Chapter 30

30

"Mike, Jodi. Jodi, Mike," Colleen said.

Colleen was sitting beside me in my Ford F-150's passenger seat with her mysterious friend now sitting behind her in the crew cab.

In the rearview I looked at Jodi's silk clothes, her fancy handbag. There was a well-bred look about her, a Park Avenue elegance and grandeur. She looked like a model in a Nordstrom catalog.

What in the hell was this about? I thought.

I swung a U-turn around on the street in front of The Forge and stopped at the light for Route 4. When I looked to the right about a quarter mile up, I saw there were a bunch of cop cars.

When I turned to Colleen, I noticed that she was looking in that direction as well. None too calmly.

"Where are we going?" I said.

"We need to head left," Colleen said, turning to me. "Just go left."

"Left. Got it," I said.

When the light turned green, I did go left. But instead of getting on the bridge, I suddenly pulled in alongside a boom crane at the worksite that belonged to the construction guys from the bar.

"What are you doing?" Colleen said as I put the truck in Park. "We need to move it. Come on."

"I will in a second," I said. "After you tell me what's going on and who your friend here is. Those cops up there are for...?"

"They're for Jodi and me," Colleen said, staring at me. "Remember I told you about my case? The dead girl from Beckford College?"

"Yes," I said. "Olivia something."

"Olivia Ramos," Jodi said behind us.

I looked back at her.

"Well," Colleen said, turning to the back seat, "Jodi, hand up the phone."

Colleen tapped the screen of the iPhone Jodi handed her and held it out for me.

It was a video and in it, a girl was being led out of a house by four men, two on either side of her. She was stumbling as if drunk. When she turned back in the direction of the camera, what looked like blood was dripping from her mouth as they put her into an SUV.

"That's Olivia. This is video on the night of her death coming out of the house of the president of Beckford College," Colleen said.

"It's my house," Jodi said.

"Your house? You're the college president?" I said.

"No," Jodi said. "My husband, Martin Cushing, is the president. I'm Martin's wife."

I looked back at Colleen, perplexed.

"In the college incident report," Colleen said, "it said that night Olivia went from a local bar and then back to her dorm where she OD'd on fentanyl. It didn't say anything about Olivia coming out of the college president's house bleeding!"

"Wow," I said. "How do the cops fit in?"

"These two bastards here," Colleen said, pointing at the phone screen. "This is the director of campus security, Travers, and this is the town chief of police, Garner. They're in on it."

"Holy shit. For real?" I said.

"Yes," Collen said. "And as we were leaving my hotel, we spotted Travers in the parking lot. He followed us out toward the interstate. And then suddenly we started seeing state police cars and town police cars everywhere. They were still chasing us as we got here so I dumped Jodi's car up the street there from the restaurant and we walked back to you."

"Okay," I said, looking in the rearview at the police lights. "I'm starting to see. Sort of. Who are these two other guys in the video?"

"Bodyguards for Frank Stone, my husband's close friend. That's his car," Jodi said.

"Frank Stone is a billionaire hedge fund guy who President Cushing went to law school with," Colleen said. "So, you can see why they're going bananas to cover this up, Mike. Jodi's video is extremely damning.

"These guys stonewalled me all day. First the college, then the town police. And they must have been following me. That's why you need to get us out of here, Mike. We need to head back to New York now."

I looked down at the screen of the phone again as I thought about everything I had just been told.

"Okey dokey. Time to go," I said as I immediately put the truck in Drive and pulled out.

We went across the bridge and made the turn onto Route 4 to the left and passed a church and a small convenience store.

That's when we saw the line of cars.

Up ahead a dozen cars were at a standstill where the road cut through a small canyon, and just beyond them, you could see blue and red lights swinging along the rock.

"Oh, no. It's them!" Jodi said in a panic. "Garner has a road block on this side, too. Now we're stuck. We're too late!"