Page 49 of Broken Rules (The Elites of Weis-Jameson Prep Academy 2)

Malcolm sits down at his desk and goes to work. He babbles off a string of technical jargon that goes way beyond my understanding of computers. I try to keep up, but I mostly just try and stay out of his way. But I’m relieved he seems so knowledgeable and has so many tools at his disposal. Maybe I’ll leave here with something that’s actually useful for Emmett.

“Is this legal?” I ask hesitantly, as he outlines the process of hacking someone’s cell phone data.

“Not at all,” he answers smugly.

It makes me a little nervous, but if you can’t trust the cops around here…what else can you do?

“Okay, I’ve got all of her cell phone data from the past six months,” he tells me after a long string of typing and clicking and speaking to me in what might as well be a whole other language.

“Wow, just like that, huh?” I gasp. “Anything recent?”

“No, it looks like all activity stopped about two weeks ago,” he says as he clicks through pages of encrypted data.

“Sounds about right. Emmett said she had already been missing for a few days before he came to me. What about the last location?”

“It looks like the last traceable on the phone was the Jameson Mall,” he replies, still scrolling through. “But that doesn’t necessarily mean that’s the last place she was. The phone could have died there and never been recharged. Or it could have been dropped.”

“The mall? Huh.” Not a surprising spot, but knowing it’s the last place her phone was used feels important. “Well, that’s more than we knew before. Anything else useful?”

“I can pull up her calls and messages,” he trails off into more typing. “Looks like these were the last numbers she exchanged texts and calls with. The texts seem to indicate meeting up at the mall, which makes sense.”

“What are the numbers?” I ask impatiently. He angles the screen so I can see. He flips through the contacts in his phone, letting me look over his shoulder as he compares them to the ones on the screen. It doesn’t take us long to find a match. “Those are Lily and Vivian’s phone numbers. You don’t think…Do you think this means they have something to do with her disappearance?”

“Based on that alone, I’d be inclined to say no,” he speaks candidly, pursing his lips. “Though you shouldn’t rule it out. Whatever happened to Bernadette could have happened right after meeting up with them. But what’s strange is…if I pull up the records from their numbers…Look at the timestamps here.” He angles the screen in my direction again and points to a transcript between two phone numbers.

“That’s Lily and Vivian talking to each other, right?”

“Yeah…all the way past the meet up with Bernadette. The three of them were exchanging messages up until their locations were traced to the mall,” he explains. “Then Bernadette’s texts drop off. But Lily and Vivian’s continue.”

“So, Lily and Vivian kept using their phones to communicate with each other…” I try to follow along with him. “Even though the three of them were, in theory, all hanging out together in person?”

“It would appear so.”

“Well, what do the messages say?” I ask eagerly. Not only could this be a crack in the case, but, out of wild curiosity. I would love to know what those three talk about when no one else is around. “Vivian and Bernadette still had some tension between them after the investigation and everything. Could Lily and Vivian just have been talking shit about Bernadette through texts while they were hanging out with her?”

“The texts don’t look like anything out of the ordinary. But it’s still strange.” He makes a clicking sound against his teeth. “Makes it look like they were coordinating around something Bernadette didn’t know about. Something they didn’t want her to know about. Or maybe just one of them was hanging out with her while the other one kept tabs on them.”

“Like to plan an attack or something?” My eyes dart across the screens, wishing I could keep up with it all.

“Possibly. With this being Bernadette’s last known location and them being the last people she talked to…” he trails off, shaking his head. “It definitely doesn’t look good on their part. The police would definitely consider them their best suspects based on this information. Have you or Emmett confronted them about her disappearance yet?”

“No. Emmett’s been too convinced of their innocence this entire time,” I scoff. “Now he finally has decided to ask them about it…but I don’t know if that’s actually happened yet, or if anything has come of it.”

“Well, you should definitely tell Emmett about this,” he announces as he spins around from his desk to face me.

“Definitely.” I nod with my eyes still glued to the screens. “I want to tell him right away. Would you come with me to talk to him? He’s so paranoid that I’m just accusing them out of jealousy. If you’re there to explain the technical side of it, he might actually take it seriously.”

“I don’t know.” He frowns. “I’d be happy to…but you remember Emmett doesn’t exactly like me anymore.”

“You said the Elites had a lot to do with that,” I uphold optimistically. “I know things appear to be a little weird with him and Vivian right now…but hopefully that’s nothing. And if so, Emmett has changed a lot now that his father’s out of the picture. I know it’s hard to believe, but he’s really nothing like he used to be. Maybe he’s let go of whatever he had against you back then.”

Of course, I can’t bring up just how bad Emmett’s jealousy over Malcolm is. He’d never come if he knew how bad that was. I can only hope he’ll set that aside in light of the news. After all, Emmett asked me to try and set aside my jealousy towards Vivian, considering everything that’s happening. He should be able to do the same.

“If you say so.” He finally nods hesitantly. “I’m willing to try.”

Malcolm prints off large stacks of all of the data before we jump into his car and drive out to Emmett’s motel. I’m relieved his car is outside. If it hadn’t been, I’d have gone into a paranoid fit thinking he was still with Vivian.

“Stay here for a minute,” I tell Malcolm as I unbuckle my seatbelt. “Let me catch him up to speed a little before he sees you.”

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