Dangerous Girls (12 page)

Carlsson looks at us. “It’s simple. The guy breaks in, finds Elise there, and then attacks her—out of panic, or anger. The ripped clothing indicated it was a sexual attack. She turned him down before, so this guy Juan would have a motive to hurt her like that. It just makes sense—more sense than one of her friends suddenly turning on her, anyway.”

“Thank you, that will be all. No further questions.”

They keep us in a
holding pattern for a week, waiting on the island for some kind of news. Every day, one or more of us get called back in for questioning, this time with our parents and lawyers in tow. The news cameras and reporters are still laying siege to the hotel, so there’s nowhere else we can go; we just sit around the suite, watching TV, calling up room service and waiting for this all to be done.

AK barely speaks. Melanie cries all the time. Max spends most of the day curled up in his room with the blinds drawn, woozy on anti-anxiety meds.

We all just want to go home.

“What did they ask you this time?” Lamar lifts his head from his laptop as I enter the suite. Dad and Ellingham are
off talking legal stuff with the other parents in the makeshift conference room; it’s just us kids in here.

I shrug, peeling off my cardigan. “The same. Just, what happened, where were we.”

I shoot a look to Tate, over by the TV. He gives me a questioning look, and I nod. We’re okay.

“I don’t get it.” Chelsea is curled in a ball on the sofa beside him. “Why do they keep going over the same stuff? Shouldn’t there be security footage, or witnesses?”

I don’t reply. Slowly I cross to the kitchen unit in the corner and run the cold faucet over my wrists, closing my eyes against everything but the feeling of the water, icy against my palms. The interrogation room is tiny, and they never set the cold air high enough. After two hours in there with Ellingham and Dekker, my clothes stick, damp and sweaty, to my skin.

“Whoever it was, they planned it.” AK’s voice comes, and I turn in surprise. He’s standing by the windows, staring out at the ocean with the same blank expression he’s been wearing since we found Elise. “The front door has cameras. They knew not to come in that way, or they’d have been on the tape.”

“So, what, they cased the place?” Lamar asks.

Chelsea scoots closer to him, hugging him close. “That means they would have been watching us. All week. Waiting.” She shivers.

“Maybe.” AK pauses. “Or maybe they knew all along.”

“What are you saying?” Tate speaks up for the first time.

AK turns to face us. “I don’t know. All I do know is I spent three hours in that police precinct yesterday, answering questions about you two. How long you’ve been together. What you do. How Elise fit in with you guys. That’s all he wanted to know.”

“Because he’s crazy,” I say quickly.

“Is he?” AK shoots back. “They’re the ones who know what they’re doing. They looked at the crime scene, and did an autopsy on the body, and all that stuff. Wouldn’t they be out looking for the murderer—if they thought he was out there?”

“What’s going on?” Melanie’s voice comes from the doorway. She’s wrapped in a hotel robe, her dark hair hanging limply on either side of her face. She looks back and forth between us. “Did they find something?”

“No, sweetie.” Chelsea shakes her head. “It’s nothing.”

“Nothing you guys want to think about,” AK mutters.

“How are you feeling?” I interrupt, asking Melanie. She shrugs, and trudges over to the couch, barely lifting her feet.

“School already started,” she says, sitting down across from the others. “When do you think they’ll let us go back?”

“Soon, I hope.” I give her an encouraging smile. “Even calculus is better than this.”

Melanie doesn’t meet my eyes. Instead she reaches for the remote, and clicks through to one of the cable news channels.
The familiar sight of our hotel fills the screen, the glossy-haired reporter filming live out from the street below.

“Mel,” I say quickly. “Don’t. You know they told us not to watch.”

“I want to see,” she insists, turning the volume up.

“. . . and with police yet to make any arrests, pressure is mounting on investigating prosecutor Klaus Dekker.” The reporter is blond and wide-eyed, clutching her microphone. She looks like a coed, dressed up in a preppy blouse, as if she was off doing body shots before the studio called her up for duty.

“What’s the mood there on the island, Katie?” the man in the studio asks.

“I’ve been talking to locals, and other tourists, and everyone is still in a state of shock.” Katie manages a concerned frown. “Although this is a destination known for its nightlife, photos of the teens’ drinking and wild partying have given everyone pause for thought, making some question just what kind of behavior the victim and her friends were engaged in.”

“Yes, we’ve been seeing the photos from the students’ social networking profiles . . .”

“That’s right. And the latest photo, of the victim’s friends Anna Chevalier and Tate Dempsey, has further fueled speculation.” It flashes up onscreen. “Taken just hours after Elise’s death, it appears to show them laughing and joking on their hotel balcony, seemingly unconcerned by her brutal death—”

Tate snatches the remote from Melanie and shuts it off. “Enough. You heard our parents, it’s all just bullshit, for the ratings.”

“You would say that,” AK mutters again.

Tate whirls around. “Have you got a problem with me?” he demands.

“Tate.” I go to intercept him. “It’s been a long day, okay? We’re all just tired, and—”

“No, I’m serious.” He pushes past me, marching up to AK. “Spit it out. If there’s something you want to say, just say it.”

AK stares back at him. “Fine.” His voice is heavy. “Why didn’t you come diving with us?”

Tate stares. “You know why. We were hungover; we just wanted to chill.”

“No, you said you were going, you couldn’t wait,” AK argues. “Then Elise says she’s staying home, and you change your mind.”

“Tate?” I ask. “What’s he talking about?”

“It’s nothing.” Tate glares. “He’s talking out of his ass.”

“We both decided to stay,” I tell AK, putting myself between them. “It wasn’t anything. We just wanted some time to ourselves.”

“Is that why you didn’t check on her?” AK demands. “You were too busy off on your own? Making out, while she was bleeding to death?”

“We texted!” I protest. “We all did. And if you were so worried, why didn’t you check on her, before you left?”

“It was early.” AK looks away.

“It was like, ten in the morning,” I correct him. “Remember, she didn’t come out for breakfast. And you went and knocked on her door,” I add, turning to Mel.

Her face trembles. “You think I don’t know that? You think I wouldn’t go back if I could, and break the door down, or do something?”

“Hey.” Chelsea reaches to comfort her. “Knock it off, all of you. This won’t change anything. Nobody’s to blame.”

“You keep saying that!” AK explodes. “But you don’t know it’s true. None of us do. We weren’t there.”

“But we were, is that what you’re saying?” Tate steps up, getting in his face. I can see the tension radiating from him, his whole body coiled to strike.

“Will everyone just calm down?” I beg. “We’ve got to stick together.”

“Why?” AK shoots back. “Because you’re worried what we might say, if it’ll make you look bad?”

“Because it’s the truth!”

My voice echoes, plaintive, but it’s like a dividing line just got drawn down the middle of the room. Me and Tate on one side, AK on the other. Melanie, Lamar, and Chelsea stranded between us, not saying a word.

“You really think we had something to do with it?” I ask AK, my voice breaking. “That we would hurt her, that we . . .” I catch my breath.

“I don’t know,” AK finally replies, his voice hollow. “I don’t know what the fuck to think anymore.”

“Thanks a lot, buddy.” Tate’s voice is laced with sarcasm.

“He doesn’t mean it,” I say, but Tate just turns and walks out, the door slamming behind him like a gunshot through the suite.

Silence.

“Go after him,” I urge AK. “Apologize. You can smooth this over. We’re all messed up, we’re not thinking straight—”

“I am.” AK looks at me. “I’m probably the only one seeing things clearly.”

I shiver. His eyes seem to burn straight through me, harsher than I’ve ever seen before. AK is the playboy, the joker, the one who suggests we drive out to Alston at two a.m. to find some legendary food cart. He doesn’t get mad; he never holds a grudge. But right now, he’s staring at me like a stranger.

“AK—,” I start, but before I can say another thing, the door opens, and my dad comes bursting in, a couple more parents behind him.

“It’s okay, sweetie.” He crosses the room, pulling me into a hug. “This’ll all be straightened out.”

“What’s going on?” My reply is muffled against his sweater.
He’s holding me so tight, I can feel him shake. I feel a sudden chill, blood turning to ice in my veins. “Dad?” I try to push him away. “Dad, what’s happening?”

“Mr. Chevalier, please stand aside.”

Dad releases me, and I look up to see Dekker, coming through the doorway with two more officers behind him. The look on his face is pure triumph.

“Dad?” My voice has a note of terror in it.

“Just stay calm,” he tells me. “We’ll be in the car, right behind you.”

I back away. “But what’s going on?”

Dekker advances. “Anna Chevalier, I have a warrant for your arrest, on suspicion of the murder of Elise Warren.”

The ground falls away.

I stumble back, but Dekker grabs me roughly, forcing my hands behind my back. He shoves me up against the wall, and I hear my dad yell out in protest as I feel the cold bite of metal lock into place against my wrists.

“You do not have to say anything . . .”

His voice drifts away. I can see his lips moving, see the burst of panic and confusion in the room, but everything fades to a dull roar as he hustles me toward the door, blood in my ears beating loud to drown out the rest of the world. All I have are glimpses, snapshots of the scene. My dad’s expression, panicked and powerless. Chelsea, weeping into Lamar’s shoulder.
The maid in the hallway, open-mouthed as they drag me into the elevator. Tourists in the lobby, pointing and wide-eyed, cell phones held high. The news crews outside, already pressed up against the front windows, cameras flashing.

The bright lights snap me back suddenly as Dekker pulls me outside, launching me into the middle of the scrum. Reporters lunge at me from every direction. I’m in the center of a storm, every thought drowned out by their yells. The crowd has swelled to ten times its usual size—all of them jostling their cameras at me, hurling their questions, their faces crude and gleeful.

“Did you kill her?”

“Where’s the evidence?”

“Are you pressing charges?”

“Why did you do it?”

I trip, nearly falling, and then Ellingham is beside me, hauling me on toward the police van.

“Don’t say a word,” Ellingham orders me. “Don’t tell them anything until I’m there.”

“But what about—”

My reply is drowned out by a fresh roar from the crowd. Tate is being led out of the hotel behind me, handcuffed between two more police officers. His parents and lawyer cluster behind, in a panic.

“Tate!” I call, pulling against my restraints. “Tate, it’ll be okay!”

They propel him away from me, toward a waiting van. But before he’s bundled inside, he looks up, searching for me in the crowd.

“Tate!” I yell again, helpless.

He meets my eyes for a minute, anger burning in his expression.

Then he turns away.

“Enough photos, you guys!” AK
raises a bottle of vodka, yelling over the pounding rock music that fills the kitchen. It’s late-night Halloween, and I’m sandwiched between Elise and Tate, posing for the flash of his cell phone camera. AK gestures impatiently, spilling his drink. “Let’s get this show on the road!”

“Who votes that AK doesn’t drive?” Chelsea laughs as she swipes the bottle from him and takes a gulp. Her tanned skin is dusted with glitter in her tiny Leia bikini, her long hair wound up in fat braided whorls.

“What are you talking about?” AK doffs the cap of his revolutionary war costume. “I am as sober as the grave.”

“Bad metaphor, it’s the day of the dead,” Elise points out, still draped around me, holding the kitchen knife we’ve smeared with fake blood. “Graveyards are party central—all the spirits going crazy.”

“C’mon, you don’t believe that stuff.” I turn to her. “Ghosts and spirits and all that bullshit?”

“Oh shit!” Elise giggles. “Okay, if this was a horror movie, you’d have just doomed yourself to some serious undead revenge.”

“Woo!” I cry, waving my arms around. “You hear that, evil spirits? I mock you and your very existence. Just try to come get me.”

“And . . . I vote that Anna doesn’t drive either.” Chelsea watches, laughing.

Lamar looks up from his phone. “I just checked in with my buddies, they say the party’s going hard.”

“Then let’s roll. Max!” Chelsea yells, without pausing for breath. He wanders in, smoking the end of a fat blunt.

“Dude! Not in the house!” Chelsea snatches it away from him. “Do you want our parents to freak again?” She moves to throw it down the garbage disposal, but not before taking a quick toke herself.

“Whatever.” Max grins through the thick zombie scars on his face. He looks down at his football uniform, dirtied and stained. “Hey, can I get some more blood up in here?”

As Elise goes to smear him with more fake-blood makeup, I feel a new pair of arms slip around me; lips kissing, soft against the back of my neck. I shiver, leaning back into Tate’s embrace.

“Did I tell you how sexy you look in that costume?” he whispers in my ear.

I laugh. “Only ten million times.”

“Well, you do.” His lips press against my neck again, but this time he bites down softly, playful. His arms tighten, his breath hot against my skin. “I can’t wait to get you out of it.”

His words send another shiver of excitement through me—this time edged with unfamiliar uncertainty, but before I can reply, he’s pulled me around so I’m facing him, his lips hard and searching on mine. I melt into him, falling back against the kitchen cabinet as we kiss, long and deep. I hear the chatter of the others in the room; music loud; the low, sweet scent of weed, but it all falls away, the way it always does when I’m kissing him.