Four Of A Kind

Chapter 30: [2.3] Blackmail Is a Form of Communication

I slipped out of my seat and headed for the door. As I passed Harlow’s row, I caught her eye. She gave the tiniest nod, then returned to doodling hearts in the margin of her notebook.

The hallway was empty. Monday morning sunlight streamed through the tall windows, creating patterns on the polished floor.

I could hear the muffled sounds of other classrooms, other teachers droning through their own attendance rituals.

I found Harlow waiting near the water fountains, bouncing slightly on her heels like standing still was physically painful.

Cassidy leaned against the lockers beside her, arms crossed, expression suggesting she’d rather be anywhere else on the planet.

“You came!” Harlow practically launched herself toward me, stopping just short of actual physical contact. “I wasn’t sure if you understood the signal! I made it up myself! Two taps means ’meet me outside’ and one tap means ’everything is fine’ and three taps means ’emergency’ and four taps means…”

“He doesn’t need to know all the taps.” Cassidy’s voice was flat. “Nobody needs to know all the taps. There are too many taps.”

“There’s a system, Cass.”

“It’s a bad system.”

“It’s a COVERT system.”

“It’s a system you invented in the shower this morning.”

I cleared my throat. “Not that this isn’t fascinating, but why am I here?”

Harlow’s attention snapped back to me. “Right! Official business! First day! So exciting!” She clasped her hands together.

“Okay so here’s the thing. I don’t actually know what my schedule is today? Like I know I have school obviously but after school there’s… things. Events. Vivienne usually handles the scheduling but she had an early meeting with the Student Council so she just texted me a bunch of stuff and I think I saved it somewhere but…”

She started rummaging through her bag. The bag appeared to contain approximately seven hundred items, none of which were a planner or a phone.

“I have lip gloss,” she announced, pulling out a pink tube. “And snacks! Want a snack? I have strawberry cookies and these weird seaweed things Sabrina likes and oh look I found my spare hair tie!”

Cassidy pinched the bridge of her nose. “This is painful to watch.”

“Found it!” Harlow produced her phone triumphantly. “Okay so Vivienne said… um… fitting for V-Girl at four… Fashion Club thing at six… or was it five?… and then there’s something about a charity dinner on Thursday that I’m supposed to remember…”

I held up my hand. “Stop.”

Harlow stopped.

“This isn’t going to work if I have to track you down every morning.” I pulled out my own phone. “I need your numbers. All of you. So I can coordinate schedules like an actual functioning human being.”

Harlow’s eyes went wide with delight. “Oh that’s such a good idea! You’re so smart! But you already have my number!”

That didn’t stop Harlow from taking my phone to make a selfie for her contact photo and save her name as “Harlow ✨❤️”.

I turned to Cassidy. “Your turn.”

She scoffed. “Pass.”

“Excuse me?”

“I’m not giving you my number, scholarship boy.” She pushed off from the lockers, her smirk sharp enough to cut glass. “You’re the help. You want to talk to me? Find me at school. If you can.”

“How am I supposed to coordinate your tutoring sessions if I can’t contact you?”

“Sounds like a you problem.”

Harlow looked between us with the expression of someone watching a tennis match. “Cass, maybe you should just…”

“Stay out of this, Harlow.”

I pocketed my phone. “Fine. But when Vivienne asks why your tutoring schedule isn’t finalized, I’ll make sure to tell her you were being… uncooperative.”

Cassidy’s smirk faltered.

Just for a second. Just a flicker.

But I saw it.

The invocation of Vivienne’s name had landed exactly where I’d aimed it. Cassidy could dismiss me. She could dismiss Harlow’s suggestions. But Vivienne was the one who reported to their mother. Vivienne was the one whose word carried actual weight in the Valentine hierarchy.

And if Vivienne decided that Cassidy was deliberately sabotaging the tutoring arrangement that had been written into my contract…

“You wouldn’t,” Cassidy said.

“Wouldn’t I?”

“That’s… that’s blackmail.”

“It’s communication. I’m communicating that your sister will be informed of any obstacles to my job performance.” I shrugged. “What she does with that information is up to her.”

Cassidy stared at me.

I stared back.

Harlow looked increasingly uncomfortable. “So… um… should I go back to class or…”

“Give him your number, Cass,” a new voice said.

We all turned.

Sabrina Valentine stood at the end of the hallway, materializing from somewhere with the supernatural silence of a gothic protagonist.

Her wine-red hair fell past her shoulders, darker than her sisters’, almost burgundy in the fluorescent lighting. She held a book in one hand and a cup of tea in the other, looking for all the world like she’d simply been passing through rather than eavesdropping.

“Sabrina.” Cassidy’s voice held a warning.

“You’re being childish.” Sabrina took a sip of her tea. “He’s our employee. He needs to contact us.”

“I don’t care about…”

“Mother will care. When the tutoring arrangement fails because you refused to provide a phone number out of spite, and the contract review results in termination, Mother will ask why.”

Sabrina’s purple eyes were fixed on Cassidy with an intensity that made the hallway feel several degrees colder. “What will you tell her?”

The silence stretched.

Cassidy’s jaw tightened. Her hands curled into fists at her sides.

For a moment, I genuinely thought she might storm off.

Then she exhaled sharply and grabbed my phone from my hand.

“Fine. FINE.” She typed aggressively, each tap of her finger against the screen containing approximately thirty percent more force than necessary. “There. Happy now?”

She shoved the phone back at me.

The contact read: DO NOT CONTACT UNLESS EMERGENCY

“Charming,” I said.

“Go to hell.”

“Already there. The commute’s terrible.”

Cassidy made a sound somewhere between a growl and a scream, then turned and stalked back toward the classroom, her combat boots echoing against the floor with each furious step.

Harlow watched her go. “That went… well?”

“Your definition of ’well’ is generous.”

“She didn’t throw anything! That’s progress!” Harlow beamed at me. “Anyway, I should get back too. But we’ll talk later, right? About the schedule stuff? And maybe we can get lunch together? Not like a date or anything! Just like a meeting! A business lunch! Do high schoolers have business lunches?”

“They do if you want them to.”

“Perfect! It’s a business lunch date! Meeting! Business meeting!”

She was already backing toward the classroom, waving. “See you later, Isaiah!”

She disappeared through the door, leaving a faint trace of strawberry-scented perfume in her wake.

I looked at Sabrina.

Sabrina looked at me.

“Thank you,” I said.

“I didn’t do it for you.” She took another sip of her tea. “Cassidy’s grades affect the family image. Your success benefits us.”

“Still. Thanks.”

She studied me for a long moment. Her expression gave away nothing, her purple eyes as unreadable as the book in her hand.

“You’re interesting,” she said finally. “Most people would have backed down when Cassidy refused. They would have accepted her terms to avoid conflict.”

“Backing down doesn’t solve problems. It just delays them.”

“And you’re a problem-solver?”

“I’m someone who’s tired of problems lasting longer than they need to.”

The corner of Sabrina’s mouth twitched. It wasn’t quite a smile. More like the ghost of one, a suggestion that somewhere beneath the ice, she found something amusing.

“We’ll see,” she said. “Give me your phone”

I handed Sabrina my phone and she saved her information as “Sabrina🥀”.

Then she turned and walked away, her footsteps making no sound against the floor.

I stood in the empty hallway, my phone in my hand, three Valentine contacts saved where there had been none an hour ago.

Two of them had emoji. One had a threat.

This is going to be a long semester.

I headed back to class.