Good Grades & Mystery Games (North University Series Book 2)

“So, that’s it? He’s just gone. Dead.”

After not sleeping properly for four nights, the last thing I want or need to deal with is my dad and my uncle. I’ve been sitting in my dad’s office for almost an hour, and he keeps asking me questions about Gio. I answer them and then he asks more, usually the same question. Something is not adding up to him, which is the last thing I can focus on right now. My priority is being there for Scarlett.

Since Gio’s death, reporters have decided to keep quiet about it, claiming that the only thing that has happened is Voss has lost a vital member to their team.

What they don’t say is how B&Co believe that Gio was the one smuggling the drugs into the business, and he died in an accident, tying up the story neatly. Motives are still loose, but they could make sense. He wasn’t a leader like Mateo was. He wasn’t in the spotlight. He lost his wife and his close friend the same night. Maybe he wanted more, and he wasn’t getting it. It just doesn’t make sense that he would try and put Scarlett in danger, enabling her on his concerns and worries about the business, knowing that she would try to figure it out on her own. I’ve had days to get my head around, but it still seems so foggy.

“I just don’t believe you’re telling me that our lead suspect has just died. It would have been one hell of a story,” my dad says, sighing as he looks through the window into the frosty forest of the backyard. “Do you know who killed him?”

I shake my head. I’ve been trying not to relive that night. The last thing I want to remember is all that blood, her screams…. “No, it seemed like a freak accident.”

“Seemed?” He quirks an eyebrow as he turns to me. I rub my sweaty palms against my trousers.

“Well, I don’t know for sure, obviously. Everything happened so fast. It makes sense that it was an accident. The only person who would want him dead is Mateo and he’s not even alive fully himself,” I say, voicing my theories aloud. My dad nods slowly before recounting the story I’ve told him three times.

“So, he never got to tell you what he was going to say?” he asks.

“No. I’m assuming it was some fucked up confession or something,” I say, shrugging.

“Right. Well, keep an eye out,” he says, getting up out of the seat to walk me out. He pushes the door open, but I don’t walk through.

“Yeah. About that…” I start and he tilts his head at me. I rub the back of my neck anxiously before shaking out my hand. “Look, I’m out. I’m done. Whatever it is that you want to keep digging for, you do it on your own. We could have also been killed if we weren’t careful and God, if anything happened to Scarlett, I would have personally murdered whoever hurt her.”

My dad nods at first. He understands what it’s like in this industry. He tries to protect me, and he tried to protect my mom. I know he would do anything to make sure we’re safe and he has to understand that I would do the same thing for Scarlett.

“You’re starting to sound like you love her, boy,” my dad says playfully, smirking. Weirdly enough, I don’t want to punch him in the throat for suggesting that. I stand my ground.

“She’s my partner in everything, in every way. She can give me a hard time, but that doesn’t mean I don’t want to protect her. She’s not done anything wrong to deserve any of that,” I say. He studies me for a moment, and he doesn’t say anything. For a second, I think he’s proud of me in some way. I glance down at my watch. “Speaking of her, I’m meant to meet her now, so we don’t fail our class. And I meant what I said. Anything I find out; I’m not doing it for you.”

He holds out his hand to me and I look at it for a second before shaking it. “Weirdly, I respect that,” he says with a low chuckle. I give him one of my best smiles, finally feeling like a weight has lifted off my shoulders.

“Good.”

*  *  *

Most of Scarlett and I’s conversations over the last few days have been a lot of one-worded ones. I’m fine with it. This is her process and I’m going to be with her throughout all of it. I just wish I could do something to ease her pain.

She came straight back to school on Monday like nothing happened. She came in, attended every lecture, completed her homework, and gave nobody any reason to suspect that she just lost a family member. She still dressed the same. She still let out her snarky comments while we studied. She’s good at pretending everything’s fine. Too good.

“How are you feeling?” I ask when I return from the bathroom. We’ve not said much to each other today, but we’re getting closer to finishing our app. We need to work on a colour scheme and more finer details, but it’s coming together perfectly. She looks up at me, her eyes still a little heavy and dull.

“Not great,” she mutters before dropping her eyes to her laptop.

“Do you want to talk about it?” I suggest quietly, shifting in my seat.

“Not really.”

“Want to sit in silence and read?”

She nods and we do.

She finishes up her final research for getting the app together, emailing back and forth with the software developer, while I stare at colours, so I don’t stare at her.

Don’t get me wrong, I love it when she shouts me and tells me I’m doing something wrong, but there is something incredibly special about these quiet moments where she lets me help her and be there for her.

There is nothing more that I want or need more than Scarlett Voss. She’s just everything.

“Hey,” she says quietly, snapping me out of my daydream.

I look up at her. I was doing the thing that she does – where she does things without realising them. Maybe that’s what happens to her. Maybe she gets too stuck in her head that she doesn’t know what her body is doing. I don’t know why I’m doing it. I shouldn’t be stressed, but I am. We’ve still got to finish the project. I don’t know where we stand or how to help her. The thought of the mystery still not being solved is making me worry more than usual.

“You’re tapping the table again. Can you chill for two seconds?”

“I can’t,” I whisper.

“What’s the matter with you?” she asks quietly, glancing around the empty library. I’ve stopped tapping as fast as it was before, and it’s now slowed down to a rhythmic tap.

“I don’t know. I just…I just need to do something,” I say, running my hands through my hair as I lean back in the chair. When I look at her, her eyes have softened, and her mouth is pulled into a small smile.

“What do you need?”

You, I almost say like a fucking lunatic.

The last thing I want to do is confuse her having a hard time with actually liking me beyond the new friendship we discovered. I’m losing my shit here. Why is this coming to such a surprise for me? It shouldn’t be, right? She’s been right in front of me for years and I’ve been aware of her before that. I can’t get awkward now. Not when she’s already going through so much.

“Ev,” she presses. That nickname, I think to myself. It makes my heart almost fall out of my chest. “Why don’t you go to the music rooms or something? I’ll finish up here. Your stress is going to rub off on me.”

“Are you sure?” I choke out.

“I’m going to be nice to you and you’re going to let me. Deal?” she says, repeating my words back to me. She tilts her head when I don’t say anything, silently trying to figure me out.

“Okay,” I say, packing up my sheets and my laptop to put into my backpack. She smiles weakly before dropping her eyes back down to her work.

When I get to the music rooms, I have a moment to think, to stop the constant worrying about what could happen or what has already happened. I know I need to live in the moment and God knows that I try, it’s just hard sometimes.

It’s so easy to tell yourself that living while you can is the best option, but there is always going to be that fear about tomorrow or yesterday. The worst part is, when you spend the whole day ignoring your worries and compulsions, the second your brain is not focused on something else, everything comes rushing back to you like a tidal wave and you feel like you can’t breathe anymore.

I get through almost an hour of playing intense dark melodies until I decide to slow it down and choose something more light-hearted. I’m not playing for an audience, but I’m sure people are walking past and assuming I’m having some sort of breakdown, which I kind of am.

I got an email from Diane Scavo, the teacher of musical arts at NU about a showcase coming up. She wants me to perform an original piece, but I haven’t composed my own music in a while. I try to give it a go, seeing if the melodies will come naturally to me, but they don’t.

My old piano teacher told me that the best way to create your own music is to relieve your greatest memories. Recently, it’s been harder to dig back into those joyful times with all the doom and gloom happening around me. Still, I try my hardest and think of a time when I was truly happy.

The first thing that comes to mind is Scarlett teasing me in that dodgy restaurant about how I was in the band and when we smoked weed and she pressed her hand to my heart or at the museum when she held my hand. All my best memories are with her, and they’ve only occurred in the last few weeks.

My all-time favourite was last Christmas when she shoved bacon in my face because I joked about her eating the last piece. I thought she felt it too – that slight spark of connection – when she locked eyes with me and I smiled with bacon falling out of my mouth as she continued to shove more in my face.

I sigh after stringing together a decent three-minute piece. It’s not perfect, but it’s something.

When I open my eyes, she’s there, standing like an angel, watching me play. If I didn’t know any better, she’s probably been hiding, listening to me all this time. But I don’t know any better, so I smile at her in the mirror.

She takes a seat across from me, still watching me in the mirror as she asks, “Is it going to distract you if I watch?”

I shake my head. “It’s better, actually,” I say, although I don’t know if it’s entirely true. “Can you sing for me?”

She laughs and the sound runs right through me like water. It’s the first time I’ve heard her laugh in a few days. God, I missed that sound so much.

“I told you I can’t sing,” she concedes.

“Fine,” I say, moving to leave space on the bench as I gesture to it. “Let me teach you something then.”

She sighs a little, but she accepts my proposal, sliding next to me on the bench. Our thighs are touching, our elbows brushing against each other, and it feels like my whole body is being dunked inside a volcano. Everything about her just lights me up: her wit, her charm, her intelligence, her beauty, her smile, her eyes, her everything.

Jeez, this is starting to get pathetic.

“You gonna teach me or what, Branson?” she asks sarcastically, watching me watch her in the mirror. I nod and I place my right hand on the keys, playing A to G slowly. “I know where the notes are. Just teach me something good.”

“I’m the teacher, remember?” I say, nudging her with my shoulder.

“Yeah, a pretty shit one,” she mumbles.

“Okay, I’ll show you Moonlight Sonata,” I say, and she nods. “I’ll play the right hand and you can do the left since it’s more repetitive.”

I play the first few lines of the song with both hands at a faster tempo than usual, so she gets the gist. She watches my hands carefully, twisting hers in her lap. When I’m done, I replay the part I’m going to teach her.

“I can not do that,” she says quietly.

“Oh my god, are you a quitter, Angel?” I hold a dramatised hand to my chest, gasping and she kicks me under the seat, and I wince. “Come on. I’ll show you it one more time and you can do it. I believe in you.”

“Your belief in me is doing nothing for me right now,” she mutters.

“Well, it better,” I say back before playing it again.

I watch her as she tries to do it on her own. She does it slowly, but she messes up a few times, so I encourage her to continue. I have sheet music on my phone, but that would only confuse her, so she’s mostly doing it by ear. Honestly, she’s not half bad. She messes it up again and she hits the keys, so they make an ugly sound.

I place my hands over hers and she gasps quietly, looking up at me. I keep my eyes on her brown ones as I squeeze her hands softly. Her mouth parts as her gaze drops to my lips for only a second and then back up to my eyes.

“You’re getting too worked up,” I tell her. “You don’t have to be perfect at it on the first try. I would teach you every day if you wanted me to.”

She laughs a little. “You would really do that?”

“Of course, I would,” I say, staring at her until she accepts it. Until she accepts that I’m always here for her. Finally, she nods, and I drop my hands from hers. “Now play it again.”

*  *  *

After we both had enough of playing, she went to meet Kennedy and I walked home. I needed the time alone. I feel guilty, though. I didn’t know Gio, but for some reason I feel like I’m sharing Scarlett’s pain with her.

When I get home, I pull out my phone to text her.

ME: Thank you. I needed that.

SCARLETT: I know.

The three dots appear and then disappear again. She’s thinking about what to say to me and I let her take her time while I pace my room.

SCARLETT: Me too.