The Pearl
Copyright© 2025 by RealityCheckStories
Chapter 15: The Truth
Erotica Sex Story: Chapter 15: The Truth - Welcome to the stripclub known as "The Pearl" with our central protagonist being a young woman named Lara. We follow Lara as she deals with learning to navigate the pitfalls her new job as a lap dancer such as keeping the lecherous club owner at bay and avoiding the corrupt police captain who has taken a shine to her. Get in, clear her debts and get out. That's her plan. But try as she might, she can't help but get drawn into a criminal enterprise hidden at the heart of the club.
Caution: This Erotica Sex Story contains strong sexual content, including Ma/Fa Fa/Fa Consensual Drunk/Drugged NonConsensual Rape Reluctant Heterosexual Fiction Crime Humor Mystery Sharing Incest Brother MaleDom Rough Gang Bang Group Sex Orgy Anal Sex Exhibitionism Facial Oral Sex Tit-Fucking Voyeurism Big Breasts Public Sex Size Teacher/Student Geeks Revenge
The bed creaked loudly as Will thrust forward, burying himself in the red head’s warm cunt. Her legs were resting against his shoulders as he rocketed in and out of her. She moaned softly as he did it. He couldn’t quite remember her name, not that it really mattered.
After the Cumpetition, he’d wanted Lara. He’d wanted to get her alone, somewhere she couldn’t escape. Whether he would corner her and demand that she admit she was the one who had tried to kill Rob, or corner her so he could fuck her senseless, he wasn’t quite sure. Maybe both. Regardless, he hadn’t been able to find her. She had disappeared off somewhere. So he had settled for the red head. Her head was lolling about as he fucked her.
“Keep fucking me. That feels so fucking good,” Sarah said, groggily.
Too high a dose, Rob, Will thought to himself. In truth, she hadn’t really needed the roofie. She had sought him out and seemed up for it. More than that actually, Will thought she was practically gagging for it. She had been all over him and super enthusiastic. She’d become a bit more docile as the drug kicked in. Still conscious, still awake, still loving his cock, but less active. He preferred it when they were more active. But he wasn’t going to let this stop him from enjoying himself. He’d remind Rob afterwards that he needed to work harder on getting the dosage right.
Will picked up the pace as he slammed into her again and again. Her pussy felt amazing around him as he slid in and out. It normally took a few minutes of slow going while they got used to his size. Normally. This bitch had been so horny that she had been as wet as could be. He loved it. He could have her fast and hard from the start.
Her legs were proving difficult to hold in place though. She wasn’t helping much. He decided to switch it up so he let Sarah’s legs fall and flipped her over onto her belly as he started to fuck her from behind, in the prone bone style.
This position will work fine. She doesn’t need to do much for this to work.
”Uh ... uh ... ooh. Fucking hell you are huge,” she mumbled as he railed her.
Suddenly, Will stopped thrusting as he heard a loud, harsh scream. Not from the woman in his bed crying out in ecstasy. No, this one had come from outside his room. He pulled himself out of Sarah and moved to put on his boxer shorts.
“Where da fuck you goin’? I was enjoying that...” Sarah said, looking up at him with glassy eyes.
He grabbed the key from the nearby counter-top and headed for the door. He opened it, stepped through and then locked it behind him. Will didn’t want anyone walking in on the drugged up girl, but he needed to know what that scream was about.
He walked down the corridor and up the stairs, where he assumed the sound had come from, one story up from him. He was right. As he reached the top, he saw a large crowd gathered outside one of the rooms.
Rob’s room, he thought.
Will half smiled to himself, thinking that maybe he had misheard the scream. Maybe it was one of pleasure and Rob was fucking somebody silly. Still, would he do it with an audience?
Will recognized several of his new Kappa Omega Kappa brothers outside the room and three of the strippers from the party. The atmosphere looked grim. As he approached, Chuck, the chapter president broke off and approached him.
“Don’t go in there, Will. You don’t want to. Trust me,” Chuck told him.
Will started to feel a knot in the pit of his stomach but pushed past Chuck and the group so that he could get through the door. Inside he saw Alan, consoling one of the strippers who was sobbing. He also saw Lara, who looked up at him as he entered. She gave him an odd stare. It was then that Will noticed the body on the floor. Rob’s body.
“ROB!” Will cried out as he dove towards his friend. He kneeled down and started to shake Rob’s shoulders roughly. “Rob! Wake up!” he cried out as he tried to shake the lifeless corpse, in a vain attempt to wake him. His head snapped back to the group just standing and watching.
“Why the FUCK isn’t anyone doing CPR? And call a fucking ambulance!” Will shouted at them.
“We did, Will. It’s coming. But man ... he’s cold. He’s cold,” Alan said, the inference being that Rob had been dead a while and that CPR at this point was completely pointless.
“Rob...” Will half sobbed as he turned back around to look at the body of the friend he had known nearly his entire life. His despair turned to anger in a second. He got up from the body and wheeled on the group.
“What the fuck happened?” Will asked nobody in particular. Again, Alan answered.
“We don’t really know. We just found him like this,” Alan told him. Will looked from him back to the group. His eyes fell on Lara and he knew in an instant that she had done it.
“You! You cunt. You did this!” Will shouted as he lunged towards her. Lara froze in complete shock as the towering man launched himself at her.
But he never reached her. Alan had reacted in a flash and grabbed Will firmly by both arms and used the momentum to spin Will away from her and onto the floor. Will landed with a thud on his face, grunting in pain. He turned from his position on the floor, looking up at Alan in surprise. Alan stood over him, poised to intervene if Will tried again.
“I know you are upset. We all are. But I’m not going to let you touch her,” Alan said. Will got to his feet, clumsily and stared in complete incredulity at Alan.
“Are you fucking stupid? She killed him, Alan! She killed Rob!” Will bellowed at him. Alan merely shook his head but he never took his eyes off the man in front of him, lest he move again suddenly.
“No, she didn’t,” Alan said.
“You don’t know that!” Will answered back.
“I do.”
“How?”
“Because she’s been with me for most of the night,” Alan said.
Will frowned at him, not fully understanding. It was then that Will noticed that, like himself, Alan was bare chested and wearing only his boxers. Will’s eyes glanced to Lara, behind Alan. She wasn’t properly dressed either. She was wearing an oversized t-shirt and not much else. A man’s t-shirt. Her long, brunette hair was slightly frazzled and she had that unmistakable “I’ve just had sex look” on her face. The truth of the matter was suddenly obvious to him.
“You fucked her?” Will asked.
“Yes,” Alan answered.
“You idiot. You’re probably her bloody alibi! She’s using you, Alan!”
“I highly doubt it,” Alan answered. Lara watched Alan’s face and could see some anger was starting to bubble under the surface at the accusation.
“Oh, wake up, you dunce. You think she just wanted you out of the blue? Couldn’t resist you all of a sudden?” Will asked.
“It’s not all of a sudden. We’ve been seeing each other for a while now,” Alan said, his chin raised as he said it. Will’s eyes went wide and his mouth dropped.
There goes that secret, Lara thought ruefully.
She didn’t like where this was headed. If this came to blows, Will was the larger man. He was taller and wider. She worried what would happen if the two started fighting. Would the other guys intervene? Or just watch? Lenny stepped forward from the doorway.
“Let’s all calm down. This isn’t the time to have this discussion, guys,” Lenny said, seemingly imploring both men to back off.
“Shove it up your ass, Lenny,” Will said, giving the man a look of obvious disdain. He turned back to Alan before continuing.
“So you’ll take her side over mine? Betray your friends? The whore bats her eyes at you and suddenly you believe whatever shit she tells you? She put Rob in the hospital! She poisoned him. This is her finishing the job. And I’m next. She wants revenge on both me and Rob for...” Will said, pausing mid sentence. He didn’t finish the thought out loud. He couldn’t. If he did, he would implicate himself. And so he had left the thought hanging in the air.
Alan finished it for him.
“ ... for what you two did to her?” Alan said. Will’s face went white, like he had seen a ghost.
“Yes, I know. I know everything. I know what you did. And let me tell you, pretending to be your friend for the these past months has been torture. That ends right now,” Alan said.
“You ... don’t know the full story,” Will started to say, panicking a little as his eyes darted around the room, suddenly very cognizant that there was a large audience listening to this conversation and privy to all the details he’d rather keep to himself.
“Fuck you, Will. You’re scum. And he was, too. Being dead doesn’t let him off the hook. And it doesn’t absolve you, either,” Alan said, the dark look in his eyes clear for all to see.
The fear on Will’s face was replaced by fury. His lip curled into a snarl and his fists clenched at his sides. Everyone else watching noticed it, and prepared for the inevitable. But Alan just smirked at him.
“Try it, motherfucker. I’ve been waiting so long for this moment. So, do it. I’m fucking begging you...” Alan said. His eyes were narrowed, his body taut like a coiled spring, ready to to go at a moments notice.
It made Will second guess himself. He had never seen Alan as much of a threat, always confident he could take pretty much any man if it came down to a physical fight. But something in the way Alan was talking right now, the confidence in his voice and the stance he had taken up, gave Will pause.
“You aren’t worth my time. They’ll lock you up with your whore as an accomplice anyway,” Will said to him. He turned towards Lara and stuck out an arm, pointing a finger directly at her. “You won’t get away with this. I’m going to make it my mission to see you get what you deserve, Lara. Believe me,” Will said, his normally handsome face now scrunched up in disgust as he said it.
A chilling shiver ran down her spine. She believed him. Chuck arrived through the door, breaking up the tense moment.
“Guys, the ambulance is here. The police are too,” Chuck announced to the group.
“Good,” Will said as he started to move towards the open door but he looked anything but pleased at the news. “Get out of my way!” Will shouted at the group standing in the doorway. They scattered to let him pass and watched him head down the corridor and away from them.
The news of the police’s arrival had jolted Will out of his rage and back to reality. The police would likely search the house once the paramedics had seen to the body. If they found a naked, clearly compromised woman in his bed, they’d have questions he couldn’t reasonably answer. They’d test her. And what they found in her system? It wouldn’t look good, especially when they discovered Rob’s extensive stash of drugs in his room.
He needed to get the girl dressed and out of the house as soon as possible. He’d help her get dressed, and lead her out the back way to his car, drive her home and dump her there. She’d wake up later at home and likely not remember a thing. He’d be in the clear. If he was lucky, nobody would see him. There was just one problem. He had no clue where the bitch lived.
He jogged back down the stairs and towards his room. He entered it and locked it behind him. She was asleep. Or the heavy dose had made her lose consciousness.
“Where do you live?” Will asked Sarah as he stood over her. She didn’t respond. She was out of it.
“Fucking perfect,” Will growled in frustration.
He didn’t have long. He needed to hurry. He quickly searched through her tiny purse and found her keys. They gave no indication as to her address. He grabbed her iPhone and moved to hold the screen in front of her unconscious face. It unlocked and he opened the apple maps app, hoping to find her address from the history. He found one marked as “Home” and sighed in relief.
He started to dress her. Her red Jessica Rabbit styled dress was tight on her frame and he struggled mightily to get it on. Her large bust still spilled over the top but it was on most of the way so he figured it was good enough. He unlocked his door, placed her purse in her lap and picked her up in his arms. It was no struggle for him. Poking his head out his door, he made sure the coast was clear before carrying her down the stairs and towards the rear exit of the house.
If he was quick, he could drop her off and be back in time to point the finger at Lara to the cops. He needed to think of a plan while he drove in case Lara or Alan leveled any accusations against him regarding the pool party. Maybe he needed to remind her of a certain video he possessed? The prospect of leaking a sex tape usually kept these bitches in line. Or maybe he should admit to the sex instead? Say it was consensual? Get his story in first?
He began to work through a narrative that he thought would work as he reached his car.
Dave took a long, deep breath as he tried to calm himself. He was shaking slightly as he stood there. It wasn’t exactly cold so he figured it must be a combination of fear and adrenaline. The next few minutes would decide whether he would finally be free of this, or if he’d be dead.
The scrapyard, the location of this meeting, was very dimly lit with only a single, ancient floodlight as a light source. It was only a few hours until morning but the sun was yet to show itself giving the yard a spooky feeling to it.
Dave hated waiting. He’d normally come late to every meeting just so that he wouldn’t have to wait. For this meeting though, arriving early had been important.
He watched as a silver Escalade pulled into the yard and came to a stop. Three men exited the vehicle and walked towards him. “The Russian” was the centre man and he was accompanied by two other men who Dave assumed were his security. All three were armed and not hiding it.
The Russian was wearing the same charcoal suit as their previous encounter, his stride long due to his impressive height. His body, lean but quite tall, made the two men flanking look small in comparison. Dave hadn’t expected them to be packing and shuffled from foot to foot in an obvious show of nervousness.
Sal Gambini had enlightened Dave as to why this clearly American man was known as The Russian. The story went that in a disagreement over territory in which to sling dope, The Russian had entered the apartment building where the head of a rival gang was housed and killed thirteen men single handedly with his weapon of choice, an AK-47. Whether the story was complete bullshit, or somewhat true with some embellishments, Dave wasn’t sure but it was obvious that the man encouraged the story. He was holding an AK-47 right now as he reached Dave. They stood staring at each other, neither in a hurry to speak first. The Russian broke the silence.
“This is your meeting, Mr. Miller,” The Russian said in his calm and eery voice, his face impassive as per usual. Dave plucked up the courage to play his part.
“Yes, it is. I’m done. Last night’s shipment is the last one I’ll be facilitating. You’ll have to go elsewhere for transportation and escort,” Dave said, trying to project confidence into his voice.
“That doesn’t work for us. Finding an alternative would take time. Any disruption to our deliveries would be unacceptable to our partners. I’m afraid you are just going to have to deal with whatever issues you are experiencing,” he told Dave.
“You aren’t listening. Let me spell it out for you. I. Am. Done. Finished. This isn’t open for negotiation,” Dave told him staring the man down.
“You’re right. This isn’t open for negotiation. You work for us. It’s over when we say it is. You can either accept that, or you won’t leave this place alive, Mr. Miller,” The Russian said, his deadpan voice just adding to the menace of the threat.
“You wouldn’t dare,” Dave told him.
“You’re awfully confident for a man who is alone and unarmed,” The Russian said.
“I may be unarmed, but who said I was alone?” Dave said.
At this signal, two shots rang out, piercing the calm of the night, and finding their targets. The Russian wheeled around to see the bodies of his two men hit the dirt, a large dark hole present in each of their heads. The Russian turned back to Dave and raised his own gun directly at Dave and prepared to fire.
“I wouldn’t do that, if I were you,” Sal Gambini said, as he approached from behind Dave. At the same time, a dozen of Gambini’s men emerged from their hidden cover and walked forward, pressing in on The Russian in a semi circle, all twelve with rifles raised and aimed directly at him.
Dave thought he could see genuine fear on the face of the normally impassive man.
“You’ve made a fatal mistake here, Dave,” The Russian said, still holding up his AK-47 and pointing it forwards. “Gambini, I presume?” The Russian asked. Sal merely nodded. Apparently, The Russian knew the man by reputation.
“If I die here tonight, my brother will hunt both of you down,” The Russian said, cradling the rifle in his hands, considering whether to fire or not, knowing he was heavily outnumbered and had little chance of fighting his way out.
“Your brother is already dead. My colleagues saw to that less than an hour ago. He didn’t die well. But you can ask him all about it. You’ll be seeing him soon,” Gambini said, raising his right hand and then drawing it down.
The Russian’s face dropped in shock at the news as Gambini’s twelve men all fired at once. Dave flinched as the shots rang out. The Russian’s body exploded in a mess of blood and guts as over a hundred rounds riddled his body. What was left, fell to the ground.
“Well, that’s settled,” Gambini said calmly, as if he hadn’t just had three men executed. “Marco, go crush the car. The rest of you, deal with the bodies. What’s left of them, anyway,” Gambini said as he turned away from his men and towards Dave.
“That went well, don’t you think?” Gambini asked him, cheerfully. Dave just nodded back, not trusting himself to speak.
“You head on home, Dave. We’ll clean up this mess. I’ll drop by The Pearl in a few days. We can discuss how our arrangement will look going forward,” Gambini told him.
Dave turned and started to walk out of the scrapyard, avoiding looking at the three bodies as he did so. He was free of The Russian. At last. But Dave knew that Sal’s help hadn’t come for free. Sure, the Mob had wanted The Russian and his crew eliminated for their own ends but Dave was now in their debt and they wouldn’t let him forget it.
Still, he was alive. He’d managed to live to see another day and that was something. He’d deal with the fallout later. For now, he had the sudden urge to fuck.
Must be a life or death thing.
He knew his preferred choices were out working the frat party tonight but he’d head into The Pearl and make do with whoever was there.
Mike pulled up to the Kappa Omega Kappa frat house, carefully avoiding the ambulance and parked next to the other two squad cars already on the scene. He’d heard the call come in over the radio and had headed straight there, knowing that Lara and her colleagues were working a frat party tonight. He hoped it was only a coincidence. Something told him it wasn’t.
He had been on his way home following his lengthy meeting with Chief Willis. After laying the entire Price investigation out for him, the Chief had dismissed Mike for the night, telling him he’d contact him in the morning with his decision on how to proceed. Mike’s future, and in many ways Captain Price’s future, was now squarely in the Chief’s hands.
Mike hoped the Chief had the moral fortitude to do the right thing, regardless of the PR disaster it would become. He seemed a decent man but it was impossible to know for sure. He wasn’t just a cop, he was a politician. You didn’t get to the level of Chief without burying a few scandals along the way. Mike just hoped this wouldn’t be one of them. Still, he had done his part, now he just had to wait and see. In the meantime, he hoped that reports of a death at the frat house had nothing to do with Lara.
He exited his car and squinted as the first rays of the early morning sun shone through the surrounding trees. He had spent the night following Price, and then meeting with the Chief. He hadn’t slept but felt okay all things considered. He’d pick up some coffee, assuming this didn’t take long. He flashed his credentials to the officer posted at the door and entered the house. He spotted an EMT he was familiar with carrying some equipment back out to his truck.
“What’s the verdict, Williams?” Mike asked him.
“College kid. He was long gone by the time we got here,” Williams told him.
“Any obvious causes?” Mike asked.
“Come on, Mike. You know how this works.”
“I won’t hold you to it. Your best guess,” Mike told him.
“I would say overdose. Cardiac arrest seems likely,” Williams said.
“Thanks,” Mike told him, letting the paramedic pass as Mike headed into the common room. His fears were realized as he saw a group of girls, huddled together as if protecting one another from some unseen or invisible force. There was a group of guys standing next to them. Everyone was in various stages of undress. One of the girls was Lara.
God damn it.
He approached the group and introduced himself. He could see the worry on her face as she noticed him.
“I’m Detective Hawthorne. I assume one of you found the deceased?” Mike asked. Britney answered first. “Jenny did,” Britney answered him.
“And where is she now?” Mike asked.
“Outside with the medic guys. She is a little shaken up. Apparently she found her dad the same way as a kid and it brought back some memories,” Britney told him. He nodded.
“Either way, I’m going to need to talk to her. To all of you, in fact. Does anyone know if she was alone when she found the body?” Mike asked the group, trying to avert his gaze from Lara as much as he could.
“She was with me,” Lenny announced. Mike turned to look at him.
“And you are?”
“Lenny.”
“I need your full name, son.”
“Leonard Kowalski,” Lenny answered.
“Okay, Mr Kowalski. And what were you doing when you found him?” Mike asked.
“Me and Jenny were looking for an empty room to ... fool around in. That’s when we found Rob,” Lenny said. Mike nodded again.
“I have to ask, did this party have any drugs present?” Mike asked. There was complete silence from the group in front of him. Mike sighed.
“Guys, I’m not going to start carting people off to jail here, but I need to know if Rob, or any of the rest of you, took anything,” Mike said.
“There could have been some ecstasy floating around. Allegedly,” Chuck answered.
“Did Rob take some?” Mike asked.
“It’s possible,” Chuck said, not willing to confirm anything concrete in case it came back on the frat. Or him.
“Did any of the rest of you take some?” Mike asked.
“I did,” a voice from behind said. He recognised it. He turned and saw Jo standing there. His partner. Mike did a visible double take. She was wearing a dark top and red leather pants, still in her Buffy outfit.
What the hell?
He’d had no idea she had been working this party with Lara. Mike hadn’t left things on good terms with her after Jo had screamed at him to get out of her apartment while discussing her recent assault. He was surprised that she had agreed to attend the party, even under the guise of keeping her cover. It shocked him even more that she was admitting to taking ecstasy.
“Are you feeling okay?” Mike asked, taking a step forward and reaching for her. He was filled with worry that it had somehow been a bad batch and that if it had killed the boy, Jo could be next.
“I feel fine ... Detective,” Jo said, taking a step back from him to help keep up the charade that she didn’t know him for the benefit of everyone else. Only Lara among them knew the truth. Mike caught himself and pulled back.
“Right. Of course. That’s good,” Mike said. It was then that they all heard a commotion coming from outside.
“Let me pass right now or I’ll have your job!” a voice came from the corridor. Lara recognised it straight away as Will’s voice. Will came trundling through the door and marched straight up to the group as he raised his arm, pointing straight at Lara.
“She’s the one you are looking for, officer. She’s the one who killed him,” Will announced. Mike looked from the new arrival to Lara and then back again.
“And who are you?” Mike asked.
“Will. I’m pledging this frat. I helped organise the party,” Will said.
“Your full name?”
“Will Kane. Howard Kane is my father,” Will said. Mike had no idea if that was supposed to mean something to him. If the name “Howard Kane” was supposed to have some sort of cache, Mike didn’t know it.
“And you think this woman here...” Mike began.
“Lara. Her name is Lara. She’s a hired whore,” Will said, practically spitting the last word as he said it. Mike was taken aback by the vitriol on display before him.
“Easy, son. Explain to me why you think Lara had something to do with this,” Mike asked.
“Because she’s insane. She slept with Rob and when he ignored her, she went off the deep end. She tried to kill him before, you know. Put poison in his salad. He was in hospital and everything. Well, now she finished the job!” Will said dramatically to the group, reciting the twisted version of events he had practiced as he had driven back from Sarah’s place.
“That’s a fucking lie, you disgusting pig,” Lara fired back, not quite able to believe the lies he was telling. She realized then that Will was getting ahead of any rape accusation. He’d get his version in first in the hopes that Lara’s version, the truth, would come across as the insane story of a jilted woman.
Mike looked at the pair of them, having no idea what was going on. He found the whole thing rather ironic, if truth be told. Lara had been upset with him for keeping secrets from her regarding the investigation.
Obviously, I’m not the only one hiding things, Mike thought. He was clearly missing large chunks of information from Lara’s life. Regardless, he had a hard time believing what the man in front of him was claiming.
“So? You heard what I just said, right?” Will said, turning to Mike.
“I did. We’ll investigate every avenue,” Mike answered.
“I want that woman arrested! Immediately!” Will shouted, stepping forward and practically coming face to face with Mike. Mike was disliking this guy more and more every second.
“Son, I decide who gets taken into custody and nobody else. You need to calm down and take a step back. Now,” Mike said, his voice taking on a commanding tone.
Will’s face returned to one of fury, similar to the one Lara had seen from earlier. He didn’t like being talked down to. Mike was a couple of inches shorter, but equally as broad and had much bigger arms. Lara knew from previous conversations that Mike worked out. A lot. But physicality wasn’t the crux of it. It was his demeanour. Lara got the feeling that if Will tried anything, Mike would have him face down and in cuffs in an instant.
Lara had always found Will a domineering figure. His looks, combined with his height and width gave him that aura. But seeing him square up to Mike, and comparing the two side-by-side, Lara now saw very little of that. The spell had been broken. Now, he looked like a spoiled little boy, talking to a professional man.
Will suddenly appeared to realize something similar as he took an imperceptible step back. It didn’t stop him talking though.
“Useless. I should have guessed it. Typical, lazy and incompetent civil servant. If you won’t do your job, I’ll get someone in here who will. My father knows powerful people. I’m calling him now and telling him all about you. He’ll have you replaced in no time,” Will said, taking out his phone and dialling as he walked away.
Mike watched him go in amusement. This guy wasn’t the first member of the public to throw a temper tantrum when thing’s didn’t go their way. Mike still had no clue who the boy’s father was, but he wasn’t worried. He turned back to face the rest of the group but before he could say anything else, his own phone rang. He looked down and saw an unknown number but he knew it could only be one person.
The Chief. He’s calling with his decision regarding Price!
”Excuse me, folks. I have to take this,” Mike said as he walked away to a quiet part of the common room.
Lara watched him go. She was coming to terms with the fact that she may have to tell Mike everything. About Rob and Will and that they had roofied and raped her. The video too. That Will had a video of her blowing Alan that Will had and could use as leverage if she ever went to the cops. About her relationship with Alan and how she had asked him to spy on them for her. Everything. This was a murder investigation now and half-truths would only get her in trouble. Lara also noticed that Jo was staring at her. Lara got the impression that Jo wanted to say something to her but was reluctant, perhaps because of the number of people around.