Slamming those thoughts down, I do what I need to do and force myself to rejoin the party and pretend everything is okay.
* * *
“Mr. Doukas.”I flinch, hearing my name growled at me in an angry but familiar voice a beat before there’s a loud bang right in front of me.
"Fuck,” I bark, sitting upright and blinking as my surroundings begin to come back to me. “What the—”
“If you’re not going to do me the courtesy of listening in my class, Mr. Doukas, then do us all a favour and go snore at home.”
My eyes find the narrowed ones of my history teacher before glancing down at the massive textbook she threw on the desk beside my head to wake me.
“I’m sorry. I worked late,” I lie, and she’s probably more than aware of the real situation seeing as the five of us crashed in Archer’s sanctuary sometime after three AM and stumbled into school, barely dressed in our uniforms after a flyby visit to our flats first thing this morning. Both Stella and Emmie ripped us all new ones for leaving them out as they drove us to school, still stinking of last night’s alcohol.
“Sure you did,” she mutters, swiping the book off my desk once more and stalking back to the front of the classroom where she continues talking about whatever this fucking lesson is about.
Slouching down in my seat, I ignore my need to do as she said and go home. I’ve had enough time off recently. I need to be here. I need to keep my grades up and get everything I need to score the uni place I want for later in the year.
Theo and I have had our futures planned for years. Our shared desire to head to Imperial College to study computing is one of the reasons I didn’t finish at Knight’s Ridge like I should have last year. Something about us starting together appealed to me, and I found a way to make it happen. Plus, Nico fucked up his first year here by failing everything, and I didn’t want to be the only one out of the five of us to move on.
Blowing out a breath, I try to focus on what I should be doing, but I never quite get up to speed on the lesson, and before I know it, the bell is ringing for lunch. My stomach grumbles right on cue as I pack up and head toward the door.
“Mr. Doukas.” I’m stopped by Mrs. Parks once more before I manage to escape. “I’ve taken the liberty of giving you extra homework to catch up on everything you slept through earlier. I’ll expect the report on my desk first thing Thursday morning.”
Snatching the papers she’s holding out for me, I mutter my agreement and stalk out of the room.
“You look like death,” Stella says when I catch up with her in the corridor.
“Love you too, Sis.”
“I might be nicer if I got a fucking invite, or you know, if you weren’t such a dickhead.”
“Say it how it is, Stel.”
“Have you spoken to her?”
I shake my head. “No. She’ll probably slam the door in my face if I even try,” I mutter.
“So you’re giving up?” she asks astounded.
“When did I say that?” Her intrigued stare burns my skin. “I’m just… biding my time. Waiting for the right moment. What about you?”
“What? Have I gone back and confessed to being the one who killed her brother?”
I blow out a breath as the weight I’ve become used to carrying around recently only gets heavier.
“She wasn’t in,” she confesses. “I went over after I discovered you’d all been sent into Lovell last night. Joanne said they’d finally spoken about everything and Jodie packed a bag and walked out.”
“She’s staying with a friend,” I admit.
“How do you know that?” she asks, her eyes widening in shock.
“How do you think? I’ve tracked her phone.” I roll my eyes, wondering how Stella hasn’t already learned our tricks.
“Jesus, you’re all as bad as each other, you know that right?”
“You really think I’m letting her run away from me? Letting her forget I exist?”
Her lips part as if she wants to tell me that that was exactly what she was thinking, but she refrains from commenting.