Jasper needed some liquor.
Once he was home, freshly showered and in dry clothes, he crossed the room to the wall that held a floor-to-ceiling bookshelf. He scanned the bottom shelf until he found what he was searching for. His high school yearbook. Jasper grabbed it from the shelf, made a cup of coffee and started riffling through the pages until he got to the B names.
There she was. Carissa Blackwell. Jasper didn’t need to ogle the photo to recall that long golden hair, legs that went on for miles and flawless skin that always looked like it was kissed by the sun.
Flipping more pages, he eyed the photos of the cheerleaders. There she was again, all decked out in that appealing little uniform. His lips quirked. Damn, he’d loved watching her cheer at football games. He’d loved making out with her under the bleachers after the game even more.
They’d done everything together senior year. Until she’d broken up with him. Jasper could feel his eyebrows growing close together just as something fell out from between the pages of the yearbook. A picture of the two of them at prom. He couldn’t remember who had snapped it. But in the photo they were dancing; Carissa was staring up at him adoringly as he had his arms wrapped tightly around her.
To this day, Jasper still wondered what had changed. Prom had been one month before she’d dumped him. When had she stopped looking at him like that and decided he hadn’t been good enough for her?
His phone—which luckily had fallen from his hand and landed safely on the dock—rang.
“Hey, Cam,” he greeted his big brother.
“So?”
Jasper shifted in his seat. So what?”
“So what have you been doing?”
Jasper eyed the garbage can, where he’d decided to throw his clothes out after he climbed out of the bay. As he’d hoisted himself back onto the wooden dock, he’d snagged his pants. The quick jaunt from the water to his new condo in the center of town had been interesting. Wet and interesting. If his brother found out about it, he’d never hear the end of it.
So he decided to play it cool. “I haven’t been doing anything,” he lied. He paced the length of the living room. He loved this condo with its exposed beamed ceiling, brick walls and amazing view of the bay. Although, the sight of the water at the moment made him cringe.
“What do you mean you haven’t been doing anything? Wasn’t your huge meeting with Mr. Morris today? I’ve been texting you for the last hour.”
Jasper snapped out of his Carissa-focused stupor. “Right. Sorry.” He proceeded to tell Cam all about the meeting. His brother seemed ecstatic for him.
“That’s amazing, Jasp. Congratulations.”
“Thanks, Cam.” And he meant it. He’d always idolized his older brother and Cam’s approval meant the world to him.
“Now, what about after the meeting?”
“What do you mean?” Jasper asked hesitantly.
“I heard you celebrated by going for a little swim in the bay.”
Jasper ground his teeth together. “How did you...” He trailed off. Of course, he already knew the answer to that question. How did anyone in Bayside know anything? The ever-loving, always-gossipy Bayside Blogger, of course.
The Bayside Blogger wrote for the Bayside Bugle’s Style & Entertainment section. No one knew her identity, or how she always—and it truly felt like always—found out the gossip before anyone else. She also utilized a daily blog, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and just about every other form of communication in existence.
“And the Blogger said that Carissa Blackwell is back in town,” Cam was saying. “She alluded to your little dip in the water having something to do with a Carissa spotting.”
Spotting? When had his brother become TMZ? Time to call him out. “I thought you didn’t read that...what did you used to call it? Trash, I believe,” Jasper said.
Cam coughed. “Uh, Elle reads it. I just happen to catch snippets here and there.”
“Sure, sure. Elle reads it. Doesn’t explain how you would know about me falling into the bay today, though, since your beloved is out of town checking out that up-and-coming artist for the gallery. You must be losing your mind without your better half around.” Got him.
Since Elle returned from living in Italy last spring, she and his brother had been practically attached at the hip. Jasper was happy for his brother. And jealous, if he was being honest. The guy was head over heels in love. And Elle looked at him the way Carissa gazed at him in that old prom photo.
“She’ll be back tomorrow afternoon. Listen, Jasp,” Cam said, his voice growing serious.
Here we go, Jasper thought. He knew exactly where this was heading. This was so not going to be fun.
“Yes?”
“Carissa.” Cam said her name the way one might say cancer or terrorist.
“Was my high school girlfriend.”
“She was way more than that and we both know it. And she’s back in town.”
Jasper ran a hand through his hair in frustration. “We don’t know that.”
“The Bayside Blogger said—”
“So what? Just because the Bayside Blogger—”
This time Cam cut him off. “Hate to admit it but the Bayside Blogger—whoever he or she may be—does tend to be right.”
“It doesn’t matter.” Cam started to say something so Jasper quickly beat him to the punch. “We dated a million years ago. I heard she got married and was living in the Midwest somewhere. I, on the other hand, have a date lined up with a certain hottie from the gym.”
There was a long pause. “Do you want to come over?” Cam finally asked.
What he wanted was to forget that he’d seen Carissa Blackwell. He wanted to have a couple beers, be alone with his thoughts, and not hear about the damn Bayside Blogger.
Luckily, he knew just where to accomplish everything he needed. The Rusty Keg, an old dive bar, sat on the outskirts of town. People would recognize him there but they’d also give him room and leave him alone.
“No, I’m good. Honestly,” he assured his brother.
And he would be. So long as he didn’t see Carissa Blackwell again.
And he stayed away from water.
* * *
Carissa was not a suspicious person. She was rooted in the here and now and considered herself rational and practical. And yet she couldn’t shake the feeling she was being watched.
She’d left Chicago yesterday, stayed overnight in Ohio, driven all day, hit some nasty traffic, and drunk about fifteen coffees before finally arriving in Bayside. Needing a moment to stretch—not to mention, take in the town she hadn’t laid eyes on in over a decade—she’d pulled over at the dock before she made her way to her aunt’s cottage.
It was while she was there, taking a moment to refamiliarize herself with Bayside, stretching and getting the kinks out of her tired muscles, when she started to get that spooky feeling. First, goose bumps broke out on her skin. Then she thought she saw someone out of the corner of her eye, over to her right. Fed up, she’d left the dock and returned to her car. That’s when she’d received full confirmation that she was indeed being watched. About five people stood outside the town’s popular square, staring and pointing at her while they whispered