Chapter 20 #2
He leaned in and said something to the woman next to him.
It was brief and simple, the kind of thing that seemed casual from the outside.
The woman glanced over, her expression unreadable, then looked back at him.
Whatever he said next made her nod and walk away, disappearing into the crowd without looking back.
He crossed the distance between them without hurrying.
Up close, he looked just like his photographs, and yet, not exactly.
He was taller than she’d thought, with a lean build like a man who does physical work rather than hitting the gym.
His face was partly shaded by the brim of his worn cowboy hat, but beneath it, he had an open, balanced face with a natural, easygoing quality.
The kind of face that made him seem approachable.
When he was a few feet from her, he stopped and looked at her with a half-smile that didn’t fully commit to his face. “You’re Jewel Sinclair.”
It wasn’t a question.
“You know who I am?”
“I do.” He left it at that, keeping his eyes steady on hers, assessing without hostility, then tilted his head slightly. “I figured this day would come eventually. You’re a long way from Otter Creek.”
“So are you.”
The half-smile moved slightly. “I guess that’s true.”
The crowd around them shifted and pressed, with someone pushing past carrying a saddle over one arm, and a group of kids darting through, chasing something that might’ve been a hat.
The smell of grilling hot dogs drifted in from the left and mixed with the dust kicked up by a group of horses in the warm-up arena just beyond the fence.
He looked toward the warm-up area, then back at her, and when he did, something in his expression tightened slightly. The ease was still there, but now a more guarded look had crept in behind it. “I figure you’d want to talk about Vivian.”
“That’s right.”
He nodded slowly, glancing past her at the crowd moving through the venue. A muscle in his jaw twitched briefly, and he looked back at her. “Okay, but not here. There’s a quieter spot around back, past the stock pens. We can talk there.”
That’s when she felt it. The sensation of wanting something so badly that she was willing to take a risk, yet still fully aware that the risk was very real. Her pulse quickened without her consent, and the hairs on the back of her neck stood up.
She thought about Cole. About the conversation on the deck. If anything feels wrong, anything at all.
She looked at Trevor. His open face, careful eyes, and half-smile that lingered, yet still hesitant.
He didn’t seem dangerous. He felt like a man who had been waiting for this talk with the resignation of knowing it was coming, but still hadn’t figured out how to have it. And he had the answers she wanted.
“All right.”
He nodded, turned, and she fell into step beside him, the noise of the venue at their backs, the stock pens ahead of them, the smell of cattle growing stronger as they walked.
The stock pens were at the far end of the venue, and the crowd was thinning as they walked. The arena’s noise grew quieter, and the smell of cattle dominated everything. The ground here was rougher and less maintained, churned up by hooves, boots, and the constant movement of animals and workers.
Trevor walked with his hands in his pockets and didn’t try to make conversation, which she appreciated and found unsettling in equal measure.
His trailer was parked in a line with half a dozen others at the far end of the lot, a living quarters rig that had seen heavy use, the kind of outfit that belonged to someone who spent more time on the road than anywhere else.
He unlocked the side door, pulled it open, and looked at her with a sheepish grin. “I can offer you water or bad coffee. That’s about it.”
“Water’s fine.”
She went up the two steps, into the trailer, and heard the door close behind her with a click, muffling the noise from outside.
Inside, the trailer was compact and tidy.
He had clearly figured out how to live efficiently in his small space.
There was a narrow table with bench seating on one side, and a small kitchen with equipment stacked and secured along one wall.
The space smelled of leather and horse liniment, with a faint staleness from a space that was lived in but never quite aired out enough.
Trevor pulled two water bottles from the cooler in the corner, placed one in front of her, and casually sat down at the table. He took off his hat, set it on the seat beside him, and looked at her directly.
He appeared younger than she had expected—probably in his early thirties, with a face showing more signs of weather than age. There were lines around his eyes from squinting into the sun and wind, but the face beneath them was open and unguarded in a way that surprised her.
She looked around the trailer, taking in its neat, worn efficiency. “Nice setup.”
He smiled, and for a moment, it reached his eyes. “You didn’t drive all this way to talk about my living arrangements.”
She looked back at him. “What happened to Vivian?”
The expression that crossed his face wasn’t quite surprise. It was more like the expression of a man who had been bracing for a particular impact for a while and felt it hit exactly where he’d expected.
He looked down at his water bottle, then back up at her. When he spoke, his voice was soft and straightforward, like someone who had been carrying a heavy burden for a long time and was tired of it.
“I didn’t kill her.”