Page 98 of Shadow and Skulls

His head rolls my way, and he finally gives me his full attention. “You’re only saying that because he told you I agreed to go along with his plan.”

My head pulls back. “What plan?”

A look of surprise passes over his face, followed by regret and something else … relief.

“So, you really do believe I’m not like Matt?” he asks.

I rise slowly, nodding. “Did he … did Tank do this to you?”

He lunges for my hand before I can pull away. My dad takes a step away from the wall.

“Kelsie, he didn’t do thistome, he did thisforme. He’s giving me a second chance.”

I don’t understand.

“Time’s up,” my dad says, grabbing Jason’s hand and roughly tossing it aside. “Let’s go.”

Jason and I stare at each other as my dad pulls me from the room. Tank did do this … and Jason agreed to it.But why?

“Everything okay?” my mom asks, quickly saying goodbye to Jason’s mom as my dad drags me past them. She jogs to catch up to us.

“We’ll talk in the car,” he tells her.

When we get there, my dad turns around in his seat. “If Tank had something to do with this, you don’t need to know any more about it than you already do.”

My mouth falls open. “I … I don’t know a damn thing.”

“That’s good.” He turns around, mumbling under his breath.

“Do you?”

He backs out, ignoring me.

“You know something, don’t you?”

My mom’s gaze bounces between the two of us, and I scoot forward, hanging over his seat.

“Seatbelt,” he says.

I fall back, giving up. “I want permission to write to Tank.”

Since he doesn’t want to talk about how Jason ended up in the hospital, maybe he’ll give in more quickly to avoid my questions.

He sighs loudly. “No.”

“Mom, we should go visit Jason again tomorrow,” I say to her.

She tips her head like an owl. “Don’t drag me in to whatever this is.” She waves her hand between my dad and me.

“You can even read the letters. Just …” I growl, I’m so frustrated. Step out of the shadows. Show them who you are. “My heart aches for connection, Dad.”

He begins to make the argument that I have plenty of connections. I stop him.

“With a man.” My gaze meets his in the mirror.

“You have a connection with Ash.”

My mother and I both laugh. “Oh, so now it’s okay for me to connect with Ash? Okay.”

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