private sector you have to justify your wages or you get fired. In Libbyâs case, she thought that getting the job was where the work came in, and that once she was in, she had only to share her half-formed opinions while smiling for the camera.
For reasons we cannot fathom, the public kept voting for Leighton time and again. Today, we have saved taxpayers the expense of a smug and useless tax drain. We have also moved one step closer toward the political utopia our professor â our leader â demands.
Youâre welcome.
This has been a message from the Society for Political Utopia.
Clare set down the page, and looked back and forth between the two detectives.
Morton spoke Clareâs thoughts. âWe think the killer is in this department, either as one of the students, or a professor.
Clare nodded. âBy professor, do you mean Dr. Easton?â
âNot necessarily. It could be someone who wants him gone.â
Kumar showed Clare a business card protected by a plastic evidence bag.
â
spu
.â
Clare flipped the card over.
âYour death will be your greatest public service.
Whatâs this?â
âWeâve been showing it to the students, trying to gauge their reactions.â
Clare passed the card back. âIs it evidence?â
âLaura Pritchard found the card in her husbandâs belongings, but weâre not telling the students that.â
âHer girlfriend is in my class. Susannah probably knows about it.â
âWe know,â Morton said, adding one more thing Clare was pissed at Cloutier for not briefing her on. âAnd for whatever reason, Mrs. Pritchard hasnât told her girlfriend that she found it.â
Clare wasnât so sure she believed that. But okay. âWhat are you telling the students, then? When you show them the card?â
âWeâre saying Sam Cray found it, in Libby Leightonâs belongings.â
âSmart,â Clare said. âAny strange reactions yet?â
âNo. But youâre only our fourth interview. Assuming you can get that phone charged, Sergeant Cloutier will brief you once weâve had a chance to consider everyoneâs statements.â
Yeah right. Cloutier would hold something back, like he had when heâd briefed her in the first place. It was like he had something against Clare succeeding.
âIt was good work â or inadvertent good luck â that you overheard that conversation yesterday.â
So Cloutier
had
deemed it important enough to pass on. At least she was getting kudos â or inadvertent congratulations â for something.
âI got the sense that Dr. Easton was holding back,â Clare said. âMaybe not lying to Brian directly, but he was cagy. And he kept looking back at me. Though I donât think he noticed me noticing.â
âRight. Sergeant Cloutier said all that. We agree with Brian, by the way. We think Matthew Easton is the societyâs founder.â
âDoes Cloutier know that?â Clare felt her blood approach its boiling temperature. She was determined not to let it come to the surface.
âOf course he knows.â
âFucking jerk.â There went her determination.
âAre you all right?â Morton eyed her strangely.
âIâm fine.â Clare gritted her teeth.
âYou were practically beating down my door for this opportunity. Donât make me think I made a mistake giving it to you.â
âIâm sorry.â Clare slumped in her chair. She felt disoriented. She needed sleep. âYouâre right. Iâm sure Sergeant Cloutier either told me or he meant to.â
âFine,â Morton said.
Clare straightened her posture. She had to show them she was serious. âSo should my main focus, as well as gathering information, be to penetrate the society?â
âIf you can. Although if Brian Haas has been trying to get in for years, it may not be as easy as you
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