AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I don’t give a fuck,I thought acidly. Then I turned my attention to Grace.
Finally, I got her alone. Finally, I could get my pen back.
“You have something of mine,” I said in a low voice.
“And what might that be?”
“Don’t play dumb. You’re wasting time.”
“Wasting who’s time? Yours? Like it’s so valuable.”
“You never get time back,” I pointed out. “So yes, it’s themostvaluable. Give me my pen.”
“What pen?”
“Don’t play dumb,” I repeated. Though there was a voice in the back of my head wondering if she actually had it. There was a chance it fell out of my pocket on my motorcycle, clattered across the pavement, rolled into a ditch somewhere.
I would have explored that possibility, but Grace’s pouty lower lip was quivering ever so slightly.
I looked left, then right. There were too many ears in our immediate vicinity.
“Follow me.” I turned on my heel and walked away from the crowd.
Just as predicted, I could hear her heels clicking on the cement behind me.
She was following me; that was a good sign.People never followed you unless they wanted something.
She had questions. I had answers.
That meant I had leverage.
When we got to a secluded corner under an extravagant cherry blossom tree, I stopped. “Did you use it?”
“What?”
I turned toward her. “Did you write with it?”
She crossed her arms over her chest. “It’s a pen. You’re supposed to write with it.”
I stepped toward her.
Her eyes widened with fear.
I didn’t care—she needed to understand the gravity of what she’d done.
“What did you write?” I asked softly, staring into her eyes, watching for lies.
“None of your business.”
“Look,” I said, sweeping a hand over my face. “That’s no ordinary pen.”
“I can tell. It looks expensive. Too bad you can’t keep track of your stuff—”
“You think this is agame?You think you’re teaching me alesson?”
She winced, but then stiffened. “I’m a teacher. So yes.”
I made a mental note to lower my voice. I didn’t want to scare her; I just needed her to understand that this was serious. “It’s just that if you used it, if you poured any amount of emotion into what you wrote—”
