Page 118 of A Home for Harmony

“He is her brother.”

“Is Eli in the house right now with you and your friends?”

“No,” she said. He held her stare and she squirmed. “He’s not. He went to school. But I thought I’d still be here when he got home.”

“You thought wrong,” he said. “Go get your stuff and get your ass to school. I’ll be following you to know you went.”

“I need an excuse or I’m going to get detention.”

“Guess you’ll be staying late then, won’t you? When you get home, we’ll figure out the rest of your punishment.”

“It’s not fair,” Scarlet whined. “Everyone skips school. You can’t say you never did it. There isn’t anything going on today. Half my teachers are out and it’s all subs. They are at a training.”

“You know what?” he said. “If you’d said that to me and asked and explained it, I might have let you do it.”

Her jaw dropped. “What? Really?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “Maybe. You’ve been doing your work and getting your grades up, but you just blew all that by this stunt. Go.”

She got out of the car and went inside, then came out a minute later with her stuff and he followed her to school. If her friends stayed there, that was on their parents to figure it out.

Rather than go back to the office, he texted Harmony to see if she was around and could talk.

The past few weeks, she’d had no other contact from whoever sent her flowers.

He’d read all the messages that she could find, and alone, none of them stood out as anything more than someone that might be infatuated with her.

Not dangerous or threatening to anything other than her peace of mind.

Harmony replied that she was home if he wanted to stop, so he swung in that direction.

“Hey,” she said. “Stopping over for some nooky?”

“No,” he said.

“You’re not even smiling over that. Did you find out something about those messages I’ve been getting?”

He shook his head. “Nothing. I just found Scarlet at a friend’s house skipping school.”

She grinned. “That’s pretty normal for her age,” she said. “Don’t tell me you’ve never skipped school.”

“I have,” he said. “I want to be pissed about it, but part of me is trying not to be.”

“You can’t expect her to be a perfect teen.”

“I don’t. I’m more pissed that it was at a person’s house that I’ve never met. I don’t know who they are. I didn’t even know she wasn’t at school. Trinda always gets the calls from the school and Scarlet had hoped that her mother would just assume Scarlet was at my house.”

“But she didn’t?”

“No. I reminded Scarlet that I still informed her mother if she missed school. It’s one of those things we always did. I could track her, something her mother doesn’t have the ability to do anymore after one of their fights that I didn’t know about.”

“Be happy one of you could still reach her,” she said.

“I am. I found the address, then was told it’s the house of a boy that she likes.”

“Ouch. And there is the problem. I know she can’t date for a few more months.”

“She told you that?” he asked.