The Bad Boy Odyssey

I calmed Emma Spencer down and told her to wait at the entrance with Noah Shaw, then grabbed my keys and headed straight for the kindergarten.

When I arrived at the gates of Starlight Bilingual Academy, I took the access card from her. I held it up to the scanner.

"Beep! Pre-K Class 1, Gabriel Cooper."

A boy’s face popped up on the screen. It looked strangely familiar, but I couldn’t place where I’d seen him before. For some reason, a wave of unease crept over me.

I called Scott Shaw.

It rang for a while before he finally picked up. There was a lot of background noise on his end.

"Hey, honey? Why are you calling right now? I’m about to head into a meeting." Scott’s voice sounded as gentle as ever.

"Did you grab the wrong school card last night—the one you left by the door?" I asked casually, "Emma tried scanning it, and it showed a kid named Gabriel Cooper."

There was a brief pause on the other end. Then he let out an awkward chuckle. "Oh… that. On my way home yesterday, I gave a coworker a ride. It must’ve been her son’s card. He probably dropped it in my car, and I mixed them up."

His tone was full of self-blame. "Just have Emma take Noah home for the day and let him rest. I’ll go to the school office tomorrow and get him a replacement card."

"That’s fine. If we can’t find it, we’ll just get a new one. It’s only a few hundred dollars anyway," I said evenly.

"Don’t!" Scott’s voice suddenly shot up, sharp and jarring.

As if realizing he’d overreacted, he quickly softened his tone and coaxed me gently, "I mean, the school admin office is a nightmare. Replacing a card means ID checks, paperwork, fees… It’s a hassle.

"I’ll take a good look in the car tomorrow. I’ll definitely find Noah’s card. You’re busy with work, so don’t worry about something this trivial, okay?"

Thrown off by his interruption, I didn’t press further. I took Emma and Noah back home first.

However, the more I thought about it, the more something felt off.

So I picked up my tablet. Scott had a habit. His dashcam automatically synced to the cloud on the tablet.

I pulled up the footage from yesterday morning.

In the video, Scott first got into the car with Noah. Then the car stopped outside an old, run-down apartment complex.

A heavily made-up woman walked over, holding a young boy’s hand, and got into the car.

"Scotty, thanks for driving Gabriel again today," she said in a soft, sugary voice.

"Why so formal?" Scott smiled and patted the boy’s head. "Gabriel, be good at school today."

"Okay! Thanks, Dad!" the boy shouted brightly.