Finally Moving On After A Decade novel · Chapter 17 of 24
Chapter 17: The Bruise
I unlocked the door and stood in it.
I didn't step aside.
"Say it from there," I said.
"It's cold, Nolan."
"Then say it fast."
She looked past my shoulder at the dark shop, the lathe and the chairs waiting in a row, and I watched her decide which voice to use.
She tried the soft one first.
"He did this on Sunday," she said, and touched the bruise. "At the courthouse steps. He was allowed to come because of the bail, and he took my arm and wouldn't let go."
"Brooks was in Teddy's bar on Sunday. He sat in the corner for four hours and read a contract."
Her mouth stayed open a moment.
"Teddy would say anything for you."
"Probably. So would the twenty customers who sat near him."
She hugged her other arm across her chest.
"May I come in?"
I stepped back.
I put the lights on, and I did not offer her a chair.
She stood beside my bench with her bare arm held out in front of her, like a woman showing a doctor.
I looked at it for a long moment.
The edges were already going yellow, so it was three days old at least.
There were four small marks in a row on the inside of the arm.
The thumb mark was on the outside, where no other person's thumb would be.
"Those are your fingers," I said.
Her face did not change.
"I can see where your thumb went, Lydia."
"You've never looked closely at me in your life."
"I've looked at you for ten years."
"No," she said, and it came out almost kind. "You looked at what you could fix."
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