Блейк Пирс: Watching

What kind of trouble are we in, anyway? she wondered. Just for going out together?

She was especially worried about Heather, who was still in the kitchen answering questions. The poor girl had been especially close to her roommate, Rhea. Of course, this was a nightmare for everybody, but Riley couldn’t begin to imagine how hard it must be for Heather.

Soon they heard the dean’s voice stammering uneasily over the dorm’s PA system.

“This is Dean Trusler. I—I’m sure all of you know by now that something terrible just happened on the girls’ floor. You have orders from Police Chief Hintz to stay in your rooms tonight and not leave the dorm. A police officer or a campus official might come by your room to talk with you. Be sure to answer any and all questions. For now, don’t plan on leaving campus tomorrow, either. You’ll all be getting additional notification soon.”

Riley remembered something else the chief had said …

“We’re likely to have questions for many of you.”

He was starting with Riley and the other four girls right now.

It was starting to make sense to her. After all, they’d been together with Rhea shortly before she was killed. But what did Hintz think the girls might know?

What does he think I might know? she wondered.

Riley couldn’t imagine.

At last, Heather came out of the kitchen, accompanied by Officer Frisbie. Heather looked pale and sick, as if she might start vomiting again. Riley wondered—where was Heather going to spend the night? She couldn’t very well go back to the room she had shared with Rhea.

As if overhearing Riley’s thoughts, Officer Frisbie said, “Heather is going to spend the rest of the night in the RA’s room.”

Heather walked shakily out of the common room. Riley was glad to see that the resident assistant met her at the doorway.

Officer Frisbie called for Gina to come into the kitchen, where Hintz was still waiting. Gina got up stiffly and followed the woman through the swinging door, leaving Riley, Trudy, and Cassie sitting in uncomfortable silence. It seemed to Riley that time had slowed down as they waited.

Finally, Gina reemerged. Without a word to the others, she walked through the common room and out the other door. Then Officer Frisbie asked for Cassie, who went next into the kitchen.

Now there were only Riley and Trudy sitting there in chairs across from each other. As they waited, Trudy kept giving Riley angry and reproachful glances. Riley wished she could explain what she had said during her short conversation with Officer Frisbie. All she’d done was answer a simple question. She hadn’t accused anyone of doing anything bad.

But Officer White was still looming over them, and Riley couldn’t say a single word.

Finally, Cassie came out of the kitchen and went back to her room, and Trudy was next to be called into the kitchen.

Riley was now alone with Officer White, feeling isolated and afraid.

With nothing to distract her, she kept flashing back to poor Rhea’s body, her wide open eyes, and the pool of blood. Now those images were mixed with memories of her own mother lying dead—so long ago, but still so horribly vivid in her mind.

How could something like that be happening here and now, in a college dormitory?

This can’t be real, she thought.

Surely she wasn’t really sitting here bracing herself to answer questions that she couldn’t possibly know the answers to.

Surely one of her best friends hadn’t just been savagely murdered.

She had almost convinced herself of the unreality of the moment when Officer Frisbie led Trudy out of the kitchen. With a sullen expression, Trudy left the common room without so much as a glance at Riley.

Officer Frisbie nodded at Riley, who got up and obediently followed her into the kitchen.

This can’t be happening, she kept telling herself.

Riley sat down at the table in the kitchen, across from Chief Hintz. For a moment the chief just stared across at her, holding his pencil over a notepad. Riley wondered if she was supposed to say something.

She glanced up and saw that Officer Frisbie had positioned herself off to one side, leaning against a counter. The woman had a rather sour expression on her face, as if she wasn’t very happy with the interviews. Riley wondered if Frisbie was annoyed by the girls’ responses or by the way her boss had been asking questions.

Finally the chief said, “First of all, did the victim ever give you any reason to think she feared for her safety?”

Riley was jolted by that word …

Victim.

Why couldn’t he just refer to her as Rhea?

But she needed to answer his question.

Her mind raced back over recent conversations, but she only remembered innocuous exchanges like the one she and Trudy and Rhea had had earlier tonight about whether Riley was on the pill.

“No,” Riley said.

“Did anyone wish her ill? Was anyone angry with her recently?”

The very idea seemed odd to Riley. Rhea was—had been—so pleasant and amiable that Riley couldn’t imagine anyone being mad at her for more than a few minutes.

But she wondered …

Did I miss any signs?

And had the other girls told Hintz anything Riley herself didn’t know?

“No,” Riley said. “She got along with pretty much everybody—as far as I knew.”

Hintz paused for a moment.

Then he said, “Tell us what happened when you and your friends arrived at the Centaur’s Den.”

A rush of sensations came back to Riley—Rhea and Trudy physically pushing her through the door into the thick fog of cigarette smoke and the deafening music …

Did she need to get into all that?

No, surely Hintz only wanted to hear bare-boned facts.

She said, “Cassie and Heather and Gina headed straight to the bar. Trudy wanted me to dance with her and Rhea.”

Hintz was reviewing notes he’d taken from the other girls, who of course had told him what they’d known about Riley’s actions, including the fact that Riley had left them to go downstairs.

“But you didn’t dance with them,” he said.

“No,” Riley said.

“Why not?”

Riley was startled. Why could her reluctance to dance possibly matter, anyway?

Then she noticed Officer Frisbie giving her a sympathetic look and shaking her head. It seemed obvious now that the woman thought Hintz was being a bit of an asshole, but there really wasn’t anything she could do about it.

Riley said slowly and carefully, “I just … well, I wasn’t in much of a party mood. I’d been trying to study, and Rhea and Trudy had pretty much dragged me there. So I bought a glass of wine and headed on downstairs.”

“Alone?” Hintz asked.

“Yeah, alone. I sat down in a booth by myself.”

Hintz thumbed through his notes.

“So you didn’t talk to anyone else while you were at the Centaur’s Den?”

Riley thought for a moment, then said, “Well, Harry Rampling came over to my table …”

Hintz smiled a little at the mention of Harry’s name. Riley realized that, like most of the community, the chief probably thought pretty highly of the school’s quarterback.

He asked, “Did he sit down with you?”

“No,” Riley said. “I brushed him off.”

Hintz frowned with disapproval, apparently annoyed that any girl would have the poor judgment to reject a true hero like Harry Rampling. Riley was starting to feel a little exasperated. Why was her taste in guys any business of Hintz’s, anyway? What did it have to do with what had happened to Rhea?

Hintz asked, “Did you talk to anyone else?”

Riley gulped.