He chuckled. “I had to take control back. The minute you started riding me, I was about to explode. If I didn’t flip you over, we would be having a different conversation right now.”
I laughed. “You didn’t want me to say you were a one-minute man.”
“And that’s exactly why I flipped you over and spread you out like that.” He pinched my arm because I was laughing so hard. “In my defense, seeing you sitting on top of me was blowing my mind. I couldn’t handle it right then and there.”
I looked up at him, still grinning. “It was surreal,” I agreed.
We were both quiet for a moment. Guilt hit me suddenly and my breathing changed. I shuddered.
Jay held me tighter. “Are you okay?”
I let out a breath. “We always said we wouldn’t cross the line because of our friendship… and because of Carter. And her body isn’t even in the ground yet and we’ve crossed the line.”
“I think—”
The pounding on the front door interrupted his sentence and startled us. Before we could really react, a second round of hammering knocks rained down. It was so loud that I could feel the urgency.
With furrowed brows, Jay sat up and grabbed his shorts. He snatched a t-shirt from the chair in the corner as he left the room. I was able to find my camisole, but I had no idea where my shorts were, so I put on a pair of his. I was halfway down the hallway when he swung the door open.
“Why are you banging on the door?” Jay asked gruffly.
“I need to talk to Brooklyn. Is she here?”
My stomach sank. The high I was feeling in bed with Jay cocooned me from everything that hit me yesterday. But hearing the urgency in Kim’s voice brought me back to reality. My legs stopped moving.
“I need to speak to her, James! It’s important.”
“Jay, let her in,” I called out weakly as I forced myself the rest of the way down the hall.
He grumbled about how she was knocking like the police, but he stepped out of the way and let her in.
“I’ve been calling you all morning! Why haven’t you picked up?”
“My phone died,” I explained. I left out the part about how when the power came back on, I was still too distracted by Jay’s dick to remember to connect my cell.
Kim looked around frantically. “It’s ten o’clock. Does that mean you haven’t seen the news? Or checked social media or anything?”
“I haven’t looked at my phone, TV, computer, anything.” In my gut I knew something was wrong. I didn’t want to know, but I knew I had to find out. “What’s going on?”
“We need to talk,” she insisted, her eyes panicky and her face ashen. She gestured to Jay with her head. “Alone.”
“He’s good. I tell him everything,” I murmured. An uneasy feeling roiled my stomach.
“And this is my place,” he muttered, crossing his arms over his chest.
“Fine,” Kim huffed. “It’s going to be everywhere anyway so what does it matter?”
I eyed her as she started pacing back and forth. “What’s going on?”
“Carter’s parents had a second autopsy performed and the results…” Kim shook her head. “It wasn’t the water that killed her. It was smoke. She died of smoke inhalation.”
Jay scrubbed his hands with his face. “What does that mean? I thought they found her on the embankment on the lake. Didn’t they say she drowned?”
“They didn’t find any indication of water in her lungs.” Kim looked between us. “Mrs. Yates said that her death was consistent with smoke inhalation.”
A confused look crossed Jay’s face. “So, if she didn’t drown and she had smoke inhalation, why did they say she drowned?”
“I don’t know,” Kim replied. “But they’re saying smoke means she was on the boat. They don’t know if she set the fire or if she went to the boat after it was already on fire. But the boat was the only thing that caused enough smoke to kill her. The PROs are fine with that conclusion because they’re fine with anything that absolves them of any kind of responsibility. But”—she stopped pacing and looked at me for a long time— “that means the burden of responsibility falls on the person who set the fire and the cheerleaders are still saying you planned and started the fire. Brooklyn, I heard Trevor’s dad say something about they might possibly consider Carter’s death a homicide.”
“What?” I screeched, not even recognizing the sound of my voice.
Jay stared in disbelief. “They don’t think…” He gestured to me. “They can’t possibly try to connect Brooklyn to a homicide.”
“They can’t. I didn’t have anything to do with this,” I cried. Even though everyone in the room knew I hadn’t, it needed to be said. “They can’t connect me to this. Can they?”
Kim started pacing again. “I don’t know but probably. Trevor was dropping me off at my class, so I had to get out of the car.”
“When did you find this out?” I wondered.
“I found out about the second autopsy last night, but I couldn’t call because I stayed the night with him. I found out about the possible homicide this morning. I called you ten times before class and twenty times after. I knew you were staying here so here I am.”
“I didn’t start the fire,” I uttered in perplexity.
“I know. And after my afternoon class, I’m going to the station to tell them I saw you and Aiden all over each other in the basement that night,” Kim assured me.
I heard what she said, but it didn’t register for a second. Once it clicked, I looked over at Jay immediately.
His jaw was clenched, and he was staring at me. He wasn’t saying anything
