The Promise (Neighbor from Hell, #10)(4)

“I could have been,” she murmured softly with a sad shake of her head. “I could have been.”

Cocking an eyebrow, he shifted his attention to his laptop and brought up the detention schedule. “You can start today,” he said, adding her name to the detention list.

“Who’s the teacher in charge this week?” she asked as she reached for another piece of candy.

“Mr. Owens,” he said, adding her name to next week’s list as well.

“And next week’s?”

Sighing, he scrolled back to the top and did his best to hide his grimace as he said, “Miss Dawson is on for the next two weeks.”

“Miss Dawson?” Jen asked, suddenly perking up. “Can I start next week instead?”

“No,” he said evenly, hitting Save and praying that this would be the only time that she was brought up today because he honestly wasn’t sure that he had the energy to deal with this today.

“It would make things easier,” Jen said, sounding hopeful.

“No.”

“But-”

“No,” he said firmly, absolutely refusing to do this.

“Fine,” Jen said, sighing heavily as she grabbed her backpack and stood up. “But just so you know, I’m probably not going to be able to learn my lesson in such an oppressive environment.”

“Then it should probably help that I plan on calling your mother and asking her to come in for another meeting,” he said, tossing the pack of cigarettes in the bottom left-hand drawer to join the rest of the contraband that he’d taken from students since the start of the year, most of it hers.

“Call my mom?” she said slowly, nodding. “Yeah, I’m not sure that would really help.”

He wasn’t either, but it was school policy.

“Do you have another suggestion?” he asked, open to suggestions at this point.

“Let me off with a warning?” she suggested with the brightest smile that she could manage.

“No. Anything else?” he asked, getting to his feet as he slid his cellphone into his back pocket and headed for the door.

“Fine. Then let me complete my detention with Miss Dawson?” she asked with a sigh as her smile disappeared.

“No,” he said firmly, opening his office door only to find Mrs. Jennings, the head of the English Department, standing in front of his door, wringing her hands together, and looking seconds away from another meltdown.

Since he already had a pretty good idea why she was here, he simply gestured for her to have a seat in his office. He stepped out of the way as Janice, his secretary, rushed into the room with a bottle of water, a box of tissues, and a small brown paper bag just in case she started hyperventilating again, and handed them all over to Mrs. Jennings, who went for the brown paper bag first.

Never a good sign, he thought, rubbing the back of his neck as he asked, “Where?” not bothering to waste any more time than necessary, but honestly, it wasn’t necessary.

“Upstairs back hall,” she gasped, placing the brown paper bag over her mouth as she began hyperventilating.

“Great,” he said, sighing as he left the office and gestured for Jen to return to class, but of course she ignored him and decided to tag along.

“So, what do you think happened?” she asked cheerfully as she did her best to keep up with him as he headed toward the back stairs.

“Get to class,” he said, trying not to think about all the possibilities that would have had Mrs. Jennings leaving her class to come see him.

“Do you think she dumped tea in the pool again?” Jen asked as he took the stairs two at a time.

“Or maybe she held another mock trial?” she asked and he barely had time to suppress a shiver of revulsion at the reminder of the last time she’d held a mock trial and the mock execution that had immediately followed, which had led to two weeks of paperwork, a meeting with the school board, and a special assembly that the DA and police department had been forced to put on for the school on lynch mobs.

“I’m sure it’s fine,” he said just as they reached the second-floor landing and was forced to jump out of the way when a group of students ran past them, releasing blood-curdling screams with their water guns raised high above their heads.

“Son of a bitch!” he snapped, just as Miss Dawson slowly pushed her walker decked out with the Lone Star flag and yelled as loud as her emphysemic lungs would allow, “Remember the Alamo!” which resulted in him standing there, trying to figure out how he was going to explain this one to the school board while the group of freshmen boys moved as one and yelled “YOLO” as they took down what appeared to be Mrs. Jennings’ abandoned A.P. literature class.





Chapter 2

At a university that is probably better left unnamed.

Philadelphia, PA

“Perhaps we could talk about this over coffee?” Joey suggested with a hopeful smile, really hoping that the man sitting across from her wasn’t seriously considering following through with any of the suggestions being screamed from the other side of the, hopefully locked, door.

“Joey…” Dean Anderson said, sighing her name heavily the same way that he had twelve years ago when she’d first been escorted to his office by security after the unfortunate incident that had occurred during freshmen orientation.