CHAPTER 10 #3
“Why is it always cardio with this group?” Jace panted. “Couldn’t the Sphinx test loyalty with like, yoga?”
“Keep running!” I snapped.
Behind us, a flashlight beam clipped my shoulder. “Hey! Stop!”
Jace shouted over his shoulder, “Can’t! Gluten allergy!”
“Not helpful!” I said through gritted teeth.
We cut between two dorm buildings. Voices echoed above and I glanced up and saw students leaning out of windows, their phones raised. Great. Exactly what we needed.
If this went viral, we were dead.
A siren wailed somewhere near the front gate.
“This way!” I hissed, grabbing Jace’s arm and pulling him behind a building.
We slid into the shadow of a dumpster that smelled like old pizza. I pressed my back to the brick wall, gasping.
Jace bent over beside me. “Great workout plan, by the way. Break into an office, flee armed security, maybe puke behind a trash can. We should tell Coach about this one.”
“Listen,” I hissed.
Footsteps pounded past, fading as they headed toward where we’d just come from.
Silence.
I let out a long breath, my adrenaline crashing hard. My hands shook as I clutched the ledger to my chest.
Jace was grinning like he’d just stepped off a roller coaster instead of outrun campus security. “You realize we just pulled off something out of a heist movie, right? I’m, like, George Clooney in Ocean’s Eleven—but hotter.”
“I’m not even going to respond to that,” I muttered.
“You two alive?” Parker whispered suddenly.
I nearly jumped out of my skin. He emerged from the shadows, his hoodie streaked with mud, breathing hard but grinning.
“I thought we were meeting by the fence?” I said, straightening up.
“I wasn’t sure the two of you would make it,” Parker responded, raising an eyebrow.
I nodded because…that was a possibility.
Jace threw an arm around him, and Parker almost fell over. “That’s why you’re my QB,” he said proudly. “Also, would now be a good time to tell the two of you that I lost a shoe?”
We all looked down. One of his socks was soaked through.
Parker blinked. “How do you even manage that?”
“Artistry,” Jace said. “You wouldn’t understand.”
I laughed despite myself, the sound rough and breathless. The tension cracked like ice breaking.
Parker grinned. “Alright, fun’s over. Let’s get out of here.”
We slipped from behind the dumpster and cut through the narrow alley we’d found ourselves in. The smell of turpentine mixed with something floral—perfume? No, maybe I was smelling fertilizer again.
Parker led, crouching down, checking corners. I made another mental note to ask him how he was so good at this.
The criminal life was definitely not for me.
We were halfway across the grass when a spotlight flared behind us.
“Freeze!”
Spoiler alert, we didn’t.
We ran.
My thighs screamed. Jace cursed every god he knew.
“That’s the fence!” I gasped, spotting the glint of metal ahead.
We were almost there when the worst possible thing happened…Jace tripped.
Not a stumble. A full-body, limbs-everywhere wipeout.
He went down hard, face-first into the grass with a noise that sounded like a dying walrus.
“Go without me!” he groaned dramatically. “Save yourselves!”
“Get up!” I hissed, yanking his arm.
He popped up, grass in his hair, and sprinted again. “All part of the plan!”
We hit the fence. Parker was already halfway over. I shoved the ledger under my hoodie, climbed, and nearly slipped when my sweat-slick palms hit the cold metal.
A flashlight beam swept across us. “I said to stop!” a guard yelled.
“Not today!” Jace yelled, vaulting over.
We dropped down on the other side and hit the ground running again.
The asphalt chewed at my shoes, the cold air burning in my chest. Freedom wasn’t clean it turns out; it was sweaty and filled with a shaky kind of relief where you were proud you hadn’t pissed yourself.
Behind us, the alarm still howled. Ahead, the dark stretch of road promised nothing but silence.
We didn’t stop until we reached the car.
I collapsed against the hood, chest heaving. Parker bent over, hands braced on his knees, gasping. Jace sprawled flat on the pavement, arms and legs splayed like a crime-scene outline.
“Well,” he said between ragged breaths, “that went perfectly.”
“Perfectly?” Parker wheezed. “You tripped, lost a shoe, and almost got us caught.”
Jace straightened, still gasping, and flashed a grin. “Yeah, but I stuck the landing—and that’s what people will remember.”
“I don’t even know what that means,” I said as I slid down next to him, clutching the ledger.
My hands still shook, but a laugh broke out anyway—wild and breathless and uncontrollable.
Within seconds, Parker cracked, too, shaking his head.
Jace followed, the three of us laughing like lunatics in the dark.
The kind of laughter that only came when you realized you’d somehow pulled off something impossible.
Finally, Parker wiped his face, still grinning. “We need to go. Now.”
We piled into the car, doors slamming in near unison. I jammed the keys into the ignition, tires squealing as we tore down the empty road. The glow of the campus faded in the rearview mirror, alarms still wailing somewhere behind us.
Silence settled heavy over the car, only the hum of the engine filling the space. My pulse was still hammering when I heard it—crinkle.
I frowned. “What was that?”
Another crinkle.
I glanced back. Jace sat there, seatbelt crooked, hair a wreck, an Oreo halfway to his mouth.
He froze mid-chew, his eyes meeting mine. “What?” he mumbled around the cookie. “Along with stress eating, I also believe in recovery snacks.”
Parker groaned. “You’re unbelievable.”
Jace grinned, unbothered. “Maybe. But I’m calm, and you two look like you just aged ten years, so who’s really winning?”
I snorted and shook my head, glancing down at the ledger in my lap.
One trial down. One step closer to Sphinx membership and all it would mean for me.
But as the road unspooled in front of us, my mind drifted back to the other thing clawing at me…another puzzle I hadn’t solved.
My mystery girl.
I pressed my foot down on the gas, a faint smile tugging at my mouth.
Time to figure out her name.