The remaining stools and chairs pushed back, and the nightclub emptied onto the street, a drunken and angry mass. Their chant continued long after Caitlin lost sight of Amireau, and didn’t stop until the wail of sirens replaced words.

Chapter 22

CHAPTER

22

TWENTY MINUTES AND three police cruisers later, the bar had nearly emptied of students. Jerry Greenwood leaned against the railing of the rooftop patio. “Where’d your young journalist friend go?”

“Not quite sure.” Caitlin pointed down to the crowd-less sidewalk. “How did the march of the Chapman Chapter end?”

Greenwood laughed. “Most scurried when the lights came on.”

“Kind of a weak protest for a college town.”

“Well, it’s Tuesday.” He looked at his watch. “Correction, Wednesday morning. How’d the shenanigans start?”

Caitlin walked him through to Lakshmi’s exit. “Because apparently Amireau has a restraining order against her?”

“First time she mentioned it?”

“News to me, and I’m a journalist.” Caitlin turned in time to catch a server. “Miss?” She held up her plastic cup, empty except ice cubes. The server nodded.

“Wait a sec,” Greenwood said. “Can I have a vodka soda, splash of cran?”

The server took their orders back toward the bar.

They sat. Caitlin picked a plastic votive candle off the table, flicked the tiny switch off and on. “How did Amireau get a restraining order against Lakshmi?”

“How did she behave tonight?”

“She calmly told me she had to leave and that she’d talk to me later.”

“Then she’s grown. After we released Dave and Kieran without any charges, she followed them everywhere, screamed at them in public, trolled them on social media. Michelson moved to California three weeks after graduation, but Amireau stayed. That summer, someone keyed his car, spray-painted Murderer on his front door.”

“You think Lakshmi did that?”

Greenwood shrugged. “She didn’t go home for the summer, so she had access, but it didn’t really matter. Guilty or not, no one proved those boys did anything wrong. Amireau’s attorney filed harassment paperwork. Lakshmi showed up in court, tried to present the people’s case against Amireau and Michelson without an attorney. Judge not only granted the order, he made her pay their attorney’s fees.”

Again, Caitlin revisited Lakshmi’s age. As professional as she seemed, two years earlier would have made her nineteen. Caitlin hadn’t keyed any cars in her youth, but she remembered how out of her mind she’d been the first time she’d switched birth controls. Throw in a best friend’s disappearance, and who knows what she could have destroyed? Still, she’d only known Lakshmi for five days. “Do I have to worry about her?”

The waitress returned with their drinks. Greenwood waited until she’d gone.