Page 41 of Bend & Break
Blake leans over the screen, her fuzzy sleeve rubbing up against my arm. “This site screams ‘we make snuff films in our garage’.”
“Technically,” I murmur, “theydomake films in a garage. The address listed is an industrial storage unit behind a vape shop.”
“Charming.”
I click into theAboutpage. There are three names listed. One of them matches the contact info from the flyer.
“Kai Brenner,” I say. “Director-slash-editor-slash-location scout-slash-guy-who-definitely-drinks white Monster energy drinks.”
Blake taps a finger against the desk.
I scroll down. There’s a section labeledPast Projects. The thumbnails are aggressively gory, and half of them are just people screaming in hallways.
I click the most recent one. A trailer loads, and I swear I’ve seen that exact hallway before.
Blake squints at the screen. “That’s the psych building.”
“Oh, good,” I say, clicking pause. “Nothing says ‘we’re mentally stable’ like filming fake murders in front of real therapy offices.”
She snorts. “Let’s email him.”
I raise a brow. “And say what, exactly? ‘Alright mate, we’re looking into a murder and you’re sort of top of the suspect list. Fancy a quick chat about it?’”
She leans back in her chair and crosses her legs. “We don’t have to say that. We say we’re film students working on a project and want to shadow their shoot. Boom—academic curiosity, plausible motive, zero murder accusations.”
And I hear her, I do—but my brain’s currently running a background process dedicated entirely to the way she moves. The shift of her weight, the roll of that sentence off her tongue, the fact that she’s sitting across from me in a jumper that’s slowly sliding off one shoulder like this isn’t a tactical assault on my very being.
I don’t know when exactly I lost the plot, but if she asked me to help bury a body right now, I’d already be checking the soil conditions.
I type out the message while she reads over my shoulder. She corrects a spelling error by reaching across the keyboard, then leaves her hand on my forearm like she forgot it was there.
“If we get an invite,” she says, “I’ll flirt with him. Get him talking.”
I pause, offended on a cellular level. “Why you?”
She arches her brow. “Because I’m hot and have resting I’m-just-curious energy. It works.”
“I have excellent bone structure and decades of finely honed emotional unavailability. That’s irresistible on abadday.”
She grins, completely unbothered. “Sure, but I can play spacey and charming.”
“Iamcharming,” I reply. “And debatably spacey, butalsoin a hot way.”
She tilts her head. “Shockingly self-aware for someone who uses three different moisturizers and would date himself if he could.”
I grin. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”
She hits send before I can overthink it. Then she sits back, stretching her arms behind her head. The movement pulls her shirt up, revealing a sliver of her abdomen, and I cannot control the fact that my eyes immediately dart to the spot.
“I swear,” I mutter. “If I get murdered by someone in a knockoff Michael Myers mask, I’m haunting your fine ass.”
“If we get chased,” she says. “I’m tripping you.”
My laptop dings.
We both freeze.
I glance at the screen, then back at her.
