67

THE PHONE

Ford doesn’t panic, not yet. She is logical. Cool in the face of adversity. Nothing rattles her. She closes the program, closes the browser, logs out of her computer. Tells Melanie she’s going for a walk on the grounds, not unheard of this time of day, then heads directly upstairs to the sophomores’ hall.

Has she been snookered by a sixteen-year-old? Is there something much more nefarious going on?

Ford has every right to search a student’s room at any time. It’s in the handbook, it’s part of the Honor Code. She’s never done it before. She’s never had to. The girls police themselves and their classmates better than she ever can. An Honor Code builds trust, yes, but there’s always the bit of rivalry that means some girls are looking for reasons to rat out their frenemies. Ford has always been good at sussing out what is real and what is animus and punishes accordingly.

But now she has no choice.

Ash Carlisle, whoever the hell she is, is hiding something, and Ford must find out what it is before the girl takes down the whole school.

She’s a hacker; Medea says she has talent. She could very easily be the one who sent the email with the photos and she was simply lying about it.

That belies logic, though. Why, if she’s an impostor, would she draw any attention to herself?

Ford needs to get to the bottom of this, and for that, she needs the originals. She has to inform Tony and his niece about what she’s discovered, but she also can’t have an investigation into a student reveal her own secrets.

Ash’s room is monkish without Camille’s things cluttering it up. Ford didn’t give Ash’s lack of accoutrement any thought when she arrived last month; now it strikes her as odd. What teenager doesn’t have a thousand and one things around them? There isn’t another room on the floor she could enter and see this level of minimalism.

Which makes searching it easy.

She finds the mobile phone taped to the inside wall above the door to Ash’s closet. She gives herself a pat on the back for clear thinking. It’s where she would have hidden it if she’d been trying to make sure no one found it.

She swipes it open. The battery is almost gone, and there’s no passcode. How irresponsible, and how lucky.

The photos are easy to find, right there in the app.

That little bitch.

Ford is faced with a choice.

Take this phone into custody, drag Ash in, and find out why she has it, or delete all the photos and destroy the phone. It’s not like Ash can come to her and ask for her phone back—she’s in violation of the rules by having it. Ford should kick her out on her ear. She should kick her out regardless, though Tony might take care of that for her.

A Goode girl in handcuffs. Her mother will have her head.

Something to be avoided at all cost. The girl knows too much.

Push and pull. Push and pull.

Maybe the two of them need to have a heart-to-heart, get all this out in the open. Quid pro quo. I don’t expel your skinny ass, you don’t reveal what you know. And who the hell are you, anyway?

Ford is grasping at straws, and she knows it. Her mother wouldn’t hesitate here, she’d have already thrown Ash to the wolves. Ford should do the same. She can’t risk losing the school over a scandal, not on top of Camille’s suicide.

Tony’s worried face. He thinks Ash killed Camille, or that niece of his does and is planting that idea in his head. And now to intimate Ash had something to do with Muriel... Muriel... Ash quit piano.

She would have to, wouldn’t she? If she wasn’t the prodigy piano player, Muriel would have known quickly. Out of practice, my ass.

But had she eliminated Muriel because she was worried about being exposed as a fraud? That would be...diabolical.

“Ash? Do you have any—oh!”

Ford whirls around to see Piper standing in the doorway. She puts her hand behind her back immediately, praying the phone hasn’t been seen.

“Dean Westhaven. Hello. I was just looking for Ash. I’m sorry to disturb you.”

And she disappears before Ford can say a word.

Damn sneaky girls. What did she see?

Ford shoves the phone in her pocket and steps into the hall. “Miss Brennan. A word, if you please?”

Piper’s tall frame stops dead. “Yes, Dean?”

“Why aren’t you in class?”

The freckles go dark with a charming blush. “I got my period. I came up for tampons but I’m out, V doesn’t have any. I was just seeing if Ash has some.”

If she’s lying, she’s a smooth operator.

Why do you assume everyone is lying? Just because you’re up to your neck in deceit doesn’t mean everyone is.

“Are the bathrooms not stocked?”

“No, Dean.”

Ford shakes her head. “I’ll see to it. Off with you, continue your search.”

Piper smiles gratefully and scoots off. The bathrooms aren’t stocked, which means the support staff isn’t on top of things. Students wandering campus, out of class, at all hours of the day. A possible impostor on the grounds. An affair with the handyman. Heavens, she’s let Goode go. Let herself go, dropped her standards.

When are you going to wrap your head around the fact that you don’t want to be here? You should find a replacement, someone who cares enough to make sure things are run properly. You obviously don’t care enough about the school’s management to be in charge.

Perhaps it is time for her to be thinking about naming a successor. But how would that look? Like she is running away the moment there’s something negative going on. Like her mother. Jude fell on her sword without a second’s thought. When asked, Jude said, “Goode is more important than any one person.”

Ford almost understands.

Resigning in protest over a forced move to coed, though, that would be a legitimate out.

No. She needs to clean up her mess, but she’s not going to run.

And she’s not going to let anything ruin her. She is going to destroy this phone. Call Alan, set up the meeting with Ash and the sheriff.

And have a word with her wayward student. It’s time she finds out exactly what Ashlyn Carr is up to. Answers must be given. By Ash, and by Rumi. He’s avoiding her, she knows it, and she needs to get him alone and find out what his relationship was with Camille.

But to do it safely, she needs privacy.

Using her own phone, she texts Rumi.

She has to wait ten minutes for the reply, but finally, finally, three dots appear.

Thank heavens. At the very least, she can find out what’s going on with these photos of him and Camille.

She calls Alan next, who is happy to be of service. She asks him to reach out to Tony for more details. He suggests she wait to talk with Ash until he’s present. She agrees, though she’s lying. She has to talk to Ash first.

Then she stalks to her attic garret, stares out the window onto the quad.

How is she going to approach Ash?