Chapter 20 He Never Answered
Monday morning practice ran long. Coach Miller kept us through the recovery cooldown and then added a second one, throwing in strides after someone made the mistake of asking if we could leave early. Nobody asked twice.
After showering and changing, I grabbed a coffee and headed toward Environmental Science.
Jackson was ahead of me on the main path, about thirty yards up, walking with Lia.
Rick and Jason trailed a few steps behind, heads bent over a phone.
Jackson had his arm around Lia's shoulders. He said something I couldn’t hear, and she laughed.
He mussed her hair; she squealed and shoved him, and laughed too.
I watched a second longer than I meant to. It had been years since I’d had people I could be that comfortable with.
My cat made a low, dissatisfied sound.
It’s friendship, I told her.
She wasn’t convinced.
A few more steps and Jackson slowed. He glanced over his shoulder, his eyes locking on mine like he’d already known I was there.
Jason noticed next and lifted a hand. “Morning, Harper.”
Rick grinned. “Hey.”
Lia looked back at the voices. Her gaze landed on me for half a second, then slid past. “Come on,” she said, and kept walking toward the lecture hall.
Jackson waited until I drew level, then matched my pace. “Morning.”
“Morning.” I watched Lia’s back. “Your friend doesn’t like me.”
“Lia?”
“She made a point of ignoring me.”
He frowned. “She takes time with new people. She’ll come around.”
“Mm.” I didn’t buy it. And I wasn’t sure I cared if she did.
We turned down the main hallway toward the lecture hall.
Ahead of us a guy walked backward, laughing with his friends, completely oblivious as he drifted straight into my path.
I started to step around him, but Jackson was faster.
His hand landed on the guy’s shoulder and guided him sharply out of the way.
“Watch it.”
The guy stumbled, caught himself, and spun around. “What the—” He stopped the second he saw Jackson.
“Sorry, man.” One of his friends grabbed his arm and hauled him back into the flow of bodies. They disappeared fast.
Jackson turned to me. “You okay?”
“I’m fine. He didn’t touch me.”
“I wasn’t taking the chance.”
My cat approved.
Environmental Science passed in ninety minutes of nitrogen cycling. Behavioral Analysis followed with sixty more on Sterling's typology of sexual sadists. Jackson sat beside me, knee against mine under the desk.
By lunch, I was starving and in no mood for bullshit, which was unfortunate because Naomi was waiting at the cafeteria entrance.
She stepped directly into my path. "We need to talk."
"No, we don't." I tried to sidestep.
She moved with me. Two of her girls hovered behind her at a safe distance, arranged for witnesses or support. Who knows.
"Harper."
"Norah."
Her eye twitched. "I've been watching you."
"That's unsettling. You should talk to your doctor about it."
"There's something off about you. Everybody can feel it."
“Mm.” I kept my face blank.
"No one knows where you're actually from. Your stories don't add up—”
I stopped listening. My attention wandered to the door frame behind her. Steel-reinforced, probably. I wondered how many pounds of force it would take to introduce the back of her skull to it.
"—and I'm going to figure out what it is. Every secret. Every—"
I thought about the pen clipped inside my bag. I imagined pulling it free with my left hand and driving it up beneath her jaw, the point punching through the floor of her mouth and into the palate.
"—I am going to pull it apart piece by piece and put it on a table in front of Jackson."
I pictured her expression changing from smug certainty to the blank look of someone who hadn't yet realized they were already dying.
Naomi had stopped talking.
I blinked, the daydream dissolving.
"Well?" she snapped. "Nothing to say?"
The girls behind her shifted aside as students began piling up behind us, forced to squeeze around the blockade.
I sighed. "Honestly, Nancy, I'm still trying to figure out which medication you're supposed to be taking."
Her face flushed with anger. I didn’t wait. I shouldered past her hard enough that she had to take a step back, grabbed a tray, and headed for the table by the window. I took my usual seat with my back to the wall.
Four bites later, Cassidy slid into the chair opposite me with a tray piled high.
"So I've been thinking about the murders all weekend," she said, unwrapping a sandwich.
"That is not weird at all."
"I know, I know. But they officially linked them. Police press conference was yesterday."
"Okay."
"The Black Industries guy was on the news too. Thomas Black?"
"What about him?"
"Apparently Richard worked for him. Colton too. People think it's too big of a coincidence."
"Give people two facts and they'll invent the rest."
"True. Still nothing on the witness. I've been refreshing the subreddit like a psycho."
"Sounds restful."
"It was a whole weekend thing and I also did homework. I'm a complete person." She chewed. "The theory now is that it's someone the victims knew. Local. Not a drifter."
"Why?"
"Because of how the scenes looked. Both in their own houses, no forced entry. It takes planning. Somebody who knew them well enough to get close."
I took a pull of water. "Makes sense."
"Right? I should be a detective."
"Please don't."
I already felt him before Cassidy’s eyes flicked past my shoulder. “Oh.”
Jackson came to a stop beside the table. "Can I sit?”
Cassidy was already gathering her things. "I was just finishing anyway." She shot me a not-so-subtle look. "Bye, Harper."
She left.
Jackson sat down in her seat. He didn’t touch the coffee or banana he’d brought with him. He leaned back, one arm draped along the empty chair beside him.
I took another bite. He watched me chew.
"You’re staring," I said.
"I know."
"Why?"
"I like looking at you."
I set my fork down. "You always like this?”
"Only when it matters."
I held his gaze. "And I matter?"
"Yeah." His voice was low. "You do."
I studied him the way he’d been studying me.
Two names left. One job to finish. Jackson was supposed to be a problem I managed by not engaging, but the strategy was failing.
Every time we ended up together, it cost me more.
He was under my skin. My cat had chosen his side, and my body had betrayed me the second I laid eyes on him in that hallway.
Maybe I could fuck him out of my system. Burn through whatever this was and get back to what mattered — the targets, the training, the work.
That was the plan.
Sex had never been the issue. Trust was.
I leaned forward, elbows on the table.
"If we fuck," I said, "are you going to get clingy? Or will you move on and let me be?"
He didn't answer right away. He rubbed slowly along his jaw while he studied me, expression unreadable. The silence stretched between us.
Then he leaned in. “I’ll pick you up tomorrow at seven.”
He picked up his coffee and untouched banana, stood, and walked away.
I watched him go.
My cat purred, long and smug, utterly convinced she'd won.
I picked up my fork and went back to my food. It tasted like cardboard. I forced down two more bites before giving up. My mind wouldn’t stop circling back to him, so I pulled my phone out under the table and opened the reddit post. Still up. No new comments. Nothing deleted.
I put the phone away.
My thoughts went straight back to Jackson anyway.
He never answered my question.