Chapter Nine

Part 3

Instead of heading into the dorm, I walked across the quad, my snowboard stuffed under my arm. The boys’ dorm was accessible through a back door, which I wasn’t surprised to find unlocked. For a school so concerned about crime, they were certainly lax when it came to security.

I closed the door quietly behind me and lumbered up the stairs toward Marshall’s floor. I was despondent after the abysmal work I’d done that day. The one question I’d asked that even remotely pertained to the investigation had caused my suspect to clam up completely. I had to do something to make myself feel better.

Marshall had told me he would return my CDs later in the week, and now seemed like a perfect time to stop by and pay him a little visit. If I played my cards right, maybe I could find out where he was getting the money for all the swag he had in his room.

I shifted my snowboard from one arm to the other and knocked on Marshall’s door. As he answered he was pulling on his jacket as if he were heading out. Judging from the lush cashmere sweater he was wearing and the pungent scent of cologne, I assumed he was going on a date with Cheryl.

“Hey,” I said. “Just wanted to pick up those CDs.”

“They’re right here,” Marshall said, grabbing up the stack and attempting to hand them to me. They balanced precariously in my free hand and I looked at Marshall, blatantly perplexed. What did he expect me to do?

“Got a bag or something?”

Marshall sighed loudly just to let me know that I was imposing upon him, then made a big dramatic show of looking around for a bag as if it were a serious undertaking. I couldn’t believe it. Here was the guy the rest of the school idolized, acting like a big querulous baby. Finally he dropped to the floor and yanked out a leather backpack with the Tommy Hilfiger flag emblazoned on the flap.

I smiled. Little did he know he’d given me the perfect opening.

“Wow. This is nice,” I said as he held it open so I could dump the CDs inside. “Where did you get it?”

“It was a gift,” Marshall said, pulling on the cord to tighten the closure.

Oh, great. Was he going to go all laconic on me, too?

“Actually, I’ve been meaning to ask you, do you remember where you got your Bose speakers?” I asked, stepping further into the room to prevent him from prematurely tossing me out, which he clearly was on the verge of doing. He seemed tense and wasn’t going to tolerate my presence much longer.

“I got ‘em in New York last summer,” Marshall said. “Now if we’re done with the twenty questions—”

“How much were they?” I blurted. Marshall sighed and rubbed his fingers into his forehead impatiently. “I mean, if you don’t mind my asking.”

“They were expensive,” Marshall said curtly, eyeing me like I was such an obvious pauper I could never hope to afford them. “Now I’m late to meet somebody, so you really have to go.” He held the door open and glared daggers at me. Suddenly I realized that his cheeks were tinged with color and his hands were curled into fists. He was definitely more agitated than necessary if he was just late for a date.

Huh. Either Cheryl was a real shrew when it came to punctuality, which wouldn’t be surprising. (She seemed a real shrew in general.) Or Marshall was meeting somebody else. Maybe even a buyer? Could it be? Was that why he was so flustered?

My pulse pounded with excitement. This definitely could be something.

“Right,” I said, hoping there was no external evidence of my intrigue. “Well, I hope you liked the CDs.”

“Yeah, definitely. Thanks,” Marshall said, totally distracted. He locked up behind us and headed for the stairs. “See ya.”

“Yeah. See ya.”

It was all I could do to keep from running right after him. I took a deep breath and held it for a count of twenty, then hustled toward the stairwell. The door on the first level was just slamming. I dropped my stuff, hoping no one would be petty enough to steal it, and raced down the stairs.

Marshall was speed-walking toward the parking lot, his hands in his pockets, his head down. Keeping a good distance between us, I followed as quietly as possible, my heart in my throat the whole time.

Who was he meeting? And where? Was I about to witness a transaction right here, right now?

Marshall disappeared around a corner, and when I peeked around it moments later, he was hopping into an idling Ford Focus. I had no idea what to do. The last thing I’d expected was that Marshall was going to leave campus. I’d figured he’d be doing his deal with another student at Hereford. That was, after all, the issue, wasn’t it?

The car peeled out and I dove back around the wall, praying he hadn’t seen me. I didn’t even have time to get a glimpse of the driver or memorize the license plate. Before I even had a chance to think, the car had disappeared down the windy drive.

I leaned my head back into the cold brick wall. My mother was going to kill me. Whoever was in that car may have been a buyer or a supplier—or some other brand of accomplice. And I’d completely dropped the ball. Obviously I was just going to have to chalk this up to one of those dismal days in the life of a detective.

After retrieving my things from the guys’ dorm I headed for my room. Danielle was sitting on her bed reading Jane Austen’s Emma. She barely looked up when I walked in. Just what I needed. More fractious behavior. I wished I could turn back time and go back to the slopes to start my day over from there. I had had so much fun with Jon, Tek and Michael. Where had I gone wrong?

“Hey. How was your day?” I asked Danielle, attempting to thaw the freeze-out.

“Fine,” she said. “Yours?”

“It was great,” I replied. “Mostly.”

“Great,” she said. “Actually, if you don’t mind, I’m at my favorite part so . . . .”

“Right. I’ll leave you alone,” I said, my heart falling even further.

I put my stuff down and started to peel off my boarding clothes. The longer the silence in the room endured, the more I felt as if my brain and heart were in turmoil. But this was stupid. I mean, how immature could you be? All I’d done was spent one day hanging out with other people. And I liked the girl, but I had been assigned to be her roommate, not her best friend for life. Sheesh!

I took a deep breath and changed into my pajamas, deciding that I was not going to let these people affect me. I wasn’t here to be Miss Affable. These people didn’t have to like me. I was here to ferret out a drug problem. They could all hate me if they wanted to. From this point on, I was not going to care.

I had a job to do, and starting that second, I was going to do it. Clearly the subtle approach wasn’t going to work with Jon, Marshall or David. It was time to start tailing them more, start asking questions around campus. I was going to find out who the bad guy was and I was going to do it, stat.

Because, after today, a whole winter break spent languishing on the couch was starting to sound pretty darn good.