Three teachers had been caught helping students cheat on standardized tests and SATs. Shit. For the last four years the school failed to meet its educational goals. One more year of failure meant they might be forced to restructure. Change of administration and staff. More kids pulled by parents who saw the writing on the wall. Rich kids yanked and placed in snooty private schools. What would be left were less-advantaged kids whose parents worked too many jobs to properly care for their children or, worse, who didn’t give a fuck about the kids at all. No wonder drugs found their way into the place.
The reason Ty got on the soccer team. The guy he replaced hadn’t moved town, merely changed schools. Shit, given their low rating and apparent drug problem, maybe he should talk to Charlotte about pulling Ty out of there too.
But he might not go. He’d made the soccer team. His girlfriend attended the school. He’d started making friends. To suggest putting him in yet another school might trigger more rounds of “I hate Uncle Lucky.”
No, better to fix the problem, for Ty and all the other students. No mystery why grades needed improving though.
Lucky stared at a list of names, athletes from Ty’s school skating by on borderline grades, and those who’d applied to Ivy League schools.You mean there are any kids left there who’d qualify?As good a place to start as any.
The next part of his plan called for strategy. His best smile and a phone call from Walter got him a much nicer loaner car than the piece of shit Malibu.
He stopped by the house, enlisting Charlotte’s help to dress him up nice. He stared at himself in the mirror. Fuck. He’d never convince anyone to believe his story.
He gave up on making himself presentable, retrieved Bo from work, and drove to the doctor’s office he’d followed the apartment guard to, stopping two blocks away. Turned out Doctor Keel took a week off, calling in his usual replacement.
“Remember,” Bo said, straightening his tie, “you’re there to observe, notice what I don’t.”
“Sure thing.” No need reminding Bo that, as department trainer, those words normally came out of Lucky’s mouth. Lucky got out of the car and trudged the rest of the way. If anyone watched, Bo arrived in the Lexus alone.
Lucky waited thirty seconds after Bo entered to saunter in himself. Bo stood at the counter talking to a receptionist—a receptionist smiling with way too much enthusiasm.
Yeah, Bo had a way of putting even strangers’ libidos on high alert.
“He’s taken,” Lucky growled under his breath.
“Can I help you, sir?” a second receptionist asked Lucky. Thank God it wasn’t Cheryl from before, so maybe she wouldn’t recognize him.
Lucky waved a dismissive hand. “I’m here to pick somebody up.”
Without another word the woman turned away. Lucky took a chair close enough to hear Bo’s conversation and buried his nose in a gardening magazine, the lesser of the evils spread out on a low table, though he’d have to hold the pages farther away to actually read.
He fucking hated doctor’s offices, recalling too many piss-in-a-cup drug testing visits during his probation with the SNB. The place stank of disinfectant and something floral and overpowering he’d not noticed on his last visit. He sneezed.
“I need to speak with the doctor,” Bo said. “A friend referred me.” He dropped the name of one of the kids on Lucky’s list.
Not many doctors in this town even talked to someone without an appointment, but the receptionist stood. “I’ll see if he’s available.” She disappeared through a door at the back of the reception area.
Bo took a seat, never glancing Lucky’s way.
Six more people sat around the waiting room, two teenagers who appeared to be together, a woman with a young girl, and a man with a boy close enough in looks to be his son.
A side door opened and a uniformed nurse stepped out. “Livingston, Perkins.” The teens stood and crossed the room. Both were young and fit, dressed in fashionable jeans and T-shirts. “Right this way,” the nurse said, holding the door while they strode past.
Bo glanced up, meeting Lucky’s eyes. Lucky gave a slight nod. His possible suspects list contained a Kyle Livingston and Raiford Perkins, both basketball players at Ty’s school.
They returned five minutes later, wide grins on their faces, and paper bags in their hands. Five minutes? Not nearly enough time for an examination, let alone two.
They left, and three more people entered the door. Thriving business the doctor had here, and a whole hell of a lot more patients than Dr. Keel had the day Lucky brought Salters and Johnson.
The nurse from before made another appearance. “Mr. Swartzentruber?”
Ah, so Bo used the alias he’d created during his undercover ops training with O’Donoghue. Bo followed the woman from the room.
Lucky stepped up to the counter again. “Can I use your bathroom?”
The young woman smiled. “Sure. Through that door, turn right, and second door on the left.”
“Thanks.” Lucky scurried through the door. He spotted two nurses, one in a room taking an elderly man’s blood pressure, another at a counter, tapping away at a computer. Several room doors stood open, with a few closed.
