Chapter 41 The Past Comes Calling
Saturday morning meant a two-hour bus ride to State meet.
I took a window seat near the middle. Jackson folded himself into the spot beside me before I could even shrug off my jacket, his long legs jammed against the seat in front.
Across the aisle Cassidy held court, talking enough for the whole row.
Janet and Brian texted as soon as we pulled out of campus. Good luck today. We’re proud of you. Send photos. They had planned to drive up until something came up.
I sent back a quick thanks and a promise for photos if anything was worth capturing.
When I looked up, I spotted Naomi near the front with headphones in and her eyes fixed on the window. I had expected her to cause a scene after learning about the mating, but so far there had been nothing. Small mercies. Maybe she had finally let go of her delusions.
The bus rolled into the venue parking lot a little after nine. The course was already busy. Athletes from half a dozen schools moved in clusters across the grass, stretching, jogging easy laps, or walking the route one last time to check the terrain.
We checked in, pinned on our numbers, and headed out to warm up with the rest of the team.
The speech was the usual mix of strategy and motivation: stay smart, stay together, trust your training. The women would run first, six kilometers through the wooded course. The men would follow afterward.
Farther down the field, Jackson’s coach had the men’s team walking sections of the course and running short drills.
Jackson broke away long enough to find me.
When he reached me, he cupped my face with both hands and kissed me, deep and slow, completely unconcerned with the audience of coaches, teammates, and rivals.
Through the bond I felt the pulse of possessive satisfaction. Mine.
“Behave,” I told him as I pulled back.
A corner of his mouth lifted. “No promises.”
“Black!” his coach barked.
Jackson ignored him for one more heartbeat, leaned in, and pressed a quick kiss to my mouth. “Good luck,” he murmured against my lips. “Run like you own it.”
Then he jogged back to his team. I turned toward the starting line and took my place among the others.
The final seconds ticked down in a stretch of restless quiet. Someone bounced on their toes. A few deep breaths carried on the air. Then the starting gun cracked.
The race opened clean. The first stretch was wide enough for the pack to settle without too much jostling. I found my rhythm early, breathing steady, footing solid, the burn in my legs still distant.
For the first kilometer everything went according to plan.
Then Naomi appeared beside me.
I felt the deliberate shift of her foot a split second before I saw it. My reflexes kicked in hard. I twisted mid-stride and cleared the worst of the attempt, but her spike still grazed my calf instead of fully hooking my ankle.
Cassidy, running just behind us, wasn’t so lucky. She went down hard with a sharp cry.
Momentum carried me another few strides. Then I swore under my breath and angled toward the edge of the course, letting the other runners stream past before I turned back.
Coach Miller was going to hate this.
I doubled back anyway.
By the time I reached Cassidy she was trying to push herself up, face twisted in pain.
“Go,” she gasped. “I’m fine, just go—”
I hauled her up with an arm around her waist and half-dragged her off the course. “Can you put weight on it?”
She tried. Her face answered for her before she could even speak.
A medic appeared a few seconds later. I passed her off. “Stay with her.”
The second she was safe I turned and started running again.
Making up the lost ground wasn’t impossible, but it hurt. Every position I reclaimed cost more than it should have. I pushed hard through the wooded trails, legs burning, lungs screaming, forcing myself past runners who had already settled into their pace.
I crossed the finish line mid-pack, exhausted and furious. One look at the clock told me everything. I hadn’t made it.
Jackson was waiting at the chute. He pushed through the bodies the second he saw me, hands landing on my shoulders as his eyes scanned me head to toe. The bond pulsed hard with worry.
“Are you hurt? What happened?”
I shook my head. “Not me. Cassidy. Naomi tried to take my ankle out. I cleared it, but Cassidy was right behind me and went down hard. I got her to the medics and went back out.”
Jackson’s expression darkened. Through the bond I felt the sharp edge of his anger, controlled but close to the surface.
Coach Miller stood a few feet away with his arms crossed and his mouth pressed into a flat line. His silence cut deeper than any yelling would have.
Around us, parents and supporters drifted toward the runners who had finished well. A few girls got congratulatory hugs. Others got claps on the back and promises of post-race food. I received a couple of polite nods and nothing more.
Jackson’s hand settled at the small of my back. “Come on.”
We headed toward the team area. Cassidy was already there, sitting in a folding chair with an ice pack wrapped around her ankle, face pale and furious.
“There she is,” Naomi said loudly as I approached. “The reason we didn’t place.”
Several heads turned.
“You stopped in the middle of State,” she continued. “Cassidy didn’t finish at all because of it, and we lost points. Real team player.”
Cassidy’s head snapped up. “It’s your fault. You tried to trip Harper and took me out instead.”
A low murmur ran through the team.
Naomi scoffed. “Please. You fell on your own. Clumsy as always.”
No one had seen it clearly. The trail had curved just enough to hide the worst of it.
Coach Miller’s voice cut through the tension, low and cold. “Enough. If anyone has actual evidence, bring it to me. Otherwise this discussion is over.”
Naomi folded her arms, still looking pleased with herself. Cassidy looked ready to commit murder.
I said nothing. I just stared at Naomi until she was the one who looked away first. My cat wanted blood. So did I.
When the final scores were posted later, our team wasn’t even close to placing. My individual time hadn’t been good enough to qualify either. The cross-country season was over.
The men’s race went exactly according to plan. Jackson crossed the finish line first, chest heaving hard. He bent forward with his hands on his knees and took two steady breaths before straightening up.
His coach met him with a wide grin and a hard slap on the back. “That’s how you do it.”
Jackson looked up. His gaze found me almost immediately through the crowd and he pushed through the bodies without slowing. He caught me around the waist, and lifted me clean off the ground, swinging me once before setting me back down.
My cat purred with delight.
I was still stinging from my own race, but his joy cut through some of the bitterness. I couldn’t help smiling.
“Congratulations,” I said.
He grinned, sweat still dripping down his temples. “Thanks.”
We moved toward the family and friends area together. Thomas hadn’t shown. No surprise. A few of the wolf parents clapped Jackson on the back with respectful nods as we passed. The alpha’s son. The heir. The one who had just delivered exactly what was expected of him.
Others were less subtle. A couple of the mothers wrinkled their noses when they caught my scent. One man looked straight through me like I wasn’t there. Another woman gave me a flat, open look of dislike before turning away. They did not make it a secret of how they felt about cats.
The rest of the meet barely registered. Awards, cooldowns, loading gear.
Before I knew it, everyone was drifting back toward the buses.
On the ride home, the women’s side stayed quiet.
Cassidy sat with her wrapped ankle propped up and the ice pack slowly melting against it, staring out the window in silence.
The rest of us were flat and defeated. Even the men’s win couldn’t cut through the sour taste left by Naomi’s stunt and our own poor finish.
Later that evening, I stood in front of the mirror adjusting the last pieces of my Britney costume. Pleated skirt, white shirt tied high under my chest, pigtails, and a lollipop. I wanted it to be a surprise for Jackson. He had gotten ready at his place, and we were supposed to meet at the party.
A loud knock sounded at the door. I opened it to find Cassidy in a white toga with her laurel crown sitting slightly askew and one crutch under her arm. She took one look at me and her mouth fell open.
“Holy shit, Harper. You went full Britney fantasy. He’s going to lose his mind when he sees you. I love it.” She grinned despite the pain. “Now let’s go. I didn’t hobble all the way over here just to sit on your couch.”
“You’re supposed to be resting that ankle.”
“Resting is for quitters. Come on.”
I grabbed my phone and keys while she waited by the door, already looking impatient.
Twenty minutes later, we reached the off-campus house. The beat pulsed heavy and insistent from inside. The party was well outside pack territory, but half the wolves on campus had shown up anyway.
The moment we stepped inside I started mapping exits out of habit, noting the front door, the kitchen side door, and the sliding glass at the back.
Rick was in swim trunks pretending to be an Olympian.
Jason had gone full Thor with a foam hammer.
Lia was dressed as Catwoman. Naomi strutted through the crowd in a red devil costume, already drawing attention.
Music slammed against the walls. Someone laughed too loud near the kitchen.
The house was stifling. Too many bodies packed into too little space, and the heat pressed in from every side.
Then I felt the familiar pull through the bond.
Jackson stood at the top of the staircase in a cowboy hat pulled low, flannel shirt open over bare chest and abs, toy gun hanging at his hip. He looked like sin wrapped in denim. The second his eyes found me, he started down the stairs like a predator who had already decided on his prey.
Cassidy muttered beside me, “He looks like he walked out of a Wild West wet dream.”
A girl in a nurse outfit reached for his arm as he passed. He shrugged her off without even looking at her and kept coming straight for me.
A possessive growl tore from my throat before I could stop it.
Cassidy blinked. “Did you just growl?”
I ignored her. The second he reached me, he pulled me hard against him, one big hand splaying across my lower back as he brought me flush to his chest. His voice came out low and rough.
“And you, darlin’, are the sexiest Britney I’ve ever seen.”
I slid the lollipop from my mouth slowly. “That so, cowboy?”
His eyes darkened. He pressed his face into the curve of my neck and inhaled deeply. A low, hungry sound rumbled in his chest.
“You smell so fucking good. Sweeter than usual. Makes me want to bite.”
Cassidy was forgotten the second he pulled me toward the makeshift dance floor.
Music thumped heavy and insistent through the floorboards.
We moved together like we were the only ones in the room, bodies locked, hips rolling slow and dirty.
His grip slid lower, fingers digging into my ass under the tiny skirt as he ground against me.
I hooked one leg around his thigh and tangled my fingers in his hair, tugging just hard enough to draw another growl from his chest.
We lost track of time. The rest of the party faded into heat and noise until only Jackson existed. His hands on me. His scent wrapped around me. The bond burning hot between us.
That is why I almost missed them. Through the press of bodies I caught a flash of red near the edge of the room. Naomi was leading, a man trailing close at her shoulder. They weren’t dancing. They were cutting a straight path toward the DJ booth.
The music cut abruptly a few seconds later. Naomi climbed onto the small platform and tapped the microphone.
“Sorry to interrupt. I just have something I think people deserve to know.”
Beside me Jackson straightened.
“You all know Harper James,” Naomi began, voice sweet and sharp. “The transfer student who cost us State today. I figured everyone should know exactly who she really is.”
The man standing beside her was staring straight at me. Blonde. Familiar. It took a second, then it clicked.
Chad fucking Bowman.
I hadn’t thought about him in years.
Jackson leaned down, voice low and lethal near my ear.
“Who the hell is he?”
"Some douche from my old high school," I said under my breath. I pulled out my phone and started typing.
Naomi continued, savoring every word. “Harper transferred here after some serious issues at her last school. Violent ones. The kind of things most people don’t come back from.”
“That’s enough,” Jackson said.
She ignored him and kept going. “There was a girl there. Harper put her in the hospital. Nearly killed her. And somehow she still got to walk away and start over like nothing happened.”
I raised an eyebrow and kept typing.
“And that wasn’t even the first time,” Naomi continued. “When she was sixteen she stabbed a guy in homeroom. Right through the thigh. Her first victim is actually here tonight. Chad?”
Chad swaggered forward, holding up a folded set of papers like evidence. “Yeah. That was me. Crazy bitch jammed a pen straight into my leg. I’ve still got the scar. The school wanted her evaluated for being a goddamn psychopath. No remorse. Nothing. She’s dangerous.”
Someone near the back laughed uncertainly. Most of the room didn’t.
Chad pressed harder, voice rising as he played to the crowd. “People always covered for her. Teachers. Administrators. Everybody. She hurts people and somehow she’s still the fucking victim. Looking at her now, nothing’s changed.”
The room had gone silent.
“Figured people should know exactly who they’re dealing with,” Naomi added, still looking pleased with herself.
Jackson stepped forward, fury radiating off him. “What the hell is wrong with you?”
Naomi laughed. “Why? Can’t handle the truth about your little girlfriend?”
I caught Jackson’s forearm before he could take another step.
His attention snapped to me at once.
“Harper—”
“Let them finish,” I said, voice flat. “I want to hear every fucking word.”