The Last Good Girl (32 page)

She shook her head. The old men at the university just didn't get it. To the extent that they had held the reins of power for so many years, their power was slipping in this new world. These young women knew how to use images and viral messaging to tell their story. In the end, the best story wins. She wondered what Dylan's was going to be.

Ten minutes after asking for a break, Justin opened the door, and they all sat down again.

Dylan leaned back and laced his hands behind his head, as if he were lounging on the beach he'd almost made it to in Caracas. If he was nervous, he didn't show it. Maybe he was confident his father would get him out. Maybe he was the most arrogant person Anna had ever met. Or maybe some part of him enjoyed this. His lawyer continued as if they hadn't stopped.

“My client and his friend did drive to Detroit that night to visit a house of ill repute.”

“A brothel?”

“More of an independent contractor. From Craigslist. A business transaction took place.”

“Do you have any paperwork to confirm that?”

“I'm just making a proffer. Confirm whatever you like.”

“After the prostitute?”

“He went to Windsor to patronize Caesar's casino. He lost eight hundred dollars there.”

“On his credit card?”

“Cash.”

Worthless. “Tell me about the bones and
The
Book of Earthly Pleasures
.”

“The lawyer from Beta Psi will answer any questions you have about that.”

“Dylan”—Anna met Dylan's eyes—“a young woman is out there. Let's end her family's uncertainty. Let's let them hug her or put their little girl to rest. You're the only one who can give them that.”

Dylan stared at her for a moment. Then he turned and spit on the floor. He wiped his mouth and said, “Fuck you.”

Anna stood, opened the door, and signaled to the U.S. marshal outside. He was a huge man, over six feet tall and half as wide, with muscles that stretched his blue U.S. marshals T-shirt. A scar ran across his eye, shutting it halfway. In another life, he would have been a pirate.

“The interview is over,” Anna said. “You can take the prisoner back to the holding cell.” She gestured to the spit. “And you might want to get some sanitizer for the floor.”

The deputy looked at the slimy wad of phlegm on the linoleum. “Who did that?” he growled.

The look on Dylan's face would've been more satisfying if she were any closer to knowing what had happened to Emily.

L
ater that day, Dylan's attorney renewed and amended his motion for Anna to be recused from the case. He added three allegations: first, that she must have given secret grand jury material to her sister; second, that she had prompted her sister to violate Dylan's Fourth Amendment right by entering the fraternity without a warrant; and third, that Anna had left Dylan in the hands of a furious U.S. marshal after their interview. The marshal hadn't actually harmed Dylan, the motion conceded.

The motion itself triggered certain obligations for Anna. Like the first one, she forwarded the motion to the Department of Justice's Office of Professional Responsibility. OPR was in charge of ethics complaints brought against DOJ lawyers. They would conduct an inquiry into her handling of the case. It was intimidating. But all she could do was let OPR officials take care of their job and keep trying to do hers.

The consequences kept rolling in. Jody called Anna, her voice shaking. “My supervisor at the plant called. I've been fired.”

“What? Why?” Anna asked. “You've been there for eight years. You have a lot of seniority.” When there were layoffs, the newest workers got hit first.

“The head of the plant is in bed with Robert Highsmith. He gets all of us to give money to his campaigns, then bundles the contributions. In return, Highsmith gets him all sorts of favors. I think Highsmith put him up to this.” Jody sniffled. “I need the job, Anna. Money's tight as it is. I can't make ends meet if I'm not working.”

“Jo, we'll figure something out. I can help with money.” She recalled the glass mansion on Orchard Lake. “Also, it seems Grady has some resources.”

Jody started crying. “I don't want help, Anna. I've never wanted to be a charity case, and I definitely do not want to rely on Grady. I just want my job.”

“Hang in there, Jo,” Anna said. “I'm going to figure this out.”

Fury burned through Anna's chest. She called Jack. “I want Public Integrity to investigate this.”

“Anna, calm down,” he said. “We don't have a public corruption case.”

“This is bullshit. He's taking this out on my sister.”

“She should talk to an employment lawyer. You don't have any evidence Highsmith had anything to do with this.”

“Yeah, but—”

“And your sister is just coming back from maternity leave.”

“You can't discriminate based on that.”

“Let's just see what happens.”

“Why are you being so soft on them?”

“I'm being a realist. If you ask Public Integrity to investigate based on your sister's speculation, they won't. And it'll feed into the story line of you being vindictive, and only serve to distract from the murder case. Let's just find Emily Shapiro—and go from there.”

By the time they hung up, Anna was even more infuriated. She saw his point. But it was hard to be neutral when her sister was being attacked.

A few minutes later, she got a call from Carla, the chief of the Sex Offense unit in D.C. and her boss. “Anna, hi. I'm sorry to tell you, but a formal complaint has been made against you here in the office.”

“There, too, huh? By Dylan Highsmith's lawyer?”

“Of course. We have to investigate. But you know I've got your back. Don't let this worry you.”

Carla was a good boss, and Anna trusted that she'd be fair. But all these complaints were nerve-racking. There would be two ethics investigations against Anna: one through DOJ's OPR and one through the DC USAO, which would also eventually be forwarded to OPR. She'd be navigating the alphabet soup of government sanctions for months, if not years. She could lose her license, her job, and the most important thing to a lawyer: her reputation.

“I'm still on the case?”

Carla paused. “For now.”

“What do you mean?”

“I'm meeting with the front office later this evening. We're going to talk about whether it's time to put a new AUSA on the case.”

“Carla, I've got this.”

“I know. We don't think you've done anything wrong. But it's about appearances. And it might be better for you too. This has gotten very personal. You and your family deserve a break.”

“I don't want a break. I want to find Emily.”

“I know. You've gotten a long way in a short time. Everyone appreciates how far you've taken this. If you have to hand it off to someone else, no one will forget that. So get your files in order. Get a good night's sleep tonight. We'll talk tomorrow.”

Anna understood the message. She had one more day left on the case.

T
he knock came right when he expected it. Wyatt opened his dorm room door. Peter York, Brian Mercer, and David Rankin stood there grinning at him. Peter handed him a thick ivory envelope. Inside was creamy ivory cardstock, with the Beta Psi emblem printed in gold.

WYATT THOMAS BOLDEN

* * *

We are honored to extend to you this invitation to join the hallowed ranks of the men of BETA PSI

“Congratulations,” Peter said. “You're a brother.”

Brian was carrying a black leather box. They set it on Wyatt's desk and started pulling out the treasures inside. A bottle of Laphroaig. A sweatshirt embroidered with the Beta Psi letters. A key to the fraternity house. Everything Wyatt wanted.

“We're having a party to welcome you and your new brothers tonight,” David said. “Greatest party you've ever seen.”

Wyatt looked at the guys. He pictured the bar tab signed by President Taft. He felt the solid wood on the yacht mast. He tasted the filet mignon at the Highsmiths' luncheon. Peter held out the key. Wyatt reached out and took it.

As his fingers closed over the cool metal, he couldn't push back the other memories. He tasted the vodka after it ran through Alex's ass crack. He felt the weight of the jug with the red cocktail. He saw the stripper's white scar pulsing against her purple face as Dylan squeezed her throat.

Slowly, Wyatt put the key back in the black box. He packed the scotch back in too. The sweatshirt was the most difficult. He held its soft material and, for just a moment, let his thumb trace the stitching of the letters. He imagined wearing it around campus. The smiles he would get from girls, the respect he would get from guys. He wanted to wear it so much, it was a physical sensation. He put the sweatshirt back in the box.

“I'm sorry,” Wyatt said. “I can't accept.”

They looked at him like he was insane. Maybe he was.

“You went through all of Hell Week,” Peter said. “You got all the shit. For Chrissakes, take the reward.”

For some guys, the reward was simple: fun, friendship, parties, status. But for Wyatt, it had become more complicated. It meant keeping Dylan's secrets, over and over. It meant choosing to be the type of person who would keep those secrets. It was the wretched clawed animal trying to dig its way out of his chest, every day for the rest of his life.

“I appreciate the invitation,” Wyatt said. “But I have to say no.”

Peter stared at him for a long moment. Then he took the box and walked out. As the door slammed shut, the guys were shaking their heads and muttering to one another. Wyatt caught the words
douche bag
.

He sank back down on the couch and sat looking at the thick ivory invitation for a long time.

Then he pulled out his phone and scrolled to the number for Anna Curtis. She answered on the second ring.

“Hi, Anna? It's Wyatt Bolden,” he said. “I have to tell you something.”

A
nna and Sam got in the car and drove right over to Wyatt's dorm. They strode into Stringer Hall, jogged up the steps to the third floor, and knocked on Wyatt's door.

He let them in. “Thanks for coming over so fast.”

“No problem,” Anna replied, as if it were a casual meeting and not the break in the case she'd been obsessively nurturing and hoping for. “Thanks for calling.”

They sat on his faded brown couch. The room had the clean, spare look of a place that wasn't used much. Wyatt probably spent most of his time at the frat.

“So, what's up, Wyatt?”

“Listen,” he said. “I've seen a lot of bad stuff over the last few months. I want to tell you about it. But I don't want anyone to know that it came from me.”

“I can try to keep your name confidential for now. But if the case goes to trial, the defendant has the right to know who gave that evidence.”

Wyatt looked out the window. Finally, he looked back at her and nodded.

“I'm not proud of this. But I think that telling you now is better than sitting on it the rest of my life. It's been tearing me up.”

“A secret can eat away at you. Coming clean is harder at first, but in the end, it's healthier,” Anna said.

“Okay.” He took a deep breath. “The night that Dylan and Emily were . . . together, I was in charge of the bar. He had a gallon jug of stuff he called Killer Heart Throb Punch. He had me stash it behind the bar and told me not to let anyone else touch it.”

“Did he drink it?”

“No. He only gave it to girls. That night, I saw him pour it for Emily, and then she got really loopy. Stumbling around. Dylan took her upstairs.

“Then, I just thought it was a drunken hookup. It was the first party of the year; I didn't know better. But I saw that same thing go down, over and over. As soon as a girl started drinking it, she, like, collapsed. It wasn't just alcohol. That red drink was spiked. He was drugging girls to have sex with them.”

“Do you remember any of the other girls he did this to?”

“I don't know their names. I might recognize one or two if I saw them again.”

“Did you see any of the other guys using it?”

“I think maybe some of them knew what was going on. But I didn't see them using it. Just Dylan.”

“Did you ever confront him about it?”

Wyatt shook his head.

“Or report this to anyone else?”

“No.” He looked at his knees. “I wanted to be a brother.”

“We appreciate you coming forward now,” Anna said. “That takes guts. Thank you.”

“That's not all,” Wyatt said. “Things got really messed up a few days ago. Emily published all these videos talking about being raped by Dylan. There was a whole series of them on BlueTube. When Dylan found out, he freaked.”

“What did he do?”

“Pulled some strings. A couple of Beta Psi alums work at BlueTube, doing tech stuff or something. He got them to take the videos down. I hear Emily was pretty bummed. She hadn't saved them anywhere else, and once BlueTube took them down, she didn't have access to them. I guess they were like her diary of the year.”

“How do you know all this?”

“Pledges do chores around the house. I was scrubbing the kitchen floor when Dylan, Peter, and a couple other guys were talking about it. No one really notices you when you're on your hands and knees.”

“Wyatt, thank you so much for calling,” Anna said. “This is really important, and we'll follow up on it. You should be proud of yourself. You did the right thing.”

“For once.” He gave her a rueful smile.

When Wyatt smiled, he looked so much like a young version of Cooper. Anna wondered if this was what a son of Cooper's would look like. And then she remembered that Cooper would have no children. She would never have a child with him. The recollection was like a gut punch, stunningly painful.