23. Chapter 23
Chapter 23
Ginny
Ginny : Need you. At the school. Can’t talk. Trying to find a way to reach Davis—Lucas needs us.
Joker : I’m on my way.
I send the message as soon as I know Keith and those other kids are gone.
“Ms. Mills?” Aubrey asks, her voice trembling. “Wha—what do we do?”
I look around the room, at a loss.
“I don’t know,” I tell her honestly. “But you should call whoever is picking you up and tell them to come get you now.”
“I don’t want to leave you,” she whispers.
“I’m the one who’s supposed to be taking care of you, remember?” I smile at her.
“But we have to get Lucas out of here, too.”
“I know, sweetheart.”
I go to the cabinet and open the door. Lucas is curled up behind the cello case, a look of fear and determination on his face.
“Are they gone?” he asks.
“For now. We need to get you out of here.”
I help him out of his hiding spot and look around the room again. When I land on the wall of instruments, I get an idea.
“Aubrey, help me open the hard-shell case. The big one, for the bass.”
Her eyes light up, understanding what I want to do. It might not work, but it’s worth a try. I pull out my phone and text Joker again.
Ginny : Need the truck. Please tell me that’s what you have.
He responds immediately.
Joker : Two minutes away from school, in truck.
“Oh, thank goodness,” I whisper to myself.
Aubrey has the case open and is pulling out the instrument, placing it in a wall stand.
I look at the inside of it, and try to mentally fit a teenager. Fuck, I’m nuts, aren’t I?
“Lucas, you wouldn’t happen to be double-jointed, would you?”
“No?” He gives me a funny look, and yeah, I know kid, I’ve lost my mind.
I look at Aubrey. “Think it’ll work?”
“I think we have to try, right?”
She nods and looks at Lucas, doing her own mental math with sizing.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” he asks.
“I need you to trust me, okay?” I ask him. When he nods, I go on. “I want you to get into the case.”
“You want me to what?”
“We need to get you out of here, and it’s not uncommon for me to take instruments out to be fixed. Nobody will even look our way if I’m taking a case out of here. Not even Keith.”
“I’m so glad you didn’t marry him.”
“Me too, kid, me too.”
He eyes the case. “I’ll be able to breathe?”
“Yes, dork.”
He smiles at me. “You haven’t called me that in a couple of years, you know?”
I pull him into a one-arm hug. “I know. You’ve gone and grown up on me. I don’t like it. And you’d have fit in that case with no problem a year ago.”
He chuckles, shrugging his shoulders. “What can you do?”
Looking at the case one more time, he steps in and sits, trying to figure out the best place for his body.
“Try to put your head toward the top until your shoulders touch the sides,” Aubrey tells him. “And then twist your legs so you’re kind of on your knees at the bottom?”
“That might work.” He smiles at her.
Once he’s situated, I kneel down beside him. “I’m going to pull the cover over now, okay? And we’re going straight outside.”
“Don’t drop me, okay?”
“No promises.” I smile at him, showing all teeth, and he shakes his head at me.
I pull the top over, making sure he has enough room and isn’t freaking out before I close the case.
“Grab my bag?” I ask Aubrey. “Leave your instrument here for now. Did you text your parents?”
“Dad’s outside now, worried.” She grimaces. “I’ll talk to him.”
“Okay, let’s get out of here.”
Aubrey grabs my bag and her backpack and I lift the case. Thank God for wheels, and that we aren’t that far into the building. Kid’s fucking heavy.
“Geez, Lucas,” I say to the case. “What has my brother been feeding you?”
I hear him chuckle, which makes the case shake, but I’ve got a hold of it, and I power walk it out of my classroom and into the hallway, looking both ways. The coast is clear. Aubrey pulls my door closed and we nod at each other. As silently as we can, we walk quickly to the front doors, Aubrey walking in front of me. We round the corner and run into Mrs. Weaver, one of the math teachers. She’s old and likes to talk.
“Oh, Ms. Mills. So glad to see you! I feel like I haven’t seen you at all this year. What are you still doing here this late?”
“Hey, Mrs. Weaver,” I say weakly. “It’s like we keep missing each other, isn’t it? Aubrey stayed after today for some practice. I’m walking her out to meet her dad.”
“Oh, that’s so nice. Is she as good as you were?”
“She might be better.” I smile widely at her. “But her dad is waiting, and this hunk of wood,” I nod to the case, “is getting heavy. We should probably get going.”
“I understand. All you young kids are in a hurry today. I was so sorry to hear about your situation. Such a shame.”
“Yeah, well, thanks?”
“Just know, I don’t blame you, sweet girl. I think you did the right thing.”
“Uh, wow.” I don’t really know what to say to that.
“He’s a real fucker sometimes, isn’t he?” she whispers.
“He really is.” I laugh. “How about lunch tomorrow? We’ll catch up.”
“How lovely. It’s a date.”
“Great. We really do have to go!” I give Aubrey the eyes that I hope she can read, telling her to move her ass. When she does, I start moving, too. “See you tomorrow,” I smile at Mrs. Weaver.
“See you, dear!”
“Fuck,” I whisper when we’re finally out of earshot. Aubrey laughs. “Wasn’t quiet enough, was I?”
“Nope,” she laughs.
The doors are in view, and Aubrey is pushing through them when I see the boys from earlier in the parking lot. Waiting. Aubrey sees them at the same time and pauses mid-step.
“What do we do?” she asks.
“Go. You’re meeting your dad and I’m meeting my friend to help me take the instrument in for repair.”
“Right.” She takes a deep breath and nods her head, psyching herself up, just in case. “We got this.”
As soon as I’m outside, I find Joker’s eyes on me. His eyebrows furrow and he cocks his head to the side when he takes in the case before realization dawns on him and he rewards me with a smirk.
Aubrey’s dad meets us at the door, and he looks both of us over.
“We’re fine,” I assure him. “But you should follow us when we leave. Going to Lucas’s home to see his uncle.”
“Davis? From Zach’s?” he asks.
“Davis. The former FBI agent from Zach’s.”
The relief on his face is tangible, and he nods. “Need some help with the case?”
“We might need some help loading it up in the back of the truck. It weighs about two-hundred pounds.”
I hope he understands what I’m trying to say. I can’t communicate with him telepathically like I can with Joker. But he nods his head and takes the case from me, grunting at the weight.
"What do you have in here, bricks?" he grunts, moving slower than I did.
Makes me smile a little. He’d probably be surprised a hard case like this one is almost thirty pounds empty, and while adding Lucas’s weight increased that, I’ve been lugging instruments around for years.
“What’s wrong?” Joker asks, meeting us in the middle of the parking lot and taking the case from Aubrey’s dad. “The hell you got in here? Bricks?”
“I asked the same thing!” Roger replies, while I only chuckle.
“Is Lucas really in this fucking case?” Joker leans close and whispers.
“Umm-hmm,” I confirm. “So, let’s get it in the truck and take it to service? The bridge broke.” I look beyond his shoulder and notice Keith standing at the steps, squinting at us. “Like now?”
Joker looks around quickly and sees what I see. He rolls the case to his truck and lifts it like it weighs nothing. I tell Aubrey’s dad the address and they head to their car while I get in the truck with Joker.
“Drive safe,” I tell him.
“What the fuck is going on?” he demands.
“I don’t know, but Lucas is freaking out. Half the baseball team is after him, and Keith isn’t far behind.”
“What did he do?”
“I don’t know. Let’s just get him home and safe, okay?”
He starts up the truck and pulls out of the spot. Keith watches us until we’re out of the parking lot.
“So, you didn’t do anything to the security system when you fucked with it, did you?” I ask.
“Why?”
“If he watches the cameras, he’s going to know for sure it was my room Lucas ran to and how we got him out.”
He pulls out his phone and makes a call. “Hey, it’s me. Need a favor. Erase the security footage at the high school for the music room for the last hour. Yeah, thanks.” He looks at me out of the corner of his eyes. “Done.”
“Thanks. Not sure it’ll really help, but we need to try.”
When we pull into Trish and Davis’s driveway, there’s already more cars there than normal.
“What did you do?”
“Called in the calvary, what else?”
“Thanks. Not sure what they’ll be able to do, but the more brain power, the better, right?”
We get out of the truck, and Joker jumps up into the bed. He’s getting ready to unzip the case when I see a sedan driving down the road. “Nope, we carry that sucker in. Keith just drove by.”
“Shit. Can you hang on for another minute, bud?” he asks the case.
“Whatever,” comes the response.
“Get back in the truck,” he tells me.
I do as he says, and when he backs out of the driveway, I look at him. “What are you doing?”
“You’ve got a broken bass that needs to go to the shop. You’ve also got a twatwaffle following you, thinking you’ve got a kid he’s after. We’re taking the bass to the shop.”
“You’re hot when you apply logic to things,” I smirk at him.
“I’ll remind you later that you said that.”
He drives the three blocks to the small music shop we have. I think I’ve single-handedly kept them in business for the last twenty years. When we get there, I go in and tell them we have an emergency and need to carry the case directly to the back. No questions are asked, all faith is given.
We get the case into the store and, once in a safe place, I unzip it, freeing Lucas.
“Thank goodness. The car ride was fun, but I really have to pee.”
I laugh in relief that he’s undamaged and point to the bathroom.
“How do we get him out of here now?” I ask.
“Easy. I texted Ranger. He’s going to meet us here and put Lucas in his car before going to get food from the diner for all of us. We’ll go back to Davis’s house and fuckboy follows us.”
“Your names for him have gotten more creative lately.”
“You should hear the ones in my head.”
Lucas returns from the bathroom and I thank the owners and let them know we’ll be back for the case as soon as we can. I’m sure this will be a story they tell at home tonight.