by Lisa Gardner
D.D. grabbed the dash. “What the hell—”
“You’re gonna love this,” Miller reported excitedly. “Report of an incident—at Sandra Jones’s middle school.”
| CHAPTER NINETEEN |
Jason and Elizabeth Reyes had just exited her classroom when something hard hit Jason from behind. Jason stumbled, almost caught himself, then got nailed a second time behind his left knee.
He went down flat on his face, feeling the breath swoosh out of his chest. Then a small, furious form was upon him, pummeling the back of his neck, the side of his face, the top of his head. Jason’s hands were trapped beneath his stomach, hard knots against his kidneys. He struggled to get his arms beneath him, to heave himself up and over, while a sharp-cornered textbook connected with the side of his face.
“You killed her, you killed her, you killed her! You bastard, you big stupid son of a bitch. She warned me about you. She warned me!”
“Ethan! For heaven’s sake, Ethan Hastings, stop it!”
Ethan Hastings was not interested in Mrs. Lizbet’s command. From what Jason could tell in his shocked state, the computer nerd had a schoolbook and knew how to use it. The corner of the primer had cut his eye; Jason could feel the blood trickling down his temple even as the kid walloped him again.
Running footsteps now. Other people drawn by the commotion.
“Ethan, Ethan,” a male voice was shouting down the hall. “You get off him. Right now!”
Get up, get up, get up, get up, Jason was thinking. For heaven’s sake, get your hands beneath you and GET UP.
“I loved her. I loved her, I loved her. How dare you? How dare you?”
The third blow caught Jason beneath the ear and he saw stars. His vision blurred. He could tell his eyes wanted to roll up inside his head. His chest was too tight, he couldn’t draw a breath, making his lungs burn. He was going to pass out. He couldn’t afford to pass out.
“I fucking hate you!”
Then as quickly as it had started, it was done. Footsteps arrived, strong male arms grabbing the eighth-grader’s furious body and dragging him, kicking, off of Jason’s back. Jason seized the opportunity to flip over, struggling like a beached whale to draw breath. His chest hurt. His head, his back, behind his knee, where apparently he’d been slugged with the complete set of Encyclopedia Britannica. Holy crap.
Mrs. Lizbet was looking down at him, worry creasing her brow. “Are you okay? Don’t move. We’ll call an ambulance.”
No, he tried to say, but the word didn’t come out. He finally managed to inhale, his chest expanding with a grateful rush. He managed the word better on the exhale, low and pitiful as it sounded: “No.”
“Don’t be stupid—”
“No!” He rolled back over onto his hands and knees, his head hanging down, his skull still ringing. Leg hurt. Face hurt. Chest was better. See, real progress.
He got himself to his feet and became aware of approximately eight dozen wide-eyed teenagers and half a dozen very concerned adults standing around him. Ethan Hastings was being pinned in place by a man who appeared to be the gym teacher. The kid, all hundred and thirty pounds of him, was still struggling furiously, his carrot-topped, freckle-covered face staring at Jason with unadulterated hatred.
Jason put a hand to his face and wiped away the first streak of blood. Then the second. Kid had cut him pretty good, next to his left eye, but it was nothing that wouldn’t heal.
“What in the world …” The principal finally arrived at the scene. Phil Stewart took one look at Jason’s bruised and bleeding face, then Ethan’s rage-filled features, and started snapping commands. “You,” finger at Ethan, “in my office. And the rest of you,” finger at gawking kids, “back to class.”
The principal had spoken. Kids dispersed as swiftly as they had gathered, and Jason found himself following Ethan Hastings down the hallway, Mrs. Lizbet’s concerned hand on his elbow. He was trying to understand what had just happened to him, and doing a lousy job of it.
“Ree?” he asked in a low voice.
“Still in the gym. I’ll have Jenna walk her to the home ec class. They spend half their time baking cookies. That should keep her busy.”
“Thank you.” They came to the nurse’s office. Elizabeth steered him inside, where he met the shocked gaze of a matronly woman wearing cat-patterned surgical scrubs.
“Playing dodgeball at your age?” she asked.
“You know, for a small guy, a computer geek can be awfully quick.”
The nurse stared at Elizabeth. “There was an altercation,” the social studies teacher explained. “Unfortunately, Mr. Jones was attacked by a student.”
The nurse’s gaze widened more. For some reason, this affronted Jason’s masculinity and he felt compelled to add, “He had a textbook!”
That seemed to break the spell and the nurse got busy, fussing over his cut eye, giving him ice for the rapidly growing knot on his head. “You need to take two aspirin,” she informed him, “then sleep for eight hours.”
He wanted to laugh. Eight hours? He needed to sleep for eight days. But it wasn’t going to happen. Wasn’t going to happen.
He staggered his way out of the nurse’s office, back to admin, where he was sure the adventures were just beginning.
Jason found Phil Stewart sitting behind a massive oak desk, the kind of furniture meant to inspire awe in students and adults alike. A small flat-screen monitor occupied the left-hand corner of the desk, accompanied by a complicated-looking phone. The rest of the desk contained nothing but a desk blotter, and Phil’s clasped hands.
Ethan Hastings was sitting in a chair in the proverbial corner. He looked up when Jason entered, and for a moment, it appeared as if he might launch a fresh attack.
Jason decided to remain standing.
“I have called Ethan’s parents,” the principal announced crisply. “As well as the police. An assault by a student is a very serious matter. I have already informed Ethan’s parents that he will be suspended for the next five days, while an expulsion hearing is scheduled in front of the superintendent. Naturally, Mr. Jones may pursue criminal charges with the police.”
Ethan blanched, then fisted his hands mutinously and stared down at the carpet.
“I don’t think that will be necessary,” Jason said.
“Have you looked in a mirror?” Phil asked dryly.
Jason shrugged. “I understand how high emotions might be running at a time like this. For Ethan and for myself.”
If he was hoping for a relationship with the red-headed boy, it wasn’t happening. Ethan shot him another threatening look, then the office door opened and Adele stuck her head in.
“Police are here.”
“Send them in.”
The door opened wider, and Jason had the unpleasant shock of seeing Sergeant D.D. Warren and her sidekick, Detective Miller, enter. Wouldn’t uniformed officers normally respond to this kind of petty incident? Unless, of course, the detectives heard about it on the radio and connected their own dots.
Jason glanced ruefully at Ethan Hastings, understanding now that the pummeling had been nothing compared to the damage the boy was about to inflict.
“Sergeant D.D. Warren,” the female detective introduced herself, then Miller. They shook Phil’s hand, nodded at Ethan, then regarded Jason with the kind of flinty stares most cops reserved for gang-bangers or serial killers.
Grieving husband, he reminded himself, but didn’t really feel like playing anymore today.
“Heard you had an incident,” Warren stated.
Phil gestured to Ethan, whose head was ducked between his bony shoulders. “Ethan?” he asked quietly.
“It’s his fault,” the boy exploded, head coming up, finger stabbing at Jason. “Mrs. Sandra warned me about him. She warned me.”
D.D. gave Jason a look, still cool, but with an element of smug. “What did Mrs. Sandra say, Ethan?”
“She married young,” the boy said earnestly. “She was eighteen. That’s
not that much older than me, you know.”
The adults didn’t say anything.
“But she didn’t love him anymore.” The boy sneered, staring boldly at Jason. “She told me she didn’t love you anymore.”
Did the words hurt? Jason didn’t know. He was in his zone, and when he was in his zone, nothing could hurt him. That was the point of the zone. The whole reason he had developed it when he had been too young and too weak to do anything else to stop the pain.
“Sandy told me she was working with you on a project,” Jason said softly. “She said you are an excellent student, Ethan, and she enjoyed working with you very much.”
Ethan flushed, ducked his head again.
“How long have you loved her?” Jason pressed, aware of D.D. stiffening beside him as Phil Stewart’s eyes widened in shock.
“No—” the principal started.
“You don’t deserve her!” Ethan burst out. “You work all the time. You leave her alone. I would treat her better. I’d spend every second of every day with her if I could. I’m helping her with her teaching module, you know. I go to the basketball games, just for her. Because that’s what you’re supposed to do if you love someone. You’re supposed to stay with them, talk to them. You’re supposed to be with them.”
“How often were you with Mrs. Sandra?” Sergeant Warren asked now.
“Every day. Free period. I was teaching her all about navigating the Internet, how to explain it to the sixth-graders. I’m very good with computers, you know.”
Crap, Jason thought. Holy crap.
“Ethan, did you and Mrs. Sandra ever go out together?” Warren asked.
“I saw her every Thursday at the basketball games. Thursday nights are my favorite night of the whole week.”
“Did you go to her house or maybe someplace else?”
Principal Stewart looked like he was going to have a heart attack.
But Ethan shook his head. “No,” he said mournfully, then spun his overexcited gaze back to Jason. “She said I couldn’t come over. She said it would be too dangerous.”
“What else did Mrs. Jones say about her husband?” Warren asked.
The boy shrugged. “Just things. Stuff. But she didn’t have to say everything. I could see it for myself. She was so lonely. Sad. One day, she even started to cry. She wanted away from him, I could tell. But she was scared. I mean, look at him. I’d be scared, too.”
Everyone dutifully turned to Jason, his shadowed eyes, his heavily bearded face. He looked back down at the floor. Grieving husband, grieving husband.
“Ethan, it sounds like you and Mrs. Sandra talked a lot. Did you maybe e-mail her, or call her on her cell phone, or contact her some other way?” the sergeant asked.
“Yeah. Sure. I guess. But she told me not to call or write too often. She didn’t want her husband to get suspicious.” Another furious glare.
“So you and Mrs. Sandra would meet outside of school,” Principal Stewart asked now, looking gravely concerned.
But Ethan shook his head. “I already told you, we met during her free period. And Thursday nights. At the basketball games.”
“What else would you do during the basketball games?” Warren asked.
“What do you mean?”
The sergeant shrugged. “Did you go for walks together, maybe around the school, or sit and talk in a classroom, or anything else?”
The boy frowned at her. “Of course not. She had her daughter with her. She couldn’t just wander off and leave Ree all alone. Mrs. Sandra is a very good mom!”
Warren slid Jason a glance. “I work Thursday nights,” he supplied quietly. “So yes, she would have Ree with her.”
The sergeant nodded slightly and he could see her debating the same questions he was debating. Ethan Hastings clearly thought he had a relationship of some type with Sandy. Just how far had this relationship progressed? A genuine physical relationship between teacher and student? Or just wishful thinking on the part of one socially awkward kid?
In retrospect, Sandy’s bright blonde hair and youthful features appeared not so dissimilar to other young, pretty blonde teachers recently arrested for their inappropriate relationships with teenage students. And Ethan probably hadn’t missed the mark—no doubt Sandra felt lonely, neglected, overextended by the demands of juggling work and motherhood. Obviously Ethan was an adoring audience, quick to shower her with praise and attention.
But he was still a boy. Jason would like to believe that if his wife had betrayed him, it wasn’t with a thirteen-year-old boy. Then again, the other husbands had probably thought the same.
There was a discreet knock on the office door again. It cracked open enough for Adele to appear. “Ethan Hastings’s parents are here,” she said.
Principal Stewart nodded and the door opened wide enough to reveal two very shocked and distressed parents.
“Ethan,” the mom cried, pushing her way past the standing adults to her son. Ethan flung his arms around his mother’s waist, instantly converting from budding Don Juan to frightened little boy. They had the same hair, Jason thought idly. The mother’s short, reddish blonde bob blending in with her son’s disheveled carrot top. They were two peas in a pod. A perfect fit.
He forced himself back into the zone, that magic place where nothing could hurt.
“I don’t understand,” the father started, then noticed the bandage on Jason’s face. “He assaulted you? My son assaulted a grown man?”
“He has a promising right hook,” Jason offered, and then, when the man blanched, “Don’t worry, I’m not going to press charges.”
Sergeant Warren regarded him with fresh interest.
“Ethan was upset,” Jason continued. “I can understand that. I’m not having a very good week myself.”
The father appeared even more confused, but Jason didn’t feel like explaining anymore. He’d hit the wall. That was it. He was going home.
He didn’t bother with goodbyes, just exited the office while behind him Principal Stewart started explaining the “alleged incident” and the discipline ramification to two parents who probably never imagined their computer-nerd son so much as swatting a fly.
Sergeant Warren caught up with him in the school entryway Jason wasn’t surprised. He was tired and ragged, so of course she was going to press her advantage.
“Leaving so soon?” she called behind him.
“I need to get my daughter.”
“You finally found someone worthy of babysitting?”
He turned, keeping his face composed, refusing to rise to the bait. “She is with the home ec class. I understand they’re baking cookies.”
“She misses her mother, doesn’t she?”
He didn’t say anything.
“Gotta be tough. Being only four years old, and the last one who saw her mother alive.”
He didn’t say anything.
D.D. crossed her arms, moved closer to him now. She had an aggressive walk, with her long, denim-clad legs. An alpha, sizing up game. “How’s your cat?”
“Very cat-like.”
“Mr. Smith’s reappearance must’ve made your daughter very happy.”
“Actually, she cried for her mother.”
“And there goes your one line of defense—that a warm, loving father such as yourself would never harm his child’s pet.”
Jason didn’t say anything.
D.D. moved two steps closer, jerking her head back toward the principal’s office. “So what do you think of your competition? He might be young, but apparently Ethan Hastings spends more time with your wife than you do.”
“You should talk to Mrs. Lizbet,” Jason said.
“Oh yeah? She knows about Sandy and Ethan’s relationship?”
“The true nature, yes.”
“And what is that, Jason?”
“Student crushes are an occupational hazard. Ask any teacher.”
“Sounds like more than a crush to me.”
“Maybe for Ethan Hastings it is.�
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“You find out, Jason? Get jealous? Feel a need to put Sandy in her place?”
“I can honestly say I am not the jealous type.”
D.D. arched a brow, openly skeptical. “Everyone’s the jealous type. Even thirteen-year-old Ethan Hastings, to judge by the lump on your head.”
“He had a textbook,” Jason said automatically. “He caught me from behind.”
D.D. smiled at him now, the very picture of friendliness. “Come on, Jason. This has gone on long enough. Tell us what happened Wednesday night. Couples fight, we all understand that. Especially a young couple, juggling work, parenthood. And of course Sandy, being young, beautiful, and very alone most nights … So you got mad. Maybe said some things you shouldn’t have said. Maybe did some things you shouldn’t have done. Sooner you tell us, sooner we can put an end to all this. Get some closure for you and your child. Imagine how scared Ree must be feeling right now. Imagine what it must be like, waking up each morning with her mother’s last words running through her head.…”
He didn’t say anything.
D.D. stepped closer, until he could smell the scent of the soap she had used for her morning shower. She had blonde curly hair, not unlike Sandy’s. Beautiful hair, Ree had said, no doubt already missing her mother.
“Tell me where she is,” D.D. whispered next to his ear. “Just tell me where Sandy is, Jason, and I’ll bring her home to Ree.”
He leaned closer, so close his lips might have brushed the curve of her cheek, and he could feel the slight involuntary quiver of her body. “Ask Ethan Hastings,” he whispered.
D.D. recoiled. “You’re blaming a thirteen-year-old boy?” she asked incredulously.
“Never underestimate youth,” he said, stony-faced. “Why, the things I did at that age …”
D.D.’s features had shuttered closed. “Jason,” she said tersely, “for a smart man, you’re being very stupid.”
“Because I won’t let you arrest me?”
“No, because you’re not connecting the dots. Let me put it this way By your own admission, you’re not the one who harmed your wife—”
“True.”
“Yet by your daughter’s admission, someone entered your home Wednesday night and harmed Sandy.”