I slide out from underneath Eric as Will comes charging in.
“Get out!” Eric thunders as I playfully swat the back of his head.
“I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” Will holds up a hand to shield his eyes. “But you’ll never believe what I just saw on CNN.”
“What?” I ask, disappointed that he woke us up for something that probably doesn’t even concern us.
“It’s Ryan,” Will starts, instantly grabbing my attention. “He got arrested last night for attacking some girl.” He lowers his hand to gauge our reaction.
“Holy shit,” Eric mutters, disgusted.
“Will, you’re telling us that Ryan made the national news?” I ask, immediately shifting from groggy to alert as my mind throttles into panic mode. “We have to check out this morning’s Gazette,” I say, scooting my feet from underneath the covers and pulling on my robe.
Will shakes his head. “I’ll bet my life that it’s not in there.”
“I wonder how it leaked then,” Eric responds, hustling out of bed and throwing on a shirt. “The Price name must’ve come over the wire and there wasn’t time to hush it up.”
“Yeah, in the big, bad city, everything’s media fodder,” I agree, following Will quickly down the steps. “No matter who you are. The more prestigious the name, the greater the fall. Once the charges are filed, there’s no hiding them.”
“The cops around here wouldn’t touch Ryan with a ten-foot pole, but in New York, they don’t know him from Adam.” Will looks back at me over his shoulder. “There, he’s just another rich man’s son.”
We gather around the TV and catch the tail end of the report.
“Ryan Price is the only son of Wall Street tycoon Conrad Price. According to an employee of the family, the elder Price threw his son out of their Park Avenue apartment after an altercation on Thanksgiving. Another witness at the crime scene claims that Ryan Price has been squatting in Central Park ever since the incident with his father.”
The screen fills with the face of a bedraggled teen full of piercings and tattoos and a very noticeable black eye. “Yeah, he wasn’t supposed to hurt the girl or anything. He just wanted her purse. He needed the money. He said he hadn’t eaten in two days. But when she resisted, he went all crazy, dragging her off into the bushes, holding her down. I tried to stop him, but that’s when he got violent. He hit me and knocked me out cold.”
The reporter continues. “Hearing the victim’s cries, passersby intervened and alerted police. It wasn’t long until they apprehended Price, who was found under a nearby bridge. For now, Price remains in police custody, awaiting an arraignment hearing on Monday.”
“Wow, this is serious,” I say, trying to take it all in.
“But that’s not all. They’re onto Ben, too. He woke me up when he texted me this morning all freaked out. He said some reporter already called him for a quote on Ryan’s arrest,” Will rushes on. “He doesn’t know how they got his name and number, but it can’t be good. Lauren could already be trying to do damage control by throwing Ben under the bus.”
“What exactly did the reporter want to know?” Eric presses, his voice deepening in anger.
“She made it seem like she wanted a response from one of his classmates about his arrest, but of all the kids Ryan goes to school with, why would they pick Ben?” Will questions, not buying the randomness of the selection.
“Well, he is the star football player of the senior class,” I pipe in. “He’s probably the most well-known student at Glendale High.”
“Yeah, but I don’t like it,” Will huffs as he starts to pace back and forth in front of the fire.
“What would Lauren have to gain by outing Ben and Ryan now?” Eric asks, crossing his arms in front of his chest.
“She probably has a pretty good suspicion that Tim blabbed what he knew to us. If Conrad’s doubling down, it’s a reasonable move,” Will elaborates, running a hand through his seriously disheveled hair. “I mean, he’s clearly written his son off. He probably doesn’t care what comes out about him now, and he’s desperate to protect his reputation at all costs.”
“Will, relax. You’re being paranoid,” I say soothingly, reaching for his arm, but he shrugs me off. “The reporter didn’t ask Ben to comment about their relationship, right? So what’s there to worry about?”
“And we can pretty much assume that Ryan knows nothing about his father’s involvement with Cassidy,” Eric remarks, spitting out her name like it hurts him to say it. “Or he would have used the information to his benefit a long time ago. He wouldn’t have been homeless in Central Park if he had that kind of dirt on his old man.”