by B. B. Hamel
Calvin stared at me with those disconcerting eyes. He was handsome, but seemed so empty.
“That first night you came to Addler’s. You asked him to do it then, didn’t you?”
“Yes.” I had no clue how he’d figured this all out, but I was impressed.
“That’s why you two were sneaking off. There’s no tutoring. I never thought there was. Only I figured he was fucking you.”
“Not fucking me.”
Not yet at least.
“You convinced Jarrod to murder a man for you.” Calvin tilted his head. “I’ll admit, that’s pretty fucked up and twisted. I didn’t think you had it in you.”
I blinked a few times. “I’m not sure how to take that.”
“Take it however you want. I always pegged you for a quiet, pissed off little emo girl. Hot, but not worth the trouble. I figured you were using Jarrod for something, but this is so much more than I ever could’ve guessed.”
“I’m not using him,” I said angrily and at the same time I wondered.
“I don’t care.”
“What are you going to do to me?” I took a step back.
He didn’t move.
“Nothing.”
I opened my mouth, tried to speak, and had to gather myself before I finally said, “Then why did you bring me out here?”
“Because I want you to understand something.” He talked like we were having a conversation over lunch about stocks. My hands fidgeted with my jeans and I shifted from foot to foot. Too much nervous energy. “I love Jarrod. I love all my friends. I’m not the kind of person that goes halfway. I won’t turn you into the police and certainly won’t tell anyone your little secret, but only because I care about what happens to Jarrod.”
“I care too.”
He ignored that and stepped forward. “I don’t care about what happens to you. So be careful what you do. If you fuck with him, if you hurt him—”
“I’m not going to.”
“—If you do, I will make sure you don’t breathe long to savor the victory.”
I let out a breath through my nose. “So you brought me here to threaten me.”
“I brought you here to let you know that you and he aren’t as careful as you think you are. If I figured it out, you think that detective won’t?”
I felt a shiver down my spine. “How do you know about her?”
“You’re really clueless.” He shook his head, his lips curling in disgust. “Hear what I’m saying. Be careful and don’t do something we’ll both regret.”
With that, he pulled his hood back up and walked toward campus.
“Wait a second,” I called after him. “You can’t just walk away.”
He didn’t pause and didn’t walk back.
He’d said what he came to say, and he was done.
That asshole. He dragged me out here to threaten me, and for what? Nothing changed, and now I was terrified he’d do something to get me thrown in jail.
But if he wanted to do that, it made no sense to bring me here and tell me what he knew.
If he wanted to turn me in or to blackmail me, he could’ve done it from a comfortable distance.
No, this was just to show me that he had power over me.
And now I knew not to fuck with him.
I trudged back to Wawa. My bike was still leaning against the wall. I grabbed it and walked it toward the road then began the long, freezing ride back, my mind spinning with thoughts of Calvin, trying to parse out what the hell just happened—and what it means for me and Jarrod.
22
Cora
I met Jarrod in the library in his corner the next day. He sat at the table with his legs outstretched and his hands behind his head.
I dropped my books on the table in front of him.
He looked up, eyebrows raised.
“Calvin knows.”
He tilted his head. “Excuse me?”
I filled him in on the night before.
I had agonized over whether I should tell Jarrod or not. The whole ride back, the wind turning my poor pink cheeks into wind-torn ground beef, I imagined all the terrible things that might happen.
But once I arrived in my clean and cozy bed, I realized Calvin never told me not to say anything to Jarrod.
He was the sort of man that wouldn’t overlook something like that.
Which meant I was free to speak up if I wanted.
Still, I wasn’t sure. I didn’t know how Jarrod would react. Anger, definitely. Defiance, probably. Violence? I didn’t know. The Horsemen never fought with each other—they presented a united front to the school. That was part of their charm: four best friends as tight as could be.
Driving a wedge into that gave me a pathetic, sick pleasure. I didn’t want to take a friendship from Jarrod, but I wasn’t sure Calvin was someone he would want to be close with after all.
When I finished, he let out a long breath and held out a hand.
“Give me your burner.”
I fished it from my bag. He didn’t comment on the wrecked screen.
He shoved it into his pocket.
“What are you doing with that?”
“Destroying it along with my own. If you logged into any services, like Google or Apple or whatever, make sure you delete any logs it saved on your clouds.”
“I can handle that, but I didn’t.”
“Good.” He tapped his fingers on the table. “Calvin won’t rat us out, just like he said. He’s strange but he’s loyal.”
“He said something along those lines. What about Addler and Des?”
“He won’t tell them. Addler would probably go to the police out of some insane sense of right and wrong, and Des might do it out of spite or for fun.”
“Des sounds like an asshole.”
“He’s chaos incarnate, that one.” Jarrod rubbed his face and shook his head. “This doesn’t change anything. We move forward.”
I sat across from him, exhausted from riding and staying up late the night before. “What does that even mean?”
“We have an alibi, but nobody else can corroborate it. So unless we can get a third party to speak up, we’re still suspects.”
“Know anyone like that?”
“Unfortunately, I don’t.”
“What do we do?” I leaned forward, head in my hands.
I was hopeless and rotten. When I started all this, I thought I’d kill Dr. Silver and move on with my life—whether that meant serving prison time or drifting along with my days. Either way, I didn’t really care, because there was never an “after” for me, only that single act, and then oblivion.
Except now Jarrod gave me a reason to keep on going, and I didn’t want to disappear anymore.
“I have some ideas, but the big one is, we need to make sure that Silver’s little molestation list gets leaked to the press.”
I looked up at him. “Two questions. How would that help and how the hell would we do it?”
“We want the town to be as sympathetic as possible. If it comes to a trial, I want everyone biased as hell. I want them all to know that he was a sick, sick monster. Might help down the line.”
“Okay, sure, but how does it help now?”
“It’ll cause chaos for the cops. They don’t like this sort of attention, especially press about an ongoing investigation. It’ll make it harder for them to get folks to cooperate, to find other witnesses.”
I nodded slowly. “When people realize they’re not dealing with a nice, friendly, respected chiropractor, they might not want to help.”
“Exactly. It’ll throw a wrench in their gears. There’s a reason why it hasn’t leaked yet.”
“Okay, fine, I can see why it might be useful, but how do we do it?”
“Leave that to me.”
I made a face and groaned. “You’re not breaking more laws for me.”
“I will do my best not to break any more laws.”
“That’s not very convincing.”
“But it’
s the best I can do. So you’ll trust me on this?”
I spread my hands. “I don’t know if I have a choice.”
“I guess you don’t.” He grin was cocky and handsome. “Come over here.”
I leaned back and crossed my arms. “What are you going to do to me?”
He stood and walked around the table. I looked up at him as he grabbed my arms and lifted me up. I let out a little shocked gasp as he moved back to his side of the table, sat down, and deposited me into his lap.
He wrapped his massive arms around my body and held me.
At first, I sat there stiffly, uncomfortable and uncertain about what was happening. But slowly, I relaxed into his arms, leaning my head against his chest, and listened to his breaths and his heartbeat. I fell into rhythm with him and felt, strangely, impossibly, safe.
“When did I go from being terrified of you to sitting on you like this?”
He laughed softly. “When were you terrified of me?”
“Basically forever. You’ve always been so harsh to Robyn and I was afraid you’d treat me that way.” I paused, frowning a little. “You never did though. At worst, you ignored me.”
“Robyn got more shit from me than she ever deserved. I owe her a massive apology.”
“You owe her a lot more than that.”
“I’ve done a lot to protect her over the years. I like to think we’re almost square.”
I hit him gently on the chest. “You’re not.”
“All right then. A massive apology and more.”
“Good. She’s a decent person, you know.”
“I know that. How’d we end up with her?”
“I’m charming and fun to be around. You’re her cousin.”
He snorted and kissed my neck. I was intensely aware that we were technically in public—anyone could walk back and catch me snuggling up in Jarrod’s lap.
But the rumor mill was already grinding away. Everyone heard about me visiting him at the party. I caught looks in the hallways, laughs and winks on the quad, and I did my best to ignore it all, but being around a Horsemen meant I was a public figure.
I didn’t want that. I liked my old life—quiet and anonymous.
Only I ripped all that to shreds and threw myself with wild abandon into Jarrod’s arms.
“I want to take you somewhere this weekend.”
I tilted my chin up to look him in the eyes. “Take me somewhere?”
“It’s a place I keep.” He frowned a little, hesitating. “It’s my place.”
“I’m not sure I know what you mean.”
“Can you take a few days? Saturday and Sunday? It might be good to lie low.”
“I don’t think Detective Bates will like that.”
“We’re not leaving the state. Hell, we’re not leaving the area.”
“Okay then.” I shrugged a little, pushing myself closer to him. “I’ll go whenever you want.”
“Good. I think you’ll like it. I don’t take many people here. I don’t like to—” He stopped himself and shook his head. “Anyway, you’ll see.” His lips moved closer and brushed against mine, but he didn’t kiss me, even though I opened my mouth for him breathlessly.
His hands held my hips and cupped my ass and he whispered in my ear.
“Remember, freak, the next time I touch you, really touch you, I will fuck you.”
I felt a wild chill down my spine.
Two days with him in an undisclosed location.
And I owed him my virginity.
I knew what this meant. I understood what would happen.
And I wanted to moan with excitement.
I felt him stiffen. His cock was hard and thick against my legs. I moved a little, grinding against it—he was as excited as I felt.
“You know I only owe you a single night, right?”
He tilted his head and shrugged. “If you’re tired of me after you’ve exhausted your end of the bargain, then you can go home. I promise I won’t force you.”
“I know you won’t.” I kissed his cheek and got off him before I went insane. “Pick me up Friday?”
“After practice.”
“What about your football game?”
He laughed and shook his head. “You really are clueless.” He stood up, slinging his backpack over his shoulders. “It’s a bye week, freak. No game this weekend.” He waved as he disappeared into the stacks.
So I had him all to myself.
I chewed on my lip and tried to suppress the heady mix of fright and excitement.
23
Jarrod
Calvin Solar lived in a bungalow tucked down a quiet shady street.
It wasn’t the house he grew up in. Calvin existed on another plane of existence than we did—including Des and Addler.
I was the poor one in the group. I came from nothing and my aunt and uncle barely qualified as wealthy. Addler’s parents were rich—although I had no clue what they actually did for a living—and Des was the scion of a Texas oil baron turned cattle rancher. They didn’t know what it meant to struggle for money, and privilege oozed from their pores like sweat on a sweltering day.
But Calvin put us all to shame.
As I stepped up his porch, I reflected on how little I knew about him. We were supposedly best friends—two of the Four Horsemen, bound together in blood and booze and pussy. Except he rarely talked about his upbringing, and whenever we asked him about it, he only answered with that eerie, intense stare that never failed to shut that shit down instantly.
It bothered me. I’m not above feeling of petty jealousy, though in this case it was more like morbid curiosity. I hated that he kept things from me, though we all had our secrets—perfect little Addler and rebellious Des included. Only Calvin’s secrets seemed deeper, darker, more putrid, filthier, stranger—and I wanted to know them all.
I was aware of the basics. He grew up stupidly rich thanks to his father’s business, SolarBright Technologies. It sounded like a renewable energy installer, except it was founded around the turn of the century as Solar Rifles, and was later rebranded into SolarBright Technologies when the manufacture of weapons fell out of favor.
They were arms dealers, basically. They preferred the term “defense contractors” but they designed, built, and sold weapons to governments all over the globe—mostly to the United States, but probably to a bunch of other nation states and non-nation state actors as well. It was extremely shady and Calvin’s money was literally drenched in blood, but he didn’t talk about it, and I never asked.
I knocked on his door and waited. He answered after a few seconds, looking slightly put out by my unannounced visit. He didn’t like to be surprised.
Calvin was the most rigid of the group. He preferred structure and order to random chaos. I had no clue how he could stand to be around Des for more than ten seconds, but they made it work.
“Solar,” I said.
“Hale.” He frowned and looked over my shoulder like he wanted to be sure I was alone. “I’m guessing this is about Cora?”
I nodded. “Let’s talk.”
He gestured for me to follow him inside. He looked tired and more than a little bored of this conversation already, but I didn’t care. I stepped into his immaculate living room, full of antiques and paintings on the walls, the furniture from some designer brand I’d never heard of, the television mounted tastefully above an Art Deco cabinet. Calvin rarely let anyone inside of his house, and never, ever had parties here—his stuff was worth a small fortune, and besides, the idea of letting strangers touch his things was likely extremely off-putting.
I’d been in there a handful of times though. I sat on a comfortable easy chair that was probably worth more than my entire existence and kicked my feet up on the coffee table—also obscenely expensive.
Everything about his house exuded taste and class.
That was likely the desired effect.
And of course, the stupid, brutish part of my brain wanted to rebel against it by destroyin
g everything.
Calvin sat on the couch and picked up a glass of something brown. The guy was barely in his twenties but he acted like he was a sixty-year-old man.
“I assumed Cora would tell you everything the second I left her.”
I made a dismissive gesture. “I don’t care about that.”
His eyebrows went up. “You don’t?”
I smiled, happy I could still knock him off-balance. Fortunately, I wasn’t lying.
I didn’t give a shit that Calvin knew. I would’ve told him myself if it wouldn’t have broken the terms of my deal with Cora. If there was one person in this world that I trusted, it was him.
Despite being a rich asshole with his whole life built on top of countless corpses, he was shockingly loyal and a good friend.
“You were only doing what you thought was necessary.”
“I know that, but I’m surprised you see it my way.”
“Occasionally, I can be reasonable. You don’t know Cora, and she holds my life in her hands, though I’m not sure she realizes it. You’re trying to protect me.”
“That’s my intention.”
I leaned toward him. “Only, if you steal my phone again, I’m going to break your fucking neck.”
He smiled. “That’s the Jarrod I know.”
“I mean it, Calvin. Don’t touch my fucking stuff. Don’t get involved in my life.”
“Is that why you came out here? To give me shit for stealing your phone?”
I shook my head and leaned back, crossing my legs.
I wasn’t going about this the right way. I needed a favor from him, and I shouldn’t be so aggressive about it.
But I couldn’t help myself.
I didn’t mind that Calvin threatened Cora. It would’ve been different if he really intended to hurt her, but I knew he only wanted to protect me, and that he’d back off if I asked him to.
Except I hated that he went through my personal shit.
That was a step too far.
“I came out here to tell you to leave Cora alone. And to ask for a favor.”
He laughed softly. Calvin’s laugh was dry and rarely used. He stood up and walked toward the kitchen. “Want a drink?”