Changing the Rules (Richter Book 1)(28)

“Yep. And good stuff, too. Not that cheap Jack that my mom always drinks.”

Elsie started laughing. “Now that’s the way to study!”

Oh, God. Underage drinking. Where did that fall in the investigation?

“Ally, I thought you were failing algebra,” Jax said, looking at Claire.

Yeah, they were both thinking the same thing. And it sucked. In reality, Claire couldn’t care less about a little adolescent fun, had drunk several times before she turned twenty-one. Then again, she’d turned eighteen while in Germany, and it was legal there.

Elsie set her half-eaten pizza down and moved into the kitchen. “Where’s the glasses?”

Jax hesitated. “You get the ice.”

“I can help.” Ally jumped up and moved into the kitchen.

“Hey, Jax, we need music.”

Jax left the kitchen while the other two scurried around in the kitchen opening cupboards.

“Well?” Claire said under her breath.

“My dad uses some country station on the TV,” Jax said, a little loud. Her eyes opened wide with a what the hell do we do now expression.

“Veto on country.”

Claire noticed an Echo on a side table. She told it to turn on and play.

“You’re the rebel and I’m at home,” Jax said quietly in Russian.

Yeah, they were kinda screwed.

Claire shrugged. There were plenty of ways to pretend to drink, not that she had to in an apartment that had several eyes watching them. The concern of something being slipped into the drink wasn’t there, and there was backup in case that did happen.

“Elsie, did you drive here?” Jax asked.

“Yeah, but I can call Kyle to pick me up and tell my parents I had car trouble.”

“You sure?” Claire asked.

Jax sighed with relief.

The girls walked into the living room and handed out the drinks. “To new friends,” Elsie said.

Claire could smell the liquor before she put the glass to her lips. “Wow, that’s strong.”

Ally nodded several times. “Yeah!” she said with a smile.

Jax looked at Ally. “What about algebra?”

Ally knocked back a pretty good size swallow. “Mr. Cummings looks at my tits, I’m sure I can sweet-talk my way into a C.”

And with comments like that, Claire knew their study date was the right choice. “Cheers.” She took a sip of her drink.





CHAPTER TWELVE


Cooper waited outside a bar in Valley Village, where Claire and Jax had taken an Uber. Since Cooper was the one watching the monitors, he was put in charge of getting them home.

He kept an eye on the parking lot while they went into the bar. After ten minutes, he was certain no one had followed them, and he sent Claire a text.

Once they were in his car, they both started to giggle.

The sound was infectious.

“That was highly entertaining,” Cooper said as he pulled out of the parking space.

He’d never eavesdropped on a teenage girls’ party without actually being there.

“Ally can seriously drink,” Claire said from the passenger seat.

“I noticed.”

“One drink and Elsie was done.” Jax sat in the back seat and leaned forward. “Do you know the guy Kyle came with to pick her up?” she asked Cooper.

“He was too far outside of range of the front-door cameras.” Cooper merged onto the freeway leading to their place.

“We need to fix that, then.”

Cooper had thought the same thing. “I already scheduled an adjustment.”

Claire smiled at him before turning around in her seat to include Jax in the conversation. “Not a lot on Kyle tonight, but Ally sure paid off. And that thing she has for Sean Fisher. I bet we can learn more about him through her, too.”

Cooper looked in the rearview mirror at Jax. “Do you know this Mr. Cummings?”

“No. But I’ll make a point to run into him tomorrow.” Jax sounded half-asleep.

“It’s hard to say how much of what Ally says is sensationalized for drama, or truth,” Claire said. “She has a hard shell.”

“I knew she lived with her grandmother, and assumed it wasn’t a great parent relationship, but after tonight, it sounds worse than I thought. She has an attitude at school, but isn’t at all like we saw tonight.”

“Lots of kids her age drink like that to get attention,” Claire said.

“That drinking gets them into trouble.” Cooper switched lanes.

“We’re all guilty of teenage drinking, and sometimes the purpose was the trouble.” Claire swiveled back around. “God, I’m tired.”

“Me too.”

Cooper glanced between the two of them. “It didn’t look like you guys drank that much.”

“Just enough to not drive,” Claire said. With her eyes closed, she reached over and placed a hand on his arm. “Thanks for picking us up.”

They’d put the plan in place to Uber to a drop-off or pick-up place away from the Tarzana home to avoid any tails. Not that it was clearly needed yet, but there was no reason to take chances this early in the game. Two girls Ubering to a bar with fake IDs was easier to explain than the assistant track coach picking up two teenage girls.