People Like Us(25)

Nola leans against a tree trunk and pulls her laptop out of her backpack. “That doesn’t sound like skewering.”

“I didn’t make up the rules.”

“And Hannigan?”

“I’m going to report him.”

She nods. “Okay. My payment?”

“Nola, I’m in a time crunch. Let’s just say I owe you a favor to be called in when you want. Okay?”

“That works.”

She types while I scrawl out an anonymous letter calling out Hannigan as a teacher in a relationship with an unnamed student, and drop it in Dr. Klein’s mailbox. I drop Hannigan a second anonymous note letting him know that if he doesn’t resign immediately, I’ll give Klein the name of the student along with photographic proof. Just as I’m about to leave the building, though, her administrative assistant calls to me from the top of the stairs and asks me to take a seat outside her office. I sit in the waiting room in a state of stifling dread, expecting to field questions about Tricia, but when I’m ushered into the office, Detective Morgan is waiting for me inside along with Dr. Klein.

“Sit down,” Dr. Klein invites, pointing to an azure suede chair.

I sit and smile nervously. “Is there something I can help with?”

“Detective Morgan is going to ask you some questions, dear. I’m just here as your chaperone,” she says.

I turn to Detective Morgan. “Okay.”

She smiles. “How are you holding up, Kay? Rough couple of days.”

“I’m all right.”

“I saw they canceled your big game tonight. That’s rough.”

Rough twice in two sentences. Not exactly an impressive vocabulary. “It is.”

“I understand you had some scouts coming to watch you play. Some recruiters.”

The unblinking way she’s staring at me is incredibly unnerving, not to mention the level of stalking she’s obviously engaged in. “Yes, that’s true.”

“Rough,” she says for a third time. For some reason, this really irritates me.

“How can I help you?”

“Just a few questions about the other night, Kay. Can I call you Kay?”

I try not to let my annoyance show. “Everyone else does.”

“You say you found Jessica a little after midnight.”

“I didn’t time-stamp it. We found her and then you guys showed up and we reported it right away.”

She looks from Dr. Klein to me incredulously. “Now, I thought you told your friend Maddy not to call us.”

“No. My friend Brie told Maddy to call Dr. Klein first. We didn’t want Jessica’s family to find out on the news or the internet that their daughter was dead.”

She scribbles in her notebook. “So you told Maddy not to call us because—”

“Brie told Maddy.”

She smacks her forehead dramatically. “Brie told Maddy not to call us to protect Jessica’s family.”

I can’t help the irritation from edging into my voice. It feels like she’s deliberately twisting my words. “I said she told Maddy to call Dr. Klein first. Then the cops.”

Detective Morgan assumes an innocent expression. “My bad. To protect Jessica’s family.”

“Yes.”

She flips through her notes. “So this in fact contradicts your statement at the scene that you didn’t know who the victim was.”

I blink. “No, I didn’t know.”

“You just said you wanted to protect Jessica’s family.”

“I did. I just didn’t know it was hers.”

She taps her pencil against the notebook skeptically. “Which is it, Kay?”

I draw in a deep breath and try to remain calm. “We wanted to protect the unknown victim’s family. We were pretty sure she was a student and Dr. Klein would know who she was.”

“Okay.” Detective Morgan raises her eyebrows and writes this down. She doesn’t look like she believes me. “So.” She looks up at me again. “When I arrived at the scene, you were holding a soaking-wet garment and had scratches all up and down your arms.”

My throat begins to go dry. I do not like where this is headed. “I dropped the costume into the lake, like I said. We had planned to go swimming. And I ran through the thornbushes to help Brie out of the water.”

“Why not run around them?”

“Because my friend was screaming and I needed to get to her.”

“How many seconds did you save by running through the bushes?”

“I don’t know off the top of my head.”

“Guess.”

My eyes flick over to Dr. Klein. She nods encouragingly, but her hands are knotted together. “Maybe twenty?”

Detective Morgan notes this down. “You were with your friends all night?”

“Yes. At the dance.”

“Were you ever alone?”

I hesitate for a second. Brie said we should tell the police that we weren’t. But I don’t know if she ever confirmed this with the others. I end up splitting the difference. “Not significantly.”

“What’s significant?”

“Not long enough to murder someone.” The more I talk, the more I realize I’m digging myself into a six-foot-deep hole.