by Anthony Alba
"Daddy I want to leave," she cried. Once she got away from here she could make sure that her father was in the right frame of mind to deal with Donald Shepard. She could make sure that Justine knew to keep her lips buttoned up. But first she needed to retreat to safer ground.
Sir Morgan looked from Victoria to Donald and then to Justine. The girl was so very pale she looked as if she might be sick at any moment and from the way she entered the room one might have thought she was going to her execution, but her walk brought her not to stand beside Victoria or Sir Morgan but the Governor.
"I'm sorry," she whimpered and Victoria saw tears begin to well up in her stepsister's eyes as she looked at Sir Morgan, "I never meant to let you down but... please I'm so, so very sorry."
"What have you done to her?" Victoria demanded. Let everyone hear her anger, her father's opinion was the only one that counted and if he thought she was angry for Justine so much the better.
"Done to her?" Donald all but growled as he guided the weeping Justine over to a nearby chair. The girl in the tee-shirt had some sort of tablet computer in her hand but with her free hand she gave Justine a handkerchief to dry away the tears.
"You are probably wondering why she is not in uniform or at class?" He did not wait for the nod from Sir Morgan. "I have no difficulty with putting a girl who warrants it in one of our uniforms. I can even tolerate having a girl who wants to wear the uniform having the experience." For some reason he gave a very quick glance at the girl in the tee shirt but it was so fast Victoria was not sure if she imagined it. "What I will not tolerate is having a vulnerable girl blackmailed into wearing a delinquent's uniform and attending a class where she is sure to be punished."
Her father was looking far too thoughtful and not nearly angry enough. Victoria could almost feel the ground begin to shift beneath her. A few cracks had appeared in the ice underfoot but it had not given way yet. All she had to do was to get away from here.
"Daddy, please let's go."
Sir Morgan looked at her and then he looked at Justine for what seemed a very long time before his gaze turned to the Governor. "I will hear what you have to say, but I assure you that if you have caused Victoria and Justine any unwarranted distress I will destroy you."
Donald inclined his head. "Your terms are acceptable."
---oOo---
The Governor waited until Sir Morgan resumed his seat. Victoria glanced at the door and then to her father before reluctantly taking her own seat. She briefly considered pressing the issue about leaving but it seemed clear that any such protest would be counterproductive. She would have to face her accusers and trust that she had covered her tracks.
"Normally I would not employ anyone with a questionable past, but Ms Lynch is one of the best judges of character I have ever met and she spoke very highly of Ms Evens. When I interviewed her she was quite frank regarding what happened and I believed her. As I said, Ms Evens has always maintained her innocence and only accepted the school punishment under protest and to ensure that she could complete her education. The question she had wrestled with over some time had been who planted the drugs in her locker and why would anyone do such a thing to her? These were the same questions I asked her when she first started here. I believe that, in solving any mystery, it helps to find who has the motive and the means. As Head Girl we reasoned that she may have made enemies but she had hardly been in the position for very long when the drugs were found, hardly time to make any real enemies. So who benefited by her downfall? The most obvious person would be the girl who was promoted to replace her, Victoria Harris."
Seeing Sir Morgan's expression, Donald held up his hand to placate him. "I assure you, Sir Morgan, this is more than idle speculation. A few days ago I received an anonymous email with... what do you call those things..."
"Attachments." The girl in the tee shirt spoke up for the first time. By the sound of her accent she was an American.
"Yes, attachments ... which appeared to have considerable information concerning Victoria and her activities. My knowledge of computers is limited and I was reluctant to act without verifying the information I had received. Nor did I wish to ask the reformatory IT department to examine the files I had received. Once they became involved, matters would be on the record so to speak. So I asked my niece Amanda to examine the files."
Victoria looked over to the girl. Donald had mentioned something about his niece wanting to meet her. Was this the girl? And why would her opinion count? Whoever she was, she was the only person who seemed completely at ease with the events and the strained atmosphere in the office. Justine was still crying but her sobbing had eased off and she was paying attention. Linda looked like someone who was reliving a very painful memory, which perhaps she was.
"Before you ask, Amanda is a computer science and programming undergraduate and is visiting me for the summer. With her technical expertise I knew she could verify the truth or otherwise of the email but at the same time keep matters in the family and off the official record."
"And what did you find?" Sir Morgan demanded. "Who sent it and what does it contain?"
Donald inclined his head towards Amanda. She met their various gazes without flinching even with Victoria trying to have her own stare drill through her.
"The sender was anonymous and quite untraceable," she began. "As for what it contains..." She tapped on the small tablet she had under her arm, and as she did so Donald rose from his seat to his desk and took up a small folder and handed it over to her father.
Victoria moved to his side quickly. She had to restrain the urge to yank the folder and whatever it contained from his hands. Inside it was bound and paginated with numbered dividers and even an index at the front.
"I have taken the liberty of printing off a copy," the American said. "I know some people prefer hard copy." The last was said with an amused glance at Donald. "If you look at tab 1 you will find the printout of extracts from Ms Harris's mobile phone provider. In particular you will see transcripts of SMS text messages sent to and from her phone just before the time of the incident at the school."
Victoria felt her heart skip a beat. Text messages - she had used them to communicate with some of the other prefects. They were so useful if you were stuck in a boring class and wanted a chat but without drawing any attention. But that was years ago; surely all trace of those messages would be gone by now?
"You can see several texts from numbers that have been identified as fellow students and whose school records show some were also prefects." As Amanda spoke, her father leaned forward slightly to read the printed off pages.
"Mostly they are complaints about Ms Evens and her insistence that school rules apply to all students and that the practice of protecting a prefect's favourite students and victimising others should stop. You will see Ms Harris's response where she promises that the 'stuck up cow' will not be a problem for much longer."
She had to do something to head this off. Victoria did not like the thickness of the file before her father. It was impossible surely that so much evidence could have been gathered. She had been so careful to ensure no one would talk.
"I knew that Linda was into drugs so... I told the school," she told them. Better to be seen as a snitch than a blackmailer. "So I knew she would not be Head Girl for much longer."
The girl called Amanda paused to regard her for a moment and those blue eyes sent chills running down her spine.
"You will also see a text sent to another number and if you look at the Police intelligence report attached you will see that the user of this number is suspected of being a drugs dealer specialising in supplying the rich and famous. Whoever this person is, the text message is an order for a substance and I believe that the amount specified in the order matches the amount found in the locker."
"I don't see any reference to cocaine. It says product," Victoria protested. She could not remember exactly what she had texted so long ago but she could see that there was no actual reference to any specific d
rug. And how could anyone get access to Police intelligence files? That sort of thing was supposed to be secret, secure.
"I quite agree," Amanda said very coolly. "However if you examine the next few pages you will see that whatever the product is, it is required on several occasions and appears to be quite expensive. Now there is the matter of the accounts." Amanda looked down at the tablet in her hand and flicked across the touch sensitive screen for a moment. "These printouts seem to have been taken from her own personal computer." She looked up from the screen to regard Victoria for a second with amused contempt. "I can appreciate the need to keep track of the fake accounts you are submitting to your charity friends while knowing what was actually going on but I would strongly recommend that you invest in some geek friends to set up some proper firewalls or at the very least use better encryption on your files."
"Amanda," Donald gave a mild warning.
"Anyway you will see that there is some significant difference between what Ms Harris had recorded as coming in and what she passed on to the various charities she is involved with. Curiously the differences are very close to the price of various 'products' that she ordered by text."
"This is all fake," Victoria cried. "I don't know who you are or why you are doing this but none of this is real." She looked directly at her father, hoping desperately for a sign that he was still with her. "Daddy! You can't believe this. I am involved in charities to help people not myself. Why would I need to steal? I have plenty of money from you."
Worryingly her father did not immediately reply. If he was put on the right track Victoria knew that he might well realise that an outside source of funds could well enable her to get up to all sorts without him being any the wiser. If she used the money from her allowance, that sort of expense would show up eventually.
"And then there is the matter of Justine."
At the sound of that Sir Morgan looked up from his study of the papers before him. "What about Justine?"
"If you look at the next section..." For the first time Amanda sounded hesitant. Not uncertain but hesitant. Victoria saw her nod to Linda and the intern moved over to beside Justine. The girl herself had her face buried in her hands and was crying softly.
"You will see certain photographs of Justine."
Dutifully Sir Morgan flipped back the pages to the next section and there was no hiding the gasp of shock and outrage that came from him at the sight of the photographs that were there.
Victoria felt as if her world was coming apart at the seams. There had to be some way out of this. So far all they had was conjecture and innuendo, but how much did they know? Even the photographs might be explained. Already she could feel a plan forming. She was outraged at Justine's behaviour and had taken the photos to make sure that Justine did not destroy her father's political career.
The photos themselves were clear and each showed Justine in various states of undress with her skirt at her ankles and her blouse open. In one image even her bra was half off revealing one pert breast while her hand was tucked in very suggestively into the front of her panties. On the small table in front of her there were several empty glasses and a long line of a white powdery substance. In all of them Justine's eyes were glazed and she seemed barely to be awake.
"Justine." Sir Morgan looked at some of the photographs for a second before looking away in disgust.
"I'm sorry," she cried, "I only had one drink but... I can't remember what happened I don't remember doing any of those... those things." Without a word Linda wrapped an arm around her shoulder.
"The reason you don't remember is because you were drugged," Amanda told her calmly. At that both Justine and Sir Morgan looked straight at her. "If you look at the next section there was a text from Ms Harris's phone to an unknown number placing an order for Rohypnol, more commonly known as a 'date rape' drug."
Victoria forced a chuckle. "Now you are saying that I tried to rape my step sister. Why would I do that?"
Amanda looked her squarely in the eye and Victoria shivered from what she saw there. The girl looked so affable with her rather tattered jeans and slightly mischievous smile. She might have passed her in the street without the slightest comment, but for a second there was a flash in those blue eyes that made her stomach tie itself in knots.
"Rape, no. You wanted to blackmail her," Amanda said flatly. "You were careful enough to carry out the deed in a VIP area of a well known nightclub away from the security cameras but... it seems that the club owner had hidden cameras installed in the private areas frequented by the celebrities." She shook her head. "I can't imagine why anyone would put secret recording devices in areas where the rich and famous might get up to embarrassing things but all the images appear to have been downloaded to a server and if you check the next portion of the folder ..."
She did not need to go on. Sir Morgan flipped back the pages and Victoria felt everything she had worked so hard for all these years begin to tumble down around her. She had checked, and double-checked but there were not supposed to be any cameras there. Yet there in surprising clarity were still images of her first dropping the powder into Justine's drink and then, when the effects took hold, they showed her half undressing the girl and posing her before she took the photographs.
"It was you," Justine exclaimed. Linda had her arm around the girl's shoulder but at this she shook off Linda and rose to her feet with fury in her eyes. "You told me that I got wasted, that I made a show of myself. You told me that as long as I did what you wanted no one would ever know."
Ignoring the accusations from Justine, Victoria turned to her father. He had gone very still as his eyes were focused on the still images. His face looked so very grey and for a second he looked a lot older that his actual age.
"And lastly there is the matter of the crucifix."
Almost numbly he flicked over the last few pages and Victoria saw the printout of emails. It had been designed especially for her, a one off made to specification... a specification that the jeweller had emailed her for approval. She had deleted those emails, she was sure of it.
Sir Morgan looked at the design for a moment then without looking at her he held out his left hand. "Give it to me."
"Daddy, please I can explain. I..."
"Give it to me. Now." His voice cracked like a whip and Victoria mutely unclasped the chain and handed over the crucifix. Everything he needed to know was set out there in the pages before him. It had been designed to be complicated so that it could not open by accident but it was all there, the special mechanism, the correct way of opening it, all detailed in that email.
As soon as he had completed the correct pattern, the base of the crucifix detached to reveal that the upright beam was hollow and inside there was a clear plastic container, a container half full of white powder.
"Daddy," Victoria cried, but he would not look at her. Why would he not look at her? There had to be some way to rescue this to explain it, but never in her worst nightmare had she ever imagined that all this information was lying around waiting to be gathered up.
Moving very stiffly Sir Morgan rose from the seat and carefully closed the file and left it behind on his vacated seat as he crossed the room to Justine. Without a word he held out his arms and she quickly fell into his embrace. "You poor, poor girl. Why didn't you come to me?"
"She is your daughter and I thought I had too much to drink. I didn't want to let you or Mum down and ..." Justine began to cry again and Sir Morgan began to pat her on the back as she cried into his arms.
After several minutes had passed and Justine's sobs had eased off, he turned to regard Linda. "Ms Evens I am ashamed that any member of my family could have acted with such wanton cruelty towards you. You have my heartfelt apology. I will cooperate fully with any police complaint you might wish to make."
Victoria felt the blood drain away from her face. Police. Surely he must be joking. A police investigation would end his career, the scandal tarnishing the family name beyond repair. And she had too much
dirt on people. If she were to go down she would not go down alone.
Surely he understood that. No, there could be no police investigation. She had partied with the son of one High Court judge and he had been a far heavier user that she ever was. Some of her old instincts were coming out of their numbed state of shock. This was a setback and she might never be able to get her dad on side. Justine and Linda were lost causes as well, but it was not the end of the world. She still had money tucked away and when she reached twenty-one she would have access to the funds set aside for her at birth.
If she had to make her own way in the world without her family, that was something she could accept. She was young, beautiful and rich. More importantly she knew how to get what she wanted from people. No, the world could still be her oyster and she would set about putting that little cow Linda and her American friend in their proper place.
"I am happy to leave the matter in the hands of Governor Shepard," Linda said after some thought.
Victoria snorted. Gutless. The girl did not even have the courage to try and get her revenge herself. Instead she handed over the opportunity to another and what could Donald Shepard do to her? He wasn't even a cop.
Grimly Sir Morgan nodded. With one arm around Justine who was clinging to him as if she would never let go, he looked at the Governor. "I owe you an apology and my thanks for helping to open my eyes to what Victoria has become."
"I quite understand," Donald said graciously. He glanced towards his niece for a second. "We often fail to see those closest to us for what they really are. As to what we should do, might I make a suggestion?"
---oOo---
This can't be happening. That single thought ran through her mind over and over. This can't be happening. Yet somehow it was, and that was something she could not process. How could this have happened to her? She had been so careful. No one who knew the real Victoria would ever dare speak up, as she had too much dirt on them. Yet somehow that American with her affable smile and sharp eyes had found all her buried skeletons. They had come tumbling out of the closet all at the same time and the sheer weight of them had buried her.
