I got to Matt's door and had barely knocked before he opened it wearing only a pair of basketball shorts and a white tank top.

Sweet Jesus

"Wow...h-hey," I said smiling taking in the wonderful sight in front of me.

Matt smiled, "CeCe, hey...thought you were someone else."

My heart dropped, "Oh, were you expecting someone?" I asked hesitantly.

"Yea, Jason and I are going to play some ball...but you are way better than Jason," he said giving me a smile that nearly melted me before leaning down and kissing me softly. "Aren't you supposed to go straight home? 'Cause I'd rather not give your brothers any more reason not to like me."

"Yea, I'm going...I just wanted to talk to you first," I said putting my hand on his stomach and pushing him inside the room and shutting the door before rearing up on my toes to kiss him again.

Matt smiled against my lips, "I like our talks," he said chuckling.

"What did Joe say to you after I left class today?" I asked getting right to the point.

Matt sighed and brought his hand up rubbing the back of his neck, "Nothing about us," he said avoiding my question.

I cocked a brow, I know that rubbing of the back of the neck thing... Nick does the same thing when he is nervous or stressed. I cocked my head to the side regaining eye contact with Matt. "Well, then...what did he say?" I questioned.

Matt bit his lip and gave me a reassuring smile, "This was my second truancy this term," he said.

And then suddenly it all made sense, no wonder he didn't really want to tell me what they discussed, there wasn't much of a discussion to tell...just Joe giving him the belt, the idea of it made me want to throw up...most girls start dating and they worry that their older brothers will kick their boyfriends ass....not beat it....how fucking embarrassing.

"OH," I said dropping my head. "Now I feel horrible."

"No, don't," Matt said putting his finger under my chin and lifting my eyes to meet his. "It's no big deal CeCe, it's not like I've never gotten the belt before," he said trying to reassure me.

"Yes but...it was Joe and he is my brother and we are dating, it's awkward," I said.

Matt chuckled, "No more awkward than any other random professor beating my ass," he said giving me another smile and pulling me to him to wrap his arms around me. "Don't worry about it babe" he said kissing the top of my head.

There was a quick knock on the door and Jason peeked his head in. "Hey, oh whoops...sorry man."

"No its fine , I was just leaving," I said rearing up on my toes to give Matt a quick kiss.

"Good luck with your boy talk," Matt said with a smirk as I grabbed my backpack and threw it over my shoulder.

I crinkled my nose. "I'll text you later." I said scooting past Jason out the door "Bye Jason."

"Later CeCe."

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I walked in the front door to find Nick in the kitchen cooking, I dropped my backpack by the door and walked in sitting down on a stool at the island and grabbing a piece of celery that he was chopping on the cutting board.

"Whatcha cookin?" I asked taking a bite of the celery then hopping up and grabbing the jar of peanut butter from the cabinet.

"Soup," Nick said swatting at my hand as I grabbed another stalk of celery. "Stop it...some of it actually needs to go IN the soup."

I smirked dipping my celery into the peanut butter and taking another bite. "Most guardians would be thrilled that their teen was snacking so wisely," I said shaking my celery at Nick for emphasis.

"Mmmmhmm...those guardians would also be thrilled if their teen hadn't been marked truant today." Nick said his tone more sharp.

"Joe told you..." I stated dipping my celery in the peanut butter again and taking another bite.

"Yup," He said popping his P for emphasis. "Wanna know how many times I was marked truant?"

"How many?" I asked.

"Once," Nick replied. "I skipped class to hang out with this girl I liked...Dad busted my ass SO bad I literally couldn't sit for like two days...I just hovered."

I giggled at the thought of Nick hovering in his chair.

"You think that's funny?" Nick asked cocking his brow. I shrugged and smiled. "Get marked truant again and you will find out." He said warning. My smile quickly faded. "I'm actually surprised Joe didn't bust your ass for it on the spot, you are lucky."

"Where is Joe?" I asked wondering when the awkward talk would ensue.

"He ran to Kevin's, Dani was sick so he stayed home after lunch, Joe went to pick up your paper." He said chopping the last of the celery and tossing it into a large pot. "We all need to talk when he gets back."

I sighed and crinkled my nose. "Can't wait," I said sarcastically.

I nabbed a couple baby carrots from the cutting board and Nick again swatted at my hands.

"Seriously CeCe, I'ma beat you if you don't stop." Nick threatened teasingly. I gave him a smirk before taking a bite of my spoils.

"Would you rather me be eating cookies and candy?" I retorted.

"I'd rather you stop eating and wait for dinner," he said grabbing what carrots I had not captured and throwing them into the pot.

"I'm a growing girl Nicky, I'm starving," I whined taking another bite of my carrot.

"Mmmhmmm, well maybe if you would spend your lunch actually eating instead of kissing on Matt you wouldn't be so hungry," he said cocking a brow.

I played dumb, it was my only defense.

Nick rolled his eyes "Please CeCe I may be older than you but I'm not THAT old, I do faintly remember what usually goes on during a date."

I stopped chewing my carrot momentarily to have an internal panic attack before defensively responding. "I did eat!"

"What did you eat?" Nick asked not convinced in the least.

"Peanutbutter," I answered plainly.

Nick cocked a brow "He fed you peanutbutter on your lunchdate?"

I nodded, "With a spoon."

Nick chuckled, "Well, if you haven't scared the boy away with your peanutbutter craziness by now, maybe it was meant to be" Nick said with a smirk "JIF?" he questioned knowingly.

I crinkled my nose, "Petar Pan."

Nick smirked, "Maybe that meant to be comment was a bit premature..."

"Nope, he is converting," I said proudly.

Nick shook his head, "He is dating you for 24 hours and already you are trying to change him."

"I like to think of it as making him better," I said giggling.

Nick smiled and grabbed the jar of peanutbutter, "I'm cutting you off."

I opened my mouth to protest when I heard the sound of the front door closing. Joe walked in the kitchen and took a seat on the stool next to me.

"Helping with dinner?" Joe asked taking my paper and a red pen out of his inside jacket pocket.

"No, mostly just getting smacked for stealing all the veggies," I said taking a bite of my last carrot.

Joe nodded his head, "Sounds about right."

Joe looked down at my paper for a few moments before turning his head to look at me with narrowed eyes. "This is the same paper," he said sounding irritated.

"I corrected it."

"I didn't tell you to correct it, I told you to rewrite it," he said his tone sharp.

"Well, I'll just take the D then," I said rolling my eyes.

"Excuse me?" Joe said sounding taken aback by my statement. Nick stopped chopping his narrowed eyes trained on me.

"I worked hard on that paper Joe, I fixed the grammatical errors and added some things but if you think that is a D paper then I will take the D, I'm not rewriting it." I said hopping down from my stool and walking out of the kitchen. I grabbed my backpack and quickly walked to my room slamming the door. I slumped down onto my bed knowing that this little conversation I had found myself in was far from over, but honestly at this point I didn't care. A moment later my door opened and Nick, not Joe, walked in.

"What the hell is the matter with you?" He questioned. I could actually almost see the steam shooting out of his ears. "Three minutes ago you were perfectly fine, then Joe walks in and you morph into a raging brat!" He spat in a loud tone that made me flinch.

"EVERYONE says my paper is good...even Kevin, he is the one who told me not to rewrite it." I argued.

"Kevin is not your professor for Language Arts, Joe is, I don't care if he wants you to stand on your head during class and sing your ABC's if he tells you to do something, you DO IT," He said emphasizing the last two words just as Joe walked into my room.

"You guys say that you don't want me treated differently because you are professors, but no one else had to re-write their paper just me, how is that not treating me differently?"

"Not true," Joe said speaking up for the first time. "One other person had to redo their paper." Joe walked over and tossed a paper onto the bed. I picked it up and started to read the all too familiar words, then looked up at Joe in confusion.

"What is this?" I questioned, utterly confused.

"You tell me," He replied dryly.

"It's my paper."

Joe cocked a brow and crossed his arms across his chest, "Is it?"

It took me a few moments to register what he was questioning. "You think I CHEATED? You think I copied this paper?" My tone was high and irate.

"Two students turn in the exact same paper, I ask them both to rewrite it and you refuse to produce a new one," He stated.

"Yea, 'cause I worked my ass off on the first one!" I spat back.

"WATCH IT!" both Joe and Nick warned in unison.

I stood from my bed and walked over to my desk, rifling through a stack of papers before grabbing a notebook and shoving it into Joe's chest. "If I copied the paper, why would I bother with all the rough drafting?"

Joe opened the notebook and leafed through pages of my rough drafts and hand scribbled notes before closing it and looking up at me with a sigh, "I suppose you wouldn't."

"So all this time you thought I cheated," I said, torn between wanting to cry and wanting to scream.

"I had two identical papers handed in, I knew someone had copied but had no way of telling who, I wanted to believe that it wasn't you which is why I had you write new papers rather than failing you both but to be honest yes it looked a little suspicious when you threw such a fit over rewriting the paper," Joe explained.

"Who copied my paper?" I questioned, ideas of how to get my revenge already streaming through my head.

"I can't tell you that," he said, shaking his head.

"How did this other student get a copy of your paper?" Nick asked.

I shrugged in frustration and sat down on my bed, "I don't know."

"Where did you print it?" Nick asked.

"I printed it at school the way I do all my papers."

"Well, maybe you left the file open? Did you have it uploaded to the student server?" he asked.

"No, I don't trust that thing, there are too many ways to hack into it even if it is password protected. I always save it to..." I jumped up from my bed and walked over to my backpack that was discarded next to the doorway. I quickly rifled through my backpack before letting out a frustrated growl. "A flash drive...that is now missing."

"Looks like we know how someone got access to your paper. Was there anything else on the flash?" Nick asked.

"No, just that paper," I said, shaking my head and taking my seat back on the bed.

"That's some good news at least" Nick said smiling, I wasn't ready to return the smile, I was still pretty livid. "I'm going to go check on dinner and let you two talk," Nick said turning and walking out leaving Joe and I together in an awkward silence.

"CeCe..." Joe started.

"I cant believe you thought I cheated," I said hurt.

"I'm sorry, I should have trusted you," he said sitting down beside me on the bed.

"Yes, you should have...so what? Now whoever copied my paper gets off scott free for plagiarism and gets the grade for this new paper they handed in?" I asked now fully irritated at the whole situation.

"No, this second paper was a way to determine who cheated more than anything else, it will not be graded. Your grade will be changed and she will be failed for the assignment." He clarified.

"So how were you going to determine which one of us cheated by the second paper?" I asked slightly confused.

"People generally keep a similar writing style, I was just planning to compare it to the old paper." he explained.

"Well, wouldn't you have already figured it out then, the paper was due today," I questioned digging for more information on my plagiarizer.

"Yours was due today, hers is due tomorrow," he said.

So whoever stole it is a girl that has Joe for Language Arts on tuesdays and thursdays...

"I'm not giving you any more information," he said "I know that's what you are trying to do, don't worry about it I will handle it."

Yea, I knew exactly how he would "handle it" too...so tomorrow I look for a girl leaving Joe's Language Arts class with a sore ass and I'll find the cheater.

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