Heartbreak Weather , Stiles Stilinski ⁶ ✓

004 | ONE FOR THE ROAD

Aspen's heart shattered for her friend.

"Jackson, I'm—" Aspen said, holding out her hands to hold his to comfort him, "I am so sorry this happened to him, and to you. And I'm sorry that I'm..."

"Defending his murderer?" Jackson finished her sentence for her bluntly.

Aspen was so caught off by his words, at first she thought she must've mis-heard him. She blinked as she stared into his cold, broken eyes, until she realised he was being deadly serious.

"Jack..." Aspen sighed softly, pursing her lips, "You know Stiles didn't actually do this..."

"Do I?" Jackson scoffed in response, leaning back in his seat as he brought his beet bottle up to his lips and took a sip, "Do you?"

Aspen's face dropped, taken aback by Jackson's suggestion. Stiles may have changed over the years, but Aspen still didn't want to believe he did this.

And having gone over the file so many times, she knew there was equally a chance that he was being framed as there was of him really being guilty.

"Listen, Aspen," Jackson sighed, "I'm gonna say what deep down we're both thinking. Stiles has changed— we both know he's not the same guy you fell in love with when we were in high school anymore."

"We've all changed," Aspen replied, finding herself defending Stiles despite her uncertainty, "None of us are the same people we were back then."

"But not all of us went down the path he did." Jackson shrugged as he shot back, "You knew what he was turning into, that's why you guys—"

"No," Aspen cut him off defensively, not letting him finish his sentence—she already knew what he was going to say. "That's not why we broke up, you know it isn't."

"Fine," said the Whittemore man, "It might not have been the thing that officially called it quits, but had the other thing not been an issue— how long do you really think it would've taken for his choices to push you away?"

"I know he's different now," Aspen said lowly, trying not to think too much about her broken heart, "I'm not saying he's a saint, but I'm also not going to jump to condemn him for committing this crime when the evidence stacked against him is merely circumstantial."

"Circumstantial?" Jackson scoffed, "His DNA was found on the murder weapon."

"How do you even know about that?" Aspen asked genuinely, "You're not in law enforcement, you don't have access to the weaponry analysis reports..."

"The prosecution's been keeping me in the loop," Jackson replied, "I think you know him actually— Lydia's boyfriend? Alex Reeves?"

Aspen let out a great sigh, running a stressed hand through her hair for what was probably the hundredth time in the past four days. Last week, she was walking through the streets of Paris, with everything she ever wanted out of life in the palm of her hand.

And then she came back to New York and walked straight into a living nightmare.

"Listen, J," Aspen sighed, "I'm supposed to head down to the state prison tomorrow afternoon, to see him."

Jackson took another seep of his beer as he raised his eyebrows like he was amused, "I'm sure you can't wait."

Aspen didn't let Jackson's snappy attitude with her offend her or hurt her feelings. His husband was murdered—he was entitled to flip this table over and scream at her in the middle of this bar as far as she was concerned. If she was in his position, she'd be a complete and utter mess, and she didn't know what she'd do.