Chapter 5: Where He Can See

I shut the door on him.

I didn't slam it. Slamming it would've told him it landed.

Then I stood in my kitchen and stared at the cereal box for a full minute.

"What did he say?" Gretchen asked.

I told her.

She put down her spoon.

"Okay, two things," she said.

"One, the Senator is a liar. Two, I'm going to go get that pad thai off the hallway floor, because it's from Willy Street and I'm not an animal."

She got it.

We ate it.

It was very good, which made me angrier.

The next afternoon, after clinicals, I drove to the garage on the east side still in my navy scrubs.

The big door was rolled up.

Jace was lying on a creeper under the front end of his green truck, with only his boots and jeans sticking out.

I nudged his boot with my sneaker.

He rolled out.

There was a streak of grease on his cheekbone, and he looked at me.

"Hey," he said.

"Tanner says he told you to take me home."

He sat up slowly.

"He says you don't do anything he doesn't sign off on," I said.

"He says I was a weekend. To keep me busy. He says he's giving you something for it."

Jace wiped his hands on a rag, very carefully, one finger at a time.

"What's he giving me?"

"He didn't say."

"Because there isn't anything." He threw the rag on the workbench. "Fourteen years, Linnea. He's never given me one thing I didn't pay for twice."

"That's not a no."

"No," he said.

"That's a no. He didn't tell me to take you home. He didn't know I was going to. If he'd known, he'd have made sure I drew a different card."

"You did draw a different card."

"Yeah." He almost smiled. "That's my point."

I wanted to believe him so badly that I didn't trust it.

"Did you quit?" I said.

"Not yet."

"Because of the job."

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