Reputation

by Sara Shepard

  A clock ticks on the wall. When will the young cop at the front desk come looking for me? When will they send out an APB that the woman who’d received special permission to use a breast pump in privacy has gone missing?

  I scan the room. Ollie’s police cap sits atop a small filing tray. There’s an assortment of pens splayed near the keyboard. Three mostly empty coffee cups perch near the window. I lunge for a red ceramic mug with the Starbucks logo emblazoned on the side and drop it into my tote. It has DNA on it for sure. I could find a lab to analyze it, and then get my hands on the forensics report of the crime scene. Ollie couldn’t have cleaned up everything as well as he cleaned the murder weapon. Something has to turn up.

  I back up, itching to leave, when a gaping file folder near Ollie’s second monitor catches my eye. There’s a name written on the top tab. My name. Willa Manning.

  I do a double take. What is this? I move toward it. With one trembling pointer finger, I open it up. And . . .

  “Excuse me?”

  Ollie’s bulky shape fills the doorway. I jerk away from his desk, hiding my hands behind my back. A strange, high-pitched, borderline hysterical laugh comes from somewhere deep inside me. “Um, hi. I . . . I was just leaving.”

  “Willa Manning.” Ollie looks surprised. “This is interesting.”

  His tone stops my heart. He knows why I’m here, obviously. And suddenly, this floor seems dangerously desolate. I strain to hear sound elsewhere in the station, but the air is airlessly, porously still.

  I try to push around Ollie, but he shoots out his elbows, blocking the door. “How’d you get up here?”

  He’s at least a head taller than I am—so tall, in fact, I can see up his nostrils. His chest is solid and leaden, and brute strength seems to crackle from within. But I can’t be afraid of him. Not now.

  I meet his gaze. “I was looking for something.”

  He nods. “And did you find it?”

  “Maybe.” As soon as I test that DNA on the coffee cup, you’re dead.

  “So how much did you read? Is my research correct?”

  I frown. Research? What does he mean? I notice Ollie’s gaze drifting over to the pile of folders on his desk. On the very top, probably now marred with my fingerprints, is the file with my name on it.

  I blink, trying to understand. Research. Research . . . about me? And then it hits me. Oh my God. Oh my God.

  I’m so stunned, I can’t quite believe it at first. I step backward. My vision tunnels. There’s absolutely no way Ollie could have a file on me about that.

  Ollie’s knuckles make a loud crack on the doorjamb. He knows, and he knows that I know. And then he says, “Did you know I grew up here, Willa? Well, not in Blue Hill proper—I’m not from that side of the tracks—but on the outskirts. But I hung out with Blue Hill kids my whole life, partied with guys at Aldrich. I went to a lot of frat parties, in fact.”

  It feels as though the blood has drained from my body. I wheel around, needing to escape from what I’m afraid he’s going to say next. I look for a window.

  “Now hold on a second,” he says, lightly touching my wrist. “Let me finish. First off, if you think I’m that guy, you’re wrong. I wouldn’t do that to a woman. But I was at that same party. I only found out about what they did afterward—it’s not like they did it to the girls out in the open.”

  It feels like I’ve swallowed razor blades. This can’t be happening. Please tell me this isn’t happening. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I try to say, though the words sound garbled, nonsensical.

  Ollie ignores me. “But the morning after, I saw this guy smooth-talking a couple of skittish girls as they left. Him being like, It’s all good, nothing bad happened. One of them was you.”

  I quiver. My mouth opens and closes soundlessly, like a fish.

  “And then I asked the dude what it was all about. He laughed, told me everything, though he couched it as ‘they were asking for it, they loved it, it was a good time.’” He shakes his head, disgusted. “I guess he wasn’t afraid I’d say anything—his dad was, like, the CEO of some billion-dollar company, and my dad was working part-time security.”

  The humiliation rakes through me like a trail of slime. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I insist again. “You have me confused with someone else.”

  But Ollie snorts like I’ve told a joke. “Nah, I remember you from that party. Those dudes were such idiots—didn’t even realize you were the new president’s daughter. But I did.”

  “I don’t . . .” I whisper, closing my eyes. But I can’t deny it anymore. Not when it’s so clear he knows. It is horrifying, but he knows. The memories pound me, wet and hot, not just flickers anymore but with true, hard edges.

  God, it was long ago. I certainly wasn’t the type of girl who went to frat parties—because, Jesus, frat parties were for idiots. But this girl I knew from the punk club, Andrea, said it might be “ironically fun.” And so I’d thought, What the hell?

  Ironically fun. I dressed up like a girl going to a frat party, buying a tight red dress from Goodwill, applying sparkly eye shadow goopily all over my lids, sliding on platform heels, and practicing my dumb-girl laugh. This would be a performance piece, I figured. I’d be an undercover reporter. When I crossed the threshold into the house, I must have passed the skank test, because the frat guys—brothers? I didn’t fucking know—looked at me approvingly. Someone handed me a beer, and I chugged it.

  For a while, it was fun. I drank beers. Guys came up to me and said they liked my dress, my shoes, my tits, my ass—totally unapologetically, like they thought they were being chivalrous and loving. It was all so despicable, but strangely intriguing—I felt like I’d gone undercover into a strange new land.

  But then the room tilted. I was drunk so suddenly, in a sickening whoosh. I laughed loudly, found myself taking part in one conversation and then abruptly I was elsewhere, talking to someone else. Eventually I found myself with someone cute. He was tall with a face like a heartthrob on a reality dating show. Not my kind of guy, but then, I wasn’t really in my right mind.

  I rose to my tiptoes, scanning the crowd for Andrea, but I couldn’t find her. I should have left then, but the guy I was talking to placed a hand on my arm like he owned me. No. You can’t leave yet. I almost slapped him—I certainly wanted to. But my limbs felt unsteady, and my aim was off. I felt weak. Scared, even. I’d never been scared of anything in my life.

  What happened next was a toxic, confused blur: that same guy taking me by the hand, kissing me. I kissed him back at first, but then I had enough. Except the guy didn’t take no for an answer. We were in a dark hallway. The music was far away, a distant bass line. He backed me into a dark room even though I kept slurring that I wanted to go home.

  My butt on the mattress. My shoes falling off with a thunk. I tried to fight because I’m a fucking fighter and this did not happen to people like me—liberated women, strong women, women who didn’t take any shit.

  And then. The feeling of being split open. Wanting to scream, maybe actually screaming, but the sound being swallowed up by laughter and music and indifference.

  Later, I woke up in a twin bed with dark sheets in a room I’d never seen before. I was wearing the short, trampy red dress from the thrift store, though the skirt had been hiked over my naked butt. It was like someone had used me up and then tossed me away.

  As soon as I sat up, pain rippled through my body. A half memory rushed back, and I gasped. I heard snippets of loud music from the night before. I tasted the beer on the roof of my mouth. And then pain rocketed through me. I clutched my throat, remembering someone pressing his weight on me. Remembering screaming, fighting. The rest of the evening rolled back in vomitus, disjointed pieces. Except it couldn’t have happened to me. There was no way.

  The hallway of the frat house was eerily silent. The living room was
trashed with empty cups and bottles, cigarette butts, and an inflatable dildo sticking out of a lampshade. People were snoring on couches and chairs and even the sticky, grimy floor—was Ollie one of them? He must have been.

  I wanted to throw up again at the sight of them. Had they all known what had happened to me? Did they just not give a shit?

  A kid on the couch opened one eye. “Hey.” Then he sat up straighter. “Oh. Hey.”

  He had broad shoulders and squinty eyes. The day before, I might have found him somewhat hot . . . but now, he repulsed me. I didn’t think this was the guy who had hurt me the night before, but what if he’d watched? Because suddenly, I had the distinct feeling that other people were in the room as witnesses. Cheering. Laughing.

  “Sleep okay?” The guy walked around the couch toward me. He was at least six three. His biceps were gigantic. There was something predatory about his smile. “Want some coffee? Hair of the dog?”

  Get away from me, I wanted to scream. But I felt dizzy, like I might pass out. Fight or flight—I’d learned about it in health class. Please don’t faint, I willed.

  The guy must have sensed my fear because he stopped. “Hey now. You’re okay, aren’t you?” When I didn’t answer, he frowned. “There’s cool-girl code about what goes on here, you know.” His smile morphed. “You’re a cool girl, right? You certainly seem cool.”

  “Y-Yes.” By this time, I’d backed up to the door. There was a menacing smirk on the guy’s face, like he found all of this entertaining.

  Stop thinking about it, I scream at my brain now, but it’s like Ollie hit a switch. Here are all the thoughts that have been crowding my mind for years, suddenly running free.

  “I didn’t think much about you until recently, though,” Ollie tells me, dragging me back to the present. “After the hack broke, when President Manning gave all those speeches. I remembered what those guys did to President Manning’s daughter. And then I realized nothing had ever come of that. It seemed even more poignant after those rape stories surfaced.”

  I shut my eyes.

  “And then I saw you at Manning’s funeral—and I was like, Holy shit. I remember her. You’ve barely aged—good for you. And you seemed uncomfortable being back here, almost like you were so afraid it was going to happen to you again. Am I right?”

  My lips part, but it’s like my voice box has been slashed. I need out of here.

  “Why didn’t you go to your father about it? Bigwig at the school, you’d think he would have been able to help.”

  Rage fills me. “Why didn’t you say anything? You were there, too. If you thought it was so disgusting, you should have turned them in.”

  “I wish I could have, but I didn’t see it happen. Besides, those guys would have lawyered up and made me look like a fool. I wouldn’t have had a leg to stand on.” He leans in. “Is that what your father said to you, too? That the frat has a lot of political pull within the school, and you shouldn’t cross them? Lotta big donors within those ranks. Lotta old-boy money.”

  “No.” I wrench my head away. “It wasn’t like that.”

  I’d thought about saying something to my father, afterward. I wanted to. In an ideal world, my mother would still be alive, and I could have gone to her first . . . but unfortunately, I didn’t have that luxury. It wasn’t that I was afraid of confronting my father . . . but no matter how eloquent my monologue, I couldn’t blurt it out. It gave my dad such pride when I brought home stellar grades, high SAT scores—and despite my cynicism about a lot of things, that still mattered to me. I didn’t want to cause him complications or strife; I dreaded to think how this might affect his brand-new position if we prosecuted. For all I knew, the guy who raped me had parents whose donations to the school had built the new science building last year. I wasn’t stupid. I knew political connections were everything at Aldrich. I also knew how much my father relished his job, how hard he’d fought to become president. It was his saving grace now that my mother was gone. To threaten his position seemed cruel.

  But even more than that, I didn’t want to be the girl in the news. I’d read enough about girls who cry rape—the shame people put on them, how people seem to circle the wagons around the guys, saving them. My face and body, every choice I made, every guy I’d hooked up with in the past, every beer I’d drunk and dumb thing I’d done—people would dig up all of it. I’d be under a microscope, each damning fact compounding toward a verdict that this was my fault, not the guy’s. I’d led him on, I’d wanted it, I shouldn’t have gone to the party in the first place. I didn’t want to go to trial. I didn’t want this bullshit to follow me around. I didn’t want to be marked as the girl who was stupid enough to be raped in the first place.

  And so I said nothing. I didn’t tell anyone. I drew further and further into myself, blaming myself, even hating myself. It was only last year, when I was reporting on a story of a young woman who’d been raped at another prestigious university, that I got involved in the online forum. I’d been astonished when women also having attended Aldrich parties came forward, too. Some of them were closer to my age, and some of them were younger, but it was always the same frat—Chi Omega. Some of them had tried to complain, but it had gone nowhere. That was what scared me the most. That even if I’d tried, I would have been silenced.

  “I don’t blame you for wanting vengeance,” Ollie says, and he sounds almost empathetic, like he’s on my side. “You snapped, didn’t you? That’s why you did what you did.”

  I wrench away and make a break for the door, but Ollie quickly runs for it, once again blocking the exit. His body is rank with Axe spray. “You’re not just back in town to fight for your sister’s innocence, are you? You want to witness the downfall of Aldrich firsthand. The school that ruined you—you want it to go down.”

  I stare at him, not sure what he’s talking about. Ollie smiles. “Please. You initiated the hack, and you know it. Your boy? Blue Parker? We traced it to him. The whole shebang.”

  I blink hard. The words don’t even make sense at first. “Wait. Wait.” My thoughts are whirling. Blue? My Blue? But that makes no sense. Except then it hits me. There’s a file about me on the desk. There’s evidence in those pages. A trail I didn’t even realize I’d created.

  “He said someone encouraged him to look into Aldrich,” Ollie went on. “It’ll lessen his sentence if he tells us who kicked this all off. I did some digging about what the guy was all about, where he’s from. And guess what I found. California. Not far from you, as a matter of fact. Even more interesting? Your number is in his cell phone.”

  “I-I don’t know anyone named Blue,” I stammer.

  “Sure you do! I got records from your editor. Richard, is it? You wrote a piece on hacks last year, but he killed the article before it published. That’s the saying, isn’t it?”

  My jaw falls open. Ollie spoke to Richard?

  “You got to know some hackers. Got to know how evasive they could be, how they could infiltrate a system without a footprint. And you still had this old wound, an old crime gone unsolved—hell, you wanted to punish people, right? I would.” He crosses his arms over his chest. “Well, you certainly punished a lot of people. Four whole universities’ worth! Guess you figured you might as well expose everyone’s sins, huh?”

  “No.” My heart beats so fast, I’m afraid it’s going to explode. “I didn’t . . .”

  I don’t know how much to say. I do know Blue. We met for coffee a few times in LA. And, during those meetings, I’d idly mentioned the corruption within the frats at Aldrich, how I was afraid it was some sort of Chi Omega tradition.

  And then Blue had leaned back in the booth, a supercilious smile on his face. He told me he could find out if that was really true, if I wanted. No strings attached. He had the skills. “Those Ivies and their hoity-toity frats, they deserve what’s coming to them,” he said, bemused.

  Jesus.

&nb
sp; Except that’s where it ends with me. I wanted the e-mails for myself, not for the world. I just wanted to know what I was dealing with. I thought I could go to my father on my own, try to handle matters from within. And I certainly, certainly didn’t have issues with other universities. That’s just . . . insane.

  But maybe Blue did. And Blue had taken matters into his own hands.

  “Do you realize what you’re responsible for?” Ollie says in an eerily calm voice. “How many failed marriages? How many lost jobs? How many kids who’ll never get a college education now because of one stupid mistake in their e-mail that now everybody knows?”

  “No,” I stammer. “I didn’t . . . you don’t . . .”

  Ollie looks at me pityingly. “It’s not like I don’t understand what you must have gone through. When someone you love betrays you . . . it’s crushing. Your bottom drops out.”

  My throat catches. Is he comparing my situation to his with Laura?

  “And so you acted on it,” Ollie adds.

  There’s disgust in his voice. But guilt, too? I imagine Ollie bursting into Greg’s kitchen and slashing him through the kidney. It’s simple, maniacal, coldhearted killing. Who’s to say he won’t do something like that again? Do it right now?

  My body quakes. But slowly, I plunge my hand into my purse. My fingers curl around a cold, ceramic handle. I pull the coffee cup from my bag, whack Ollie across the face with a solid, ringing thud, and run.

  43

  WILLA

  SATURDAY, MAY 6, 2017

  I skid down the hall. Glimmers of dull, fading light from a window spill across the floor. The stairwell is ahead, and I pick up my pace. If I can just get to the first floor, I’ll be safe. Safe from Ollie, at least.

  I hear footsteps and Ollie’s heavy breathing. All at once, he’s on top of me, tackling me to the floor. My cheek slams against cold linoleum. I’m able to get out a muffled scream before Ollie claps his hand over my mouth. “You can’t resist arrest. I’m going to read you your rights.”