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Corinne's heart sank.

"Of course it's Shoupe." Corinne mutters, rolling her eyes. It was always Shoupe.

She and John B. exchanged panicked glances, both thinking the same thing.

How the hell do we get outta here?!

Once again, that joint lightbulb goes off, their only option staring back at them—the window.

"Really?" Corinne whines, already knowing what her best friend is thinking. That was a habit of theirs.

"Do you see a better option anywhere?" John B whispers.

JJ went through first, then John B, followed by Corinne, who gripped John B's shoulder for balance as she swung her legs over. JJ's arm quickly found its way around her waist, securing her against him as they hung off the side of the building, clinging to whatever foothold they could find.

Corinne's breath came out in short, shallow gasps, the adrenaline spiking her nerves.

As JJ noticed the harsh rise and fall of her chest against his, he tried his best to keep her calm. JJ's grip tightened, his lips brushing against her ear.

"You've gotta calm down, princess, or we're gonna get caught."

He immediately thought of about 10 unnecessary jokes he could've made then, but ultimately decided it wasn't worth being pushed off the ledge by an irritated and nervous Corinne.

She wanted to snap back, but the warmth of his breath and the steady hold of his arm grounded her, just enough to keep her focused. "I'm trying," she hissed back, pressing closer to the wall.

"Well just calm down, okay." He says calmly, tightening his grip on the pole he was using for support. "I've got you."

Corinne could feel the strong arm holding her waist, secure its grip around her, which brought her some sense of certainty in JJ's words. It wasn't that she didn't trust him. She did with her life, but the circumstances they were under warranted a bit of panic.

She could hear Pope and Kiara whisper-shouting protests at their current predicament, which made her laugh to herself. She looked up against her to see JJ shushing them with a grin on his face.

John B craned his neck to peer through the window, watching as Shoupe and another officer combed the room.

"I said it. Didn't I say it?" Corinne could hear Shoupe's voice talking to what must've been another officer.

"Go ahead. Throw these in a bag, would you?"

Silence followed for another few seconds, before the other officer; who sounded like a woman, questioned Shoupe.

"Everybody's gotta dip their beak."

Huh?

JJ's eyes widen, as he hears the same thing, eyeing John B. "What the f..."

"Right, right. Their beak." The woman officer hesitates.

"Do you believe..." JJ starts. Just as Corinne was about to attempt to quiet him, something suddenly clatters loudly from the ledge they were standing on, to the ground below them.

John B winces as they hear the object fall to the ground, while Corinne's eyes widen at the noise. JJ quickly recovers, pushing himself and Corinne against the building once more.

A few seconds later, as excepted, the blinds to the window come flying up, causing Corinne to screw her eyes shut, willing herself to stay calm, to stay quiet.

Maybe if she closes her eyes they just won't see her.

JJ's thumb rubbed gentle circles against her side, a small comfort in the chaos. They stayed like that, frozen, until they heard Shoupe's voice again.

"All right. Let's go. No one's here." The last thing Corinne hears before she breathes again is the shuffling of feet, the rattling of keys, and finally, the door to the motel room shutting.

Corinne finally exhaled, her grip loosening just a fraction. They'd made it. Barely.

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"Well, that was fun," JJ said with a casual smirk, though his adrenaline was still pumping.

The Pogues were finally back on the HMS Pogue, cruising across the water back towards the police station.

"Could have warned us sooner." JJ chuckles.

"We would have," Kie replied, her voice tinged with frustration. "Except Pope was on the math team."

"You were on the math team?"

"I was on the math team," Corinne interjected, her tone laced with mock offense. She glanced at Kie, narrowing her eyes. "Watch it."

Pope ignored their teasing, his brow furrowed. "The cops took everything like it was a crime scene. Did you guys find anything?"

"Did we find anything? No, I don't think so—Oh, yeah, we did." JJ sits up, pulling out a stack of the money and the gun they found in the safe.

John B and Corinne exchanged weary looks, unimpressed but not entirely surprised by JJ's impulsive haul. It was so like him—reckless, unbothered by the weight of what he'd done.

"Why take that from a crime scene?" Pope's voice pitched, anxiety rippling through every word. He reached forward, lowering JJ's arms as if they could be caught at any second.

"Better than cops having it." JJ shrugged.

"You serious?" Kiara shot a glance at John B, her eyes questioning their constant tightrope walk with trouble.

"Dude, you do remember my mom's a cop, right?" Corinne shot back at JJ, her voice firm as she squinted at him. The hint of exasperation in her tone wasn't just about the stolen items—it was about JJ's relentless need to push boundaries, to break rules like they were made for him to shatter. JJ just shrugged, the corner of his mouth twitching in defiance.

"I'm gonna lose my merit scholarship," Pope muttered, his mind racing with worst-case scenarios.

"Hey, hey, hey. Sh, sh, sh. sh, sh." JJ slid an arm around Pope, pulling him close in an awkward half-hug, his attempt at comfort jarring as he pressed the gun to his lips in a shushing motion. "At least you have us, right?"

"I'm living the nightmare," Pope groaned, shoving JJ away with a glare that softened when Corinne's laughter bubbled up, cutting through the tension for a fleeting second.

The Pogues pulled up to the police station, its usual air of dull routine replaced by frantic energy. Corinne couldn't help but notice the shift—this wasn't just another mundane day for her mother. Sheriff Peterkin was in full command mode, her eyes sharp, voice cutting through the chaos as she interrogated a man whose clothes were stained with salt and sand.

"So, what happened?" Peterkin's tone was firm, efficient, interrogating a man whose clothes were stained with salt and sand, a witness to a washed-up dead body after the storm.

"Well, I was up at the Mason Outlet, and, uh, I seen this lump, and the crabs was just goin' to town on it, you know?"

Corinne, standing a few steps to the side, crossed her arms. Her gaze fixed on the witness, but her thoughts were elsewhere. She admired her mother's dedication to the job. Growing up, she'd heard countless stories of her mom's integrity, always making sure justice was served—even when the world seemed to be against it. But today... things felt different. The station was filled with tension, and she couldn't shake the feeling that something was about to shift.

"So, I figured the best thing to do was, uh... throw him over in the ice chest and then call y'all." The man finishes.

Corinne's disbelief slipped out before she could catch it. "Wow, so you really found a dead body and just scooped it up?"

The man nodded eagerly, his smirk widening as he realized Corinne's interest. It was unsettling.

"Corinne," her mother said sharply, a subtle warning that she was toeing a line.

Corinne's mouth parted, ready to make some biting remark, but the rush of EMTs arriving silenced her. She turned toward the stretcher being wheeled through, the lifeless, waterlogged face of the body sending a cold shiver through her. She caught a glimpse of the woman who rushed toward it—Lana Grubbs, her face twisted with grief as she screamed, "Scooter? Oh, God!"

Corinne froze. Scooter Grubbs was dead? It felt like someone had slammed the brakes on her heart.

"Is that—"

"Corinne, honey," her mother's voice cut through her shock, firm but laced with an emotion Corinne wasn't used to hearing—concern, maybe even fear. "Go join your friends, please. I don't want you seeing this."

Corinne opened her mouth to argue, to insist she was fine, but something in her mother's voice stopped her. It was the kind of tone she only heard when things were about to get serious, when her mom was trying to protect her from something darker than the usual chaos.

"Mom I'm fine it's just—"

"Now, Corinne." Sheriff Peterkin said, her voice carrying a weight that made the air between them feel thicker. It wasn't the tone of a mother, but the voice of someone in control, someone who had always been the one calling the shots.

It was a familiar tone, one that Corinne had learned to read well over the years—sharp, firm, and with an undercurrent of something that might have been fear or frustration, but was always masked by authority. Her mother's eyes were dark and unreadable as she gestured toward the group of teenagers in the distance. It was a silent command, one that Corinne knew would be difficult to defy.

Corinne gave her a look—one of silent frustration, of defeat—but she didn't argue. There was no point. She knew the drill. Turning on her heel, she left the relative comfort of her mother's presence and walked toward the Pogues. Her chest tightened as she caught sight of them, all eyes wide with panic, scanning the police station like they were on the run from something more dangerous than just the law. She could feel their unease radiating out from them, their shared anxiety feeding into her own, and it twisted something tight in her stomach.

Corinne had always respected her mother—how could she not? From a young age, she'd been taught the importance of justice, the weight of integrity, all the things that had made Sheriff Peterkin not just a mother, but an institution in their town. She had been raised on stories of her mother's unshakable dedication to the law—how she could spot a lie from a mile away, how she could make decisions others would shy away from.

To Corinne, Sheriff Peterkin had always been untouchable, a figure who existed in a world where everything made sense, where the rules were simple and clear, even as the world around them was anything but.

But that image, that untouchable ideal, began to fracture as Corinne grew older. It wasn't just the secrets—the things her mother kept hidden from her—but the truths Corinne began to uncover. She watched her mother navigate the murky waters of the law, making choices that didn't always align with the moral compass Corinne had been raised with. Sometimes, the job required more than Corinne could stomach, and that was the part of her mother's world that felt like a betrayal.

Like today, when Peterkin had pushed her away from the scene, as though she were a child who couldn't handle the violence, the chaos that surrounded them. It stung more than she cared to admit. Wasn't she a part of this world too? Wasn't she more than just the daughter of the sheriff?

The silence between them had grown louder recently. It wasn't just about her mother's work; it was about the emotional distance that Corinne was starting to feel, the invisible wall that her mother had built around herself. The harder Sheriff Peterkin tried to protect her, the more Corinne resented it. She didn't want to be treated like some fragile thing that needed to be shielded from everything. She wanted her voice to matter. She wanted her mother to see her as more than just the kid in the background.

But every time she tried to step up, Peterkin pushed her away. Every brush-off, every look that said "this is my job, not yours," was a crack in the relationship they used to have.

Now, watching her mother handle the situation with her usual commanding presence, Corinne felt small, like she was watching someone else, someone she could never quite reach. She had no doubt her mother was great at what she did. But Corinne wondered: could she ever be great in her own right? Could her voice ever mean as much as the badge her mother wore?

Turning back to the group, Corinne felt that old ache again. She wasn't just the sheriff's daughter. She was her own person. But how could she prove it when her mother never gave her the chance?

"Got exiled by my mom once again..." Corinne's voice trailed off as she noticed the fear etched on their faces, a look she'd seen too many times before.

"What'd I miss?"

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"Okay, I missed a lot," Corinne muttered, exasperation lacing her voice as she sank into one of the weathered chairs on John B's porch beside JJ's seat.

She let out a long breath, brushing strands of her hair from her face as she processed the news—the expensive Grady-White they found in the marsh belonged to the late Scooter Grubbs. The air was thick with tension, the salty breeze doing little to calm her nerves.

Pope burst onto the porch, panic etched across his face. "Okay. So, um... we didn't see anything." he declared, his eyes darting wildly between his friends. He moved with urgency, collapsing onto the creaky couch beside Kie, who watched him with a mix of concern and disbelief.

"We don't know anything. We need to have total and complete amnesia." Pope's voice was strained, his words tumbling out faster than he could catch them.

"Actually, Pope's right for once." JJ pops up from his seat, his lips curling into a teasing smile. "See, I agree with you sometimes. Deny, deny, deny."

"Guys, we can't keep that money," Kie states guiltily.

"Okay. Not all of us can afford unlimited data plans, Kiara." JJ voices annoyingly.

"We have to pass that off to Lana Grubbs. Otherwise, it's bad karma." She shoots him a disapproving look.

Corinne, sensing the conversation spiraling, spoke up. "Look, I say we just go dark. Lay low. We don't have to be heroes here."

"If that means we get to keep the money, then I agree." JJ flashed Corinne a mischievous grin, his blue eyes catching her brown ones in a challenge. Corinne kicked out her foot, nudging his leg in playful annoyance. JJ's hands flew up in exaggerated surrender, but the smirk never left his face.

"I don't agree." John B finally breaks his silence.

"What? Why?"

"Just think about it." John B ran a hand through his hair, his expression pensive.

"This is Scooter Grubbs we're talking about. The guy that's buying individual cigarettes at the Porthole. Shit, one time I saw this dude begging for change in the Save-A-Lot parking lot because he needed gas."

"He did that to you too?" Corinne chimed in, her question almost irrelevant, but John B just nodded, the shared memory adding another layer to his point.

"We're talking about a dirtbag marina rat who's never had more than 40 bucks in his pocket, and all of a sudden, he's got a Grady-White?" John B rants.

"Just sayin'." He holds his arms up in defense.

The Pogues spent the majority of the day pondering John B's claims, even Pope suggested prostitution at one point.

They settled on the conclusion that there had to be some sort of illegal contraband in that wreck, meaning Scooter Grubbs was participating in some sort of illegal trade.

"For the record, if that is a smuggling ship with illegal contraband on the inside of it...it probably belongs to someone else," Pope says, snatching the stack of stolen cash from JJ's hands.

The Pogues were now sat in John B's room, still ranting about the earlier events of their day.

"Minor details."

"Very minor." Corinne squinted playfully, pinching her thumb and forefinger together to emphasize her point.

JJ noticed her gesture and reached over, grabbing her hand with a mischievous grin. Corinne swatted him away, a small chuckle escaping her lips, the atmosphere between them lightening.

"They could come looking for it." Pope reasons. "Taking it would be catastrophically stupid."

"Right," JJ said, snatching the money back, his infamous grin plastered on his face. "Well, stupid things have good outcomes all the time." He recites his stupid philosophy.

"How many times do I have to explain why that theory is just wrong?" Corinne groaned, exasperated, but her argument fell on deaf ears.

JJ's gaze was already miles away, lost in the thrill of the treasure hunt. "All we need to do is figure out a way to get into the cargo hold of that wreck. Until then, we just lay low. Just act normal."

"Right. And how exactly do we do that?" Pope sighs.

The question hung in the air like a cloud. They all knew Pope was right, but admitting it felt like surrendering to something bigger than themselves. Just when the weight of it all seemed too much to bear, Kie's voice cut through the thick silence with a lightness that none of them expected.

"Kegger?"

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AUTHORS NOTES |
third chapter!! i'm veryyy excited to dive deeper into corinne's relationship with her mom it's one of my fav dynamics in the story and i hope y'all are liking it so far too see y'all in the next chapter <33