Page 75 of Dirty Game

Well, fuck.

I sit up, flex my hands. Sore knuckles, cuticles torn.

I scrape the taste of cigarettes from my tongue and take stock of the room—nothing missing, no sign of a struggle, not even a note.

She’s gotta be in here somewhere.

I work my way through the safehouse in order.

Bathroom: empty, mirror still fogged from her shower.

The steam is faint, already dying, but I can smell her soap.

Kitchen: untouched.

The living room is last.

She’s there, sitting on the couch with her back to the door, pen moving so fast across the paper I can hear the scratch.

There are three ledgers open, two laptops propped on the coffee table, a grid of color-coded sticky notes climbing the wall.

Her hair’s shielding her face, but I see the way her shoulder blades shudder every so often, like she’s fighting off a chill.

I let the door click behind me.

She hears it, keeps writing, doesn’t look up.

“Rosalynn,” I say it soft, but not kind. The kind of voice that would make a body freeze mid-step, every instinct screaming danger.

She sets the pen down, finally, but her hands stay planted on the laptop.

Nails bitten to the quick, the wrist tight with faded scars.

Her spine stays curved, like she’s trying to hide.

“Didn’t mean to wake you,” she says, voice smaller than last night. She won’t look at me. “I couldn’t sleep.”

I cross the room, slow and deliberate, never taking my eyes off her.

“What are you working on?”

She shrugs, the motion so small it’s almost invisible. “Just making sense of your numbers. Cross-referencing some inconsistencies in the casino transfers. It’s... it’s nothing.”

“Can we talk?”

She closes her eyes, lips pressing together like she’s sewing them shut. “I need to process.”

For a second, I want to drag her off the couch and shake the answer out. But that’s not how this works. Not with her.

I rest my hand on her back, my shadow swallowing her whole. She wants space? Fine.

“Sure.”

She swallows hard, throat jerking, but doesn’t answer.

I straighten, hand hovering at the door before I force myself to leave.

The urge to stay, to watch, to dissect every flicker of her nerves is almost stronger than the urge to breathe. Almost.