Kreed drew back far enough to search my face properly, gray eyes tracking over my features. “What’s wrong?”
I hesitated, caught in the awful space between logic and instinct. I could just be paranoid, and I didn’t want to sound foolish, but I learned my lesson the hard way about keeping secrets. “I can’t shake this feeling I’m being watched or followed.”
His entire body went rigid against mine. “Just today?”
I nodded. “It started this morning, and it’s been getting stronger all day.”
Kreed’s attention snagged on something behind me, his head turning as his eyes narrowed. He scanned the far end of the student parking lot, his gaze tracking across rows of cars to beyond the rusted chain-link fence separating school property from the public street.
“What is it?” I asked, pressure gathering in my chest at his sudden tension. My hand instinctively reached for his arm.
“Someone’s sitting in that truck,” he said quietly, but there was steel underneath the words. “Just watching. Not moving. I swear I’ve seen it before.”
I followed his gaze to the old beat-up pickup truck parked at a crooked angle beneath a half-dead maple tree, its skeletal branches providing minimal shade. Rust bloomed across the wheel wells in brown patches, and the front bumper was held on with what looked like wire and stubbornness. I knew that car.
The driver got out and leaned against the dented hood with his arms crossed over his chest, posture casual but alert as if he was waiting for someone.
For me.
Jesse?
Why was he here?
If Jesse was here, did that mean Rusty was as well?
Had his father set him to collect me?
A dozen thoughts and questions raced through my head, and before I could tell Kreed who it was, he muttered a vicious curse under his breath and started striding across the parking lot with long, purposeful steps. His hands curled into fists at his sides, and his mood shifted. Someone was about to have a very bad afternoon.
“Kreed, wait.” I barely managed to keep up, my shorter legs forcing me into an awkward jog. “We don’t know why?—”
Too late. He’d already closed the distance, his hand shooting out, fisting in Jesse’s T-shirt, and slamming him against the truck’s passenger door with enough force to make the entire vehicle rock on its suspension. “What the fuck are you doing here?” Kreed snarled,his face inches from Jesse’s. “Start talking before I make you regret every decision that led to this moment.”
“Jesse?” I gasped once I’d caught up, my shoes skidding slightly on loose gravel as I came to an abrupt halt.
He winced visibly, whether from Kreed’s grip or from seeing me, I couldn’t tell, but he flashed me a familiar crooked smile anyway. “Hey there, Bubbles.”
Kreed’s already dark glare somehow managed to darken further. “Drop the nickname,” he ground out. “I don’t find it remotely cute or charming.”
Jesse’s cocky smirk faltered, uncertainty flickering across his features or what I could see of them. Most of his face was blocked by his hood or covered by his hair.
“Have you been following me around town?” I asked, stepping closer despite Kreed’s obvious desire to keep me at a safe distance.
“I had to make sure you were safe,” he replied. “After everything that happened, I couldn’t just?—”
“Her safety isn’t your concern or your responsibility,” Kreed cut him off, the threat in those words unmistakable. “Not anymore. Not ever again.” He released his grip on Jesse and stepped back. “Take that to your father and to your crew.”
A sudden gust of wind tore through the parking lot, lifting dead leaves in small cyclones. It caught Jesse’s hood, blowing it off his head and exposing his face fully to the harsh afternoon sunlight.
That’s when I saw the injuries I’d somehow missed in my initial shock of recognition. The split lip still healing, crusted over with dark scabs. The bruising that spread across his left cheekbone in an ugly rainbow of colors. Half-healed cuts that ran along his jawline like someone had dragged knuckles across his face repeatedly. The sunlight was merciless, cutting across his features and exposing every ugly mark in vivid shades of purple, blue, yellow, and sickly green.
“Jesse—oh my god.” I moved automatically, stepping directly in front of Kreed and reaching up to grab Jesse’s chin before he could pull away or hide the damage. I turned his face gently from side toside, cataloging the injuries with growing horror. “What the hell happened to you? Did your father do this? Did Rusty?—?”
Jesse’s gaze darted past me, focusing on something…someone behind my shoulder. His expression shifted, became guarded and knowing in a way that made my stomach drop.
Understanding crashed over me.
No.
