And now, here she was, looking so obviously like a complete psycho with even more damning evidence tucked in her pants! She would be sent to see … who exactly?
“I’ve already called Mr. Robins.…” Mrs. Sosa began. Oh yes, that’s exactly who they would send her to.
CHAPTER 14
Name: Devon Mackintosh
Session Date: Oct. 6
Session #3
Campus was typically quiet on a Saturday morning. A thick fog had settled around the Keaton hill. Devon couldn’t even see the adjacent mountainside from her window. She had bundled up in her thickest sweatshirt and sweats, and fluffy Uggs. Somehow looking presentable at this meeting didn’t seem like a priority. She had accepted her fate and knew the school would not look kindly upon any student hoarding items like she was. She also knew that the presence of Hutch’s photo in her stash made it worse. It made her a stalker, an obsessive, everything Presley had accused her of being.
Inside Mr. Robins’s office she found him sipping from a silver travel mug of coffee. His curly hair was still wet from a shower, but stubble formed a thin carpet along his chin and cheeks. Devon and Mr. Robins had something in common; they both knew this meeting was going to suck and hadn’t put on false airs for it.
“I don’t understand how this happened,” Mr. Robins began, without even bothering to say hello. He shoved his black-rimmed glasses back up the bridge of his nose, only to have them slip down again. “You seemed to embrace the training. Your comprehension seemed well above what I had hoped.”
“I tried to follow the training guide as much as possible,” Devon added.
“I should have seen how much you were affected by Jason’s death. The denial. The anger.” He seemed to be talking to himself more than to her. “I just never expected it to go this far. The drinking, the pills.…”
“Mr. Robins. I told Mrs. Sosa. I didn’t drink from those bottles. I found them. Isla gave me those pills to protect herself. Well, not all of them, but I wasn’t taking them.”
He shook his head. “We have to shut the program down, Devon. We tried, but it’s not working. It was taking too much of an emotional toll on you. Plus, the video footage never amounted to anything. Bad connection or something.”
Even though she was being convicted of crimes she hadn’t committed, Devon still found herself feeling bad for Mr. Robins. His vision of this program had vanished into the bottom of a teenager’s found beer bottle. At least Devon knew that Raven’s video scrambler worked. She had protected the privacy of Matt and Isla and Cleo. That was something. “I don’t know if you were drinking, or if you were taking these pills. I can’t prove that, and I’m inclined to believe you here. But, you were still found with these items in your possession. I’ve already spoken to Headmaster Wyler and we’d prefer not to make the failure of the program public knowledge. You were clearly not prepared for such a demanding position in light of Jason’s death. You won’t be suspended.” He took a deep breath, letting the reprieve sink in. “The headmaster and I thought that twenty hours of yard work and the rest of the year under probation would be a sufficient consequence. And with that decided we can begin to put this business behind us.”
Devon’s cheeks burned. She knew he expected her to be relieved, grateful even. Instead, she was pissed off. She wasn’t some delicate flower, a basket case who’d fallen apart. She’d adhered to his training. Anything else was his fault. Except, none of that mattered now. Devon had gone too far. Hell, maybe she should have turned her notes over to Mr. Robins after their first sessions instead of thinking she could solve everything. Matt’s control issues, Isla’s addiction, Hutch’s murder.… But looking at Mr. Robins slurp coffee, she knew she was in a better position to help than he’d ever be.
“What happens with Matt, Isla, and Cleo?” She hated the idea of him trying to get Cleo to be happy, or to convince Isla that she didn’t need the drugs. They wouldn’t confide in him. It was that simple.
“I’ll continue the individual counseling,” Mr. Robins said. “Now’s the time to tell me anything I need to know about your subjects for their sessions. Anything you may have been hesitant to share before. It’s for the good of your subjects.”