Page 83 of Iced Up Love: Part Two

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It takes a few seconds, then it loads.

I scrub through it without hesitation, my focus narrowing until I find the right section, the one that stuck the first time I saw it even though I didn’t know why.

I stop. Play. Watch.

The angle. The same tilt. The same slow drag. The same way the camera lingers just a second longer than it needs to.

My stomach drops.

I pause it.

Go back to Lia’s video.

Play it again.

Then back.

Then again.

I don’t need to keep doing it. I already know. The certainty settles in my chest in a way that doesn’t leave room for doubt.

“Fuck,” I mutter under my breath.

The word comes out low, tight, the kind that sits in your throat instead of releasing anything.

It’s him.

Paul.

Her ex.

I push back from the table, the chair scraping against the floor behind me as I stand too quickly, my body already moving before my thoughts have fully caught up.

All I ever had on him was a name. A mention.

Something buried in an article tied back to one of my mother’s companies, something small enough that I didn’t need it at the time, something I noted and left alone.

Now it’s everything.

I grab my phone and call her. It rings twice before she answers.

“Jackson,” she says, her voice edged with irritation at the hour. “It’s late. This better be—”

“I need information on someone.”

There’s a pause. A shift.

“That’s not something you call me for at this hour unless—”

“It’s a matter of life or death, mother.”

The words come out steady. Controlled. Even as everything underneath them isn’t.

Silence.

Then... “Who.”

“His name is Paul,” I say. “He was mentioned in an article connected to one of your companies. I’ll send you what I have. I need everything on him.”

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