Ripper (Hunter #1)(7)

I thanked Sharon, who showed me to the elevators. We made our way to the third floor. Room 315 was halfway down the hall, and I knocked on it shortly as I read the many notes on the corkboard secured to the door. Though it stated plainly that this was Joanne and Cassie’s room almost all the notes were for Jo. The notes started out asking her to call so and so or saying someone had dropped by, but the newer notes begged her to get in touch. They spoke of deep worry. This wasn’t a girl who bugged out on her friends.

“Wannabe. I’m getting nada and if she was even a minor witch I should feel something.” There was no judgment in Liv’s pronouncement, merely truth.

The door opened and I was faced with a walking, talking Hot Topic mannequin. Cassie Lydell had the Goth thing down. She wore black on black on…surprisingly enough, more black. Her combat boots were black, as were the artfully torn fishnets that covered her legs. Her miniskirt was a more faded black which spoke of much use, but the T-shirt looked new. It was some band’s tour shirt, and apparently the band really liked demons and poorly drawn Hell symbols.

“What do you want?” she asked through her black-tinged lips.

I elbowed Liv because she was trying hard not to laugh. Apparently she’d forgotten what it was like to be young and hyper-pretentious. I would have to pull out the pictures of her in her surplus army coat. It was a phase that came right after her skater year.

“Hello, I’m Kelsey Atwood. I’m investigating the disappearance of your roommate.” I would have handed her a business card, but she would just stare at me like I was an idiot.

She did it anyway. “Okay.”

I held my temper. “We need to come in and ask you a few questions and maybe look around at Joanne’s belongings. It can tell us a lot sometimes.”

She shrugged, her black bob shaking. She was a tall, lanky girl, and she opened the door, not bothering to wait for us to walk in before she tossed herself on her bed and started thumbing through a magazine.

I wasn’t buying it. I could see Liv getting pissed, but she was missing some important signs. The minute I mentioned Joanne’s name, Cassie swallowed not once, but twice. Her jaw had firmed into a hard line. It was the kind of thing you did when you were trying to control yourself.

“When was the last time you saw, Joanne?” I kept my voice quiet and sympathetic. I didn’t need to give her anything to rebel against.

She didn’t look up from her magazine, but I noted that she wasn’t reading. Her eyes stared straight forward. “I don’t know. Couple of days ago.”

“Do you even care that your roommate is missing?” Liv asked, outrage in her voice.

Cassie tensed, but didn’t look up. I widened my eyes at my friend. It let her know she wasn’t helping. She sighed and her hands went up in submission. I needed to give her something else to do.

“Why don’t you look through her clothes?” Liv loved clothes. She knew they said a lot about a person. “Tell me what you see.”

“All right,” she said, apology blatant in her tone as she walked to the small closet and started to look through it.

I turned back to my problem. Cassie had gathered her armor tightly around her, and I was going to have to push through it. I sat down on the edge of Joanne’s bed and regarded the girl, deciding on the best tactic. “Did Joanne ever have any trouble with the girl at the front desk?”

Cassie glanced over the magazine with startled eyes. “Sharon? She’s annoying, but I don’t think she had a problem with Jo. Did she say something bad about Jo?”

I managed to suppress the self-congratulatory grin that wanted to come out. Now I knew she liked her roommate. Her default position was to never show she cared about anyone. “Oh, she didn’t say anything. I got a feeling that she was one of those chicks who gets weirded out by anyone even slightly different from what she considers normal.” I wasn’t lying. Sharon had said the words herself.

Cassie’s black lips turned up a little. We were making progress. “She’s not that bad, actually. There are way worse than Sharon, but Jo gets along with everyone.”

“She doesn’t seem like the kind of girl who ups and walks away.” I took in the small room. The differences were well delineated. Cassie’s side of the room was messy and cluttered with clothes and makeup and CDs. Joanne’s side of the room was pin neat. Her bookshelf held her textbooks, a couple of notebooks, and a stack of paperbacks with cracked spines.

Cassie set the magazine down. “She’s not. I tried to tell her mom that she’d been acting weird but…”

But Helen didn’t think Cassie should be saying anyone acted weird, I could guess. I leaned forward. I wasn’t going to make the mistake of not taking her seriously. “How was she acting weird?”

She bit her bottom lip as though wondering exactly how much to tell me. I had to put a stop to that.

“Cassie, I’m not here to judge her. The crap I’ve done in this lifetime makes me unfit to judge anyone. I’m here to find her. The only thing I care about is figuring out what happened to her. I ain’t the cops. You can tell me whatever and trust me, I’ve probably been there and done that.”

Cassie groaned in frustration. “I don’t know exactly what’s going on. I just know she’s been acting weird for Jo. She’s been going out late at night and staying out all night sometimes.”