She brushed at the wetness in her eyes and nodded.
“Good girl.” He turned to Tyler. “Mr. Bradford, I’d like you to take a camcorder and film”—Brendan looked around at the smashed glass—“the damage.”
“Sure,” Tyler shrugged lazily. “It’s your party.”
It’s someone’s party, Laurel thought. She looked toward Katrina, who stared back at her stonily.
Laurel turned and walked out of the room.
She walked down the stairs, through the dining room, and into the great room, and stopped in front of the monitors. She looked up at the wall, at her reflection in one of the cloudy mirrors.
Then she looked at the monitors.
So Katrina just turned off the camera, so she could smash the glass and win points with Professor Cody. Can I prove that?
She stepped closer and found the Reverse button. She backed up the recording and hit Play …
And saw Katrina standing in a baby doll nightgown, standing in front of the closet, reaching in to choose a sweater and pants … turning toward the bed … then stepping forward and shutting off the camera.
Exactly what she’d thought she’d find.
It’s a good cover story: shutting off the camera so she could dress in privacy.
Laurel reached forward and shut off the recorder.
This whole experiment is completely out of control already. Is there any salvaging it, really? Is there any reason to stay, and let it be hijacked by a spoiled rotten Southern princess?
And the answer came to her in a flash. Uncle Morgan. No matter what else is happening, I have a chance to find out what happened.
A voice spoke behind her. “Okay. Let’s hear it.”
She turned to face Brendan. He was silhouetted in the light coming through the tall windows. “I know you’re having trouble believing—,” he began.
“I’m not sure that there’s any point in continuing this study,” Laurel said in a low, brittle voice. “Not if all she’s going to do is make things up.”
“We don’t know that,” Brendan said, his voice equally low.
“Oh, really? ‘Ah turned it off when Ah changed mah clothes earlier and Ah forgot to turn it back on?’ ” she mimicked Katrina savagely, Carolina accent and all, and was gratified to see Brendan flinch. “It’s completely obvious that she did it herself.” Laurel could see from the uncomfortable reluctance in Brendan’s face that he agreed with her, but she kept going, anyway. “Tyler gave her a whole blueprint with that article. They were out there reading it not twenty minutes before this happened.”
“Okay,” Brendan said, soothingly this time, which infuriated Laurel all the more.
“No, it’s not okay. They got high, they read Leish’s article, and they staged a manifestation.” Her voice was rising again. “And what you don’t see is that you’re encouraging it. We’re not anywhere near the level of scientific objectivity we need to be to make this study viable.” She saw him recoil again, and felt a mean triumph. She couldn’t resist twisting the knife. “Unless it’s now just a study about Katrina acting out. Which you’re rewarding her for doing, you know. So of course she’s making things up to please you.”
Brendan’s face reddened. “To please me? What does that have to do with anything—”
Laurel found her voice rising for no reason she could name. “Oh, please. Don’t pretend that you haven’t seen—”
“What is this, some feminine intuition—”
“Practically on her knees every time you walk in … and you’re feeding into it. ‘Journal this for me, Katrina—’ ”
“And I’m supposed to pretend this has anything to do with reality—”
They were almost screaming at each other, toe to toe, and Laurel suddenly had the sense that she was not entirely herself, that someone else was screaming through her.
She caught a glimpse of them both reflected in the mirrors and it did not seem to be Brendan but a tall, lean blond man.
Laurel gasped and started back, away from him … and then the feeling was gone, and so was the anger. She looked at him shakily. “What are we doing?”
Brendan sagged. “I don’t know.” Laurel was walking, first in circles, then suddenly out of the great room—she had to be out of the room. She walked into the glazed brick entry hall. Brendan followed her.
“I’m sorry. I don’t know what that was,” he said.
She sat on the bench, across from the odd family portrait, and looked at him. All the blazing anger she had been feeling just a moment before was gone, completely evaporated, as if the rage had not been her own. Brendan