“Don’t leave on my account. I’m just here to play trivia.” Her arm brushed mine as she took a few steps past me. “Is this him? Your husband? The one you rebounded into after Joan?”
Shit.“Dana. Don’t start. We teach high school. We don’t regress into adolescent drama culture.”
But Dana had already held out her hand to Jackson. “Dana Adams. Don’t take this personally, but I keep telling Bastian he married you too fast.”
Jackson didn’t take the offered hand. “Oddly enough, I do take that personally.”
Dana’s hand hung awkwardly out for a long moment before she let it drop. “There’s no reason to. It’s not aboutyou. You look like a nice man who deserved better than this unlucky draw. See, he had a girlfriend before you.”
I had to walk around behind Dana to get to Jackson’s side. “Dana. Stop. I don’t want to ask you again.”
Dana didn’t stop. Why would she? She’d already breached several sections of the social pact and had no reason not to bull right over another few. “I keep saying, he should have tried harder to patch things up with her. Found his ambition and drive.”
Jackson folded his arms tight over his chest. “Would that be the girlfriend who left him?”
“She would have taken him back if he’d put in the effort. Ever since she heard he got married, she’s been really sad. Jealous, even. Regretting what she did. She’s been calling to talk to him. I sort of wonder if that was always Bastian’s intent. Get married to get back at her, or make her jealous.”
Tracey stepped up and put a hand on Dana’s bicep. “Dana. That’s enough.”
Dana shook Tracey’s hand off. “Or maybe Bastian got married so fast because he didn’t actually love her. Is a man who has no problem leaving his family behind even capable of love? Especially with a soldier who’s going to spend all his time away. What will he do while you’re gone to punish you for leaving him alone?”
That did it for me. My long fuse burned to the end, caught the powder, and detonated.
I forced my way between Dana and Jackson, right in Dana’s face. “That. Is. Enough. I was willing to stand here and let you insultme, Dana, because we work at the same school and I wanted to get through the end of the year without incident. I willnotstand here and let you disrespect my husband.”
Dana opened her mouth and drew in a breath to speak. I held up a finger to silence her.
“You have been stalking me forweeks. I should have filed a complaint, but I didn’t. We’re almost to the end of a very difficult year. All I wanted was to let this whole, stupid crusade of yours die off over summer break. Now, you’ve given me no choice.” I met her offended gaze with my stony one. “Stay away from me. Tell Joan to leave me alone. This ends now.”
My insides shook with adrenaline as I left her there, foundering in her unspoken retorts, and strode for the door. I didn’t look back, but I did see in one of the bar’s mirrored decorations that Jackson had followed. Tracey had moved, too, interposing herself between Dana and the door so she couldn’t come after us.
“This was a mistake,” I said between gritted teeth when Jackson fell in next to me.
“Oh, I dunno about that,” Jackson replied, voice low and too even.
I glanced sideways at him. Sergeant Sadler walked next to me with his command mask on, the expression he used when he had hidden strong emotions and armored up his heart. “I do. You shouldn’t have had to hear that.”
“Hear from a stranger that someone’s been stalking you? That you’ve been talking to your ex? No, you’re right, I shouldn’t have heard that from a stranger. I should have heard that fromyou.” He didn’t look at me.
“I haven’t talked to my ex!” I said, louder than I meant to. “My ex has been spamming my dead phone with messages that she wants to talk. It’s hard to even convince the phone to boot up now, because it has to download her messages.”
“And you haven’t blocked her.” We reached the truck. Jackson yanked the door open so hard the hinge creaked.
I climbed into my side with less force. “No. I haven’t. I wanted her messages on record in case I ever needed a restraining order. Last time she messaged me, I told her not to contact me again, and I started to block her but my phone died.”
The engine roared to life, deep and guttural. It sounded like Jackson’s mood. “And you didn’t tell me, why?”
“Because I forgot!” I said. My hands dropped into my lap. “It is as simple as that. My phone would cooperate for once, I’d find her messages, I’d do whatever I needed my phone for to start with, then my phone would die and- You know. Out of sight, out of mind. We’ve had so much happening lately, it would slip my mind. I’m sorry.”
He said nothing. This is very different than not saying anything. Saying nothing is its own reply, a deliberate silence that encourages the worst of interpretations.
“If you can get my phone to boot, you can look at the messages. I try to pretend she doesn’t even exist, or I tell her to lay off. Half the time I’m trying to text you when I kick my phone into working, and I’m more interested in talking to you than giving her attention,” I said.
Jackson still didn’t take his eyes off the road. “So it’s on me that you never told me your ex was bugging you. Or that her friend was stalking you.”
“No! No one said that! Jackson, yes, I made a mistake, but it was an honest one. That doesn’t change the fact that it was a mistake, though, and I take the blame. You can look through my phone. You can check the phone records. Whatever you need to see I’m telling the truth.” My burger sat like grease and lead in my stomach.
I regretted eating it. I regretted taking Jackson to meet my coworkers. We should have stayed home, safe from the drama Dana wanted to stir up.