Page 15 of Check the Halls
“Oh no.” Alyssa’s disappointment sounds insincere on the line. “I’m so sorry to have bothered you. Our new director, Madelyn, clearly dropped the ball on this. My sincerest apologies.”
“Wait.” My heart starts to pound in my ears. It’s so loud that I wonder if Alyssa can hear it, too. “Madelyn? Madelyn Clairmont?”
I hold my breath as I wait for her confirmation. For a moment, I worry she’s left the call.
“Yes.” Her tone is clipped, even colder than before.
I feel like a game show contestant trying to solve a puzzle in a time crunch. Maddy has a new job in Ottawa. She gave them my name for an upcoming event. I don’t have anything else to go on. I don’t understand what any of this means.
What I do know is that there isn’t a time or place that she could call where I wouldn’t come running.
“Right. The Gala. Tell Madelyn I’m in.”
CHAPTER 6
MADDY
THEN
The sudden hush of the incessant chattering from the next row has me looking up from my textbook.
Ben Michaels, the next hockey god if you believe the rumours, has entered the room.
My heart does this ridiculous little flip the second I see him—dark hair tousled like he just rolled out of bed, backpack slung over one broad shoulder.
His dark eyes scan the room, stopping when he spots me in the back corner and his face breaks into a wide grin.
I will myself not to blush, but I can already feel the heat rushing to my cheeks. That grin. It’s somehow lazy and bright at the same time. He looks at me like I’m the only person he wants to see. Like I’m the only person in the classroom. The only person in the entire school.
He heads in my direction and doesn’t stop at the empty desk in the middle of the row or the one near the window. No, of course not. He walks straight to the seatin front of me, dropping his bag onto the floor as though he’s done this a hundred times before.
He sits down then immediately twists around in the chair to face me, resting his arm on the back. “Hey, Mads.”
“It’s Mads now?”
He shrugs. “Friends give each other new nicknames. How’s your week been?”
You mean since you found me hiding in an abandoned classroom? Since I confessed not only that I’d never been kissed but that I was about to be forced into it in front of an audience? Since you left me there, claiming you had to get to chemistry?
“Peachy. Thanks for asking.” I notice a group of girls nearby openly gawking at us. No doubt Ben is the shiny new object that they want to collect for their charm bracelet. “You don’t come to class much, do you?”
“Hockey comes first. It’s sweet that you missed me, though.”
I feel my cheeks burn, but I laugh it off. Half the female population of this school might be fawning over him, but I’m not one of them. “I never said I missed you.”
“Didn’t you though?” He leans forward the slightest bit, his arm brushing my fingers where they rest on my desk. “How’d your English assignment go?”
I knew it. I knew he had something to do with what happened.
“Funny you should ask.” I sit back in my seat, crossing my arms across my chest. His eyes fall to my breasts for the briefest moment making my stomach flutter before they snap back to my face. “When I showed up to class, ready to accept my tragic fate, Mr. Dowling announcedthat we would still be reading the lines, but there was to be no touching between partners.”
“Wow.” Ben’s over-the-top, mock surprise has me biting down on the inside of my cheek to keep from laughing. It’s a good thing he has hockey because while he’s very handsome, he’s a terrible actor. “I wonder what made him change his mind.”
“Hard to say. My friend Jasmine heard that someone tipped off the principal that a male teacher was forcing students to partake in non-consensual physical acts and grading them on it.”
He whistles, long and low, and the sound registers deep in my belly. “That wouldn’t have gone over well. Imagine if someone had threatened to tip off the local news.”
I’m still aware of several classmates in my peripheral vision staring slack-jawed at our exchange, but I can’t make myself care. “Imagine.”
