Spring Secrets: Pine Point, Book 3 Read Online Free Page B

produced a ring of keys from the pocket of her blazer. “The large one is for the classroom, the silver one for the closet in the corner, and the small gold one for the two file cabinets.”
    “Thank you.” Sienna palmed them. Yes, she’d taught a special-needs class before. Once. Three years ago. During her interview for this position, it had seemed like the perfect qualification, along with her education and the fact she’d grown up in Pine Point. The superintendent and principal had obviously agreed. Now she wondered if they were all off their rockers.
    “The schedule for the day is posted by the door,” Jenny went on. She turned and pointed. As she did, Caleb walked over to the blue banner.
    “Nine o’clock is arrival time,” he began in his thin, high-pitched voice. “At nine-fifteen, you have to call the main office and tell them if anyone is absent. And if we are each having hot or cold lunch today.” He paused. “I am having hot lunch. My mother gave me one dollar and fifty cents for it.”
    Jenny leaned close and whispered to Sienna, “He’ll be your best resource.”
    Caleb dragged his finger down the banner and the explanations went on. “We leave for lunch at eleven-thirty. Every other day we have special, like Art, or Music…”
    Jenny tiptoed her way around Caleb, mouthing, “Call me if you need anything.” Loni stood and followed her with a smile and a bob of her chins. Sienna nodded at them both, and then it was just her alone with the students.
    “At twelve o’clock, we go outside when the weather is nice,” Caleb was explaining, “but not if the temperature is below freezing. That is thirty-two degrees Fahrenheit or zero degrees Celsius.”
    “Yes, it is,” she said, but he didn’t slow down or stop to respond.
    “And at quarter to three, we have to pick up everything and walk out to the buses when the bell rings at three o’clock.” He finished and folded his hands in front of him, like a public debater who’d finished his formal presentation.
    “Well, thank you for all of that,” Sienna said. She tried to give him a smile, but Caleb looked over her shoulder, avoiding eye contact. She didn’t touch him. Instead, she walked over to the bookcase, selected two books, and sank into the chair at the edge of the rug. “How about a story or two to start the day?”
    Billy and Bailey were squirming where they sat, but they looked up expectantly, which she took as a positive sign. Silas had returned to the chair under the window and was rocking it furiously. His cheeks had turned bright red, but he waved at her and grinned as if he was having the time of his life, so she left him there.
    Caleb walked across the room, pulled out a chair, and sat at the small table near the teacher’s desk. He folded his hands again and waited, his gaze still focused somewhere over Sienna’s head. In the only other chair at the table sat Dawn, the lone girl in the class. She had wide blue eyes and beautiful blond hair pulled into neat braids. She wore what looked like designer clothes, a long maroon sweater over patterned leggings and cute black shoes with bows on the toes. But her cuticles were chewed to the quick, and as Sienna looked at her, she pulled her knees up to her chin and dropped her gaze to the floor.
    A flash of memory swept over Sienna. The Pine Point playground in bleak winter, kids playing, Sienna standing near the swings and waiting for her turn.
    “Her mother talks funny,” one of the boys said in a low voice. He inspected his bright red ski jacket and tugged on the ski lift tag attached to the zipper.
    Sienna dug her bare hands as far as they would go into the pockets of her secondhand coat.
    “My mother says she’s a gringo ,” said another boy with a glance at Sienna. “That means a dirty Mexican.”
    Eight-year-old Sienna turned, cheeks burning, and stumbled in the direction of the slide instead.
    “I know the schedule says math at nine-thirty,” she said as she