DEVON
Monday
I’m lost.
Reason being, I decided to listen to Chiamaka fucking Adebayo.
After detention on Friday, she attacked meagainand forced her number into my phone, and then sent me a message this morning to meet her in lab 201—wherever the fuck that is.
A hand grabs my arm and I almost scream. My heart’s near to exploding as I swing around, only to see an annoyed-looking Chiamaka.
“You’re late.”
Think I don’t know that?
“I didn’t know where lab 201 was.”
She doesn’t seem impressed, and I don’t think I really care. I want Aces to stop, I want Dre to speak to me again, and I just want to get into Juilliard and be done with Niveus.
She pulls me into a random room—lab 201, I guess—and I’m met with a lanky guy seated at a desk with a laptop opened up.
She hits my arm. “Give him your phone.”
I look at her, hoping she feels the dagger I’m mentally throwing.
“Why my phone? Why not his or yours?”
Chiamaka gives me the look my ma gives me when I give her lip.
“Peter doesn’t have a phone—which is shocking, especially for a tech guy, I know. He’s already got my phone, but because I don’t get the blasts about me, we need your phone too. Is that okay with you? Or do you need me to explain again, slowly?”
I should just leave; her condescending tone isn’t worth it. But I don’t. Like a zombie, I give the guy my phone and he plugs it into his computer.
“Were you able to get into the USB? I told Devon to bring his too—”
Peter shakes his head. “It’s impossible. All the files are unusable. I could look at his too if you want, but the files on your USB seem to be deliberately corrupted, which I’ve never seen before…”
“We’ll just see what comes up with tracing the messages back… How about the CCTV?” Chiamaka asks.
“I looked for the CCTV that covers the area by your lockers at the time you thought the USBs were planted, but there was a power outage just before. It killed the lights and the cameras and didn’t restart until just before first period.”
Aces always seems to be several steps ahead of us; they are very sophisticated too. I try to think of anyone I know who might secretly be a tech genius and who might have something against me, but my mind goes blank.
Peter hands my phone back. A black screen with a bunch of code pops up on his laptop.
“It’s done, everything I need is here,” Peter says, which kind of makes me nervous.
It’s not like I have anything too incriminating on there… just messages, and really, what message can be worse than the damage Scotty’s old phone archive has done?
“I’ll work on tracing the locations these messages were sent from, shouldn’t take me too long,” Peter says.
“When can you have it done by?” Chiamaka asks.
“I have a lab report due, so maybe before the end of the week…”
She touches his shoulder.
“Peter,” she starts, cocking her head to the side. “It’s very urgent, I’m sure you understand that.”
