Page 33 of Shatter

The door slams behind me hard enough to rattle the framed photos on the wall, the old ones, men in cuts from the nineties with long hair and longer beards, squinting at the camera from the backs of their bikes.

Rati comes in behind us and leans against the wall by the door with his arms folded, and Emil drops into a chair at the far end of the table.

Vanir's already here, in the seat to Tor's left, a laptop open in front of him and his reading glasses pushed up into his gray hair.

He must've come straight from bed when Tor called.

He doesn't look at me.

His fingers keep moving on the keyboard.

Tor doesn't sit.

He stands at the head of the table with both fists planted on the wood, his inside-out T-shirt stretched across his shoulders, and he looks at me.

He doesn't say anything for a long time.

I stand in the middle of the room with my bare back to the door and my arms at my sides, and I let him look.

The blood drying on my hands pulls at my skin every time I flex my fingers.

The ceiling fan ticks.

Somewhere downstairs, a woman's voice murmurs, Vail or Gwen, low and soothing.

"Tell me." Tor's knuckles whiten against the table.

I tell him.

The diner.

The sedan with the rental sticker, parked facing the road, and the light pole going dark like somebody hit a switch.

Checking the back door.

The scream.

My voice comes out steady and flat, a list of facts laid out on a table, and I listen to it like it belongs to somebody else.

"He had cable ties." I keep my eyes on a knot in the wood of the table. "He was walking back to her with them. He reached into his jacket when he saw me."

"So, you shot him." Tor's voice doesn't change at all.

"Twice." I swallow. "Then once more."

Emil lets out a low whistle.

Tor doesn't move.

"Then what?" He waits, unblinking.

"Then I dragged him behind the dumpster and took his phone and her things." I dig the burner out of my back pocket and set it on the table, then the BC license, then her pink phone, and her ring of keys. "His name's Colin Dufresne. Vancouver, according to that. He had a revolver in a shoulder rig. I left it on him."

Vanir reaches over and slides the burner toward himself with one finger without looking up from his laptop.

"Canadian." Tor stares at the license. "What the fuck does a Canadian want with a waitress in Tallahassee?"

"I don't know." I make myself hold his eyes.