Chapter Thirty-Eight Kane
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
KANE
“Amber,” a voice calls out near the bottom of the stairs.
Quietly, I peek over the railing just in time to see Mrs. Williamsburg pause with her hand against the banister. She turns to face someone, her brows raised in curiosity.
“Oh, Lynn. I didn’t see you out there,” Mrs. Williamsburg says, her tone full of fake enthusiasm.
I smirk at that.
“I was mingling. I must say, you’ve outdone yourself as always. Everything is immaculate.”
Mrs. Williamsburg huffs and shrugs. “Thank you, but you know Richard. All of this is his idea.”
“You’re being modest. We both know those husbands of ours don’t have a coordinated bone in their bodies.”
Alex’s mom laughs at that. “You’re not wrong.”
“Anyway. I was hoping to chat with you about the fundraiser. I have ideas that I think would work great.”
“Oh. Of course. I was just on my way to clean up this unfortunate wine stain from my blouse. How about I come find you when I’m done?”
“Sure,” Mrs. Lindsey says, then turns to walk away.
Mrs. Williamsburg resumes climbing the stairs, and I quickly move across the landing and tuck myself behind the obnoxiously large vase. She reaches the top step, then turns to walk down the hall where Alex and the others are.
My thumb hovers over my phone, ready to send the warning text but I never have to. She walks right past the office and turns at the end of the hall toward her and Richard’s bedroom.
I let out a breath, my shoulders relaxing. Lowering the phone, I stay put because at some point she’s going to return. If Alex is right, we’ve got about five more minutes before Richard finishes his rounds and notices we’re not in the room. They’ve already been in the office longer than we planned.
With my nerves on edge, I decide to send a text.
Kane: Hurry up.
Those three dots appear on the screen, and at the same time I hear voices coming from downstairs.
Familiar voices, a man and woman. I creep back to the stairs and peer over the banister.
They’re standing just out of view, their faces hidden by the shadow of the stairwell.
Curious, I descend a few steps, being sure not to give myself away.
“You lied to me,” the girl says angrily.
“You’re in no position to speak to me that way.” The man glances around to be sure no one is around.
From this angle, I still can’t see either of their faces, only their silhouettes. So I move farther down, my body locking once I finally see their profiles.
Gracie?
Richard?
Gracie tenses and grits her teeth. “You promised that you would make sure he never hurt anyone else. But you lied. He attacked Sam, and you—”
“Enough,” he barks. “Jackson is being handled. Now, what do you know? What is your little friend looking for?”
“What the fuck?” I whisper.
“Nothing,” Gracie responds.
“Don’t lie to me.”
“I’m not. She’d just found out that her mother was a student here and wants to know about her.”
“Why?”
“Because she’s grieving.”
Richard stands there for a minute, contemplating whether or not to believe her. And I guess he does because his tone softens.
“Fair enough.” He fastens his blazer. “Remember our deal. If I find out you’re lying… let’s just say I’d hate to see your father’s reputation ruined.” Without another word, he turns on his heel, leaving her standing alone.
With a deep breath, Gracie removes her phone from her clutch and checks it.
“Shit,” she mutters.
“This whole time you’ve been working with him?” I blurt while stalking down the stairs until I’m directly in front of her.
Gracie startles, her eyes snapping to mine, wide and full of regret. “Kane.”
“When I caught you coming out of his office, it wasn’t school related. You were spying on Sam.”
“No,” she stammers.
“You’re lying. I just heard it all.”
“I swear, it’s not what it looks like.”
My nostrils flare. “Then how is it?”
Gracie stares at me for a moment. I can see the wheels turning for her.
She exhales deeply. “I was the one that reported Jackson last term for raping me.”
Shock drops my jaw. “Gracie, I’m so sor—”
“It’s fine. It’s over now. But when I reported him, instead of them holding him accountable, they protected him.
Just like they’re doing with Sam. If I didn’t drop the charges, didn’t pretend it never happened, Richard would use information he has to ruin my father’s reputation.
And, as much as our relationship isn’t great, I can’t let that happen to my family.
But Richard didn’t stop there, and now he’s been blackmailing me into telling him information about Sam.
But I promise, I never told him anything important, and I never would.
I’m just stuck, Kane, and when I learned Jackson tried to hurt her, too, I—”
“You’re not stuck.”
“You don’t get it.” She pauses. “I don’t think we know the half of what we’re up against. The things he has on my father… something tells me it’s nothing compared to the chancellor.”
I tense at that, my mind racing a mile a minute. I don’t know what I expected us to find, but it wasn’t this. Wasn’t this dark, this dangerous. If he’ll go to these lengths, exploitation, coercion, threats—Gracie might just be right.
“But, Kane.” She sighs and sniffles again. “There’s something else.”
Just then, Sam, Alex, and Mountain come briskly down the stairs.
“We got it, let’s go,” Sam orders.
Gracie stands, silently pleading with me not to say anything. I nod, not because I want to keep another secret, but because I wouldn’t know where to start. Besides, this isn’t really my story to tell.
Once Sam reaches the bottom, she throws her arm around Gracie’s neck and squeezes her tight. No words, only comfort as if she knows that something isn’t right. Gracie peers at me over Sam’s shoulder, and I shrug.
Then I look over at Alex. He’s the last to descend the stairs, and his eyes are piercing me like daggers.