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ALLIE
“On your next exam, you will be asked about the differences between mitosis and meiosis, so I suggest that all of you go home and study this weekend. This will be one of the hardest exams of the semester,” Mr. Barnes said and stared down all the students in his class like a fucking hawk.
The entire class stayed quiet, giving him slight nods. To say that everyone in Redwood was terrified of his exams was an understatement. People tried hard to avoid Mr. Barnes’s class if they could because that man had it out for the entire student population.
“Did you see Carter’s face?” Jenny whispered behind me to her friend.
“Someone fucked him up bad,” another student whispered.
Imani leaned closer to me. “Have you seen him yet? I heard he looks like shit.”
I swallowed hard and shook my head. Jace had told me he talked to Carter, but I highly doubted it. For Coach to sit him out, there must have been some kind of fight. Coach knew that they probably wouldn’t win without Jace in the game. It had to be bad.
“No,” I said. “I’m too nervous.”
Mr. Barnes cleared his throat and narrowed his eyes at me. “Do you have a question?”
Jenny and the other student smacked their lips closed and looked at me, as if I were the only one who had been talking during the lecture.
I shook my head and took one for the entire Biology class. “No, sir.”
After Mr. Barnes grimaced and looked away, I slumped down in my seat, thankful that he hadn’t called me out. I couldn’t deal with more drama this week. Between Jace and Carter and Kai yesterday, I wanted one peaceful day in this hellhole town.
“Class is dismissed. Allie, stay behind. We need to chat.”
All the blood drained from my face. This was the first time since Mr. Barnes had caught Jace and me in his classroom that he had spoken my name or even looked in my direction. If he was going to start something about it, I didn’t know what the hell I was going to do.
Everyone started packing up their materials.
Imani glanced over at me. “What’s that all about?” she asked, taking off her reading glasses and placing them into her case.
I envied her that she only had to wear them for reading and wasn’t as blind as I was when it came to seeing things mere feet in front of me.
“I don’t know,” I said, gathering my belongings and walking up to Mr. Barnes’s desk. “I’ll meet you in the hall.”
Mr. Barnes waited until all the other students were out of class and the door was closed. I hugged my books to my chest and shifted uncomfortably back and forth on my feet. He sat at his new desk and handed me an envelope.
“What’s this?” I asked, voice barely above a whisper.
“The letter of recommendation that you requested for your scholarship, not that you actually need one, seeing who your mother married, but—”
“You actually wrote one for me?” I asked with wide eyes.
“Of course I did. You’re the most hardworking, driven, and intelligent Biology student I have seen in my twenty-two years of working here. And before you ask, there is nothing in that letter about what I”—he cleared his throat—“walked in on the other week.”
My lips curled into a smile, and I clutched the letter to my chest. After thanking him, I walked out of the class to find Imani gawking at someone across the hall. With piercing blue eyes, a sharp jaw, and a shirt that looked a size too big for his scrawny body, a guy was trying to push the key into a classroom diagonal from us.
“Who is that?” I asked, brows furrowed.
“A new professor,” she said, squinting at the door. “Computer Science, it looks like.”
“Doesn’t Mrs. Goldman teach Computer Science?”
Imani looped her arm around mine and began walking down Redwood’s halls. “Mrs. Goldman got caught hacking into some of her students’ parents’ computers and accounts,” Imani said, shaking her head. “She had been taking money from them. I think she stole almost a half-billion dollars.”
My eyes widened. “What?! When did this happen?”
“Last week. You’ve been too preoccupied with your stepbrother’s cock to listen to the gossip, it seems.”
