“Calm down and take your seat.”
“No, this is bullshit.”
“Watch your language.”
Frustration twisted my tongue into a knot. I gripped the back of the chair until my knuckles turned white.
Someone knocked on the door and pushed it open.
Coach Jobs. No way would he let this happen.
He stepped inside and closed the door behind him.
“Coach, I didn’t do anything,” I pleaded. He’d back me up. He always backed up his players. And I’d never given him any trouble before.
Coach glared at the principal. “I know you didn’t, Logan. I’m sorry.”
Sorry? What the hell was happening here?
“Just so you know,” Coach said to the principal, “I called his aunt. You got no right doing this without a guardian here. She’s on her way.”
My heart slammed against my chest.
This was more than a suspension for making out with a girl. The school was using that as cover for something else.
The principal’s jaw twitched, clearly annoyed Aunt Em was on her way.
“Don’t say anything else, Logan,” Coach warned me.
An eerie sense of familiarity flowed over me. This was starting to feel too much like the time I’d spent in the police station after my parents died.
Aunt Em barged through the door twenty minutes later. “What’s going on?” Her gaze landed on me. “Are you okay?”
I shook my head.
The principal stood. “Mrs. Randall, Logan was caught violating school policy—”
“What school policy?” she demanded.
He laid it out for her.
When he was finished explaining my so-called crime, she scoffed. “So what? Isn’t that what sixteen-year-olds do?” She jerked her thumb over her shoulder. “I just passed two of your students canoodling in the hallway. Will you be suspending them and wasting their parents’ afternoons as well?”
Any other time, I would’ve chuckled at Aunt Em’s phrasing, but I was pulsing with too much fear.
“Well, due to the incident, some other disturbing information came to light,” the principal said slowly.
Aunt Em’s body went rigid as a pin. “What information is that?”
He slid a print-out of an article across the desk.
I scanned the headline and my stomach dropped.
Was local boy responsible for murder-suicide?
What the hell?
I recognized the name of the paper. My eyes met Aunt Em’s. “What is that?”
Ignoring my question, she shoved the paper away. Her eyes were snapping fire. “I don’t know where you obtained your information, but that piece of garbage was retracted the next day. And the person who wrote it was fired.”
The principal swallowed hard and looked away.
“You didn’t know that, did you?” Em said in a low voice. She was deadly pissed now. I almost felt sorry for the principal. “What is this really about?”
The principal twitched and fidgeted under Em’s blistering stare. “We can’t have him in this school,” he muttered.
“My nephew hasn’t done anything wrong.”
“It’s…it’s out of my hands.”
Aunt Em frowned in confusion. “What’s out of your hands?”
“The board doesn’t want to take the risk. They want him removed from the school immediately.”
“You can’t do that,” Em protested. “Who on the board?”
The principal fidgeted in his chair. “Mrs. Belmont.”
Aunt Em’s gaze landed on me, and I wanted to melt into the floor.
“I see.” Aunt Em’s voice was pure frost as she stood and motioned for me to do the same. “You’ll hear from our lawyer next.”
The principal’s eyes bugged. Guess the poor bastard figured we’d slink away. He didn’t know Emily Randall very well.
Chin up, she marched out of his office into the hallway.
Somehow word had spread, and Jensen was waiting for us by the front entrance. “What’s going on?” he asked.
Em pressed her hand on his shoulder. “I’m taking Logan with me now. Will you drive his truck home, please?”
“Yeah, of course.” His wild gaze swung between us. “What happened?”
Too stunned to say a word, I pulled the keys out of my pocket and handed them over.
“Grab his things from his locker, too, please,” Em said quietly.
“Okay.” He already knew the combination. We were always going through each other’s lockers. “Logan, what happened?” he asked again.
I shook my head. “Later.”
Em gently touched his cheek with affection. “We’ll talk at home, sweetheart. Everything will be fine.”
Like hell, it would.
I sat up in my room listening to my aunt and uncle discussing the situation—loudly. Nothing like the arguments my mom and dad engaged in. I still hated it.
With a few thoughtless words and actions, I’d destroyed the harmony in our home.
Worse than that, I betrayed everyone in my life who mattered to me—my aunt and uncle, who had worked so hard to give me stability and normalcy after my parents died. Jensen, who hated the reminders of his former life, and didn’t like being the center of anyone’s attention.
Last, I betrayed myself. Sharing that jagged piece of my soul with someone who ground it into dust. Why didn’t I keep my big, stupid mouth shut?
Heavy with misery, I rolled off my bed and padded out to the living room.