The affection I’d felt listening to Frankie talk about Jack disappeared like smoke in the wind. “Wait… You actually think he killed Heather? Even though you know what kind of person he is?”
Frankie met my eyes. He looked exhausted. “I think he could’ve changed his mind, gotten scared. I can even understand it.”
The words hung in the room until Frankie continued. “Jack had to have done it. Because if he didn’t, I lost him for no reason.”
Mint kicked off the wall and strode toward him.
“All that time,” he said, “you and Jack were together behind my back.”
Frankie watched him anxiously. Mint was his idol. What he said meant everything.
“Have you told your dad?” Mint asked. “Your teammates?”
Frankie shook his head. “Not yet. Michael Sam’s the only NFL player who ever came out before he retired, and look what happened to him. People protested. His career was over in the blink of an eye. I keep picturing that happening to me, and I…can’t bring myself to risk it.”
Mint said nothing, only turned and walked away.
“In case you were wondering, the autopsy showed Heather had three major bruises on her head, five minor.” Eric tapped his foot on the concrete floor, stealing Frankie’s attention. “But none of them caused a concussion.”
Frankie closed his eyes and nodded, looking like he was trying very hard not to weep.
“You heard, obviously, that Heather didn’t put up the kind of fight you’d expect from anyone, let alone my sister. There was no skin under her nails, no blood from her attacker. Combined with the fact that there were dozens of people’s DNA everywhere in that room—including all of yours, and mine—the cops thought forensic evidence was a dead end.”
We’d all heard about the lack of usable DNA. It was one of the things that surfaced after Jack’s charges were dropped, when the whole campus was up in arms over him being let go, with no new suspects to take his place.
“What wasn’t public is that a toxicology report revealed the reason Heather barely fought back,” Eric said. “Her system was flooded with a drug cops couldn’t identify. It would have dulled her senses, slowed her reactions.”
A drug? Caro and I shot each other surprised looks. That didn’t make sense. We were Heather’s roommates. We would’ve known if she had a drug problem.
“The closest thing the cops could compare it to was this drug that was giving them a lot of trouble back then. A street drug called tweak.”
Tweak. I heard the glass shattering, the crunch of footsteps, the deep, terrible scream of pain. The dangerous people—violence in their eyes, darkness pulsing beneath their skin.
I didn’t have to lift my head to know who was staring at me from across the room. Like always, the pull of his gaze was magnetic.
I found him against my will, in time to watch a terrible knowing dawn in his eyes.
“That. Is. It!” Courtney shrieked, taking everyone by surprise. She picked up a discarded beer bottle and threw it against the wall, where it shattered into sharp rain. “I’m not going to stand here one second longer and listen to Heather’s creepy little brother, who used to stare at my breasts when he thought I wasn’t looking, try to frame us for her murder.”
“Court—” Mint started, an amazed look on his face.
She whirled on him. “No! I’m not playing this game. What’s next? Busting out a Ouija board? Taking lie-detector tests? Digging up Heather’s grave? I’m going back to the party, and so are you.” She turned to the rest of us. “You assholes can do whatever you want.”
A slow, satisfied smile crept over Eric’s face. He raised his hands and clapped. “Brava. Truly, a stirring performance.”
Chapter 14
January, sophomore year
Over time, I’d learned there were other girls like me—Kappas who were unhappy being second-best. No girl ever said it out loud, but still, we found each other. Our first opportunity to dethrone Chi Omega came rush, sophomore year. We poured our hearts and souls into it—hours of researching freshman girls on Facebook, buying them alcohol, holding secret rush parties in our dorms, slipping into forbidden conversations in line for frat bathrooms. We did everything we weren’t supposed to do.
I’d also learned that sometimes, the space between what you were and weren’t supposed to do was one of those messy gray areas. Like senior year of high school, when I was neck and neck with Madison Davies for salutatorian. Madison, with her perfect, corkscrew curls and hottest-girl status, was also smart, much to my dismay. The class ranking came down to winter finals. Whatever position we held at the end of fall semester was what we’d report to colleges. What I’d send off to Harvard.