Chapter 2 - THE SIDE DOOR.
By nine the next morning, Alexander had learned two things.
The first was that Chloe had, in fact, worked Founders’ Night.
The second was that Hawthorne University seemed unusually interested in pretending she had not.
He learned the first from Chloe’s bank account.
Alexander had access because Chloe had given him emergency authorization before leaving for college, mostly because she was nineteen and still occasionally forgot passwords.
A payment from Bellamy Event Services appeared every other Friday.
Usually around two hundred dollars.
Sometimes less.
Chloe had never mentioned it.
Alexander was not angry about that.
She had spent most of the previous year insisting that she wanted to handle more of her own expenses.
Her scholarship covered tuition.
It did not cover everything else.
Books.
Laundry.
Gas.
Coffee.
The kind of expenses adults forgot were serious until they watched a nineteen-year-old calculate whether she could afford both shampoo and a required online textbook code in the same week.
The second thing Alexander learned came from Hawthorne’s dean of student affairs.
Dr. Elaine Foster met him at ten-thirty inside an office large enough to contain Alexander’s entire first apartment.
“I understand how upsetting this is,” she began.
Alexander sat across from her.
He hated sentences that began that way.
Foster folded her hands.
“Hawthorne is cooperating fully with law enforcement.”
“Was my daughter working your gala?”
“We use an outside catering contractor.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
Foster’s mouth tightened slightly.
“I’ve been told Chloe occasionally picked up temporary hospitality shifts.”
“Then why did your university tell Detective Ortiz she wasn’t working last night?”
“I can’t speak to what Detective Ortiz was told.”
Alexander pulled a printed bank statement from his jacket.
He set it on the desk.
Foster looked down.
Bellamy Event Services.
Her expression changed almost imperceptibly.
“You came prepared.”
“My daughter’s in the hospital.”
“I understand.”
“No,” Alexander said. “You understand I’m sitting in your office.”
That ended the polite rhythm for several seconds.
Foster looked toward the window.
Outside, Hawthorne University looked exactly like the kind of place brochures promised.
Brick buildings.
White columns.
Old trees.
Students crossing lawns with laptops and expensive coffee.
Tuition exceeded sixty thousand dollars a year before housing.
Some students arrived in cars worth more than Alexander’s house had been when he first bought it.
Chloe had arrived with a scholarship, a used Subaru, and instructions from her father not to confuse expensive surroundings with important people.
Apparently somebody at Hawthorne had already taught her the opposite lesson.
Foster exhaled.
“Mr. Sterling, I don’t supervise catering.”
“Who does?”
“The Bellamy Conference Center coordinates vendors.”
“Then that’s where I’m going.”
She stood.
“I don’t recommend confronting employees while there’s an active investigation.”
Alexander stood as well.
“I’m not confronting anybody.”
“What are you doing?”
“Listening.”
That answer bothered her more than anger would have.
The conference center stood at the edge of campus, connected to the university by a stone walkway.
Alexander did not enter through the front.
He walked around back.
The service entrance sat beside two dumpsters and a loading dock.
A laminated sign had been zip-tied to a metal railing.
EVENT STAFF ENTRANCE.
Alexander stared at it.
He pictured Chloe approaching in the dark wearing black catering clothes beneath a winter coat.
A student at Hawthorne.
Entering her own university through a door beside the trash.
The loading-dock supervisor recognized Chloe’s photograph when Alexander showed it to him.
“Yeah,” the man said. “She worked last night.”
“You’re sure?”
“She’s worked a few events.”
“Then why would Hawthorne say she didn’t?”
The supervisor’s face closed.
“I didn’t say that.”
“I did.”
The man looked toward the doorway.
Alexander followed his glance.
A security camera hung above them.
“You should talk to Bellamy,” the supervisor said.
“I’m talking to you.”
The man rubbed his jaw.
“Look, I got a mortgage and two kids.”
Alexander understood immediately.
“What’s your name?”
“No.”
“I’m not asking you to testify.”
“You’re asking questions that end the same way.”
Alexander studied him.
The man was probably in his forties.
Work boots.
Cheap watch.
Wedding ring.
He kept checking the door.
Alexander lowered his voice.
“I’m not here to cost you your job.”
The supervisor looked at Chloe’s photo again.
“She was a good kid.”
“Is.”
“Yeah.”
He swallowed.
“Is.”
“What happened last night?”
“I don’t know.”
“What happened before she left?”
The man glanced toward the camera again.
Then he stepped closer.
“Students who work these events get different wristbands.”
“Why?”
“So guests know who’s serving.”
“They’re also students.”
“Doesn’t matter when the donors are here.”
Alexander said nothing.
The supervisor continued.
“They’re told to use the back hallways. Staff bathrooms. Staff elevators.”
“Who tells them?”
“Bellamy management.”
“Because?”
The man laughed once without humor.
“Because people paying fifty grand for a table don’t like seeing somebody refill their water and then sit beside their kid in economics class Monday morning.”
Alexander felt something unpleasant settle in his chest.
“Did Chloe complain?”
The supervisor looked at him.
“She didn’t like it.”
“That isn’t the same thing.”
“No.”
“What did she do?”
The man hesitated.
“She asked why student workers had to hide.”
“And?”
“She got told Founders’ Night was about presentation.”
Alexander looked at the metal service door.
Presentation.
A clean word.
A useful word.
A word that could make humiliation sound like logistics.
“Anything else?”
The supervisor’s eyes moved again.
This time toward a young man pushing a rack of glassware through the corridor.
Maybe twenty.
Dark hair.
Thin build.
He saw Alexander.
Stopped.
The supervisor immediately stepped away.
“I gotta work.”
Alexander watched the young man.
The kid looked directly at Chloe’s photograph.
Then at Alexander.
“You’re Chloe’s dad?”
“Yes.”
The color drained slightly from his face.
“My name’s Eli.”
He glanced toward the supervisor.
Then he lowered his voice.
“I was there last night.”
Alexander became very still.
“Did you see what happened?”
“Not the attack.”
“Then what did you see?”
Eli looked toward the front of the building.
“Before she left.”
Alexander waited.
Eli swallowed.
“There was this group.”
“What group?”
“Students.”
“Names.”
Eli shook his head quickly.
“I can’t.”
“Why?”
Eli looked down at his Bellamy Event Services badge.
“Because I need this job.”
Alexander followed his eyes.
Minimum-wage catering uniform.
Frayed cuff.
Shoes polished because somebody had told him guests noticed.
“Eli.”
The young man looked up.
“My daughter is in intensive care.”
“I know.”
“If you know something that can help Detective Ortiz, she needs it.”
Eli’s mouth tightened.
“They made fun of her.”
Alexander said nothing.
“Who?”
“One of them was Bryce Vale.”
The name meant nothing to Alexander.
Eli seemed surprised.
“You really don’t know?”
“No.”
“His dad is Conrad Vale.”
Still nothing.
Eli looked toward the university buildings.
“The Vale Center for Business.”
Alexander understood.
“The building with the giant name on it.”
“Yeah.”
“What did Bryce do?”
Eli shifted his weight.
“He called Chloe the help.”
Alexander’s expression did not change.
Eli continued.
“She told him she was a student.”
“What did he say?”
The kid hesitated.
Then he repeated it.
“He said, ‘Not tonight you’re not.’”
Alexander stared at him.
Eli looked ashamed, though none of it had been his fault.
“That wasn’t all.”
“What else?”
“He asked her to bring him another drink.”
“Did she?”
“No.”
For the first time, something almost like pride entered Eli’s voice.
“She took off her serving apron.”
Alexander waited.
“She folded it.”
“And?”
“She put it on his table.”
A faint image of Chloe at seven years old refusing to apologize for something she had not done crossed Alexander’s mind.
Eli almost smiled.
“She told him, ‘Get it yourself.’”
Alexander could see it perfectly.
Then Eli’s expression changed.
“That’s when Bryce stopped laughing.”
“What happened next?”
“One of his friends grabbed her phone.”
Alexander’s eyes hardened.
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did Chloe have it out?”
“Yes.”
“Was she recording?”
Eli looked around.
“I think so.”
“You think?”
“I saw the camera screen.”
“What was she recording?”
Eli opened his mouth.
Stopped.
A black SUV rolled slowly past the loading dock.
Eli’s entire body stiffened.
Alexander noticed immediately.
The SUV continued.
Dark windows.
No visible plate from where they stood.
Eli stepped backward.
“I have to go.”
“Eli.”
“I’m sorry.”
“What was Chloe recording?”
Eli looked at the SUV disappearing around the corner.
Then he leaned toward Alexander and whispered five words.
“Ask about the kitchen floor.”
Before Alexander could stop him, Eli pushed the glassware rack through the service door.
Alexander remained beside the loading dock.
Ask about the kitchen floor.
He pulled out his phone.
There was already a message waiting.
Unknown number.
No greeting.
No signature.
Just a photograph.
Chloe was standing in catering clothes beside a stainless-steel prep table.
A young man Alexander did not recognize was pointing toward the floor.
Several people were laughing.
And at Chloe’s feet, shattered across the tile, was a white china plate.
Alexander enlarged the image.
On the far edge of the photograph stood Eli.
He was looking down.
Not at the broken plate.
At something beside it.
Something outside the frame.
Then Alexander noticed the timestamp.
May you like
10:43 P.M.
Forty-seven minutes before Chloe disappeared.
