“Me. Bait. I’m perfect. Plus, my boobs are huge, I have it on good authority many an older gentleman has a fetish of suffocating between them.”
“Ew.” Axel makes a face.
“Hey.” She shrugs. “She’s my best friend. She’s family. I’ll get dirty if I have to. Don’t worry, I’ll wash the old man off before I climb back into your bed.”
Jude groans. “There are at least six things wrong with that sentence.”
Axel snorts. “Only six?” His grin fades. “Seriously though... how are you guys so sure this is going to work?”
I chew my lower lip. “Because I don’t think the person behind the Dean’s List actually wants to hurt us.”
Jude arches a brow.
“I think they’re trying to help. Maybe they just didn’t know who to trust. Maybe they weren’t sure they could trust Jude yet.”
“No offense,” I add.
“None taken.” Jude shoves his hands into his pockets. “A few weeks ago, if that list had landed in my hands, I would have burned the world down with it.”
“And now?” Axel crosses his arms. “Now you’re healed? Totally sane? Not looking for revenge anymore?”
Jude lets out a rough laugh.
“I love you, man,” Axel says quietly, “but I don’t buy it. What if this doesn’t work? What if nobody shows up? What if the list stays hidden?”
Jude stares at the floor. “Then I keep looking.”
“And if you can’t find it?”
His jaw tightens. “Then my father goes after everyone I care about. He already took my mom. I’m not letting him take anyone else just because he can’t live with what he’s done.”
For a second, nobody says anything.
Then Axel grins.
“Aw. Look at that. Our little psychopath grew a conscience.”
Jude rolls his eyes. “This is all we can do. Try our best.” He glances around the room. “Wait... where’d Charlie go?”
I hadn’t even noticed that she’d slipped away.
The door swings open.
Charlie walks back in wearing a pair of black heels that could probably kill someone, a slinky black dress, and red lipstick that somehow makes her smile look dangerous instead of pretty. Herhair is twisted into a messy bun like she just rolled out of bed and decided to start a war.
She flashes us a grin. “Ready for seduction.”
Axel goes completely still. “Shit,” he mutters.
She winks. “You get me later. Right now, I’ve got an old man to ruin.”
“Can everyone please stop saying old man?” Axel groans. “It’s weird.”
I pull out my phone.
“So what?” he asks. “We send the Dean’s List another tip? Hope whoever’s behind it bites?”
I snap a few pictures of Charlie and attach them to the anonymous email.
