Page 210 of Twins for Three Bad Boys

There’s no movement. No sign of him. Just shadows of a life I already walked away from weeks ago.

“I thought I was building something here,” I murmur. “Like if I just kept going, if I did everything right, it would eventually feel like mine.” I shake my head, a small, almost disbelieving movement. “But it never did. I just kept trying to make myself fit into it better… I’m not doing that anymore.”

Wayne slings an arm over my shoulder. “Well, I think that’s enough reminiscing for one day, don’t you? How about we get some food and head back to the hotel?”

“Yeah,” I say softly. “Yeah… that sounds good.”

Because anything has to be better than this.

And tomorrow, I’ll put all of this to bed once and for all, letting go of the last dead weight holding me back.

CHAPTER FORTY

Fletcher

I don’t enjoy schools.

That sounds worse than I mean it to, but there it is.

It’s not the kids. Kids are fine. Better than fine, usually. They’re honest in ways adults spend years training out of themselves. If they’re happy, you know it. If they don’t trust you, you know that too. There’s no polished language to hide behind. No meetings. No phrases such as ‘concern’ when people mean accusation or ‘procedure’ when they mean they’ve already decided who they’re willing to sacrifice.

Yeah, it’s the adults in schools I don’t trust.

Too many neat walls. Too many soft voices saying ugly things. Too many people convinced that if they use the right tone, cruelty doesn’t count.

So, by the time we pull into the school parking lot the next morning, I’m already in a mood.

The building looks exactly like I expected, brick, trim hedges, bright little signs out front with smiling suns and handprints and some slogan about kindness in colorful letters. The kind of place that’s supposed to make people feel safe. The kind of place that tells on itself the second it doesn’t.

June goes still in the passenger seat when Wayne kills the engine.

I see Rex notice it too. Of course, he does. He reaches forward from the back and hooks a finger lightly in one of the belt loops at the back of her jeans, not enough to pull, just enough to remind her he’s there. “Still with us, darlin’?”

She lets out a breath through her nose. “For my sins.”

That gets the smallest smile out of Wayne.

I watch her turn toward the windshield again, taking the building in. Her mouth presses thin, her hands folded in her lap, fingers tucked tightly against each other. She’s wearing the expression she gets when she’s determined not to let anyone see the fear, which mostly means I can see it all over her.

Wayne reaches across the center console and takes her hand. “We go in. We get answers. We leave.”

June nods once. “Okay.”

“Only thing you have to do,” Rex adds, “is tell the truth. Loud enough for those idiots to hear it.”

That gets a real smile this time, quick but genuine. “Tempting.”

I open my door before I can say anything that’ll tip my hand too much. If I start telling her how hard I’m trying not to break something already, this day will get harder, not easier.

A cold morning breeze hits my face, sharp enough to blow the last of the sleep out of me. We all move around the truck without much talking. Wayne comes around to June’s side automatically. Rex hangs back just enough to watch the lot. I stay close on June’s other side, not touching her but near enough that she doesn’t have to wonder where I am.

Inside, everything smells of lemon cleaner and stale coffee. The hallway is lined with bright construction paper projects, smiling cartoon pencils, framed student art. Tiny handprints in tempera paint. Cutout stars with names written in careful marker. Someone has put a quote about every child being a light under a bulletin board full of photos.

June slows.

I see her eyes move over the walls. The pictures. The classroom doors. The little things that wouldn’t mean much to anyone else but clearly mean plenty to her.

“This was your hall?” I ask quietly.