Chapter 11
Asher
The entire drive to St. Virginia Academy, my mind keeps circling back to the same irritating conclusion.
Felix. That name again.
The same man who keeps calling Roxanne late at night. The same person she always answers immediately, no matter what she’s doing. And now she’s leaving work in the middle of the day because he got into some kind of trouble.
I grip the steering wheel tighter while weaving through traffic.
Ridiculous.
Some ugly part of me is already imagining another man waiting for her attention the second she steps out of my car. Another man she softens for and worries over.
The thought sits badly in my chest along with the confusion that we’re driving to a high school. Does Felix work there? A teacher? Would Roxanne really be with someone who barely earns up to her own annual salary?
If she’s really with him, it must be that stupid thing called love.
I scoff.
I know that shit isn’t real. And for someone like Roxanne, it’s even more flimsy. All I need to do is intimidate this Felix a little by showing him that Roxanne has me now.
Roxanne stays tense beside me the entire drive, fingers twisting tightly together in her lap while she stares ahead silently. Her composure has started cracking in small ways lately. Most people probably wouldn’t notice it, but I do.
The strain she keeps trying to hide beneath expensive clothes and polished smiles is still obvious to me. Something about it unsettles me more than I’d like.
When we finally pull into the private academy parking lot, Roxanne reaches for the door almost before the car fully stops.
I step out after her automatically.
“What are you doing?” She asks frantically.
“Following you.”
“I don’t want you to.”
The answer should be simple, and I should probably politely leave, but I can’t.
“You look stressed,” I find myself saying, because even though I badly want to find out who this Felix is, I also genuinely worry for her.
Her expression flickers briefly before she looks away again and continues toward the building. She walks toward the principal’s office, and I begin to wonder if Felix is the principal of the school.
That would make more sense.
Inside the reception area, the atmosphere is tense. A nervous-looking administrator leads us toward the principal’s office while explaining something about an altercation during lunch break.
Then we turn the corner.
“Felix!”
I stop short as Roxanne screams because the person she runs to isn’t a man, but a teenager.
Felix is a teenager.
He’s tall for his age, lean, and glaring at everything within a 2-mile radius, but he’s still a boy nonetheless.
A bruise darkens one side of his jaw while two other boys seated nearby look significantly worse off. One has a split lip. The other is holding an ice pack against his face.
I don’t need anyone to tell me what went down here.
The sharp relief in Roxanne’s voice catches my attention first. Felix glances up from his chair, visibly stiffening when he sees Roxanne. Then his eyes shift toward me briefly.
“Hey,” Felix mutters.
“What happened?” Roxanne asks quickly while crouching slightly in front of him. Her fingers immediately reach for his face, checking the bruise carefully despite his obvious irritation. “Are you hurt anywhere else?”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re bleeding.”
“It’s literally one cut.”
Roxanne’s brows furrow as she folds her arms across her chest. “You were in a fight.”
“They started it.”
The principal appears beside us then, with the exhausted expression of a man who’s dealt with too many teenagers for too many years.
“Ms. Sinclair,” he says politely. “If you’ll come with me, we can discuss the disciplinary measures.”
Roxanne straightens immediately. “Of course.”
Her gaze flicks briefly toward me then. Like she suddenly remembered I’m here.
“I’ll just?—”
“I’ll stay with him,” I say before she can finish.
Surprise flashes across her face, then hesitation. It's almost like she isn’t sure leaving me alone with Felix is a good idea. Honestly, I’m not entirely sure either.
Still, after a brief pause, she nods. “Thank you, Mr. Sterling.”
Then she follows the principal into his office. The silence that settles afterward is awkward for approximately three seconds.
Then Felix looks at me and says flatly, “You’re her boss.”
I lean back slightly in the chair beside him. “You know who I am?”
“Mr. Sterling.” He shrugs one shoulder. “Roxy complains about you a lot.”
I blink. A soft smile graces my face as amusement flickers low in my chest.
“Does she?”
“Mostly when you’re being annoying.”
Interesting choice of wording. Kids are absolutely delightful.
Felix studies me more carefully now. “You’re not what I expected.”
“That sounds ominous.”
“I thought you’d be older.”
I huff out a quiet laugh despite myself. The kid relaxes slightly at the sound. And gradually, my attention drifts toward the bruise on his face again.
“You hit them back pretty hard.”
His jaw tightens instantly. “They deserved it.”
“What did they do?”
He goes quiet and shrugs. “Doesn’t matter.”
It clearly does, but I don’t pry.
I study him for another moment before memory surfaces unexpectedly. The PI report mentioned that Roxanne is the sole and legal guardian of her younger brother following their parents’ deaths.
How come it never occurred to me that Felix was her brother?
Something shifts uncomfortably inside my chest as the reality dawns on me.
Roxanne raised him alone.
I look at Felix again with an entirely new understanding.
No wonder she works the way she does and always seems to jump at every other opportunity to make money. It can’t be easy raising a child all alone. Just seeing the school she sends him to shows how hard Roxanne is working to care for her brother.
Do I really have the right to judge her and call her money-hungry?
The principal’s office door finally opens twenty minutes later. Roxanne walks out looking exhausted already.
“You’ve been suspended for three days.” Roxanne's voice is filled with anger as she stops before Felix.
Felix mutters something beneath his breath.
Roxanne immediately turns toward him. “Excuse me?”
“I said whatever.”
“Felix.”
“No, seriously, Roxy, it’s fine.”
“It’s not fine,” she snaps quietly. “You got suspended.”
“Because I punched someone.”
“You could’ve seriously hurt someone,” Roxanne argues, slapping one of her hands over the other.
Felix is adamant. “They deserved it.”
“That doesn’t matter.”
“Yes, it does.”
The tension between them rises instantly as they argue. The dynamic between them that seemed like that of a mother and son shifts into the regular sibling banter.
Despite the harsh words, you can tell just how much these two care about each other.
Felix rolls his eyes dramatically before pushing to his feet. “Can we go now?”
Roxanne presses her fingers briefly against her temple like she’s fighting off a headache. I step in before things escalate further.
“I’ll drive you both.”
Both of them look at me, wearing the same shocked expression. They absolutely look alike.
Roxanne recovers first. “That’s not necessary.”
“It’s already on my way,” I lie.
Her apartment is nowhere near my route home. However, I don’t feel too good about letting these two find their own way home when they’re this angry.
A second later, she nods.
The drive back is tense, but the sexual tension that had permeated the air between Roxanne and me is now filled with Felix and Roxanne's anger.
Felix stares stubbornly out the backseat window while Roxanne keeps trying to lecture him about fighting.
“You can’t solve every problem with violence.”
“You don’t even know what happened,” Felix retorts sharply.
“Then explain it to me.”
“I said it doesn’t matter.”
“It clearly mattered enough for you to punch someone.”
I want to get involved and remind Felix not to talk that way to his older sister, then I remember just how stubborn I was at that age, too.
How on earth is Roxanna managing?
Felix groans loudly. “Can you not do this right now?”
Roxanne turns toward him fully. “I absolutely can because you were suspended, Felix.”
“In front of everyone, too,” he mutters bitterly.
“Because you got into a fight in front of everyone.”
“You embarrassed me.”
“I’m your guardian. It’s literally my job to embarrass you,” Roxanne yells this time, her voice cracking at the end.
Normally, the line might’ve been funny. Right now, Felix just looks angry and strangely hurt. While Roxanne looks exhausted.
By the time we reach their apartment building, the atmosphere has only worsened. Roxanne thanks me quietly as we step out onto the sidewalk, but Felix is already halfway toward the entrance.
“Felix,” she calls sharply.
He doesn’t stop.
“You can’t keep shutting down every time I try talking to you.”
He turns then, frustration flashing openly across his face now. “You don’t get it.”
“Then help me understand.”
“Just leave me alone!”
To a mere onlooker, he just looks like another child throwing a tantrum, but something about Felix's tone tells me he absolutely did not want to be left alone.
I don’t know what it is, but there’s something deeper disturbing him.
Roxanne goes completely still, and so do I. Felix looks horrified immediately after he says those words. Before either of us can respond, he turns and bolts down the street.
“Felix!” Roxanne starts after him instinctively.
I catch her wrist gently. “Wait.”
Panic flashes across her face immediately. “Asher?—”
“I’ll go.”
“I should?—”
“You’re both angry right now.”
For a second, she looks torn between arguing and collapsing entirely. And finally, she nods seconds later and lets me go. My chest tightens painfully as I release her wrist and head after Felix.
I find him three blocks away, sitting alone at a small park near the apartment complex. His elbows rest on his knees while he stares at the pavement with the particular misery only teenagers seem capable of achieving.
He notices me approaching immediately and groans softly. “Great.”
I sit beside him anyway, not at all bothered by his outward hostility. For several seconds, neither of us speaks.