Chapter Two

Dean

“Choked pretty hard in there, didn’t you, Dean?” Tessa’s voice was two parts smug and just this side of nervous.

I stopped my hustle down the hall toward coding class and turned to find my little sister leaning against her locker. Her bright red lipstick wasn’t exactly in regulation with the Wilmont uniform and presentation rules, but I’d never be the one to point that out.

“Whoa,” she said, popping off the locker when I reached her. “Did he expel you?”

I rubbed my palms over my face, forcing back the adrenaline that had shaken my muscles since the epic fail of a sexual awareness presentation a few hours ago.

“Course not.” I hiked my bag onto my shoulder, flashing her my everything’s fine smile—one we’d shared more times than I could count over the years any time she thought Mom was about to ground me.

She was the only girl in our family, and so I had this unavoidable instinct to protect her.

“I didn’t do it,” I continued, shaking my head. I studied her not-at-all-surprised face for a few seconds before the proper shock registered in her eyes.

“You didn’t?” she said, but I could see straight through her.

“Tessa,” I groaned. “What do you know?” I’d never peg my sister for tampering with Principal Tanner’s precious presentation, but one of her rebellious friends? Maybe. The boyfriend she’d had since she was six? Maybe times two.

“Nothing!” She gaped at me before rolling her eyes. “You worry a helluva lot for someone who’s ready to buck the system any chance he gets.”

“One,” I said, holding up a finger, “don’t ever say buck the system. Two”—I held up another finger—“just because I like to test weaknesses in any given security system doesn’t mean I’m not going to worry about my baby sister when she clearly is in way over her head.”

She scoffed and pulled out her cell, fingers flying across the screen. She pocketed it after a good fifty-six seconds of ignoring me. “I’ve got to meet Colt,” she said, and flashed me a perfectly innocent smile. “I’m glad he didn’t expel you.” She punched me on the shoulder. “I’d hate not having my over-worrying brother here to protect me.”

I snorted. “Tanner knew I didn’t do it. Whoever jacked with his video had to break into his office last night or early this morning before the assembly, and I was with him setting up the system.” I watched every line of her face, wondering if she would give anything away. Her features were smooth as she stared right back at me.

“Sounds like a hassle for just a few laughs.”

I arched a brow at her. “A few?”

The entire school had found the updated presentation hilarious. Hell, it had shocked me—the fact that someone had the balls to pull that on Tanner—so much that I hadn’t gotten the vid down quick enough.

That had earned me a half-hour lecture in his office—an endless stream of negative criticism against my “computer skills.” Please, he would shit his pants if he knew half the things I could do with a cell phone, let alone my own perfectly configured laptop.

Still, he’d been pissed enough to punish—more like embarrassed enough. It wasn’t every day he was thrown off his crisp, pristine routine of perfection. He needed someone to blame and for now he only had me. Not for the vid, because I’d been at home last night—as he’d called and confirmed with my mother—but because I hadn’t checked the video before I’d hooked up his computer to the projector. Then again, neither had he.

Could’ve been worse, I suppose. He could’ve expelled me or refused to recommend me when MIT called to gather my stats closer to the spring—he had that much power. Instead he decided to “teach me a lesson” and ensure that my “skills” would improve at the same time.

“Code Club,” he’d called it. Said it with the same bravado as a frat-dude would say Fight Club. I was to hold an extracurricular club after school, three times a week, educating any student who wanted to learn more about anything involving computers. “No better way to improve your skills than teach. And after the horrid fiasco you let me walk into today, Mr. Winters, you clearly need more practice in all matters electronic. In addition, you’ll maintain, update, and streamline the academy’s website.”

His words echoed through my head as I glanced at my cell. “Tell Colt he’s a douche,” I said, glancing down at Tessa, who waited patiently as if I’d say more about Tanner. Almost like she wanted me to say more. I sighed, lowering my voice. “Tess.”

“What?” she snapped. “I’m not going to tell him that. He already knows you hate him.”

I rolled my eyes. I didn’t hate Colt. He actually treated my baby sister better than I’d ever seen any of my friends treat their girlfriends. But, he was dating my sister. I had to give him shit on principle. “Tess,” I said again, guiding her back toward her locker. “This is your one shot.”

She swallowed hard before a muscle in her jaw ticked. That same anger trigger I’d seen in Sean too many times—like the one time I’d cracked his password on the desktop in his room and reconfigured all his specs.

“Talk to me.”

“I have nothing to talk about. You’re being weird.” She avoided looking me in the eye.

“Damn it, Tess,” I said, pinching the bridge of my nose. I was going to be late to coding. “If you know who pulled that crap this morning—” I glanced around, making sure Tanner wasn’t going to rappel from the ceiling or something. “You could catch a lot of heat.” Whenever Tanner found out who did it—and he would because he always did—then he’d likely punish the culprit’s circle of friends, too.

That was his style. Probably one of the main reasons I’d never pulled a stunt on his system even though I’d been dying to since the sixth grade, when he’d forced me to peel off every sticker on my laptop that I’d collected from my summer computer science boot camp. I’d earned those tiny, sticky badges of honor, and he’d claimed they were a distraction and forced me to toss them in the garbage.

“Whatever,” she said. “You’re delusional. And now I’m late.” She brushed past me, hurrying down the hallway that was now almost empty of students.

Maybe I was. Maybe none of her friends would be dumb enough to pull a prank like that, but when it came to Tessa, I was on high alert. We were only two years apart. She’d been my best friend since my parents brought her home—not that I’d ever tell her that—and I couldn’t stop the instinct to protect her. It was in my blood. Probably why Sean—my older brother—was always riding me about shit, too. He likely felt the same way, but whenever he came home to visit and started hovering over me, I told him to eff off.

Kind of like how Tess just did to me.

Huh.

Perspective.

I blinked a few times, crawled out of my head, and rushed down the hall.

Thirteen strides later, I dashed into Mr. Griffin’s room.

His full, quiet room.

I swallowed hard, ducking my head under the light of the projector as I found my seat in the back.

“Mr. Winters,” he said, drawing more attention to my entrance as I settled in my desk. I dug my laptop out of my bag, firing up the screen in seconds.

“Sorry,” I said before he could continue. “Principal Tanner had a technical issue.” May have been with “my skills” and not a computer, but close enough for the excuse.

Mr. Griffin waved me off. His black polo was untucked, one hand loosely hanging in his khaki pocket. Fresh out of college, he had to be one of the youngest teachers at Wilmont, but no one could deny his enthusiasm for teaching code. “No worries,” he said. “I wanted to ask you what your favorite coding language is.” He glanced around the room at the other students who had been taking notes before I dropped in. “I know you’ve been at this for longer than some of the class.”

I scanned the room. The only other true hacker in the room was a swirl of light pink in a sea of blind curiosity.

Amber Henderson.

The girl had skills. She also happened to be funny as hell, sharp, and wicked hot. The fact that she’d had a boyfriend for the past year had kept us merely acquaintance-like friends. Her fingers currently clicked her keyboard—she was locked in—the rest of the room vapor. Griffin could’ve easily called on her for the question, but he was ribbing me for my late arrival.

Touché.

“Python,” I finally answered, returning my focus to the front of the room. The words Programming Language were in black letters on the screen behind Griffin.

He nodded rapidly, clicking to the next slide where five bullet points listed the most effective coding languages. “You probably like that because you’re a pen tester, yeah?”

I held my hand out and did the universal so-so shake. I loved breaching walls and locks and codes meant to keep me out, but I hadn’t chosen cyber security as my only flavor of hack. Not yet. Not when there were so many more avenues to take.

“Well,” he said, mimicking my so-so shake, “Python is a great language. So is C, or C++.” He pointed to the slide behind him. “Coding languages are not only important if you want to break into something or build something. They’re vital to understanding what you’re working on. If you can’t read the language, you’re not going to get far with the given task.” He smiled, an easy grin that was rarely seen on the staff here at Wilmont. “Which,” he continued, “is why we’ll be spending the next few weeks on languages…” Griffin launched into his lesson, and I lost myself in a project I’d meant to wrap up last night but had crashed before I could.

I already knew my preferred language. I already knew almost everything Griffin would cover this semester, but this was an advanced computer course—one of many offered, the only perk of sticking it out at Wilmont. I couldn’t not take it. Plus, the hour block gave me extra time to code on my own.

Fifty minutes and a blink later, I dragged myself out of the zone and bounded up to the front of the room before Griffin could excuse everyone.

“Winters?” he asked while he powered down his gear.

“I’ve been appointed head of”—I cringed as I tried not to puke over the words—“Code Club.”

Griffin’s eyes widened, and he choked on a laugh. “Principal Tanner sent me an informative text before you stumbled in here.” He gave me a pitying look before he gestured to the students dying to get out of their seats. “Feel free.”

“Okay,” I said, turning to face the room.

I focused on Amber, the few streaks of pink in her dark hair that fell just short of her eyes and tightened around her ears. She was beyond easy to look at and took some of the sweat out of my palms. “If anyone is looking to get in some extra coding time, or needs help with other programming stuff…” I lost my train of thought when Amber’s green eyes popped up to mine as if she just realized I’d been speaking. “Um.” I cleared my throat. Today had been too long already, and now I’d have to stay after school three hours longer for this damn club.

I needed to reboot.

I cleared my throat. “I’ll be here right after school. Today, Wednesday, and Friday.”

Amber tilted her head.

Another student, Holly, one of the sole six girls in the class, shot her hand into the air. “Is it an extra credit thing?”

I shook my head, my palms smacking against my thighs. “Nope. Just a…club.” I refused to call it Code Club. It was bad enough on its own. Anything truly worthwhile would be strictly underground; putting a spotlight on what we were doing kind of took the point out of hacking.

“It’s just for knowledge,” I continued. “Practice. That sort of thing.” Now that the words left my mouth, I could practically feel Tanner laughing his ass off in his office. He knew as well as I did that Griffin was lucky to have a full eighteen-student class. Coding was tricky, hard, and really only enjoyable to those who actually wanted to learn the skill. Doing it for an extra three hours a day without any other incentives? Forget about it.

“Thanks, Winters,” Griffin said, patting me on the back. “I encourage anyone who wants to up their game to spend the extra time given.” He joined me in staring at a bunch of blank faces. All except one. A pixie with pink in her hair who couldn’t help but smirk. “Okay then,” Griffin continued. “You’re free to go.” The room instantly transformed into a flurry of motion with his magic words—a scene I was usually happy to be a part of, except for when they were all running away from me and what I loved to do in my spare time. It was almost comical.

Almost.

I supposed if no one showed up, I could at least use the time to maintain the website like Tanner had demanded, and then prep for the TOC coming up in March. I’d just have to make sure I did a damn good job on the website so Tanner didn’t find a worse way to punish me for not being able to stop something I hadn’t seen coming.

Something worse than a Code Club.

Something like shining his shoes or catering one of his social dinners.

I was so fucked.