Say It Again (First Wives, #5)(9)

She considered sending a message to Reed. AJ Hofmann. That was all she’d need to give him, and she knew, instinctively, that Reed would look up the name.

Was that depending on another human being?

Probably.

How secure was Richter? Would her message even meet its mark?

Keep your actions close and your thoughts even closer. Sasha knew she wouldn’t reach out to Reed or Trina while at Richter. As firewalls went, the school had one with a pretty deep vault.

She finished in the bathroom and returned to bed. Familiar noises, or more to the point, familiar silence offered a sense of peace in the base of her skull. She closed her eyes and attempted to push the stranger at the bar from her head.

Her breathing slowed and the steady beat of her heart followed.

It was time to unplug and recharge.

A brief sense of panic had her reaching under her pillow.

Her fingers grazed the hard edge of the knife she kept within reach. She sighed and forced her heart to slow once again.



The library housed a smattering of students, mainly those at the college level who still attended Richter. The high school kids were in class, or so it would seem. And the primary school kids almost never spent time in the library during the day.

Sasha greeted the librarian by name when she entered the stately room. “Hello, Ms. Arnold.”

The sixtysomething-year-old woman was the poster version of every librarian out there. Reading glasses perched on the end of her nose, salt-and-pepper hair pulled back in a bun, the extent of makeup was a nude gloss on her lips. Or maybe it was some kind of balm to ease the dryness.

“Ahh, Miss Budanov. I heard you were here. How are you?”

“Did the headmistress send out a memo?” The question was a joke. The silence it was met with confirmed that Lodovica had done just that.

“I don’t recall you visiting me many times while you were a student. What brings you to my domain now?”

“I find myself at a crossroads, as I’m sure the headmistress has implied. I’m not sure what direction to take and thought it might help to see where some of my classmates ended up seeking employment. I wanted to start by looking over the old yearbooks.”

“You didn’t keep yours?”

Sasha shook her head. “I didn’t see the need. Until now.”

Ms. Arnold walked around the desk and led Sasha through the library. They zigzagged through the stacks until they reached the location of Richter alumni.

“You’ll find what you’re looking for here.”

“Thank you.”

“Let me know if you need anything else.”

“How about an Internet password?”

Ms. Arnold blinked several times, smiled, and finally said, “Of course.”

She walked away and returned a few minutes later with a card that had a written password on it. “The service here hasn’t improved much over the years. All access to social media is restricted, much like when you were a student.”

“I remember.”

“Brilliant. Well, I’ll leave you to your search.”

Sasha pulled two familiar yearbooks out of the stacks, and another for the year following her last one at Richter.

The massive oak tables in the center of the library had a generous number of notepads, pens, and pencils. Sasha set her supplies aside and opened the book that marked her last year.

Pictures of familiar faces in various forms of activities stretched out before her. Cameras weren’t allowed in any of the basement activities. And cell phones simply weren’t allowed on campus. Recording the sins of your youth was not tolerated at the school. During her time at Richter, it seemed unjust, but in reality, it probably saved many students from lost job opportunities in their futures.

Sasha moved through the pages quickly and slowed down when she found the pictures of students on the obstacle course. She recognized her own image as she scaled the wall, one leg in the air, her arms wet with perspiration. Her face was hidden from the camera, but that didn’t keep anyone from knowing who it was at the time.

She’d nailed the best time for any female student in her junior year of high school and then kept beating it, if only by a few seconds, for the next four years. How would her time be now? Sasha rolled her shoulders and turned the page.

The class pages started with the college students. There were only a couple dozen of them at that age. Most of the kids left after high school to go on to universities all over the world. The ones that stayed were often like Sasha. Their absent, dysfunctional families paid to keep them enrolled at Richter for their own good. Some students were hardened by military families and didn’t do well without strict rules.

Sasha’s gaze found the image of one of the male students she’d gotten to know in her last two years at the school. They’d been lovers, if you could call it that at that age. Russell Visser. He’d been kicked out of two boarding schools before he reached Richter in tenth grade. He’d tried to get kicked out of Richter, too. Only that wasn’t an option. The headmistress never expelled students. She put them in solitary instead. It was the most effective way to keep students from crossing the line. In society if you can’t follow the rules, and get caught, you’re put in prison. Richter had its own version. And instead of hardening the students, it made them focus. When they broke the rules, they did it on purpose, and often it was immaculately calculated to avoid getting caught. A standard goal of any student, Sasha remembered, but at Richter, those who broke rules on epic levels became school legends. It wasn’t until graduation that the offenders, or heroes of these legends, let themselves be known.