Dead Politician Society (24 page)

Annabel was in Starbucks ordering a half-caf, half-soy, half-skim vanilla latté, when her BlackBerry buzzed in her back pocket.

Utopia Girl:
You still think we're writing this book together, don't you?

She paid for the drink, then leaned against the wall to wait.

Death Reporter:
Have you changed your mind?

Utopia Girl:
No. Made up my mind not to let you long ago.

Death Reporter:
Why?

Utopia Girl:
Don't like you.

Death Reporter:
But this is about mutual benefit.

Utopia Girl:
What will I gain if you publish this book? Can't collect royalties whether I'm caught or not.

Annabel glanced around her. No one was close enough to watch her type.

Death Reporter:
I told you that I'll find a way of getting them to you. An anonymous bank account — even I won't have to know who you are.

Utopia Girl:
No, you tell the cops the number of the account and they find me withdrawing from it. Think again, Death Whore.

Death Reporter:
So why have you been talking to me?

She grabbed her latté from the shelf, and stuck a lid on it, before heading for the door.

Utopia Girl:
Sanity. You think it's easy to kill a bunch of people and keep all that emotion bottled up. It would be enough to give the fittest person ulcers.

Death Reporter:
So you don't want your story told to the world?

Utopia Girl:
Screw telling the story to a bunch of ignorant assholes. The world will read it with amusement then go on their merry way.

Death Reporter:
So why do you trust me with this stuff?

Utopia Girl:
I haven't told you anything that matters. Besides, it's easy to trust someone when you know they'll be dead soon.

Death Reporter:
Are you threatening me?

Utopia Girl:
Do you think you're hard to find, in your downtown starter condo, as you walk to work along Adelaide and down Yonge Street and then home again by the same route? Sometimes you meet your sister for drinks, and more occasionally you see the man you wish was your boyfriend. On Friday you wore pink. It didn't suit you.

Starter condo? Where did Utopia Girl live, some glamorous student dormitory?

Death Reporter:
You need to stop this. I've put up with your abuse, for the sake of a good story, but I won't stick around to hear threats.

Utopia Girl:
Then turn off your BlackBerry. I'm calling the shots. This is the story of your life.

Annabel had arrived back at her building. Something had to change. This was not going according to plan.

Death Reporter:
I'm not willing to pay with my life.

Are we all here?”

Matthew glanced around the small room, lined with boxes of restaurant supplies. He was proud of this group.

Once the pudgy little kid who was last picked for sports teams and forgotten on schoolmates' party invite lists, Matthew had created a society with so much mystique that he could hand-pick his members from each year's academic elite.

But now someone was threatening all that — from within or without, Matthew didn't know. He had to decide whether to disband the society — at least temporarily — or to keep it together and fight.

“We're all here, sir.” Brian's voice was higher-pitched than usual. Poor kid was clearly nervous. He'd found out about the meeting somehow, and shown up at the beginning, forcing an impromptu membership vote.

Diane shook her head. “You've been a member for five minutes, Haas. You'd think you could start out by listening.”

Ah, Diane. She was a sexy little thing, even if she came across as a tight-assed bitch. Matthew had enjoyed his time with her. She'd been a surprisingly good lover for her then eighteen years. Shame she hated him now.

“Brian didn't join this group to listen.” Jonathan shot Diane a glare. “Just like you didn't come into our lives to make them any more pleasant.”

Nice kid, Jonathan. Bit of a one-issue wonder. Matthew's goal with him was to bring him out of his angry anti-small-business-tax phase and help him look at society as a whole.

“Dr. Easton, can you make him be quiet?” Diane's quirky silent dig — she called him Dr. Easton as often as possible and even when they were alone, though he had told her several times to continue to use his first name after they stopped sleeping together.

“No.” Matthew smiled.

“I can make you be quiet.” Jonathan shook a fist at Diane.

“Really? With violence?” Diane looked around the room for some support, but found none.

“Anyway,” Jessica said, “I'm interested in hearing this new order of business Brian wants to propose.”

Jessica was odd. Although she was one of the most naturally attractive women he had ever taught, Matthew had not once been tempted to make a pass at her. She seemed open, she acted laid-back, and yet he actually felt depressed at the thought of getting her in bed.

“I'm not suggesting we do anything all at once.” Brian reached into his knapsack and pulled out an expensively bound notebook that looked about five hundred pages thick. “This is my family's manifesto.”

Susannah toyed with her ceramic coffee mug — refreshments courtesy of Jonathan's mother, who had loaned them her store room for the meeting. “You say that like you're proud to have a family manifesto. Like you don't think it's weird at all.”

“I recognize that it's not the norm.” Brian's voice lowered slightly in pitch. “And I certainly don't mean to gloat about it.”

“Gloat?” Susannah's eyebrows lifted.

“I've been sent here for a purpose. There are goals that I would like to see accomplished.”

“Sent here?” Diane hooted. “You mean, like, to Earth? Does anyone want to take a re-vote on Brian's acceptance?”

Jessica leaned forward in her chair. “What goals, Brian? Forget what these negative ions have to say. I'm interested.”

“Spare me.” Diane rolled her eyes at Jessica.

“Why should I?” Jessica rolled her eyes back.

“Guys, this is nuts,” Matthew said, in the most authoritative voice he could muster. “Brian, we'll get to your manifesto in a bit. First we have to cut some of this tension.”

Jonathan spoke. “It's the Utopia Killer. We want to believe that someone's framing us — or misdirecting the cops toward us — but when it comes down to it, we're scared. What if the killer is one of us?”

“What if?” Susannah said. “How could it not be one of us? Who else has access to the business cards?”

“They're left at rallies and protests all the time. Anyone could grab one and make copies.”

“Did anyone else receive the card? Or only Libby Leighton?” Jessica asked.

“How would we know?” Susannah looked at her like she was simple. “Do you think the police come to us with every new clue they find?”

“It could be someone from another year,” Jessica said. “Is that Elise girl still in jail? Maybe she's out and back in business.”

“She's still in jail,” Matthew said softly.

“It's kind of too much,” Jonathan said. “If it's all the same to you, Dr. Easton, I'd prefer not to be given any more catering gigs until the killer is caught.”

“I think it's best if no one does any more catering until the killer is caught.” Matthew studied his students. “I'm sorry if you've come to depend on it as a source of income, but it isn't worth being implicated in these murders.”

“Who was working the events?” Diane clicked her pen.

“Let's not go there.” Matthew was firm.

No. Heaven forbid they “go there.” Why would Matthew want to help narrow the field of suspects? Clare desperately wanted to smoke, but the store-room window was open, and she didn't want to draw attention to the bin where she was crouching in the alley.

Susannah's voice was strong and clear. “Look, we all had access. If we weren't working a given event, we could have stopped by and made up any lame excuse if we were seen by the others.”

“I told you I thought I left my bow tie in Elly's van.” Diane's nasal tone pierced Clare's ears even at a distance.

“So how come you needed to crash Libby Leighton's house party to get the tie when you weren't working?” Susannah said. “Some freaky sex ritual with your accountant boyfriend?”

Clare could picture Diane glowering, and the room filled up with laughter.

“Let's leave the alibi checking to the police,” Matthew said. “What's the point of mistrusting each other and saying things that will damage friendships going forward?”

“What's the point of an action-based society if we run away from solving our own problems?” Susannah said. “If it
is
one of us, we have more information than the police do to solve this thing.”

A car turned into the alley. Clare was well enough hidden to avoid being seen by the driver, but the noise muffled the meeting for a couple of minutes while the car crunched the gravel and settled into its parking spot a few buildings over.

“Dr. Robertson,” she heard Susannah saying as the noise abated. “Maybe one or two others in the Poli Sci Department. They hate this class, Dr. Easton, everything it stands for.”

“Why?” said Jessica. “Who would —” Her voice was softer than the others', and Clare lost the rest of her statement.

Susannah's voice was not so soft. “Because they represent the status quo. They're teaching the old system they know and love. Dr. Easton challenges all that. He makes politics positive. He empowers us to ask the questions they don't want us to think about. The questions that will truly lead to change.”

“The fuddy-duddies wouldn't be behind the calling cards or murders, though.” Good old Brian. Clare was glad he'd found a way into the club. He would likely be disappointed soon. Even if the club stayed intact, Clare doubted that his belonging to the
SPU
would bring him any closer to seeing his father's manifesto realized. But it would be better than feeling forever shut out. “If they hate change, they wouldn't create it, not even to discredit Dr. Easton.”

“I might resign from the society,” said Jonathan. “I see Susannah's point, about sticking it out and solving this together, but I don't think we can change the world by devouring ourselves from within.”

“I agree with you.” Matthew's response surprised Clare. “I'm thinking of disbanding the society.”

It obviously made sense to disband the club, but Clare hoped like hell it didn't happen. How was she supposed to crack this case if her one major source of clues was eliminated?

“Disbanding it?” Susannah sounded stunned. “Isn't that extreme?”

“Isn't murder?”

Jessica spoke again. Clare couldn't hear her words, but she sounded sad.

“Yes,” Matthew said, apparently in response to Jessica. “I'm afraid I do.”

“Who do you think it is?” Diane asked.

“I honestly have no idea.”

Frustratingly for Clare, the overall voice level subsided after this. From the clips she could gather, the fate of the society was left tentative. No meetings, and no activities — legal or otherwise — would be organized until the Utopia Killer was caught. Which at the rate the investigation was going, Clare estimated would be sometime the following decade.