Fallen Crest Public (Fallen Crest High #3)(87)

Derek snickered. “Depends on who the girl is.”

A fresh burst of laughter came from Ethan. “Did she deep throat you?”

“Could she?”

They kept laughing.

Logan cursed and slammed his hand against the car door. “Shut the f**k up.”

“Shit.” Derek straightened away from the vehicle. “I thought this was a topic we could laugh about. You would be if it happened to one of us.”

“You better run, Streeter,” Logan threatened, his hand going to his door handle. “I’m going to beat your ass until—”

“Enough.” I stepped out and slammed my door. As I rounded to their side, I asked Ethan, “Kate’s inside?”

“Not yet. You called her?”

“Yeah. I told her to bring everything.”

“You think she will?”

I shrugged, glancing at Logan from the corner of my eye. “She knows I hate Tate.”

Derek snorted. “And she thinks the two of you are tight again.”

“Yeah.”

Strauss slapped his hand to Derek’s chest and pushed him back a step. He moved in front of me. “Kate stopped sniffing around us when she thought the two of you were good again. Is that going to be a problem?”

“No. We just need proof she was coming around before that.”

“We got that.”

Logan got out of the Escalade as I told Strauss, “You and Derek stay up top. We’ll do this downstairs.”

“I cleared it out when I got your text,” Ethan added.

“Good.” I glanced at Logan. “Where’s Tate?”

He checked his phone. “She’s inside. I’ll tell her to hide in a room downstairs for now. You know Sam’s probably headed here too.”

Everything was falling in place, except for that.

As we started for the house, I told Strauss, “Sam will figure out where we’re at. She’s got too many buddies from FCA here. Don’t stop her, just let her through. We’ll have Tate play interference when she gets into the basement.” I didn’t like it, but she was coming no matter what. “And don’t let anyone touch her. She’s still hurting. A lot.”

Strauss asked, “What about the other girls?”

“Kate and Parker can come down with us right away. Hold Natalie and Jasmine back.”

“But what about the stuff? They need to hear it, don’t they?”

“We’ll text you when to let them hear. Ethan, give yours to Streeter. He can play it for Jasmine.”

Swapping phones, Ethan smirked at the other guy. “Good luck with that. She’s going to go nuts on you.”

Derek paled, but jerked around to me. “What do we do then? He’s right. They’re both going to flip.”

“Then let them through.”

Logan remarked, “That’s the whole plan, dumbass.”

When we crossed the street, people stopped what they were doing on the front lawn. A tackling game paused. Conversations halted. People looked up, but no one said a word as we walked past them. It was the same effect inside. The music continued playing, but the partying halted until we were downstairs. As we descended the stairs, I glanced around to find the best room, but Logan tapped my arm and pulled me into a corner. Ethan got the gesture to stay back and he did. Tate came down the stairs a second later, but he pulled her over to him.

Logan waited to make sure she wouldn’t head to our corner. He lowered his voice then, “What are you going to do if Kate goes to Broudou? She’s going to get mad. She could tell him the truth about who Sam is.”

I shook my head. He was right, there was a chance. “There’s people in Broudou’s camp that are covering for her. He saw Kate and me. We both know he doesn’t trust other people’s word, just what he sees for himself.”

“And when he does whatever he’s going to do?”

“Channing said he’d let us know. We’ll call the cops.”

“She won’t go to the cops. Kate hates being the victim.”

I flashed him a grin, though my eyes were dead. “We’ll make a personal call to her uncle. We both know how protective he’s been.”

“He’s going to hurt her bad. We’re okay with that?”

Thinking about what Kate did to Sam and knowing it could happen again, but by Budd Broudou reaffirmed everything for me. I didn’t care what he did to her. I was too dead inside to care. “He was going to hurt Sam. All we’re doing is giving him a different target. You know that.”

Logan nodded with the same darkness coming over him. “Okay.”

“Okay?”

“Yeah.”

Another look passed between us. An image of Sam in that hospital bed flashed in my mind. It haunted me. All the bruises, dried blood, how frail she looked in that bed would haunt me for the rest of my life. This was what I needed to do to make sure it didn’t happen again.

I headed to Ethan’s rec room and went to the far wall. Logan filled Tate in on her part of the plan. She disappeared into a separate room. Then he came to stand beside me while Ethan took position next to the pool table in front of us.

The door was left open, but it wasn’t long until I heard Kate’s voice.

It was go-time.