Summer on the Short Bus (23 page)

He pushes away from me so he can see my face. “Oh yeah?”

“She used to carry those big pink peppermints in her purse. You know the kind you get at the drugstore that fall apart as you put it in your mouth? Of all the memories to have of your mother, right?”

“They're hot pink and about this big?” He raises his hand and makes a little circle with his fingers. “I love those. My nana always has a big jar full of them on her kitchen counter.”

The shared pleasure over the ninety-nine-cent treats make me smile, and for a moment I forget that I'm in the middle of committing my first felony.

TWENTY-FIVE

B
am! Bam! Bam!

The pounding on the door jars us both from our emotionally charged moment back to reality.

“They're here!” The panic in Aidan's voice carries through the crack beneath the door, prompting Quinn to release me so fast, I really should be wearing a seat belt. “You guys, come on!”

We both survey the damage in the room. It looks like a tornado passed through.

“Go with him,” Quinn says. “I'll take care of this.”

“No way, it's my mess. I'm not letting you clean it up alone.”

Whack!
The door flings open, banging into the wall behind it. Heart racing, I turn over my shoulder and am relieved to find Aidan in the doorway, though I have no idea how he managed to get himself up there.

“Hurry the hell up!” he says. “I can see the dust cloud coming in from up the road. They're gonna be here any minute!”

“Cricket,
go
!” Quinn stops reloading the file drawer so he can look me square in the eye. “It'll be a lot easier for one person to get out of here unseen than three. Just go with him—I'll be right
behind you.”

“Are you sure?”

“
Yes!
Now get out of here!”

Against my better judgment, I turn and clear the small distance to the door in a matter of seconds. Aidan is waiting with one hand on the doorknob, and an intense look on his face. A vision of Edward ordering me into the protection of Jacob's hairy wolf arms before the Volturi arrive suddenly flashes through my mind and I shudder. Claire's got way too much influence on me.

“Let's roll,” he says. He gives the door a hearty tug and wheelies himself to the ground. I skip both steps, landing with a
thud
, and immediately take off after him.

We fast-track it behind the mess hall and past Sam's trailer. Aidan's arms are working overtime, spinning so fast they're blurring like blades on a propeller. Despite my flip-flops, I manage to hang just a few feet behind him, although with the way my heart is pumping, I doubt that will last for long.

The distinct sound of tires on gravel prompts Aidan to curse, and me to dig a little deeper into an energy reserve I didn't know I had.

“We're almost there!” he shouts.

Following his lead, I scramble up and over a small embankment, and into a thicket of white pine trees just behind the flagpole. Aidan skids to a dusty halt while I stumble in beside him, immediately squatting down to his level and out of sight.

“You okay?”

“I don't know.” I gasp and clutch my chest. “I think I'm going to need a paramedic. Or an inhaler.”

“Oh, the burden of having legs.”

“Ah shit, Aidan,” I say, still gasping. “I'm sorry, I didn't mean—”

“Relax,” he says, trying to catch his own breath. “I'm just kidding.”

“You're an ass,” I say, trying to ignore the collection of fresh scrapes and scratches on my feet. The overwhelming scent of pine has my stomach turning, so I do my best to focus my attention on the little two-room cabin we've just escaped.

“What do you think will happen if he gets caught?”

“He's not going to get caught.”

“
If
he does.” I turn to him with desperation in my voice. “What would happen? Would she fire him?”

“Probably.”

“What about school? Do you think she could get his scholarship taken away? His parents can't afford the tuition.”

“I don't know.”

“Oh God!” My hands cover my mouth as a horrific idea crosses my mind. “Do you think she'd have him arrested? For trespassing or breaking and entering? I know we were joking about it before, but this is real, Aidan. Like
real
. He could go to jail or stand trial—”

“Cricket,” he says, obviously annoyed. “Nothing's going to happen to him.”

“What makes you so sure? You've seen how up and down Rainbow's been with us. For all we know, she might have him duct-taped to a chair right now.”

“Dude,”
he says, looking at me with the eyes of an exhausted parent. “He's fine, okay? Nothing's going to happen to Quinn. He's not going to jail, or detention, or anywhere in between.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“Because”—he motions his head to the side—“he's already out.”

“What?” I turn back toward the office and see Quinn tearing through the field we've just crossed. His cheeks are pink, and his eyes are wide. “Oh, thank God!” I get to my feet and begin waving my arms above my head.

“So much for staying hidden,” Aidan mumbles.

The second Quinn spots me, I instantly feel relieved. With the cloud of dust he's kicking up, it's nearly impossible to see if anyone's following him, but based on his enthusiasm, I'm guessing we're safe. He clears the embankment in one enormous, Spider-Man-like leap, landing with his hands on the ground.

“Holy crap!” He collapses against me, completely out of breath. “I've never run so fast in my life.”

“Did she see you?” I ask.

“No,” he says, breathing hard. “At least I don't think so. I
thought for sure I was screwed. Right after you guys left, I heard the truck pull up, and the car doors shut, but no one ever came into the office. I ended up just shoving the rest of the paperwork into the drawer so I could get the hell out of there. Hopefully she won't go digging around for old pictures anytime soon.”

“So you guys actually found something?”

Quinn and I exchange a quick glance before I answer.

“It turns out Rainbow and my mom were friends in college. I'm not sure how close they were, but based on the picture we found, I'm guessing BFF territory.”

“Really?” Aidan's eyes widen. “Well, that blows my whole secret mommy theory.”

I feel my brows tighten together. “Your secret mommy theory?”

“Yeah. I started thinking you'd find an original birth certificate that proved Rainbow was actually your mom. Like she took off when you were a baby and your dad just concocted the whole cancer story to protect you or something.”

“Are you high?”

He laughs. “It wasn't that far-fetched an idea, was it?” He looks to Quinn who just shrugs.

“You both watch way too much
Maury
. Anybody can tell by looking at us that we're not related.” Quinn shrugs again, though this time it's in my favor. Now that he's seen the photographic evidence it's hard to refute. “But that's beside the point,” I say. “We still don't know who's leaking all my personal info to Rainbow.”

“What are you talking about?” Aidan says. “It's obviously your dad.”

“It doesn't add up,” I say, shaking my head. “My dad is really private when it comes to me. There's no way he'd share my personal information with someone I've never even met.” Unless he was already friends with Rainbow, too. “Oh my God.” I recoil slightly at my sudden light bulb moment. “If Mom and Rainbow were
that
close, maybe my dad knows her, too.”

“He does donate money here,” Quinn says. “It's definitely a possibility.”

Nodding, Aidan chimes in. “Yeah, maybe she just provided moral support. In the dark, without any clothes on—”

“Aidan,
stop
!” I kick the wheel of his chair with my foot. “Any more of those images and I'm going to have to give myself a lobotomy.”

“Okay, okay,” he says. “But seriously, maybe she helped with things around the house or was a shoulder to cry on. You were really young—there's no way you'd remember.”

I shake my head. “Carolyn was the only one. She's told me before—he wouldn't talk to anybody else but her—” Hard and fast, the memory of Rainbow questioning Sean about Carolyn's absence when I arrived strikes me down like a bolt of lightning.

No way.

Carolyn is the leak?

TWENTY-SIX

“I
waaaaaas thinking I could do a haaaaandstand and then Cricket could pop up in betweeeen my legs. Don't you think thaaaat would be coooool?”

I'm not sure why it surprises me that Claire would agree that my head suddenly appearing from between Meredith's useless legs would be a good addition to our train wreck of a routine, but it does. “That's ridiculous,” I say. “And gross. People don't want to see my head popping out of your crotch!”

Claire bursts into laughter while Meredith covers her blushing cheeks with her hands.

“It's perfoooormance art, Cricket. Open to interp-in-intterp . . .”

“Interpretation,” I say. “But it doesn't matter. It's going to look stupid. I'm not doing it.”

“Whaaaaat is your problem, Cricket?”

“Excuse me?” I stare down at Meredith. “What did you say?”

“Yooooou heard me,” she says, unmoved by my tone. “You are reeeeally grumpy tooooday.”

“Yeah. You're bitchy,” Claire adds. Heaven forbid any
conversation pass by without input from her. “Is it about this morning? Or do you need more Midol?”

“No, Claire,” I say, my eyes practically rolling out of their sockets. “As I've said before I
don't
need any Midol. I'm sorry I'm being bitchy; I'm just upset about something that happened last night.” And can't stop thinking about it. “What happened this morning?”

“The thiiiiing with Quinn,” Meredith says.

A chill races up my spine. “What thing with Quinn?”

“With Raaaainbow and what heeeee did.”

“What are you talking about?”
I jump to my feet, losing what little patience I had. Meredith jerks back. “I'm sorry,” I say, aware I probably look like a blonde Godzilla from her angle. “I'm not trying to scare you, but I need to know exactly what happened. Where's Quinn?”

I see a lump pass down her throat as she swallows back what's bound to be an eruption of tears.

“He . . . uh . . . Raaaainbow said . . .”

“Rainbow said she needed to talk to Quinn. In her office.”

I whip my head over my shoulder to face Claire. Finally she has something useful to say.

“Did she say why?”

She shrugs. “Not really. They left so Colin had to finish collecting rocks with us. I found a white one. It looks like a diamond, want to see?”