Matt reached for his phone as Paris Vickers called for Bree’s resignation.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Bree left the station through the rear door and hurried to her SUV. The tires squealed as she pulled out of the parking lot. She eased off the gas pedal. This was not a lights-and-siren emergency.
But it felt like it.
She called Dana to let her know about Luke.
“No.” Dana sounded shocked.
“Yes.” Bree breathed.
“It’ll be OK.” Dana’s voice came through the Bluetooth speakers.
“I know.” But nerves kept her fingers tight on the steering wheel as she drove to the high school. “Parenting is harder than I expected. Some days, the worry feels like it’s eating a hole right through me. I wonder if it gets any better after they grow up.”
“I doubt it.”
Bree snorted. “Thanks for the reassurance.”
Dana said, “You worry because you love them. That’s never going to change. You just have to learn to live with it.”
“You’re probably right.” But the thing that ate away at Bree was her fear that she was screwing up, that she would make major mistakes raising the kids, that she wasn’t good enough.
“You can’t control everything.”
“And that is the problem.”
“You’re doing a great job with them,” Dana said as if she could read Bree’s mind.
“I wish I could be sure of that. Some days I feel like someone pushed us all off a boat, and I don’t know how to swim, let alone save them. I’m floundering along trying not to let any of us drown.” And potentially failing. Pressure built in Bree’s chest until it felt as if it would burst. “What would I do without your help?”
“You need to chill,” Dana said. “I’ve seen you face murderers with less stress. Luke isn’t perfect. Stop expecting him to be. It’s not fair to either one of you.”
“You’re right.” Bree parked the SUV at the curb in front of the school. “I’m here. I’ll call you when we’re done.”
A tension headache throbbed at the base of Bree’s skull. She reached for the door handle.
Dana said, “Deep breath.”
Bree filled and emptied her lungs.
“Now go find out what happened, and be Aunt Bree, not Sheriff Taggert.”
“Thanks.” Bree ended the call and climbed out of the vehicle.
Something didn’t feel right about the situation. All kids made mistakes. She didn’t expect Luke to be perfect. But he just wasn’t a fighter. He wasn’t the kind of kid who came out swinging. He harbored some residual anger from his mother’s death, but he internalized emotion. He dealt with his grief by exhausting himself with work. In that way, Luke was a lot like Bree.
Could she have been wrong? Had she missed a sign that he’d backslid?
She went into the office. Luke and three other boys sat in the outer lobby. A counter separated this reception area from the administrative personnel and offices. Behind the counter, several women worked on computers. An older woman with her hair in a tight bun manned a phone and kept one experienced eye on the four sulking boys.
Luke sat in a plastic chair against one wall. He held an ice pack to his mouth and glared at three boys on the other side of the room. Among the other boys, Bree counted two blackening eyes and a split lip. Outnumbered three to one, Luke had given as good as he’d gotten.
She shouldn’t be proud of that, but whatever. Parenting was weird.
The tallest boy sat in the middle of the trio, flanked by two dark-haired teens. A long bang of blond hair fell over his forehead. As Bree entered the room, his mouth twisted into a smug—smackable—sneer. Something in his posture made him appear to be the leader. Bree had been a cop long enough to know instinctively that this one was the problem.
She approached Luke and crouched in front of him. He kept his gaze on the other boys. The hate and hot fury in his eyes startled her. She lifted the cold pack away from his face. His lip was swollen, and a bruise was darkening his jaw below his mouth. She replaced the ice and spoke in a low voice. “Are you OK?”
He gave her a jerky nod. But he didn’t look at her, and the discomfort in Bree’s chest cranked tighter.
“Let’s go out in the hall,” she said. “I’d like to hear what happened from you first.”
His gaze shifted to meet hers, and he shook his head once. The muscles of his face were hard as stone, his mouth strained, as if he were working hard to keep quiet and didn’t trust himself to speak.