Page 157 of Fight or Flight
My mind goes blank with fear as I stare up at him, but a flicker of something in his eyes makes me pause. It’s not anger or rage or even that calculating look he gets when he’s plotting something.
It almost looks like regret.
A weird sense of calm falls over me. I might not fully understand why Jace is the way he is, but I know what he’s capable of, and he would have already done it if he really wanted to kill me.
The fact that he’s hesitating means there’s a part of him that doesn’t want to do this, and that’s the only reason I’m still breathing.
“You’ve got exactly ten seconds,” he warns.
Instead of trying to think of something I can say that will get me out of this mess, my brain ping-pongs back to the conversation I just had with Dan.
“I think I know who the mole is,” I blurt out.
His eyes narrow. “Are you saying that to save your own ass? Because I’d recommend against lying to me right now.”
“No, I swear.”
He snaps the blade back into its holder. “Talk.”
“I think it’s Dan.”
“Why?”
He’s still pissed, but he’s listening. That has to mean something.
“He stopped me before I came up here to tell me some stuff. I didn’t put it together when he did because I was distracted with my plan, but I think it’s him.”
“What did he say?”
“He asked if there’s anything going on between us because he saw you leave my room the morning after you brought me home from The Crypt. But as far as I know, Paxton is the only person who knows about that, and there’s no way he’d tell Dan.”
“What else?”
“He also said he saw you leave my room right after it was broken into?—”
“Someone broke into your room?”
I nod. “I didn’t tell anyone it happened, but he was really specific about the timing, and right after that, he said he overheard you tell Jax that it was easy for you to get me to let you fuck me, and that I made it easy for you to get the thumb drive.” I swallow. “But it just occurred to me that you don’t call them that. You call them flash drives.”
“I do call them that.” He slips the knife in his pocket but doesn’t move off me. “Is that it?”
“He told me about something that happened with my brother.” I swallow around the lump in my throat. “He said KJ was being blackmailed after he was caught with a guy right before he died, and it looked like you were going to do the same thing to me. But how would he know KJ was being blackmailed? His older brother is the same age as KJ, but they weren’t close. KJ would never have told his brother about that. And there’s no way he could connect us fucking and a random thumb drive to blackmail unless he already knew what was going on and knew what was on the drive. And he acted like everyone knew about KJ and it was a big deal and that he got outed, but not a single person has mentioned it to me ever, and my brother being outedisn’t exactly something that would stay quiet, even after all these years.”
The last of the dead look fades from Jace’s eyes, and he climbs off me.
I slowly sit up.
“I didn’t break into your room,” he says bluntly. “And if I did, you’d never know it.”
“Yeah, I’m realizing that now.”
“But you still thought it was me?” he asks coldly.
“I didn’t know what to think, but the place was ransacked, and I found your knife, or at least what I thought was your knife.”
He gives me a hard look. “You really thought that I’d be dumb enough to ransack your room and leave my knife behind when you know what I can do? Does that sound like it would be my MO?”
“No, and I should have seen that someone was trying to frame you,” I say softly. “But I was messed up about the fire and got in my head about it and then I told my mom about you and started thinking that maybe you might feel something for me when I know that’s impossible, and then I saw the knife and…” I shake my head. “I thought the worst of you because I didn’t want to admit that I don’t hate you, and that I kinda really like you. That I might even love you.”
