Chapter Fifty
“You’re happy today,” Thiago comments as he catches me staring dreamily into the distance. I’m currently leaning into his side, braced on the stone bench where we like to have breakfast. Turning my dumb grin onto him, the stretch of it spreads wider across my face.
“I am happy. Genuinely.” Just saying those words is like a weight lifting from my chest. Even before the events of last year, I’ve never felt this…
light. Like I don’t need to shoulder my burdens alone because I have others who will share the load with me.
Both Thiago and Everest have played a part in that, much to my surprise.
The ghosts of my past have finally stopped haunting me, despite how Harrison met his end.
I just have to keep my secret buried alongside him and find a quiet moment to ask Thi how we’re going to look for Laura now.
Opening my mouth to ask just that, Thi presses a kiss to my temple and exhales.
“Are you sure you don’t want to just stay here with me? We could just sit in antisocial silence together.” I chuckle under my breath, nudging him with my shoulder.
“We can do that literally anytime. I haven’t felt this awake in a long time.
” Pushing to my feet, Thiago groans but doesn’t tug me back down like I thought he might.
Spinning in my leggings, sports bra and loose tank top, my ponytail swishes a delayed second later.
“Besides, I need to work off those pastries or I’m going to need Everest to roll me around the pitch. ”
“Those are all words I never want to hear again,” Thi scrunches up his nose. I smack his bicep. “Fine, go have your run. I’ll be right here when you get back.” I pause just before my sneakers can take me away.
“You’re staying outside?” I raise my brows. Reaching into his backpack, Thi tugs out his laptop and opens it on his lap.
“Maybe this whole fresh air thing isn’t so bad,” he comments, ducking his head away from the smug look that crosses my face.
I resist saying I told you so, just about.
Instead, I lean in and kiss his head before pushing my headphones in.
My feet hit the path, soles brushing over grit and fallen leaves as I cut across the edge of the quad and let the cool morning air rush over my skin.
Goosebumps raise along my arms, my lungs burning before they begin to expand properly.
It’s been far too long since I’ve had the energy for a morning jog, but the route comes back to me like muscle memory.
Punk rock bleeds into my head as I warm up, leaving all rumors and whispers far behind.
Not that I’ve ever cared what anyone thinks, but when I’m running, I’m free to forget that anyone else exists at all.
Campus slips around me in fragmented pieces I barely pay attention to.
The sports field is still silvered with dew, the goalposts cutting clean lines against the pale sky.
A line of first years huddled outside the library is almost as long as the seniors queuing outside the coffee kiosks, not yet losing their tenacity for bonus credit and kissing ass.
Passing the art block without slowing, I refuse to let my gaze linger on the tall windows or think about my ripped canvas in the trash.
Not today anyway. Today, my muscles are burning, my ponytail is swinging and my heart is beating in a way that doesn’t feel like it’s trying to punch out of my chest. As if my body has finally woken up, repairing something I haven’t been able to fix otherwise.
I didn’t realize how much I missed this. The simplicity of a physical routine. The exchange of effort for relief. Just one foot in front of the other, the path ahead of me, and the rapid bassline in my ears.
By the time I loop around the far side of the science buildings, I’m smiling like an idiot.
I pick up my pace, the morning sun breaking through the trees in streaks of gold and dappling the pavement ahead of me.
For one stupid, beautiful second, everything feels like it’s slotting back where it belongs. My classes. My team. My…men? Me.
Right up until the first police car turns onto campus.
My stride falters so swiftly, I almost trip over my own feet.
At first, my brain tries to reject what I’m seeing, like maybe if I blink hard enough, the flashing blue lights will prove to be a mirage.
But then another car follows, and another, streaming through the main gates in a line of black and white that makes the entire world narrow to the cold punch of panic slamming into my chest. My heart stops, refusing to beat as the realization washes over me.
They found Harrison’s body. My secret has clawed its way back from the grave. No, no, no.
As the cars turn towards the main office building, students around me begin to notice too, heads turning and phones lifting.
I pop out my headphones to hear the murmurs already starting to swell.
I back up a step, then another, before twisting on my heel and breaking into a run again, only this time there’s nothing freeing about it.
My feet pound against the path as I circle back the way I came, cutting across the grass instead of sticking to the paved route.
Ignoring the burn in my legs and the sharp stitch forming beneath my ribs, my mind spirals with one thought. I need Thiago.
He’s exactly where I left him, as promised.
Still sitting on the low stone bench, one leg stretched out, one bent beneath his laptop.
Two empty coffee cups lie beside him. I skid to a stop in front of him, the breath tearing out of me.
One sweeping look at my face and Thi’s laptop is snapped shut, his hands gripping my biceps as he stands.
“Meg? What’s wrong?”
“Police. A lot of them. They just came through the main gate.” I can barely manage the words but I force them out regardless. For some reason, Thi’s shoulders relax and his hands rub me soothingly.
“It’s okay, Amorzinha. Everything is okay.” I shake my head at his small smile, my lungs forgetting how to function properly.
“No, you don’t understand. We need to warn Everest.” The hands on my biceps freeze in place.
“Warn him about what?” Thi asks quietly.
I’m trembling now, too distracted by my body’s internal shutdown to understand what’s happening with Thi’s features.
“Wait. Warn him about what?!” His voice raises in pitch and I rush to silence him.
His blue eyes widen as if some insight has just come to him.
A low breath escapes his parted lips. “Oh shit. What did you guys do?”
“No time. We need to find him.” Nodding, Thi shoves his laptop into his bag and zips it roughly. His eyes flick over my shoulder, toward the route I came from, and then back to my face.
“Let’s try his house first. Is there a shortcut across campus?
” I’m already nodding, cataloguing the route.
We can cut behind the admin block and down a service lane, where there’s less people and no cameras.
Taking Thiago’s hand, I drag him a step behind me, glancing back regularly to check he’s still with me.
We move fast, slipping between buildings with our fingers interlocked tightly until Everest’s frat house comes into view.
My chest feels like it’s been scraped raw from the inside, but at least we’re here now.
Everest will know what to say, what to do.
The front lawn is empty, the windows staring outwards.
There doesn’t seem to be any life inside, but I don’t slow as I hit the porch with firm stomps of my sneakers.
The dull wail of sirens sounds from a distance and my chest crushes inwards. We’re running out of time.
Trying the front door and finding it unlocked, I push inside.
My feet fly up the staircase, not hanging around for pleasantries.
Thiago doesn’t falter either, our joined hands slick with sweat and fear.
At the top of the stairs, Everest’s office door is the only one that’s shut, all others proving to be empty on first glance.
I don’t stop to knock or wait around to use my manners.
Not with sirens crawling closer and the panic churning in my gut.
Slamming my palm against the handle, I shove it open, dragging Thiago in behind me.
Then I stop dead, Thi’s chest crashing into my back with a soft oomph. There’s not enough brainpower in the world to communicate what is happening before my eyes.
Everest is pressed back against his desk, one hand fisted in someone’s T-shirt, the other buried in his white hair.
That someone being…well it can’t be but it appears it’s...
Reid. Standing between Everest’s thighs, Reid’s body is angled over him, as they kiss so aggressively, it’s borderline fighting.
Hands clutch harshly, pushing and pulling, lips crashing against one another’s.
My mind empties, fully and completely. As if someone has unplugged every wire inside my skull, I’m left standing there with my mouth parted and my hand clenched around Thiago’s turning into a death-like grip.
Everest’s head snaps toward us first, his eyes frenzied, his chest rising hard beneath Reid’s crumpled grip.
Reid’s reaction is slower, his expression shuttering almost instantly, but not fast enough to hide the heat still stamped across his face.
For a suspended second, nobody moves, until my brain supplies one thought and one thought only.
“What the actual fuck?” I frown, not knowing where to look. At Everest’s blazing green eyes or Reid’s unbothered gray ones. Stepping into my side, Thiago lifts his index finger into the air.