“In some states. But not North Carolina.”
“Hmm.” I tapped my chin.
Caro looked back and forth between Kristin and me, her eyebrows lifting higher than I’d ever seen them go. “For the love of all that is holy, do not tell me you’re actually considering this. What we should do is track down every copy of the video and delete them. That’s girl code.”
“Oh yeah?” I asked. “Was it girl code for Amber to string me along so I’d buy her tickets to the Nelly Furtado concert and a whole semester’s worth of alcohol?” On a credit card I couldn’t afford, I added silently. “Is it girl code for Courtney to throw herself at Mint every time she thinks I’m not looking?”
Caro turned pink. So she’d noticed.
“Or, sorry—you know I love her—but for Heather to keep casually mentioning that the last five Phi Delt Sweethearts have been Chi Os, when she knows we all want it? Is that girl code?”
Kristin snorted. “Or what about Courtney telling Emma Davis she needs to lose weight to get a boyfriend, when Emma has a thyroid problem and Courtney’s only skinny ’cause she takes secret diet pills her mom buys from China?”
“None of those things are good,” Caro cried. “Especially Courtney’s pills. Those things are basically speed and they make her crazy and way too thin. It’s sad her mom buys them for her. But releasing some poor freshman’s sex tape to get back at the Chi Os is worse.” She turned the full force of the Caroline Rodriguez guilt stare on me. “Please tell me you recognize that. You’re going all Lady Macbeth, and it’s freaking me out.”
Outside Kristin’s window, the sun began to break through the steel-gray sky, warming the half inch of snow on the ground. A lone bird trilled.
I sighed. “Caro’s right. It’s wrong. And we could get caught. Sorry, K.”
Kristin only shrugged.
“Thank God,” Caro said, dropping her head in her hands.
She and I went back to our dorm room, made popcorn, and watched Felicity. Two days later, Amber Van Swann’s sex tape was sent from an anonymous number to a handful of fraternity brothers, who passed it to their friends, who passed it to theirs, and within a week the whole school had it.
Amber was destroyed. She wouldn’t leave her room. Her parents threatened to sue the school, but there was nothing the administration could really do, and Amber refused to let her parents go after her boyfriend, the likeliest source of the leak. She transferred out of Duquette before the semester was up, and for months—several glorious months—the whole campus called Chi Os the sex-tape girls. Heather was furious. Courtney refused to say Amber’s name out loud.
A light dimmed in Caro. For a while, she didn’t want to go out, didn’t want to binge nineties shows, studied alone at the library. But for all her talk about right and wrong, she never once insisted we go to the chancellor with what we knew.
I was horrified, obviously. But the day it leaked, my first thought—I couldn’t help it—was that sometimes, you really didn’t have to lift a finger to get exactly what you wanted. Sometimes, all you had to do was sit back and do nothing, and it was just that easy.
Of course, I banished the thought.
Chapter 15
Now
We practically ran, all of us fleeing the haunted Phi Delt house, desperate to get back to the white tent with its lights and music and safety. We didn’t talk—that was for later, when the image of Eric—damaged brother, deranged detective—wasn’t so vivid. For now, we moved, hearts beating fast, breathing labored.
Just as the tent loomed into sight, Frankie jerked to a stop. “I’m not going in.”
Caro braked so hard she nearly stumbled. “What… Why?”
“That, back there, with Eric? I wasn’t expecting…” Frankie blew out a breath. “I wanted it to be different, when I told you. Not tied up with Heather and those accusations. And now…I don’t know. I can’t go back in the party and pretend it didn’t happen.”
“We care about you, Frankie,” I said quietly. “We support you. Who you love changes nothing. We’re the East House—” My voice caught. We weren’t the East House Seven. Not without Heather, or Jack. Not with the way we’d started looking at each other, ever since Eric said the word secrets.
Caro hurtled herself at Frankie, catching him in a fierce hug.
“Whoa,” he said, rocking back.
“We love you.” Caro’s words were muffled against his jacket. “Don’t leave.”