2009
"My ghost, where'd you go? What happened to the soul you used to be?"
She was readjusting her skirt, tugging and tugging on the hem that kept seeming to slide even higher up her thighs, when he opened the back door. His hair was messy and his face had yet to be shaven for the day.
"What took you so long?" Jason complained, pulling her inside by her forearm.
Jo slung her half-dry hair over her shoulder, still irritated at him for his midday booty call. It was one thing for it to happen in the middle of the night and another in the midst of one of the only family vacations she had a year. "We were with the Reynolds' at the lake. I had to convince my mom the hotdogs I ate made me sick and beg Garrett to give me a ride over here."
"Is he pissed at you?" He shut the door, sliding the white curtains back in place.
"No, he wanted to see Jenna anyway," She explained, wishing she hadn't sacrificed the hotdogs her father made for the sake of her lies. He wasn't much of a cook, but he'd spent half the day cooking enough for everyone. She knew it made him feel bad that his food could've given his daughter food poisoning. "But I had to give up wakeboarding for you."
"I didn't know you liked wakeboarding."
"It's one of the only physical things I enjoy."
Jason leaned down and looked into her eyes. "You're lying to me, little girl."
"Prove me wrong." She put her hands on his chest, dragging her nails slowly until she reached his belt.
He moved closer to her with a smug look on his face before taking her bottom lip between his, kissing her gently. Her hands clenched his hips at his touch, wishing for something less teasing than a chaste kiss.
"I don't like you hanging around her, Alison. She is bad news."
Jason reacted quicker than she did at the sound of his mother's approaching voice; he scooped her up quickly and moved into the laundry room, shutting the door behind them before Jo's pretty brown eyes could ever even open.
"What are you—"
He put a hand over her mouth. "They'll hear us. Don't speak."
She pushed his hand from her mouth and stomped on his foot. His glaring was mostly unnoticed in the dark of the room as the only source of light was from a small window over the washer. Jo tugged him by the collar and whispered, "Do you expect me to just wait for them to leave? I told your sister I'd hang out with her in an hour and a half."
"We won't be in here that long."
"No, just long enough to get caught."
In the corner was an old wooden chair that would've looked nice once in a dining set but had long since been forgotten under cobwebs and dust. Jason moved it to the door, strategically placing it under the knob as a provisional lock. He raised his brows as she furrowed hers unimpressed.
She thought about climbing out the window, telling him better luck next time, that it may have happened at a party once but they were sober, and she wasn't in the mood to hang out with boys in cramped places. Then he pulled her into a wet kiss, mumbling something about passing the time, and she thought about how intoxicating he was all on his own.
When he focused his mouth at the spot under her ear, Jo stumbled against the running dryer and worried for a half-second that someone might hear them. She tried to be aware of her surroundings but everything was shutting down, melting under his touch. It was even harder to fight back a breathy moan when the hands that were gripping her thighs slowly made their way north.
His fingers looped around the band of her underwear and slid them down her legs before helping her step out of them. Jason spun her around, pressing her against the dryer.
She reached a hand behind her to feel him and the way he yearned for her touch as desperately as she did his. Jason buried his face into the back of her neck in a sloppy attempt to occupy his lips with something other than the groans that were threatening to surface after he'd eased her hand beneath his pants.
It wouldn't take much more of him rolling his hips into her grip for things to come to a head. Jason worked her skirt above her hips and his pants beneath his before aligning himself with her.
His hand was back around her mouth, another gripping the dryer, as he ground his hips into hers. She clutched his hand with hers, leaving a crescent mark from every nail she dug into his skin. The moment was unmatched, between the unnerving feeling of everything they'd worked so hard to keep hidden being discovered and the way his every move felt so frustratingly limited in their sound-sensitive little room.
She wanted to pull his hair and throw her head back, cry out his name. She wanted to hear his voice telling her how good she was for him, how good she felt around him.
He was becoming careless—moving closer and closer to the edge without her—with each thrust. Jason kicked over the nearest laundry basket and lifted her leg on top of it, spreading her legs to feel the turbulent vibrations of the dryer against her core. Jo wrapped an arm around his neck to bring him closer in an attempt to feel him even more.
The sensation was almost too much as she was on the verge of tears when she climaxed. Everything came in rocky waves, making her feel a little less steady as they each crashed. Her knees buckled when he followed after, brushing the sweaty locks of hair from her neck so he could kiss there.
He stumbled back from her, adjusting himself lazily and admiring the number he'd done on her.
As she watched him redress, the alarms went off in her mind warped and in slow motion. "Jason, you didn't wear a..."
"No, we don't just keep them stashed around the house."
He reached for one of the cleaned handtowels that were stacked neatly on the washer and ran it under the old sink by the door. Jason wrung it out before handing it to Jo to clean herself up.
"You didn't pull out." She whispered, horrified once she understood why this time felt messier. "Oh, my God."
She stopped breathing then. It was one thing to play dangerously at the line of being caught, to toy with the idea just to get an addicting burst of adrenaline. But it was different to cross that line with something so easily detrimental—something that could've been just as effortlessly avoided.
"Josie, don't freak out," Jason whispered in her ear, wrapping an arm around her shoulders and pulling her in. "Go wait in my bedroom. You can take a shower or something. Get cleaned up."
She watched as he moved the chair from the door soundlessly. "Where are you going?"
"To get one of those emergency contraptions."
"Emergency contraceptives," She corrected him even though she knew he'd never make a mistake if his mind weren't elsewhere. "You can't. My family owns the only pharmacy in town and word spreads fast."
He stressed. "I'll drive to Ravenswood if I have to."
"I don't want to be all alone here."
He shook the hand that she had reached out to him off, walking out and leaving her behind when the coast was clear. "Grow the hell up, Jo."
She chose to let his comment hurt, but not affect her. Not until she made it to his room without being seen. Not until she'd stripped bare and turned the water as hot as it would get. Not until the mirror was fogged over enough to hide the image of a distraught young girl.
She stayed under the stream of water and let it pelt down at her back until she felt like her outermost layer of skin had washed down the drain. Foolishly, she thought of a snake shedding its skin and how maybe she could do the same, only her mistakes going, too.
What would she do with a baby when she was still accused of being one herself? What would she do when her parents asked for the father? Maybe she had it in her to lie and say she shamefully couldn't remember. Maybe Jason somehow could care enough to own up and take responsibility. It would be half-him, after all.
And it made her sick to even think about any of it. That wasn't the life she wanted, not in a million years. She didn't want to miss out on childish things to care for someone else. There was so much she'd yet to do with her life that she couldn't think of anything more awful than trading it all for another. She didn't want a baby.
Selfishly, she just wanted herself.
Jo turned off the faucet but didn't get out of the shower even after the air in the bathroom had gone cold again. She didn't think she'd been there long until the door to his bedroom opened and shut. She stayed inside, not ready to face him again.
The door to the bathroom swung open. Only this time, a longer, more golden set of hair entered. Alison got down on her knees and opened every drawer of his bathroom counter, eyeing the contents curiously.
Jo froze up, her fingers locked on the curtains as she watched her best friend snoop through Jason's belongings through a crack. How long would it take before she turned around and yanked the curtain back? Had she been caught off guard by the light or did Jason notoriously run the power bill up? Did she notice her best friend's clothes in the hamper?
Questions swarmed Jo like an angry mob until she wished she could turn the water back on and wash them away.
After a few moments, Alison got bored with her discovery of shaving cream and toothpaste. As Jo listened to her scrounge his room for hidden scandals, she yanked the towel from his rack and wrapped it around her frame snugly.
"What the hell do you think you're doing, Alison?"
Mentally, she sighed in relief at Jason's impeccable timing.
"Mom asked me—"
"No, she didn't." He cut her off viciously, knowing better. "You've been going through my stuff. Stay out of my room."
"Why? What are you hiding up here?"
Jo stepped down onto the cool tile of his bathroom, padding her feet towards the door and peeking through the gap Alison had left in it on her way out.
Jason towered over his sister with a menacing height difference. "It's none of your business, dammit!"
They stared one another down, only breaking contact when Jason peered up to see Jo watching them from the bathroom.
Alison took the moment of distraction and ran with it, slipping out of his room just as swiftly as she had entered and slammed the door behind her. He reached out towards the door and locked it as Jo left the bathroom, clutching the towel around her tightly.
"Are you leaving?" He asked as she began digging her dirty clothes from the hamper.
"I don't know about you but I'm tired of hiding in dark places today." Jo yanked one of his shirts from the hanger and put it on. The idea of putting her skirt and underwear back on made her coil in disgust so she took a pair of clean boxers from his bureau. If she rolled them up around the hips enough, they could pass for a pair of checkered shorts. "She almost caught me in here."
"I handled it."
"All you did was make the cat want to chase the mouse even more." Jo sat on the edge of his unmade bed to slip her sandals on. Every move was rough and rushed, her anger getting the best of her. "She's never going to stop. It's Alison, for Christ's sake."
"I don't know what else you want me to do." Jason threw his hands up. A black bag that had been wrapped up tightly was in one of them. "Kill her?"
"Now is not the time for jokes." She spat, walking towards the door.
He caught her by the arm, refusing to let her take another step. His gripped lightened as did the hard look on his face.
As she looked into his eyes, she wondered if anyone knew the color blue could hurt so much. Jo looked away from him, feeling the blatant pain and uneasiness turn her stomach into knots. She just wanted to cry more.
"If you take it, we won't have to worry." He offered her the plastic bag.
"Worry about how to tell your girlfriend you've been cheating on her?"
"And worry about how you'll tell your best friend you betrayed her and got knocked up by her big brother." His ill-temper was absent; only exhaustion in its place. "Riley. Your parents. Mine. Think about this, Jo."
"I'm not fucking delusional. You don't have to talk me out of teen motherhood." Jo took the bag from him and walked off, not looking back. She'd have to call Alison later and say that she was sick with food poisoning. The day had gone over its limits with the average DiLaurentis quota.
2010
Neurogenic shock—a word that she hadn't registered in her vocabulary since learning it in an introductory health course in the ninth grade. Her teacher—a bitterly single woman of forty, who liked to take points off her assignments out of spite—had taught them once that it was a medical condition that affected the neural signals, leading to an acute sense of paralysis.
Despite the lack of trauma to her spinal cord, everything felt like an obvious symptom. Her heart race felt slow, her breathing shallow, fingertips cold. She felt stuck, unable to move in the chilly greenhouse. Frozen in time.
Ian Thomas was, for all they knew, alive. A vindictive man with a taste for twisted voyeurism had been outed as a murderer and was on the run. It was hard enough to watch a bad man die before her eyes. To know he hadn't died at all and was well enough for revenge, well, that was the most devastating of all.
It wasn't over.
Emily yanked her winter coat tighter. "He's dead."
Hanna looked at her in disbelief. Surprisingly, she seemed to be the only one functioning correctly after the news. "So Casper the neighborhood pervert learned to text?
"Should we tell the cops?" Aria brushed her hair from her shoulders as she glanced up at Jo. "Your dad?"
"Yeah, because that's always our best option." Jo looked up, having finally found her voice. She cleared her throat roughly before straightening her pose like it reflected her bravery. "Haven't you learned anything? Telling people hurts, not helps."
"Well, we can just do this on our own. Remember what happened to Spencer?"
She bit back. "And remember how everyone just pointed and stared?"
Hanna looked at Aria and Jo, stomping her feet childishly, "Can't we just finish this conversation at school?"
They were reminded when they looked at each other that, no, they couldn't. Not unless they had a time machine that could go back to stop their new therapist from ever handing out terrible advice to parents.
They stayed close together as they walked back, feeling unsafe since going through Melissa's phone. When they heard a loud crash to the left, they jumped and reached out for one another.
"It's Jason." Spencer breathed as she noticed him tossing large bags of garbage on the street for the waste pickup to come by in the morning and collect. She squinted her eyes to make out the individual pieces of junk he'd stacked in boxes. "He's throwing out all of Ali's old tributes."
"What's he doing back in that house?" Aria asked Jo. "I thought he was staying up in Philly."
"He is."
"Was." Emily corrected her. "It's getting cold."
"You guys go ahead," instructed Jo as she kept her attention on Jason. When Emily raised her eyebrows to ask if she was sure, Jo gave her a tight smile. "I'll be right behind."
She waited until her friends were out of comfortable hearing distance before approaching him with her hands stuffed warmly in her pockets. "Still lookin' to throw on that astronaut suit you were telling me about? I rented the ship, but we only got it for the weekend."
He didn't look at her or do anything in the slightest to acknowledge her presence until he was inside his door and turning off the porch light. It was nothing more than a glance.
Jo shook her head like it would get rid of the confusion. What was his problem? She wasn't more than three feet from him and it wasn't like the wind just carried her voice off. It was cold and strong, but it might've taken a hurricane for that.
Versus standing in the dark any longer, she made the trek back to her home. Jo eased up the creaky latch of the wooden gate as she snuck around the side of the yard where the trellis under her bedroom window was located. She stuck an uneasy foot into the woodwork, always wondering when the day one come that it would snap under her weight. Making it safely to the top, she slid open her window and climbed inside, shutting it behind her.
"Didn't take you long to do the exact opposite of what you're told, did it?"
She made a vulgar hand gesture at Riley, wondering how long he'd been waiting for her to come back. "Fuck off."
"How adult of you, cousin, to lash out at everyone who's ever tried to help you."
"Why do you think I needed your help?" She tugged off her coat and stuffed it back into her closet. "I finally learned how to take care of myself and that bothers you, doesn't it?"
"A criminal record and dealing dope are taking care of yourself?"
She spun around and took two large steps, getting close enough to grab the front of his shirt. "Shut your mouth! Someone could hear you."
"Maybe someone needs to."
In a fit of rage, she balled up her fist and aimed it at his stomach. Riley doubled over with a nasty cough. She had half the mind to hit him again—it was the old way they used to settle all their disagreements, by fighting. "I am under a fucking microscope because you told my mother something wasn't right. We have a pact never to snitch and you broke that! Now, I can't even hang out with my friends."
"Do you even hear how angry you are over nothing?" He pushed her away from him, more for his safety than to hurt her. When she got like this, it was like a loose cannon; there was no telling when it would explode. "You're under the microscope because you put yourself there. Because you can't go more than five minutes without catastrophically fucking something else up!"
"Stop suffocating me, you clingy bastard!" She cried out, not caring that she could wake up her parents with the noise. "I'm not her! I'm never going to be. You don't have to try and save what's not dead."
Jo wished she could take it back immediately after saying it. He inhaled a shaky breath, obviously expecting a different kind of blow, and nodded solemnly in acceptance. But, she didn't want him to accept it. She didn't want it to get to him the way it did. The feeling of being backed into a corner with everyone attacking was overwhelming, exhausting.
That didn't matter. It was too late.
Riley walked to the door and opened it. They were both sick of the constant fighting. "You're already a ghost."
***
When the lunch bell rang, she collected her notebook and hastily shoved it into her bag. Slinging it over her shoulder, she moved towards the door sluggishly from attempting to go without sleep.
"Can I speak to you a moment?" Mr. Fitz called out to Jo before she could make it out. She turned towards him and nodded, sliding herself into the closet desk adjacent to his. "I just wanted to say how phenomenal your essay on the social evils of the modern world and its impact on literature was the best I've seen."
"Can you put that in writing? I'm so telling Spencer."
"Don't tell Spencer." Ezra's eyes widened at the thought, making Jo laugh. It was just Hastings' genetics to win, and Spencer losing to someone as lazy as Jo... that made for a good story, she thought. "I was shocked you listed men as one of the evils, but you did have some great historical evidence to back it up."
She snickered while tracing all the pencil marks unruly students had left behind with her finger. Jo knew exactly who to thank for the inspiration behind that idea. Sarcastically, she figured she'd write them in her speech if came to an award.
Ezra reached for a felt pen on his desk, uncapping it. In bright red, he scribbled a sloppy 100! on the top corner and circled it. "Good job, Jo. you've come a long way, and I'm pleased to see that."
"Not many people in my life can say that right now."
He was surprised, but not entirely shocked at that. Awkwardly, he asked, "Do you... do you want to talk about it?"
"Aria's probably told you that we have a shrink for that now."
"That would involve communication," scoffed Ezra. "We're not doing much more than drifting apart these days."
Jo never felt that she was one for giving advice—it seemed like it was a little too 'pot calling the kettle' for her—but she did have experience. If somehow people could learn from that, it was enough. "I used to date this older guy. Everything I did just felt like it wasn't good enough like I couldn't live up to the standards that the girls his age could. I was insecure about losing what we had that it led to some very bad choices."
He leaned back in his swivel chair and rubbed his hand through his short hair stressfully. "But she's so beautiful and smart and amazing. She has no reason to be insecure."
"Just let her know that no matter what happens, you're going to be there. It's all she wants."
"I'm trying my best, but it's like she doesn't hear me."
"She's listening more than you think she is." Jo hesitated for a moment in thought. "I think I'll miss you. In a non-sobfest way, you were the only teacher that believed in me."
"Maybe you can attend Hollis one day and I'll believe in you some more."
She threw her head back and gave one of those deep-belly laughs, finding the whole thing ironic. "Let's not push our luck."
Jo stood from the desk with her bag in tow after Ezra thanked her for her help with Aria. But he didn't have to. She was just doing what she wished someone would've done for her a year ago. Whether it was saving her from a broken heart or teaching her how to avoid one, it didn't matter. Only that things would've ended differently.
She walked to her locker and tugged it open. She never bothered to lock it, learning after one time that it was a complete pain in the ass to work a lock when high on Xanax. Stuffing in the things for English class that she didn't need until tomorrow, Jo slammed it closed.
"You look pretty today."
She let out a loud yelp at Mona, not having heard or seen her approach. "What do you want?"
"Hanna's not talking to me. Maybe you could convince her to give me another chance."
Jo crossed her arms and leaned against the wall of lockers, giving her a look that said there was minimal time to explain before she lost interest in charity cases. In the back of her mind, she wondered if there was some sign on her back that offered half-ass emotional support for everyone's relationship struggles.
"I thought I was doing the right thing," Mona began, speaking at a fast pace to get it all out. She to have been desperate to come to Jo. Her chances would've been better with one of the others. "He broke her heart into pieces. He didn't get to just do that all over again in some stupid letter. Hanna was better off without him and his excuses."
"Caleb wrote Hanna a letter?"
"She never got it. I ripped it up before she could."
"You mean to tell me that her first love wrote her a letter, giving her the apology and answers she deserved, and you kept that from her?" She straightened up as Mona backed away in intimidation. "You evil, little bitch!"
Mona opened her mouth to speak, but Jo wasn't finished. "She's never gotten over the way he took off without knowing why he would hurt her in that way. Hanna loved Caleb."
"I know, but I'm her best friend. You have to understand why I couldn't watch her go through that again. She needed to move on."
"No, I'm her best friend, who knows that Hanna needed—more than anything—to decide on her closure." She hissed in her face. "You're just horrible, Loser Mona."
Mona clenched her fists as she physically shook with rage. Jo watched as the tears welled up in her deep brown eyes, threatening to spill and ruin her eyeliner. She couldn't find it in her to care. It was Hanna's feelings before Mona's. Why should she ever feel bad for standing up for her friends?
She jogged towards the cafeteria at a pace only the unathletic would've considered fast, knowing her friends would be waiting outside so they could go through the line together. It was the easiest way to be around each other without raising suspicion.
Impatient expressions turned to angry expressions when they caught sight of her, finally shuffling into the lunch line. There was no guessing how long they'd been waiting.
"I have to tell you guys something." Emily started nervously. Each of the girls looked at her with curiosity. "I think A deleted the videos from my laptop."
Jo whipped her head in Emily's direction, feeling it was more of a blessing than anything they had lost the videos. If they couldn't use them against Ian, the police couldn't find out what happened that summer.
"Who's going to believe us now?" Aria panicked as she pulled a fruit cup onto her tray. Emily kept her eyes on her tray like she felt guilty for not taking better care of them. It couldn't have been her fault. A did what A wanted and no one could do a damn thing about it.
"The videos were only one piece of evidence." Jo tried to coerce them into getting over it. The more they forgot about those videos, the better off everyone was. "There's got to be more somewhere."
Spencer agreed, seeing the logic of being able to find where Ian hadn't covered up the tracks of an ill-planned murder. "We dig up enough of the past and eventually, the story of that night will write itself. We won't need the videos."
They each walked to the registers at the end of the line with trays full of food that was most likely going to be thrown away; public school food didn't seem anything more than barely edible these days.
Hanna's shoulders sagged as the girls split up. "That's just so much harder than it could've been."
"Getting involved in a murder was never easy, Han," Jo said through a mouthful of fruit as she went to exit the cafeteria. She tossed the pear up in amusement, taking another bite after the third catch. When she picked up on the second pair of feet clicking behind her in the hallway, she glanced over her shoulder to find Hanna sans her lunch tray. "Why are you following me?"
"I don't have anyone else to sit with."
She aimed for a trashcan in the distance, whooping loudly when it went miraculously inside.
Her plans for the next few weeks were to spend lunch inside the safety of some stoner's car, testing out new methods of blurring reality, since her social life had taken a drastic turn for the worst. If she was forced to suffer alone, she'd do it as painlessly as she could.
Only that wouldn't work if Hanna continued to tail her like a motherless puppy.
"That's because Sully said—"
"When have you ever cared what anyone's ever said?" Hanna caught up with her in a quick jog, interrupting. "Or thought?"
Jo quit walking and sighed instead. "Things are different."
"Yeah, they are but it doesn't mean we are."
"Try telling that to my family." Jo shook her head, trying so desperately not to tell off a pair of boys that were staring them down objectively. She thought better of it by deciding Hanna was more important than any gross fifteen-year-old. "They look at me like I'm some sort of alien."
"I'm sure your cousin doesn't think that. He loves you."
"You don't know him."
Hanna stared blankly at her for a moment. Maybe she was thinking. Maybe she was holding back. Nonetheless, she twisted on the heel of her stilettos and walked off in the direction of the courtyard without saying another word.
Jo watched her go, wondering what that was all about. It wasn't about open rebellion and disrespect for the rules anymore. She couldn't just be stubborn for the sake of it. That is if she wanted to win the game she'd been pawned into playing.
Hard-headedness was a prominent trait, but nothing compared to her staggering ability to persevere against it all.
***
She should've been home half an hour ago when Riley had first called. He'd begrudgingly asked her what she was up to, in which she refused to answer—only to bicker, not because she was wholeheartedly worried he would snitch again. After waiting for an answer that wasn't coming, he'd told her Auntie Kat's new ten-thirty curfew was being instated tonight and left her with the busy signal playing in her ear.
But she had a call from an unknown number with hoping there was a chance she'd be willing to meet with a last-minute customer. With a lack of market after her most recent police scrutiny, she'd agreed to wait outside her family's pharmacy only for the money.
"When they told me your name, I thought you were a boy."
She looked at the new buyer—redheaded with pressed khakis and loafers—through narrowed eyes. "Don't talk to me more than you have to."
"Caleb was right." He scoffed as he pulled out a brown leather wallet from his back pocket. "You are bossy."
"Are you sure he didn't mean bitchy?"
"Who knows? He's not been doing much talking since he came back. Dude won't even fix my phone for double."
It was news to her that Caleb had ever come back since getting on that bus to Arizona and leaving nothing but a mess of Hanna's heart behind. But it made sense why Mona was in trouble. With the way she was adamant it was the right thing she was doing by hiding his letter, there was no way she would ever admit what she did. Caleb must've done it himself.
Which meant he'd spoken to Hanna, who'd yet to speak about something that significant to her friends. It didn't bother her much; she'd kept Jason from them. All that mattered was that Hanna got what she deserved and her cheeks hurt from how stupidly happy she was. Caleb being back and apologizing for everything could lead to that sort of future.
Not to mention she could finally stop paying the student aid that worked in the front office to shred the attendance cards. It was too risky and she was too annoyingly cheery for Jo's rain cloud persona.
"Aren't you going to give me some sort of warning?" He asked after they'd made the exchange of cash for the dime bag full of pills.
"Yeah, don't do drugs."
He shook his head as he walked off to a shiny, white Mustang and peeled out of the parking lot.
She waited until his car was far enough into the horizon that she couldn't see it before moving to her car that was parked in the alley behind the pharmacy. Jo tugged the keys free from her pocket, pressing the remote to unlock the car twice. It beeped loudly, the head and lights flashing once.
As Jo went to open the driver's side door, a shrilling sound broke through the quiet of the ghostly evening—the security alarm to the pharmacy.
Her initial reaction was to get in her car, lock the doors, and wait it out. But her second was of the tire iron in her trunk and the footage she'd regretted leaving to be wiped in the morning. Jo ran to the trunk and retrieved the iron before shoving her key into the back entrance of the pharmacy. As she entered, the alarm became even louder, a flashing of red light illuminating the room every other second.
Seven minutes—that's how far off the closest police station was, not including any unaccounted officer patrolling the streets.
Across the room, her eye caught sight of the main entrance, locked and untouched as she left it. Except something was amiss. She clutched the tire iron closer as she tried to figure out what her brain was trying to point out to her. And then it clicked. Every A was missing from their Jameson Family Pharmacy door decal.
That's what this was a trap, or a test, or some sort of clusterfuck she'd been so ignorant as to walk straight into.
Jo ran to the keypad for the alarm, punching in the eight digits of her birthday to disable it. The alarm kept screeching and screaming and squealing, nothing she entered working. Thinking of it was nothing but futile, she ran to the back room and tried her key only for it to fail her as well.
"What the fuck?" She whispered as she noticed something broken off into the keyhole. With four or fewer minutes left and no other options, she brought the iron down on the knob until it fell on the floor with a clunk.
If it wasn't for the lack of time on her hands and the knowledge that insurance would cover it all, she would've thought more rationally by doctoring the footage. But that just wasn't her style at all as she smashed her mother's computer to bits, jumping at the crackling of electricity.
When it was decidedly dead and gone, she went through the aisles, swinging at whatever she could hit. When she made it to the back where two cameras were mounted on the wall, she reached up and bashed them in before knocking the knob off the pharmacy door as well.
Jo hurried through the aisles and collected only bottles marked with prescriptions meant for pain. Careful to only touch the bottles with the sleeve of her jacket, she twisted the caps and emptied the contents into the toilet of the family bathroom, flushing them down.
In the far off distance, she could begin to hear the sirens. Jo stuffed the bottles into her jacket pockets and ran towards the back door. Suddenly, she stopped and turned back to the front door. The missing A's were too much of a hint to leave behind. It took her three swings before the glass shattered into pieces on the ground.
Jo ran to her car, stuffing the iron and her jacket in the trunk, promptly locking it. With little to no time left, she slipped back into the pharmacy and ducked behind the counter, hiding.
She heard the sounds of heavy feet crunching over broken glass and in seconds, the alarm was disabled, the pharmacy quiet. She watched as flashlights danced across the dark walls.
"Police," They called out. "If you have a weapon, drop it and come forward with your hands raised."
She shut her eyes in pain when the lights flashed in them.
"Josie?"
She held a hand out to the light to cover it, catching a glimpse of Garrett Reynolds, the responding officer. It was then she broke into crocodile tears, clutching at him. "I'm so glad you're here! How did you turn off the alarm?"
"We've got a code for the first responder on this system," He said as he tucked his gun back into his belt. "What happened?"
"I was driving by and heard the alarm," She took a step back, rubbing at her eyes. "I know I shouldn't have but the whole door was shattered. Someone was still here and they freaked when they saw me."
"Do you know who it was? Did they hurt you?"
Jo rubbed her hip, shaking her head, "They pushed me down. Someone taller and stronger."
Garrett pulled her under his arm, rubbing a calming hand up and down her spine. He guided her from the counter and towards the shattered front door where the squad car was parked in the front lot. "I'm going to have a look around and then call it in."
He ushered her into the passenger's seat before walking back into the pharmacy with his flashlight drawn. He didn't come back out until a black SUV pulled into the parking lot, her father exiting.
Garrett beckoned him over first. With the window cracked, she could just faintly make out their conversation. "Sir, all surveillance has been destroyed, including the computer where it was connected."
"My wife kept everything stored on an external hard drive. That, too?"
"I figured that much, but there was no drive found." Garrett turned back to point into the building. "The front, the office, and the pharmacy show signs of forced entry."
"Missing pharmaceuticals?"
"You'd have to ask your wife that, sir."
Her father shook Garrett's hand before commanding him to take an official statement from his daughter and drive her home. He would call for backup and stay to investigate whatever remained.
***
She paused her movie when the knock on her door pounded through the wood. Calling for them to enter, she set her laptop to the side as her dad walked in, donning a charcoal-colored suit.
"Before I say anything else, I want you to know you are safe. I will always make sure of that." He told her as he pulled the chair from her vanity and sat down.
Jo eyed the gun at his belt, shiny and black, wondering how many times he'd ever used it. She'd never asked but it felt like it might comfort her to know her father was capable of saving her if need be. Dramatically, she figured no one could save her anymore—not from herself at least. Every time things looked up, she did something to ruin it. Riley was right.
"I'm sorry for putting myself in trouble like that," whispered Jo as she stared down at her hands fiddling in her lap. She felt like she'd disappointed them tonight in more ways than they knew. "I know you told me to do better."
"I should've listened to you the night of the bell tower."
She paused, taken aback. "You did."
"I didn't believe you." Her father sighed, "Maybe if I had, you would've not gotten hurt tonight."
"Do you believe me now?"
"There's been multiple break-ins around town. People's garages being raided, camping gear being stolen," He loosened the tie around his neck and slouched in his seat. Externally, he was off the clock, but she knew his mind was still at work with the way he spoke to her like he was making an official statement. "Tonight we found a reason to believe that the person who attacked you was Ian Thomas and we are currently pursuing his disappearance from a new perspective now."
She thought it would be relieving to hear those words, but a hollowness was still present in her chest knowing it wasn't for the right reasons. "You think Ian came back?"
"I think a desperate man on the run that sustained injuries from a fall would need drugs to compensate for the lack of medical attention." He picked up a frame sitting on her vanity. It was a picture of Jo and Alison from two years prior. He smiled softly at it. "Is there anything else you have to say about tonight that you didn't have the chance to before?"
"I wish I'd done things differently."
He stood from the chair and walked to the side of her bed. Reaching out a hand, he cupped his daughter's face in his hands. "Me, too."
When he left her room, she tried to turn her attention back to her movie but all she could think was what she did tonight—staged a robbery to hide a felony. Lied to the police, to her father. Blamed a man for a crime he was innocent of. Played the doe-eyed victim to walk free. And lastly, how proud Alison would've been.
With the last thought spooking her the most, she pressed play on her laptop. The scene cut to black and white, a long-haired girl sneaking into a room and exiting with several pill bottles under her arm. As the girl looked up at the camera, sirens blared through the speakers and a message scrawled in red appeared on the screen.
You have my movie and now I have yours. Wipe the drive or this pretty actress gives Rosewood PD front row seats to her premiere debut. —A
Jo slammed her laptop shut and tossed it towards the foot of the bed, bringing her knees to her chest. A was playing more than one game tonight when they triggered the alarm; they'd stolen the security footage in retaliation.
But Jo knew one thing—if the bitch demanded rain, she would make it pour hellfire.
a/n:
probably should've put up a warning before this smutty chapter, but it felt unnatural. once again it's super important to imply that my little flashbacks are not always in order. maybe at the end, I'll write out a timeline or something.
-b