When he told her he couldn’t have kids, she believed it wasn’t his fault. For a few months, everything went back to the way it should be.
Until some inept office clerk sent that bill to his house.
61
WITHIN MINUTES OF Fallon’s waking up the next morning, a nurse comes into her room. It isn’t Tammy. This nurse is much older and not nearly as cheerful. Her grey hair is shaved almost to the scalp, and her uniform is creased hard enough to break.
“You should be nice and rested by now,” the nurse says. “It’s nearly ten o’clock.”
Fallon scrambles to reach the water on the nightstand. “Did I miss checkout?”
The nurse glowers at her.
Fallon clears her throat.
“The doctor will be in to see you before you can be released,” the nurse says. She refills the water and walks out.
As soon as she’s gone, Fallon turns on the TV.
Game show. Talk show. Sitcom. She flips through the channels, wondering why no one is talking about the news at this hour. The national channels are too busy talking about politics.
The doctor interrupts her channel surfing. He’s a young man with a nice smile and big eyes.
“How are you feeling?” he says.
“Much better. My throat isn’t as sore.”
“Good to hear.” He checks her chart and listens to her heartbeat.
“So do they know yet?” Fallon asks. “If it was really poison?”
The smile disappears as he shakes his head no. “I have no information about that.”
“Do you know who died? I was told someone died.”
“I do not know.” The doctor signs the bottom of her chart. “I’m going to go ahead and release you, but if you have any issues or if you start feeling light-headed again, come straight to the emergency room.”
He walks out. Fallon starts to get up but realizes the IV is still in her arm. With a sigh, she presses the button for the nurse.
Once she’s disconnected, disentangled, and dressed, she walks out of the room, preparing herself for the next step: Before she can leave the hospital, she has to meet with the billing department.
Instead, she is met by two people standing by the door to her room. Both wear jackets emblazoned with the FBI logo.
* * *
TEDDY IS STILL in his hospital bed, still waiting for Allison, when the FBI agents show up. Not a surprise. A mass poisoning like this one is going to bring in the FBI. Maybe even the DEA. One or two poisonings is one thing, but seven people at once—with one dead? Time for the feds to take over.
A man and a woman, both wearing FBI jackets. They seem professional enough, which Teddy can appreciate. Nothing worse than an unprofessional law enforcement officer.
The bald man is Agent Roland, which is so generic, it almost seems like an alias. The first thing he wants to know is everything Teddy ate yesterday.
“Well, I had coffee at home. One cup, black,” Teddy says. “At Belmont, I made another cup of coffee before first period—”
“Where did you get the coffee?” Roland asks.
Teddy stares at him. “As I was saying, I made another cup of coffee in the teachers’ lounge before first period. Prime Bold is my flavor. After that, I didn’t eat again until lunch, which I bring from home. Bologna on white bread and an apple. I eat the same lunch every day.” He pauses, waiting for a reaction. There is none. “Yesterday, I did go to the dining hall to get a small carton of milk. I drank it while I ate in my classroom.”
“Is that normal for you? To get a carton of milk?”
“Sometimes, yes. Or I bring a water from home.”
“But yesterday, you definitely drank milk from the dining hall?”
“Yes,” Teddy says, wondering if Roland is a little slow. “I’m positive.”
“What about your sandwich? Did you make it?”
“I did.”
“Anyone else have access to it?”
Teddy thinks for a minute. Or pretends to. “No. I always keep my lunch in an insulated bag in my classroom.”
“What about at home?”
Teddy is a bit surprised by this question. “Home?”
“Do you live with anyone?”
“I can’t see how that’s relevant.”
“It is,” Roland says. “We need to know who had access to everything you ate or drank.”
“I live alone,” Teddy says, hoping that will end this line of questioning.
It doesn’t.
“Who else has access to your home?” Roland asks.
“I just said I live alone.”
“So no one else has a key?”
Teddy keeps his expression the same and his emotions in check. Otherwise, the hate he feels for this FBI agent might come through. “My wife has a key.”
Roland looks surprised. “You said you live alone.”
“I do. We are . . . separated.”
Roland and the other agent, Pruitt, exchange a look.
“Look,” Teddy says. “This has been one of the most tragic times in the history of the school. As Teacher of the Year, I’m very invested in our students and in their success, and what’s happened is horrifying. What we need to concentrate on is who would do this to the school. To the students. My wife has absolutely nothing to do with this.”
“We just need to be thorough,” Roland says.
Teddy realizes this is going to take longer than he’d anticipated. “May I ask a question?” he says.
The agents nod in unison.
“I understand someone died yesterday, but no one has said who it is. Has this information been released?”
Roland pauses before answering. “It was on the news earlier,” he says. “The headmaster died.”
Teddy pretends to be shocked.
62
THE DAY AFTER the #HomicideHighMassacre, Zach is right back in the living room with Ezekiel and his parents. Same room, same positions, but it’s not the same.
“This is a good thing,” Ezekiel says. “Zach wasn’t anywhere near the school for days before this happened.”
“I knew taking him out was the right thing to do,” Mom says.
Dad puts his hand on Mom’s shoulder. “You were absolutely right.”
A good thing. Six people sick enough to be hospitalized and one dead headmaster. This is what lawyers think is a good thing.
Zach is so angry, he wants to scream.
The only thing that keeps him from doing that is looking like he’s lost control. Even if it feels that way inside, he won’t show it.
Don’t express every single emotion you have. You’ll look unstable.
No one wants to be considered unstable. Look what happened to his math teacher, Mr. Maxwell. He still isn’t back at Belmont.
“That’s the good news,” Ezekiel says, looking rather proud of himself. “However . . . I do have something else.” When no one says anything, he continues. “As you may have seen on the news, the FBI has arrived in town. They are going over everything from the past events, including Courtney’s arrest.” Ezekiel looks at Zach for the first time this evening. “And they want to speak with Zach.”
“No,” Mom says.
“Not a chance,” Dad says.
Ezekiel smiles as he pushes up his glasses. “Obviously, that’s what I’ve told them. However, things are a little more complicated now that the FBI is involved. It’s difficult to say no to the feds.”
“What happens if he doesn’t talk to them?” Mom says.
“Well, there’s no doubt the state will move forward with the bribery charge. And that’s just for starters. Now that the FBI is here . . .” Ezekiel spreads out his hands, as if to say Who knows?
“Obstruction of justice?” Mom says.
“Could be. They can come up with all
kinds of trumped-up charges when they want to. They could even argue those bribery charges meet the federal statute. And if they do that . . .”
Ezekiel drones on, going back and forth with Mom, tossing around legal terms like they’re holding a mock trial. They talk about Zach like he’s in a video game, being moved around by whoever has the controller.
In fact, he feels like that most of the time.
Usually, he goes along with it because it’s easier, because he’s young, and because these are the people who are supposed to know what’s best for him. Maybe they do. Maybe they are making the best decisions. They just aren’t the right ones.
If Zach’s father was in this position, he wouldn’t tolerate it. And Zach is nothing if not his father’s son.
“I’ll talk to them,” he says, standing up from the couch. “Set it up.”
He ignores the protests from his parents, and from his lawyer, and he walks away from all of them.
Feels pretty good.
* * *
IN THE DEAD of night, Fallon drives to the school. No other cars on the road. Not a person in sight. The only sign of life is the streetlights, and it’s a little creepy. Fallon keeps checking her rearview mirror, waiting for someone else to appear.
The school is cordoned off now, taken over by the FBI, but she doesn’t need to get inside. She needs to get close to her camera. If she can get within range, she can download the data and delete it from the camera itself.
Assuming the FBI hasn’t already found it.
It’s unlikely, she thinks. The camera is tucked away behind a book, far from any food or drinks or poisons. Unless they plan on emptying the entire school of every book, paper, and smartboard, it should be safe. She hopes. Because it would be a bad time to get caught illegally recording someone in the classroom of a private school.
She’s pretty sure deleting the footage doesn’t erase it forever. And if anyone can recover it from the camera, it’s the FBI. But she has to try.
The east side of the school is where Teddy’s room is, and right now she’s the only one on the road. Not surprising at two o’clock in the morning.
She pulls over to the curb and takes out her phone. At first, the app doesn’t connect. After three attempts, it finally does. Downloading the data doesn’t take long. Again, not surprising. The camera is motion-activated, and the school has been closed since the poisonings on Monday. The last time she retrieved the data was at lunch on Friday.
As she drives away, everything feels a little less creepy. Maybe because nobody stopped her to ask what she was doing.
But the closer she gets to home, the angrier she gets.
On Friday, Teddy had stayed in his classroom during lunch. Fallon never got a chance to adjust the camera, which means she still can’t see his computer screen clearly. Now, she’s got nothing. Absolutely nothing.
Hard to ruin someone’s life without information.
She stomps up the stairs of her building and into her apartment. It feels just as small and suffocating as when she left it. Sleep isn’t an option. Not yet. She loads the data into her laptop and starts watching the footage.
Teddy eating lunch. Teddy working on his computer. Teddy teaching his afternoon classes. Teddy gathering up his things and leaving right after his last class ends.
The camera stopped recording at that point.
Until classes began again on Monday morning, the only person who should appear on the video is Joe. He cleans the classrooms every night.
Fallon sees that, as expected.
But then there’s more.
63
TWO FBI AGENTS walk into the interrogation room where Zach and his lawyer are waiting. One man, one woman, both middle-aged and wearing suits. The man is bald, with small eyes and thin lips. The woman wears no makeup and she has short, simple hair. A sensible haircut, Mom would say. She hates those.
Zach is wearing pressed khakis and a brand-new white button-down, and his hair is freshly cut. He smiles, because he always smiles when he meets someone, even if they work for the FBI and they’re investigating him.
His parents made it clear they are 100 percent against this interview. Zach 100 percent does not care. And in this state, he can talk to them without having his parents present.
“Thank you for meeting with us,” the woman says. “I’m Agent Pruitt. This is Agent Roland.” Agent Roland sits across from Ezekiel, while Agent Pruitt sits across from Zach.
So she’s the one who’s going to ask all the questions. Good to know.
“This must be a little overwhelming for you,” she says.
“You could say that.” Zach doesn’t have to pretend to be nervous, because he already is.
“As I’m sure your lawyer has told you, we’re looking into the recent events at Belmont Academy,” she says. “Your name has come up.”
“I understand.”
“Good. Why don’t you start with Courtney Ross?”
“I’ve known her since we were in the fourth grade.” Zach stops, saying nothing further. Not without another question.
Agent Pruitt waits a beat before asking, “So is it fair to say you two are close?”
“Yes.”
“So close that you bribed a guard to see her in jail?” she says.
Ezekiel jumps in, doing his lawyer thing. “That hasn’t been proven. Those charges are—”
“I know,” Agent Pruitt says, raising a hand to cut him off. She doesn’t look at Ezekiel, only at Zach. Under the bad lighting, her eyes stand out. They’re green and brown, a swirl of colors that look different depending on the light. High cheekbones, too. She is anything but plain; she just wants to appear that way.
“Nothing you say in this room can be used against you in that case,” she says to Zach. “We aren’t recording this interview.”
Zach analyzes each word she uses, trying to find the loophole. In that case, she said. But they can probably use what he says in their case. If they have one.
Except he hasn’t poisoned anyone.
“Yes, I saw her in jail,” he says. “And I paid a guard to do it.”
Ezekiel stands up and says, “I need to talk to my client alone.”
Zach spent a lot of time thinking about what he would say to the FBI, and he knew his lawyer wouldn’t like it. That’s why he didn’t tell him in advance.
Agent Pruitt is still looking at Zach. “Do you want to speak to your lawyer alone?”
“No, I’m fine.”
“Zach, I must advise you to end this interview now,” Ezekiel says.
“I appreciate that, but I don’t see what’s wrong with telling the truth.”
Neither of the agents says a word. They wait until Ezekiel sits back down at the table, hands folded, mouth shut.
“So you did see Courtney in jail?” Agent Pruitt says.
“Yes. I saw her once and spoke to her on the phone once.”
“What did you two discuss?”
“She was really upset. First, because her mother had been murdered. And second, because she was in jail. I tried my best to comfort her, to tell her this was all a mistake and it would work out.” Not exactly a lie, but certainly an exaggeration. Courtney wasn’t that upset. She was depressed.
“Did you talk about how her mother died?” she asks.
“I never asked if she did it, if that’s what you’re thinking,” Zach says. “She told me anyway. She said she didn’t do it, and she wanted me to know that.”
“Do you believe her?”
“Absolutely.”
“What else did you talk about?”
“I told her about things going on at school, tried to give her a little break from her own problems. Just stupid things, gossip. She said she didn’t have anyone to talk to other than her lawyer and her dad and she was really lonely,” Zach says. “Still is, pr
obably.”
“Anything else?” Agent Pruitt says.
“No. I didn’t see her for very long. Ten, fifteen minutes at the most.”
“And the phone call? What did you talk about then?”
Zach takes a deep breath. “That was after Mrs. Benjamin died, and I knew Courtney would be upset. They worked together on the Bugle. Our student paper.”
Agent Pruitt nods.
“I wanted to see how she was doing,” Zach says.
“And how was she?”
“She was upset. It was all so . . . unreal. Still is.”
“Did you talk about how Sonia Benjamin died?”
“Yes,” Zach says. He looks down at the table, shaking his head a little. An act. “I hoped Courtney would be released. That after Mrs. Benjamin died, the police would realize Courtney wasn’t the killer. I told her that.”
Agent Pruitt doesn’t say anything. Zach continues looking down, waiting her out, determined not to meet her eye. Not yet.
“Zach,” she finally says. “You went to great lengths to see Courtney, and put your own self at risk just to talk to her.”
She stops. Zach remains quiet, waiting for the question. He knew this one was coming, and he’s prepared for it.
“Why would you do that?” she says.
Now he looks up. “Because I love her,” he says. “And I was going crazy without her.”
Agent Roland has been silent throughout the interview. He nods. Just a tiny bit, but it’s enough.
He gets it. More importantly, he believes it.
Zach slumps a little, trying to look sad. Trying to look like a lovesick teenager who couldn’t stand to be away from Courtney Ross. His unrequited love.
“I know it sounds stupid, but it’s true,” Zach says. “She doesn’t even know that . . . Well, anyway. That’s why. I really do love her.”
Agent Pruitt looks to her partner, who shrugs a little and turns to Zach.
“Thank you for coming in. I think that’s all we have for right now.”
For Your Own Good Page 21