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Connor is quiet. He doesn’t comment on my choices.
“What’s your earliest childhood memory?” I ask, eager to move on.
His eyes snap to mine, and he cocks his head to the side. “My mom reading me bedtime stories. I always begged for the same one every night, and each and every time, she read it like it was completely new, like she’d never read it before.”
“My earliest memory is sitting in a tire swing at a foster family’s house. One of their older children would push me hard until I fell out. Then, she would laugh and make me sit back down, so she could do it again.” I don’t mean for it to sound as sad as it does.
Connor moves closer.
“Would you rather be naked for a year straight or be bitten by a venomous snake?”
“What the fuck?” he says, rearing back.
I laugh. The corner of his mouth twitches.
“Be bitten, I guess. It would be over quickly. A year is a long time.”
“Yeah, I would rather be naked. I hate snakes.”
I move a little closer to him. His fingers brush against my arm under the water. Then, they circle my bicep, pulling me to him. His other hand finds my waist. I bet he’s thinking about me naked right now. His fingertips dig into my flesh, but it doesn’t hurt. It makes me shiver with pleasure.
“I don’t think I would survive if you were naked for a year,” he murmurs so lightly that one could almost say it was never spoken.
“I think I would survive if you were bitten by a snake,” I say just as quietly.
His nostrils flare. Then, he lets me go.
But I don’t mean it.I want to take the words back. I thought it would prompt a reply.
Instead, he moves away from me.
The loss of his body in proximity to mine hits me like a bucket of cold water, and I gasp. I need to get out of here. I’ve lost my damn mind.
11
CONNOR
“I’ve got the file.” Geo steps into my bedroom as I pull the gray henley over my head.
I already know what I’m going to find in it—mostly.
“It took a while since her name wasn’t always Wryn.”
I hold my hand out, and he slaps it in my palm and then shoves his hands in his pockets.
“Rough night?” He gestures to the picture still sitting on my bedside table.
I glance over and then to the empty glass sitting beside it.
“It was fine,” I say.
He gets the hint and drops it, like I was hoping.
I open the file, skimming over it. “I’m taking this to the office.”
“You use that room more than I thought you would,” Geo says, and I stop short.
“I like being able to see the spot where he took his last breath,” I tell him, never wavering, and he nods. “Has the review meeting been set?”
