Drop Dead Gorgeous 〰 Jake Fitzgerald

33

"Is it...the leaves?"

"Nope."

"Okay....that car over there?"

"What car?"

"The green one."

"No."

"I give up, what is it?"

"Your shirt."

Jake stared down at his shirt for a bit before glancing up at me with a smile. "You're so clever."

"You let me win."

He scoffed playfully, looking back out towards the sidewalk. "Did not."

"Fine, your turn."

"I see something blue."

"Um...the sky?"

"Yeah, you're good at this."

I glared at his smiling face. "You know, you're supposed to make this hard on your opponent."

After he explained everything to me - the secrecy and sneaking around - he asked me on a date to make up for his absence this entire time, a date which consisted of getting ice cream and walking around the small town of Lakewood, something idiotic when a killer was on the lose.

"I did make it hard on you."

"Nuh-uh, I'm not playing I-Spy with you anymore."

"Aw, c'mon, Lex Luther."

I chuckled at the return of his nickname for me, thinking back to when he first started calling me that.

Then I started thinking about the killer.

When he called me, I thought he was going to let another one of his murders public, but he ended up talking about how I'd forgotten something "very important". I opened my front door to find a cardboard box with a bloody camera recorder.

The same one I found the night of Zoe's murder.

And so I finished watching the videos that were stored in the chip. And I was still confused as to what everything meant, how the videos tied up to everything. And I thought about the possible reasons why the killer would have me watch videos starring my mom.

"You okay, princesa?"

"Yeah, just fine. You?"

Jake smiled. "I'm doing fine."

He stopped at a curb before standing in front of me, looking straight into my eyes. "You make everything seem fine."

"And you stress me out," I answered as he pulled me closer, smiling widely as he set his forehead on mine.

"Would it really be a date if I didn't?"

"Hey, Lexa."

I separated form Jake slightly to see Eli approaching us, his face showing determination.

"Jake," he said once he reached us.

"Eli," Jake responded, holding me closer against his warm body. I rolled my eyes slightly at his dominance but went on to ask, "What's up, Eli?"

"We need to talk about-"

He stopped short and looked at Jake for a second before turning back to me. "-the job problem."

"The what?" Jake and I both blurted out.

"Yeah," he went on, looking at me with purpose in his eyes, "you know, the one we got for homework in Stats class. With the percentages of...employees."