“When?” I wasn’t ordinarily the planning type. I left that for Noah, but this was my show, and I wanted to make sure all the details were taken care of, including not introducing a bunch of date rape drugs onto the campus scene.

Mal folded his arms, “Gray and I will deal with this. You take care of your girl.”

I got on the phone and called Ryan. “When’s the meet?”

“Half hour.”

“I’ll be there.”

Ryan had set up a meet with the president of the lacrosse club. I didn’t know him very well. He was a senior and some kind of philosophy major. I had to wonder what kind of sociopath he was to take philosophy and not think for a moment about the repercussions of his actions. I hated philosophy classes for just that reason.

“SO WE’RE HERE TO PARLAY.” Brent Davidson rubbed his hands together in anticipation, as if we were playing a game of Risk. We had agreed to meet in the basement of the Alpha Phi house, which apparently violated a thousand sorority house rules, but Lana had decreed it was the perfect place. Neutral territory for both of us, or that’s how she sold it to Davidson. We stood facing each other in a dank room, the water heater of the house not ten feet away.

I wondered if he thought that this would be some great chess game, with his wits matched against mine. I had a lot to accomplish in the next twenty-four hours, so I wasn’t going to spend a lot of time stroking this guy’s ego. Actually, I was going to spend zero time. Today was the day for a beatdown, and not one meted out by my fists.

“You’re weak, Davidson,” I informed the lacrosse club president. “That’s why you’re here playing a club sport instead of an Ivy out east. You lack real talent and suck as a leader. Your club is a cancer and needs to be excised.”

My bluntly spoken words penetrated Davidson’s backward baseball cap, and he looked about as pale as the color of his polo. He glanced nervously at Ryan, who stared back impassively. I continued. “Here’s what’s happening. There is no bargain. Your house is being searched right now, as we speak, by campus police. They will find in your kitchen pantry a grow light and ten weed plants. Now that’s not so bad, right? A few recreational drugs aren’t going to put you down, but in Clay Howard’s room they’re going to find a hundred grams of GHB. That’s a lot of date rape drugs. See, either Clay’s raping every girl on campus, or he’s dealing. Which do you think it is?”

Davidson’s mouth opened and shut like a fish sucking for air. I waited for his little brain to catch up. “No one’s using GHB in the house.”

“Is that right? I’ve heard it’s already being called the rape house. Good ol’ Central campus rumor mill is working extra hard today. Turns out that Clay keeps a little ledger next to his pill stash. There are initials in it, and a lot of those initials match the guys in the club. Initials like BRD. That wouldn’t be you, would it?”

I didn’t think that Davidson could have gotten paler than he already was, but the whiteness of his skin made his eyes look like they were going to pop out. I moved back a bit so that I’d have a decent amount of room to swing, in case it came to that.

“You aren’t going to get away with this!” Davidson cried. “Everyone will know you’re behind it.”

“You mean everyone like the students? Because that’d be a good thing. They’ll know not to fuck with me or mine. If you mean campus admin, how would they ever draw the connection? Unless you’re going to admit to a violation of Honor Code ten, Section A, which says that if you knowingly spread false and malicious statements about another student, you’ll be up for expulsion. BRD, dude, you’re only a month or so from graduation. Do you want to jeopardize that?”

Whether it was because of the use of his initials or the threat of delaying his graduation, Davidson decided to stop protesting. I admired the effort he employed to keep from screaming at me. “What do you want?” he asked dejectedly.

“That ledger, which points fingers at over half the club, goes away if you agree to two things.”

“I’m listening.”

“First, you clean house.” I handed him a piece of paper and, when he refused to take it, I reached over and picked up his listless hand. Shoving the paper into his palm, I closed his fingers over it. “This list contains the names of the girls who were the target of the revenge rumors. You have until tomorrow to file charges against the appropriate men in the house in front of the Honor Code committee. With the filed charges, you will have affidavits filled out from members of the lacrosse team speaking in favor of the victims and against the accused. If this isn’t done by five P.M. tomorrow, the ledger stays with Campus Security and will eventually be transferred to the county for investigation by real detectives. You want them sorting through your e-mails and browser history?”

Davidson shook his head and shoved the list into his pocket.

“The second thing is that you forfeit the rest of your matches and you apply for a decertification for the club.”

“No way, man, this is my senior year,” Davidson protested.

“Hey, your funeral. Don’t know how you’ll play when you have the drug investigation hanging over your head, but I guess you’ll deal.”

“You’re a fucking sociopath,” Davidson snarled at me.

“Now I know you never paid attention in any of your classes. Sociopaths don’t feel anything. I’m feeling a lot right now. Glee. Satisfaction. Also anger. Don’t step wrong, or I’ll punch you until every bone in your face is broken.”

“What about Ryan, here?” Davidson shook his finger. “He’s going to be taken down by this, too.”

“Nah, see, Renaissance Man is beloved by a number of factions here at Central. The sport factions, the GLBTQ groups, the Greek system. I hear he’s being fought over by the sororities as to who gets to have him as a little brother.”

Ryan smiled angelically as we both looked at him.

“Ryan’s going to become the face of the lacrosse club. He will publicly mourn the loss of the club, but acknowledge that it was something that was necessary. Next year, the club charter will be reapplied for, by Ryan and a select few surviving members deemed by Ryan to not be involved in whatever disgusting shit you guys carried out during your reign.”

“Why the fuss? AnnMarie had her say.” Davidson had turned petulant now. His quicksilver changes of emotion were almost comical but showed what little spine he had.

“She didn’t have a ‘say,’ she was doing some much-needed truth-telling. I’m not doing this for AM,” I lied. Of course it was for her, but I wasn’t putting her in the crosshairs. “I didn’t put myself in harm’s way for four years in Afghanistan so I could come home and watch a bunch of assclowns terrorize an entire campus of women. This is a fucking mess, and I don’t want my years at Central to be tainted by it. You with me?”

Davidson nodded. “What about Howard?”

“You leave him to me. You’ve got a shitload of stuff to do before five P.M. tomorrow.”

“Or what?”

“Or I guess you’ll see how you like seeing your name in the New York Times connected with a date-rape drug. Bet that looks good on the old résumé.”

With that, I signaled for Ryan and we left.

“What’s your plan for Howard?” Ryan asked quietly once we were outside.

“Just a military prank.” I squeezed Ryan’s shoulder. “Why don’t you go to AM and Ellie’s apartment. Make sure they stay inside tonight. Rent some movies. I’ll be by about ten.”

At 9 P.M., I showed up at Karl’s, a dive bar with about ten tables and cockroaches as dinner companions. People drank heavily for anesthetization both inside and out. Gray was sitting with Howard at one table in the corner. I pulled down my skull cap and flipped up my collar. No need to be too obvious. I sauntered over and sat down right next to Howard, stretching my arm across the back of Howard’s chair.

“Having a bad day?”

He was gone. Blitzed. I could barely make out his words between the slurring and spitting. “You’re behind this. I know you are, fucking asshole.”

“Where’re your friends?” I looked pointedly at the empty tables and chairs.

Gray looked at me, a twinkle in his eye, and answered for Howard. “We’re getting acquainted. This guy says that he’s been taken advantage of by some jackass with an ax to grind. You the jackass?”

I nodded. Gray was having far too much fun tonight.

“I’m here to make it up to you, though, Howard. We’re going to have some fun tonight.” But before we could do anything, his head dropped listlessly on the table and drool seeped out of the corner of his mouth.

“This is disgusting,” I told Gray. “You were supposed to watch him.”

Gray shrugged. “I was, but I couldn’t keep him from drinking without sitting on him, and I figured that defeated the purpose of me being the one to babysit.”

“Fuck, okay, let me think.” I drummed my fingers on the table. I needed Noah, the plotter, because my plans all hinged on threatening Clay with bodily harm until he left. Hard to threaten a guy who was passed out face down in his own drool. Finally, I threw up my hands in disgust. “I can’t do anything to him while he’s drunk. It would make me no better than he is.”

“Principles, schminciples,” Gray scoffed.

“Don’t encourage me,” I said. “I’m trying to do the right thing. I have to be able to look AM in the face tonight. Let’s just take the asshat home. I’ll corner him tomorrow when he’s hungover but sober.”

We hauled the drunk and drugged Howard out of his chair and half-carried, half-dragged him out of the bar. Gray handed me a pair of plastic gloves, and I snapped them on. “Jesus, what size did you get? Extra small? The rubber is cutting off my circulation.”

“You want to touch him or complain about the plastic gloves, Bo Peep?”

I shut up. Worried that Howard would get sick, Gray ran in and paid the bartender for a roll of plastic wrap. We lined his car and laid Howard in the backseat. Howard stayed unconscious even after we wrestled him out of the car and onto the porch of his house.

The next morning, someone texted me several photos of Howard, still passed out with his hand on the business end of a wooden steer. I didn’t know if it was a sorority girl’s revenge or the work of someone in the theater arts program, as the steer looked like a prop for a play. He’d be unable to go a minute without someone mooing in his face.

Mal and Gray took care of the drugs, and Ryan took care of the club decertification. I didn’t have to hit anyone once.

Chapter Thirty-Two

BO

I WAS WAITING IN THE library lounge for AM to appear after class. I’d stopped waiting for her outside of her classroom. She didn’t like that. She’d eventually told me it made her look weak, like she needed someone to escort her across campus. I just liked to spend the time with her, but I understood her need for independence. It was one of the things that had drawn me to her in the first place, so I really couldn’t complain. Instead, I waited in the lobby of the library. She’d meet me here and we’d study. Or AM would study, and I’d just drink her in, this miracle of a girl who saved me. All this time I thought I was saving her.

She burst through the doors, noisily, unafraid of someone noticing her. The tension I’d once seen in her shoulders while she moved through campus was no longer present. I felt my mouth widening in response to her apparent happiness.

“Finals canceled?” I asked.

She shook her head, but her eyes were dancing wildly with some suppressed emotion. I thought it was glee. She executed a little hop over to me, looking five kinds of adorable. I wanted to scoop her up and lick her all over, but I restrained myself.

She threw herself at me, and I was surprised. When I looked around, there were people milling about. I took advantage of her changed behavior and snugged her up close to my body. Her eyes widened as she felt my arousal hard against the swell of her belly, and her amusement turned to outright laughter.

It only made me want her more.

“What?” I asked her, rubbing my hands along her arms.

“Clay Howard has left school.”

“Really?” I tried to look surprised, but she caught something in my tone. Her amusement faded away and was replaced by a suspicious look. With an effort, I smiled as blandly as possible. “Where’d you hear that?”

“It was all anyone could talk about in class,” AM informed me, but she was searching my eyes, my face, for some sign that I knew something. I employed some of the discipline that I was working on and tried to project innocent interest. It must have worked, because her suspicious look dropped away and was replaced by excitement once again.