Page 80 of Stolen Fate

She was someone I wished to never meet, because I honestly didn’t know how I would react to her. I wasn’t a violent person by nature, and the worst fights I had ever been in were with my little sister, and even those were tame by anyone’s standards.

I probably wouldn’t get into a fight with her, but I doubted I would be able to keep the look of disgust from showing on my face, and I wouldn’t want to, either.

Her behavior toward Elliot was deplorable.

When we stepped outside, a gush of cold wind blew through and I pulled Elliot closer to me. He looked up and smiled at me, his eyes twinkling in happiness. I was happy to see him look so happy, but the smile I gave him quickly disappeared when I noticed who was waiting for us by the car to take Elliot to school.

“Where’s Simon?” I asked Jerry, and I had a bad feeling about it. I should have asked more questions when Jerry had driven us on Friday, but I didn’t think much of it when he said it was Simon’s day off.

“Nothing you need to worry about, Evelyn.”

I took a deep breath to keep from saying anything in front of Elliot. I knew what that had meant. Simon was either fired or reassigned for flirting with me, and it was Jace’s asshole-y way of making sure Simon and I wouldn’t be spending any time together.

I was going to murder him.

I got inside the car and helped buckle Elliot into his car seat.

We were silent on the car ride to school, save for Elliot’s usual happy chatter. I didn’t think he would notice how I was feeling, but when we were about five minutes away from the school, Elliot asked, “What’s wrong, Evelyn?”

I met Jerry’s amused eyes in the rearview mirror and resisted the urge to stick my tongue out at him.

“Nothing’s wrong, sweetie. Are you excited for your turn to read with the teacher today?” I asked.

And that worked to distract him, because he babbled excitedly about what book he was going to pick. The teacher had this thing where each day a different kid would go up and help her read to the whole class. They got to pick which book they wanted to read, and today was Elliot’s turn.

I got him to the classroom pretty quickly after we pulled up in front of the school. Elliot was practically dragging me along, excited to start his day, and though I was still angry, I couldn’t help but smile in delight about it.

I walked back to the car at a much slower pace, trying to think of what I could say to Jerry to get him to tell me the truth.

By the time I climbed back in, I was no more ready. So I just asked him directly.

“Where is Simon, really?”

He let out a sigh and shifted gears, pulling away from the school. “He has been reassigned to work in security at Mr. Reed’s company.”

“Why?”

He raised an eyebrow at me, as if to say, Do you really not know?

It was my turn to let out a sigh. “Great. Just great,” I muttered under my breath.

And it wasn’t like I could confront Jace about it right now. I would have to wait until he got home, and then I’d have to wait until after Elliot went to bed.

I looked up and met Jerry's inquisitive eyes.

He raised an eyebrow in question, obviously catching on that I was trying to work up the courage to ask him something.

“I need you to take me to Jace’s office,” I said. “Do you know when he usually takes his lunch break?”

“Mr. Reed doesn’t have a set time he takes his lunch. He does it whenever he has the time. I don’t think it would be great for you to just show up unannounced.”

“Fine, then let me call him.”

I pulled out my phone, wanting to do just that. Jerry let out a sigh. “This is about Simon, isn’t it? You calling to get Simon’s job back isn’t going to do him any favors. It would just confirm Mr. Reed’s suspicion.”

“Yeah? And what’s that?” I asked stubbornly, but I was happy to note Jerry wasn’t taking me home.

“That there is something going on between you and Simon, or at the very least, that you want something to go on between you and Simon.”

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