Page 46 of All That Glitters

I glance down at the cocoa.

Take a sip.

And head back to my seat.

Chapter twenty-two

Scary Hockey Player

Jameson Sinclair

I don’t think I smiled this much when I got offered my hockey scholarship. But every time I recall Marigold holding that little Styrofoam cup, I find my lips tugging up uncontrollably. Nash thought aliens had abducted me and traded me out for an AI clone because of how happy I was after the game. He kept asking me questions only the real Jameson would know. Except I didn’t know half the answers. At the end of his interrogation he just hummed and then left me alone.

It’s the next day, and I’m still thrilled with how well the gesture was received. She didn’t thank me, but she also didn’t throw everything away and yell at me either. It’s a step. A baby step, but a step nonetheless. Now I just have to keep momentum. My annotated copy of Julius Caesar is in my bag. I think I’ll leave it on her news desk for her to find the next time she comes in this week.

When I enter the newsroom for our work hour, I catch an intense-looking conversation between Paisley and Marigold.

“I’ll be fine,” Marigold insists. “It’s just like the party we went to the other night.”

My smile flips into a frown. The last thing I want to hear about is Marigold going to another frat party. Why would she want to, anyway?

“It is not, it’s much more—”

Marigold spots me and cuts off Paisley’s sentence. Paisley glances over at me from her spot on Marigold’s desk.

“You know we have chairs, right?” I ask as I head to my desk.

Paisley rolls her eyes in response, then looks at Marigold.

“You should ask James to go with you.”

“Absolutely not, and if you tell him about this, I’m not speaking to you for at least a month,” Marigold hisses.

My brows rise. “Where am I going?”

“If I tell you, will you promise that the story is Marigold’s and you won’t try to take it from her?” Paisley asks.

“I would never do that,” I say, to which Marigold scoffs her disbelief.

“I don’t need him,” she insists.

“Yes, you do. Even if I was willing to go—which I am not—neither of us are scary enough to fend off nonsense. You need scary-hockey-player privileges, which James has in spades.”

My curiosity and concern are piqued. Paisley loves adventure, so it must be something pretty bad for her to want Marigold to have protection.

“I’ll sign something saying I won’t share about whatever it is,” I offer.

Marigold shakes her head, but Paisley’s eyes light up. Paisley snags a stack of sticky notes and a pen off Marigold’s desk and begins scribbling.

“Paisley, I said no.” Marigold tries to grab the sticky notes, but Paisley hops off the desk and crosses the aisle to me.

“Sign by the X,” she says, holding out the stack of lavender paper.

I, James Sinclair, promise to keep the information about Marigold’s article confidential and not steal it for my own use. I also vow to keep her safe at all costs.

Both of those things are easy in my book, so I scrawl my signature beside the X. Paisley takes it back, inspects it with far too much drama, then nods.

“Do you want to fill him in?” Paisley asks a scowling Marigold. When no reply comes, she continues in a low voice. “Marigold found out about an underground fraternity fight club. She’s going tonight at midnight to get details and plans on writing an article about it.”