Page 26 of Claimed by Him

Twelve

Adare had stoppedby last night and taken a look at my whiteboard. I’d given her the basics of what I’d learned so far, and she agreed with me. Theo wasn’t involved, and neither was anyone he worked with.

Which was why I was making my way to Centennial High School to see if I could scare some information out of teenagers. Okay, maybe not scare, but some kids needed a good kick in the ass before they did the right thing.

I wouldn’t be using that particular pitch to get into the school.

Instead, I pasted on my best smile and lied through my teeth. I was Meka’s aunt who’d moved out here to help get her back on track. To do that, I needed to talk to people who knew her. Fortunately, I was able to get Theo to call the school and let them know I was coming in, which meant that after I signed in and went through security, I was golden. I gave them Theo’s list and asked them to send teachers and anyone else they thought of my way.

I was there for hours, talking to teachers and students, some of whom actually knew Meka, but others who’d only wanted to get out of class. Her teachers all said similar things about her. Bright girl. Lots of potential. Needed to focus more on school work than on socializing. She did moderately well on most of her tests, but she rarely did homework. She had a natural gift for math, so she did better there without the extra work.

All of those things could mean that something was wrong in her life, or it could just be that she was acting like a typical teenage girl.

Kids who were ‘friendly’ but weren’t actual ‘friends’ described Meka as a loner, quiet, without many friends. But that wasn’t how her friends thought of her. Three of the female names on Theo’s list were friends, and they all said she was smart, funny, sarcastic, out-going. She was the one who tied them all together.

And then there were the boys.

According to them, Meka was both a slut and an ice princess. A prude. The sort of girl who’d give blowjobs to the entire football team one minute, and a cock-tease who never put out the next. She was described as trash who would spread her legs on the first date as well as one of those girls who wouldn’t give any sort of action, no matter how much money a guy shelled out.

With all of it, good and bad, from friends or acquaintances or guys who wanted her, there was one thing that they all had in common.

A name.

Shawn Atkins.

Meka’s boyfriend.

I didn’t like him. He came into the room, sat down across from me, and I felt an immediate dislike for him. He was one of those smug guys who irked me to no end. He was older than Meka by a couple years, but the patchy scruff on his chin made me think he was trying to be even more ‘mature.’ He had messy blond hair that I was sure he thought made him look sexy or something, and dark eyes that were just as arrogant as the expression on his face. Not only arrogant but lecherous also.

The little bastard was checking me out.

“I hear you’re Meka Ludwick’s boyfriend.”

“Boyfriend?” He snorted. “I don’t tie myself down like that.”

“Pretty much everyone says you’re with her.”

He looked up from ogling my chest and shrugged. “What can I say? Bitches dig me.”

There was so much wrong with that sentence that I had to remind myself that this wasn’t the time or the place to give him lessons on not being a misogynistic asshole.

“When was the last time you saw Meka?”

He shrugged again. “We hooked up the other night, but I ain’t seen her since I left her, rode hard and put away wet, if you know what I mean.”

“I’m going to ignore how little you know about women – and grammar – and stick to the matter at hand.” I gave him a hard look. “Have you heard from her recently? Within the last couple days?”

He leaned forward, dropping his eyes to the front of my shirt again. “I thought you was here to help her with school shit. What’s that got to do with the last time I talked to her?”

I sighed. This was the last person I had to talk to aside from the principal, and I’d lost my patience two ‘players’ ago.

“Yes or no. Just answer the question.”

He shrugged. “My phone was broke all weekend.”

I narrowed my eyes. A teenager who didn’t get a new phone thirty seconds after their old one died was suspicious in my book. This kid was on my suspect list, but I needed to be careful to stay objective. Just because I thought he was an ass-hat didn’t mean he had anything to do with Meka’s disappearance. With teenage boys, natural teenage hormones and sociopathy were hard to tell apart.

“All right. If you hear from her, tell her to give her dad a call. He’s worried.” I watched him carefully, but that damn hair covered too much of his face for me to see even a flicker of guilt. “Get out of here.”

---