29. Asher

"So,what we know is that your father was working in the area, but he'd never planned to stay for long. He was a seasonal worker, just passing through."

Winter's PI, Alan, sat in front of me, nursing a cup of coffee. He looked jumpy; he'd never really relaxed much after I'd broken his nose a few weeks ago. He still had bruising around his eyes from it. Still, that was because he'd been following my mom. It was his own fault.

"But now you have a name, right? That has to help," I said. We were sitting in the Chickadee Diner, where my sister used to work.

He shrugged. "A little. What I'm looking for now is anyone who might have hired him to work seasonally, maybe at the marina or the beach. The problem is that those places don't always have a great records system. If they were paying him under the table, then there wouldn't be much to go on. We also only have a first name to go on. We might have to ask your mom for more information."

"What makes you think she'd decide to tell me now, after all these years?" I wondered, asking myself as much as Alan.

He shrugged nonchalantly. "I can see hiding it while a kid is young. You don't want them running off and getting in trouble trying to seek someone out. Once they're grown? You deserve to know."

I stared at him. Was he right? It was hard to think that way. My upbringing had convinced me of how strong and correct my mother was. She'd provided for her twins and survived when lesser people would have crumbled. I'd always respected her wishes, until now. For the first time, I resented the fact that she was making it so much harder to find the truth than it had to be.

"We'll see," I told Alan. "But I can't make any promises. I learned my stubbornness from somewhere, after all."

Back at campus after tennis, I shot off a quick message to Marcus before heading to class.

You missed training this morning. What's up? Coach is pissed.

It wasn't like Marcus to miss training, not unless some family shit was going down with him. He hadn't seemed to come back to the Hellions' dorm last night, either. He didn't respond, and I had to head into class.

Before lunch, I had one of my art electives. While art was my hobby and I loved studying it, I wouldn't major in it. Instead, I'd do something sports-related, so that I could more easily transition to coaching when the time came.

"Okay, everyone, sit down," Professor Dupont called and pointed toward a pile of sketchbooks on his table. "Has everyone handed in their assignments? True beauty, in all her forms." He looked around expectantly and nodded when no hands went up to admit missing the deadline. The class liked Professor Dupont. Everyone made an effort.

"Okay, now, since we've had our noses to the grindstone for a while, I wanted to mix it up and do something a little more fun."

The class as a whole groaned. Generally, whenever a teacher found a project fun, it turned out to be harder than ever.

He picked up a bowl of folded slips of paper and shook it. "Shh! Be adventurous. Be brave — and do what I say," he quipped. The class chuckled.

He walked around the semicircle of chairs. "As artists, we shouldn't get complacent. You are all too young and wet behind the ears to be stuck in one medium…this task will shake you from it. It goes like this. Pick a piece of paper. If that medium isn't something you usually use, then that's what you're going to be working with for the next week." He shook the bowl and stopped in front of me.

"Asher, you can do the honors."

Everyone watched as I sank my hand into the bowl and fished out a slip of paper. It had a single word sprawled across it.

Metal

Metal? I showed it to Professor Dupont, and he beamed.

"That's a very interesting medium for you, and you're more than big and strong enough to bend that unwieldy material to your will. Good luck."

He moved around the rest of the class. I stared at my slip of paper and racked my brain to think of something to make with metal.

"Okay, ten minutes to come up with the idea and then we get started."

Motherfucker. Something with metal. Something not too difficult, since I only had a week to work on it. What could I make with metal?

An idea popped into my head, and I didn't stop to question it. It just felt right. I wrote it down on my slip of paper and called the professor over. He took it and read what I'd written, raising an eyebrow.

"I like this for you, Asher. This'll show a range I haven't seen from you before. Who knows, maybe it'll turn out to be your favorite medium. Get to work."

The rest of the class flew by. I moved my shit to a different classroom with the equipment I needed and got to work designing the piece. Before I knew it, the bell rang, and people packed up and left. When I got out of the building, I headed straight for the cafeteria at the sports building, the metal project all I could think about.

I'd just sat at an empty table, my sketch of my design on the table, when Marcus appeared and slipped into the free seat beside me.

"Where the hell were you? You missed practice this morning."

"I'm aware. I think the three voicemails Coach left me might have tipped me off." He sighed as he sank back. He seemed exhausted.

"Where were you?"

"Don't ask." Marcus picked up a fry and bit off the end. "What's that?" He nodded at my sketch.

"What does it look like?"

He squinted at it. "A ring?"

"Is it that ugly that you're not even sure?" I asked, picking up the sketch and eyeing it critically.

"Ignore me. My brain has turned to shit this morning."

"Bad day?"

He shrugged, irritated, like he wanted to shed whatever it was that had bothered him, but it wouldn't quite go. He glanced around the cafeteria and suddenly stilled. I took a drink of water. He seemed so tense. He half stood, his gaze glued to the other side of the room.

"What is it?"

He stared another long moment, his eyes narrowed and intense. "My new music teacher."

"Really?" I followed his gaze across the cafeteria. "Shit, is she even old enough to be a teacher?" I wondered as I took in the woman he was staring at.

She was talking to one of the English Lit professors, the one all the girls had a crush on, and laughing. She followed him to a table and sat across from him.

"You okay?" I asked Marcus, whose hands had curled into fists on the table.

"Fine. Let's just eat." He didn't sound like himself at all.

"Whatever. You want to come up to the cabin next weekend?"

Marcus turned back to me and shrugged. "Depends if you're bringing Winter or not. I don't want to be a third wheel."

"Of course, I am," I heard myself say easily.

Marcus raised an eyebrow at me. "I thought it was just a game."

I shrugged. "It was. And now it's not."

Marcus chuckled. "She broke you? The great never-lose Martino's string of victories…finally at an end."

"I don't know if I consider myself the loser in this scenario," I drawled, folding up my sketch and putting it into my bag. "After all, I get her."

Marcus whistled lowly. "Like that, is it? So quickly? Great. You've joined Cade and Beckett in the loved-up club. I'm the last man standing, like always." His dark eyes flickered back to the young and mysterious music teacher.

"Sorry, dude. It happens to us all, sooner or later. Eat up. You better go and see Coach and apologize in person. I'll come with you."