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Her gaze shot to Brian and Joel. “So you two know about Ben?”
Both nodded, as if marionettes.
Brian returned his attention to Spencer. “You aren’t going to agree to help her, are you?” he asked, as if Spencer would be crazy to agree.
No question in his mind. “She has my answer.”
“Spencer, please.” Callie’s eyes misted with what he assumed were fake tears. He hated to be so skeptical; Callie was someone accustomed to getting what she wanted.
“I’m not likely going to be the class valedictorian because I’m stupid,” Spencer reminded her.
His response seemed to shock her, as if she hadn’t considered any ramifications that would fall on his head if he were to get involved in this. If someone from the school was dealing drugs and he started snooping around, who did Callie think they would go after? He might as well paint a bull’s-eye on his chest.
“Spencer won’t be taken in by you batting your eyelashes at him,” Brian told her.
Both his friends glared at her from across the table.
“You have your answer,” Joel, the more levelheaded of his friends, said. “Spencer’s not interested.”
Callie looked stunned, as if she found it hard to fathom that anyone, especially Spencer or his friends, would ever refuse her.
A commotion on the other side of the cafeteria broke out as Scott and Ben leaped from their chairs, sending them crashing to the floor. The two stood nose-to-nose, glaring at each other. Everyone in the room diverted their attention away from Callie to the other side of the room.
The lunch monitor, Mr. Sullivan, hurried over to separate the two, coming to stand between them as they continued to glare at each other. After a few minutes, they righted their chairs and sat back down.
“That was my fault,” Callie whispered, and lowered her head. This time it looked like the tears that flooded her eyes were genuine.
“What do you mean?” Spencer asked. Despite his determination not to care, he couldn’t help himself.
“Ben’s defending me.”
“To Scott?”
“I already told you,” she blurted out. “Scott’s upset, and when Scott gets angry like this, it’s not good. He’s always had something of a temper, and ever since Coach chose him to be the quarterback, it’s gotten worse. It’s like he feels it’s his right to be king and everyone should bow to whatever it is he wants.”
“Kind of like you?” Joel asked.
“Exactly,” she said, and released a deep sigh. “I embarrassed Scott at the dance and now he won’t stop bad-mouthing me in front of my brother.”
Both his friends swiveled their heads to Spencer, looking for him to explain.
Personally, he’d like to forget about the dance, put it out of his head, because if he didn’t, he’d find himself considering helping Callie and he knew better.
“Scott wanted to dance with Callie,” he told his friends, “and she basically said she’d rather be with me.”
Callie seemed to think this was the golden opportunity to prove herself. “I promised Spencer every dance and I stuck to my end of the bargain.”
Spencer wasn’t hearing it. “The only deal I agreed to was to hack into your brother’s accounts, which I did. It isn’t my fault nothing was there.”
“Yeah, nothing,” Brian said, and then added with a small display of pride. “Trust me, if there was anything to be found, Joel and I would have caught it.”
Spencer wanted to be sure she understood. “It was a mistake to ask you to homecoming with me. We were friends once, and I hoped to recapture that.” He’d wanted more but realized how impossible that was. They were different people now.
“We both made mistakes,” Callie agreed. “The thing is, you’re the only one I can trust. I need your help.”
It demanded all the resolve he could muster to refuse her. “I’m sorry, Callie. I did my part and that’s as far as I’m willing to go.”
Callie let that settle in for a moment before she turned her attention to Joel and Brian. “What about you two? Would you be willing to help me save my brother?” She made it sound like she was Joan of Arc, desperate for someone to fight alongside her.
