“It has layers. It’s going to take years to grow back.”
“We could make it really short, like Keira Knightley in that commercial.”
“I’ll look like a nine-year-old boy.”
Liv shakes her head. “Not anymore. You going to keep it?”
“Is there a way a person can keep the T but not the A?”
“It’s not a bad A.”
“That’s what Jack thought.”
This is what I wanted. My friend who’d do anything for me, who’d risk having thugs track down her burner phone but still cares if my hair looks good. Being (quasi-secretly) less than the purest girl in cheer. Having a family. Living where I belong.
I would have done anything to get this back.
I did.
84
Jack
I’ve spent the night in what might be solitary confinement. There’s no one else around, and the lights don’t go all the way out. They still think I killed Karl Yeager’s kid, Alex, on purpose, that I was gunning for Mendes, and that Nicolette was next.
Yet again, I’m scared shitless.
Then I get to the interview room on no sleep, and there’s my mother in a black suit and a look on her face that says that she’s about to blow.
“Where’s my lawyer?”
She says, “I’m on a leave of absence from work. I’m one of your lawyers. Do you understand what that means?”
“I don’t think you should be my lawyer.”
“It means you can talk to me, and I can’t testify against you.”
I don’t understand where she’s going with this.
I say, “Is Mendes all right?”
She reaches into her briefcase for a yellow legal pad, which she holds up like a shield. “What were you thinking? Do you value your freedom this little?”
Don’t ask someone who just spent his first night in prison if he values freedom.
“I was thinking that if I didn’t make Nicolette Holland disappear, I could visit you in the Manx crypt.” It comes out as a snarl, but at least I don’t call her a name.
The pad drops to the metal table. “We might be talking about two different things,” she says slowly, back in overly calm control. “Was someone threatening me?”
“Your laundry room went up in flames, someone tripped the alarm inside the house when the security cameras weren’t working, and then they messed with the brakes on your car. You do the math.”
“Watch your tone, Jackson!”
I’m sitting in lockup, and my mom wants me to watch my tone.
“Sorry.”
Then I tell her what Don said I had to do; what I thought I had to do; what I thought I had a plan to get out of doing—only everything backfired, and I ended up in Cotter’s Mill, Ohio, holding what turned out to be a murder weapon.
She’s clutching me and sobbing hard, despite all the signs prohibiting physical contact, and no one’s doing anything about it.
85
Nicolette
If they’d just laid it out sooner, I could have fixed it sooner.
“Jack didn’t kidnap me. Why would I say he didn’t if he did?”
My lawyer, the good cop who thinks I’m a porcelain teacup, and the bad cop who thinks I’m the devil, don’t believe a word I say.
They’re talking among themselves about Stockholm syndrome. This is when a hostage starts thinking her captor is Mr. Dreamy. It’s caused by mental collapse due to the stress of being a hostage.
Not me.
I’d act like he was Mr. Dreamy. I’d peer into his eyes with pseudo-adoration. Then I’d cut his heart out with my nail file.
I say, “I can’t have Stockholm syndrome. Nobody kidnapped me. I was nobody’s hostage.”
Bad Cop says, “Where did he hold you?”
Clearly, this is bad.
They don’t believe the truth.
Not that I plan to tell them that much of it. But there are critical bits of the truth that should (if there’s any fairness in the world) keep Jack out of jail.
I mean, Alex was coming at me with a knife. Isn’t that classic self-defense? (I looked it up.) I’m not letting Jack go to jail. The whole point was for us to be safe. Not dead and not in prison.
My lawyer hooks her hand onto my arm, all boney and tight. She says, “Could we take a break?”
Bad Cop won’t stop glaring at me.
I say, “I know I screwed up.” My lawyer’s hand tightens like a vise. I say, “I believed the wrong thing. I’m sorry.”
My lawyer’s hand is cutting off the circulation to my arm. I don’t know if this is maximum sympathy or another signal to shut up.
Good Cop says, “Nobody thinks what happened is your fault.”
I’ve watched enough Law & Order reruns to know they mostly say this when they’re trying to get killers to confess.
I’m not confessing. I’m assessing my target. Like Jack kept saying to do.
“It is my fault. Kind of. I thought Steve was going to kill me! So stupid. But he said.”
Bad Cop says, “Is that why your boyfriend shot him?”
I have to fix this.
I have to fix this fast.
My lawyer says, “We’re leaving, Nicolette.”