“Ms. Williams,” Darius greeted the Central High vice principal. It was closer to the start of the day than the end of it, but if he rushed over, it didn’t show. The benefits of dressing on the casual side of business-casual, Jasper figured. Ms. Williams was perched behind her desk with a floral blouse on and her hair up in a frizzy bun, the usual way she tried looking maternal and approachable. That helped get unsuspecting kids in range of her harpy talons. “I’m here to pick up Jasper.”

  “Of course, Mr. Mitchell.” With a tight smile and crisp tone like that, she was being extra salty. Jasper smirked. Why shouldn’t she take pride in a job well done? “I trust you’ve been told your daughter hacked into the school computers and altered a presentation to be shared at the Summer Festival conference?”

  “Yeah. From what she’s told me herself, Jasper felt the Central High rules weren’t being upheld by staff.” Level and calm, legendarily so, Darius didn’t anger easily. Not like Jasper, who definitely didn’t put it that way when she called her adoptive father from the bathroom. He took the only open seat, dwarfing the state-issued chair next to Jasper.

  Ms. Williams, unused to having an adult opponent, squinted at the bearded giant of a man before her with dreadlocked hair spilling over his shoulders. But she held her ground against that steady gaze of his somehow. She had the same resolve as cockroaches and Twinkies, after all.

  “Regardless of her feelings, the rules still apply to Ms. Madero.”

  “They apply to everyone,” Darius clapped back. “Including the PTA president’s kid stealing from the school store on camera.”

  Oh, now he’d done it. Jasper snorted a laugh that went ignored. His perfect calm finally got that poised smile to falter, and Ms. Williams only barely recovered with a bracing breath.

  “That matter is being addressed separately.” She wrestled that plastered neutral happiness into place while she nudged a picture frame to be perfectly aligned, or whatever she deemed that to be. “A father as reasonable as yourself must understand why we’ve decided to expel her. After repeated instances of disciplinary issues, we have no other choice.”

  “So I expose what you’re covering up for your bestie, and I get expelled?” Jasper put her feet up on the corner of Ms. Williams’ desk and scowled at her pointed stare. She liked to think the mismatched socks she put on that morning added to the insult.

  “I get it,” Darius corrected her, firmer than he was with the vice principal. Joke was on Williams, though, that meant he’d already written her off as a lost cause. That’s how Jasper chose to see being in trouble with him, anyway. He thought she could do better. He was probably right. “I hope this is a good lesson in discipline for all of us.”

  Jasper barely got into their house and turned right into the living room before Darius got going.

  “There are two weeks left in school.”

  “I can count,” Jasper agreed, tossing her backpack on the couch and dropping down to sit beside it. His lectures didn’t take long but she’d rather be comfy for it.

  “And you know better. You should have come to me.”

  Scoffing, Jasper just rolled her eyes and kicked off her shoes. “My way was faster.”

  “And got you expelled before finals,” Darius added, like she wasn’t in the painfully sunny office when that happened. He sat next to her in the big armchair that suited him much better than that faded, thin seat at Central. “Now you’ll need summer school at a different school to catch up before next year.”

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  “But that brat won’t get away with anything ever again. Everybody knows he’s a cheat and a sneak,” Jasper said, relishing the memory of everyone gathered in the gym and watching as the prize child of Central High unlocked the store after school and helped himself to snacks. A fight even broke out before any teachers could sweep in to save him! Maybe he’d have a black eye. She’d get the tea on Twitter later. “So Mommy and Daddy can’t cover his weaselly little ass.”

  “Jasper,” he leaned forward, turning those steady green eyes on her with a warning tone. They had eye color in common, at least. “You’re too smart to resort to swearing.”

  “Fine. He’s a spineless, conceited, privileged worm, and someone had to put him in his place.”

  Exhaling through his nose, Darius shook his head.

  “Standing up for what’s right is important, Jasper. I’m glad you have that moral compass. But it keeps steering you into trouble.” She picked at her nails to avoid his I Care About You, So I’m Worried stare. That soft one with the raised eyebrows that combined with his cheesy metaphors to devastating effect. It never stopped him before, and that somehow didn’t change. “You should’ve come to me. I can talk to the teachers and other parents to solve things without breaking every rule on the way. It takes longer, but you’d still be in class right now.”

  He waited for her to answer, patient as always. Honestly, Jasper had no idea where he got it all. She tested it all the time without even trying and—

  Jasper looked back at Darius and shrugged.

  “They weren’t teaching me anything there.”

  She wasn’t saying it just to say it, that was fact. The tests weren’t hard, and she could zone out in class without missing a thing. Group projects were the most trying part of anything Central put her through. Even that wasn’t anything new, since Jasper already knew people sucked.

  “You’re right.” Seriously? Even trying to divert him showed what an understanding man Darius was. No wonder he was allowed to adopt her when he wasn’t even dating anybody. Probably helped that he lived on the grounds of a prestigious academy for smart kids, where he worked as head of maintenance, security, and a bunch of other things. She didn’t know his title or care to, really. It was enough to know nothing went on around there without him knowing.

  “Course I am,” she muttered, twisting a ring around her finger to keep busy. Not one of those fidgety ones, but it did the trick.

  “I’ve talked to Ms. Holmes.”

  He finally sat back in the chair, which told her all she needed to know about what they discussed. Verity Holmes was the high-strung figurehead of the institute she founded in her predecessor’s name, and she low key had an eye on Jasper as a new charity case student for their ranks. The more she heard about Jasper’s projects and tests, the more noticeable her interest was. Darius continued explaining what she already knew just the same.

  “She said you can take the entrance exam after finals end at Holmes Institute. Your grades are promising, and the courses here will challenge you more than public school.”

  He was giving her reasons to say yes if that was what she wanted. The mellow silence that came after could stretch on forever, and he’d be there.

  The 11:30 am bus for the plaza went by outside the window. Someone honked, probably at the bus for being there at all. Jasper flicked her tassel keychain. Gave real thought to going upstairs without another word and closing her door, but there wasn’t anything she’d do up there that she wasn’t doing right there on the sofa.

  “Why didn’t she offer this when I was a freshman?”

  “She did,” Darius admitted. “I’d adopted you a few months before. There was a lot of change going on in your life, and I didn’t want to add more.”

  Thinking back to when she first started living with Darius, he was probably right. Getting to sleep and staying asleep in the new house had been hard. She practiced mediating and used pillow sprays and white noise machines, and it still took months to find a reliable sleep schedule. Sort of. Her appetite went up and down, and sometimes, she didn’t want to spend any time with Darius at all. It was easier to be alone. Alone was a familiar constant in a world of variables.

  Yeah, he was right. Again.

  “You don’t need to decide now. You’ve got two weeks of being grounded to think on it.”

  “Ugh, Darius,” Jasper grumbled. “He deserved it!”

  “No good deed,” he reminded her, a playful smile on his face as he stood up. “The exam study guide’s on the counter. I suggest you start there while I get back to work.”

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