Page 90 of Speak

Just dead silence.

It unsettles me. It never has before I’ve always preferred the quietness but now… now it’s just too loud. I hear the soft rumble of an engine as it slows to a stop. From where I’m standing I watch a black jeep with illegally tinted windows park on the side of the road between a few trees, hidden and out of sight.

I go on about my day, clean my already clean house, go down to the basement that isn’t a library or a soundproof room, it’s a home gym. I work out, then go back up to shower, make myself a sandwich, order the trashy novel Raven and I were reading on her couch so I can read it myself.

The Jeep is there when I go to sleep.

It’s there when I wake up on Sunday morning.

It’s gone when I go to the market for groceries.

It’s back when I climb into bed Sunday evening.

My thoughts drift to Raven, like usual, then back to the blacked-out Jeep nestled in the trees.

A knowledge from my own experiences makes alarms go off in my head. All the signs are there.

It’s a stake out.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Raven.

My shadow is back.

I don’t know how to explain it. But I canfeelit. Except this time, there’s no sense of dread. When I told Damon about it yesterday, he said seeing it as a child could have been my own way of trying to still have a connection with my dead father. As a protector because why didn’t it come for me when I was dying, cooped up in that fucking locker for days?

When I told him I saw it at the pond, while I was drowning Chase, he asked why didn’t I see it while slicing Tyler’s veins open?

When I finally told him about my dream, the one that lead me to sleepwalk, that I was being chased by shadows, he said I could be associating my guilt with my kills and that I was manifesting them in my dreams.

But I don’t feel guilty and I definitely don’t feel remorse.

He said I probably do subconsciously.

Idon’t.

But I can feel eyes on me even when I’m back at Rayne-Moore. Jonas’ practice runs over in the morning while I’m at the gym on campus. I take shower in the locker room, get dressed and then use the app for the Koffee Kart to order myself and Jonas light roast Americanos. I want to try everything on the menu. I have my head down when I feel a pair of hands wrap around my waist and lips onmy temple. My eyes immediately close shut and I let myself relax against him, let his scent invade my senses like he did all weekend.

“Fuck I missed you baby.”

I want to ask why? We slept together in my dorm last night when we got back to campus. We were a tangle of limbs until he had to leave for practice. But I get it. I missed him, too. I turn and get on the tips of my toes to kiss him. It feels so good to kiss him again. I want to kiss him always.

I never thought I’d be the type to swoon for a man, but Jonas Anderson is absolutely swoon-worthy.

“You look beautiful.”

Swoon.

“Meet me in the library later, encyclopedia section so I can eat your pussy. I’m dying to taste you.”

My heart stops.

“Keep looking at me like that and I’ll do it right now. Re-claim you in front of everyone so they all know you’re mine again.”

“Well, don’t you two look cozy.”

My back stiffens and I feel Jonas tense up. We both turn to face him slowly. His hair is unkempt, eyes rimmed red, he looks haggard, as if he hasn’t slept in days, deep circles under his eyes.

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