Page 60 of Jayson
Every creak of the floor is calculated. Every breath drawn quiet. There are no signs of her on the lower floors. So I head upstairs, where the shadows seem to lean in tighter, like the house is watching me.
Her father’s room is just how I remember it—clean, masculine, curated. The room of a man who controlled people for a living. The kind of man who smiled for the cameras and shredded souls behind closed doors.Rest in Death.
The door creaks open on its hinges. And that’s when I hear it— A breath. A shuffle. The softest whisper of movement. Then?—
CRACK.
The bat comes out of nowhere.
Reflex takes over. I duck, feel it whoosh over my head. She’s got good instincts—terrible aim, but guts? She’s overflowing.
“Fuck!” she gasps, eyes wild as she pulls back for another swing.
I lunge, grab the bat mid-swing, wrench it from her hands with a single twist. She stumbles back, heart hammering, chest heaving.
“Jesus, Keira,” I snap, voice low, rough. “Are you trying to kill me?”
Her eyes blow wide, fury overtaking fear. “What the hell areyoudoing here?!”
I toss the bat aside. It clatters to the floor like punctuation to a question I don’t plan on answering nicely.
“I should be asking you that,” I growl, stepping closer. She’s cornered now, but still standing tall, spine straight. That defiance in her jaw only makes it worse. Makes me want to shake her and kiss her in the same breath.
“How the hell did you know I was here?” she snaps, her voice shaking with barely concealed rage.
I don’t answer. That silence only fuels her fire. Her eyes go wide, wild—burning into me like an open flame.
“Youfollowedme,” she accuses, the words ripping out of her like shrapnel. “You actually fucking followed me!”
“Damn right I did.”
“No apology?”
“Not when I was right not to trust you.”
I step into her space, close enough to see the thin sheen ofsweat on her temple. She looks shaken, like she saw a ghost. Maybe she did. Maybe Iamone.
“What are you doing here, Keira?” My voice softens, but only slightly. “You told me you were going to class.”
Her eyes flicker. Guilt. Shame. Something else I can’t quite place.
“That’s none of your business.”
“Itiswhen so many lives are on the line, Keira,” I bite out, trying to steady the growl in my throat. “You know why we’re in this position. I’m not trying to control you—this isn’t about owning your choices. But I need to know that I can trust you not to lie to me.”
My tone lowers, heavier now. “So why didn’t you go to class?”
She lifts her chin, that pride flaring for a second. “I was,” she says flatly. “Then I wasn’t.”
I exhale through my nose, jaw locked. “That’s not an answer, Keira.”
She breaks eye contact and turns away, already trying to shut me out, to disappear behind those walls of hers. But I reach out and catch her wrist, gentle but firm, and she goes still beneath my grip.
Her voice is a whisper. Haunted. Fragile. “This house… it’s the only place that has the answers I need.”
“To what?” I press.
But she doesn’t answer.
