Page 44 of Hide and Seek
11
JAX
Myles lowershis notebook and looks out into the night. He’s staring right at my hiding place, but thanks to the inky darkness and thick blanket of leaves between us, I can see him, but I know he can’t see me. Pulling the earbud out of my ear, I tuck it away in its case as he turns away from the window and heads over to his desk.
Now that there’s no risk he’ll see the light from my phone, I pull it out of my pocket and exit out of the camera feed I was watching when his curtains were still closed and listening to after he opened them, then slip my phone away and settle back against the tree trunk as Myles moves around his room.
After a few minutes of puttering around, he disappears out of sight, then passes in front of the window with a towel draped over one arm and the basket he keeps his toiletries in clutched in his hand.
I wait until he leaves his room, then climb out of my tree and slip into the woods so I can stay out of sight. When I’m clear of Boone House, I leave the woods and make my way through the many paths that connect the different areas of the school.
I don’t see anyone as I cross out of Kings territory, but that’s not surprising. Campus is a ghost town right now. The only people here are a skeleton staff to keep the place running until the school year picks up again next week and a handful of students who came back early.
The utter lack of student life on campus is a welcome relief after months of being surrounded by people. My footsteps are loud in the nearly silent night, and I slow my pace. There might not be anyone around, but it’s still smart to not bring any attention to myself by acting suspiciously.
Tonight didn’t go at all how I thought it would, and I’m not mad about any of it.
Jace and I got back to campus earlier today, and as soon as Myles used his ID to get through the main gates, I went to my tree to wait for him.
I’d never admit this to anyone, especially not Jace, but I’ve felt weirdly off-center for the past week. Like that feeling you get when you’ve forgotten something and can’t remember what it is, or when you’re missing something but have no idea what.
If that wasn’t weird enough, my thoughts kept wandering to Myles, and not just when I had some downtime. It didn’t matter if I was in the middle of something or just chilling. Thoughts of him would randomly pop into my head. All of that is strange enough, but I didn’t just think about the game in the woods and how I got to play out one of my deepest, but not even close to one of my darkest, fantasies with him.
I had plenty of those thoughts, but I also thought abouthim—and all benign things too. I wondered what he was up to and if he was safe at his parents’ house. I thought about him doing his bedtime routine as I did mine, and I pictured him every time my cousin Xave popped an energy drink in front of me, which was way more often than could possibly be healthy.
I found myself looking through the files we have on him and rereading details I’ve already committed to memory, and I checked the feed in his room every night to make sure no one who wasn’t supposed to be there went inside.
I thought getting back on campus would be enough to get over whatever the hell was going on with me, but I was wrong. We weren’t even in our room for an hour before I told Jace I was going to check something, then hustled my ass over to Boone House and broke into Myles’s room without a second thought or even a plan.
I don’t even know why I did it. Well, that’s not true. I know why. I did it because I wanted to. I just don’t knowwhyI wanted to.
The cameras I set up are working perfectly, and the only people who went into his room while he was away were two of the house cleaners, and they were in and out in less than thirty minutes. They didn’t touch anything they weren’t supposed to, and there was no indication that they were up to anything other than cleaning.
There was no reason for me to be there, but I still broke in because I wanted to. And it wasn’t until I was standing next to his bed and looking at his closed curtains that I made an impulsive decision and moved the chess piece.
I had plenty of time to move it back before I left, but instead of fixing it, I switched the clock hands and solved his shadow cube. Not just to test him, but to give him some clues to work with.
This might have started as a tracking mission so I could get answers, but he changed the game when he put those messages against his window and invited me to play hide and seek. He broke the fourth wall, so to speak, and instead of getting bored with him after playing out one of my fantasies, that night only cemented what Jace suspected and I refused to see.
I’m not just emotionally invested in Myles. I’m preoccupied by him.
A little snort-laugh bubbles out of my chest. I’m not just preoccupied by him, I’m obsessed with him, and there’s no point lying to myself or trying to pretend otherwise.
But it’s not like I’m the only one. I thought that night in the woods was too much for him when he made no effort to contact me again before the break, but he didn’t act like someone terrified of being followed and watched. He didn’t change any of his other behaviors, still kept to his same schedule, and didn’t even close his curtains until a few minutes before he left for the break.
And I was watching when he got back to his room tonight. He immediately noticed the chess piece, which isn’t surprising, but he seemed to instinctively know that wasn’t the only thing that I moved.
Watching him methodically check almost every inch of his room and immediately find the clock hands and the cube only cemented what I already knew. Myles isn’t just incredibly smart. He also has a strategic mind. He sees the world differently from most people.
He sees it like I do, and he’s the only person I’ve ever met who can match me or give me any sort of challenge.
But most importantly, tonight proved that he still wants me; he just doesn’twantto want me.
Too bad for him he’s about to find out that if he’s going to start something, then I’m sure as fuck going to finish it.
I just need to make sure he stays alive long enough to figure out why he’s on the Kings’ radar and why they’re so keen to off him.
I’m so agitated I’m almost speed walking, and I slow my pace as I approach Belmont House, a huge, castle-like structure complete with turrets, battlements, and a massive wrought ironfence with coiled barbed wire on top and underground motion sensors to make sure no one can sneak past the armed guards who staff the gate entrance.
