Chapter 4 #4
I lean my hip against the table, making absolutely no effort to step back from Alice. “Well, shit,” I say, smiling at him. “Look what the basement dragged in.”
Jagger’s stare doesn’t move from me. “Johnny.”
God, I love when he says my name like that.
Low. Flat. Mean.
Like a warning with a body count.
I lift my brows. “Little brother.”
Alice shifts beside me, her voice dry but tighter than before. “Do you two always make entrances like this, or is it a family defect?”
“It’s genetic,” I tell her without looking away from Jagger. “Tragic, really. No cure.”
Jagger takes one step closer, and the air changes with him. Alice feels it too. I can tell by the way her shoulders pull back, by the way her hand moves toward her camera like the lens might save her from whatever the fuck is about to happen.
It won’t.
But it does look cute when she tries.
“What are you doing here?” Jagger asks.
I look at Alice, then let my gaze drag back to him with all the innocence I absolutely do not have. “Talking.”
His jaw ticks.
Perfect.
“About what?”
Alice answers before I can, sharp and irritated. “My project.”
I smile. “See? Educational.”
Jagger’s eyes drop to the table again. The anatomy book. The photos. My hand close to hers. Every little thing arranged wrong enough to bother him.
“You done talking?” he asks me.
I laugh softly. “Oh I don’t know, we were just getting to the interesting part.”
Alice cuts me a look. “We were not.”
“We absolutely were.” I glance down at her mouth, then back at Jagger because I’m not a fucking amateur and the point is making sure he sees it. “She was about to tell me what else she likes taking apart.”
Her eyes flash. “That is not what I was about to do.”
“No?” I tilt my head, smiling like I didn’t mean to make it sound filthy. “Shame.”
Jagger moves another step closer, and the whole room tightens with him.
Not loud or dramatic. My brother doesn’t need to throw furniture to make a point.
He just gets still in that fucked-up way of his, like every part of him is being held back by one very tired thread.
His eyes stay on me, but his body knows exactly where Alice is, close enough beside the table that if I moved too fast, he’d be on me before she finished blinking.
God, I love family time.
I glance at Alice, then back at him, enjoying the way his jaw ticks when my attention lingers a second too long.
“You’re doing that thing again,” I tell him.
Jagger’s voice is flat. “What thing?”
“Pretending you’re calm.” I sigh like I’m disappointed in him, because I am. Deeply. Constantly. “It’s cute, but it’s not convincing.”
Alice shifts beside me, irritation sharp in her face. “Is this your whole personality?”
“Not the whole thing.”
“Shocking.”
“I know. I’m layered.”
“You’re loud.”
“Only because you’re still listening.”
“It’s not working.”
Jagger’s eyes cut to her for half a second, and fuck, there it is again. That little reflex he can’t kill fast enough. Like even when he’s pissed at me, some part of him checks her first.
That is new.
That is annoying.
That is exactly why I came down here.
I step back before Jagger can decide he’s done behaving, because timing matters, and I’ve gotten what I wanted.
Alice knows I can find her. Jagger knows I touched the edges of her world.
And now the two of them are standing in this basement pretending I didn’t just shove my hand between them and wiggle my fingers.
Jagger stops beside the table, close to Alice but not touching her. He doesn’t have to. His whole body is turned toward her like the rest of the room stopped mattering the second he saw me too close.
I hate that I notice.
I hate more that it gets under my skin.
As I pass him, I lean in just enough that only he can hear me.
“She’s fun.”
His eyes snap to mine.
There it is.
The ugly part.
“Stay away from her,” he says.
I grin, slow and honest. “No.”
For a second, I think he might actually hit me.
I almost want him to.
But Alice is watching, and Jagger is trying very hard not to prove me right in front of her. Noble. Boring. Deeply disappointing.
I leave before he can decide otherwise.
The stairs creak under my boots as I head up, and by the time I reach the main floor, I’m smiling again. Behind me, the basement door stays shut. No yelling. No crash. No Jagger dragging me back by the collar and making the night interesting.
Pity really.
Outside, the rain has picked up. Campus shines under the lamps, all wet stone, orange Halloween lights, and fake skeletons grinning from dorm windows like they’re in on the joke.
I light another cigarette and stand beneath the library awning.
Alice Aster.
Camera girl with smoke on her tongue and enough nerve to take a cigarette from my mouth.
Jagger’s little ghost.
My brother’s newest mistake.
She says she doesn’t want in the middle of us, which is adorable because people always think wanting matters. Like the game waits politely for permission. Like anyone here is decent enough to ask before ruining something.
Too late, Alice.
You pointed your lens at the wrong monster.
And now every monster in the room is looking back.