The Lie (Kings of Linwood Academy 2)

“There’s always a choice! Linc didn’t have to erase those fucking pictures from his phone. You all didn’t have to lie about what you saw! You could’ve backed me up! You could’ve told Detective Dunagan what we saw, and maybe if all four of us told the same story, he would’ve looked into it! You had plenty of choices. So don’t pretend like you didn’t.”

Chase shares a look with his brother, doing that strange twin thing where they seem to have an entire conversation with no words. Then Dax pushes away from the door and comes to sit next to Chase on the bed.

“Yeah, okay.” Dax dips his head in a nod, running a hand over the back of his neck. “We did have a choice. And the option we chose was a shitty one. But out of all the choices we had in a fucked up situation, it was the best one there was.”

I blink at him.

That’s not what I was expecting him to say.

I expected more platitudes, more denials that they did anything wrong. I never really expected him to admit that what they did was awful. That they hadn’t wanted to do it.

“Why?” I whisper.

I wish I hadn’t dropped my textbook. I want something to hold onto, a buffer between me and these boys who get under my skin too fast, too easily. They break down my defenses as if the walls around my heart are made of fucking paper, and I can’t afford to get burned again.

Chase leans forward, spreading his legs and planting his elbows on his muscled thighs. He’s wearing dark jeans and a forest green shirt that draws out the green in his eyes.

“River was keeping as close of tabs as possible on what his dad knew about the police investigation. Granted, that wasn’t everything—it’s not like the cops call up the lawyer with every little piece of information they get. But Mr. Bettencourt was running his own investigation too, trying to dig up stuff the police missed to prove that Iris’s death wasn’t an accidental hit-and-run. That’s what the Lepianes hired him for.”

“Yeah,” Dax chimes in, picking up smoothly where Chase left off, as if the two of them share a damn brain or something. “And as far as River knows, his dad didn’t have any clue your mom was on Dunagan’s radar. Not until after she was arrested.”

“We didn’t keep anything from you, Low.” Chase shakes his head. “It wasn’t like we all saw it coming and lied to you about it or didn’t tell you. We were as surprised as you were.”

Something in my chest loosens a bit when he says that.

I got roped into this thing with them, dragged into the inner circle of this tight-knit little group because I was with them when they witnessed a murder. But for a long time, it felt like I was just “the girl who was there too”, the annoying little thorn in their side who they had to keep from doing anything stupid.

It took a long time for me to feel like they actually trusted me, and to start to actually trust them back.

The night we snuck into Mr. Bettencourt’s law office and dug around for information on Iris’s investigation, I thought something changed between us all. It was the night I found out about River’s hearing impairment, and I made the guys promise to stop keeping me out of the loop on things.

And I thought they had—until my mom got dragged away in handcuffs.

When that happened, part of me was sure the guys had all known it was coming, that they’d planned for it, and that they’d deliberately kept me out of the loop as they conspired to betray my mom.

So it doesn’t make everything better, but it sure as fuck helps to know that they were as shocked as I was.

Assuming Chase is telling the truth.

“How can I believe you?” I tug my hair out of the knot at the top of my head, running my fingers through the long brown strands. “You guys lied to me and kept me in the dark about so much shit. I found out from girls in the fucking locker room that Lincoln hooked up with Iris last year. He could’ve told me about that, and he didn’t!”

Dax rolls his eyes. “Yeah, well. Linc’s personal issues aside, I promise you, Low—we didn’t know. If we’d had any idea your mom was gonna get arrested, we would’ve told you.”

“And that’s the whole fucking point!” Chase adds. “Somebody set her up.”

Seemingly unable to contain himself anymore, he jumps up from the bed and strides toward me, grabbing my shoulders and steering me toward the easy chair. He presses downward gently, and when I perch on the edge of the seat, he crouches in front of me.

“Who do you think called in that tip on your mom?”

“What do you—?”

“The man in the black mask.”

My heart feels like it stops beating, sitting like a lump of clay in my chest. “What?”

“We don’t have proof yet, but that’s our best guess. I mean, think about it, Low. Why would someone frame your mom for a murder you witnessed? It all ties up too neatly to not be connected somehow.”

“Yeah.” Dax steps forward to join his brother. Their shoulders brush as they both crouch before me, two sets of blue-green eyes gazing up at me. “And Detective Dunagan said they got a credible tip. That means it had to come from someone who knew enough about the murder to offer a believa