The Risk (Kings of Linwood Academy 3)

“What do you want to ask me about?” She sits up a little, seeming more anxious to get this moving along now that she knows she won’t be getting a twin sandwich.

That’s right, bitch. My sandwich.

Making sure not to let my thoughts show on my face, I take a step forward. “Someone told us that you knew Iris, and that you might’ve introduced her to an… an older man she was seeing. Is that true?”

She looks amused, a satisfied smirk playing across her lips. “Yeah. Probably.”

“What do you mean, probably?” Lincoln asks, his voice hard.

“I mean, I taught her my technique. I didn’t know she snagged a man though. Good for her.”

“What technique?”

Summer sighs, sitting up and swinging her legs off the bed. She leans back on her hands, eyeing the four boys before looking at me.

“Well, you seem like you’re doing okay. But in general, high school boys tend to be a bit of a letdown. I prefer older guys. They know what the fuck they’re doing in bed, plus they’ve got money to actually give you presents and stuff. Cartier jewelry,” she adds with a heavy inflection, as if I’m supposed to be impressed by this.

“So what’s your technique?” I ask.

“Well, if you want to land a big fish, you have to go where the big fish are.” She bats her eyelashes, and I decide I like this girl even less than I liked Iris. “My parents get about a billion invitations to black tie galas and fundraisers and stuff. They can only go to so many though—my mom doesn’t even like them, and my dad is so tightfisted he doesn’t like giving his money to anybody. So I take their invitations and go instead.”

So she can go trolling for rich older men. Ugh. Gross.

“And you taught this ‘trick’ to Iris?”

“Yeah.” She gives a satisfied smile. “I took her with me once. Said she was my plus-one.”

“What was the event? A gala? A fundraiser?”

Summer waves a hand airily, as if that little detail doesn’t matter one bit. I guess, for her purposes, it doesn’t.

“I don’t know. Some fundraiser.” She makes a little scoffing sound. “I can’t believe that bitch got a hookup and didn’t te

ll me.”

I want to ask if she knows Iris is dead, because she sure isn’t acting like it. But she must—it was all over the news. I guess her attention span just isn’t long enough for her to still be in mourning.

“Do you remember what it was for?” I press, taking another step forward. “When was it?”

She rolls her eyes in irritation, but purses her lips as she thinks about it. “In the spring. I dunno, it was a fundraiser for a politician. Halloway or something.”

My skin prickles all over, like a ghost just walked through me. It takes all my effort to keep my voice steady as I force words past my lips.

“Hollowell? Alexander Hollowell?”

“Oh, yeah.” She nods. “That was it, I think. She must’ve given her number to somebody there that night. I can’t believe she didn’t tell me, that bitch.”

“She never… told you anything about him? Never talked about a guy she was seeing?”

“Oh, she talked about Trent all the time.” Summer makes a face. “And I sort of got the sense she had another guy on the hook, but I thought it was someone else from Linwood.”

“Do they usually have photographers at those sorts of things?” River asks softly.

Summer tosses him a look like he’s some kind of ill-bred heathen. “Of course.”

We question her a little longer, but she keeps insisting she doesn’t know anything about the secret older man Iris was seeing. And even though I don’t want to, I believe her. Iris barely told Savannah anything about Hollowell, which means she either realized how taboo what she was doing was and wanted to keep it under wraps, or she was worried her “friends” would try to steal him from her.

When I can’t think of any more questions to ask Summer, we all go back downstairs, and the kings and I make a beeline toward our clothes. I considered telling Summer not to mention our conversation to anyone, but decided against it. She seems like the kind of girl who gets off on drama, so asking her to keep it quiet would basically be like daring her to tell everyone she knows.