Path of Destruction (Broken Heartland, #2)(14)

Cooper stormed between them, taking Prescott by his shoulder, turning him quickly on his heels, and pushing him up against the side of the truck.

“You hard of hearing, Prescott? Do we need to go see the nurse?” Shoving him once more, Coop enjoyed the satisfying slam of metal. She hadn’t spoken in two weeks and the first words she said were to a complete *. Naturally. At least they’d been words telling him to leave her alone.

“Mind your own business, man.” Hayden’s eyes were wide, but his voice was even. “This has nothing to do with you.”

“She is my business, Pretty Boy. And I distinctly remember telling you to back off. Not to mention I just heard her telling you to let her go loud and clear. So what I can’t figure out is how I could hear it from ten feet away but you couldn’t.”

“Coop,” Ella Jane said softly from beside him. “I’m fine.”

“You,” a male voice rang out. “Office. Now.”

Coop turned to see a teacher pointing at him. A crowd had formed. Great. Pretty Boy was two seconds from assaulting EJ, but of course he’d be the one to get nailed.

“Go,” he said quietly to Ella Jane, knowing he was blocking her from the man’s line of sight.

She nodded and walked to the driver’s side of her truck.

“That’s the last time I tell you to stay away from her with words,” he said evenly, hoping Prescott got the message as he released him.

He offered a pointed smirk at the teacher on his way.

Day one and his ass was already in trouble. He was pretty sure that was a record. And that his dad was going to kill him.



“You’re not serious. I barely touched him.” Cooper gaped at the woman sitting across from him. She was an attractive, auburn-haired woman, probably in her forties, but still.

The vice principal adjusted her glasses and frowned at him. “It’s the first day of school, Mr. Cooper. I’m not sure how they did things at Hope’s Grove, but here at Summit Bluffs, we have a zero-tolerance policy when it comes to fighting.”

He sighed. “I wouldn’t call it fighting exactly. More like adamantly disagreeing.”

“Your transcripts show that you are a good student, Mr. Cooper. I can’t understand why you’d have conflict with a Summit Bluffs student you barely know on your first day. Especially Mr. Prescott. He, too, is an exemplary student.”

Of course he had the faculty brainwashed, too.

“I do know him,” Coop said under his breath. “Unfortunately.”

He knew more about Hayden and his corrupt family than he wished he did. All the way down to the fact that his mother dumped Prescott’s dad after high school and chose a life with a real man—his father. Now, his parents were terrified that Kevin Prescott was going to use his recent inheritance to grind an ax on. Which reminded him—he had work to do after school.

“I can’t do a week of detention.”

“Well, I hate to inconvenience you, Mr. Cooper. Perhaps you should have thought of that before you put your hands on another student.”

He was about to tell her that if Pretty Boy could keep his hands off a certain student, then he wouldn’t have had to put his hand on him. But that might’ve led to Ella Jane getting dragged in here, and he was pretty certain she’d ditched more than one class that day.

Swallowing his pride, he gave her a pleading half smile. “My family’s farm was trashed by the storm. My parents are doing everything they can to secure the funds to rebuild and repair the damage. I have two younger brothers and I have to be home after school.” Admitting how bad things were to a complete stranger in his least favorite place on Earth was pretty much the last thing he wanted to be doing. Begging sucked. “Is there anything else I can do? Some other way I can work off my sentence?”

“There is, actually.” Mrs. Gleeson sighed. “We need help on the social committee. With the decorations and heavy lifting and such. The event planning team meets on the third Thursday of the month. In the media center during sixth-period senior study hall.”

“For how long?”

“Well, four Thursdays plus any events that fall in that time frame. And you’d commit to helping with prom. I figure that balances out the detentions pretty evenly.”

Spreads it out was more like it. But what choice did he have?





“You’re here!” Raquel’s voice reached an ungodly decibel as Cami walked through the media center door and into the social committee meeting. It was as loud as her hair and makeup that day.

Cami used to get excited about blowing her hair out and donning a smoky eye at school, but these days, she was barely able to muster the bare minimum—lip gloss and a comb through.

The room consisted of four tables and two dozen chairs. It looked more like a conference center than a high school library. Notes about the dance were already scribbled on the white board in the front of the room.

It took everything she had left in her to be there. It was one of those stupid, seemingly pointless things she used to live for. Homecoming committee, student council, and all the other bullshit that looked good on a college application.

College.

Just the thought made her want to cry. She should have been excited about college. She should have been getting ready to move to OSU next fall and be with Kyle. He should have been down there right now. Playing football. She’d had plans of visiting each other on the weekends. Spending the weeknights on the phone talking about how much they missed each other.