The Last Good Girl (3 page)

Dylan's privacy settings only allowed her to see his profile picture. She'd have to subpoena the rest. Dylan was a good-looking young man with brown hair and an all-American grin. There was nothing about his photo that said he was dangerous. But you couldn't tell much from pictures. The nicest people might look like trolls on camera, while the most photogenic smiles could mask horrific secret lives.

“Let's go right to the boy's house,” Anna said.

“Sure.”

“What kind of search team is assembled so far?”

“Campus police are searching campus. Local police are searching off campus. I've got an FBI tech working on finding her phone and setting up an alert on her ATM and credit cards. We've asked farmers in the surrounding area to search their land.”

“Good,” Anna said, though the idea of finding the girl in a cornfield was chilling.

They passed out of Detroit and the asphalt got smoother. In the suburb of Southfield, golden skyscrapers dominated the skyline. Detroit was sometimes described as a doughnut; the city itself was an economic hole, while the surrounding suburbs were full of wealth and infrastructure.

They passed out of the suburbs, drove through a stretch of farmland, and then entered the town of Tower Hills. It was a self-contained college town and one of the most cosmopolitan places in Michigan. The campus was treed and grassy, dotted with historic stone buildings and jewels of modern architecture. The surrounding streets were lined with funky shops and coffeehouses. A five-story clock tower stood on the northern end of campus; it was on half the postcards of the college.

Sam pulled onto a wide U-shaped street across from the campus. The outer side of the street was lined with stately Georgian mansions, identically constructed of red brick, black shutters, and white columns. Only the Greek letters on their porticoes were different.

“Fraternity row,” Anna said. She'd come here with friends a few times herself, for road trips in her college days. The fraternity facades were lit from below, which would've made them look important and formal, except that they were swarmed with college kids stumbling drunkenly around, whooping and laughing. Although the Tower student body was less than 20 percent Greek, fraternity row was the place to party. It was Saturday night, almost eleven
P.M.
Things were just getting started.

Sam pulled up to the curb in front of a house with the words
BETA PSI
in black block letters across the white portico. Despite the cold weather, a long line of students snaked from the front door, down the steps, and onto the sidewalk. A doorman sat at a table on the front porch, screening the potential partiers before letting them in.

Anna and Sam got out of the car and strode up the walk, past the line of students, to the front door. A few kids yelled at them for cutting the line. Music pounded inside the house.

The doorman was a young man wearing a Beta Psi T-shirt. On his table was a list of names under the words
HIGHLIGHTER PARTY
.

“Hey,” the kid said. “Do you have an invitation?”

“Not exactly,” Sam said.

“Turn around,” the doorman said. “So I can see your ass. If it qualifies, I'll let you in.”

Anna looked at the line of girls waiting to get into the house. Were they all willing to turn around and see if they “qualified” to get into this party? She couldn't believe this was happening in 2015—and that the young women were going along with it.

“Or you could tell a joke,” the kid said. “But it has to be a good one.”

Sam flashed her FBI badge and a smile. “How's that? Pretty funny, right?” The doorman stared. “Thanks for the invite.”

Sam pushed open the front door. A wave of indoor air—hot, human, and jungle humid—hit Anna's face. The interior was dark except for bright slashes of neon. The bulbs in the chandeliers were black lights, glowing purple. Everyone wore white T-shirts covered in neon writing. Many held highlighters and were drawing on one another's shirts and skin, leaving colorful neon designs that glowed under the black lights. It was like walking through the negative of a photograph. Everything white shone purple, everything neon fluoresced, and everything else was shrouded in black.

They pushed through the crowd in the foyer. Rooms sprawled darkly in every direction, each throbbing with music and packed with glowing young people. The scent of beer, sweat, and Axe body spray was everywhere.

“I'm looking for Dylan Highsmith,” Sam shouted to a young man near the staircase. He eyed them appreciatively and flashed a drunken smile, which made his teeth glow purple. Sam was obviously not a student, but she was a beautiful woman in her midthirties, with a mass of dark, curly hair. She wore black pants and a black leather jacket, and she rocked them. Anna herself was twenty-nine, probably too old to be mistaken for a student, but she had long blond hair, and her long coat hid the fact that she was wearing a pantsuit.

“What's it worth to you?” the kid leered.

As a young woman in a profession where people expected a gray-haired man, Anna was used to being underestimated. She'd learned to use that. Being underestimated could be a power in itself.

“We'd be really grateful if you could point us in the right direction,” Anna said, smiling at him.

“That way.” The kid pointed and smiled back. “Dylan's wearing the crown. Want a drink?”

They followed his finger into a large back room. It was dominated by a Ping-Pong table, held up by four seminaked boys on their knees, acting as the legs of the table. Neon designs glowed on their exposed skin. On the surface of the table were four Solo cups filled with beer. Four boys were playing beer pong in the dark. The white ball glowed purple as it bounced back and forth. Neon-hieroglyphed girls watched and cheered. When the ball splashed into one of the plastic cups, the player in front of it lifted it and chugged. He almost got to the bottom, gagged, and stumbled to the corner. “Boot! Boot! Boot!” yelled the crowd, as the kid vomited into a garbage can.

The players on the other side of the table roared with victory and high-fived. One of the victors wore a shiny white plastic crown, glowing purple. He had dark hair, perfect teeth, and jeans that might've cost more than Anna's weekly salary. Sam and Anna made a beeline for him. “Dylan Highsmith?” Anna asked.

He looked her up and down, then grinned. His teeth glowed bright purple. “Hey, babe.” He reached out and grabbed Anna's butt, a big fleshy handful, which he squeezed and used like a handle to haul her into his chest. He brought his leering mouth down, breathing beer fumes into her face. Anna was so surprised, she didn't think about how to react. She just reacted. She shot her knee up, hard, into his groin. He grunted, let go of her, and doubled over. The crown tumbled off his head.

Dammit,
Anna thought, as she stepped back. That was not going to facilitate the kid's cooperation. Nor was it going to look good on Sam's 302, the FBI report that would summarize the witness interview.

Dylan straightened up, narrowed his eyes, and took a threatening step toward her. Sam drew back her leather jacket, revealing the badge and gun at her waist. “FBI Agent Samantha Randazzo. This is Anna Curtis, Assistant U.S. Attorney. I suggest you take a moment to collect yourself, sir.”

A few kids hooted at the realization that Dylan had groped and then been kneed by a federal agent. A girl with honey-colored hair and Tory Burch flats picked up the plastic crown and held it like something precious.

Sam said, “Do you need medical attention?”

Dylan stared at the badge and shook his head. His beer-pong partner came over and stuck out a hand. “Peter York,” he said. He carried himself with the self-assurance of a boy who grew up in a country club and had been trained from an early age on how to interact with servants and other lesser beings. “Can I help you?” The girl holding the crown fitted herself into Peter's side.

“We're investigating the disappearance of Emily Shapiro,” Sam told Dylan. “Where can we talk privately?”

“Emily Shapiro is a crazy bitch,” said the girl.

“And you are?”

“Whitney Branson, one of her roommates.” She swiped a manicured finger quickly under her left nostril, then her right.

“Shut up, Branson. Don't say anything till I come back.” Dylan pulled out his phone. “I need a minute,” he told Sam. He walked to a corner and made a call.

“Can I offer you a beer?” asked Peter.

Sam took out her notebook and asked for their names and DOBs. Anna scanned the party. It had quieted considerably. The students stood in clusters, watching them and whispering. The space around Anna and Sam had grown, as if law and order were contagious.

Only the four miserable boys under the Ping-Pong table hadn't moved. They kneeled on the sticky floor, arms raised above them to hold up the tabletop. They looked like the statue from
Atlas Shrugged,
only far less dignified. They wore only underwear. Every inch of their exposed skin, head to heels, glowed in highlighter designs: slashes, doodles, Greek letters, and cruel words.
PLEDGE. SLAVE. WHALESHIT. BEER BRINGER. PISSANT
.
One of the boys met her eyes, and Anna startled. She wasn't sure—the black lighting was weird and the kid was out of context—but something about his face looked familiar, like a shadow of Cooper's. The boy quickly looked away.

Dylan strode back into the group. “This conversation is over,” he said.

“Why?” asked Anna.

“Because I don't feel like talking to you, and I don't have to.”

“It's true, you don't have to talk to us,” Anna said. “But you should. There's a girl missing. We might still be able to find her alive. But we really need your help. You were the last person to see her alive.”

“Let me make this totally clear,” Dylan said. “I'm invoking my right to remain silent and to have an attorney present when questioned by you. I'm also asking you to leave this house, which is private property. Leave. Now.” He turned to Peter and Whitney. “Was there anything unclear about what I said, witnesses? My lawyer would love if there were. We pay him seven hundred fifty dollars an hour, and he can't wait to dig in.” Dylan looked at Anna. “He's particularly interested in the fact that this prosecutor assaulted me in my own home. I may just bring charges.”

“Here's some free legal advice,” Sam said. “Grabbing someone's butt is a sex assault. Ms. Curtis could've put you in the hospital and it would've been legal self-defense. You're lucky you only got a quick knee.”

It didn't change the fact that they didn't have a warrant—and they didn't have enough evidence to get one. They had to leave.

• • •

As soon as they were outside, Anna and Sam each pulled out their phones. Anna called Cooper.

“You okay?” Cooper answered on the first ring.

“Yeah.” She spoke softly, cupping her hand around her mouth. Her breath came out in clouds through her cupped fingers as she strode toward the Durango. “Is your brother Wyatt a member of the Beta Psi fraternity at Tower University?”

“Yeah. Why? Is he in trouble?”

“No. But he might be helpful. I'm investigating another kid in his frat, and I'd like to talk to someone on the inside. Can you get him to meet with me?”

“I'll try.”

“Thanks.”

When she hung up, she got in the car and turned to Sam, who sat in the driver's seat reading a text. The agent's lips were pressed in a grim line. “What?” Anna asked.

Sam looked up. “They located Emily's cell phone and purse.”

“Where?”

“At the bottom of the Pit.”

To:
[Class List: Media in the Internet Age]

From:
Professor Ginger Robinson

Date:
August 25, 2014

Re:
First Assignment

Welcome back to returning students, and welcome to incoming freshman! Thanks for choosing “Media in the Internet Age” for your elective. I'm so glad that you signed up for this yearlong interactive class. I hope you had a wonderful summer and are ready to jump back into exploring, learning, and growing.

This e-mail is to give you your first assignment, which begins before we even meet the first time, because now is such an interesting time for you, and it should be captured.

Please record at least one video per week, in which you describe your experience as a college student—your reaction to your roommates, teachers, the college itself. This is a video log of your time here, also known as a vlog. This assignment will continue throughout the year. It is my hope that you will not only grow comfortable talking on camera, but that this will be a project which will allow you to look back and track how much you've changed and grown, and to reflect on the forces that shape us.

Please start this week. Describe how you feel as you arrive at school and settle in. This is the only week where I'll ask for specific content, which is the following: (1) Describe yourself in three words. (2) Tell me your greatest strength and your greatest weakness. (You should get used to these questions, by the way, as you'll be asked them in job interviews for the rest of your life!)

In future sessions, your vlog can be as simple or elaborate as you'd like. Some students find this to be quite cathartic. The only minimum is that you record yourself for at least five minutes every month.

Get creative. Sing, if the spirit moves you! Dance! Dress up as your teachers and impersonate them. Film three minutes of yourself being President Shapiro. Eat your least favorite food from the cafeteria on camera. Time-lapse how fast a Domino's pizza is devoured by you and your friends. Or just talk, share what you're feeling and thinking. Viewers respond to authenticity. This is your experience.

Create your own channel on BlueTube, with the settings on “private” so no one else can view them. Upload all your videos for storage, but do not publish them to the public. Do not view them yourself until the end of the year. You may be amazed to look back and see the changes in yourself. In May, you will review your videos and choose your top five, which most encapsulate your student experience. Submit those to me.