Hush Money by Susan Bischoff

know, Joss, stick up for her?
Say something? Call someone?”
    “ She didn’t. Look, I didn’t understand
what was going on and it wasn’t any of my business. So I stayed out
of it. And that’s what you should have done because now you’re
totally on Marco’s shit-list and that is not where you want to be.
He’ll do nothing but make trouble for you. And now he knows about
your…Jesus, Kat. Who knows what he’s going to do with that?”
    “What are you going to do with
it?”
    “I? What, like you think I’m going to tell
someone about this? Who would I even tell?”
    She sniffed. “Yeah, I guess.” She started
down the steps, stopped, and didn’t turn to look at me.
    “You’re not who I thought you were.”

Chapter 6

    Dylan

    Eric was telling me something about some car.
He was always talking about cars, and even though it was usually
interesting stuff, I wasn’t listening. I was watching Joss.
    Truth be told, I was watching Joss a lot
lately. One minute I was like— to hell with you, Marco, get over
yourself. And the next I went back to thinking that things
between Marco and me were bad enough already right now without
causing more trouble.
    Not like other girls. There’s an
understatement. It’s like there were all the other girly girls with
their hair-flipping, laughing at everything you say, talking about
the labels of everything they wore… All the other things they did
to get attention. And then there was Joss, who wore a bulky field
jacket over jeans and t-shirts all year ‘round. With combat boots.
And who seemed to do whatever she could to be as invisible as
possible.
    Man, would she be jealous if she knew what I
could do. Or not. Maybe she’d be freaked out.
    She was talking to Kat, which was unusual.
Joss pretty much always left right after the bell, without talking
to anyone. But she’d been acting strange—stranger than normal—all
day. She was quieter, more withdrawn, more troubled. And yeah, that
was Joss…only moreso.
    Besides the fact that just her being there
and seeking someone out to talk was weird, the way they were
talking was weird. They were too close for Joss, who always seemed
to need a lot of distance, with their heads bent together, their
conversation obviously private and intense. Joss’s expression was
more than her usual blank mask. She looked like she was asking for
something. That glossy dark hair of hers was down, curling around
her face. It blew across her cheek and she reached up to tuck it
behind her ear.
    Damn, even that was hot.
    I was turning into a stalker.
    Eric nudged me in the ribs. Eric was one of
those guys who always seemed to see what was going on, even when
you thought you were being cool. He probably knew I wasn’t
listening to a word he was saying, knew I was watching Joss, and
knew I wouldn’t want Marco seeing me doing it. Which was cool of
him. Marco was finally showing up; he had Rob Grayson with him.
    This was not a good sign. Rob didn’t hang
with us; he was a geek. And I’m not saying that means he wasn’t
good enough to hang with us. More like he was too smart to want to.
We didn’t really have much in common, and Rob might as well hang an I’d Rather Be Playing Chess sign around his neck. The only
time Marco dragged him into our group was when he wanted Rob to do
something for him. Something criminal.
    Last time he’d had Rob hack into some
computer and place fake orders for some stereo equipment, marked
paid, to be delivered to his cousin’s house. He and his cousin had
sold most of it. I didn’t know if Rob had done it for a cut of the
money, which he’d gotten, or if it was just ‘cause Marco
intimidated him.
    Marco liked money. And he was enjoying coming
up with this kind of stuff and getting away with it. I think, for
him, the stereo plot was just a test. A test for Rob. Now Rob was
in, whether he liked it or not.
    Just like I was.
    “All right, listen up. Jeff, you’ve heard
this already, so you’re on look-out right