Chapter 46
N ash
The phone in the classroom rang, and everyone looked at the thing on the wall. How long had it been here? I knew before Mr. Romanovich picked it up that they were summoning me. I felt it in my gut as soon as his eyes flicked to mine and began packing my shit.
Mr. Romanovich hung up the phone. “Nash, Dean Henry would like to see you in his office.”
Marching outside, I was tempted to go to the parking lot instead of the office. But I knew the Curators would hunt me down. If not today, tomorrow, or even next year, they would find me. Besides, I wasn’t raised to run from danger.
I didn’t see any of the cars that had arrived with Axel’s parents, and it was quiet as I opened the front door to the main building—just like nothing had ever happened.
There was certainly nothing announcing that someone else would die.
The main office door was open, and when I walked in, the secretary directed me straight to the dean.
This was it, the moment of truth. I sucked in a deep breath and walked into Dean Henry’s office.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Collier. Please close the door,” he said, without even glancing up from what he was writing. Wasn’t this convenient? I was closing myself in my own doom cage. “Have a seat.”
“I’d prefer to stand,” I said.
“And I’d prefer not to have this discussion, but here we are. So sit your ass in the chair so we can have a civil conversation.”
Dean Henry never raised his voice, and yet he made the hair on the back of my neck stand easier than all the tantrums my father threw.
His entire office oozed with authority, and as his eyes slowly turned up from the paperwork he was signing to look at me over his glasses, my pulse hammered a little harder.
Walking around the chair, I sat down and tried to act like I was bored when really I was taking in my surroundings. I wouldn’t be surprised if the dean was a secret assassin and threw his pen into my eye, killing me instantly.
“That wasn’t so hard now, was it, Mr. Collier?”
“Can you please call me Nash? I hate that it sounds like you’re talking to my father,” I said, my finger tapping on the arm of the leather chair.
I’d never paid much attention to the way the room was decorated, but as I scanned the walls, I noticed pictures of Henry shaking hands with famous athletes, politicians, and even actors.
It made me wonder if they had all attended Wayward at one point.
“I can do that.” He stood from his desk and opened the doors under his fancy coffee machine. Ren would love that thing. He pulled out cream and made himself a drink. “Would you like something to drink, Nash? I can offer you coffee, tea, or water?”
I hadn’t expected a refreshment offer before he shot me. “Sure, whatever you’re having is fine.”
He didn’t say anything until both cappuccinos were made, and he set one down in front of me. I took a sip and had to admit it was delicious.
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. Shall we get to why you are here,” Dean Henry asked, leaning back in his chair as he stared at me over the rim of his cup. He took a sip and set it aside. There was something entirely too threatening about him doing nothing.
“That would be great.”
“Those who run the school want you to know that they know what you did.”
I swallowed hard. “Is that so? Would you like to tell me what I did so that I don’t have to guess?”
“Come now, Nash. Let’s not play games. If you’re going to make adult decisions, then you also need to own up to them like an adult.”
“I am an adult,” I said, anger brewing in my stomach. “When you live in this world, especially in my home, age is just a number.”
“Perhaps, but we are splitting hairs over the wrong subject. Then again, that was your point, wasn’t it?” He took another sip of his drink. “Let me be perfectly frank with you, Nash. This is a safe space. What you tell me stays in this room.”
“Until you decide to use it against me.”
He smirked. “Perhaps, but in this case, no. So, let me start again. The Curators know that you killed Axel Lindbergh in cold blood. They also know that you didn’t act alone.”
My mouth pressed into a flat line as I forced myself to hold perfectly still and give nothing away. Dean Henry’s mouth curled up on one side.
“Are you not responding to that?”
“I didn’t realize there was a question in there. I thought you were telling me what the school believes happened.”
“Did happen. We have eyes and ears everywhere. The walls don’t breathe without us knowing.
” He opened a file on his desk and laid out three pictures.
Each of them had my stomach churning for different reasons.
The first was of my cabin. I didn’t think anyone knew where it was, but more specifically, the picture was taken to show off the sacrificial slab we used for Axel.
The second photo was Axel on the slab as Myles crouched over his body as he made the firt cut of the bloody eagle.
Everyone that I knew to be there was visible in the picture, so someone else was hiding in the dark.
A cold dread snaked down my spine. The last image was of Axel’s dead body fished out of the river, his dead eyes staring up at the camera lens.
“Are you showing me this so that I know why you’re going to kill me?”
Dean Henry put the pictures back into the folder before securing it in his desk. The sound of the drawer rolling into place and clicking closed might as well have been the hammer on a gun, the way my heart jumped.
“No.” He sighed before picking up his coffee and polishing it off.
“I’m telling you this because I want you to understand that you don’t take a shit that we don’t know about.
We know everyone working for you and what you have them doing, and I’m going to be very honest with you right now, Nash, we don’t care.
You wanting to dismantle your family’s empire is none of our business.
What does become our business is when you cross lines and attack other families.
Those rules and laws are in place for a very important and specific purpose. ”
I chugged the rest of my cappuccino, my mind racing as I tried to think of a way to talk myself out of this.
“I’m going to ask you this one question, and before you blurt out an answer, I want you to think about it and answer honestly and from your heart, as it will determine what happens next.” I nodded. “Why did you and your friends kill Axel Lindbergh?”
“I don’t need time to think about it. I can give you an answer right now, and I would tell you the same thing an hour from now or from my grave.”
“Very well, let’s hear it.”
“First, I would like to stipulate a condition,” I said, and Henry smiled wide.
“Do you really feel that you’re in a position to negotiate?”
I lifted my shoulder and let it drop. “Probably not, but I’m going to.”
“What is the stipulation?”
“No matter what you know, only punish me. My friends and those loyal to us listen to what I tell them to do, and this instance is no different. If I hadn’t given the order, then Axel would still be alive.”
Dean Henry stood from his desk and walked over to the window to look outside.
“Fascinating, Nash. You are far more noble than I gave you credit for. Sacrificing yourself for your friends shows backbone and real character.” He was silent for a long time, but I refused to say another word until he agreed.
He could go back on it if he wanted to, but Henry didn’t seem like the type.
“Alright, you have a deal. Regardless of the answer you give, only you will be punished for the crime.”
I shifted forward in my seat and looked down at the floor as I gathered my thoughts.
“I could tell you that I did it because Axel pushed my buttons, which he did. I could also say that I didn’t trust him, which I didn’t.
I could also say that it was only because he was vying for my position in the established school hierarchy, which he was.
All of those are true, but they are not the main reason.
I don’t care about Axel’s area, power, or what I can take from his family.
What I do care about is that a close friend of mine was brutally attacked and her virginity stolen.
” I lifted my eyes to Henry’s. “I couldn’t let that stand.
” I swallowed and couldn’t believe I was going to say this.
“I admire her and feel protective over her. What happened never should’ve happened on my watch.
” I rolled out my shoulders. “Also, you should know that Axel told my friend that he did what he did to get to me, and he felt safe here at the school. That was a direct attack on me by using her, and an insult to the power this school and the Curators hold. He needed to die, and I’d do it again a thousand times. ”
His eyebrow shot up. “So you consider Ren Davies your close friend?”
“So you know what happened to her?”
“Of course. Didn’t I already tell you that nothing happens without our knowing?”
“Then why didn’t you take care of him for what he did?” My voice held heat as I glared at him. More emotion than I could’ve anticipated rose to the surface, and I closed my hand into a fist.
“Because we didn’t get the chance. You took matters into your hands first, but rest assured he would’ve been dealt with appropriately,” he said.
“So now what?”
“I want to make sure I understand this correctly. You killed Axel because he attacked Ren?”
“Yes.”
“No other reason? Aside from the others you listed?”
“No.”
“And what does your father know of this incident?”
“Other than what you told him? Nothing. I don’t run decisions like this past him,” I snarled, but Dean Henry remained still.
“Maybe you should.”
“If you truly knew my father, you wouldn’t say that.”