Chapter 3
Noah
The car was full of talk, but no one was saying anything important.
Dante glanced at me as Hadley and Savvy debated everything that had happened.
“What is it?” he asked me quietly.
“There’s something they’re not telling us.” I glanced at him, and he nodded. “I don’t know what, though.”
“Me neither.” His gaze flicked to the backseat, where the girls were still talking, and Dustin was staying quiet. Probably wise.
“I can’t believe she’s dead,” Hadley mused. “I didn’t expect that. I never even researched it as a possibility.”
The car was quiet as we all thought about it.
“What did she say to you?” Dante asked me quietly. “When you hung back?”
I snorted. “Told me if I got the chance to transfer, to do it.”
“Huh.” His hands tightened slightly on the wheel, but I noticed. “That’s what you said too.”
“Yeah.”
We drove in silence, well, if you ignored the fact that Hadley and Savvy were analyzing every sentence spoken today as if it were gospel, or open to interpretation. Mason Sterling had left little to interpret. He’d been very straightforward in his answers.
Fuck off — the universal language known to everyone.
Why was he so angry? Apart from the fact that his career had been wiped out, why hadn’t he transferred?
“Why didn’t Sterling move schools?” I asked no one in particular, but thankfully, it stopped the girls’ constant chatter. “She told me to transfer. Why didn’t he?”
“He was accused of sexual assault,” Savvy said slowly. “Wouldn’t that be something schools check for?”
“But he wasn’t,” Dustin mused. “She never accused him. No one outright accused him, and no charges were ever brought.” He tapped my shoulder.
“You’re right, though. There was nothing stopping him from moving schools.
He was a freshman. Shit sticks, but it eventually washes off.
He could have moved across the country.”
Dante and I shared a look. “Shit never washes off,” I grumbled. “Once they think they’ve got something on you, it never goes away.”
“He could have been affected by it,” Hadley said in agreement. “He could have needed therapy, counseling, anything. His career was just gone.” I turned to look at her. She was glaring out the window. “It’s what that bastard Sutherland does,” she muttered. “Fucks with your future.”
Dante nodded grimly. “I wouldn’t put it past him to make a few phone calls and blacklist his name.”
Savvy sighed loudly. “Well, that’s just a horrible thought.”
“Horrible truth,” I corrected her. “They were all set to get rid of me, remember?” I looked over at Dante, who nodded. “I had you and Coach Holt to vouch for me, but even then, he didn’t look too keen to come forward until Dante said something.”
“Your dad needs to find a new university to manage,” Hadley said to Savvy, and I think she was serious. “There are too many things wrong with our one.”
“How far does it go, though?” Dustin had leaned forward, over Hadley, so he could talk to Dante and me. When he let out an oomph, I guessed his girlfriend had just punched him in the ribs or something for lying on her.
“What do you mean?” Savvy asked him, trying to move away as Hadley and Dustin sharpened their elbows. “Oh my God, you two, are you serious? Stop bashing each other. You’re not alone back here!”
I hid my grin behind my hand as Dante started to scold the back seat like an exasperated parent wrangling his children to behave.
My attention drifted outside as the squabbling grew louder and Spence adopted his QB locker-room voice, which he used only when we were down in the game.
Briar was tiny compared to her brother or me.
If she were five-five, I was being generous.
I was almost a foot taller than she was.
She’d been talkative but timid when I first met her, keeping her eyes down and her hair over her face, hiding her resemblance to her brother.
Their eyes were the same, but unless they were side by side, I wasn’t sure you’d immediately put them together as siblings.
Her dark hair had that burgundy undertone.
Pale skin, freckles across her nose, dark green eyes that move around the room the way mine do — never quite resting.
Her mouth was soft but unsmiling. She’d stood between her brother and a room full of people who wanted something from him.
Protecting him without being asked. And vice versa.
She’d caught me looking, and irritation had flashed behind those restless green eyes before she’d looked away, as if she were pissed I’d been watching her.
And I had been watching her. Because I didn’t have thoughts about what his hair would feel like in my hands as I fucked him.
Nope. Reel it in.
Why was she back at Wrighton? Was it to uncover the truth? Or was she simply looking for a job? Either way, it made sense that she’d lie about her name. Unless Holmes really is her last name. Maybe she got married?
“Did she have a wedding ring on?”
The silence that met my question made my ears burn.
“What? Her name is Holmes; she may be good at hiding behind her hair, but did either of them look like they knew anyone who could give them a new identity?”
Dante’s lips twitched. “Good point. Sav? How good is the employment vetting?”
I twisted in my seat to look at her. She seemed confused by the question. “Why would I know? Dad doesn’t exactly hire the admin staff.”
“Who does?” I asked her. “Your dad does what? Professors? That kind of thing?”
She nodded. “I don’t know who would handle the other sections. I mean, there are heads of each department—”
“Do they have to go through your dad for final approval?” Dustin asked.
“I don’t know,” she admitted. “I could ask.”
At least three of us said ‘no’ at the same time.
“Let’s keep her identity between us,” I told them. “If she comes back, it’s leverage if nothing else.” I heard Dante murmur his approval. “Hey, Dust, you said the Santos family owned the college?”
“I said that,” Savvy corrected me. “They sit on the board, yes.”
“So would they know how the system works?” I pressed. “Is it something we can find out?”
“From them?” Dante asked, his mouth twisting with displeasure.
“I think this is more than your weird rivalry with Jett Santo,” I snapped. I met his stare and didn’t back down.
“A simple Google search can be less painful,” Hadley told us from the back seat, her head down, focused on her phone.
She read quickly, mostly under her breath, but I caught a few words.
“Okay, so, the heads of each department hire, and the dean gives the final rubber stamp. The less your role in the institution, the less you need to provide.” She kept reading.
“Pretty standard for all positions is a birth certificate, proof of address, bank details, blah blah blah.”
“So she’s either got fake ID, or she’s married?” I said, which was my original question.
“She’s not married,” Dustin scoffed. “She’s like twenty-one or something.”
Dante was shaking his head. “I think she’s the older sibling.”
“Agreed.” I could feel their stares on the back of my head, and Dante’s beside me.
“She’s older than him. It was four years ago.
He’s what, twenty-two, twenty-three? She’s already got a job, so, say she left school at twenty-one, is social media manager a job you get straight off the bat?
I’d say a year, two at most between them. Plus, she’s protective.”
“Yeah, that’s true,” Dust said.
“You can only be protective if you’re older?” Hadley asked skeptically.
Dante grinned. “Jianna is older than I am, but I’m protective of her not because I’m younger but because she’s my sister. He was ready to throw down with us for touching her. She was ready to stand in front of him to stop him.” He glanced at me. “She’s the older of the two.”
“So she could’ve been married, and her name wouldn’t be fake,” Hadley contemplated.
I nodded, but Savvy was having none of it.
“No way. She said it’s Holmes, like Sherlock Holmes.
There is no way she is at our school, where her brother got kicked out for something he didn’t do, and she isn’t investigating.
I don’t care who’s the oldest, I do know she’s lying.
She faked her name, and I want to know why and how. ”
“Or there’s that,” Dante murmured with a small smile.
They started discussing it again, but my attention wandered back to Mason. He was innocent of any wrongdoing toward Tiffany Preacher. What else was he guilty of, though? I recognized the look in Mason Sterling’s eyes too well.
I’d seen it every day in my own reflection.
I knew what it looked like when someone had been handed a reason to be angry but never given a clean way to set it down.
I pulled my phone out of my pocket and texted my brother, Tate.
Me: Hi, you got any geek wizzes in your classes?
I didn’t need to wait long before his reply.
Tate: I AM the geek wizard in my class
I grinned as I read it.
Me: How easy is it to fake your birth certificate for a job interview at a college?
Tate: Do I want to know why you’re asking, or should I just assume it’s simple curiosity?
Me: Assume
Tate: Oh boy
The dots came and went, and then he replied.
Tate: It’s not that hard. No one really looks.
Unlike when working with minors or little kids, the measures are much stricter.
But college? We’re all adults, or almost adults, for us who come straight in at 17.
The internet can make you anything these days if you know how to use it right and what your employer is looking for.
That’s what I suspected. She didn’t need fake documents like a spy film;, she just needed a little know-how. Her employer had stated exactly what it needed in the job application.
Me: Thanks
Tate: No problem. You need me up there yet? Finals are just around the corner
It’d be good to see him, but I wanted him as far from Wrighton U as I wanted to be.
Me: I’m managing
Tate: Never doubted you
I sent him a ‘speak soon’ and shoved my phone back in my pocket. I felt Dante’s stare and glanced over. The others had quieted down, and I wasn’t sure if I had missed something.
“You good?” Dante asked.
“Yeah.”
He didn’t push, and I didn’t offer more. So maybe there were a few more creases in the friendship that still needed to be ironed out than I thought.
When we got back to campus, I was grateful to get out of the car. Dust was only four inches shorter than I was, and I felt a slight pang of guilt when I heard his groan of relief at being able to stretch his legs.
“No more road trips,” he grouched, flexing his legs. “I need these babies to run.”
I turned away when Hadley offered him support and whispered something in his ear that made him grin and, seemingly, instantly recover.
“Food?” Savvy asked. “Shall we go get some?”
They all agreed, but the last thing I wanted was a meal with two couples. Even if they were my friends.
“I have to call my brother,” I told them, tapping my jeans pocket. “Catch you on the flip.”
I walked away before they could argue about why I couldn’t do it later. I went straight back to the dorm, knowing it would be empty, and enjoyed the silence, even if just for a little while.
I really liked Savvy, and Hadley was fun, but together? They never stopped talking.
At all.
I wasn’t one for a lot of conversation because not everything has to be discussed and digested.
In my room, I shut the door behind me, locking it just in case, and shrugged off my jacket. Kicking off my boots, I lay on my bed and let the silence wrap around me.
There it was. Peace at last.
And inevitably, it went as soon as I started thinking about earlier. I wondered whether Mason would have been more forthcoming if he hadn’t felt cornered or ambushed. I thought about the look on his face when Dante said we’d found him. There was something in it — something I recognized.
I wondered if his sister tasted—
“Nope.” I sat up.
She was hot. She was more than hot. She was freaking gorgeous. I’d said it the first time I saw her, and I hadn’t changed my mind. The fact that she was a couple of years older than me and fiercely protective of her brother just made her hotter.
I liked a woman who knew what she wanted . . . especially in the bedroom.
“Not the time, not the woman,” I reminded myself as I got off the bed. “And she’s obviously devious,” I added. “You don’t need devious women in your life.” I sniffed. “You have Savvy and Hadley for that.”
I grinned as I sat at my desk and opened my books. I picked up my phone to call Tate.
“Okay, I lied. Apparently, we’re debating ‘the observer’s responsibility in controlled violence.’ Tell me that’s just a fancy way of saying ‘don’t be a jerk with power’.”
“You really need to stop letting your adviser pick your electives,” he grumbled, and I heard him shuffling around. “I was on the big boss battle in God of War.”
“I can call you back?”
Tate made a buzzer sound. “Are you kidding? And miss out on ‘don’t be a jerk with power?’ Dude . . . who are you even talking to?”
I grinned. “Right. Okay, well, hit me with your big brain, bro. I’m ready.”
After all the shit that went down today and surrounded me in this program, it wasn’t only Mason Sterling who needed his sibling’s support.