My brows knot. “How shitty?”
“Hold on…” He must pull the phone away, his voice harder to hear. “What are you doing awake—no, never mind. Bed. Now.”
“Dad.” I know that voice and her serious tone like he’s unconscionably destroying her favorite pair of boots and gothic makeup. It’s my little sister Kinney. “You don’t understand. The witching hour is at 3 a.m.—I need to commune with my people.”
“Wait…are you dead? Did I forget to print an obituary of my own thirteen-year-old daughter? Let me think about this.” My dad’s dry voice definitively saysI’m not thinking about this.His thick sarcasm makes Farrow’s lips upturn even more towards me. Knowing exactly where mine originates.
“Dad,” she huffs.
“Kinney Hale,” he refutes, “I banished ghosts from this house millenniums ago. They’re all afraid of me. You’re wasting your time. Sobed. Now. You have school tomorrow.” He must put the phone to his ear. To me, he sighs, “Kids.” Just to piss her off.
“I’m not a kid, you troll.” I can actually hear her stomping away.
My dad laughs. “I love you, little Slytherin!” he shouts after her. And to me, he asks, “Sorry, where was I?”
“Shitty news,” I say, hesitant to pull off my jeans in case I need to go home for whatever reason. Farrow stays as motionless as me.
“Are you in your car?”
“Yeah. You’re on speaker by the way.”
“Farrow, is he speeding? If he is, you have my full permission to ground him. Take away his phone. He hates that.”
Farrow is smiling like a Cheshire cat.Lovingthis too much. I glare and flip him off. He clasps my hand. “He’s only five-over,”he says easily, still smiling. I bring our hands down, examining his tattooed fingers that spellk.n.o.t., the other hand reads:t.a.m.e.in black ink. Farrow watches me fixatedly but adds to my dad, “Let’s blame traffic.”
It’s more than a good lie. It’s one that’s meant to help me first and foremost. Not my parents. Not the security team.Me.
He’s on my side.
“Steal his keys next time,” my dad says.
I glance at the phone. “How about you not order my bodyguard around? That’s my job.”
Farrow grins and mouths to me,you wish.
I almost groan. I just want to fuck him.
Before my dad talks about my mom worrying about me behind the wheel, I say, “I can’t talk long. What’s the shit news?”
“We’re gonna have to reschedule our lunch tomorrow. Your Uncle Connor and Uncle Ryke have parent-teacher meetings.”
I read the texts earlier this morning—and the pictures have been going viral since noon. My little cousins Winona Meadows and Ben Cobalt spray-painted Dalton Academy’s science lab with the words:frog killers!
Those two always sendme memorandums on environmental objectives that H.M.C. Philanthropies should complete. They’re thirteen and fifteen. And they get in trouble together monthly.
“Let me know the new day for lunch; I’ll be there,” I tell him. I look forward to lunches with my dad and my uncles, but if one of us can’t make it, we just reschedule to a day later in the week. It’s shitty, but it’s not the worst.
“Drive safe, Moffy,” my dad says, his tone serious.
“I will. Night.”
“Love you, bud.” He hangs up.
I pocket my phone and stare off. Thinking. My dad’s voice lingersin my ears. Being with mybodyguard—there areconsequences packed on top of consequences. If I can, I want to avoid all of them.
I train my gaze on Farrow.
He rests his knuckles to his lips, brows raised at me. “Listening to Socrates and Plato again?”
