Page 31 of Fractured Hearts

“Yeah, that’s fine. I’ll pick next time,” he says, looking at me with such confusion I have to turn away or risk laughing. I don’t want him to think this is some big joke.

“Buckle up, Buttercup, you’re in for a wild ride.”

twenty-eight

EZRA

I keep stealing glances at Jo. I can’t figure out what her game is, but there has to be one, right? She can’t suddenly want to get along? I didn’t hit her in the head; otherwise, I would be concerned she had some brain damage. She doesn’t seem to notice me staring at her. Her attention is completely focused on the screen.

“So that guy is a mechanic, and the other one is an EMT, but the mechanic’s brother is also the boyfriend of the EMT’s roommate.”

“What?” I say, turning back to the screen to see two men making out on the hood of a car.

“Well, this is the second movie, and I thought you might be confused about the relationships between the characters,” she explains, looking at me.

“I’m definitely confused about a relationship,” I mutter. Jo laughs, clearly having heard me. Pausing the movie, she adjusts herself so she can face me fully.

“Look, we can’t keep ignoring each other or being at each other’s throats because of Maverick. We both care for him, and we both know he’s a grown ass man who can make grown ass choices. Nothing we say or do to each other is going to change that. We can at least get along while we’re stuck together and in any future moments we’re graced with each other’s company.”

“That’s very . . . pragmatic of you,” I say slowly, like I don’t quite believe her. She’s right, though, and I hate it. Maverick can make his own choices, and no matter how much Jo and I bicker or are cold towards each other is going to change that. If anything, it’s going to make things more difficult for him in the future.

“Truce?” she asks, holding out her hand expectantly.

I take a deep breath and nod. “Truce.” Her hand is warm and firm in my own, like someone who learned at an early age to assert their competence via handshake.

“Wanna take a deep dive into our traumas or keep watching the movie?” she asks, smirking. I laugh. I can’t help it. Jo is so honest and genuine it’s refreshing. I know she’s joking, but I also know that if I decided I wanted to have a heartfelt conversation with her, she would immediately be up for it. It’s nice feeling like I have something close to friendship with her since she’s the only one I have to talk to, other than my dad and Jasper, but they’re both busy and far away. She’s here, and she’s offering.

“Movie,” I say. “We can talk about how you’ve not once asked me to contact your parents to let them know you’re okay at a different time.” I smile, thinking I’ve got her.

Jo side-eyes me and smiles. “I’d love to, right after we discuss your mother.” My smile drops. I should’ve known better. This woman doesn’t miss a thing.

Jo just laughs and plays the movie. We watch the rest of it in companionable silence. This newly formed friendship will last about as long as it takes for me to win back Maverick. Because there’s no way in hell I’m letting her keep him.

twenty-nine

JO

I study the bruises on my body after I step out of the shower. I’m getting faster, stronger. I know I am because I took Ezra by surprise right before the end of our session this morning. He’s going to have a nasty bruise on his ribs.

I quickly get dressed in leggings and a warm, oversized knit sweater. It’s supposed to storm tonight, and I love watching storms from the glass door in the kitchen. It looks right out over the cliff. Sometimes I’ll even sit on the patio and watch the clouds roll in over the water. Under different circumstances, I would love this place, and even though I’ve come to enjoy parts of it, it still feels like a prison.

My phone pings from where it’s resting on the charger on my nightstand. It spends most of its time there since the only phone numbers in there are Harlow, Ezra, Martha, and Darren. I talk to Ezra enough as it is, and I’m not about to start a friendship with a middle-aged couple when I can’t even give them my real name. Harlow has her own alert noise and that wasn’t it. That means the notification has to be for the podcast website.

Midnightmare5650: I did a deep dive on the dark web. We know that a death certificate was filed for Noelle Price, but what if she’s actually Gianna Delgado?

I stiffen. As far as anyone knows, Noelle Price is a victim of a faceless murderer, and Gianna Delgado died in a car accident. There isn’t anything public connecting the two deaths. When Harlow mentioned covering this case before we knew everything Ezra witnessed, I did a thorough search. According to the only news article I could find about it, Noelle Price was found dead from blood loss, and they deemed her death suspicious. That was it. No follow-up or family members to look into it. It was classified as a cold case a few years later and that was the end of it. The police report Harlow got her hands on blamed the mystery boyfriend and then closed the case. It screamed shoddy police work, but now I’m thinking it was on purpose as a cover-up.

I ended up finding Noelle’s social media accounts, which led me to Gianna, but she turned out to be a dead end as well. It’s hard to ask questions to a ghost. But what stood out to me was that the only thing I could find on Gianna was the official police report on the car accident with the unidentified victim. No family outrage or cries for help to find the cause of the crash or the identity of the second victim, either. The most interesting part? There was never a death certificate filed for Gianna Delgado.

That’s as far as I got before everything literally blew up. There were no pictures attached to any of the articles, so I had no idea the murder victim was actually Gianna instead of Noelle. So how could this Midnightmare person have connected the dots there? This is why I love internet detectives. They find everything you want to keep hidden.

I can’t wait to go over everything with Ezra later. It’s become part of the routine here, and I don’t know if I’m looking forward to it because there isn’t anyone else to talk to or because he seems genuinely interested, even when I’m not talking to him about Gianna’s case. Ezra has this way of looking at me when I speak that makes me feel like I’m the most interesting person in the world. It’s the type of attention that’s easy to get addicted to.

The kind of attention I can’t get addicted to. The problem is, I already am.

thirty

EZRA