Page 77 of Brazen Mistakes

He pulls out his phone and grins, showing me a picture Walker just sent of him and Clara at some cafe, her smile so welcome my heart skips a beat.

I’m pretty sure Jansen’s not going to answer my question, but after pointing at a parking lot for me to pull into, yanking off my tennis shoes, handing them over, and pulling on his leather boots, he flops back into his seat. “No.It’s not normal.”

I push the seat back to yank on my sneakers, my toes numb from sitting in the car without them. “Should we worry? I think we all remember freshman year clearly, Jay.”

He grimaces out the windshield. “I don’t know. I’m not close to the edge or anything, man. But, I don’t know, the big stuff we’ve been doing makes the little stuff less fun, you know?”

I nod, knowing this was always the risk with Jansen. “You know, if it gets weird up there in your head, I’m here, right? We all are.”

He throws a grin at me, his eyes almost too bright. “Got it. Also, I’m not scaling anything in your shoes again, RJ. It was like trying to climb a wall in flippers. I was worried I’d fall for most of that scramble.”

Laughing like I know he expects me to, I let it slide for now. If he says he’s holding it together, I’m not going to doubt him. If he’s coming undone, we’ll all see it. Secrets have never been Jansen’s strong suit. “And here I thought you were pretending to be an uncoordinated kid.”

Snatching a mitten from the dash, he chucks it at me. “I still made it just fine.”

“Doesn’t mean it was graceful.”

Once my shoes are back on, we head back to join this shopping trip. Walker’s made a list of things he’s getting for me, too, so at least Clara won’t be alone in the torture. I guess if I ever need to go inside the place we’re robbing, I’ll be able to blend now. I hate the time suck of it, though. There are so many more important things for me to do than pop from boutique to boutique. Every moment not spent tryingto track down all the dangers and issues I’m responsible for, or spending time with Clara, makes my anger lick at my toes.

I’ve been cutting into my sleep to keep up, but I know that isn’t sustainable. If only my dad weren’t making such a mess of an already impossible workload, I’d feel better. Just sharing with Clara that he has a gambling problem earlier today had me ready to drop into my obsessive control mindset again. But her hand in mine kept me present. I don’t want to hurt her again, not like the other night.

“Speaking of how we’re doing, how are you?”

I start out of my mind and glance at Jansen, wondering if he can read my thoughts on my face. “How so?”

“You’ve been working almost non-stop since September. And it sounds like there might be stuff up with your dad?”

I’m apparently transparent. “My dad isn’t doing well, but my mom and I have a plan set up where I can hopefully keep him in line while she tries to get him help. They both insist that our pastor can handle it, but, I don’t know. At this point, I think it’s more of a PTSD thing than a spiritual failure, but neither of them will make an appointment with the VA.”

“And this plan? How much work is it on top of everything else you’ve got going?”

“I’m adding my dad to the blacklist at all the casinos in Minnesota and Wisconsin.”

Jansen huffs out a breath. “Man. That’s a lot of work. They’re not all on the same system, are they?”

“Nope.”

“Any future back doors for us?”

“Probably not.”

“That blows.”

A real laugh burbles out of me, and I can’t help but be grateful Jansen is, well, Jansen.

He drops the seat back, so he’s staring out the sunroof of Walker’s SUV. “And all the other work?”

“There are just so many threads to pull, so many kids stuck in shitty situations. I don’t feel like I’m making any progress.”

“The numbers would say otherwise.”

“Numbers aren’t everything.”

“No. I guess they aren’t.”

The car grows silent as I try not to remember all the shit I’ve seen since I started this quest to clean Clara off the internet, to rob blind all the sickos that bought videos of her, of the women, girls, and boys, who got caught up in the fucked-up world we live in. And the fact that there are so many that I’ve found here, local? It makes me want to take my sisters and lock away their technology, ban them from dating, or at least screen any boyfriends they might have.

They’d hate me for it.

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