Abram hasn’t looked down. Only briefly, more out of necessity when he had to move his things. Other than that, it’s almost like he’s purposefully been avoiding looking at where the red book sits.
It automatically makes me more suspicious.
I arch a brow, clipping my chin. “Recognize it?”
He waits forty whole seconds—I count—before giving in to my probing gaze. I’m not going to back down, not from this. There’re too many things that need to be answered.
“It’s a book, Rory. I’ve seen lots of them, same as I know you have.”
Abram sounds nonchalant, casual even, but I see the lines of distress that etch his face. Some of those were already there before I’d slammed down my book, but now they deepen further.
“Why are you avoiding this one then?”
“I’m not.”
“You are,” I utter right back. “You haven’t looked at it since you fixed your papers.”
“I have.”
“You haven’t.”
My tongue grows heavy at how composed he manages to stay. Countering back to every question. We’re going in circles.
I know he’s not being truthful because I can feel how tense he is. If he knew nothing about this, then he wouldn’t be reacting this strongly to my questions.
Abram may be good at keeping his features drawn and muted, but it’s his eyes that give him away. There’s a familiarity in them.
Flipping open the book, I don’t take my eyes off him. I have to see the truth for myself.
I’m studying him, and he’s watching the page. His eyes follow along word for word as I recite the inscription. I don’t need to look. I’ve read it a thousand times before with eased boredom.
“A closed chapter does not mean the book is finished. We make our own endings.” Forever the words are ingrained in my mind. The handwritten inscription locked to the page.
Abram’s face doesn’t slip and my fist slams down on the desk, aggravated. Why is he being so evasive about this?
The force causes the lone photo sitting atop the polished wood to ricochet. The frame crashes to the ground. The photo of him, Finn, and I at the gala is now hidden underneath a wall of cracked glass.
I feel bleak. The air in this office suffocating.
I tap my finger. He follows, stunned to his spot. It moves lower down the page. Needing to see how he reacts to this last piece, not because I don’t already know the answer, but because he still hasn’t admitted to anything.
My gut already telling me I’m right.
“You wrote this. These are your initials. You’re A.C.”
For so long, I believed that stood for Alma Campbell. I thought she’d written me this note. I know now that I’d been wrong. She couldn’t have because the words had already been imprinted on the page before she’d given it to me.
These words, that message meant for someone else.
“You stole this,” I accuse, as the tip of my finger smashes back into the page. “Took it from someone after they wouldn’t sell it to you, didn’t you?” My voice finds its power. “Didn’t you!”
Abram’s eyebrows are so drawn together by this point they nearly touch. More color drains from his face. His eyes pulse, but there’s also a stillness in them. I don’t understand his reaction.
“…This book had been tossed, thrown away.” His voice suddenly sounds so far away. Distant to the present as his mind stays locked to the past.
I reel back with astonishment. “So you admit it then? You did take it.”
Mr. Sketchy wasn’t lying.