A Forbidden Finale (Student/Teacher Romance)

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Three

The note came exactly two weeks later. It was placed in my toiletry bag, where no one else would find it, and it contained an instruction.

Find out what Liliana and her group are planning next. Send your information to this email address.

An e-mail address, which was a random combination of letters and numbers, was attached to the bottom of the note. I stared at it for a good few minutes before registering what it said, and what it meant.

Amber wasn't the person blackmailing me.

There was no reason she'd request this, it didn't net her anything. She'd never had any real beef with Liliana, from what I could gather. Liliana just got annoyed by her when they were forced to share a dorm room. She didn't hold any vengeance there.

The actual task I'd been given was going to be hardest, though. Liliana wasn't speaking to me. She'd even moved away from me in the few classes that we had together. I wasn't going to get the information from her.

Callum and Dean were my only options. Callum and Liliana were an item now from what I'd heard via eavesdropping—it took up most of my lessons now, since I didn't have anyone to have a real conversation with.

So Dean was the one.

I wasn't in any of his classes, and after over a fortnight, it was going to look very odd when I walked up to him and asked what he'd been up to recently and whether he was planning on bombing anyone else in the near future.

I buried my head in my hands and screwed up the note, stuffing it in a zip pocket of my suitcase. I was going to have to find a way, otherwise I'd be out of the school and possibly in a jail cell.

The note didn't have a time limit, so I opened up my laptop and inquired. Maybe my blackmailer would be polite enough to give me some insight.

***

I'd been given two weeks to find out their plan, which was ages. It should have been long enough to discover what three students were planning on doing to help the environment easily.

But here I was, with three days to go, and nothing to show for it. I'd cursed myself daily for not paying more attention to the name of the forum that the three of them posted on, but I didn't know their usernames even if I'd found it.

I tapped my foot in my politics class and watched the back of Liliana's head as she chatted away to the girl beside her. We were supposed to be debating something with our partner, but I wasn't even attempting it. The guy beside me was scribbling away at something on a piece of paper, so he wasn't bothered.

I caught the word, though, and it wafted over to me like a sign. Party. It was the perfect time. Dean and Callum's joint birthday was tomorrow, of course they'd be having a party. And it was bound to be in their normal spot.

I wasn't opposed to both finding out the info I needed and getting absolutely wasted in the process.

Now I just needed some excuse to show up. Liliana wasn't going to be pleased if I was there, so I needed a rock-solid reason for her not to shout in my face.

And at the front of the classroom, slumping in his chair, was the answer. Leon. He'd turned up the last one, someone was bound to ask him if he was coming to this one. I'd tag along with him.

I'd expressly told him how I felt about him, but he'd said he wanted to be friends and he'd so far respected that. I'd enjoyed the brief time we'd spent together in the past couple of weeks. We'd gone for a couple of walks, and he'd shown me places in the grounds I'd never seen before.

I'd had to ignore the fact I had plenty of memories associated with the bandstand when he'd lead me there.

Other than those couple of walks, though, Leon and I didn't talk much. He had work and ballet to practice, and I was with Ethan a lot. I was scared of contacting him too much in case he got the wrong idea about my intentions, anyway.

But at the end of the class, I packed my books away quickly and jogged over to his table. He gave me a disarming grin, putting his own things away, and standing up. "Want to walk?"

"I can't, I have to go to my lesson with E, erm, Mr. Langley. I just wanted to chat real quick."

"Oh, sure." We exited the classroom and he told me he'd walk me to my lesson. "What's up?"

"Are you invited to Dean and Callum's birthday party tomorrow night?"

"Sure. You want to come?" Leon knew that I didn't speak to the trio anymore, but I'd fed him a lie about how Liliana and I had fallen out over some gossip she thought I'd spread. It was a petty thing to fall out about, but he'd eaten it right up.

"Do you mind? I've been really missing partying recently and I'd kill to do a bit of drinking. Relax a bit. I know the twins didn't invite me, but I'm sure they wouldn't mind me being there, either. If they say anything I'll just go, no onus on you."

"It's no onus on me, anyway. It's just a party, there's always more. I wouldn't hang you out to dry, either way."

I gave him a wide smile. "Well, cheers. I'll meet you tomorrow at some point. Just drop me a text."

"Will do." He peered into the ballet studio and my gaze followed. Ethan was warming up, his leg up on the barre whilst he stretched. Ethan met my eyes and his eyebrows twitched just a tad. "Well, catch you later, then."

"See you tomorrow."

I entered the ballet studio and Ethan gestured for me to start my own stretching. I wanted to tell him everything, to spill about what I was going to have to do, but it wasn't seriousness enough to risk it yet. My task was practically menial.

So, I smiled at Ethan, and didn't say a single word about my predicament. He didn't need to know. I'd do what I was told, and everything would be okay.

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