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Clearwater U allows students to check their grades and other class assignments online. It’s not usually something students are able to post on—we can only access information that teachers and admins post. But if Leslie uploads the video of Trent there, it’s practically a guarantee that the whole school will see it.
Finals just finished. People will be logging in all across campus to check their grades.
And instead, they’ll see… this.
A tiny part of me feels like absolute shit right now. But although it seems way too harsh to do this, Trent has already done far worse to me. I don’t even care at this point. My life is over with anyway, so might as well take a page out of Trent’s book.
It takes a devil to beat a devil.
With a few keystrokes, Leslie uploads the file—but I’m the one who presses ‘Post’.
25
West
As Trent, Reese, and I walk across campus, silence reigns between us.
We’re all trying to decompress from what happened yesterday. I didn’t think things were going to escalate to that level, but considering the fire I’ve always seen in Emma, I’m not all that surprised she went after Trent the way she did.
Fuck. Some days, it feels like all four of us are going to destroy each other. Like we’re on a train that’s hurtling toward a brick wall, but we’re all too stubborn to pull the fucking brakes.
Reese finally breaks the silence. “Dude, why didn’t you tell us what you were doing?”
“Because I didn’t want you to stop me,” Trent shoots back, his voice stony. He’s still got a bruise by his eye.
“You’ve fucked us over too, you know,” I grunt. I’m lucky as hell my grades were solid in all my other classes, so this didn’t affect me too badly, but still. I would’ve appreciated a fucking warning.
“It’s fine. We won’t be kicked out of school.”
“It was too far, man,” Reese says, anger tightening his voice. “We’ve always been a team. And you went behind our backs on this. It’s not fucking cool.”
“Listen,” Trent says, stepping ahead of us. He turns around to face us, putting a hand on each of our chests to stop us in our tracks. “I know it’s fucked up. But it was the only way. I was ready to forgive her. Fuck, I was fall—” He breaks off, his face hardening. Then he shakes his head. “It’s better this way. We wanted her gone, right? Well, now she’s gone. We won’t have to see her face ever again.”
Gone.
It’s true. She’s gone. Emma might not be physically off campus yet, but she will be soon. The school will rescind her admission, and she’ll leave. Maybe she and her dad will leave Clearwater again, just like they did when we were all in high school.
This is what I wanted. Right?
It was all I could think about for weeks after she first showed up here. Getting her out. Out of school, out of my life, out of my head and my heart.
But now?
That’s the last fucking thing I want.
Trent, Reese, and I have always had each other’s backs, and that means more to me than almost anything.
But I don’t know if I can have Trent’s back on this. I know she fucked him over in high school, but after hearing her scream at him yesterday, seeing the wild look on her face, I’m nowhere near as convinced as he is that she’s lying.
I’m starting to think maybe he let his pain at the fucked-up shit his parents went through blind him to the truth.
Trent turns without another word and continues walking across campus. Reese and I slide each other looks, and I can sense that he’s not totally convinced everything has gone down the right way either.
“Let’s go.”
I jerk my head toward Trent’s retreating back. It’s about time the three of us had this out once and for all. All of it.
We start to head after him, but that’s when I notice something strange happening around us.
