Page 60 of The Other Side
For the next hour, we searched through the records room with absolutely no luck, except for the yearbook.
“Chance—there’s nothing here.” I set my flashlight down, completely exhausted, my eyes bleary from squinting in the dark at the tiny typewritten font.
“There has to be a record somewhere.” He leaned against the wall, just as tired as I was. “Two girls went missing—it was a big fucking deal.”
“Well if there’s information about what happened, it’s not here.”
Chance snapped his fingers. “Violet, you’re a genius.”
“What?”
“Those keys open any door on campus?” He looked through the door to Jolene’s desk, where I had left the ring of keys.
“Yeah…”
Chance raced through the door, grabbing my hand as he went.
“Wait—the yearbook!” I stopped him to go back and get it, closing the records door behind me. “Where are we going?”
“Headmaster Winston’s office.” Chance grinned, keys in hand.
“Chance…” I pulled on his hand, hesitant to go with him. If he got fired, he still had money and a family he could go back to, in theory. But I didn’t, not really.
“I won’t let anything happen to you.” He seemed to sense the reason for my concern. “I promise.”
“If we get caught, I’ll tell them you drugged me or something.” I tried to make light of the heavy situation.
“Stockholm syndrome would be more believable. What with all the shameless flirting.”
I couldn’t help but roll my eyes.
“We should have worn gloves.” I wrung my hands nervously as he used Jolene’s keys to open up the headmaster’s office.
We’d only just entered the room when we heard someone coming down the stairs. Our panicked, wide eyes met in the near dark.
Chance silently closed the door, flipping the lock back into place, then grabbed my arm and hauled me into the large wardrobe situated behind the door. We clicked off our flashlights in tandem, waiting to be discovered.
Chance’s warm body was pressed flush against mine, as well as something long and hard, which was digging into my thigh.
“Please tell me that’s the yearbook,” I whispered pitifully.
Chance shifted his arm and lifted the book, which at some point had ended up in his custody, shoving it against my chest and relieving the spot on my leg.
“Is that gorgeous mind always in the gutter?” he snickered.
I was happy to be in the dark then, as my full-body blush returned. “Do you ever turn off?”
“You make it extremely difficult when everything you do turns me on,” he whispered. I could feel his lips at the crook of my neck, and I thought for certain he might try to kiss me.
The door handle clicked open, and we both stilled, holding our breaths as the light switched on.
“I told you Janice—I left it in my office—I’m sorry.” The headmaster was speaking to his wife over the phone.
We listened with literal bated breath as he rummaged around his desk for what was probably only a minute, but felt like itstretched on for hours, as Chance and I waited to see if we’d be discovered.
“Found it,” he proclaimed suddenly. While a very thin stream of light came through the door of the wardrobe, we couldn’t see what he was doing or what he had come back to retrieve. “I’ll be home in half an hour.” He hung up the phone, switched off the light, and locked the door. His footsteps slowly faded down the hall.
We waited another couple of minutes to be sure he was actually gone before tumbling out of the wardrobe with no grace whatsoever. I tried to forget about having almost kissed Chance.
