COACH CREED STOOD AT THE FRONT OF THE LEADERSHIP classroom, arms folded across his ’Maine Men shirt as Kitty and the rest of the class filed into the room and took their regular seats.
“So it turns out,” he started, as if they’d just walked into a conversation already in progress, “that little twerp Baranski was trying to protect those DGM criminals, which should be a crime itself. But the police have let him go.”
Mika leaned forward. “I’m going to talk to Coach Miles today,” she whispered. “See if we can get Theo in as manager before Creed tries to kill him with hill charges.”
“Good idea,” Kitty said out of the corner of her mouth.
Coach Creed began pacing the room. “The authorities have no leads at this time. They’ve failed, which means it’s up to us to find Ronny’s killer.”
Mika raised her hand. “I thought we were here to find DGM?” she said without waiting to be called upon.
“Same thing, Jones,” Coach Creed snapped. “Where there’s pirates, there’s booty.”
Kitty didn’t like the sound of this. At. All.
“So listen up!” Coach Creed continued. “’Maine Men, we’ll be upping your patrols. I want you around campus during class, before class, after class. All the time, got it?”
“Got it!” Rex said.
“And I want lists of students who have been exhibiting any kind of suspicious behavior,” Coach Creed continued. “Nervous tics, unexcused absences, isolationist tendencies. Work in groups. I want a comprehensive suspect list by the end of the period.”
Kitty turned around to face Mika. “Want to work togeth . . .” Her voice trailed off and her eyes drifted toward the back of the room, where Donté was waving at her.
Mika turned to see what Kitty was looking at, and smiled wickedly. “I see you already have a partner.” She winked at Kitty. “You can fill me in later.”
Donté swung a desk around for Kitty as she threaded her way to the back of the classroom, and the two of them huddled up, pretending to work on their suspect lists.
“This school is getting weird,” Donté said under his breath.
Kitty nodded, keeping an eye on Coach Creed. “Big Brother is watching you.”
“Creed’s totally off the rails,” Donté said, glancing at the coach. “He didn’t used to be like this, I swear.”
That’s right. Creed coached the men’s JV basketball team. He would have been Donté’s coach last year. Kitty recalled the conversation she’d overheard that morning between Creed and Father Uberti. Maybe it was time to do a little fishing?
“Oh yeah?” Kitty asked.
Donté shook his head. “Dude was always strict. Kind of old-fashioned. He was at a military school before he got the job here and I think he sort of preferred the discipline at his old job.”
“What school was it?” Kitty asked.
“Don’t remember. Somewhere in Arizona, I think.”
Kitty stared at Donté, her suspicions confirmed. Arizona. Could there be more than one military academy in the state? Possibly. But the link between Coach Creed and Ronny was feeling more tangible every moment, and all roads seemed to lead to Archway Military Academy.
“Got anything for me?”
Coach Creed loomed above them. Instead of creating his list, she’d been staring at the notebook page on her desk, pen in hand, while her brain grappled with anonymous clues and military academies in Arizona. Without even realizing it, Kitty had written a single word: Archway.
“Not yet,” Kitty said, trying to cover the page with her arm. “I haven’t noticed anything—”
“Let me see.” Coach Creed whisked the notebook out from beneath Kitty’s arm and held it up to his nose. “What the hell is this?” he roared.
Shit. “Nothing,” Kitty said, trying to laugh it off.
Coach Creed shoved the notebook in Kitty’s face. “What the hell did you hear, huh? What are people saying?”
Kitty flinched away from the page. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“None of it is true, do you hear me?” He stepped closer. “None of it.”
“Coach!” Donté said. He was on his feet, his massive frame towering over his former coach. “Leave her alone.”
“Greene, focus on your own list.” Creed glanced down at Donté’s page. “I see you haven’t done any better than our vice president here.”
Donté didn’t back down. “I don’t think this is an appropriate use of class time.”
“Appropriate use of class time?” Coach Creed said incredulously. “I thought you understood the severity of the threat to our school, Greene.”
“Maybe I don’t see it that way.”
Coach Creed looked as if Donté had slapped him across the face. He pointed at the ’Maine Men emblem on Donté’s shirt. “Greene, you’re a ’Maine Man. You swore an oath to protect the reputation of Bishop DuMaine Preparatory School. Are you telling me that means nothing to you?”
Donté stared at Coach Creed for a moment, the muscles around his jaw rippling. Finally, he nodded. “You know what, Coach? That oath does mean something to me.” Then he reached over his head, grabbed the collar of his ’Maine Man shirt, and pulled it off. “And this is the best way I can think of to protect our school.” Without another word, a shirtless Donté left the classroom.
Coach Creed stormed after Donté. “Greene! Come back here. I’ll fail you. I swear to God!”
As his voice faded, Kitty battled the urge to cry. She’d tipped Creed off about Archway, plus Donté had gotten into trouble on her account. Not exactly a stellar start to her detective career.
“You okay?” Mika asked, taking the seat Donté had vacated.
“Yeah.”
“Kitty Cat,” Mika said, smiling wickedly. “What have you done to poor Donté?”
Kitty slumped forward on her desk. “He’s going to fail leadership and it’ll be all my fault. He’ll hate me.”
“Are you kidding me?” Mika laughed. “You’ve got that boy whipped. What did you do, put out on the first date or something?”
Kitty’s head snapped up. “No, I just—”
The bell rang without Coach Creed or Donté having returned to the classroom. Mika slowly rose to her feet. “Well, whatever you did, share it with me when I meet Mr. Right, will you?”
Kitty absently packed up her bag and slung it over her shoulder. She’d been so panicked by Creed’s reaction to Archway, she’d kind of missed the fact that Donté had come to her defense and dropped out of the ’Maine Men.
“You forgot this,” Mika said, handing Kitty an envelope.
Kitty was about to say it didn’t belong to her, when she caught sight of the familiar label with her name on it.
“Oh, thanks.” She hoped Mika couldn’t see her hand shaking as she grasped the envelope to her chest.
Kitty waited until Mika had headed off for her chemistry class before she dared to peek inside. She walked slowly, scarcely aware of the throng of bodies bustling through the hallway around her. She paused at the top of the stairs and slid the contents of the envelope into her hand.
It was a photo.
There were two people. One of them—a boy, by the outfit—was missing a head. It had been cut clean out of the photo. The other definitely had a head, and she looked familiar. Her hair wasn’t styled like a twenties flapper, cropped short in the back with a heavy fringe of bangs, and the clothes weren’t thrift-store chic, but there was no doubt in Kitty’s mind that the smiling girl in the photo was Bree Deringer.
She turned the photo over and saw a caption scrawled across the back.
Best friends and Fighting Jesuits: Bree Deringer and Christopher Beeman.
