and I want you to tell me if I sound irrational.” She frowned a little bit as she rubbed her thumb over the curve of my bottom lip.
“All right. If you sound crazy, I will let you know.” It would be hard for her to come close to that, considering what I’d just heard.
Ollie cleared her throat, and the hand she had wrapped around my waist clutched at the fabric of my t-shirt. I could tell she was trying to make light of whatever was weighing on her mind, but it really was bothering her.
“I haven’t heard from Mercer in a couple of days. It’s nothing new. She’s been acting weird since she started seeing this guy, and she’s the type to fall in love fast and hard. But she won’t let me meet him. She gets super touchy whenever I bring up how weird their relationship seems. She’s so defensive where he’s concerned. At first, I just figured she really liked him and was being extra protective, but now,” she frowned, and her fingers tightened their hold on my face. “I’m wondering if she might be caught up in something that has to do with me. What if the guy she’s seeing has ties to Sawyer? What if Sawyer paid someone to get close to Mercer so he could keep tabs on me? I didn’t want to worry her with that speculation, but the longer the relationship goes on, and the stranger her behavior becomes, the more worried I get.’’ She gave me a doe-eyed look that made me want to move mountains for her. ”You know, now that I think about it, I don’t even know his name. She’s never mentioned and I was too caught up in my own stuff to ask. I want to find out who she’s seeing. Since she won’t give me any information, I’ll have to resort to being sneaky. But after having Sawyer creep through my whole life, I think I sound nuts. I don’t want to be like him.”
I sighed and bent to drop a kiss on her forehead. Easy affection was something I’d only ever been able to share with her. It came back to me the minute I held her in my arms once again. It was like all the time I’d tried to forget her was forgotten. My body and my heart knew where she belonged.
“No. You sound like a concerned friend. Not an obsessed lunatic.” I shifted so I could kiss the tip of her nose, lifting my head when I heard sounds of surprise from a group of girls walking past us. It looked like word that I was seeing someone was bound to make it around campus sooner rather than later. “What are you planning to do?”
“I don’t actually have a plan. But, she always leaves her phone laying around, and it doesn’t have a password or lock screen. I thought about taking a peek at when and where their next date is and show up unexpectedly. Or look for photos of them or details about him so that maybe Vernon could help me dig up more digital details. I have a bad feeling about the relationship, and it only intensifies the longer Mercer is involved with him and the longer she keeps him a secret.”
I grunted in response and grabbed her hand to tug her after me as I headed toward her next class. Ollie was the only girl I’d ever walked to class. “Crashing her date is a bit extreme, but as long as it’s a public place with a lot of people, and you don’t go alone, I think you’d be okay. You have to resign yourself to the fact that Mercer might get very angry with you. You might be risking not only your job, but your friendship, and I know she means a lot to you.”
“I can’t be friends with her if something terrible happens to her. There are a lot of red flags about her behavior lately. I can’t ignore them.”
I squeezed her hand reassuringly. She might reevaluate her concern once she had the whole picture of what happened with my half brother. “Let me know what you need from me or the boys. We’re here for you. No matter what.”
Vernon was right. We had to keep her safe, even from herself. After everything she’d been through, she might be her own worst enemy.
Briefly, I was really jealous of the guy she lured in to test Sawyer. Not only