The mole is a girl, but it’s the boys they’re all looking to now.
“Don’t listen to them,” Zay murmurs.
“I’m not,” I lie.
His eyes flick to me. There’s a knowing there that makes me want to look away. I don’t.
“You know people talk when they’re scared,” he says. “They’ll say anything to convince themselves they’re still safe. That some other version of leadership would have magically prevented all this.”
His tone is light, but underneath it is something harder. Something that sounds like anger on my behalf.
“Doesn’t change the fact that they’re thinking it,” I say.
He tears his toast in half. “No. But knowing the way they think is better than being blind to it.”
I push my mug away, appetite gone. “Knowing doesn’t mean I can fix it.”
“Not overnight.” He leans back in his chair, watching the room with the lazy, hooded gaze that makes people underestimate him. “You’re doing the right thing. You’re looking at everyone. You’re making people nervous. That’s good. Nervous people slip up.”
Nervous people also shoot preemptively. But I keep that to myself.
Across the table, Jackie appears in the doorway with her baby balanced against one hip, dark curls escaping from a loose bun. She’s in leggings and an oversized T-shirt that says NO SLEEP CLUB, hair wild, eyes sharp. She looks like she could take on ten men while burping her daughter, and I’ve seen her do something close.
She surveys the room like a queen deciding who to punish today, then jerks her head toward the hall when she catches my eye.
“V,” she says. “Upstairs.”
Zay’s brows lift. “You in trouble?”
“Probably,” I say, standing.
He smirks. “You want backup?”
“Absolutely not.”
He taps the edge of my coffee mug with one finger as I go, like a silent promise that he’s still here. That he’s watching. That he’s not going anywhere.
I hope the mole isn’t listening.
Upstairs, the house feels like a different world. The noise from the kitchen fades into a low, distant murmur. The hallway is lined with doors cracked open, a few voices drifting out—someone talking on speaker, a TV playing a muted show, the clack of keys from someone’s laptop.
Jackie’s room is near the end of the hall. She’s already inside when I knock once and push the door open.
The space is warm and cluttered, clothes draped over a chair, a pile of clean laundry half folded on the dresser. A crib sits near the far wall, filled with soft blankets and a mobile that looks like it was assembled at three in the morning on no sleep. The bed is unmade, covers rumpled. It feels lived in, chaotic in a way that’s almost comforting.
Jackie is perched at the head of the bed, back against the headboard, legs stretched in front of her. Her shirt is pulled up on one side, her baby latched to her breast, small fingers splayed against her skin. Jackie doesn’t flinch when I enter. She doesn’t cover herself or rearrange anything. Breastfeeding, like everything else, is just another thing she does in a day full of harder tasks.
Talia is at the foot of the bed, cross-legged, hunched over, arms wrapped around her own knees like they’re all that’s holding her together. She stares at some fixed point on the carpet as if the pattern there is more interesting than the people in the room. Her hair falls forward, partially hiding her face.
“Sit,” Jackie says. It’s not a request.
I sink onto the floor near the dresser, leaning my back against it. From here, I can see the side of Talia’s face—the faint bruising under her eyes, the tightness in her mouth. She looks like she’shere, but not really. Like she left some part of herself outside and forgot where.
“You look like shit,” I say softly.
She huffs out a small, humorless sound. “Love you too.”
Jackie adjusts the baby, one hand cupping the tiny skull, the other pressing gently at the back to keep the latch secure. Her fingers move with a practiced confidence that makes something twist in my chest—a mix of admiration and a quiet, aching envy I don’t have time to examine.
