LITMIR.BIZ

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of our boys are behind this heinous event, I want to know about it immediately. Proper remedies will be taken to assure that this issue will be addressed.”

      “Doctor, if I find proof that one of your boys was part of this morning’s vandalism, he will be arrested.”

      Williams was silent. It was one thing for him to reprimand and even to punish the students involved. It was quite another for their felonies to be broadcast over airwaves—not the PR that Foreman Prep liked. “Exactly how do you determine proof?”

      “It varies.”

      “If you should find proof … or perhaps the correct word might be ‘evidence’?”

      “‘Evidence’ is fine,” Decker said.

      “And if it should be necessary … for you to take appropriate action, is there a way that this can be handled … without a tremendous amount of fanfare?”

      “I have no intention of calling up the press.”

      “And if the press should call you?”

      Decker was silent.

      The headmaster placed his hands, fingers fanned out, on his highly polished walnut desktop. “Our boys are minors. If their names are released to the press, there will be problems.”

      “Dr. Williams,” Decker chided. “Surely you don’t advocate suppression of the public’s right to know.”

      “Innocent until proven guilty,” Williams stated.

      Decker smiled. Spoken like a true American with his ass against the wall.

      “I’m Dr. Jaime Dahl—special services administrator.”

      Decker stuck out his hand. “Thank you for taking the time—”

      “I didn’t volunteer for this witch-hunt, it was foisted upon me.” A swish of blond hair. “Let’s get that straight. I don’t approve of any kind of searches. I believe it’s a violation of civil rights.”

      His day to get grief. Yet it wasn’t entirely her fault. At Decker’s behest, Dr. Williams hadn’t informed her or anyone else of the true purpose of the search. She’d probably be appalled by hate crimes, though she’d no doubt retort with, “One violation doesn’t excuse another.”

      Through designer eyeglasses, she was slinging wicked looks his way. What made it worse was she was a fox—around twenty-five, with lush lips and knockout legs. She was wearing a black business suit and looked more like an actress playing the part of a school administrator. If this were a Hollywood script, they’d be in bed an hour from now. He must have inadvertently smiled, because her eyes grew angrier. She sneered at him. Too bad. He hated being dissed by anyone, let alone a fox.

      She spoke in a clipped cadence. “Follow me.”

      She led him down a flight of stairs, through a long, wide Berber-carpeted hallway, designated the student locker area. They were waiting for him—rows of adolescent boys standing next to their little bit of privacy, their hands at their sides. Two uniformed guards were watching them. The scene made Decker feel as if he were the aggressor, and that didn’t sit well with him. He stopped. “Is there any specific place I should start?”

      “One is as good as the next.” Jaime tapped her toe, her left buttock moving with each rhythmical click of the shoe. “Let’s go from freshmen to seniors. They know what to do. They just went through the routine drill a few weeks ago.”

      “They may know the drill, but I don’t.”

      Jaime sighed impatiently. “One boy at a time will open his locker, swing the door all the way out, then take two steps back. Then you do your search and seizure. When you’re done, you step away and let the boy close his locker. Give them back a little piece of their stripped dignity.”

      “That sounds fine—”

      “I’m glad you approve,” Jaime snapped back. “Shall we get on with it?”

      “The quicker I’m out of here, the happier I am.”

      “I suppose that about sums it up for me, as well.”

      “Why are you so unhappy about this, Dr. Dahl? Drug checks are part of standard operation in this school. You had to have known that when you took the job.”

      “For the administration to do what’s necessary to maintain standards—that’s one thing. We don’t need the gendarmes telling us how to run our school.”

      “Ah—”

      “Yes, ah!”

      Decker’s smile was wide. He tried to hold it back and that only made her angrier. She stomped over to the first lad—a fourteen-year-old moonfaced kid with a sprig of freckles across the nose—and asked him to open his locker.

      He did, following Jaime Dahl’s drill to a tee. Decker was impressed.

      Inside were papers, notebooks, pens, a few car magazines, and lots of candy wrappers.

      “Thank you,” Decker said, taking a step backward.

      The boy closed his locker. Jaime told him that he could go.

      The boy left.

      One down, about three hundred to go.

      The tenth kid had a locker containing two bottles of pills. They looked to be prescription. He asked Jaime about them.

      “As long as the medicine is from a doctor, we allow it into the school.”

      “Can I pick up the bottles?” he asked her.

      “Why are you asking me? You’re in charge.”

      He picked up the bottles. “It’s all the same medicine.”

      “I have a note,” the kid said anxiously. “You can call my mom.”

      Decker looked him over. A stick of a kid: he was shaking. “I’m just wondering why you need sixty pills of any kind at school when the dose is one a day … at night.”

      The kid said nothing.

      Decker put the bottle back inside his locker. “Something you might want to think about. Someone could get the wrong idea … like you were selling off the excess. Of course, I know that’s not the case. But … it kinda looks bad.”

      The kid mumbled a pathetic “Yessir.”

      “It’s all right, Harry,” Jaime comforted him. “We can talk about this later.”

      “Yes, Dr. Dahl.”

      Decker went on to the next one, then the next. Over the course of the next hour, he found lots of bottles that looked suspect. Either they were genuine pharmaceutical containers with pills that didn’t match the prescribed medicine, or they carried counterfeited labels altogether. Since medicine was allowed, Decker left it up to Jaime to discipline. Usually, a stern look from the beautiful doctor was enough to send the boys into paroxysms. Decker felt for the kids, just like he had felt for Jacob after the boy had confessed his drug use. Kids had a way of doing that to him, making him feel bad even when he was just doing his job.

      Rooting through the trash of rotting food, old papers, wrappers, and garbage. Not to mention old, wet gym clothes that smelled riper than decayed roadkill. Besides the pills, Decker found more than a fair share of cigarette butts—tobacco and otherwise. He pretended not to notice them. He also came upon packages of condoms—most of them unopened. There were also lots of pinups—mostly female, but there were some studly males as well. All of the posers wore smiles and adequate amounts of clothing. He also found several indiscreet Polaroids that he conveniently overlooked. It didn’t take long before Jaime Dahl became acutely aware of his omissions. It didn’t make her friendlier, but it did make her curious.

      She said, “You’re not taking notes.”

      “Pardon?”

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