Page 73 of Evil King

“Deon!” My mom’s voice was frantic, and she was clearly crying. “Where are you?”

“Mom! What’s wrong? Are you okay?” Cherri’s expression turned to concern in an instant as I spoke. “What’s going on?”

“Baby, tell me it’s not true what they’re saying about you,” she whined. “Tell me you didn’t do it.”

“Do what? Mom!”

“It’s all over the news, Deon!” She sniffled. “They’re saying you killed a teacher by pushing her from the fourth floor of your school.”

My heart dropped into my stomach. “Oh, fuck!”

31

Cherri

Deon and I stared in horror at the news stories and articles thatfilledboth of our timelines. Every social media site, every major news outlet, and anything that could carry a headline had Deon’s mugshot plastered above a statement that he’d pushed Miss Abrams from her fourth-floor classroom. There were quotes from students and staff confirming the story, including people that I knew for a fact werenotin the building when Deon and Miss Abrams had their little issue. Deon had explained what happened to me in great detail when he called me the day that it happened, and it was just occurring to me that we didn’t have a chance to talk about what Nathan had told me about her and why I’d asked Sicily to bug the classroom. No matter which way I looked at it, itwasmy fault that Deon was in there, and now he was being blamed for her murder.

“What do you mean you got fired? They haven’t even charged me yet!” Deon yelled, still on the phone with his mom. “Okay. Just… Mom. I swear to fucking god, I didn’t kill anyone. You know I didn’t. I’m not a killer.” Deon’s head dropped, and it was as if I could hear her bringing up his record. “Yeah, but I didn’t do that either, Mom. You know that.”

I quickly put my phone away and started up the car. It was a bit of a struggle, getting dressed in a rush, given the circumstance we were in, but we managed, all while Deon stayed on the phone, trying to calm his mom. I was frustrated that our date had been cut short, but I was even more frustrated that this issue was cropping up after Deon had already been assured that things had been let go. Were they just lying to him when they said he wasn’t suspected of it anymore or did something change?

Well, one thing changed. Nathan and I had changed.

Was this my fault too?

“Mama, you have to calm down, okay? You need to listen to me.” Deon’s hands were clenched into fists as he tried to keep his temper in check. If his mom had just randomly seen the news, it was totally reasonable for her to be freaking out, even if what they were saying wasn’t true.

“Be patient, Deon,” I whispered to him. “She’s panicking.”

He nodded and took a deep breath. “I’m on my way home, Mom,” he said a bit more calmly. “Where are you?” Though I couldn’t make out the words, I could hear Deon’s mom, Ciara, yelling from the other end of the call. “I’m with Cherri.” He chuckled. “Yeah, a bit of good news with the bad.” He looked at me and said, “She’s excited about that.”

I did a lackluster fist-pump. “Yay.”

“Yeah. We’ve actually been talking for a while, but things finally”—he looked over at me and smiled—“happened.” He rolled his eyes. “Yeah, Mom. I’m brazenly aware of the fact that I made you lie to Cherri and you always felt bad about it. Yes, of course I told herImade you do that.” He looked over at me. “By the way, I asked my mom to lie to you about where I was.”

“I gathered that,” I replied.

“Yeah, Mom, she knew that,” Deon said. Then he scoffed. “I told you, we’re on the way. Just listen to me, Mom. If there are any cops there, don’t talk.” He sighed. “Shouldn’t have mentioned cops.” He tried a few times to cut into what I could only imagine was a long string of Ciara freaking out, and then finally got in, “Mom. It’snotgoing to happen again because I didn’t do anything wrong.”

“You didn’t do anything last time!” I yelped, and Ciara must have done the same because Deon’s eyes widened. “Sorry.”

Deon didn’t hang up with his mom on the entire drive home, which left me without a good opportunity to explain to him what Nathan had told me about Miss Abrams. I wish I hadn’t gotten so caught up in everything that happened because I couldn’t shake the feeling that it was an important piece to the mysterious puzzle. I had no idea what was about to happen, but hopefully, I’d have a chance to mention it to Deon before things got too crazy.

I parked my car in front of Deon’s house, and gratefully, there were no police there yet. Deon rushed in the house, and Ciara was standing in the living room with the news on. Deon’s mugshot was on the screen next to a glowing image of Jessica Abrams.

“Oh, it’s not like she was an angel, anyway!” I yelled at the television and then turned to see Deon and Ciara both staring at me. “Sorry. I’m not a big fan of hers.”

“Hello, sweetheart,” Ciara said, reaching out her hands. “It’s been a long time.”

“Yeah,” I said with a smile, walking into the hug.

Ciara looked over at Deon as we parted. “She got even more beautiful.”

“It’s unreasonable, right?” Deon said. “How am Ievergonna get used to it.”

I smiled at them. It felt like taking a step back in time, being in the same room with them both again. If only we had the time to sit and catch up. We had to figure out how to get Deon’s name cleared of the accusations against him.

He walked over and looked at the television. “So, have they come up with anyrealevidence?” he asked.

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