S.O.L.

" Robin?"

"Probably but her name isn't on the admin account,"

"Fake account?"

"Yeah would have to be,"

"Do you think Kirsten-"

"Maybe, but Willow said she seemed upset when she saw the bruises,"

"Will?"

"Wouldn't risk it coming back to him directly. And the school article was posted before the Facebook page postings"

I dropped my head in my hands as I listened to Chase, Miles, Cass, and Owen bounce around their thoughts. Olivia surprisingly stayed quiet, taking up her seat next to Callum while Reid rushed to take off her coat, having rushed over here at the S.O.S text.

"That fucker! He had this set up, I know he did. The whole "promising young man" garbage that everyone loves," she snarled. "I called Lyla at the paper here, she owes me a favour and as head of the newspaper for us she gets the tea before the rest of us. Blocked number called her, said Chase is building a smear campaign to knock Will out of the prospect pool and Willow is giving him the ammunition as his jealous ex,"

I let out a groan. "Man or woman caller?"

"Voice distortion," she responded. "It had to be Will or Robin," she came over to the couch, giving me a quick hug before flopping down in the recliner.

" she isn't having the story posted, but the rest of the paper is pissed about it. College paper or not that's a pretty top tier story to them, so it's only a matter of time,"

As soon as Miles called us down to the living room, Chase took screenshots and sent them to John before searching up the Facebook page himself. It was already gaining traction with 400 members, a lot of them being people from our highschool and in my classes here. There were dozens of posts about what a good guy Will was for his work in the learn to skate program, volunteering with the team for holiday soup kitchens throughout the years ( ones I all but dragged him out of the car to go to by the way) when he helped coach the Tim bits program in his final year of highschool, the donations he made to our local hockey organization back home.

Unfortunately for me with every post about how great he was there was a least a comment about what a piece of shit I was.

"Will was never the same after he got with Willow, he was always in a bad mood and stopped going out to organization events"

" I bet she was the one abusing him. Why else would her best friend start seeing him?"

"She said he cheated on her, I bet she's only trying to have him charged to get back at him"

"Weird coincidence she would start dating Chase Andrews then all of a sudden turn on Will and try to send him to prison"

"I can't believe Willow would do this to him, she's such a fucking bitch,"

"False accusers should honestly just kill themselves"

"This is why women have a hard time getting justice. False accusations just to get back at him? As if jumping to his top competition wasn't bad enough? Rumour is Chase hit her and she's covering for him,"

Suddenly a hand appeared in front of me, taking my phone from my hands, I looked over to see Chase sliding it into his sweatshirt pocket.

"You're done reading that," he stated

"Give that back," I snapped, reaching to take it from him, but he grabbed my hands

"No, reading all of that shit won't help anyone or anything," his green eyes met mine and the look on his face had me stopping in my tracks. He was right, but it was like a train wreck I couldn't stop watching. All of these people that I saw everyday, some I had known for years even, and some I hadn't ever spoken to all had such a low opinion of me? What did I do to them?

I slumped back down into the couch beside him, angrily batting his hand away as he reached for mine. After he sighed I thought better of it and placed my hand on top of his.

" So, where do we start with this?" Reid asked, pulling out her own phone. "There's only one admin for this page, Kendra Marie. Quick glance says it's a fake profile. "

"Marie is Robin's middle name," Cass threw out there. "Not enough to pin her but enough to make it known to us I would think,"

Chase's phone vibrated in his pocket, thankfully John was open to text communications in his days off. "John says he has looked into it and the most we can do is make a report. Can report individual comments where Willow is named, but they probably won't be able to force the page to come down because it's actually about Will. It doesn't exactly fall into the publication ban because there are no details defining exact court proceedings,"

"But if we report comments they can see who did it and block us from the group," Cass stated. " and that does nothing about the paper article. They don't mention Willow by name but most people know who the ex is,"

" so I'm screwed," I stated.

"We will figure it out baby," Chase said rubbing his thumb over mine. "Do you want to try going to the station, or calling the non emergency line? Probably won't be able to do anything tonight but we can try,"

I shook my head "let's worry about it in the morning. I want a paper copy ,"

Chase's phone dinged again, and he read it out loud

Wyatt: Will has been suspended for five games, not allowed to attend practice during. Coach is pissed, dean threatened his scholarship.

Chase: that makes sense why they would do this now

Wyatt: Boys are fuming. Contacted coach. Told them not to interact on the page or they are benched. Can't bash will, or support Willow without it coming back on the team. Not looking good for you either Bud.

Chase: not worried about me, thanks boys. Not much we can do till tomorrow. Now put the phone down you have a concussion.

Wyatt: 🖕

After going around in circles several more times, we all decided to call it a night. I dragged myself up the stairs and flopped down onto the bed. Chase slid in beside me, and pulled me to his chest. I didn't have the capacity to cry right now, it was just one thing after another.

After tossing and turning most of the next few hours, I rolled myself out of bed just as the sun was getting ready to rise. I'd already decided I wouldn't make it to my morning classes and the longer I tossed the more I wanted to say screw the whole day entirely. There was only two weeks left before Christmas break and my class work was already piled high without me being made the school piranha over night.

After I had a quick shower, Chase woke up and did the same, before driving me to the police station. Again.

I picked at the sleeves of his sweater I borrowed as we pulled into the parking lot. My coffee sat untouched in the cup holder while I stared at it as if it held all the answers in the world. My heart was beating erratically in my chest. My anxiety was sky high, causing me to sweat.

"Baby," he placed one of his hands over mine to stop the picking. I looked up to meet his eyes."Are you okay?"

I shook my head "I just want this over," I admitted quietly. "Maybe if I drop the char-"

His face hardened "No. that's what he wants. He is going to pay for what he did, and go down for this whole campaign too,"

"But what if-"

"You are not dropping this Willow. If you stop now, it'll just look worse for you and he will get away with all of it"

I sighed, rubbing circles over my temples " okay, okay. You're right,"

Chase slipped his finger under my chin and tilted my head towards him before leaving in to press a soft kiss to my lips. "Let's go,"

We both hauled ourselves out of the truck and made our way inside.  We stated our names and the reason for our visit to the officer seated behind the desk, and she took notes before sending us off the the chairs in the waiting area. After half an hour we were called back in and showed to an office looking room where a balding  man sat behind the desk.

"Good morning, I am officer Parks, I understand you're having some problems?"

I sat down in the chair and shade and I began explaining the situation. Officer parks nodded at the appropriate times, occasionally jotting down notes. By the time we finished I could tell what he was going to say.

He laid down his pen and gave a petulant frown . "It seems you are in quiet a situation. However unfortunately without proof of who is running the page, there is not much we can do at this time. I would suggest reporting the comments yourselves and having them removed. With enough reports, Facebook may just decide to take the page down themselves,"

"But when you are running a page on Facebook, you can see who reported the comments and ban them from the group," Chad responded.

Office parks nodded, "I understand that, however not having access may be a good thing for you," his brown eyes darted over to mine  and I couldn't stop my jaw from physically dropping. " I'm not saying the page is good for you, but if you don't know what they're saying-"

"The what? It can't hurt me?" My eyes welled up in frustration. " it isn't going to hurt me less to not know what they are saying. The problem is that it exists, "

"No, it's not going to hurt less but it can help you focus on something else," he said sternly, "there isn't much that we can do in this situation unless there is proof of who it is, and from what you have shown me, that is a fake account. Your best bet is to report the comments, and report the account to see if it gets taken down, the page would go with it,"

"You mean there's no way to track it with an IP address or anything?" Chase asked

"That's not really my area of expertise, but even if it gave an IP  address, even a device itself, you can't really prove that they did it unless they admit it. 'Oh I lost my phone, my laptop was stolen, I let so and so borrow it. It wasn't me I swear ' "

Chase and I bristled in silence for a moment.  "I'm sorry this isn't  the resolution you were hoping for, is there anything else I can help you with today?"

I picked at my sweater sleeves to try to get a handle on my shaking hands. "No,thank you." I responded quietly, I stood up, turning to the door without another word.

"Wait, Can we have a copy of the report?" Chase asked.

I didn't wait to hear the response. On auto pilot, I made my way out of the office, and through the waiting area, barely registering the officer at the desk wishing me a good day. I made it out to the truck and leaned against it, taking a deep breath.

I knew this was going to be the outcome, John had told us as much last night. But seeing it happen in my head and having it happen in real life were two completely different things. They were going to get away with this. Even if they admitted it, it's already on the internet, and the internet lasted forever. Having him charged could be a success and he would have to stay away from me, but even if I won, I still lost. They would still hate me and I would forever be known as the girl that ruined his career over a lie, and based on the comments I was dragging Chase down with me.

"Willow?" I looked up to see Chase jogging towards me " got the report, why did you just take off ?"

I shrugged, looking at his shoes. A pair of hands grabbed my shoulders and he pulled me into him. I rested my head against his shoulder, wrapping my arms around his waist. I breathed in the scent of his body wash and cologne, trying to block out everything around me. I couldn't tell him why I left like that, because I couldn't tell him how I felt. Was there even a word for this? It's almost like I was so angry and sad that I couldn't make my body show emotion. I couldn't cry, but I couldn't put on a face either.

"I'm sorry, baby. But we will get something figured out,"

I nodded. He held me for a few moments before he finally let go, placing a kiss on my forehead. We climbed back in the truck and I read through the paper. They may has well have stamped shit out of luck on the top of it.

We made a quick stop over at John's office where Chase ran in to drop everything off. He was back out in a few minutes.

"I guess I should get you back home so you can go to class today," Chase said

"Yeah, you should get going," I said

"You don't have to go Willow, nobody would blame you if you took the day off,"

I shrugged. " theyre going to blame me anyway"

He and I both knew I wasn't talking about classes, but he didn't have anything to say to that.  We were quiet on the way to my place, and I didn't even realize we had made it there until he slid the truck into park.

"Do you want a ride in?"

I forced my lip to quirk up "you're already late babe. Its okay,"

He hesitated for a minute before pulling me in for a kiss. I kissed him back before sliding out of the truck and grabbing my bad from the backseat. I waved him good bye as he drove off.

Contrary to what I said, I was not going to class.  I dropped my bag  and shoes at the door, my feet feeling like lead as I trudged up the stairs and flopped down on my bed. I curled up into my blankets and opened my phone, typing in the Facebook page and started scrolling through the terrible things I didn't do.