J. Huss - PANIC

“Sit.” Ford’s words come out as a command. My training kicks in and I sit the fuck down in the nearest chair and keep my mouth shut. Spencer takes the couch and Ford stands in front of the TV. “Who’s hungry?”

Who’s hungry? I roll my eyes at him but I ask permission before I get up. “May I go downstairs and take a shower? You guys dragged me though the fucking mud.”

Spence mumbles out a, “Sure, go ahead.”

“I’ll go with you, Rook. Spencer, you sweep the place and lock us up.” Ford grabs my arm and pulls on me until I stand. “Come on. I don’t like the basement, I don’t want you down there. There’s no escape except for the window well in the bedroom.”

“You know what I don’t like?” He doesn’t answer, just walks me through the kitchen and waves a hand at the stairs. “Well, I’ll tell you anyway, since you’ve suddenly found your mute button. I hate being treated like I’m weak and stupid. If you’d told me to follow you outside I would’ve gone, you didn’t need to try and suffocate me as I was being pulled through the mud.”

“Well, Rook,” he says as we enter my little apartment. “You are pretty weak and you do a lot of very stupid things. So”—he stops to look me in the eyes—“you can expect to be treated like a liability until we know what part you’ll play and where your loyalties lie.”

“Ha! Where my loyalties lie?” Oh, I am so angry. “That really pisses me off, you know that? I trusted you, I—”

The hand clamps over my mouth again. “No talking. Just get in the shower and I’ll wait here.” His hand is still firmly pressed against my mouth as he stares at me. “I expect an answer, Rook. So nod, or give me the sign language version of a yes, sir.”

I nod, but what I really want to do is bite his hand.

He releases me, huffs out a long breath of air, plops down on my couch and turns on a hockey game.

I go into my room and throw open my closet door, grab a clean pair of jeans, a long-sleeve white thermal, and a Shrike Rook t-shirt.

The backpack is calling my name before I even get the shirt off the hanger. I peek out my bedroom door and listen. Ford is still watching hockey and the announcer is screaming “Goal!” so I figure he’s pretty wrapped up in it. I turn the shower on and then go back to my closet.

This backpack is the only thing besides my Converse shoes that I have left from my other life.

I can’t help it, I fall to my knees and slide the drawstring cord to open it up, then check the little side pocket for the key. I took it from Jon’s office before I left. The other stuff inside is everything I need to make a quick escape. I packed it up the day I shot Jon in the knee because I figured even if I wasn’t arrested, I might still get in trouble. Maybe not from the cops, but eventually someone would come looking for me. It was a given.

And I was right. All those someones are breathing down my neck right fucking now.

Inside the bag I have twenty thousand in cash. I take the money out and flip the bills like you see people do in the movies. Twenty grand doesn’t look like much when they’re all hundreds. You’d be surprised how small it actually is when they are wrapped up in two little bundles. I’ve also got one change of clothes and some basic toiletries and the fake ID Jon made me use when we went places before I turned eighteen.

I stuff the backpack under the hanging t-shirts and go take my shower. When I get out I put clothes on and when I walk out in the living room Ford gives me a dirty look.

“What are you wearing?”

I roll my eyes. “Clearly you can see what I’m wearing.”

“Are you going somewhere?”

“No, Ford. I just like being fully clothed when I think something bad might happen. There’s nothing worse than running for your life through the woods wearing a nightie with a crazed boyfriend on your tail. Believe me, I know from experience. I’m wearing clothes, so shut the fuck up about it.”

“Whatever. Let’s go upstairs.”

He gets up and I follow. I guess my sympathy card with Ford has been played, because that last remark didn’t even get an eyebrow raise. I might as well settle in and be nice, that’ll make my night go a little easier.

“Find anything, Spence?” Ford asks.

“No, I swept the downstairs at least. We’ll just stay in here. But”—Spencer looks over at me—“no talking,” he says, putting a finger to his lips. “We need to go outside if you feel the need to talk, and to be honest, we should just wait and see what happens tomorrow at Ronin’s arraignment. So it’s no use anyway.”

Ronin is in jail.

It hits me hard and I sink down onto the couch and scrub my face with my hands, trying to stave off a headache. I’m pretty pissed that I didn’t figure out these guys had a past. I mean, fuck, Rook. How stupid can you be? How gullible? How naive? And now I’m right back where I was when I showed up at Antoine’s.

Confused.

Is Ronin a good guy?

Fucking Ford admits he’s not a good guy. That shit came right out of his own mouth at my birthday party. In fact, he brought that woman on purpose, to show me specifically that he’s got serious issues. The kind of issues I am very familiar with.

And Spencer admitted to killing a guy.

And they’re all responsible for at least two illegal jobs that I know of. How many more are there?

“Rook,” Spencer says as he takes a seat next to me. “I’m the same guy I was last night when you cried on my shoulder. I’m the same guy who painted your body all summer, remember?”

I sigh. “I know, Spencer.” He does know me awful well, doesn’t he? Practically reads my mind now.

“And even though Ford is an asshole when he’s working, he’s still the same guy he was this morning when he took you running. Right?”

I look over at Ford and he’s glaring at me. “What’s with that look?”

“Blackbird,” Spence says, pulling my attention back to him. “He’s still the same guy. You’ve just never met the asshole version we all know and hate. And right now we all have to morph into that other version of ourselves. Because we gotta get out of this, Rook. No one’s coming to help us. So please, we just all need to do our jobs.”

“But what’s my job, Spencer?”

“Be quiet and do what you’re told. Just let us handle this one, OK? Just let us take care of it.”

“But you said you’re not gonna help Ronin, right?”

“Ronin will help himself. He’s good at what he does, he’s smart, he’s devious and sneaky and all those things you hate about men and certainly don’t want to hear are your boyfriend’s God-given gifts. But he’ll figure something out. It just might take some time, that’s all.”

I avoid Ford’s penetrating stare as I mull all this over. Because I don’t want to know these versions of my friends.

I want Ford to stay the guy I trust to point me in the right direction and force me to do things that are good for me even though I hate it.

I want Spencer to stay the guy who makes me laugh, paints me pretty biker jackets, and makes scrapbooks of our body art so I’ll be happy.

And I want Ronin to be the guy I spend forever with. I want to sleep next to him, and go on long vacations with him, and take beastly sexy showers with him.

But as long as this shit is hanging over us, nothing will ever be like that again.

So I just curl up on the end of the couch and close my eyes. I’m tired and I’m gonna grab some shuteye while I can. Because I will be one busy girl in a few hours. 

This is how I get through jail. Because this isn’t the first time I’ve been under suspicion, nor will it probably be the last, considering the wake of crime spraying out behind me from all our previous jobs. But this is what I do.

One. Embrace the orange jumpsuit. You cannot fight it. It’s dirty, it smells like that cheap-ass soap they use, and it’s had more hands on it than you want to think about. But unless you want to go naked—and you don’t, trust me, the mattresses are revolting enough to make you want to sleep on the floor, even with the sheets and orange jumpsuit—just learn to love it.

Two. Do not eat more than once a day. No matter what. They really are trying to poison you.

Three. Do not think about what you might be guilty of. That just makes you vulnerable to questioning.

Four. Embrace your alone time. No people to talk to means fewer ways to screw yourself over.

Five. Try your hardest not to think about the girl on the outside and what she may be thinking of you right now.

Rook has got to be out of her mind. And the really fucked-up part about all this is that I have no idea what I’m being held for. They said felony obstruction, but that could pertain to just about anything I’ve done over the past five years. I’ve had a long career of justice obstruction.

But I’m not supposed to think about that shit, or Rook, or Spencer, or Ford, or Elise.

Elise is gonna kill me.

I am so fucking dead when I get out of jail. She’s gonna want answers, she’s gonna want promises, she’s gonna want all kinds of shit I might not be able to tell her.

Damn, this jumpsuit is itchy. And I could really go for some fresh fruit.

A loud buzzer sounds and my door clicks open. A guard appears with his hand on his weapon. “Flynn, you’ve got a visitor.”

“Awesome, finally someone to talk to in this shithole.”

Did I mention rule six? Don’t fool yourself into thinking you can stick to these rules. Because jail, and especially county jail, sucks ass. And you will have no choice but to wish for company, think about the shitty clothes, the poisonous food, your crime—real or imaginary—and your girl, who probably left your ass as soon as she heard you were incarcerated.