me and stops dead. Surprise, pain, want, fury—it all flits across his face before the mask slams back down.

“Eli,” I say, standing from the stool. “We need to talk.”

He stares at me for three long seconds. Behind him, I can see movement—Milo’s frame, Knox’s shadow, Holden leaning against the door frame with his arms crossed and an expression that saysthis was her idea, not mine.

Eli’s jaw works. His eyes drop to the floor, then come back to mine, and I can see the war playing out behind them.

“Five minutes,” he says.

He gestures for me to follow him toward one of the private rooms off the main floor. He holds the door open for me and I walk past him, the door closing behind us with a soft, final click.

FIFTY-EIGHT

ELI

“Five minutes. Go,” I say, leaning against the door with my arms crossed. If I get any closer to her, I won’t be able to think.

“Sit down, Eli.” She crosses the room and takes a seat on the chaise lounge on the raised platform.

“You do know what people do on that chaise, right?”

She rolls her eyes. “Lower your walls for a second. I just want to talk.”

I don’t sit. But I move off the door and take two steps into the room, which is as much ground as I’m willing to concede.

“Talk,” I say.

“I need you to know that you were wrong.”

“About what?”

“About yourself. About what you are. About what being with me—with us—would cost you.” She’s looking at me with those gray eyes and I hate how steady she is, how certain, when everything inside me is shrapnel and static. “You told me teaching is the only thing that keeps you human. That’s not true.”

“You don’t know?—”

“I know that the man who held me on that beach while I was covered in someone else’s blood is the same man who reads stories to five-year-olds and who teaches adults basic sentence structure so they can get a better education. I know those aren’t different people fighting for control. That’s one man. Whole. And you don’t get to carve yourself into slices because you’d rather punish yourself than admit you can be a hangman, a teacher, andmine.”

The words hit somewhere deep and unprotected, and my jaw locks. “It’s not about punishment. It’s about risk. If any part of this gets back to the school?—”

“Does the school know you come here?” She gestures around the room. “Do they know you hang serial rapists?”

I stiffen. “No. And that’s exactly the point. They don’t know about this place. They don’t know who I am after hours, and that’s the only reason I get to keep doing both.”

“Then how will they find out about me? Why am I the thread that unravels it all?”

I breathe through my nose and try to keep my hands from shaking. She’s blitzing my weak points on purpose—aiming for the places I can’t armor up. Smart. Unforgiving. A little ruthless. I like that about her, and it terrifies me.

“Because you matter,” I say before I can stop myself. “Because you aren’t something I want to hide. Fuck, Sage. I want more than that.”

“So you’d rather spend the rest of your life alone? Punishing yourself for wanting something you can absolutely have?”