"Detective Lassiter," Lassiter grunted into his cell phone, not even looking up from his reports as he answered it.

"Carl!" an almost frantic voice shouted on the other end. "You have to help me!"

Lassiter stood up instantly, already recognizing the voice. "Ty? What the hell—where are you?"

"School!"

Lassiter rolled his eyes, collapsing back into his chair. If he was calling from school, there was no way in hell it was an emergency.

"What’s going on?" he demanded shortly. "And why are you tying up a police line? I told you I can’t call in an emergency evacuation just so you don’t have to sit through the school play again."

"It’s not that," Ty pressed on rapidly, his changing voice squeaking. "They’re going to expel me!"

Lassiter sighed, pinching his nose between his thumb and forefinger as he tried to stave off a headache. "What did you do?"

"Nothing!" Ty insisted. "Someone cleaned out the cafeteria cash registers while everyone was at the assembly watching the stupid play. They think I did it, Carl!"

Lassiter groaned. "You didn’t--?"

"No!" Ty sounded truly offended by the implication. "I don’t steal money, Carl! You know that! Sometimes I just take little stuff when I forget--"

"And occasional iPods," Lassiter pointed out.

Ty huffed. "That was last year, Carl. I have taken anything like that since!"

Lassiter tipped back in his chair, clutching the phone tighter. "Why don’t you call the Hendersons to get you out of it?" he asked.

"I can’t. They’d freak out if they knew I was in trouble again. Mrs. Henderson is already paranoid I’m going to end up in jail because of last time. Do you have any idea what she’d do if she thought I stole a couple hundred bucks? I would never see the light of day again!"

Lassiter sat up again thoughtfully. This was true. "Fine," he growled. "I’ll come down."

Ty was sitting on the hard wooden bench outside the principal’s office when Lassiter arrived. There was a tall man standing over him, glaring down at the clearly irritated boy.

"Head Detective Carlton Lassiter," he announced as he approached them, whipping out his badge and flashing it at the principal. "Santa Barbara Police Department."

The principal blinked in surprise. "We didn’t call the police," he said slowly. "We were hoping not to get them involved in this little...misunderstanding."

"So was I," Lassiter muttered, glaring at Ty, who was grinning up at him now.

"We can handle it, Detective."

"Yeah," Lassiter snorted. "I’m sure whatever Sparky the Wonder Security Guard you have around here is a crack investigator."

"Carl, he still won’t listen!" Ty complained, crossing his arms over his chest. "I didn’t do it!"

The principal glanced around the hallway almost nervously, flicking his head towards his office as he locked eyes with Lassiter. "Let’s step into my office," he suggested. "It’s more private."

Ty followed the detective and the principal into the office, muttering his innocence under his breath.

There was also something about school being lame in there, but Lassiter couldn’t hear all of it.

The principal shut the door behind him and crossed to his desk. He positioned himself in his chair carefully, thoughtfully regarding Ty and Lassiter, who were standing across from him now.

"Detective," he began, attempting to keep his tone cordial. "I don’t know what Ben told you--"

"He told me he didn’t steal any money," Lassiter cut him off. "Besides, you’re not going to expel a kid without any evidence. You can’t have anything concrete--"

"Oh, but we do."

The principal spoke the last phrase almost smugly, turning his attention back to Ty. "Ben," he smirked. "You didn’t tell Detective Lassiter the whole story, did you?"

"Uh…" Ty stammered, glancing nervously up at the glaring detective. "I told him most of it…"

"Ty," Lassiter snarled. "What the hell is he talking about?"

Ty sighed. "The play was lame," he grumbled. "You have no idea, Carl. It was lamer than your nose hair trimmer. So, I left."

"Where did you go?" Lassiter demanded.

Ty shrugged. "Where I always go when I run away."

"Where the hell is that?"

"I don’t know. I don’t remember."

Lassiter opened his mouth, but there didn’t seem to be anything to ask. Ty had always run away, always disappeared for hours, occasionally a few days, at a time. He’d never said anything about where he went, but somehow it didn’t surprise Lassiter that he didn’t know himself.

"So, you don’t have an alibi," Lassiter shrugged, looking back at the principal. "Opportunity doesn’t mean--"

"That’s just the beginning," the principal raised his hands at Lassiter’s objections. "He wasn’t there, so that’s why we asked to look in his locker. Which he consented to."

Lassiter raised an eyebrow at Ty, who suddenly seemed three inches shorter as he slouched. "Ty--"

"I didn’t know the money was in there!" Ty burst out, his large black eyes pleading with Lassiter. "I swear, Carl! I didn’t take it!"

Lassiter groaned, closing his eyes.

The money had been in his locker.

Of course.

It was an open and shut case.

The kid was guilty as hell.

Except he wasn’t.

He couldn’t be.

"We also found two hundred or so pens in there," the principal pressed on. "And various marbles, paper clips, pencils, bottle caps, and erasers."

"I forget sometimes," Ty mumbled, running his hands through his thick black hair. "I forget and put them in my pockets."

Lassiter’s eyes narrowed. "Was there a Xanax pen in the locker?" he demanded.

The principal nodded slowly, opening his drawer and pulling one out and holding it up for Lassiter to look at.

"You stole my favorite pen?" Lassiter growled, glaring at the defeated boy.

"It’s my favorite pen, too," Ty mumbled, defenseless now.

"You see my problem, Detective," the principal sighed, tipping back in his desk chair. "The money was in his locker with other stolen property. He doesn’t have an alibi for the time of the assembly. He has a history of this type of behavior…what other conclusion am I supposed to reach? You’re a detective. What would you think if this was your case?"

Lassiter sighed, for a long moment not having an answer

He was a cop. He could see the damning evidence. It looked bad. For any other case, for any other suspect, he would probably have been convinced he had the guilty party.

Hell, he would have dragged them into interrogation and not let them go until either had a confession or tears.

But this wasn’t any other suspect.

This was Ty.

And Ty said he didn’t do it.

It went against every natural instinct he had, against every ounce of training he’d had. It was a purely emotional response to what was a logical problem. But that didn’t seem to matter right now.

"You can’t honestly stand there and expect me to ignore every bit of evidence we have, can you?" the principal pressed on when Lassiter didn’t respond.

Lassiter leaned over the desk, his eyes narrowing at the man behind it. "He didn’t do it."

"You don’t know that."

"The hell I don’t!"

"How?"

Lassiter blinked, straightening up.

He didn’t know, of course. Not really. Not technically. All the evidence said he was wrong.

Damn the evidence.

He pointed at Ty firmly, unwavering. "Because he told me he didn’t."