Rushing to Die (19 page)

 

Chapter Thirty-­four

T
OSSED OUT OF
formal recruitment . . . I could barely process such a tragedy. The hours of blood, sweat, and tears. All the paint, tulle, and twinkly lights. The fights over the perfect stuffed-­animal placement, the heated debates over flat iron versus curling iron. The bouncing practice!

I wandered through campus, not ready to go back to the house and tell everyone what had happened—­what I'd done. But who was I kidding? Someone had probably posted all the gory details on GreekGossip.net already. Or Maya had delivered the proclamation, torn up all the invitations to pref night at our house, and hung crime-­scene tape all around the beautifully landscaped grounds.

The last time I'd felt this devastated, I'd just learned that one of my sisters had betrayed my chapter. Now, the sister that had betrayed Delta Beta was me.

The shame of it knocked me back into a nearby bench. I put my head in my hands and let the tears come, as the memory of another bench, next to the Jackson Memorial Engineering Building, floated to the surface. We had been so proud of raising the money to dedicate that bench to my pledge class. Our kissing booth at the student center had raised nearly five hundred dollars before we were shut down by the administration for possible sexual-­harassment violations. The location was perfect, too, since the Jackson building had been named for Louella's husband, a Sutton College alum, and a pioneer in advanced nail-­gun technology. As a pledge, I had been so excited to learn that, until I realized his invention had nothing to do with fingernails and everything to do with drywall. That was back when I idolized all Delta Beta alumnae, when I believed that they were nice old ladies who only had our best interests at heart.

Kind of like how my chapter thought of me. A nice old lady no longer. The sobs started again and were interrupted by two Hunter boots stopping in my field of vision.

I looked up. “You!”

Ginnifer was in the same clothes she'd worn when she was recorded by our cameras giving something to Alexandria Von Douton.

I scrambled to my feet, pretty sure I could outrun her in those rubber boots. But if she decided to take me down, those boots would help her. We were pretty evenly matched.

“Margot, I just heard the news.”

“GreekGossip?”

The grim expression on her face was all the confirmation I needed. I let a curse word fly, and Ginnifer's eyes widened in shock. But if there was ever a time for me to use the “d” word, it was now.

“Have you called headquarters?” I couldn't believe this question, of all questions that I needed immediate answers to, was the one that popped out. I think we could both tell I was not operating on all cylinders, anyway.

When Ginnifer shook her head slowly, alarm bells went off. There was something seriously, seriously wrong here.

A sisterhood mentor who wasn't calling headquarters regularly? And who hadn't updated them on a chapter's being kicked out of rush?

Her confirmation of this major breach of protocol was the last piece of the puzzle.

“You've betrayed your sisterhood.”

Ginnifer's hands twisted, and there was a strange plea in her voice. “You have to understand . . .”

I'd tried giving her the benefit of the doubt, but now I had to address the damning evidence. “You've been meeting with Von Douton, you ratted us out, about the strippers, about Callie, about the surveillance system.”

It was a guess, but it fit. No one else inside the chapter had been caught multiple times with the enemy.

“Why would you set us up like this?” My shriek was probably heard all the way across campus at the Frito Lay Agricultural Hall.

Ginnifer's hands twisted frantically. “I didn't know what they would do, Margot. I thought some information here and there would be safe. I mean, how was I to know that Sutton rush was so bloodthirsty?”

“You NARCed on us!” I already knew about part of it, of course, but now so much more made sense. But not all of it. “But you were always trying to make sure we followed the rules!”

Ginnifer stepped toward me, and I took a step back. I didn't know if I trusted her enough to be in my personal space. “Yes, I did. Because . . . I didn't want to tell them anything. And because I wanted a clean rush for once in my life, and I thought Sutton was my chance.”

A single tear spilled out of her eye, and it would have made a beautiful addition to a pref-­night ceremony, except for the fact that she was admitting her betrayal of Delta Beta.

“I wanted to follow in your footsteps. The legendary Margot Blythe, the greatest sisterhood mentor who ever lived, and here I got the chance to learn from the master, to sit at your feet and soak up all your wisdom.”

This made no sense. “But you kept yelling at me with your megaphone.”

Ginnifer ducked her head. “I was insecure.”

Oh, okay, I guess I would be insecure if I were a young sisterhood mentor and had been assigned to work with me. I had been pretty awesome at my previous job.

Key words: HAD BEEN. I was sucking at my current job. Exhibit A: Getting chapter kicked out of rush. For years, future generations of sisterhood mentors would learn how NOT to advise a chapter by studying my actions of this week. I rubbed my forehead, as if that could forestall the horrible migraine that was coming. “Yelling is not the most effective way of communicating.”

“It seemed to work okay . . .”

I had been talking to myself, but I didn't point that out. “I have to call headquarters to tell them everything.” I shuddered at the conversation with Mabel Donahue that was to come. Explaining how the chapter had gotten kicked out of rush AND there were two unsolved murders being blamed on our S&M director AND how I had failed to provide proper leadership for the sisterhood mentor? I wondered how far I'd get with my wig and glasses. Maybe I could talk to Ty about witness protection.

And the worst part of it was, I didn't have any answers to give Mabel, when she asked me why I didn't keep a closer eye on Callie, or Ginnifer, or . . .

“Wait.” Ginnifer looked up with pathetic, puppy-­dog eyes. As if I was going to feel sorry for her. “Why, Ginnifer? Why give all of it to Von Douton? I don't understand that part. You said you wanted to be more like me, and I would never, ever betray us to a Moo sister.”

Ginnifer looked miserable. “It's going to come out anyway. Since you'll probably ask for an investigation . . .” She let it hang out there like there was some chance that I would give her a hug and tell her it was going to be all okay. Maybe when Moos flew.

She saw the “no chance” written on my face, and continued, “Ms. Von Douton has a granddaughter at Alabama.”

That was Ginnifer's alma mater, I remembered, and I gestured for her to get on with it. “And her granddaughter had information about certain activities that I encouraged during rush there.”

“You didn't,” I said.

“She was going to tell headquarters about all the tequila shots we gave to the rushees,” she said. “Then there were the bribes.”

“For Leticia's sake!” I clapped my hands over my ears.

“It wasn't a big deal, we just . . . called the Department of Homeland Security on the other chapters. Just the two times. Their study-­abroad activities were really suspicious.”

It was all the proof I needed that she was morally deficient. Betraying our chapter hadn't even been the first of her crimes: She'd had years of experience performing possibly illegal activities. I reached into my pocket to feel the comforting shape of my cell phone. Three little numbers, and I'd get Sutton emergency ser­vices. I didn't even care who won their bet this time. I'd shout Ginnifer's name right before I was attacked with a spike to the back of my head.

“Did you hurt ­people, Ginnifer?” I asked quietly, even as my hand shook withdrawing my phone. “Did you kill Shannon Bender and Daria Cantrell?”

A half sob erupted from her. “No!”

She sounded sincere. She looked stricken. But I'd been fooled by her before. “I don't know if I can believe you,” I said, even as my grip eased up on the phone. I don't know what it was, but I didn't feel unsafe. Just betrayed.

“I did it for Delta Beta!” she cried.

She didn't know how many times I'd heard that before. “I have to tell headquarters everything.”

At that, she turned and ran away.

After I went through the Starbucks drive-­thru, I realized I couldn't avoid my responsibilities any longer, even if they were the worst duties ever.

I still had taken vows to these women here at Sutton and Delta Betas throughout the world. Those vows must be honored even if I did it wrong.

At the Delta Beta house, I called everyone into the chapter room. They had all heard the news, and there was a mix of confusion and emotional pain in every question that I couldn't answer.

When I apologized to the chapter, I meant every word. I was sorry we wouldn't make quota. I was sorry we wouldn't pledge new sisters. I was so sorry our headquarters would likely pull our charter, and everyone would be homeless.

That was the extent of my positive thinking. I was out of rainbows and sunshine and baby ducks. The time had come to face facts.

My Michael Kors watch said pref night was starting in five hours. I headed to my apartment, determined to find solace in the flask I had hidden in my lingerie drawer and a pint of cookies and cream that I'd been steadfastly ignoring during rush-­work week.

After pulling on a pair of flannel pajama pants and my coziest, most comforting fleece from sophomore year, which had seen many postbreakup pints of ice cream, I poured a dose of Fireball into my Delta Beta shot glass, toasting Mary Gerald Callahan and Leticia Baumgardner. I had barely made a dent in the cookies and cream when there was a knock at my door. I ignored it. As I was about to be fired, I figured the members better get used to not having me around. The knocking grew insistent, then downright pushy.

“All right!” I yelled. “Come in!”

In a whoosh, the door flew open, and there was Sheila DeGrasse, looking all pulled together and chic and evil in a black sweater dress, tights, and thigh-­high boots that totally should have been mine.

She arched an eyebrow at my flannel and fleece. “Oh, honey,” she said, her tone pregnant with pity.

“What are you doing here,” I mumble-­glared at Sheila, who had the gall to burst in on my pity party in a seriously fierce pair of four-­inch red boots. To her credit, she didn't back down from the girl on the couch clutching a pint of ice cream and wearing pajamas. She tutted and looked pointedly at my cookie dough. “And you call us the Moos.”

Sheila needed to go. She was disturbing the coma I was trying to put myself into. I was about to suggest that she shouldn't let the door hit her on the way out, when she said something that stunned me.

“Callahan Campbell is innocent.”

Well, the substance of her statement didn't shock me. But the bald assertion of a truth that I didn't find the need to argue with from a Tri Mu was pretty incredible. And suspicious.

“I know,” I haughtily said. “I've been telling everyone that. Thanks for the update.”

Sheila's lips tightened at my sarcasm, and I felt sorry for a nanosecond for letting my depression get the better of me.

“Don't you want to know why I came over?”

Depressed Margot wanted to throw a blanket over her head and tell Sheila to go back to the farm. But, naturally, Curious Margot won out, as she always did. “Yes,” I said.

“I have proof of Callahan's innocence. And I thought you'd like to be there when I gave it to the cops.”

“Down at the police station?”

Sheila nodded.

This could be a trick. No matter the status of our truce, I still was wary of Moos bearing gifts.

“No,” I said definitively. “When Lieutenant Hatfield has something to tell me about the case, he'll give me an update.”

Sheila's brows rose in interest. “Oh. You two are that close?”

Not really. “It's professional courtesy,” I informed her. Not that she would know anything about that. She didn't look convinced, so I went on. “I have a very firm policy of not intruding on police work. I don't even know where the police station is.”

Sheila let out a bark of laughter. “You don't trust me.”

There it was. “No.” I admitted it because—­why not. Let's lay it all out. “After what happened today? I was stabbed in the back by the Mafia. Like Caesar, they each took a turn, the Deb, the Moo, the Lambda. And the rest of the advisors didn't do anything. I would have stood up for them, insisted that any chapter leaving rush weakened all of us. We're stronger together, but no, they saw I was weak, and they all did nothing. And now you waltz in here, with your shiny hair and your Angel perfume and hot boots, and I'm supposed to believe that you don't have an ulterior motive?” My voice had risen, it was shaking and on the verge of hysteria. “I may have been born on a Tuesday, but it wasn't last Tuesday.”

As tough as Sheila was, I shouldn't have been surprised at how she stayed ice cool during my shrieking. I had to give her credit for that. It was probably a character trait that helped her become the preeminent rush consultant in North America: staying chill while frantic, hormonal sorority women screamed at her. Finally, she spoke, calmly and scarily. “You're absolutely right.”

“You really need to stop agreeing with me!” I half yelled.

“I do have an ulterior motive.” Sheila's eyes shimmered. “Normally, I'd let your chapter hang, ensure a fantastic pledge class for my client, and move on. But I want justice for Shannon. You were right at Panhellenic. If Callahan Campbell isn't exonerated, the police are letting the real killer go free.”

Truce or no truce, I didn't ever know if I'd trust Sheila DeGrasse. But that ulterior motive I understood. I dug my spoon into a big chunk of cookie dough and took a bite. Then I stood. “I'm taking my own damn car.”