"How long has he been in your seminar?" Bruce asked, leaning back.
He kept his voice casual, the tone of a man making polite small talk, but Mike knew better. Bruce was harvesting, pulling threads to see how they connected.
"Only a week," Sabrina replied. She didn't look at Mike as she spoke; she kept her eyes on Bruce, her voice steady. "Since the term began."
"He sits in the back, and he asks two or three questions per session, always relevant, always precise."
"He never asks the kind of questions that are actually a mask for something else."
"You've been paying attention to him," Bruce noted, a knowing glint in his eye.
"I pay attention to everyone in my seminars," Sabrina countered immediately. "It's how I teach."
"Sure," Bruce said.
He didn't push. He knew when a point was settled and when a silence was becoming too loaded to navigate in front of a witness.
