Jack? Why had Jack punched Alex? Laurel was at Jack’s side, his arm slung over her shoulder.
‘What’s happened?’ Nate asked, reaching for her.
She flinched away from him and pulled out her phone, tapping viciously at it.
‘All I know, is if that bastard puts his hands on my sister again, a broken nose will be the least of his problems,’ Jack said, voice steely.
Nate’s anger burst to the surface.
‘You didwhat?’
‘Come on, I didn’t do anything. This has all been blown out of proportion.’ Alex spread his hands wide in appeasement. ‘I was just having a little chat with Laurel here.’
Nate looked at her, and his smartwatch vibrated.
‘Yeah, we were having a chat,’ Laurel said, voice thin.
He took a step towards her, but she flinched away again. His stomach clenched.
‘Can you please tell me what’s happened?’ he asked gently, holding up his hands as he would do to a scared animal.
‘I’ll tell you what’s happened,’ Laurel said in a quiet, dangerous voice he had never heard before.
‘Uh oh,’ Robin said under his breath.
‘No wonder you wanted to forget about what happened ten years ago, Nate,’ she started, stepping away from Jack, her hands clenched at her sides. ‘Because you stole my work, and sent your best friend here,’ Laurel shot a dirty look at Alex, ‘to tell me what a waste of space you thought I was. An ugly, pathetic loser who had no business writing a paper, and what the hell was I doing trying to get between you and your golden girlfriend, Lucia, because you wouldn’t look twice at someone like me. That frankly I was arrogant and you couldn’t ever speak to me. That you were so embarrassed for me.’
Tears were flowing freely down her face, dripping off her chin onto the gravel floor.
‘Laurel, I don’t know what you’re talking about.’
‘Then you publishedmypaper. You stole my work, Nate. You and your best friend here. Then you have the gall to come to my home and ask me to forgive you? To worm your way into my life? Fuck, you’re cold.’
‘Laurel, I don’t—’ He stepped towards her, but stopped as Robin stepped forward too. Nate knew a warning when he saw one. Was this what had happened ten years ago? Did Alex really say those things? ‘Stole your paper?’
‘Really? You don’t know anything about it?’ she asked, but the sarcasm was heavy. ‘You don’t remember sending your best friend to eviscerate me? You must have blocked out receiving my paper because it was too embarrassing, yeah?’
‘What paper? Laurel, I swear to you, I never saw your paper,’ he said, racking his brain, because surely he would remember something like that.
‘Well, you’ve got a chance to revisit those memories, because I’ve just sent you a copy of it, and it would appear that the introduction to your ‘breakthrough paper’ was actually lifted word for word from the essay that this pathetic, arrogant, embarrassing undergraduate wrote.’
He looked at Alex.
‘What did you do?’ he whispered.
There was a flit of hesitancy across Laurel’s face as they all looked at Alex, wiping blood on the sleeve of his jacket.
‘Oh, mate, I didn’t do anything you didn’t know about. Come on, Nate,’ he said.
‘Laurel, I didn’t—’ he started, but she interrupted him.
‘You asked me to forget about it, to start afresh, and it was all because you wanted to keep your dirty little plagiarism a secret,’ she said and fresh tears sprung to her eyes. ‘Was everything a lie?’
‘No, Laurel, that’s—’ he said, reaching for her, but she held up her hands.
‘I can’t be around you,’ she whispered.
‘Rebecca’s home. You can go to her,’ Jack said.
