Chapter 22: Move

The quad noticed before I did.

The chatter on the paths dropped away in rings.

A girl with a coffee stopped with the cup halfway to her mouth.

Maybe it was the same girl. I didn't check.

Will took one step forward.

I put my hand on his arm.

"No," I said quietly. "Mine."

He stepped back.

Maddie grabbed his sleeve and held on.

Hunter stood on the brick path in front of me.

His navy jacket was still twisted where the officers had held it. One button was missing.

His hair had come loose from the gel.

For the first time since I'd met him, there was nobody behind him.

No bodyguards. No Tyler. No aunt. No father.

Just a boy in an expensive suit on a path he didn't own anymore.

"You did this," he said.

His voice cracked on the last word.

I didn't say anything.

"You came here and you took everything," he said. "My aunt. My school. My dad won't even look at me. He walked right past me. Did you see that?"

"I saw it."

"So are you happy?"

People had stopped all over the quad now.

Sixty, eighty of them. Phones up.

Nobody laughed.

Nobody said a word.

I looked at his jacket.

At the tear on the shoulder seam. At the missing button.

Three weeks ago I'd have noticed the cut was off.

Now I just noticed it was a sad jacket on a frightened boy.

I checked my watch.

It was ten past twelve.

"Move," I said.

That was all.

One word, not loud.

He stood there for a long second.

I could see him looking for it. The next line. The thing his father would say. The threat. The name on the building.

There wasn't one.

He stepped aside.

He stepped off the brick path onto the grass and stood there with his hands at his sides while I walked past him.

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