Chapter 21
Istood in front of an open locker with a smile on my face Thursday morning, staring down at my phone. I’d texted Logan before leaving for school, and when I pulled my phone from my bag, I found his response waiting for me.
good morning! whatcha doing today?
Logan
good morning, you. I work for two hours after practice. but you should come visit :)
He normally didn’t reply to my morning texts until lunch—because, he confessed, he normally was running so late that he barely had time to stop his alarm—and even though I really should’ve been unpacking my backpack and pulling out my math book, I couldn’t bring myself to lock my phone.
should I??
Logan
I might have a free mocha with your name on it
you keep giving me free drinks. you’re going to get fired. >;( I can’t be the start of your life of delinquency.
Logan
too late
Two arms suddenly wrapped around my neck, a strong waft of peach and mango perfume accompanying the tight grip. My hand spasmed on the side of my phone, locking it in a panic. “Ugh.” Jade’s sigh was directly in my ear. “Why have I barely seen you lately, Mads?”
My pulse was slow to die down after the scare. “I saw you yesterday after practice,” I said with a chuckle.
Her forearm cut into my throat, nearly restricting my airway. “You’re not doing anything after the game tomorrow, are you? We have a Players Only party.”
There were some Fridays after the game that those in the Top Tier threw what we called Players Only parties.
It wasn’t necessarily exclusive to the Top Tier, but definitely exclusive to football players and cheerleaders.
There were other times someone would host a party where anyone could show up, but these parties were exclusive.
And Babble always blew up with all the speculation, the gossip, and the intrigue.
“I’ll be there,” I said. “But I probably can’t stay for the whole time.”
Jade finally relinquished her near death grip and came up to lean against the locker beside mine. She looked effortlessly put together, per usual, but her eyes were sharp on me. “Why not?”
The answer I couldn’t give her? Because I wanted to surprise Logan and go to Danielle’s bonfire. After last night, I wanted to do as much as possible to get to know him, and that meant meeting all his friends.
Jade was blinking at me expectantly, and the thought of lying to her was less easy. Probably because she had a clear view of my face now, ready to catch any of my tells. Take a breath, Madison. “Like I said yesterday, my mom’s been so—”
“Did you tell your mom about talking to Coach?”
I jumped at the abrupt subject change. “No. Why?”
“Just curious. You’ve been hanging out with her so much, I didn’t know if you were telling her everything.”
“Coach hasn’t said anything more about it,” I told Jade, answering the question I was sure she was thinking.
“She’s waiting til after homecoming.”
“She told you that?” They’d talked about me? It made sense, I guess, for Coach to go to the other half of co-captain to say that one wanted to jump ship. But still. “What did she say? When did she talk to you?”
Jade’s gaze slid down the hallway, suddenly unable to meet my gaze. Or unwilling. “Well, she didn’t—”
“What are we talking about?” Riley swiftly cut in, not an ounce of remorse of interrupting me. She looped her arm through Jade’s, saddling into her side. “About Babble?”
My phone vibrated, but I angled the screen away before anyone could glimpse it. “What about Babble?”
Riley’s gaze bounced from me to Jade and back again. “Neither of you saw?”
“Saw what?” I demanded, because Jade remained quiet. I was surprised she hadn’t already reached for her phone. “Someone posted something? I didn’t think to check it this morning.” Which was a surprise all on its own.
Instead of opening Babble up on my own phone—I was too afraid Jade would catch a glimpse at my notification from Logan—I waited for Riley to pull it up on her end. Jade busied herself with examining her fingers, diligently looking for a hangnail.
Riley came up close to me and angled her screen.
It took me a second to realize what was even in frame, since Riley’s brightness was so low.
The picture, taken at night, was blurry and grainy, but it was clear there were two people in frame.
The first thing I noticed was the bright blue sleeves of someone’s jacket wrapped around something dark. I squinted. “I can barely see.”
Riley, letting out a huff of irritation, reached over and used two fingers to zoom in on the couple. That something dark the arms were wrapped around was someone wearing a Jefferson High varsity jacket—one with their last name scrawled on their shoulders. I could barely make out -TLE.
Castle.
That was Logan’s back.
And those were my arms—my blue Brentwood High varsity jacket-clad arms.
Panic flooded me. Pure, undiluted panic. Almost my entire frame was obscured by Logan’s broad shoulders in the photo, save for my arms around his frame and my legs beside his. My vision blurred, but I could still make out the headline: Treason on the Cheer Team?!
“How crazy is this?” Riley all but screeched, giving her phone a shake. “There’s a traitor among us!”
That, coincidentally, was the opening line of the post.
There’s a traitor among us!
Or is there?
My trusted sources say a certain pom-pom slinger might’ve dipped their toes into the villainous waters of the Jefferson High cleat-wearers. Look at this photo and YOU decide—fact or fiction? Which Brentwood Babe is playing with fire?
As my eyes frantically bounced over the phone screen, my pulse picked up speed in my chest, making me lightheaded. I could almost feel myself sway in place, mere seconds from spiraling. “W-What do the comments say?”
“Just lame speculation.” Jade rolled her eyes. “It’s not like it’s only the cheer squad that has varsity jackets. The volleyball girls have them. Basketball. Track. It literally could be anyone—I don’t know why Babble Girl is trying to stir up trouble on the cheer squad.”
It felt like I lifted my head in slow motion, Jade’s figure weaving in and out of focus. She looked bored. There was nothing identifiably me—my blonde hair was hidden, my name on my jacket wasn’t visible, you couldn’t see my face.
You could, however, see the front porch of my house.
But the photo was so blurry and dark, it arguably could’ve been anyone’s porch.
That was my desperation talking.
“Literally.” My voice sounded perfectly ordinary; not like I was seconds from throwing up all over Riley’s phone screen. “How ridiculous.”
I risked another peek at Jade. She sounded nonchalant, and she made the excuse that it could’ve been anyone with a varsity jacket, but she knew the truth. There was only one person a Castle-branded-varsity-jacket-wearer would be hugging.
Riley pulled her phone back, thumbing through the comments on the post. “Better she posts something bogus and not the whole Connor thing yesterday.”
And, on a slow pivot, now Jade turned to stare Riley down. It was the look I’d been expecting, having seen the Babble post, but instead, she gave it to her cheer underling.
Good, a part of me breathed in relief. Let her turn her anger to Riley. “What Connor thing?”
Riley made a face at me. “Jeez, Mads, do just not care anymore? You’re MIA on everything?”
“I—I didn’t—”
“Riley.” Jade’s voice was a quiet murmur, but laced with muted anger. “Don’t—”
“The person in the hookup closet yesterday.” Riley pumped her eyebrows. “It was Connor.”
I immediately frowned. “By himself?”
She scoffed. “Of course not. Kyle said he heard a girl in there with him.”
“Who?”
Jade shot me a look, like how should I know?
“No one waited outside of the closet to catch a glimpse of her?”
“Kyle found them, left to get his phone from his locker, and by the time we all got there, they were gone.” Riley nudged Jade. “But we’ll figure out who with. And we’ll ruin her.”
Everything felt topsy-turvy. Connor in the closet yesterday with someone who wasn’t Jade.
That was massive news… and yet no one had told me.
Kyle hadn’t texted the Top Tier group chat, but they’d all gone running.
Was there a chat I wasn’t in? More importantly, why hadn’t Jade run to me as soon as she found out? Instead, she’d run to Riley?
The five-minute bell rang out overhead, startling me enough that I almost lost my grip on my phone. “Anyone else want to cut class?” Riley asked with a groan, pocketing her phone. “Because I do.”
Jade didn’t even entertain the thought. “The Top Tier doesn’t cut class.”
“You two go without me,” I said, closing my locker door. “I’m going to run to the bathroom.”
I didn’t go to the bathroom, though. Instead, I rounded the corner and fell against the wall, quickly tugging my phone out of my pocket. There were two texts from Logan, but I opened up Babble instead, the urge to look at the post and comments too strong.
Logan’s varsity jacket with Jefferson High scripted on the back was in plain view, as was his jersey number, but—thankfully—his last name was too blurry to see clearly.
JeffBoy22: NO WAY!!!
MrTwister123: That is so a Brentwood varsity jacket. WHO is hugging the enemy?!
Hunt4Bulldogs: Why does it have to be someone on the cheer squad? Emma from the track team seemed pretty cozy with a bulldog at the meet back in spring…
As I looked at the picture closer, something else occurred to me. The angle of the photo was odd, almost as if it’d been taken at a higher elevation. What, was someone crouched in a tree? Who?
Then it hit me. There was only one spot that photo could’ve been taken from.
And it was perfectly from the angle of Maisie Matthew’s second-story bedroom window.
I was going to kill her.
From where I sat at my lunch table, I had a straight shot to Maisie, who sat at her own table with her head propped against her fist. I didn’t put much stock in my lip-reading skills, but I could’ve sworn she was talking about me.