Rutwell College Chronicles: Ch. 04

Authors note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, events and incidents are the products of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

Rutwell College Chronicles: The Bookmaker

Introduction:

Welcome to Rutwell College.

A place of learning. A steppingstone for all who enter its halls in the great journey of life.

For over two centuries, students at Rutwell have found themselves growing, stretching their limits, encouraged to try new experiences, to embark on paths they never considered before.

In these lecture halls and libraries, this haven of scholarship, the faculty find fresh minds to mold, empty vessels looking to be filled. Youth and experience coming together in creative and unexpected ways with astonishing results.

As the motto of the college says, 'Mens Aperta, Corpus Saturatum'... 'Open Mind, Sated Body'.

Prologue:

Calvin Weeks, the newly installed head of the campus police pinched the bridge of his nose, eyes squeezed shut as he fought off the blurring of his vision from staring at mounds of paperwork.

The campus, much like any other, had its fair share of crime between petty theft all the way up the ladder to assaults of all types. That said, he and the other members of the campus police did a good job keeping things in check. A number of his team were ex law enforcement. Veterans who, having served their twenty years, had opted to pad out their retirement packages with a cushy number at the local university. Calvin for one was glad so many of them had, their experience and knowledge off-set the inexperience of many of the other men working at the University as security. These others were better suited to working malls as security, not having the training, intelligence or people skills to deal with the thousands of smart mouthed, privileged and just plain moronic young men and women who made up the student body here at Rutwell.

It was one particular crime, or rather a slew of unreported crimes that currently occupied Calvin's attention. A fair number of faculty members had approached him due to concerns with visible injuries seen on many young men attending their lectures. Attempting to be discreet, Calvin had walked the hallways himself, looking for evidence of injuries. He found a lot. Blackened eyes, split lips, bruised faces and fists, even the odd broken nose. His first thought was that these young men had formed some sort of 'fight club' and were beating on each other for laughs.

That theory didn't sit right with him however, there was something else that these men had in common, he could feel it. It was a simple matter to request their files from Ms. Thompson, one of the college Administrators. She was a formidable woman, gorgeous with a body that was created to make any man's head turn. She was also fiercely protective of Rutwell, seeing both the institution, its faculty and its student body as almost her children and like any good mother Ms Thompson was receptive to those whom she felt had her family's best intentions at heart. That meant she not only sent over the files but she informed Calvin that she was at his disposal should anything else be needed. From a shaky start, Calvin and Ms. Thompson had become, if not friends, then at least allies. She regarded his tenure as head of security as a positive for the University, while Calvin had been grateful for the care and attention she had given his daughter Jo on her return to the campus.

All that meant though was that his failure with this 'case' was all his own. The files had shown two other links between the injured students. The first was that they were all athletes, spread out among track, football, baseball, basketball... almost every part of the colleges athletic spectrum represented. Calvin had approached their coaches, looking for links between the students, any trouble they might be having. There was nothing, well there was the added pressure to resolve the issue as now the coaches didn't want their best players receiving anymore injuries.

The second link was that almost all of the students were attending Rutwell on scholarship. The majority of them coming from working class backgrounds, a small minority from middle class families. This indicated a lack of funds.

Evidence of fighting, a motive to make money. It hadn't been a massive leap to conclude that it wasn't 'fight club' that was happening here, it was organised bouts, fighting for money. That put things in a new light. To put a halt to anymore injuries, Calvin, Ms. Thompson and the heads of the Athletic department made it very clear that anyone participating further in this criminal enterprise would, for a start, lose their scholarships and places at Rutwell. They might also face criminal charges although for these young men, losing their futures was a far worse fate.

The injuries stopped, so far as Calvin could tell, but still not one of the students involved had been prepared to admit to any wrong doing or to provide a name for the person behind the whole caper. These were some tough young men, strong, well capable of defending themselves. In Calvin's mind, it would have to be a serious criminal, or more likely a criminal organisation, that was capable of frightening so many men into keeping their mouths closed.

Which was why Calvin was getting nowhere with the files. There was no chance that someone among the student body could put this thing together, keep it running as long as they had and even when the money dried up, still put the fear of God into all the participants. He tidied up the files on his desk and switched off the light. He was going back to his apartment to sleep. If the person behind this wasn't a student, then it wasn't a concern of his, not anymore.

Chapter One:

Carolina DiNazti strode out of the lecture hall, the almost four-inch black lacquered heels of her Balmain knit ankle boots made a clipping sound as she powered her way down the hallway. She was pissed off and each clip-clip of her boots seemed to be a drum beat of danger, the other students in the hall veering out of her way, happier to stumble in the wake of her passage than risk her displeasure by impeding her progress. A casual but uninformed observer might think that Carolina was a professor, despite her obvious youth, given the way the crowd parted around her like the red sea flowing under the direction of Moses's staff. Yet she wasn't. Carolina was a student, a business student, and had been for over three years now. With just two semesters left to her, it should be the case that her only concerns were her upcoming exams... and how she wished that was the case.

Her real concerns, and the source of her anger, were linked as problems often were and based on money as problems tend to be. Her father, Aldo DiNazti, was a criminal. Carolina took no real pride in this fact however she neither hide it or feel shame in it either. It was a fact of life and she loved her father, end of story.

Had Aldo been a successful criminal, running a profitable organisation in New Jersey, her home state, then his chosen profession would have been easier still to bear. He wasn't however, successful that is. Aldo had run an illegal bookmaker's enterprise and loan sharking concern, turning a decent profit but nothing spectacular. Good enough though to send his only daughter to a good University without her having to be saddled with crippling student loans. Then he'd been arrested, charged and convicted in this last year. Also had received a sentence of seven years, less with good behaviour, which of course was upsetting to Carolina. However the earnings she depended on were now cut off, his partners forced to relocate due to the attentions of local law enforcement and whatever debts were owed to him were earmarked for her family and Also's legal costs.

Carolina would have taken on the burden of a loan, for two semesters it wasn't that bad, but there weren't many institutions too eager to lend money to the daughter of a convicted felon, a loan shark no less. So, she had been faced with the prospect of having to leave college without her degree. This was unacceptable to young miss DiNazti.

When she had first joined the rest of her students at Rutwell, an unfortunate rumour had started around campus that not only was the young woman a daughter of a New Jersey criminal, she was in fact a daughter of a Mafia family. This rumour had of course been started by Carolina herself, a lesson her father and uncles had always taught her, start as you mean to go on. She wasn't particularly interested in making friends at the university, nor was she interested in suffering any of the blowback from social cliques and 'mean girl' fraternities. Far better to be given a wide berth and a grudging respect born out of fear. This had also served to keep any wandering hands approaching her, juiced up or drunken jocks still having more sense than to try to cop a feel of a Mafia connected student. The rumour also had another advantage, once her money troubles began.

Desperate to finish out her time at Rutwell, Carolina had combined her knowledge of her father's bookmaking enterprise, her own business acumen and the greed of the poorer students at the university to start her own venture. An illegal bare knuckle boxing ring. Fights were staged off campus to keep things quiet and also so that gamblers from the city, those with a bent for violence and wagering, could attend. Recruiting from the student body and paying well, although as always it was the 'house' that profited most, Carolina spent a couple of months accruing a sizable return on her business. Flush with money, she had spoiled herself with clothes, jewellery and other items, only paying off the first of the two-semester fees. Given the profits she'd been making, she didn't see the point of clearing her debts before they were due.

This was where her anger today had come from. The meddling of faculty and the campus police had meant that her entire stable of fighters was now empty. She'd spent the weekend threatening, bribing and cajoling students who had participated up till now but to no avail. They were all terrified of having their scholarships or places on the team taken from them. Scared of her and her phoney reputation they might be, the prospect of angry parents and losing their shots at lucrative sports careers made her veiled threats unmoving.

So now she had two weeks to get the money together or risk losing everything with just six months of college left. A freshman, obviously ignorant to her reputation, was slow in moving from her path, taking his time instead to admire her. To his credit, Carolina was worth a second, a third, even a fourth glance. Her shoulder length brown hair had been coloured ruby red in one of the city's better salons and that rich color seemed all the more striking against her current wardrobe choice. Her own athletic body, all five feet six inches and one hundred and thirty-five pounds of it, was bedecked in an A-line black leather skirt, short and flared out, and a tight fitting cropped black fine knit top that had three golden buttons on the shoulder of the short-sleeved garment. Of course, the clothes were from the same designer as her shoes, Carolina didn't believe in mixing and matching when it came to fashion or accessories. On the subject of accessories, that day she was sporting a gold, multi-ringed arm cuff on her left bicep, a selection of rings on both hands, a gold and black rectangular faced Chanel watch on her wrist and finally a Chanel gold choker was fastened about her throat.

As the gaping freshman continued to check out the way her top accented her high proud 34D breasts, Carolina simply raised a hand imperiously, slapping him across the face without breaking stride.

Behind her she heard the young man yell at her before a chorus of shushing and whispered explanations from those with more knowledge and better sense made his spluttering complaints trail off into silence.

Still her heels clipped loudly in irritation, even the brief flush of excitement at slapping that idiot, hadn't been enough to lighten her mood. That dark disposition only deepened at a flat-footed rapid clomping behind her announced the imminent arrival of Nora Merriweather. Despite knowing the Nora was attempting to catch up with her, Carolina simply added more speed to her walk, seeking the privacy of open air before having any conversation with the excitable and unreserved, at least vocally, Nora.

The double doors that served as the entrance to the building parted before her and Carolina managed to get twenty feet free of the building before Nora finally overtook her. As the perpetually cheery and slightly chubby young woman fell into step with Carolina, too breathless at this point to speak, Carolina abruptly stopped to purposely throw Nora off balance.

"Why are you chasing me like that? Why didn't you just text me?" Carolina asked the question in the usual flat, bored tone that she adopted with Nora.

"Tried... huff... to text... puff... you. Not... huff... answering" Nora panted out. They made an odd pair, standing in the quad as they did. Carolina was all long legs, graceful fashion and hard brown eyes, gorgeous looking but in an unobtainable, aloof way. Nora, God bless her, was almost entirely her opposite.

Carolina tapped her foot impatiently, waiting for Nora to steady her breathing well enough to talk properly. To the fashion-conscious Carolina, Nora was a mobile train wreck, top to toe. Her long straight mousy brown hair was lifeless, pulled back in a severe ponytail so that the cherubic oval shaped face seemed plumper than it actually was. Compounding this, Nora's wardrobe habitually consisted of tops and skirts that were almost always a size too small and five years out of date from a fashion perspective. This daily fashion faux pas made Nora chunky looking and of little interest to the majority of the male students attending the college.

In actual fact, Nora's figure was far more voluptuous than chunky. Carolina, having tried a number of times to persuade her to dress better, was well aware of the young woman's measurements. Standing a hairsbreadth over five feet tall, Nora's curves 39-26-44, actually had Carolina slightly jealous. Of her breasts at least. Nora's were one hundred percent natural while Carolina had resorted to augmentation to achieve her own 34D bust.

"Seriously, you need to exercise," Carolina said testily, tired of waiting on Nora to recover.

"Sorry, so sorry Carolina. I just wanted to let you know, I huff got your papers uploaded for the project, that's all."

Busy as she had been running her enterprise and of course, spending the profits, Carolina had let her college assignments slip. Thankfully Nora had been only too happy to help out, the young woman from Iowa was utterly obsessed with Carolina, desperate to earn even the most grudging of compliment. Recognising that this was a moment where she needed to feed this particular puppy a treat, Carolina plastered an insincere smile on her face, briefly touching Nora's face with her fingertips.

"Thank you, Nora, what would I do with out you? We should get coffee together, my treat."

"Great!" Nora said, using the sleeve of her red hoodie to mop at the perspiration on her face, "I need a coffee."

"Well.... Not right now," Carolina clarified. "I've got those..." The taller woman took a moment to look around her, checking nobody was within earshot.

"I've got those 'auditions' to get to," Carolina said. Nora was well aware of the illegal fights that Carolina had been staging, she had been more than willing to be involved alongside Carolina, thrilled to be included. In fairness, Carolina had kept her at a distance, really only using her to spread additional rumours regarding the NJ native's 'criminal connections'. Once her student fighters had been removed from the equation, Carolina hadn't so much confided in Nora as she had vented at her, using the young woman as a tool while she railed against the injustice of her business problems and brain stormed a solution.

"Of course," Nora's face fell, the round glasses she wore slipping from the bridge of her nose as her head drooped down.

"Raincheck?" Carolina's voice and her parting pat on the shoulder were enough to once more lift Nora's spirits. As Carolina's quick stride bore her off into the distance, Nora's voice carried to her one more time.

"Good luck..."

Chapter Two:

Murphy's gym was in the seedier area of the city. Nestled among derelict buildings and abandoned cars the small business fit right in. In short it was a shit hole.

Carolina hadn't chosen it for its ambience however, the owner was willing to rent it out for the evening for a few hundred dollars and that suited her fine. There was a time and a place for cheap and nasty, she was an astute enough business woman to recognise that fact.

The loss of student bodies for her fights had put her in a spot and it had taken her a while, raving at an ashen faced Nora, before she'd hit on an idea. Carolina had approached a couple of gym and boxing club owners through an intermediary, one of her former fighters who was also a local boy, getting them to spread the word that she was looking for some tough, if washed up, fighters for some 'exhibitions'.

That had taken a couple of days to put together and now it was time to see who had shown up. The click of her heels on the wooden floor of the boxing gym echoed in the silence and she had a flutter of fear in her stomach that nobody had turned up. As her brown eyes looked with distaste at the shabby interior with its stained boxing ring and rusting machine, they spotted the small group of men huddled together beside the owner's office.

Seeing Carolina arrive, the owner pushed himself clear of the group of men and strode over to her. Short, fat and balding, Carolina doubted this man had ever availed himself of his own gym's facilities. Still, seeing how decrepit everything here was, she could hardly blame him.

"Yous dis Jones woman whose lookin' teh rent de place," he asked bluntly. Carolina didn't give him the courtesy of a reply, simply pulling out a roll of money and dropping it into his hand.

"Fair enuff lady, you gots it fer four hours, den ima back to locks up," he said, shuffling the bills apart to check he'd been paid in full. Satisfied, he stomped away, the door closing with a crash behind him. The men who had been huddled around the owner had now all turned and were in a loose line, all watching her. Not one of them was under forty years of age and at first glance Carolina wondered if she'd have been better trawling the homeless community for fighters. Given the stain, ripped sweats that seemed uniform among the men and the general sense of unshaven, unwashed desperation that hung around them, Carolina wasn't altogether convinced that she hadn't inadvertently rounded up a group of unfortunates.

First impressions were important, all the more given her youth, so Carolina slipped into full bitch mode as she addressed them.

"You can call me Ms. Jones. It isn't my real name and that fact should tell you exactly how 'legal' a proposition I'm going to make you."

"You can proposition me any time Chica," a stocky Latino quipped to a round of appreciative chuckling from his compatriots.

"Tell me funny man, you want to crack jokes, stare at my tits some more or do you want to do business? Maybe you should just fuck off now if you aren't serious about being here!" Carolina shot back, her tone enough to make the smirks and laughter among the men dry up and blow away.