After Me (12 page)

“Yeah,” I said. “Zombie justice dealt out Chuck Norris style. The way I see it, those guys are predators just as much as the ones online. Taking care of them is part of my assignment.”

“I like it.” She raised her hand for me to slap. “And I hope Matt Winston is the first one you take out. In fact, you should kick his butt even if he didn’t have anything to do with Caitlin. He deserves it for what he did before.”

“What do you mean?” I asked, excited about finally getting some information. “What’d he do before?”

“Well, I don’t know it for a fact,” she said, “but right after he transferred to Bay Harbor, there was a rumor going around that he left his other school because a girl accused him of rape.”

“Oh, really?” I said. “If that turns out to be true, I’ll definitely be paying Mr. Matt Winston a visit he won’t ever forget.”

“How are you gonna find out if it’s true or not?”

“I get the feeling Lew knows all about Matt’s past,” I said. “But if he won’t tell me anything, I’ll have to see if I can find out from Matt himself.”

She frowned. “How are you gonna do that?”

“He hit on me the first time he saw me,” I said. “I can’t see him passing up a chance to take Gwen out even if he thinks she’s trash. And I’m sure his true colors will come out as soon as we’re alone.” I leaned back in my chair and crossed my arms. “Alone with no witnesses.”

Chapter Eighteen

D
ougie wasn’t on the school bus when we got on the next morning.

“Maybe he’s at the police station looking at mug shots of gangbangers,” I said as Annalee and I sat down.

She laughed and tried to stifle a yawn. “Sorry. Guess we stayed up too late talking last night.”

I knew better. I’d seen her tossing and turning all night and heard her muttering in her sleep. She was a lot more bothered by everything she’d seen and heard from me than she was letting on. I just hoped it wouldn’t be too much for her.

For my part, I’d spent most of the night online reading every word of every article I could find about my case. It actually seemed as if Vanessa was truly upset by my disappearance, and I couldn’t help wondering if she might’ve cared a little bit about me after all. If she did, she’d sure done a helluva job keeping it a secret. But could I have been wrong about her? And did I want to be wrong?

I’d also waited until Annalee went to sleep before logging in to Gwen’s FaceSpace to see if there was anything from Lew. Good thing, because I would’ve died a second death if she’d seen me giggling like a dork when I read his post on my wall.

Spent the evening plotting your downfall like a good nemesis. Triple C saves the world from the Zombie Apocalypse. Story at 11.

Was he just being funny, or did that mean he’d really been thinking about me all night? And, God, what a ridiculously big thrill it had been to see him use the nickname I’d given him.

Annalee interrupted my private Lewfest when she said, “Be sure to tell your foster mom thanks again for letting me have these clothes.”

“Okay, but I think the dozen times you thanked her already is enough. Those jeans do look great on you though. I saw a couple of guys checking out your butt when we got on.”

“Yeah, right.” She blushed, but I could tell that made her happy. I really needed to figure out a way to help her find some confidence.

When we got off the bus at school, we headed toward Sidney and his friends in their usual spot, but the sound of angry voices across the parking lot made me stop and turn to look. The group from the cafeteria the day before was standing around Matt’s Silverado, and the guy who’d gotten the milk poured on his head was holding Caitlin’s arm while she struggled to get free.

I was about to go help her when the guy said something that made her rear back with her free hand and hit him square in the mouth. He barely even flinched, but he let go of her arm before saying something else with a hateful laugh. Caitlin held her hand in obvious pain and said something back to him before running away in tears. Nobody in the group followed her.

I turned back to Annalee and said, “Here’s my chance to see if she’ll talk to me. Tell the guys I’ll see ‘em at lunch.”

Caitlin had fled to a green Volkswagen Beetle parked a few rows away from Matt’s truck, and she was sitting in it with her face hidden in her arms against the steering wheel. The passenger door was unlocked, and she looked up at me in surprise when I got in.

“Who are you, and why are you in my car?”

“My name’s Gwen. It looked like you could use a friend.”

Recognition registered on her face. “Aren’t you the girl Matt said used to be a hooker?”

I couldn’t help laughing. “Do you always believe everything Matt and his friends say?”

She wiped her eyes angrily. “No. I’ll never believe anything that comes out of their lying mouths again.”

“See, we’re on the same team.” I reached over and squeezed her shoulder. “Wanna tell me what they did to you?”

She shrugged off my hand. “Why do you care?”

I stared out the windshield and forced myself to remember how pathetically helpless I’d felt when I’d been at BOSSMAN’s mercy, then I channeled all that anger into my answer. It was still basically a lie, but this way it had a ring of truth to it.

“Because I know what it’s like to be taken advantage of and forced to do things against your will. Matt was right about me living on the street, but the things I did weren’t my choice.” I turned to look at her and really meant what I said next. “Nobody deserves to be used like that. And anybody who does it sure the hell shouldn’t get away with it. If you tell me what happened to you, I can help you make the assholes pay.”

She stared at me a few seconds without saying anything, then her eyes filled with tears again. “Nobody will believe me. Or back me up.”

“I’ll believe you,” I said. “And since I wasn’t talking about going to the cops, you don’t need anybody to back you up. In fact, nobody needs to know you said anything at all. I can make them pay in private.” I gave her a wicked smile. “Unless you want to be there to watch.”

“What can you do to them?”

“Trust me,” I said. “I’ve got some special skills I had to learn in order to survive. A ‘very particular set of skills’ to quote Liam Neeson.”

She still looked confused. “You mean like karate?”

A light bulb went on in my devious little head. “Yeah, kinda. It’s something I learned from an Asian kid I met on the streets—a mixture of karate and a few other martial arts. It’s called zomjitsu.”

She seemed to think about it a moment, then she said, “I didn’t want to go to Scott’s stupid party in the first place…”

* * *

I
thought I was gonna die all over again waiting for lunchtime when I could tell Annalee what I’d found out. Even though it meant I’d have to wait until sixth period to see Lew, I snagged Annalee in the cafeteria foyer and pulled her behind the library so we could talk in private.

“I take it from the way your eyes are blazing that you got Caitlin to talk,” she said as she took out the turkey sandwich I’d made her that morning for lunch. “What’d she say?”

I told her everything. The previous weekend, Caitlin’s best friend Kinslee had talked her into going to a kegger that Scott Murphree—the guy she’d dumped the milk on—threw at his house while his parents were on a cruise. Kinslee said Scott had invited them personally, and since freshmen didn’t usually get invited to his parties, not going would have been social suicide.

Caitlin said she’d felt uncomfortable as soon as they arrived, mainly because there were about twice as many guys than there were girls, and all the guys were football players. She’d also noticed that all the other girls were either freshman or JV cheerleaders. As soon as they walked in the door, Scott had shoved two big glasses of beer in their hands and announced that anybody caught with a full glass had to take off an article of clothing.

Kinslee didn’t seem to mind any of it and told Caitlin to stop being such a baby when she said she wanted to leave. Caitlin said she’d never had beer before and didn’t like the taste. She tried to sip it instead of chugging like all the other girls, but she started feeling weird before half the glass was gone. All the guys kept telling her to drink the rest of her beer and get another one or she’d have to take something off.

Then she noticed that the other girls were disappearing with two or three guys at a time, and she really started to freak out. When Scott came over and ordered her to “drink your fucking beer, bitch,” she threw it in his face and tried to run for the door, but Scott and several other guys caught her and held her down while they poured beer in her mouth and made her swallow it. The next thing she remembered was puking her guts out in her front yard just before dawn.

Annalee had stopped eating a few sentences into the story. Now she wrapped up the rest of her sandwich and put it back in the bag. “How did she get home?”

“She vaguely remembers somebody putting her in the back seat of a car, but she can’t remember anything about him except that he said he was taking her home and kept saying he was sorry.”

“Did they… rape her?”

“She doesn’t know,” I said, “but she feels pretty sure they made her do some things she wouldn’t normally do.”

“Did she tell her parents?”

I rolled my eyes. “No, she said she was too ashamed for going in the first place. And when she talked to Kinslee about it the next day, Miss BFF claimed that Caitlin got way drunker than everybody else and made a fool of herself by stripping and begging Scott to sleep with her. She also warned Caitlin that the other girls at the party would say the same thing if she tried to cause trouble for Scott or any of the other guys.”

Annalee frowned. “Why would they cover for them?”

“I’m not sure, but I have my suspicions.” I picked up a rock and threw it against the side of the building, leaving a chink in the brick. “Caitlin told me one of the varsity cheerleaders named Fallon said something this morning about how freshmen have to pay their dues like everybody else.”

“What did Scott say that made her hit him?”

“He told her she left the party before she was done paying, so she could get on her knees and finish whenever she was ready.”

Annalee was starting to look ill. “God, why does she still have anything to do with them?”

“Oh, you know,” I said, “it’s that whole stupidity thing that makes her care more about being popular than what they did to her.”

“Makes it kinda hard to feel sorry for her,” she said.

I sighed. “I’m sure I would’ve agreed with you when my name was Jada, but my opinion of what stupid girls deserve has changed since I became one of them. Caitlin might be dumb and shallow, but she didn’t deserve to be drugged and used by a bunch of jocks who think rules don’t apply to them just because they run up and down a football field.”

“You think they put a roofie in her beer?”

“Yeah, they probably drugged all the girls there, which is why none of them know what really happened to anybody, including themselves. And since they’re just as stupid as Caitlin, they’ll say whatever Scott and the other jocks tell them to say because they don’t want to make waves. Actually, from what that Fallon girl said, it sounds like it might even be some kind of initiation all the cheerleaders have to go through.”

“I think I’m gonna be sick.” Annalee turned and heaved a couple of times, but nothing came up.

Maybe she wasn’t cut out to be Zombie Girl’s sidekick after all.

I patted her on the back. “Hey, we don’t have to talk about this anymore if it’s bothering you this much.”

She shook her head and took a couple of deep breaths. When she looked at me again, her eyes had a determined glint to them. “No, I’m okay. Sorry for being such a wimp. I want to hear what you’re gonna do to Scott and his disgusting friends.”

I smiled. “Caitlin doesn’t remember much about the night of the party, but she remembered enough to give me directions to Scott’s house.” I picked up another rock and crushed it in my fist. “I’m gonna pay him a visit tonight and see if he wants to party with me.”

“Awesome,” Annalee said. “But maybe you should check with your advisor first to see if it’s okay. I mean, what’ll happen if you break a rule or something? Will you get sent somewhere else?”

“I don’t think so, but I’ll check with Flo when I get home just to be sure. Don’t worry, okay?”

She nodded. “What are you gonna do to him?”

I told her the brainstorm I’d had about pretending to know martial arts. “All I have to do is give him a chop here and a kick there like I know what I’m doing. He’ll think it’s the power of the Force or
feng shui
or whatever it is those karate guys use that’s helping me kick his ass. And you can bet I’ll make sure he knows
why
I’m doing it too, even though I promised Caitlin I’d keep her name out of it.”

“Good idea,” she said, “but I wish you could keep yours out of it too. You know, like wear a disguise or something so he can’t identify you and get you in trouble.”

“Maybe I can,” I said. “Do you know where I can find a thrift store around here?”

“Are you kidding?” She gave me a wry look. “I’ve got a frequent shopper card from the Goodwill store around the corner from my house.”

“Great. We can go there after school and find an outfit for Zombie Girl.”

* * *

M
y preoccupation with Caitlin’s problem for most of the day made me almost forget how much I wanted to see Lew, but when he greeted me with that smile of his as I walked into chemistry class sixth period, it all came back to me in a smoking hot rush.

“We missed you at lunch,” he said as I sat beside him. “You and Annalee hitting the library again?”

He missed me! Well, he said
we,
but that meant him too, didn’t it?

“Nah, we were just talking.”

“Everything okay?”

“Just girl talk,” I said. “You know, which lip gloss is the best, how to keep your nail polish from chipping, who’s our latest crush.”

He gave me a look I couldn’t quite read. “So who are the lucky guys?”

Just you for both of us, Mr. Clueless.
Wait, he did say
lucky.
But did he mean me or Annalee? God, I was so pathetic. If I hadn’t already been dead, I would’ve been tempted to scream
Kill me now!

“Justin Bieber and Morgan Freeman,” I said instead. “I’ll let you guess who likes whom.”