I took a deep breath and grabbed Adam’s arm. “Okay. Let’s go to my dorm. I want to curl up in a ball on my bed and pretend today neverhappened.”
We headed across Royal Hall, making sure we took the narrower side halls so that we could avoid all of the areas where students usually congregated between classes—the locker banks, the cafeteria, the halls leading to thequad.
We managed to avoid everyone until we stepped into a hall near the science labs on our way to one of the sideentrances.
“Ms. Collins!Stop!”
I turned to see Headmaster Sanders hurrying toward us from the other end of the hall. “Oh, shit,” I muttered, shouldersslumping.
“Guess it was only a matter of time before he hunted us down,” Adam said, rolling his eyesupward.
Sanders finally reached us, chest heaving from the exertion of chasing us down. “Ms. Collins, I’ve been looking for you everywhere!” he said, mopping his brow with a handkerchief. “We need to have a discussionabout—”
I held up a palm, not even caring if I seemed rude. “Sir, please,” I said, my voice close to cracking. “I really can’t do this right now. Can we talk anothertime?”
I expected Sanders to huff angrily, but instead he nodded. “Of course. I just wanted to let you know that you aren’t in any trouble for that… thatincidentin the auditorium. I’m aware of the true nature of that deplorable video, and I will be doing everything I can to find the student—or students—responsible for displaying it.” He stopped and cleared his throat. “I also wanted to extend my deepest apologies to you, Laney. I’m genuinely ashamed that something like this has happened on mycampus.”
“Oh,” I said meekly. After my past experiences with Sanders, I was expecting him to find some way to blame me for the wholething.
“How do you know what the video really is?” Trina asked, eyesnarrowing.
Sanders neatly folded his handkerchief and slipped it back in his pocket as he replied. “A student came and informed me about it after the incident,” he said crisply. “Like I said, I’m disgusted that someone could do something so terrible to a fellow RFA student, and my staff and Iwillget to the bottom ofit.”
“A student?” Trina cocked her head to theside.
Sanders shot her a quizzical look. “Hm?”
“You just said that a student told you that the video showed an assault. Which student in particular?” sheasked.
“It was Hunter Connery,” Sanders said. “He was very concerned about you,Laney.”
Trina let out a derisive snort. “Well, if you care so much about getting to the bottom of the incident, you need to call Hunter right back into your office. He’s the one who didit.”
His brows shot up. “You think he wasresponsible?”
“Yes. Hunter Connery and his band of merry manbabies set up that video,” Trina said, armsfolding.
“Why would he track me down and tell me about the video if he was responsible for displayingit?”
“Because he’s trying to get on top of the whole thing by making himself look innocent right away. It’s like how criminals sometimes insert themselves into investigations and act like they’re helping. They want to be close to it so they know what’s going on, and they also want to make themselves seem like they’re above suspicion,” she said. “Oh, also, Hunter was one of theonlypeople on this campus who knew about the existence of thatvideo.”
Sanders rubbed his chin. “I see,” he said frostily. “In that case, I’ll have to have another chat withhim.”
“Good.” Trina took a step back. “You’ve let him and his cronies get away with this bullshit for far toolong.”
Sanders cleared his throat again, looking deeply uncomfortable. “I think it’s time for you two to get to class now,” he said, motioning to Adam and Trina. He turned his gaze to me. “Laney, you can go back to your dorm and spend the rest of the day there, if that’s what you’d like. I can’t imagine how difficult it must be for you to stand in these halls rightnow.”
I bit my bottom lip. “Actually, sir, I was wondering… could I have the rest of the week off?” I asked. “I’ll still do all of my work, of course. I just don’t want to go into any of my classes for a few days. Not while that video is still fresh in everyone’sheads.”
I knew I was asking for a lot, but to my surprise, he nodded right away. “That’s understandable, and it’s probably a good idea considering the circumstances,” he said. “I’ll make the arrangements with your teachers and have Ms. Flores drop your classwork off each morning, and you can skip all of your extracurriculars. But only until Friday. We can’t let today’s incident affect your schoolingforever.”
“I know. Thank you, sir,” Isaid.
He gave me a thin smile. “You’rewelcome.”
Trina’s brows lifted. “While you’re handing out favors, would it be okay for Adam and me to skip the next fewperiods?”
“Why?” Sanders asked, turning his attention toher.