Finally, Dustin looked up. “Then it’s confirmed.”
“Yes,” I said, my voice steadier than I felt. “But buried. And if they buried this, who knows what else?”
Noah exhaled through his nose, a sound closer to a growl. “So we were really right — the program’s rotten from the inside out?”
Dante’s stare didn’t leave me, though he spoke to both of them. “That’s exactly what she’s saying.”
Dustin handed the phone back to me, rubbing the back of his neck. “Jesus, Dante. You realize what happens if this blows open?”
“Yeah,” Dante said flatly. “Which is why we don’t let this take us out.” His gaze flicked between the three of us. “We’re in this together now. All of us.”
No one spoke for a beat. The weight of what he’d just said settled like an anchor, pulling us all down into the same dark water.
I realized there was no going back.
“I confronted my dad,” I told them, and almost laughed at how both of their expressions mirrored Dante’s a few minutes ago. “And after telling Dante, and knowing you maybe suspected it, well...” I looked between the three of them. “I think this is so much more than what you thought, and I think the only way to get through it, is to—”
“Survive it,” Dustin grumbled. “You told your dad you found this?” He shook his head. “Damn, you got balls.”
Dante beamed at me. “I told you that too, remember?”
Noah was watching us. “There is so much here I need to think about,” he admitted. “But I thought you two were going to be... discreet?”
“Fuck discreet,” Dante said, wrapping his arm around me. “She’s mine.”
Noah huffed out a laugh. “Yeah, no one here’s trying to take her off you, man.”
Dustin grinned for the first time. “Well, I dunno. You sure about him, Savannah?”
“I really am,” I told him. “Weird, huh?”
“Why is that weird?” Dante demanded.
Noah opened the fridge and handed me a bottle of water first, and then to the two guys, too. “So what do we do?”
They all looked at me. “I think you do what you planned to. Keep your heads down, but I think knowing the extent of it is only to your benefit.” Dante took my bottle of water off me, opened it, and handed it back. I wasn’t sure what to say to that. I could open a bottle of water. “Um... thanks?”
“He has more Southern gentleman in him than most,” Dustin explained with a grin.
“Ah, okay.” I felt my flush, and Dante winked when I looked over, and I didn’t hide my answering smile. “So, I, um, looked into some of your teammates who are beingassisted. Do you want to know who?”
They all spoke at once. Dante and Noah said yes, Dustin said no.
“Majority wins,” Dante said, crossing his arms.
“What’s your vote, Savannah?” Dustin asked me. He saw the other two’s frowns and looked back at them with wide eyes. “What? She brings this to us, and you think she shouldn’t get a say?”
Dante let out a huff of exasperation. “Well of course she gets a say, but—”
“He’s right,” Noah said firmly. “There’s no but.”
Three pairs of eyes looked at me. “Well...” I blew out a breath. “I’d want to know,but—” I spoke louder over them to be heard as they started talking among themselves — “I don’t have to play with them, and I don’t have topretendwith them. You do.” Noah and Dante were frowning, but Dustin was nodding in agreement. “So for that reason, I wouldn’t want to know. And,” I added softly, “they may not even know.”
Dante looked thoughtful. “You mean the ones who are getting their grades altered?”
“Yeah, there are some who are only getting grades altered, and to be honest, they may actually think they’re scraping by.” I saw that all three of them had the same thought. “I checked on you all. You’re all doing this yourself.” I ran my fingers through the ends of my ponytail when they all looked at me. “You know, in case you were wondering.”
“It’s a probable assumption,” Dustin said carefully, “that the ones not getting paid to shut up won’t know it’s even happening. If it’s just their grade being altered...” He saw my frown andshrugged. He tilted his head as he thought. “I assume it’s a C they get and not something stupid like an A.”
