21. Jasmine
JASMINE
The tile is cold under my bare feet when Mom's name appears on screen, and I answer before I've decided which version of myself she gets tonight.
"Hi, baby," she says. "You eating? You don't sound like you're eating."
"I'm eating." I lean against the sink. "I'm fine, Mom."
"You go quiet on me for days and call it fine. Where even are you?"
"Out of the city for a few days. A work thing. Somewhere quiet." All true, kind of.
"Quiet," she repeats, suspicious. "With that man?"
"It's—complicated."
"It's always complicated with the handsome ones." She laughs, then gentles. "I worry, Jazz. You've had a hard year. Don't run yourself into the ground."
"I know." I close my eyes. "How are you? The new meds, the—"
"That's why I called, actually." Her voice does something I haven't heard from her in years. It lifts. "I meant to tell you sooner, but I didn't understand it at first. The hospital sent a letter weeks ago, then called Tuesday to confirm it. The balance is gone. Paid in full."
"What?" My eyes widen.
"Forty-one thousand dollars. There's a program—the Anson Patient Relief Fund. I cried right there on the phone, I'm not ashamed of it."
The name feels familiar. Anson. I've seen it. Routed paperwork in Sebastian's outer office, a sub-fund under one of the Crowe charitable arms, account strings I scrolled past because it wasn't mine to deal with.
"Mom." My mouth has gone dry. "Did you apply? Fill anything out?"
"No, that's the miracle. They reached out to me. Said I was pre-qualified."
My legs go weak, and I place myself on the bath. I never gave Sebastian anything about it. Not to anyone. That means he went looking.
"Jazz? You there? Aren't you happy?"
"Of course, Mom." And I am—the relief is enormous, and I almost weep with it. "I'm so happy. You deserve to breathe."
"Then why do you sound like that?"
"Long day." I press my knuckles to my mouth. "I love you. Go celebrate. Order the good takeout."
"Love you too, baby. Come see me soon."
I stay on the cold lip of the tub a long while after she hangs up. Staring at the towel that is too white, the faucet, too gold. The beautiful things surrounding me all feel fake. Everything just fake.
He must've paid it. Before I knew what he was.
Before anything. I stamp up, and go to find him.
Somewhere, his voice carries, and Gideon responds—the easy cadence of men who think they're alone.
The study off the landing stands open, and the wall console is still lit, half-asleep, my own face one tile among many.
I touch the panel. Names, times, initials—a quiet ledger of a life I thought I was living by myself.
CARTER, J. — Residence exterior, supplemental coverage active since onboarding.
Since my eyes first set eyes on him. Before I'd even unpacked my desk.
CARTER, V. — Liability resolved. ANSON. Flag: do not disclose to JC.
I scroll, clumsy, clearly not a hacker, just a woman with one fingertip. An entry about search results—my name, lifted out of the articles that should have followed Owen's mess for years. A tracker. My car. A note about a decoy ping. And then the thing that stops my breath cold:
THREAT INTAKE — CARTER, J. — All assessments route to S.C. prior to subject notification. Prior to subject notification. Subject.
Another entry blinks underneath it.
CARTER, J. — Social contact review. PENNY SAYER. Cleared. Low risk.
My stomach turns.
Penny. He has Penny in here. Not as a friend, not as the woman who brings me terrible coffee and worse advice, but as a checked box. Cleared. Low risk. Like anyone who speaks to me has to pass through his mouth before they are allowed near my life.
I scroll again, faster now.
CARTER, J. — Article suppression complete. Whitaker narrative reduced from public search return.
My old career. My humiliation. Owen's words written too, quietly scraped from the surface while I was still walking around thinking I had survived that mess by myself. Then another.
CARTER, J. — Evening route variance noted. No notification unless pattern repeats.
My hands go numb. Route variance. That was me walking home a different way because I liked the bakery lights on Baxter. I chose a street because it smelled like rain on hot pavement. He made even that sound like a weather report for a thing he owned.
Not danger. Me. My mother. My friend. My name. My car. My routes.
All arranged into neat little boxes, waiting for his permission to become my own life again. Every danger. Everything, he kept. I jerk my hand away. Find my jacket, grab some car keys in the bowl, and I sneak out the front, quiet.
I ignite the engine. The headlights stripe the windshield and I drive through the gate as it opens. I take a long dark road toward the highway, and I call Penny.
"Tell me you're alive, you absolute ghost—"
"He paid my mom's hospital debt. Over forty thousand."
A beat. "Okay. That's a lot of money, Jazz. That's a huge gesture."
"Did it in secret though Penny. He's had coverage on my place since the week I started. He's been pulling my name out of articles relating to my old boss. There's a tracker in my car. And I just saw things that he's kept to himself."
"Before you're told."
"He's been deciding all sorts."
"Okay. Okay. I'm not going to tell you you're overreacting, because you're not."
"It feels like Owen."
"Jazz—"
"Not the same. Yes, right. Owen took my work and called it his. Sebastian has taken my life and is trying to say it's keeping me safe. But it's similar, Penny. A powerful man. Taking over my life, like I'm meant to say fuckin' thank you."
"You're allowed to be furious and grateful at once," she says. "He might have a hundred reasons. You must hear him out. Only he can give you the truth. Give him a chance."
"Yeah." My voice cracks. "Yeah."
"Where are you going?"
"Not sure."
I pull onto the shoulder, and let go. It comes up out of me ugly and loud, both hands fisted on the wheel. The tears run down my cheeks. I press my forehead to the cold rim of the wheel and ask the dark the only question left.
Does he love me—the loud, stubborn, inconvenient person—or does he love controlling me, hiding me from the world?
A cage is still a cage. Especially when the lock is on the outside.
I do not drive back. I stay parked on a side road until morning.
If I go back, it will be for answers, not forgiveness.