CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
JASE’S WORDS REVERBERATED in Brook Lynn’s mind. I spent the last nine years in prison.
She laughed at the joke. Because he was joking. Right? He had to be joking. Her new boyfriend couldn’t be an ex-con. He couldn’t have done something so terrible he’d had to spend nearly a decade behind bars.
“Don’t tease me,” she said.
“I’m not teasing.” His tone was as hard as granite.
Ice crystallized in her veins.
“You have questions,” he said.
“I mean it,” she insisted. “This isn’t funny.”
“I’m not teasing,” he repeated.
A lump grew in her throat. Jase, the man she was falling for, really had spent the past nine years in prison?
She stood, jolting away from him. He watched her, his expression losing its hard edge and going blank. The blank one she knew too well. But she didn’t know him at all, did she?
Multiple emotions frothed inside her, and she began to pace. “How is that possible? Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I tried. You stopped me.”
“You should have told me anyway. Should have told me sooner!”
“Maybe. But I’m telling you now.”
“Now isn’t good enough.”
He flinched. A reaction that kept her from bolting out the door.
“Ask anything,” he said. Not only did his expression remain blank, but his voice was now deadened. “I will answer.”
“Wh—what were you in prison for?”
He closed his eyes for a moment. “Voluntary manslaughter.”
He’d killed someone. Her hand fluttered to her throat, her pulse hammering fast and hard. “Tell me everything.”
He placed his hands on his knees. “I was eighteen.”
A kid. His entire youth had been spent behind bars with hardened criminals. Murderers. Sociopaths. Rapists. They’d shaped the man he would become.
At least his scars made sense.
“There was a guy. Paxton Gillis. Pax. He was nineteen, in college. Tessa had gone to a frat party. He was there and he followed her to her car and raped her.”
Brook Lynn flattened a hand over her stomach.
“When West, Beck and I found out, we hunted him down. I don’t remember who threw the first punch. So much of what happened is a blur. I was so angry. I lashed out and just...didn’t stop. I couldn’t.”
She remembered the picture and the news clipping she’d seen when she’d searched Jase online—the slim teenager who’d been arrested for beating a college student—and she felt sick.
“So West and Beck were in prison with you?” she asked.
“No.”
“Why?”
“I took full responsibility.”
“Why?” she repeated, her voice lashing like a whip.
“They had bright futures.”
“And you didn’t?”
He hiked his shoulders.
She stopped to stare at him, to study him. He wasn’t just blank anymore—he was cold. As cold as he’d been the first day they met. He hardly seemed capable of a good mad, much less a black, uncontrollable rage. But too well did she remember the wine-and-cheese tasting. How, for a split second, he had looked capable of murder. Would he have hit that woman, despite his claim otherwise?
A tremor of fear washed through her. What would happen if ever he lost his temper with her?
That day in the yard, he’d pushed her and come at her with his hands fisted.
He might not want to, might not mean to, but...
Fear held her in its jaws, razor-sharp teeth sinking deep into her heart.
“Are you sorry?” she asked.
“Every day since,” he said.
Was he really? Or was that his answer simply because it was the right one?
“You don’t look sorry,” she said. “You don’t look like you feel anything.”
“I feel. You know it.” He stared back at her—giving nothing away. “Are you afraid of me now?”
“Yes,” she snapped, because it was true. She understood why he’d erupted back then. His friend had been hurt in a horrible, cruel way. But he hadn’t stopped himself from going too far. In his own words, he couldn’t stop.
“I would never hurt you, Brook Lynn.”
“So easy to say,” she muttered.
Another flinch, as if she’d struck him. Yes, okay, he did feel. But was it enough to stop him from unleashing on her if ever his control snapped?
“Jase,” she said, hating herself—hating him. “I...I’m going to go. I need time to process this.”
He didn’t hesitate to give her a clipped nod, as if he’d expected the words. She waited, but he offered nothing more.
Disappointment coursed through her. Had she expected him to fight for her to stay after she’d just confessed to fearing his temper? It may have been wrong of her, but...yes. Part of her wished he would draw her into his arms, hold her tight and promise everything would be okay.
So confused!
“I...I’m sorry.” Turning, she fled the room, the house...and the man she’d never really known.
* * *
BROOK LYNN DIDN’T report to work the next day, or the next. Jase’s chest had stopped throbbing at least; it now hurt all the damn time. He wanted to shout “See! I knew this would happen.”
He’d once heard fearing something gave it entrance into your life, and actually brought it to pass, like a self-fulfilling prophecy, because it changed the way you thought and spoke and acted. This—Brook Lynn’s defection—had been his biggest fear.
And here I am. Without her.
By some miracle, during their talk he’d managed to return to the state he knew best—every emotion hidden behind armor—guarding himself against desperation, rage and even heartbreak. He’d managed to hold himself together all the minutes—seconds—since. He’d worked. He’d gone to another soccer game and cheered for the Strikers. He’d helped plan a few details for Tessa’s celebration.
Today, the armor had cracked and he’d begun to break down bit by bit.
He should have been prepared for this. How many people had he lost in his lifetime? He should be over it already.
Except he wasn’t.
Jase stood outside in his backyard. There was a full moon tonight. Locusts buzzed. Crickets sang. The combination was pleasant and should have soothed him, but he hated all of it. Brook Lynn wasn’t here to share it with him, and she never would be. One day she might even share it with someone else. Someone without a record.
He drained the beer in his hand then threw the empty bottle into the trash bin he’d carried out here. A six-pack waited on the porch table—his second of the evening.
“You want to tell me what’s wrong?”
Beck’s voice. Jase didn’t bother turning around as the back door slid shut and footsteps sounded. “No,” he said.
“How about the reason Brook Lynn stopped coming around making my dinner?”
“Nope.” He popped the cap of another beer, drained half the contents.
“Well, okay, then.” Beck grabbed a beer for himself.
“You aren’t going to push for answers?”
“No.”
“Why? Never mind. I know why.” Jase gave a harsh laugh. “I don’t know how many ways I can say it, but you guys really need to get over your guilt issue.” He drained the rest of the bottle, swayed on his feet. Had that been a sneer in his tone?
“I will always feel guilty for what we did,” Beck said quietly. “Or rather, what we didn’t do.”
“You shouldn’t.” Had the situation been reversed, had one of them taken the blame and told him to stay quiet, he would have done it, despite his feelings on the matter. Because that’s what they did for each other. Whatever the others asked.
He threw his bottle at a tree, the tinkle of broken glass filling the night. Brook Lynn had accused him of not feeling. Well, he felt. Despite his armor. He felt so much he suddenly choked on it. Bitterness, resentment. Hate. So much hate. Guilt of his own. Sorrow and remorse. Pain—oh, the pain, still there in his chest, growing worse with every second that passed. It was just better for everyone—including himself—if he didn’t allow himself to feel so strongly.
“She left me.” He pushed over the table. The remaining beers hit the ground, the tops blowing off. Liquid guzzled out. He was panting, fighting for every breath. “I told her about prison, and she cut and ran.”
“Hey, hey, hey.” Beck cupped the back of his neck, applied pressure. “You and I both know just because something is going on one day doesn’t mean it will be going on the next. I’ve come to know that girl. I’ve seen the way she looks at you. Which makes something I’ve done especially stupid.”
Confusion penetrated his haze. “What have you done?”
“Not important right now. I’m certain Brook Lynn won’t stay gone.”
Beck hadn’t seen the panic in her eyes, hadn’t heard the fear in her tone. “You’re wrong.”
“I wouldn’t make a statement like that unless I was one hundred percent confident,” his friend said. “I know women. Well. Like, really well. Like, really really—”
A small spark of humor. “I think I get it.”
“She just needs time. Imagine if she’d led a life you knew nothing about.”
“I would want her, no matter what.”
“You would also need...say it with me...”
“Time,” they said in unison.
The loud crunch and grind of heavy metal forcibly changing shape suddenly echoed. He and Beck shared a look of concern before taking off in a sprint. The first thing Jase noticed as he rounded the corner to the front yard were the headlights blinking on and off—West’s headlights. Smoke curled from the hood. A hood wrapped around a tree.
Jase quickened his pace. “I thought he was in his room.”
“He was.”
“West!” He reached the door first—the mangled door. He and Beck had to work together to wrench it open. West spilled out, blood dripping from the center of his forehead.
“Call 911,” Jase said, catching West before the guy hit the ground.
“That tree had it coming,” West slurred, the scent of alcohol pungent on him.
Oh...hell. “Forget 911.” The law would only make things worse. “Let’s get him inside.” Jase slung his arm around West’s left side, and Beck came up to his right side. They acted as crutches, leading him toward the door.
“You could have killed someone,” Beck muttered.
“How? Didn’t drive anywhere,” West said. “Would never. Just reparked my car.”
“And purposely hit the tree?” Jase asked.
“Told you. Tree had it coming.”
“This,” Beck ground out.
Jase knew exactly what he meant. This was how West self-destructed around the anniversary of Tessa’s death.
Beck added, “Get ready. It only gets worse.”