Rev (22 page)

I'VE BEEN THINKING
a lot lately about the differences between right and wrong. Surely, stealing is wrong. But is it wrong if you steal food to feed a child? Murder is wrong, but I suppose I could probably make a case for that as well. Morality is really subjective – at least that is what I'm going to tell myself so I can sleep at night after this.

Mr. Beck won't issue Jeremy a permit because he has a beef with the club. That seems wrong, especially in light of the fact that
, when I asked Jeremy why he was so determined to work at Forsaken Custom Cycle, he said he wants to make his dad proud. While Grady is usually pretty mum about anything related to the club, he does talk with me liberally about the personal dynamics at play between the club members and their families. Some of the relationships seem a little messy, but he promises me that once things calm down with the crazy Italian guy, Jim and Ruby are going to have a big party so I can get to know everyone. They’re obviously a tight-knit group that has each other’s backs, and if I want to be worthy of my place beside Grady, I’m going to have to earn it.

"Next," the teller says. She gives me a friendly wave of her hand, welcoming me to her station. I recognize her as the mother of one of my students. Her daughter, Vickie
, is a sophomore with a serious eager-beaver attitude. I give her my best friendly smile and push out whatever lingering guilt I am feeling about doing this. It's for a good cause, I remind myself. Even if there are some casualties along the way, I'm determined to carry this through. Mr. Beck may not be the monster that I want to paint him to be, but he’s certainly not a good guy, either.

"Holly, how are you doing today?" The teller is all smiles as I s
et the three checks and the deposit slip on the counter. I lean forward just slightly and give her an apologetic smile.

"Oh, pretty good. You know, I just realized that I don't have the account number for these deposits. Mr. Beck was
in a bit of mood when he sent me over here. I would really hate to have to go all the way back to the school." Thankfully, she doesn't push. One of the benefits of small-town banking is that it's actually quite easy to convince a teller to pull up a customer's information using just their name.

"Don't worry about it. Between you and me, Mr. Beck never remembers his own account number." With a few taps of the keyboard and a little redirect of the mouse, she's pulled up what she was looking for, grabs the pen, and gets to filling out the account number on the deposit slip. In addition to Mr. Beck's obvious agenda against the club, he has a rather liberal interpretation of what can be counted as a business expense. Unfortunately, his liberties have all been small and accounted to less than $500 in the last few years. I'm not looking to bust the guy for a few too many business lunches from questionable establishments. Call me crazy, but I don't think the school board allows their administrative staff to write off lunch at the golf course every other Tuesday, even if Mr. Beck's companion is
the ever-charitable local attorney, Larry Jennings.

“Thank you,” I say as the teller deposits the checks without issue and hands me a receipt. I look over the receipt for a moment and hop from foot to foot. The teller eyes me curiously
, but stays quiet. Finally, I turn back toward her and give her a nervous smile. “I might be biting off more than I can chew here, but I just don’t want to get in trouble at work. Are deposits like these common for Mr. Beck?”

The teller looks around and bites her lower lip. I sigh then pat her rested hand on the counter. With a nod, I say, “I’m sorry, forget I asked.”

I’m about to turn around when she says, “Wait. Listen, if you’re uncomfortable with making these deposits, I suggest you go to the school board with your concerns. I have nothing against Mr. Beck—he’s always been good to my kids—but he has a membership at the golf course. That place is expensive. My husband is a landscaper there, and he’s seen him playing a few rounds during school hours with Larry Jennings. You know that lawyer whose son was…violated?”

Pay dirt.

I force myself not to smile or show any other sign of excitement over this information. I knew Mr. Beck was up to something. His behavior has changed too much in the last several weeks for there not to be a reason for it.

“Well, my husband thinks Larry Jennings is trying to find out what happened to his son
because Mr. Beck is always handing over these files and the few times Bob got close enough to hear, they were discussing troubled students. It doesn’t seem right—an administrator doing something that like. It’s awful what happened to poor Darren. Things like that aren’t supposed to happen here, ya know?”

I nod and lean in like what she’s said is the absolutely most interesting thing on the planet. “I know. That’s kind of scary, but how can Mr. Beck help?”

“The police haven’t made any arrests, so I’m guessing he thinks it might be someone at the school who hurt his son. Only reason Bob and I can figure why Larry has been so generous to Mr. Beck.”

The more she talks, the more I realize I am in over my head. I’ve never done anything like this before
, and the best I can hope for is that I don’t end up ruining my own life in the process. But I have to know what’s going on. I figured I’d find something fishy in Mr. Beck’s records, but had no idea I might run across something like this. I don’t even know what “this” is yet, but so far it’s not looking so good for Mr. Beck, which actually helps me follow through.

“Generous?”

“I didn’t say anything, and I’ll deny it if you say I did, but one of our other tellers deposited a check from Larry Jennings to Mr. Beck the other day. I wouldn’t have thought twice about it, but when I was balancing her station, I just happened to remember my husband griping about Mr. Beck playing golf during school hours.”

“I’ll keep it to myself,” I say. “I’m not out to get him or anything, I just don’t want to be involved with something that doesn’t feel right. Gotta protect my own butt, ya know?”

She agrees, and we exchange a few pleasantries before I go. The more I find out about Dick, the better I feel about forcing his hand to give Jeremy the work permit.

Back at the high school, I stride in with shaking hands and flushed skin. I spent the entire drive over from the bank trying to calm myself down, but when that didn’t work, I decided to just go with it. With purposeful steps, I beeline for Margot’s desk. She looks up with concerned eyes and a frown. “Holly, what’s wrong?”

“I think I may have done something that could get me in trouble,” I whisper as I lean over her desk. “Mr. Beck had me deposit those checks, right? Well, please don’t say anything, but one of the ladies at the bank suggested that Mr. Beck may be making more deposits to his personal account than he should be.”

“I’ve been curious about that over the years,” she says quietly. Her eyes dart around the room nervously. “It’s always tiny little amounts, but it adds up. Tell you what, just refuse to run his personal errands from now on. That’s what I’ve started to do. But for now, you have proof he asked you to do it, so even if he does get his wrist slapped for too many expenses, you’re in the clear.” She finishes off with a friendly smile. I give her a
nod and act like her words were the most comforting thing I’ve ever heard. In reality, they do comfort me. They tell me that if this goes south, Margot believes me.

“I’m just going to go tell him that I think my working hours are better served here
, doing the work I’m paid for, not running errands,” I say quietly and straighten my back as I head down the hall toward Mr. Beck’s closed office door.

Two knocks later, after a thousand knots in my belly, doubts in my heart, and the overwhelming desire to turn around and run away, Mr. Beck shouts for me to open the door. When I turn the handle and enter the room, he’s at his desk with our attendance and grade tracking software pulled up. His face is a shade redder than normal, which is saying something considering he’s always a little on the red side. Jeremy Whelan needs this, the club needs this, but most of all, Grady needs this.

“I’d like to offer you one more chance to change your mind about extending a work permit to Jeremy Whelan,” I say as I close his office door and push the button lock into place.

“Holly, I’ve explained why I will not issue Jeremy a work permit, at length, to several people, and I refuse to have this conversation again. I’m sorry,” he says in exasperation. I nod
, and pull out the deposit slip, and hand it over to him.

Now or never.

“What’s this?” he asks as his eyes try to make sense of the numbers on the small receipt.

“It’s your deposit receipt,” I say. I’m really doing this. I am. “This morning you sent me an email asking me to prepare three checks from the school’s vendor checking account to be made payable to you.”

“I did no such thing,” he shouts.

I raise my now steady hand in front of my face and shake my head. “You’ll find this is going to go much more smoothly if you can restrain your temper.”

“What are you doing Ms. Mercer?” he asks.

“I’m letting you know that I’m uncomfortable with running your personal errands. In your email, you explained that you purchased new office supplies for yourself and you had a business luncheon as well as a dry cleaning bill that was to be charged to the school’s account. I never have understood why you think the school is responsible for your dry cleaning bills, and this one was a doozy,
Dick
. Who spends over three hundred dollars on dry cleaning, anyway?”

“I didn’t ask you to deposit any checks this morning. You had me sign those checks for the soda vendor, the water delivery guy, and the landscaper. I’ve never spent that much on dry cleaning!” He’s started to scream again, but I use my hand to indicate that I’d like it if he lowers his voice. His face is a much darker red now
, and he’s breathing heavy.

“Silly,
Dick
. The district pays for the landscaper and the soda vendor, and Margot has already paid the water delivery guy through June. You see, I have all of that on my calendar. I wouldn’t have asked you to do such a thing. Did you know I’m obligated to report suspicious behaviors?”

“This is starting to sound like blackmail. The club is putting you up to this, aren’t they? I’ll have both Cheyenne Grady and Jeremy Whelan expelled for this. You’ll be fired
, and I’ll bring charges against you for your part. That bunch of inbred felons can’t buy me.” His jaw trembles as he talks, his eyes are hard, and he’s struggling to pull in deep breaths.

“No, the club has no idea we’re having this conversation,” I say. Nor should they ever find out. I suspect Grady wouldn’t be too happy with me if he did. “Do you really think you have the upper hand here?”

“I haven’t done anything wrong,” he says lowly.

In the
eleven years that he has served as principal at Fort Bragg High School, Richard Beck has only expelled seven students. One of those students actually set the library on fire—on purpose. The other six earned their expulsions the good old-fashioned way, by not showing up to class and letting their grades plummet. In addition to looking up Mr. Beck's expulsion rate, I took the liberty of pulling the former student files that we have on Forsaken family members since Mr. Beck's employment. Trying to explain to Grady the reason I needed the real names of his brothers was a huge pain in the butt. He used this really deep voice and guffawed at me as he said things like, "club business, babe," and, "appreciated, but keep your nose clean." Grady may have been adamant about not telling me when I first brought it up, but I was able to reason with him. As it turns out, Sterling Grady can be convinced of almost anything as long as you have his dick in your mouth.

Once he was able to see the value of my offer, I got to work. It didn't take me long to prove my suspicions right. Though Mr. Beck has only expelled seven students in his tenure, he has petitioned
—extensively—for the removal of twelve. The five students he hadn't been able to expel were all related to the club. From his communication with the school board, it looks like he almost got Josh Wilcox expelled in his sophomore year. But just as he asked for leniency on behalf of Jeremy Whelan, Jim Stone had gone to bat for Josh Wilcox back in the day as well. Mr. Beck's reasons for attempting to expel these kids always comes back to one thing: a concern over their violent nature. And yet, there are no disciplinary records that indicate violent outbursts.