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My phone was ringing.
Gem was calling me. I answered because she’d not been in school yet. “Hello?” My voice was shaky.
“Oh. My. God! Where are you?” She stopped, her voice coming back calmer. “Sorry. I was panicking. Of all the days for me to have a dentist appointment, but I’m here and you weren’t answering your phone and I saw everything. Where are you? Theresa said she saw one of your cousins take you out of the cafeteria.”
“I’m—” I looked around, to five guys giving me not-happy looks. “I’m . . .” What did I do? I turned toward Clint.
He read my unspoken plea and took the phone from me. “Hello?”
I could hear Gem’s voice from the other end.
He nodded. “Let us have her for a bit. We’ll let you know when we’re done. She’ll need you.”
She was talking again, until he said, his voice soft, “Yeah. I know. Bye.”
He didn’t hand my phone over, going through it instead, sitting on the teacher’s desk.
“Clint?”
He was shaking his head, his eyes burning. His anger was surfacing again. “This shit—this fucker. He doesn’t get this attention anymore. He doesn’t get to do this shit to our cousin.”
“Clint.” Trenton’s entire body was vibrating. His tone was low.
Clint’s eyes flicked up, cold. “I’m not doing shit, but I’m going through here and clearing out the crap she doesn’t need to—” His finger clicked, and he froze.
I knew it then. Felt it because the room took on a whole new suffocating level of anger. It was sweltering. His eyes locked on me. “The fuck? He sent you this shit?”
It was the picture.
I nodded, feeling faint. “Last night.”
He was off the desk and coming at me.
I jerked from the abruptness.
The rest of the guys startled too, but Scout got between Cint and me. “Calm it, Maroney.”
He had a hand to Clint’s chest, and Clint looked at it, looked at Scout, and growled, “I don’t give a fuck how good you hit. You get between me and my cousin, we’re going to have problems.”
Scout was two inches taller than my cousins, but the way Clint was looking, none of that mattered.
Scout didn’t move back, but his hand dropped. “You’re coming at her pissed. How’s that going to make her feel?”
Clint’s eyes were narrowed, and his tone sent chills down my spine. “Don’t forget she took the brunt of the school gossip last week because of our fallout, and we all know that was coincidental timing because you didn’t want that other shit to come out about Amalia.”
“Clint.” Cohen entered the exchange.
Clint swung his gaze his way, but his head was lowered and locked. He wasn’t chilling. “Don’t fucking start, Rodriguez.”
Cohen’s eyes narrowed to slits too.
Alex coughed. “Okay. Stop. Scout called me this morning because he knew about the text Ramsay got sent last night.”
Trenton and Clint both exploded.
“What?”
“Are you kidding me? You say this shit now?” That was from Clint.
“We were at the party together.” Scout started, but I tuned him out.
People knew. It was out.
It hadn’t been before.
It was now.
I’d told him.
I’d told only him.
“You piece of shit,” I said it quietly, but it got their attention.
They’d still been arguing.
I was standing behind them.
They all turned to face me.
Now my body was vibrating. Anger. Rage. It was filling me up, and filling me fast, and I needed an outlet for it. Scout was my outlet. “You goddamn piece of fucking shit. You told? You did this. You let it out—”
“I didn’t.”
“Bullshit. I tell you and the very next day it comes out?”
His face had been unreadable, masked, but then it switched, and white-hot rage was staring back at me. He took a step toward me, “I didn’t! That’s the whole fucking reason I’m here. I called Alex this morning to let him know about the text because you don’t seem rational half the fucking time. The other reason I called him was to apologize and to let him know that I knew. That you told me. I’m tired of not talking to three of my best friends, and with what you laid on me last night, I really didn’t want to keep not talking to them.” He stopped after that, his nostrils flared.
He was in his emotions.
I was in my emotions. “You’re lying.”
Those nostrils flared again. “I don’t fucking lie.”
“He doesn’t lie!” Cohen growled from the side.
I needed to take a minute, one minute. I needed to think clearly, and as soon as I made that decision, I could see everyone in the room wasn’t thinking clearly either. Alex was warring, going between his friends and his family. Clint had moved so he was standing at my side, now ready to get between Scout and me.
And Trenton . . .
“Where’s Trenton?”
He was gone.
“Fuck,” from Alex.
This wasn’t good.
He said, “Oh no.”
This was bad. Really bad.
Trenton was a wildcard. With what was said in here, who knew what he would do?
