Page 70 of Last Seen
A smile quirks the corner of his mouth so briefly she thinks she imagined it. With a sigh, she says, “I spoke to the doctor for a grand total of thirty minutes, tops. She came to my house uninvited and drove off into the rain. I know nothing more than that. I’m here about my sister, Sheriff. The doctor didn’t give me anything concrete to go on.”
The sheriff is handsome in an eerie way, and when he furrows his brow, she sees even more echoes of his younger brother, Noah the chef, in his face. There’s an openness to Noah, though, a joyfulness that the sheriff is clearly missing.
There is something else about him that feels familiar, but she can’t put her finger on it. His eyes, maybe. They are dark and fathomless. Like a snake’s.
The eyes. That’s it. The sheriff reminds her of the man in the bar, the stranger who talked to her.
“You don’t remember me, do you?”
She didn’t know then, and still doesn’t, why she should have remembered him. But now, looking into another set of dark eyes just as bottomless, and feeling the chill rush through her body, she realizes she’s in deeper trouble than she thought. She shouldn’t have come here. She shouldn’t be talking to him. She should have left this alone. She needs to get out of here, and fast.
But she has to know. Leaving things alone is not her forte. Curiosity killed the cat.
Curiosity killed Cat,her mind provides.Or at least got her into a lot of trouble. Go careful.
“You have a lot of brothers, don’t you? Are there any pictures of all of you around here?”
“Why?”
“I wanted to see ... Listen, a stranger came to my hometown, spoke to me, and then my friend was murdered. He looks a bit like you, actually. Chief Early will have the artist rendering that you can see. Maybe you’ll know him.”
The sheriff’s face is hard to decipher. She tries again.
“How much did Early tell you about what was going on? Did he mention Cat?”
Cameron leans back and raises a brow, rocking in his designer chair, but doesn’t answer. She knows this tactic, and vows to keep her mouth shut from this moment on. He can’t be trusted. This she knows deep in her soul.
He watches her. She doesn’t look away.
The staring contest has gone on for a few moments when she hears a voice calling.
“Cameron? Cam? Where the hell are you?”
“Oh, for Christ’s sake,” the sheriff mutters.
The chef from the pizza place appears in the doorway.
“What do you want, Noah?”
“I hear you arrested the girl.”
“Thegirlhas a name,” Halley says.
“Halley,” Noah replies. “I know. Cam. What are you doing?”
“Leave. Noah. This isn’t your business.”
“The hell it isn’t.”
“Go back to flouring your pans, little brother. I have real work to do.”
“Oh, fuck off, Cam.”
So there is no love lost between the Brockton brothers. Interesting.
“Would you shut it?” the sheriff growls. “This is a murder suspect and I’m in the middle of an interrogation.”
“A murder suspect?” Halley gasps. “Who am I supposed to have murdered?”
