Page 47 of Watch Your Back (Devil’s Backbone #2)

Carina has been dealing with a stalker for years. Nearly a decade. And she never told Ashley about it, which everyone could see knocked Squirrel around.

It’s all so confusing. What did the hypnosis and Dr. Fox have to do with Carina’s stalker? Was it all a coincidence? We need to figure it out, or we’ll all end up losing our sanity along the way.

W e all stayed the night at Max and Mom’s house after going over the information a dozen times.

We couldn’t tell them everything—we couldn’t admit that Heath had accidentally murdered Dr. Fox or that we’d covered up the crime with arson and a staged break-in.

We certainly couldn’t tell them that Carter nearly raped and killed me under the influence of hypnosis.

One thing I was absolutely certain of was that the handwriting on Mom’s note matched Abigail’s diary. But I didn’t have the diary anymore, so all I could offer was my firm confidence in my memory of the cursive scrawl.

I could see Mom didn’t believe me. Or maybe just that she suspected I was simply remembering wrong…and maybe I was. Memories were weird like that. But when I woke up the next morning, I just had a gut feeling that someone else might verify my claims.

“Katie’s been in prison for twenty-four years,” Nate said with a heavy sigh as we drove up the freeway toward Hastings. “Dr. Fox wasn’t even teaching at Nevaeh when she was a student, and Abigail wasn’t born yet. I don’t see how this can help.”

“I’m with Nate on this one, Squirrel,” Royce admitted from the back seat, where he was sandwiched between Carter and Heath. “As sure as I am that she got tangled up in some hypnosis crap, there’s no way to prove it.”

I threw my hands up in exasperation. “Okay, but how did she get involved in hypnosis? She was in the Devil’s Backbone, right? So are we. There’s got to be a connection, and she’s literally the only person I can think of that might give us honesty. Your dad seems oblivious, Nate, and?—”

“Well, yeah, because we gave him nothing to work with. Maybe if he knew more, then?—”

“Then he’d be totally okay with the fact we are all accomplices to murder ourselves?” I snapped, cutting him off. “No. He wouldn’t, and neither would my mom. At least Katie can’t judge us.” Not that we could go confessing to shit while visiting her in maximum security prison.

Everyone was quiet for a moment, and I chewed the edge of my lip nervously. The anxious twist to my gut hadn’t let up since the moment I’d heard Mom crying on the phone and only seemed to be getting worse.

“This is bigger than just Dr. Fox,” I said after a while. “Maybe Katie can’t give us anything useful, but maybe she can. It’s worth trying.”

“I agree,” Heath offered. “Your gut is pushing this, and I trust your instincts, Ashes.”

“I guess worst-case scenario, Royce gets to introduce you as his actual girlfriend and we go for some of those excellent burgers,” Carter added thoughtfully.

It made me realize that they’d all probably done the trip to Hastings with Royce plenty of times before.

They really were good friends to one another.

Nate was quiet, his jaw clenched and his knuckles white on the steering wheel, but I didn’t push the issue. We were all tightly wound right now, and the last thing we needed was a three-hour drive filled with bickering.

Thankfully, the conversation in the back seat shifted to sports, which then somehow circled around to the Nevaeh women’s basketball team and how Jess was doing in recovery after being hit by a car.

She had a long recovery ahead, but by some miracle, Zara—the passenger in the car—was doing well.

She’d transferred to a different university for next semester, which wasn’t surprising.

“Are we all coming in?” Heath asked when we arrived at the prison just ten minutes before visiting hours started. We’d parked in the half-empty lot and all got out. “Is that allowed?”

Royce shook his head. “Three people maximum, remember?”

Nate tossed Heath his keys. “Go for a drive if you want, but for fuck’s sake, don’t hit a deer.” He grabbed my hand in his and started striding for the entrance without any hesitation or question about who the three people visiting Katie would be.

“You need to stop manhandling me, Essex,” I muttered when we approached the foyer.

He glanced down at me, the very corner of his mouth curving up. “Do I, though?” As if to emphasize his point, he squeezed my fingers and directed us toward the reception counter with Royce taking the lead to get us checked in.

We all handed over our IDs and patiently submitted to the metal detectors and various checks before being led through into the same visiting room Royce and I had met Katie in last time. It was a lot quieter than when we’d last experienced it, and I suspected that was thanks to it being a weekday.

After being directed to some seats, we waited while a guard fetched Royce’s mom, my foot bouncing anxiously until Royce clamped a firm hand on my knee.

“Breathe, Squirrel,” he murmured, his frown full of concern. “You’re going to send yourself into a panic attack at this rate.”

I hadn’t even noticed I was panicking, but now that he pointed it out…yeah, okay, I needed to chill the fuck out. I had enough time to take a few slower breaths before Katie was led into the room by a bored-looking guard and her handcuffs attached to the table as before.

“Twice in one month. This is unexpected,” she said by way of greeting with a smile on her lips. “Hello, Nathaniel, lovely to see you. And you again, Ashley. What’s going on?”

Clearly, she was sharp enough to know we hadn’t made the drive simply to visit for visiting’s sake. A small wrinkle bunched her brow as she eyed the three of us in concern and focused her attention on her son.

“We have some sort of confusing questions we want to ask,” Royce admitted with a grimace. “Um, I guess first things first, do you recognize this handwriting?” He pulled out the photocopy of Mom’s threatening note and flattened it on the table for Katie to see.

Katie peered at it, frowning as she inspected the paper.

Then she sighed and shrugged. “It’s just a messy scrawl.

It could be anyone’s. It looks vaguely familiar, yes, but probably because most people my generation have a messy scrawl.

This note seems sort of threatening, though, or maybe a warning? Where’s it from?”

I jerked my gaze to Nate in surprise. “Could it be a warning? We hadn’t considered that.”

“Ashley, honey, is someone threatening you?” Katie’s frown was deeper than ever. Somehow, despite never actually raising her son, she was more maternal than some other moms I’d met. “If you need help?—”

“I’m okay,” I quickly replied, not totally believing that statement anymore.

“But we just wanted to run a few ideas past you. If that’s okay?

Only because we feel like there have been a few things happening recently that seem way too coincidental with how you ended up in here and maybe…

I dunno. Maybe they’re not just coincidental? ”

Katie blinked a couple of times, then nodded. “Anything I can do to help. I’m an open book. What things are we talking about?”

I chewed the edge of my lip, nervous as hell, but Royce saved me by answering himself. “Hypnosis things,” he muttered, only just loud enough for his mom to suck in a sharp breath. “And it seems to be tied to the society somehow.”

Katie wet her lips, shifting in her seat. “I see.”

“Also we wanted to ask if the name Hyperion means anything to you?” Nate added, surprising me. I’d almost forgotten all about that breadcrumb we’d found in Dr. Fox’s office.

“Hyperion,” Katie repeated, looking thoughtful. “It seems familiar. Let me mull that over while you tell me more about this hypnosis stuff.”

“We sound insane, don’t we?” I whispered, my face heating with embarrassment. “I swear we aren’t. Things have been happening…”

“You don’t sound insane, Ashley,” Katie said with a serious set to her lips. “I know you need to remain vague, but has anyone been hurt?”

I glanced at Royce, and he gave his mom a silent nod.

Katie exhaled heavily, her shoulders sagging. “Okay. Um, Nathaniel, would you mind terribly if I spoke with Royce and Ashley alone?”

Nate stiffened in surprise, his fingers squeezing mine where he had grabbed my hand under the table. “Why?”

Royce shook his head. “Mom, this concerns him too. All of us, actually. There was an accident at Nevaeh recently. One of the society members drove into a bunch of students, then crashed into a wall. It killed him and injured several others, but his girlfriend said he was in a trance. Like he had no control of his own actions.” He was offering evidence that couldn’t incriminate us, but I could see Katie wasn’t convinced.

Her sad eyes darted to Nate again, and her lips tightened.

Nate huffed a sigh. “I’ll go,” he muttered. “If that’s what it takes to get answers.” He released my hand and stalked back out of the visiting room with stiff posture, the tension basically radiating off him.

Once he was gone, I turned to Katie in confusion. “Why?”

She gave a troubled sort of smile. “Because it’s not the sort of thing I feel he wants or needs to hear, honey.

I mentioned last time you were here that Michael and I didn’t really know one another all that well before I got pregnant?

Well, that wasn’t strictly true. Sorry, Royce baby, close your ears.

Mike and I had been casually dating for a few months.

Nothing serious, and his family would never have approved of him dating a scholarship student, but I did have genuine feelings for him.

I believe he felt the same. He certainly confided a lot in me.

About his life, his family, his friends… ”

Royce rubbed at his brow, shaking his head. “I don’t get it. What’s this got to do with Nate?”

Katie huffed. “Mike and Max were best friends. Them, Rhys Briggs, and Edward Bassington. I suspect they still are?”

Royce and I exchanged a look. “Yeah, except Carter’s dad died when he was eight.”

Katie blinked a few times, like she hadn’t known that fact. Then she shook it off. “Well, Mike used to confide in me a lot. One of the hot topics back then was Max and his girlfriend, Jocelyn.”

A chill ran down my spine at the mention of Nate’s bitch mother. “What about them?”

“Jocelyn was a ladder climber of the worst kind. She came from money herself, but it just wasn’t enough.

Neither was her relationship with Max, and she was forever trying to snag Mike for herself as well—except of course, he was secretly seeing me.

” She was trying to walk us to whatever point she was trying to make, but my mind was already whirling like a tornado as I processed the information.

Royce seemed just as frustrated and impatient. “What does that have to do with anything?”

Katie pursed her lips, seeming to debate whether to continue for a moment. “Jocelyn’s father worked for the military on a project called Hyperion. I remember it because Mike suspected she was using her father’s military connections to conduct research on her own master’s thesis.”

Oh fuck. I felt like I was going to vomit.

“What, um, what was her thesis about?” I croaked, my head already swimming as all the blood drained to my feet.

Katie grimaced. “I think you already guessed, Ashley. Jocelyn was deeply involved in exploring the limitations and uses of hypnosis.”

Fuck a goddamn duck. I should have seen that coming.