“Anyway, she told me all this after she busted me tailing her. She was not happy about that, in case you couldn’t guess. We had a fight, and she nearly broke my nose.”
“Jesus.”
“Couple weeks later, she called me crying from the compound and asked me to come get her, no questions asked. She was in a panic. So I parked off the highway near the compound and stealthed my way through the woods and through their dumb fence—which couldn’t keep a rabbit out, much less the Feds. And I helped her escape Paul’s house through the bathroom window.”
“What the hell?” I said, sitting up straight. “Was he keeping her prisoner? You told me she was safe with him tonight!”
He held up a hand. “She is, and he was not holding her prisoner. Apparently, she met Paul’s dad, Big Burg, and he freaked her out. You know they buy and sell illegal weapons, right? It’s not just the fentanyl.”
Everyone knew. They were eternally a week away from being raided. For the gun sales, for smuggling fentanyl and a host of illegal prescription drugs from Canada via the lakes. Paul’s mother was in prison for tax evasion.
These were not fine, upstanding people.
“Well,” he said. “That day when Jaz called me to come get her, Paul had left her in his house while he went on some urgent errand for Big Burg. Apparently, Jaz got bored, didn’t stay put, walked through the compound, and stumbled upon Big Burg conducting a deal—guns or narcotics, not sure. But she saw more than she expected, and it scared her. She didn’t have her car with her, and Paul wasn’t answering his phone. She just freaked—and who can blame her? I saw so much bad shit when I was hanging with Paul, and the worst of it always started with Big Burg. That man is a psychopath.”
“And Paul isn’t?”
“He’s no choirboy, but when he gives you his word, he honorsit. He’s very particular about his code, I guess you could say. And he promised me tonight that he won’t touch a hair on her head.”
“And you trust him?”
“I trust that much. And I trust Jaz when she says it’s okay.”
I hugged my knees, trying to figure out ifIdid, especially since she’d already told me about her mental state. When I added Pretty Paul into the mix, I could absolutely see why someone like him could be destabilizing. I thought back over everything both she and Seb had told me. “Jaz said she sprained her arm in a parking lot when you got the black eye.”
“Ye-e-eah,” he drawled. “That whole thing was a misunderstanding. Paul mistakenly got it in his head that Jaz had left him for me.”
Hold on,what? “You and Jaz... ?” Confusion and worry rose.
“God no,” he said, shaking his head emphatically. “It’s just what Paul assumed.”
The relief that flooded my chest was monumental. “Oh my God,thisis what you meant when I asked if you’d stolen something of Paul’s and you said ‘maybe’? You stoleJazmine?”
“I took her out of a bad situation and gave her my protection. I’d do it for any of you.”
The way he said this, eyes slanted and expression dead serious, anyone would believe he meant it. But Iknewhe did, after what he’d sacrificed for Benny.
“Thank you for helping her,” I said.
He nodded, then settled against the back of the swing and stared at the dark horizon over the lake. “Anyway, for a while after I got Jaz out of the Vanderburg compound, I thought Paul just wanted revenge against me for fucking up his game. Hechallenged me to settle it at the bonfire... that’s when you walked up.”
“Right,” I said, remembering Seb shirtless, about to get his ass handed to him.
“But after tonight, I’m thinking I miscalculated when I assumed that Paul was just out to get me because I helped Jaz get out of the compound. See, I thought he blamed me and not his own father for scaring Jaz away from a relationship after that day.”
“But he didn’t?”
“Paul’s pissed at me, for sure. But from a couple things he said tonight, couple things hedidn’t. . . I’m starting to think what we’re looking at here is that Paul’s seriously hung up on Jaz. However things started between them, they must’ve been more serious than Jaz let on.”
I thought about that for a moment and remembered Lulu saying that breakups were hard. “Paul has feelings for her?”
“Maybe. But I’ll be damned if I know how she feels about him.”
I wished I could’ve said differently, but I didn’t know, either. She’d told me it was over. Guess it was a little more complicated. “What do we do? Jaz doesn’t need this right now.”
“One thing I’ve learned is that you can’t tell people what they do and don’t need, even if you’re right. Like it or not, Jazmine is an adult. Even if it’s hard not to think of her grinning down at you with pigtails and a missing tooth the first time she stood up on a paddleboard.”
He wasn’t wrong. I had that same image of her. But I suppose that none of us were those children anymore. I double-checked my phone to make sure Jaz hadn’t texted, then I took a long drink of water and watched Punkin digging a hole in the sand in thedark. “Well, then. Guess there’s nothing to do but wait for Jaz to let us know she’s okay. Not sure how long that will be.”
