Insufficient evidence. Which was the official language for: there was never any evidence at all.
The scholarship hold was lifted.
Delia got the email at 11:15 in the morning. She came back to the room at lunchtime and sat down on her bed and didn't say anything for a moment.
Then she said, "It's over."
"That part," Reagan said.
Delia looked at her. "How did you do that?"
"I didn't," Reagan said. "You had eight versions of your paper, with timestamps going back three days. That's what did it."
"Reagan."
"You saved your drafts. I just made sure someone looked at them."
Delia was quiet.
"Thank you," she said.
"Don't..."
"Don't tell me not to thank you," Delia said. "I know you're going to say that. I'm thanking you anyway."
Reagan let it sit.
"You're welcome," she said.
* * *
On Wednesday, Trent Calloway was called to the Dean's office.
Reagan didn't know the specifics of what happened in that room. She hadn't asked to know.
What she knew was what Walter Briggs told her when she passed his bench Thursday morning. He'd submitted his written statement Tuesday afternoon and received a confirmation receipt from the college administration.
"Twenty-two years," he said, when she stopped by the bench. "I wrote a lot of statements. This one felt good to write."
She nodded.
"How's the preparation going?" he asked.
"Eighteen days," she said.
"You going to win?"
She thought about it honestly.
"I'm going to be ready," she said. "That's what I can control."
He nodded at that. The specific nod of someone who has heard a lot of promises and can tell the difference between one that's real and one that isn't.
"My wife wants to know," he said, "if you'd like to come to dinner sometime. She says anyone who knows how to wait that long deserves a home-cooked meal."
Reagan looked at him.
Something moved in her chest. The specific warmth of being seen by someone who has no reason to see you, except that they chose to look.
"I'd like that very much," she said.
"Sunday," he said. "6:00."
"Thank you, Mr. Briggs."
"Walter," he said.
"Walter," she said.
* * *
On Thursday, Ford Beckett found her in the library.
He sat down across from her without asking. But with a diffidence that was different from his previous manner. As though the question of whether he had the right to sit had occurred to him, and he'd decided to risk the answer.
"Trent's been suspended," he said.
"I know," she said.
"One full year."
She nodded.
He was quiet for a moment. Then: "Shane's not. He didn't get anything formal. But Crawford talked to him, and his father's been... There's an audit happening of the scholarship decisions. Someone filed a public records request."
Reagan said nothing.
She had filed the public records request. She'd done it the day after the meeting with Crawford, through the state's standard process. A matter of public record. Anyone could have done it.
Ford looked at her. "That was you."