Baumgartner Generations: Henry (23 page)

“I told him
I came here to see you,” Libby told him. Henry really didn’t like that sexy
tone to her voice. It was downright seductive.

“Huh.” Dean’s
tennis shoes crossed the floor between the beds and Henry shrank back without
thinking. “How come?”

“Come over
here.” Libby was practically purring. Henry closed his eyes and reminded
himself why she was doing this in the first place. “Closer.”

“What is
this?” Dean sounded cautious, bemused…but interested. Definitely interested.

“I wanted to
ask you something,” Libby murmured. Henry could barely hear her, but Dean
obviously could. He was standing facing his own bed—the bed Libby was on.

Was she just
going to come right out and ask him? Henry hit the
record
button on the
little micro recorder.

“Whoa, hey!”
Dean exclaimed and Henry saw him take a step back from his bed. “What—?”

Henry was
dying to know what, too. He couldn’t hear anything at all except his own
breathing but he had a feeling he knew what was going on. Libby hadn’t said
anything about how she was going to get Dean to tell her what she needed to
know, but now he had an idea. A very bad idea.

“Libby,”
Dean gasped. “Are you drunk?”

“So what if
I am?” She actually slurred her words a little bit. TV news anchor? No—actress,
Henry decided. Her talents were being wasted on paper, that much was clear.

He heard
Dean groan. What the hell was going on out there? Henry set his jaw, watching
the wheels turn on the cassette, willing himself not to move. It took all his
effort.

“Oh,
god…Libby…” Dean sighed and Libby made a sound, a very familiar sound, one
Henry had heard not too long ago when they were in bed together. She was
moaning.

Then he
heard her say in a low, throaty voice, “Take off your pants. I want to find out
if you’re as good as your big brother.”

“Ha.” Dean
was smiling. Henry could actually hear his roommate grinning. “I love a
competition.”

Of course he
did. Libby knew damned well he did.

Henry saw
Dean’s pants fall to the floor.

“Oh yeah,
that’s good.” Dean’s shoes were still on the floor, but his feet weren’t in
them anymore. “Come on, take your shirt off.”

No way.
Henry closed his eyes. This wasn’t happening. She wouldn’t dare…

“Stay
there.” Libby got off the bed, walking over to Dean’s dresser. Henry saw her
cute pink stockinged feet. “Don’t move. You promise?”

“Sure,
baby,” Dean agreed. Was he so arrogant? Did he really believe Libby had shunned
Henry and chosen him instead—that she had come here just to fuck him, with
nothing else on her mind? But he seemed to have bought it, hook line and
sinker. Dean fully expected he was going to get laid.

“Let’s play
a game.” Libby’s voice was teasing.

“A
blindfold! Kinky!” Dean chuckled. “But I want to see those gorgeous tits.”

Henry
gritted his teeth. He heard a strange clinking and then a loud CLICK.

“What the—?”

Another loud
CLICK.

Libby asked,
“Are you ready to play?”

“Handcuffs? Naughty!”
There was clear anticipation in Dean’s voice, but Henry understood now.

Libby moved
to sit on the edge of Henry’s bed and although he couldn’t see her, he felt her
energy somehow—she was saying,
This is for us, for you. I want you, not him.
He didn’t know how he could possibly interpret things that way, considering all
she’d done was cross the span between the twin beds and take a seat, but he
knew it was true.

“Hey.” Dean
didn’t sound so happy now. “Where’d you go?”

Libby was
sitting on the edge of the bed, clearly aware of Henry beneath her as she told
Dean, “You’re not going anywhere.”

“I wasn’t
planning on it.” He snorted. “Come over here.”

Libby’s next
words created both silence and confusion for at least thirty seconds. “Marcus’s
guys are on the way.”

There was
real fear in Dean’s voice when he finally found it. “What are you talking about?”

“You wanted
to know who my source was for the hazing article?” Libby was like a cat,
playing with a bird or a mouse. “Marcus and I go way back. And he’s not very
happy with you, is he,
little
man?” She put a disdainful emphasis on the
word
little.

Dean was
scared, but he was trying not to show it. “Quit fucking around. Give me the
key.”

“No.” There
was no teasing tone to her voice anymore. She practically spat the words out. “This
is for Elaine.”

“You fucking
cunt!” Dean roared. “You know who my father is! You’ll be fucking expelled!”

“Big threats
from such a
tiny, little
man.”

Ouch
,
Henry thought, finding himself oddly proud of the way she was standing up to him.
He wished, more than anything, he could confront Dean directly and, well…kick
his ass. That’s what he wanted to do. But this, Libby toying with him,
manipulating him, was almost as good. Almost.

“I still
have that tape,” Dean threatened. “I’ll put it on fucking YouTube, I swear to
god I will!”

“Do what you
want.” Libby sounded bored. “They may just kill you anyway.”

“He’s not
really coming,” Dean said softly, muttering. “I told him he’d get his money
this weekend. You’re just fucking with me.” He almost sounded like he was
trying to convince himself.

“Oh he’s
coming,” she assured him. “Listen to this.”

Henry
clamped a hand over his mouth, stifling his own surprise. Now Henry knew why
Libby had asked for his phone. It wasn’t just so she could turn it on “silent”
and keep it from giving away his position under the bed.

Val’s voice
came out of Henry’s cell—of course, Dean was blindfolded and had no idea that
it belonged to Henry. He just heard the desperate, pleading whisper of Val’s
voice saying, “Dean’s in trouble. Marcus’s boys are coming for him tonight!” before
Libby turned it off again.

Once he’d
heard it, Dean howled like he was in pain. “Let me go!”

“Are you
kidding me?” She scoffed at the idea. “No way. You deserve it after what you
did to Elaine.”

“Fuck that.”
Dean swore, sounding desperate, but also somewhat calmer. “Libby, listen to me.
I’m going to have their money this weekend. Call her back! Tell them to call
the dogs off!”

“And Santa
Clause and the Easter Bunny are your best friends too, right?” Libby actually
laughed.

“Look in my
backpack.” Dean was gritting his teeth. “Front pocket.”

Libby moved
from the bed, finding his backpack by the door.

“Right up
front. See it?” Dean asked.

“What is
this?” Libby padded back toward the bed, sitting on the edge of Henry’s bed again.
“Names?”

“The guys in
my study group.” Dean hesitated and Henry knew this was it. He was going to say
it. He was actually going to tell her. “Notice they’re all football players.”

“So?”

Dean went
on, spilling it, his voice actually gaining strength as he talked. “We’re
playing Eastern Michigan this weekend. EMU hasn’t had a winning season since
1995. Not only are they going to beat the spread against U of M this weekend,
they’re going to win the whole damned thing.”

Jesus
Christ, he actually sounded proud! It made Henry nauseous.

Libby
pressed him further, and Henry knew she wanted it to be as clear as possible on
the tape. “What are you talking about?”

Dean hissed,
“We’re throwing the game! It’s all fixed! And it cost me a lot of damned money,
too.”

Libby was
quiet and then she said, “And you’re betting on the winning team, of course.”

“Hell
yeah—all bets will be on Eastern!”

And there it
was, all the proof they needed. Dean had admitted it to a witness and they had
it on tape.

“Why would
they?” Libby mused. “Why would these guys in your ‘study group’ jeopardize
everything like this?”

“Because
they’re getting paid!” he exclaimed. And then he stopped, as if he’d just
realized something. “You could get paid, too, Libby. I know your parents are
frickin’ dirt poor. Just think what you could do with ten thousand dollars!”

“Ten
thousand?” Libby asked. “Is that what they’re getting?”

“No.” Dean
paused. “Fifty thousand each.”

“How much
are you keeping?”

Another
pause. “Half a million.”

“Holy hell,”
Libby whispered. “Where did all the money come from?”

“Literacy
Tutor Foundation.” Dean laughed. “It’s my dad’s pet charity. I’ve been pimping
for it since the beginning of the year.”

“Stealing
from it, you mean,” she snapped.

“Whatever.”
Dean shifted on the bed. Henry could hear the handcuffs moving on the post. ”After
Saturday, there’s going to be plenty to go around. Tell Marcus I’ll pay him
double!”

Libby
hesitated. “What if I just tell him you’re going to throw the game?”

“Marcus
looks out for himself. He’s a second-stringer with a bad knee. He’s never going
to play pro ball. He’d be lucky to get a tryout as a walk on!” Dean scoffed. “He’s
not stupid. If he finds out, I’m sure he’ll just use it to his advantage, like
I am.”

“Yeah, but
there’s a difference,” she snarled. “You planned this whole thing!”

“So?” Dean’s
voice had the same arrogant tone it always did, and Henry found it infuriating.
His roommate was handcuffed to a bedpost, afraid half a dozen defensive linemen
were on their way to beat him to a pulp, and somehow his worldview had yet to
change. “Look, there’s nothing he or anyone can do about it now. It’s a done
deal. We might as well all profit from it.”

Henry held
his breath under the bed, watching the wheels of the tape turning, sealing
Dean’s fate.

“Come on,
Libby, let me go.” Dean wasn’t pleading anymore. Maybe the fear had receded some,
or maybe he really felt he was getting somewhere with his bribe. Who could turn
down money, after all? “Ten thousand dollars. Think about it.”

“Twenty,”
Libby said quietly.

Under the
bed, Henry’s eyes widened.

“Fine,” Dean
agreed. “Just let me go.”

“Fifty,” she
countered.

Henry
blinked. Was she serious? Was she really contemplating—?

Dean didn’t
answer for a minute, and then he said, “Okay, okay…”

“Quarter
million.” Libby’s voice was flat, emotionless. Ruthless. She had him beat, and
clearly Dean knew it.

After a
brief, defeated silence, he said, “Okay. Whatever you want.”

Henry
watched as Libby stood, walking toward Dean’s bed. She stood there for a while,
long enough to make Henry squirm. He was sure Dean was, too.

“You didn’t
even acknowledge what you did to Elaine.” Her voice was so low he almost
couldn’t hear her at all. “You don’t even care.”

“Oh come
on!” Dean exclaimed, sounding really angry now, and even a
little…self-righteous. “We both know she was drunk and she fucking wanted it.
She was more than ready to top Henry off—why not me?”

Dean suddenly
howled in pain.

Henry
winced, his breath caught. What in the hell had she done to him?

“You couldn’t
pay me enough to let you go, you motherfucker,” she growled and Dean screamed
in pain again. “I hope they do kill you!”

Then Libby
was bending low, peeking under the bed, urging Henry from underneath. He slid
out as quietly as he could, taking the tape recorder with him. Dean was writhing
in pain on the bed in his boxers, still blindfolded, hands over his head, the
handcuffs looped between one of the wooden posts.

“Libby!”
Dean yelled as she headed toward the door, gathering shoes and coats and pulling
Henry in that direction too. “Don’t you leave me like this! Don’t you fucking
dare!”

They closed
and locked the door. It might afford Dean a little protection, if Marcus’s boys
did show up—and at the very least, it would keep anyone from unhandcuffing him
for a while, even if they did hear him yelling for help. Maybe even long enough
for the cops to arrive.

It wasn’t
until they were outside in the snow that Henry asked, “What did you do to him
to make him scream like that?”

She shrugged,
giving him a lopsided grin. “Apparently it’s true what they say about men’s
testicles being sensitive.”

“Ouch.” He
winced. He didn’t even want to think about it. He touched the tip of her nose,
where a snowflake had landed and was melting. “Okay, Erin Brockovich, now what
happens?”

“Now we take
this information to the paper.” She took the tape recorder from his hand,
tucking it into her jacket pocket and she showed him the notebook she’d taken
from Dean’s backpack. It detailed not only the players involved, but beyond
that there was a whole list of bets and an entire record of the ‘charitable
donations’ people had made to the Literacy Tutoring Foundation that Dean had
funneled elsewhere.

“The
university paper?” Henry asked.

She set her mouth
in a grim line. “No, the real one.”

Henry
grabbed her hand as she turned to go, pulling her back into the circle of his
arms and kissing her breathless.

When she
broke the kiss, her eyelids fluttering open, snowflakes caught in her red
lashes, she whispered, “I lied.”

“About
what?” He couldn’t even imagine.

“I don’t
like you.” She pressed her cheek to his chest, his heart thudding there under
her listening ear, and he knew Toni had been right. He’d known all along who his
soulmate was.

“Could have
fooled me.” He kissed the top of her head.

“I don’t
like
you,” she repeated, her words muffled against his jacket, confessing, “I
love
you.”

He didn’t
say anything—couldn’t speak—words had completely failed him. His whole life,
they had failed him. They meant nothing, spoken or written. Like or love? It
didn’t matter how they were spelled. It was the feeling behind them that
mattered.