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“This is the same thing. Like it or not, you are part of this investigation. We made you part of it, and you ran with it. Zora took all the necessary steps to make sure you and I were safe. We were both working the same thing, just in different ways. And the other side decided to go too far. That’s not on us.”
She drew in a shaky breath. “Okay…”
“Have you eaten recently?”
“No. I don’t think so…”
His phone buzzed, and he pulled it out, not the least bit surprised there was a text from Robin. He showed Jessica, and she tapped the notification then read it aloud.
“Tell Jess not to go junior year. Feed her before then. Hugs and kisses.” She barely got the last three words out before she began to snicker.
Samuel eyed the text. “What does junior year mean?”
She shook her head.
“Jess…”
She covered her face with a hand. “I’ll be good.”
“What happened your junior year?”
“A lot of things. Be more specific!”
He chuckled and stroked her hair. “What is Robin talking about?”
Jessica groaned and peered at him from between her fingers. “That was a coded message for me. Not you.”
He stared at her, waiting it out. Either she’d tell him or dig in and say no. She knew where her boundaries were.
She squeezed her eyes shut. “You only get to laugh about it tonight, and then we pretend it never happened, okay?”
Now he was truly intrigued.
“Deal.”
She pushed away from him and crossed her legs under her. With a heavy sigh, she fixed her gaze on him. “Robin and I were in a sorority, right?”
“I recall.”
“So, lots of parties.”
He nodded.
“Our junior year was… Eventful. Lots of random stuff was going on, silly drama, and every party it was like… Another silly thing. But Robin’s talking about the Spring Fling party. It’s semi-formal, but most people end up dancing in their underwear by the end of the night. Whole thing. Don’t ask. It was weird then and if it’s still happening, it’s probably weird now. We always left when the first person started undressing.”
Samuel had so many questions, but it soothed part of him to hear she hadn’t paraded around like that. He had no right to feel this way, but there it was.
“There was this guy who’d been a total ass. He was central to some of the drama going on. Anyway, he starts hitting on me that night. Won’t leave me alone. I finally have hit the right combination of booze and don’t give a fuck, so as we’re trying to leave he grabs me and starts making this whole scene getting me to stay.”
Yeah, he already didn’t like this kid, but he couldn’t imagine Jessica merely putting up with it.
She closed her eyes and scrunched up her nose. “He went down on his knees to beg, and me in my drunken, pissed-off glory grabbed him by the hair and… I face humped him while… Robin remembers it better. I just yelled about how unless he was promising to go down on me or let me ride his face, he wasn’t man enough. It was mortifying and not my best moment by far.”
Samuel felt air on the back of his throat.
He knew his jaw was hanging open.
But he also couldn’t shake the visual of Jessica in a cocktail dress sliding up her thighs…