Chapter 8

The girls sat in the dorm in stunned, exhausted silence.

"Murdered..." Ilsa said tonelessly, looking at the floor. She shook her head slightly, her brown mane slow dancing against her skin. "I can't believe it. Who could have done it... and why?"

Melanie stood up, looked at Ilsa, then traced her hand lightly across her lover's shoulder. Ilsa watched as Melanie began a slow pace across the floor.

"I can't even imagine who. But Ilsa, we have to start understanding that we are going to be questioned," Melanie said, looking down as she walked. "I mean, people probably saw us go in to Ms. Crow's dorm. People knew about our situation with her."

"I'm sure everyone will be questioned, Melanie," Ilsa said, watching her girlfriend pace the floor.

"Yes, but we might have been the last people in there with them, we-"

"Omigod, the videotape," Ilsa said, covering her nose and mouth with two steepled hands.

Melanie stopped pacing. "Videotape? What videotape, Ilsa?"

Ilsa stared at her, her eyes wide with terror. "Melanie, they were taping us, everything that happened in that room. You couldn't see the camera from where you were, but I just remembered it..."

Melanie came and sat down next to her, looking at her intently. "A camera??"

"When Desiree..." Isla said, stifling a sob, "... when she made me kneel..." Ilsa closed her eyes to make it through the memory, "... when she made me lick her like that..."

Melanie stroked Ilsa's hair. "Yes Ilsa, tell me."

"I-I saw a tripod out of the corner of my eye. I looked at it, and saw it had a camera on top, and a red light was on. That's all I could make out before Desiree grabbed me by the hair and pulled me down, and..."

"I know... I know, Ilsa," Melanie soothed her, wincing at the memory of being helpless on the floor, watching the hated Desiree make Ilsa service her.

"I even remember Ms. Crow saying something to Desiree, like 'we're going to enjoy watching this again'."

Melanie said. "Oh godd..." She lay down on her back, looking the ceiling. "Once the police see that tape, we are the number one suspects. They'll think we came back and killed them as revenge for making us do those things."

Ilsa lay her head on Melanie's tummy. "What are we going to do?"

"We have no choice but to tell the truth, baby," Melanie said, stroking Ilsa's hair. "They'll have everything. We just have to explain all about us, Ms. Crow blackmailing us, all that, and what we were forced to do with her and Desireee. But that we weren't there when they were killed. Someone else did that. We'll be fine as long as we don't lie."

Ilsa said nothing, just nodded weakly.

In Ms. Crow's dorm, a detective knelt next to the body of Desiree Mills, naked from the waist down, face down in the doorway of the teacher's bedroom.

He looked from girl's body to the entrance way leading to the living and office area, about five feet away, where the body of Marsha Crow lay, on her back, her lifeless eyes fixed in a dull stare at the ceiling. She was naked, and a towel lay on the floor next to her.

The detective's eyes wandered, then rested on the bloody pair of scissors and the umbrella, both lying next to each other between the two females.

"So," his partner said, coming out of the bathroom with a flashlight in hand. "Whaddya think? Teacher is having a secret affair with student. Killer might be a jealous lover of one of them... comes in, finds them together, goes into a rage and kills her first," he nodded to Ms. Crow, "and the young one tries to come to her aid and fight him off with the umbrella... gets stabbed... killer drops the scissors and hauls ass."

"I like it. So far that makes sense. Anything in the bathroom?"

"As a matter of fact, yes. A dildo. The kind you strap on if you wanna play the husband's role, you know?"

"Wow."

Just then, one of the uniform officers poked his head under the crime scene tape that stretched across the door. "Detective? The Headmistress, Miss Franklin, wants to talk to you."

"Yeah, we need to sit down with her, and start interviewing everybody. Okay. Tell her we'll be there in a few minutes. I wanna see what's in this videocamera first. Let's pop it open..."

Two hours later, the dorm warden knocked on Melanie and Ilsa's door.

"Headmistress wants to see you too in her office."

Melanie and Ilsa pulled on their uniforms and followed Carol to the Headmistress' office.

They walked in to Miss Franklin's office together. The Headmistress looked tired, and highly stressed. She managed a quick smile, and held Melanie's gaze for a little longer than Melanie thought normal.

"Good morning girls. Obviously, you know what we are dealing with here this morning."

They both nodded and mumbled, "Yes, Ma'am."

The brunette Headmistress let out a long sigh.

Ilsa grasped Melanie's hand for support, terrified of what was coming. Had the police already told Miss Franklin about the videotape they viewed? Melanie squeezed her hand for reassurance, and squirmed slightly in her chair.

Miss Franklin looked from Ilsa to Melanie, then opened her drawer and removed a small videocasette.

Ilsa shut her eyes tightly and shuddered, and Melanie tensed, waiting for what the Headmistress was about to say.

To Melanie's shock, the Headmistress handed the videocassette to Melanie, and said, "Here take this, and put it in your bra for now, out of sight."

"M-Ma'am?" Melanie said, her face a mask of confusion.

"I'll explain, just do it."

With trembling hands, Melanie put the mini-cassette in her blouse as instructed.

"I saw this tape last night, part of it anyway, and I watched the rest this morning in my office."

The girls sat in transfixed silence.

"I'm so sorry you had to go through that ordeal." The Headmistress looked down, and cleared her throat. "You see, I went for a little walk late last night. Two of the girls and one faculty member had told me last week about some peeping Tom who had been hanging around the woods, looking into the school--"

Ilsa sat up suddenly. "Yes Ma'am I saw him too! We must tell the police-"

"Shh." Miss Franklin held up her hand. "Don't worry about that."

"So I went and walked the grounds, just to see if everything was all right. And I heard some noises coming from Ms. Crow's dorm. Some laughing. I could tell there were two people inside, and of course, that would be against school rules, having a student in a teacher's dorm at that hour."

The girls listened intently, wondering why Miss Franklin was telling them this. Shouldn't she be telling the police? Or had she already?

"I went to the bathroom window, which was slightly open, and looked inside. You see, from that window, one can peer to the left and actually see into the bedroom, if the door is open, and well, it was."

The woman took a deep breath, looked at the two girls, and continued.

"The first thing I saw was the television screen. And this awful scene of you, Melanie, being... um... so cruelly... violated, by Desiree Mills."

Melanie hung her head, and a tear slipped from eyes as she fought off the urge to sob. Ilsa tilted her head so that it was resting on Melanie's shoulder.

Miss Franklin looked down at her desk. "I watched in absolute horror for almost a full minute, and I heard the voices of Desiree and Ms. Crow, laughing and talking as the scene played. I went to the door, and opened it with my master key, and I stood in the doorway of the bedroom, unbeknownst to them, for almost a full minute. I think I was shaking, I was so angry..." The woman's lip began to quiver.