Chapter 11 - The Safe at Harper House
Emma didn't ask Olivia to steal the recording. Instead she told Ruiz what Olivia had said and let the investigator determine whether it could be requested lawfully.
At home, Grant listened without interrupting. When she finished he asked, "How are you sleeping?"
"Like a person who knows everyone at school has an opinion about her."
He nodded. "We can change schools."
"And leave Maya? The younger kids? No."
"Staying doesn't make you more worthy."
"Leaving wouldn't make me less worthy either," she said. "I know. I just don't want to go."
At Harper House, Olivia's parents fought behind the study door. She sat on the stairs and heard her mother say, "You brought a school camera into this house?"
Charles answered, "I brought it where no teenager could find it."
"Then why did Olivia know?"
Olivia climbed back to her room before they caught her listening. She hadn't expected the sound of her mother's fear. Her parents always treated trouble as public relations. Not this time.
The next day Olivia brought her mother, Elise Harper, to Ruiz's office. Elise gave permission for counsel to review what she knew; she didn't claim that she had witnessed the cafeteria attack. She did say Charles had instructed her to delete messages about the meal contract.
"I didn't delete them," she said. "But I stayed quiet. That's mine to answer for."
Ruiz scheduled an interview and asked Elise to preserve the messages. Olivia watched her mother leave and looked suddenly much younger than seventeen.
A district email arrived while Emma was in class. Its subject line read: TEMPORARY SUSPENSION OF HUDSON MEAL PARTNERSHIP.
Emma opened it with rising dread. Unless a replacement vendor was found, free weekend meal bags would stop being distributed on Friday.
May you like
The investigation had begun to protect hungry students.
Now those students might be the first to pay for it.
