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That assistant football coach got between them, and he was talking, though Hunter wasn’t really listening. Something about fighting and the guidance office and . . . Hunter didn’t give a crap.
His eyes were on Kate, standing there among the gathered crowd, next to Nick Merrick, Gabriel’s twin.
Nick was talking, his tone full of an almost resigned exasperation. “So now you’ve met my other brother, Gabriel . . .”
Hunter wasn’t listening to him, either.
He was staring at Kate. Or more precisely, her hand.
And the way it was resting on Nick Merrick’s arm.
Hunter slouched in the chair in the guidance office and stared at the corner of Vickers’s desk. His shirt was wet and tacky from the soup, and somehow it had turned ice cold on the walk down here. He didn’t want to give Gabriel the satisfaction of hearing him complain about it.
Kate and Nick. How had that happened? Wasn’t Nick dating Becca’s friend, Quinn?
The air felt tight and scratchy against his skin, like a wool sweater that didn’t fit right.
Ms. Vickers was tapping her pen against her desk blotter. “Twice in one day, Hunter.”
He wanted to ask if she could just give him detention or whatever so he could get the hell out of this room.
But he bit back the words. Becca’s father’s parting comment kept ricocheting around his brain, adding to the headache. You made your bed, kid. Now you lie in it.
It sounded so much like something his father would have said.
Ms. Vickers shifted in her chair. The fluorescent light in the ceiling was buzzing with a tiny flicker. “And Gabriel Merrick. I’d hoped your recent brush with the law would keep you out of my office for a while.”
“I’m happy to leave.”
She didn’t crack a smile. “You know we don’t take physical altercations lightly here. Who wants to tell me what happened?”
Hunter didn’t lift his eyes from the corner of her desk, waiting for Gabriel to sell him out.
But Gabriel didn’t say anything, either.
Ms. Vickers sighed. “All right, Hunter, what happened with Calla Dean? Coach Taylor says you had a run-in in the lunch line.”
Hunter felt his hands form fists. “I didn’t do anything.”
“She says—”
“She’s lying. I didn’t touch her.”
Ms. Vickers pursed her lips. “I asked you to stay away from her entirely. If I don’t think you can do that, you’re going to force me to suspend you.”
This was ridiculous. “I’m trying!”
“You didn’t make it through lunch. I’m not sure that qualifies as trying very hard.”
Hunter almost came out of his chair. His hands were ready to snap the plastic armrests clean off. “I didn’t—”
“Hey.” Gabriel’s voice was sharp.
Hunter rounded on him, ready to finish what he’d started in the cafeteria. “What?”
Gabriel didn’t flinch from his look. “Dial it back a notch.” He glanced up.
And then Hunter realized that the overhead light was buzzing more frantically, making loud clicks within the tube. The air in the room had to have dropped ten degrees.
