Change of Heart (2 page)

“Billy attacked Sean,” Morgan said.

Attacked? Billy? Mr. Dormer must have been thinking the same thing that I was—
Impossible!

“Billy Royal attacked Sean Sloane?” he said. “Why would he do that?”

“Because he's jealous,” Morgan said. “He doesn't like that I'm going out with Sean.”

“I see,” Mr. Dormer said. “And you saw what happened?”

“Yes. I was walking with Sean. All of a sudden Billy grabbed him. When Sean tried to walk away, Billy shoved him.”

Mr. Dormer blinked and shook his head as if he had woken up to find himself in a parallel universe. In the world he normally inhabited, people like Billy Royal did not instigate fights with people like Sean Sloane.

“Even after Billy shoved him, Sean still tried to walk away,” Morgan said. “That's when Billy attacked him.”

“But Billy's the one who's bleeding,” I pointed out.

Mr. Dormer gave me a sour look. The message was clear: he was talking to Morgan, not to me.

“Sean was just defending himself,” Morgan said.

Mr. Dormer shook his head again. He thanked Morgan and turned to go back inside, presumably to his office, presumably to sort things out and punish whoever was to blame, which, if he accepted Morgan's version of the events, was going to be Billy.

“Are you sure you're not exaggerating?” I said after he had gone. “I mean, when was the last time Billy attacked anyone?”

“Are you calling me a liar?” Morgan said.

“No. But this is Billy we're talking about.”

“Billy's lucky that all Sean did was defend himself,” Morgan said. “If Sean had wanted to, he could have really hurt Billy. But he didn't. He's not like that.” I thought about Sean jumping Billy from behind. That had nothing to do with self-defense. It was dirty fighting, plain and simple.

By the end of the school day, everyone knew that Billy had been given a three-day suspension for “attacking” Sean.

“Poor Billy,” I said when I met Morgan at her locker after school.

Morgan slammed her locker door.

“Why do you always take his side?” she said.

“I'm trying not to take sides. You and Billy are my friends.”

“You're such a hypocrite, Robyn.”

“What?”

“I know what you think,” she said. “You think I shouldn't have broken up with Billy. But look at you. You broke up with Ben.”

It was true. I had broken up with Ben Logan. I'd told myself that it wasn't right to keep going out with him when it was obvious that he cared for me a lot more than I cared for him. And when I was spending most of my time wishing that he was someone else: Nick D'Angelo, who I had been going out with before I met Ben and ... well, it was complicated.

Ben didn't take the breakup well. But he and I didn't go to the same school, so he didn't have to see me every day. I think that made it easier for him than breaking up with Morgan was for Billy.

“If you don't want to go out with Billy anymore, that's your business,” I said. “But he's still my friend. And he's devastated.” He really was. Instead of being his usual easygoing and cheery self, he had become sullen and withdrawn. Whenever he saw me with Morgan, he veered off in another direction. He hadn't come right out and said so—after all, he's a guy—but I was pretty sure that he thought I supported Morgan's decision to dump him. That I was on her side. But I wasn't. “I feel sorry for him, that's all. I still don't understand what happened between you two. What did Billy do that was so terrible?”

“There you go again, defending him.”

“I asked a question. Since when does that constitute defending someone?”

“It's the way you asked, like you can't believe that Billy would ever do anything terrible. Like he's perfect and I'm the one who always messes up.”

“I didn't say that—”

“It's chemistry, Robyn. Sean and I have chemistry.”

“I thought you had chemistry with Billy.” That's what she had told me dozens, maybe hundreds, of times.

“Well, I have better chemistry with Sean. And don't give me that look again. This is not my fault. It just happened.”

“You make it sound like a car accident,” I said. Was that how it worked: one minute you were going merrily on your way and the next, out of the blue, your heart collided with someone else's and there was nothing you could do about it? But that wasn't what had happened between Morgan and Billy. That had been a slow buildup over years. Maybe that was her point. Maybe that was why she and Billy hadn't lasted.

Or was it something else?

“Are you saying you never really loved Billy?” I asked.

“No,” she said. “At least, I don't think that's what I'm saying. But come on, Robyn. You didn't think Billy and I were going to be together forever, did you?”

To be honest, I had never thought about it. But now that she mentioned it, I suppose that was exactly the picture I'd had in my mind. They'd been such a perfect couple. Billy brought out the best in Morgan, and Morgan made Billy smile almost all the time.

“I hate to say it, Robyn, but in a way I'm glad Billy attacked Sean ...”

“What?”

She hesitated for a moment.

“I didn't tell you this because I know how you feel about Billy,” she said slowly. “But he's been acting really weird. He calls my phone fifteen or twenty times a day. He follows me around, even when I'm with Sean—especially when I'm with Sean. He's practically stalking me.”

“Billy?” I said. “Billy would never—”

“You're doing it again. I'm not lying, Robyn. And I'm not exaggerating. He's driving me crazy. Now that he's suspended, maybe he'll stop harassing me. Maybe he'll give up and get over it.”

I went to Billy's house after school. I rang the doorbell a dozen times, but there was no answer. I wondered if his mom had taken him to the hospital. I wondered if his nose was broken after all. I dug out my cell phone and ended up in his voice mail. Then I headed for my father's place.

My parents are divorced. I mostly live with my mother, but I spend every other weekend at my father's. Sometimes when my mom, who is a lawyer, is working on a big case and puts in long nights at her office, I stay at my dad's place during the week, too. Most of the time he's glad to have me.

My first clue that this was not one of those times: when my dad heard me come through his front door, he popped his head out of his office (one of the few truly closed-in rooms in his open-concept loft) and looked not-so-pleasantly surprised to see me.

“Robbie,” he said. “I wasn't expecting you.”

No kidding. He seemed flustered, and my father isn't someone who is easily flustered.

“You want me to leave, Dad?”

My second clue that I wasn't being welcomed with open arms: my dad didn't immediately say,
No, of course not
. He seemed to be thinking it over.

“What's the matter?” I said.

He glanced back over his shoulder. That's when I realized that there was someone else in his office with him. My first thought was,
It's a woman
. After three years of being separated and one year of being divorced, my mom had accepted a marriage proposal from a man named Ted Gold. Maybe my dad had finally taken the hint. Maybe he was moving on.

But, no, that wasn't it.

“Nick is here,” he said.

Nick stepped into the doorway beside my dad, and my heart slammed to a stop. I hadn't seen Nick in a while. He used to rent an apartment on the second floor of the building my dad owns. My dad occupies the entire third floor. A gourmet restaurant leases the ground floor. But Nick had abandoned his apartment a few months ago. He had taken off without any warning. He had reappeared only a few weeks ago, also without warning. The whole time he was gone, I'd waited to hear from him. I had also started going out with Ben. Now Ben was history, but Nick didn't know that yet. Up until this very minute I'd had no idea where he was. And the last time I'd seen him, he'd told me that it was probably best if we both moved on.

And yet here he was, standing beside my father. Nick's jet-black hair was longish and scruffy. A jagged scar cut across his cheek, from the bridge of his nose to his right ear. He was dressed, as usual, head to toe in black. When he looked at me with his amethyst-colored eyes, he took my breath away. He always did. Had he come looking for me?

“Nick,” I said. “What are you doing here?”

I didn't mean it the way Nick obviously took it. His whole body stiffened. He turned to my father. “I'd better get to work. It'll take a little time, okay, Mac?”

Mac? Nick always used to call my father Mr. Hunter.

“No problem,” my father said. “And don't forget Thursday night. You know where we're supposed to be, right?”

We? What was going on?

Nick nodded. He barely glanced at me as he strode out of my dad's office, through the enormous living space, to the front door where I stood frozen by surprise and longing. When he got close, I had to fight the urge to reach out and touch him. He nodded curtly at me as he passed but didn't say a word. The door clicked shut behind me, and I heard footsteps—boot steps—going down the stairs.

“What was he doing here?” I said.

“It's a personal matter, Robbie.”

“Is he all right?” Nick had been in plenty of trouble in his life, a lot of it involving the law. Most of the time he tried to do the right thing, but not all the time.

“As far as I can tell,” my father said.

“What did he want?”

“I told you, Robbie. It's personal.”

“What are you two doing on Thursday night?”

“I can't tell you that.”

My father used to be a police officer. He was always good at keeping secrets or, as he put it, not discussing official police matters with civilians, which included me. Now that he's retired from the police and has his own private security business, he's even better at keeping secrets. I could threaten, I could argue, I could cry, but all I would get is, “Sorry, Robbie. No can do.”

I hovered near the door, torn between staying and going. Nick's footsteps grew fainter until I heard nothing at all. I dropped my backpack to the floor, kicked off my boots, and headed for my dad's guest room, which doubles as my bedroom. I didn't slam the door, but I did close it firmly behind me.

It took longer than I expected—a full ten minutes—before my father knocked.

“Come on, Robbie,” he said from the other side of the door. “You're not mad at me, are you?”

I was. But I got up off the bed and opened the door anyway.

“He's not in trouble, if that's what's bothering you,” my dad said.

It wasn't.

“Did he ask about me?”

My dad looked me directly in the eye. He shook his head. “I'm sorry, Robbie.”

So was I.

“I have to run out and get some groceries,” my dad said. “You want to help me make dinner?”

I said okay, even though food was the last thing on my mind.

My dad shopped. We cooked. We ate. We cleaned up. Then Morgan called.

“You have to do something for me,” she said. “You have to talk to Billy. You have to make him stop.”

“D

o you want me to wait for you?” my dad said. We were sitting in his Porsche at the curb outside of Billy's house.

I shook my head.

“I don't know how long I'm going to be,” I said. “I'll just go home after.” My mom's house was only a couple of blocks from Billy's. My dad lived much farther away.

My dad said okay. He probably thought I was still mad at him, but I wasn't. I was mad at Nick. Like I said, it was complicated.

I kissed my dad on the cheek to show him there were no hard feelings. After he drove away, I rang Billy's doorbell.

Billy's mother answered.

“He's upstairs,” she said. She meant the third-floor family room, where I found Billy slumped in front of the TV, his cell phone in one hand, the remote in the other, a damp cloth in a bowl of melting ice on his lap, and what looked like a history essay beside him on the couch. Both of his eyes were black, and his nose was swollen. He didn't even glance at me when I entered the room.