“Michael? No. No!” She grabbed my forearms. “I wanted to help him. He told me everything—about Cesare. But something’s not right. He’s hiding something.”
Air huffed through my nose. “Just one thing?” Feeling it, how everything with him was this ocean of lies. Of ego. Of control. Manipulation.
Her hands dropped. She stepped away from me. “He’s not like that.”
I closed my eyes. Took a deep breath. Pushed it out slowly, through my nose. Because now I knew, what I hadn’t been able to ask. Where I stood with her.
“What do you think it is, then?” I asked.
Her head shook again. That minimalist move. Almost unconscious. “Maybe I’m wrong.”
The silence stood between us. My hands itched, wanted to reach out and stroke the hair feathering her temple.
I crossed my arms over my chest. “He’s the one I should be talking to, then.”
She didn’t say anything. Chewed her lip instead of looking at me.
I left her standing there.
As I crossed the parking lot, the bell sounded. Michael wasn’t at his car, so I went inside, to his homeroom. He wasn’t there, either.
I went to my homeroom.
Michael was waiting by the door. “Come on,” he said, taking my arm and propelling me toward the bathroom.
I shook off his hand, but followed him inside. Michael checked the stalls to make sure we had privacy. He spoke before I could.
“I’m dealing for Cesare,” he said. “Cyndra’s helping me. But everyone thinks it’s you.”
My teeth ground tight. “Why are you telling me this now?”
Michael’s hand went up to the blade of muscle alongside his neck. He squeezed and pulled, trying to shift an invisible creature. “You were eventually going to find out. I thought it would be better if I told you myself.” Knowing that I’d already heard.
Cyndra. Giving him the heads-up. She’d probably texted him as soon as I left her. A muscle jumped in my jaw, something telling it to bite. “We’re done.”
I turned to the door.
Michael lunged in front of me. Blocked the door, hands up like I was a car skidding across ice.
“Wait! Why should this change anything? It’s exactly what everyone has been thinking anyway. Ever since you started hanging out with us. Ever since you started showing up at our parties in new clothes.”
“Think I don’t know that? Move.”
“Stop and think. You’re not dealing. I don’t want you to deal—”
“Good.”
“It’s perfect. Classic misdirection. Everyone thinks it’s you. But it’s not. You won’t get in trouble, you won’t get caught, because you’re not actually doing anything. Meanwhile, they’ll never even think to check me. Or Cyndra. It’s perfect. It helps me, but it doesn’t hurt you.”
“How do you know what hurts me?”
A smirk curled his lips, but he was smart enough to keep his mouth shut.
“What if you get caught?” My fist pressed his chest.
A wide smile split his face. “I won’t.”
“If you do? I’m sure you’d take the weight for everyone, right? For me?”
He tried to shrug, but pressed against the door, it looked more like a small struggle than a gesture of nonchalance. “If I get caught—if—I can handle it. And no one else will get involved.”
Like he wouldn’t throw me under the bus if it came to it.
“I told you. I can get away with murder,” Michael said.
Using the expression, although it was literally what he’d proposed.
I let my fist drop. Because he was right. It didn’t change a damn thing. It was what everyone thought, and nothing would change that. And it didn’t even matter if it did. I was already implicated. So the only real question was: Would Michael get caught?
I told myself it didn’t matter what people thought. That it didn’t matter what Michael did or didn’t do. That it didn’t make a difference what Cyndra did, either. And what would happen if I quit now? It sure as hell wouldn’t be safer. If Michael wanted to run his little schemes, he could do it just as easily without me. At least if I kept working for him I could keep an eye on him.
It was too late. I was already involved.
What could I do to protect myself and Janie? The answer was simple. Help Michael get away with it. Help him get out of his jam. Think of all the angles. Cover them.
Exactly what Michael wanted.
“Fine.” A smile tugged my mouth. “Hey, thanks for telling me.” In honeyed tones of fake gratitude.
Michael had done what he always did. Tried to get in front of the situation. Take control, by “breaking” the news to me.
So he could either think I’d bought it, which I wasn’t a good enough actor to sell, or I could call him on it. So he knew I wasn’t a clueless idiot.
Either way. He was right.
Nothing had changed. I’d keep taking his money, and he knew it.
And Cyndra had shown me precisely where I stood.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
The rest of the week and half of the next one went by quickly, feeling like a curve in the track. I kept my eyes open and my mouth shut.
Michael acted different—like he knew something. Like he’d gotten the upper hand, maybe with Cesare. Maybe with someone else. It put me on edge, but the money kept coming, and all I had to do was hang out.
It was safe enough. I’d see it coming—whatever it was that put that oil-slick grin on Michael’s face.
And it was too easy to keep going. I’d walk Janie to the bus, then walk to Clay’s, and then to school, where I’d change clothes. Breakfast in the parking lot with Michael and his gang. Break in the courtyard, lunch outside at the picnic tables (except one day when it rained and we displaced the drama nerds inside), and afternoons of mostly free time.
Rinse. Repeat.
It was weird. Weird because I got used to it so fast.
Janie got me some greasy bruise-ointment from the Asian grocery. By the end of the week, they’d faded to yellow-brown and my ribs felt good enough with the brace on that I went to help Jonesy.
More money. Every bit got us closer.