The Lady Sleuths MEGAPACK TM(255)

                             I swallowed. Did he know about us? How could he? I’d never told anyone about our relationship. Had Katie?

                “We were pretty good friends,” I finally said. “She was one of my freshmen here on the floor, of course, so I saw her all the time. We hung out. We were on the Student Activities Board together, and she used to ask me for help with her psych homework—she was a history major, she knew all about what people did, but sometimes she had trouble understanding why they did it.”

                “I have the same problem in my line of work,” he said, nodding. Maybe he didn’t know about our relationship, after all. “Was there anyone who disliked Katie? Anyone she fought with?”

                For that one, I didn’t need to think before answering. “Dee,” I said. “Her roommate. She and Katie fought all the time. They fought last night, actually, before the picnic.”

                “Picnic?”

                “They—Katie and Dee—Gavin and Ethan, too, actually—they were all in the same first-year seminar, Introduction to the Sociology of Gender. Professor Farmer always has a late-night picnic for his seminar students at his house at the end of the term. It’s indoors, I don’t why he calls it a picnic, but he does. He lives a mile or so out of town, north on Route 7. Anyway, before they left for the picnic, Dee and Katie got into a huge argument. Katie thought Dee had stolen her iPod. She accused her of it, and Dee went crazy—it was awful. They were both yelling at each other. Their room is three doors down the hall, but I could hear them from here. I went over and told them to knock it off, and Katie came here for a minute to tell me what had happened. She actually”—I swallowed a lump in my throat—“she was sitting right there where you’re sitting.”

                He gave me a minute to compose myself. When I started breathing again, he resumed his questioning. “Anyone else? Anyone she recently had issues with?”

                Should I tell him about Gavin?



                             He sensed my hesitation. “Anything you can give us may help,” he said kindly.

                I drew in a breath and decided to risk it. “Yesterday, this guy on the hall, Gavin, asked her out. Katie said no—she wasn’t interested in being in a relationship, I think, and, besides, Gavin’s not really her type. He came to me, told me about it—Gavin did, I mean. I calmed him down, reminded him that one ‘no’ from one girl wasn’t the end of the world. He was pretty steamed about the situation when he stormed in here, but I think he was okay when he left. I don’t think he was ever mad enough to—to do anything to hurt Katie. That’s—I mean—no, I’m sure he wasn’t.”

                “All right, Max, thanks.” He slipped the notebook into his jacket pocket and stood up. “I think that’s enough for now. If I need to ask you any more questions, is it okay if I come back?”

                I nodded.

                “Here’s my number,” he said, handing me a business card. “You think of anything else, give me a call, okay?” He opened the door and walked off down the hall.

                * * * *

                Just the thought of it was staggering.

                Katie had been killed, probably murdered, not even two days after dumping me. That made me the spurned lover, and, regardless of what Branigan said, I’ve seen enough cop shows on TV to know that a spurned lover is an obvious suspect.

                I hadn’t killed Katie, I knew that. But I also knew that, in order to protect myself from being suspect number one and chance the truth coming out and getting me tossed out of Middlebury halfway through my junior year, I’d have to figure out who did kill her before the detective dug any deeper into our relationship.