Chapter 1 #2
But I don't put it down. Instead, I do something that might be the stupidest thing I've ever done in my life. I hit Dime's number and put the phone on speaker, setting it down on the desk where Logan can see it.
"What are you doing?" Logan's voice is sharp with suspicion.
"I'm calling my boyfriend," I say as calmly as I can manage. "Because he should know where I am. I was supposed to meet him for lunch," I lie.
The phone rings once. Twice. On the third ring, Dime's voice fills the classroom, rough and warm and so familiar it makes my chest tight with longing.
"Hey, baby. What's up?"
"Hi, Dime." I keep my voice steady, but I know he'll hear the tension in it. He knows me too well. "I'm still at school. In my classroom. Room 237."
There's a pause. When Dime speaks again, his voice has changed. It's still casual, but there's an edge to it now. "Everything okay, sweetheart?"
"I have a student here with me. Logan Matthews. He's seventeen years old, and he's been taking some kind of drugs. He's not feeling very well."
Another pause. Longer this time. "Is that right?"
"He's also upset because he found out about us. About our relationship."
"Allison." Logan's voice is sharp with warning. "Hang up the phone."
But I don't. I can't. Because I know Dime is putting the pieces together. I know he's already moving.
"I can't hang up right now," I say, both to Logan and to Dime. "Logan has something he wants to show me."
"What kind of something?" Dime's voice is deadly quiet now.
"The kind that makes noise," I say carefully.
Silence stretches over the phone line for what feels like forever. Then Dime's voice comes through, and it's like nothing I've ever heard from him before. Cold and dangerous and absolutely lethal.
"Logan, can you hear me?"
Logan's eyes widen, and he looks at the phone like it's a snake. "I... what?"
"I said, can you hear me? Because I want you to listen very carefully to what I'm about to tell you."
"Don't talk to him," I whisper, but Logan seems frozen.
"You have something that belongs to me," Dime continues, his voice carrying easily through the speaker. "And I want it back. Unharmed. Unchanged. Perfect."
"She doesn't belong to you!" Logan's voice cracks. "She's not property!"
"You're right. She's not property. She's mine by choice. She chooses to be with me. She chooses to love me. And I choose to protect what's mine."
My phone buzzes with a text. I glance down and see Dime's message: Police on the way. Keep him talking. I'm coming.
"How long have you been watching her, Logan?" Dime's voice is conversational now, almost friendly. "How long have you been following my woman around?"
"Months," Logan answers before he can stop himself. "Since last school year."
"And what exactly did you think was going to happen? You thought you'd what – scare her into caring about you?"
"I thought... I thought if I could just make her see..." Logan's voice trails off, and for a moment he looks like what he is – a confused, hurting teenager who's made some very bad choices.
"She sees you just fine, kid. She sees a student who needs help. She sees someone who's throwing his life away over a fantasy."
"It's not a fantasy." Logan's grip tightens on the gun. "What we have is real."
"What you have is a delusion. What I have with her is real.
I know what she looks like when she first wakes up in the morning.
I know how she takes her coffee. I know the little sound she makes when I kiss that spot right behind her ear.
" Dime's voice drops to a growl. "I know how she sounds when she says my name in the dark. "
"Stop!" Logan screams, and the gun wavers in his hand. "Stop talking about her like that."
That's when I hear it. Sirens in the distance, getting closer.
Logan hears them too. His head snaps toward the windows, and his face goes white. "You called the cops."
"I called my boyfriend," I say quietly. "He called the cops."
"No." Logan shakes his head frantically. "No, no, no. This isn't how this was supposed to go."
"How was it supposed to go, Logan?" I keep my voice gentle, even though my heart is hammering so hard I'm surprised he can't hear it. "What did you think would happen?"
"You were supposed to realize." His voice breaks, and tears start streaming down his face. "You were supposed to see that I love you more than he ever could! That I would do anything for you."
"This isn't love, sweetheart." The endearment slips out before I can stop it, and Logan's face crumples. "Love doesn't hurt people. Love doesn't scare people. Love doesn't point guns at the person you care about."
"But I do love you." His voice is so small, so broken. "I love you so much it hurts."
"I know you think you do. But Logan, you don't even know me.
Not really. You know your teacher. You know the person I am in this classroom.
But you don't know who I am when I'm home, when I'm scared, when I'm happy, when I'm angry.
You don't know my favorite movie or my biggest fear or what I dream about at night. "
"I could learn." He takes a step closer, and I press back against the desk. "I could know all those things if you'd just give me a chance."
The sirens are getting louder. They'll be here soon.
"Logan, you need to put the gun down. You need to let me help you get through this."
"I can't go to jail." His voice is barely a whisper. "My mom... she'll never forgive me. I've already screwed up so much."
"Then don't screw up anymore. Put the gun down. Let's end this before it gets worse."
For a moment, I think he's going to do it. His hand starts to lower, and hope flares in my chest. We're in a room that's right by the parking lot. The door to my classroom is right by the main entrance.
Then we hear the screech of tires in the parking lot outside. Car doors slamming. Heavy footsteps on the stairs.
Logan's head snaps up, and when he looks at me again, there's something different in his eyes. Something final.
"They're here," he says flatly.
"Logan…"
"If I can't have you," he says, raising the gun again, "then he can't either."
The phone crackles, and Dime's voice comes through, sharp with panic. "Allison, get down!"
But before I can move, Logan does something I don't expect. Instead of pointing the gun at me, he spins toward the door just as it bursts open.
"Police! Drop your weapon, now."
Logan doesn't drop it. Instead, he swings the gun toward the officers, and I see his finger start to tighten on the trigger.
That's when everything happens at once.
I scream Logan's name and lunge forward, trying to knock his arm away.
The gun goes off with a sound like the world ending.
Someone else screams – a voice I don't recognize.
Heavy boots pound across the floor.
More shouting. More chaos.
And through it all, Dime's voice on the phone, calling my name over and over again.
Then everything goes dark.
When I come to, I'm on the floor behind my desk. My ears are ringing, and there's a sharp pain in my left shoulder. I can taste blood in my mouth.
"Allison!" Dime's voice, but not from the phone. He's here. In the room with me.
I try to sit up, but firm hands press me back down. "Easy, baby. Just stay still."
"Logan?" My voice comes out as a croak.
"He's alive. They got him. He's alive, but he's hurt."
I try to piece together what happened, but my head feels like it's full of cotton. "The gun…"
"Went off when you tried to stop him from shooting at the cops. You probably saved his life, you know. And maybe theirs too."
"I'm okay," I whisper.
"No, you're not." His voice is rough with emotion. "You're bleeding. There's glass in your shoulder from where you hit the window. And you scared the living hell out of me."
I finally manage to focus on his face. He looks terrible – pale and wild-eyed, with his hair sticking up like he's been running his hands through it.
"How did you get here so fast?"
"I was already on my way when you called. Had a feeling something was wrong when you said you missed me. You never say stuff like that over the phone unless something's bothering you."
That's when I notice the other people in the room. Paramedics. Police officers. Principal Harrison, holding her husband's hand. She looks over at me. "Are you okay?"
I nod.
"Ma'am, we need to get you to the hospital," one of the paramedics says. "You've got some glass we need to remove, and we want to check for a concussion."
I start to protest, but Dime cuts me off. "We're going to the hospital. No arguments."
As they help me to my feet, I catch a glimpse of Logan being wheeled out on a stretcher. He's conscious, but he looks small and broken and nothing like the terrifying figure he was just minutes ago.
"Is he going to be okay?" I ask.
"He'll live," Chief Harrison says grimly. "Kid's lucky you interfered when you did. Otherwise, this would have ended a lot worse for everyone involved."
They load me into an ambulance, and Dime climbs in beside me. As we pull away from the school, I can see news vans already setting up in the parking lot.
"This is going to be a mess," I say weakly.
"Yeah, it is." Dime takes my uninjured hand and squeezes it gently. "But we'll deal with it together. All of it."
I lean back against the stretcher and close my eyes. The adrenaline is starting to wear off, and I'm beginning to understand just how close I came to dying today. How close Logan came to destroying his entire life.
"Dime?"
"Yeah, baby?"
"When this is all over, when the media circus dies down – I want to talk. About us. About what Dani told me. About everything."
He's quiet for a long moment. "Okay."
"I mean it. No more secrets. No more half-truths. If we're going to make this work, I need to know who you really are."
"Even if you don't like what you find out?"
I open my eyes and look at him. Really look at him. This man who dropped everything and raced across town to save me. This man who stayed on the phone and helped me stay calm when I was staring down the barrel of a gun. This man who's holding my hand like I'm the most precious thing in the world.
"Especially then," I say quietly.
The ambulance hits a pothole, and pain shoots through my shoulder. I bite back a curse, and Dime's hand tightens on mine.
"We're almost there," he says. "Just hold on."
But as the hospital comes into view, I can't shake the feeling that this is just the beginning. That whatever secrets Dime has been keeping, whatever darkness surrounds his involvement with Saint's Outlaws MC, it's all about to come crashing down on us.
And I have no idea if our relationship is strong enough to survive it.