Hunter lifted both shoulders in a slacker gesture. I stood, taking an angry step away from him. ‘REALLY?’ I demanded. ‘You just used her, didn’t you? Just used Stefanie, put yourself first and now that she’s gone, you don’t even care?’ I really needed to be let out of this cell, before I really did commit murder. ‘Callie was right,’ I muttered, mostly to myself. ‘You’re all stupid.’
Hunter gasped as if his feelings were hurt. Whatever. I stalked to the bars and shook them, hard, which made me feel like a bad ass. ‘TY!’ I yelled. ‘Get me out of here!’
Casey called a friend who called a friend and, two hours later, I had a spitfire of an attorney drive in from Winston-Salem. Her business card read, ‘Bibby Hepworth, the best criminal law attorney in North Carolina,’ and I have to say, she called all the influential people in the county and soon, I was being released as a favour to someone’s momma. Delta Beta sisterhood at its finest.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
While I was out of jail, my lawyer advised that I prepare for a court hearing to be called soon. The news was not welcome. I didn’t have anything left in my suitcase to wear to court. Then I remembered Aubrey’s offer to lend me clothes. I’d feel a whole lot better facing some judge in an outfit that hadn’t been worn three times already.
Aubrey’s room was on the third floor, which was odd for the Chapter President. When I lived in the house, the Chapter President always lived on the second floor, just because it was livelier, closer to the action.
But maybe Aubrey liked to study in her room. I mean, these things could happen. On her door was a white board, which was quaint in college in this day and age of texts and chats and instas, but this white board was decorated with hearts and smiley faces and an inside joke or two, so I guessed some things never changed.
I knocked twice and then again. There was no answer. When I opened the door, I could quickly see that Aubrey had a single room, which, again, was probably appropriate for the President. She could have more privacy for meetings and stuff this way. A twin bed was draped with a pink and white striped comforter, Lilly Pulitzer-style sheets and about fifteen pillows in eyelet and satin. Very girly and cute.
There were the normal sorority house furnishings, a desk and a chair, and Aubrey had brought in her own massive beanbag, which was fuzzy and black. It didn’t seem to go with the eyelet and Lilly, but maybe it didn’t show coffee stains, which would be my concern as well, latte addict that I was.
Contrary to public opinion, sorority girls did not have massive, automated closets with a row of designer bags showcased along the top shelves. No, in the Delta Beta house, we had tiny coffins of closets, stuffed to the brim with designer bags showcased along the top shelf.
Aubrey had pushed her house-issue dresser into the closet, which was a smart way to organise a tiny space, I had to say. I started sorting through the hanging dresses, analysing each one for size, fit and fashion. As expected, she had lots of cute things, from J.Crew to Anthropologie to some boutique labels even I hadn’t heard of. One dress was perfect, but it had spaghetti straps, which would not be appropriate for legal proceedings in October. Maybe she had a coordinating cardigan? I remember she had worn one to Stefanie’s S&M hearing. I pulled open the top drawer of the dresser, intending to just do a cursory search for cardigans. The top drawer was, as I should have realised, Aubrey’s womanly underthings. I was about to shut it when I saw a peek of black under the stack of Victoria’s Secret Juicy boy shorts.
Tentatively, I pulled the black cover of an address book out. It looked exactly like the one I had found in Liza’s drawer. And the one that was missing. My fingers shook as I opened it and saw that it was, in fact, the exact one that had gone missing from my apartment bedroom.
My heart rate zoomed and, by impulse, I closed the closet door while I tried to work this out. Ainsley was the one working for Liza. And Ainsley was the one who was now acting crazy trying to get Amanda and me to ‘shut down’ the phone sex number. So why would Aubrey steal the book full of phone numbers? Unless Ainsley stole it and hid it here. Or maybe Aubrey stole it, to protect her sister.
I shut my eyes. Of course. Aubrey was do anything to protect her sister, even if her sister was a skanky good-for-nothing Moo. It’s what I would do, in her shoes, if I was cursed to have a twin sister that pledged Tri Mu.
The door to Aubrey’s room opened and I bit back a gasp and shoved the book into the back pocket of my jeans. I understood why Aubrey wanted to protect her sister, but I needed to safeguard an entire sorority’s reputation. I couldn’t just let this out there, not with the Tri Mus breathing down our necks.
My hand went to the doorknob and paused as I heard Aubrey answer her phone.
‘Yes?’ She asked.
There was a pause.
‘This is she.’
‘No, I told you …’ She stopped, interrupted by the someone on the other line. ‘No,’ she said again. ‘I won’t. That was the last time, I can’t do this anymore. My sister … she was hurt because of me.’ Another pause. ‘I understand. But I can’t help you. I quit.’
The room got silent before it was filled with the sounds of Aubrey crying softly. Well, crap. I had two options, stay in a cramped closet and pray that Aubrey suddenly didn’t decide to change her clothes. Or two, come out of the closet and pretend that nothing had happened.
I flung open the closet door with a handful of dresses on hangers in front of me. ‘Hey Aubs! Just borrowing your dresses like you said I could! Thanks!’ With a cheerful wave, I sauntered towards the door and might have gotten out safely if I hadn’t heard a sniffle from the girl behind me, curled up in a massive black beanbag. My head hung low. Who was I, trying to avoid a crying girl? Crying girls were my specialty, intended or not.
I turned and faced Aubrey, looking absolutely overwhelmed. ‘Okay,’ I said, tossing the dresses on her bed. ‘What’s up?’
She shook her head firmly, her lips pressed together, not wanting to talk. But everyone talked to me. I was the Chapter Advisor.
I ripped the address book out of my pant pocket. ‘Is it about this?’
To say Aubrey was stunned was putting it mildly. ‘I’m so sorry,’ She finally gurgled. ‘I know I’ve let everyone down.’
That was it. Aubrey St. John was as much of a saint as her last name implied. ‘Stop, Aubrey. You’re being too hard on yourself. It’s your sister who needs to apologise to you.’
Aubrey’s red, wet face froze in confusion. ‘What? No. She was only trying to save me.’
‘I guess that’s one way of looking at it. You know she went to Tri Mu HQ, right? Spilled the beans about the whole operation.’
And that got Aubrey wailing again. For as much crying as I’ve been dealing with the past week, I really wasn’t getting better at handling it. I seemed to be getting worse.
‘She’s in that hospital because of me! And our sorority is ruined because of me!’
‘Take a deep breath,’ I told Aubrey. ‘It’s not you. You’re not the one who was having phone sex for money. Your sister made her own choices. You tried to save her, to protect her, but ultimately it’s going to be her fault.’ And Liza’s. But it felt much better putting the blame on a Tri Mu.
Aubrey hiccupped and looked at me with wide eyes. ‘NO!’ She shook her head and reached for my hand, nearly sending me headlong into the belly of the beanbag. ‘That’s not it! It was me! I’m the one who had phone sex for money. Ainsley was trying to protect me!’
At that moment, I was pretty sure I was in an alternate dimension. My brain was fogged up, my ears were clogged. I couldn’t have just heard what I thought I heard … could I?
But then, everything clicked, fog and clogginess aside. Ainsley hadn’t been crazy. She was the protective one, ready to do anything, say anything to get her sister out of the phone sex ring. And when I’d called that number and heard Ainsley’s voice … ‘She picked up your phone, didn’t she? That’s how she found out.’
Aubrey nodded glumly. ‘I lef
t it in her car accidentally over summer break, right before rush. It rang and she answered and it was …’
‘Who?’ I asked breathlessly.
‘Pistol Pete.’ Aubrey looked away. ‘That’s what he called himself. He was a regular.’
I couldn’t help my lip turning up. Pistol Pete? Really? Gross.
‘I tried telling her it was a guy I was dating. I thought she bought it, but then … my phone was missing another day and she found me at the Commons. She went nuts on me, saying she knew what I was doing and I had to stop.’
‘Why didn’t you?’ I asked gently.
‘At first, Liza just asked me to help with a sociology experiment. She needed girls she could trust. I was honoured that she’d chosen me. But then the paycheques came in and I …’ She paused as the memory put a woeful expression on her face. ‘There was a pair of Jimmy Choos that matched my semi-formal dress perfectly …’
Ah. I patted her hand. It all came back to shoes. I understood now.
‘The money was nice … really nice. But I also felt … used. I saw what my sister was saying, that I needed to quit. It was just hard. And when Liza died, I thought that was it. That was my out. But …’
‘The calls kept coming,’ I finished for her.
She waved her phone. That must have been a call from a john that I just heard.
‘Why did you steal this?’ I asked, holding up the address book.
‘I had seen Liza with it a few times, she had told me that’s where she kept records, for her research. I thought I could find Heather’s number.’
‘Heather?’ I remembered the call Casey had made to the hotline. The girl who had answered was Heather.
‘A lot of us used fake names, but Heather was Liza’s partner. I thought if I could get her direct line, I could call and ask her to take me off the list. Because I really, really do want out, Margot.’ Her bottom lip started trembling again. ‘Believe me, I do.’
I did believe her. About as much as I believed anyone these days, that is.
‘Do you know anything else about Heather?’ I asked, wondering if maybe Heather was the key to everything.
‘I just know what Liza told me a few times after she got off the phone with her.’
‘What is that?’
‘That Heather is a stone cold bitch.’
A stone cold bitch sounded like a person who would commit murder. But so did a desperate sorority Chapter President. Or a rival chapter’s President. Of course, I didn’t say any of this to Aubrey. On account of her being a potential murderer.
‘I think Stefanie met her, though,’ Aubrey said carefully.
‘Stefanie Grossman?’ I asked, because as I recalled there were about five Stephanie-variations in the chapter.
The name made Aubrey’s chin wobble and I remembered Aubrey’s antics at Stefanie’s S&M hearing.
‘You guys were close, weren’t you?’
Aubrey used the back of her hand to dab at her mascara-rimmed eyes. ‘We were pledge sisters. Stefanie was like the extra triplet.’‘So Ainsley knew her too?’
‘For a few years, we all lived together in the dorm. But then Ainsley got all Tri Mu on us. I ran for chapter office and Stefanie moved in with Liza.’
Whoa. The elusive Stefanie and Liza were roommates? How had I not heard this? Aubrey must have seen the shock on my face. ‘They kept it quiet. Liza was already skirting the rules by keeping her own apartment and if people knew she lived with a collegiate member, they’d all think she was playing favourites.’
‘But she wasn’t,’ I said slowly. ‘Because Liza wrote Stefanie up for her S&M violations at the football stadium.’
Aubrey looked pained at the memory. ‘What happened to Liza and Stefanie’s friendship, Aubrey?’
She shrugged in slow motion, as if the simple act was difficult due to the weight of the world resting on her. ‘Same thing as me. Stefanie wanted out.’
The fact that Stefanie was also one of Liza’s phone sex operators should have come as a bigger shock. It said a lot about what I had gone through this week that it wasn’t. Still, I wanted to be clear on all this.
‘So Liza wrote her up?’ I asked.
‘Worse. Liza set her up.’
Now we were heading back down Paranoia Lane and about to turn right down Crazytown Boulevard. ‘I saw the papers. There were witnesses.’ The Panhellenic Advisor had been one of them.
‘I know,’ Aubrey sighed. ‘But the last conversation I had with Stefanie, she swore up and down that she had not gone down on Hunter in the bathroom.’
Whoa squared. ‘You knew it was Hunter?’
Aubrey gave me a ‘duh’ look. I guessed that kind of gossip was hard to keep quiet in a sorority house.
But this still didn’t make sense. I was missing something huge or else I was never going to narrow down exactly who killed Liza. And Stefanie. Because right now there were approximately five suspects. And one of them was me.
‘I need to get into Liza and Stefanie’s apartment.’
Aubrey’s eyes widened.
‘And you’re going to let me in.’
*
If Liza had trusted Aubrey with a key to the Chapter Advisor’s office, I was fairly sure she was close enough to Liza and Stefanie to figure out a way to break into their apartment. Turns out, we didn’t need to break in. During that last chapter meeting, Liza had stored her purse in Aubrey’s room. With her keys in it.
Casey was the perfect lookout, I figured. He was distractingly handsome, he could lie his pants off and the odds of anyone recognising him in Sutton were low. The problem was, he sucked at lookout fashion. He picked me up at the sorority house wearing tomato red chinos and a blue, red and yellow checked shirt with a yellow paisley handkerchief neatly folded into a pocket. He looked like a Kennedy cousin crossed with Will.I.Am.
Liza and Stefanie’s apartment was in a complex with exterior doors and theirs was a second floor unit overlooking a green area that smelled like dog poop. Casey stood at the bottom of the stairs to delay anyone who would come in and surprise me. I felt bad. It was really stinky down there.
I held my breath while the key slid easily in and opened the door. The apartment was in terrible shape. It was hard to tell whether it had been searched by someone nefarious or whether the police had gone through it. The front door opened directly into the living room. There was a galley kitchen immediately behind the living room, with a small eating nook that had been turned into an office of some sort. Two doors led off the living room, one to my right and one to my left.
I perused the living room first, wondering whether I’d even recognise evidence if I saw it. After all, I hadn’t recognised that the ten digit numbers were phone numbers when I’d first seen those. There were a few boxes of photographs under the TV stand that I flipped open. Some Cosmopolitan magazines were piled on the Ikea coffee table. Those probably came in handy as phone sex operator, with all those ‘Sixty-Seven Secrets to Please a Man’ articles. The fact that Liza and Stefanie read them were a ringing endorsement, I was sure. Moving on to the office, there was a laptop dock, but no laptop. Briefly flipping through the papers, I saw a bunch of printouts on Latin American history and a women’s studies class syllabus. Those were probably Stefanie’s. One thing I didn’t see were any bills. Interesting. I checked under the desk and didn’t see a shredder or a trashcan.
In the kitchen, I flipped through the cabinets praying that something would jump out at me. Except a murderer. I didn’t want a murderer to jump out at me.
With no more tell-tale spreadsheets or bank statements with the name ‘Heather’ on top, I chose the bedroom on the left first. From the pictures next to the unmade double bed, this had to be Stefanie’s room. I teared up at the picture of a young girl with her Grandma at her Bat Mitzvah. She shouldn’t have ended up dead on the lawn of the Delta Beta house.
I spent too long looking at Stefanie’s pictures. She had wild brown curls that she liked to toss right before a photo was taken. They always
seemed to be in motion. And now they’d never move again. The thought spurred me on. It didn’t matter what questionable choices Stefanie had made. She deserved justice.
I filtered through a bookcase, opening books, fanning through any pages that looked bulky. The drawers of her dresser were stuffed full of Delta Beta tees and there was another tight squeeze on my cardiac muscles at the reminder of who this girl was.
The apartment and the bedroom didn’t seem like people had been here recently, much less been hiding out. Where had Stefanie Grossman been since the last conversation with Aubrey? Aubrey had assumed she’d been here, but I thought there’d be a lot more evidence of dirty dishes, or piled up laundry. Not that the place was super clean, but it didn’t seem like the place Stefanie had been holed up. Even the bathtub was super dry. I don’t know about you, but if I shower every day, there’s definitely residue. Is that TMI?
Leaving Stefanie’s bedroom, I crossed the living room to Liza’s room, checking my watch as I did. I’d been here for fifteen minutes and hadn’t heard from Casey. I hoped he was still breathing through his mouth.
I checked the same things in Liza’s room that I had in Stefanie’s: the books, the magazines, the drawers. There was nothing suspicious or noteworthy. The bathroom was similarly dry. On impulse, I picked up the Delta Beta Busy Bee on Liza’s bed and gave it an absent minded squeeze, even as my eyes traced figure eights around the room, trying to see something – anything – that would help me figure all the mysteries out.
That’s when my fingers felt something up the bee’s butt that shouldn’t have been there. I turned over the stuffed animal and there was a seam loosely basted together. With the pull of a string, Busy Bee’s butt emptied and two zip drives fell into my hand. Now I don’t know about most people, but Delta Betas don’t violate stuffed animals for no good reason.
The zip drives stuffed in my pocket, I locked the front door and joined Casey at the bottom of the steps. He had his yellow paisley handkerchief tied around the bottom half of his face like a flamboyant bank robber.
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