Chapter 9 - ELEVEN MINUTES
Eleven minutes.
That number followed me all night.
I imagined Ava pounding on a metal door while music played in the cafeteria and teachers walked through hallways a few yards away.
The next day, I found her old name scratched into the underside of a library desk.
AVA R. WAS HERE.
Maybe it meant nothing.
At lunch, nobody laughed at me anymore.
That was almost worse.
I had wanted to be treated like everyone else.
Now I was the principal’s daughter.
Again.
“My brother Jordan is on that list,” he said.
I recognized the name.
Jordan Lee-Kim had been suspended the year before.
“He didn’t attack anyone,” Noah said. “Sloane’s cousin shoved him first.”
“Why didn’t he appeal?”
“He did.”
Noah slid his phone across the table.
There was a photograph of a disciplinary form.
Jordan’s statement ended halfway down the page.
Under it, someone had added three sentences in a different font admitting he started the fight.
My skin prickled.
“Where did this come from?”
“My mom photographed the file before they closed his appeal.”
“Does Helen have it?”
“Not yet.”
Before I could answer, a shadow fell across the table.
Sloane stood there alone.
No Chloe. No Piper.
“Can we talk?”
Noah laughed.
“You’re kidding.”
She ignored him.
“Mia. Please.”
She led me to the empty art hallway.
“My dad says this is getting out of control.”
“Your dad deleted evidence.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I heard his voice.”
Her face went white.
So she hadn’t known about the audio.
Good.
She looked toward the stairwell.
“You need to stop digging.”
“Why?”
“Because Crowe isn’t the only adult involved.”
“Who else?”
Sloane shook her head.
“I can’t.”
“You poured a bucket of dirty water over me in front of two hundred people. Now you can’t talk?”
Her jaw tightened.
“You think I wanted any of this?”
“Yes.”
She flinched.
Then she whispered, “My dad keeps files on everyone.”
“What kind of files?”
“Parents. Teachers. Board members. Your dad.”
My chest tightened.
“What does he have on my father?”
May you like
Sloane looked straight at me.
“Something about your mother’s death.”
