My face blanched. “What? I’m not his star student.”
“With SAT scores like the ones you have? Having students as smart as you brings in potential donations and future Ivy-League-destined individuals, so trust me, he doesn’t want anything to happen to you.”
My heart studded to a stop. “How do you know my SAT scores?”
Christian swiveled his head in my direction. We were looking at one another, and even through the blackness of my room, I swore I could feel his stare. “I looked through your file.”
I felt the muscles in my face falling. “You...what? My entire file?”
He didn’t miss a beat. “Yes.”
So that’s what this is about. Pity. Instantly, I felt my hopes come crashing down. I felt stupid. And worse, I felt ashamed.
“That’s why you're here.” I said it aloud as I was thinking it. Like he wasn’t even in the room.
“I’m here because—"
“Because you feel bad for me.” I scoffed and fell back onto the bed. “I don’t need your pity. I had a fucked-up life after my dad died. So what? The girl you knew back then is gone. I don’t even remember her. I don’t need you to save me anymore, Christian.”
“You should know by now that I don’t give people pity.”
“That’s why you're here!” I whisper-yelled. “You read my file. Learned all there is to know about me and my life. How my mom is now a crackhead and gave up her rights to me the first time CPS was called, how my dad was murdered because he was a part of some sketchy money laundering shit, how I’ve lived in seven foster homes, and well, I told you about Gabe, so you know everything there is to know about that.” I felt my body shaking with anger. I wanted to scream. The frustration I felt was inevitable. The frustration not only over the fact that Christian knew things about me that I wanted to keep buried, but also because a lot of people knew things about me that I didn’t want to even think about myself. That was all I was to most people: a freaking file.
“That is not why I’m here.”
I shot up, my hair flying past my face, the quilt falling to my legs. “It is! You already told me you hated me, wanted me gone, blamed me for your mom's death, and yet you’re here? Something doesn’t add up, Christian. You feel guilty for treating me like shit because my entire life is shit.”
A beat of silence passed between us. My chest was heaving up and down beneath my T-shirt. My hands were clenched together in my lap. Sometimes I did this; something small provoked me, and then I just lashed out. Everything seemed to hit me all at once.
Christian’s voice was supposed to soothe me, but I was too worked up to allow it. “Let’s not bring up my mother’s death.”
I was too angry and mortified that he had read my file to know what to say. Instead, I rolled over, my back now facing him. “I’m going to sleep. Feel free to climb out my window at any time.”
I wanted to grab my iPod in the worst way, but getting up out of the bed felt like I was waving a white flag, like I was backing down from my anger. I wasn’t. So instead, I just lay there, fuming, pushing all the thoughts of the past out of my head. I carefully built up my walls and pretended I was in my own world, without the memories or echoes of a gunshot. But soon, I found myself listening to the sound of Christian’s breathing, and it somehow lulled me right to sleep.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Christian
I parked my Charger beside Ollie and Eric, my eyes scanning the courtyard for a dark-haired girl who wouldn’t even look in my direction.
My neck was stiff as fuck, my back aching, both of which had nothing to do with football. Three days of sleeping up against a wall or on the floor did that to you.
Hayley wasn’t speaking to me. I wasn’t speaking to her, either.
She was angry that I had read her file, refused to believe that I was at her house for any other reason than pity, and when she said things weren’t adding up, she was absolutely right. What the fuck am I doing? The golden question. I had no idea. I was supposed to feel guilt and hatred when I looked at her face, just like it was before, but I felt so much more. And it was making me crazy. I climbed through her window every night as if I didn’t tell myself hours prior to stay away.
I thought back to the conversation between my father and me this morning and sighed.
“I got a voicemail from Jim. Why did you call him?”
“Because I needed him to look into something for me.”
“Hayley Smith? Stay out of it, Christian.”
“Why? What do you know?”
“What I know is that it isn’t safe for you to be butting into things that are well beyond your years. Let the authorities handle it.”