Killing Britney Page 8

  fourteen

  That night while Britney was taking her bath, Adam slipped out of the house through the garage door that opened off the corridor holding the washer and dryer. He squeezed between Britney’s car and the junk piled against the wall, past the riding lawn mower and the huge lidded garbage can, past the cardboard boxes piled high with Christmas decorations, past the snow-blower and the stacked sawhorses. As he made his way around Britney’s snowboard, he inadvertently kicked her father’s skis, sending them flopping down on the front wheel hub of her Bug. He hoped that he hadn’t damaged anything, but it was hard to tell in the darkness of the garage, and he couldn’t turn on the light because he didn’t want anyone to catch him out here.

  Wrapping his duck-hunting jacket tight around him and adjusting the plaid scarf around his neck, he stepped out the door at the back of the garage and onto the hard-packed snow covering the backyard.

  The wind hissed off the snowdrifts. It bit into his cheeks and prickled at his fingertips, but he was willing to put up with this at the moment. His need for a cigarette was that strong. Turning his back to the wind so he could create a cove to shield the flame, he lit up and breathed the smoke deep into his lungs.

  Adam had started smoking during the tumultuous period last year when he had started doing most everything he now regretted.

  He’d made a lot of mistakes during his final few months in New Hampshire: the failing grades, the recklessly driving through people’s backyards, which had garnered him a suspended license. He’d begun to hang out with rich kids guys like Fisher and Hal, smoking their pot and pretending they had something in common. He knew that they were allowed to mess up in ways that he wasn’t—their fathers had the pull to cover for them, and even if they failed every single one of their classes, they’d still get into the best Ivy League schools. He didn’t even like those guys. But he knew that by buddying up to them, he’d enrage his parents, and that had been his only goal at the time. He was so hurt by the fact that their marriage was falling apart that he felt he had to hurt them back in any way he could.

  Being shipped to Madison had come almost as a relief. Nobody here knew how much trouble he’d gotten himself into back home.

  Once the wind calmed down, the cold wasn’t so bad. Gazing back at the house, he smiled. A single window on the second floor was casting light out into the frigid air. Something about that one lonely light made him feel less lonely himself. This wasn’t so bad, living here with the Johnsons. Especially if it meant getting to know Britney’s friend Melissa better.

  He knew the light must be coming from the bathroom where Britney was soaking in the tub. She’d been in a bad mood all night—not that he blamed her. From what Melissa had told him, that CD had been pretty freaky.

  He stared up at the house for a while, feeling sentimental. The roof was tiered into multiple levels, and his eyes roamed over it, mapping the smooth flow of snow there.

  On the roof of the garage, there was a large dark lump of something. Adam couldn’t tell what it was. It looked like a trash bag. He wondered how it had gotten up there.

  Then he saw it move.

  He froze and watched it closely.

  It moved again.

  Now he could make out the contours. Someone was crouching up there. He could make out the head under a dark black stocking cap. There was the torso. Whoever it was up there was staring into the bathroom window, spying on Britney while she took her bath.

  As stealthily as he could, he reached down and picked up a clump of snow, which he mashed into a snowball.

  One. Two. Three.

  He threw the snowball with all his might, but he missed. When the snowball splattered on the garage roof, the guy turned to see where it had come from. He spied Adam and bolted over the other side.

  Adam chased around to the front of the house. Just as he got there, he saw a chubby figure in a black snowmobile suit fall into the snow and then scramble to his feet and break into a run.

  Adam ran after him. Well, he sort of ran. The snow was so deep that it was impossible to move with any real speed.

  The figure made it to the road and broke into a sprint toward the Montgomerys’ driveway, sticking to the plowed pavement, where it was easier to run. He had a pretty good lead by the time Adam broke through the drifts.

  Speeding after him, Adam almost cornered him under the basketball hoop, but with a dart, the guy shifted directions, sending Adam slipping to his knees, then took off again back toward the main street.

  The two of them trudged down the middle of the road. Adam was lighter and more athletic. He gradually gained ground on the guy until finally, just as they reached the corner where the cul-de-sac hooked up with Maple Run Road, he tackled him.

  They wrestled for a minute, Adam struggling to pin the guy to the ground, the guy twisting and kicking to get away. When Adam got the guy on his back, he raised his fist to punch him in the jaw. Then he looked at the guy’s face finally, and he was shocked to discover it was Bobby Plumley.

  “Bobby? You freak. What’s the matter with you?”

  “Nothing. What’s the matter with you?” Bobby responded.

  “You perv. What the hell do you think you were doing up there?”

  “I wasn’t doing anything.”

  “I saw you.”

  “I don’t care what you saw. It’s not what you think.” Bobby looked scared.

  “Oh?” Adam sat back into the snow. He knew that if Bobby tried to run again, he’d catch him. “You were spying on Britney. You were fucking peeping on her in the bathroom. Did you catch her naked? Jesus. Maybe she was right about you after all.”

  “You don’t understand.”

  “What? What don’t I understand? You know? You’re lucky I didn’t go grab one of Mr. Johnson’s guns and shoot you with it.”

  Bobby stood up and dusted off his snowmobile suit. He rubbed his back where Adam had barreled into him. “Okay, look,” he said, sitting down on the snowdrift next to Adam. “Maybe I did see Britney naked just now, but that’s not why I’m out here tonight. I can get porn off the internet if I want to see naked girls, okay?”

  Adam listened skeptically. “Then why are you here?”

  “Remember all the stuff Melissa and I told you about the other night? What we didn’t say was that Britney is bonkers. She and I used to talk, okay? We used to be really, really close.”

  “That doesn’t—”

  Bobby rolled on. “Did you know that her mother was a schizophrenic? No? I didn’t think so. Did you know she thinks that her mother’s death wasn’t an accident? I don’t think you knew that either. And I bet you didn’t know that she thinks she was responsible for her mother’s death.”

  “I don’t—”

  “But she does. She thinks someone was after her, that whoever killed her mother had actually been trying to get to her. You didn’t know that. You don’t know anything. But I do, so why don’t you leave me alone?”

  Something about Bobby’s story sounded fishy to Adam. It was all so complicated. Wasn’t the simplest answer usually the right one? Didn’t it just make a whole lot more sense if Bobby, who Adam knew was in love with Britney, was stalking her?

  “You know what, Bobby? None of that has anything to do with you sitting on the roof of the garage and peeking in the bathroom window. Come on. Tell me the truth. Or do you want me to get Britney and you can tell her?”

  The look of horror that spread across Bobby’s face was proof enough to Adam that he was right.

  “No. Don’t do that. Please, please don’t do that.”

  “Oh, don’t beg, Bobby. It makes you look even more pathetic than you already are.”

  “I thought we were friends.”

  “Yeah, well, that’s before I caught you peeping through the window at my real friend, Britney.” Hearing himself say this, he was shocked and surprised, but he knew it was true: Britney was his real friend.

  “I wasn’t peeping!”

  “Yeah, right.”
<
br />   Bobby curled his arms over his knees and crossed them in front of his face. He stared coldly out into the distance. “You don’t get it at all,” he said icily. “I don’t want her to get hurt. I’m trying to protect her.”

  The way Bobby said this, with such gravity, such conviction, almost convinced Adam that he believed it.

  “You’re protecting her from what?”

  Bobby’s bottom lip curled into a frown. He seemed to be struggling with some dark urge inside himself. “From herself,” he said. “Just forget it, okay? There’s no way you’d understand.”

  Adam had had enough of this. He stood up. The wind was picking up again, and he shoved his hands into the inner pockets of his coat to keep his fingers warm.

  “Go home, Bobby,” he said.

  Without looking back, he began to walk toward the house.

  “Wait,” Bobby called after him. “You’re not going to tell her, are you?”

  Adam ignored him and kept walking. He wasn’t sure if he’d tell Britney or not, but he figured it was best to keep Bobby scared. For a while at least.

  fifteen

  This was unheard of: the mighty Rabid Raccoons, the undefeated state champs, usually so vicious, so pitiless and awesome, were playing as though they’d just learned how to skate. Their shots were wild, nowhere near the goal. Their passes were slow and obvious—easy to pick off. Their defense just wasn’t there. On the day when they should have come storming onto the ice, full of unquenchable bloodlust, focused like cruise missiles on showing the world that Ricky’s death had not been in vain, they were playing like they had no heart at all.

  The Portage Possums, the worst team in the league—their record was the mirror opposite of the Raccoons’—had scored first and second and third. Now they were into the final period, and the Raccoons still hadn’t retaliated.

  The fans had grown restless and angry. Deafening boos and shouts of “You guys suck!” circled the rink like thunder. During a time-out near the end of the second period, someone had thrown a Big Gulp of Pepsi over the glass at Digger; it missed him, but the brown liquid had splattered everywhere.

  In the front row, the hockey wives huddled together, their shoulders slumped, glum expressions on their faces. They were in shock. Erin had roused them into leading a few cheers early in the game, but as the clock clicked forward, they found inspiration harder and harder to come by. Now they watched morosely, elbows on knees, frowning faces embedded deep in their fists, as their men threw their pride away.

  Britney felt like it was all her fault. If she had just kept Ricky with her for five more minutes that night—even if it had meant five more minutes of fighting—he wouldn’t have been at that gas station at that precise instant. All of history would have been altered.

  As she sat there brooding, she obsessively fingered the hockey pin on Ricky’s letter jacket. Except for the funeral, she’d worn the jacket every day since his death. Like a badge of fidelity.

  Cindy said, “To think I turned down the Tomlinsons for this. They pay fifteen dollars an hour, and their baby just lies there and sleeps. I could have watched American Idol and walked away with forty-five bucks tonight.”

  Usually someone would have responded to this. Jodi would have said, “Yeah, but you’d have to change diapers. You’d have to touch nasty baby butt.” Or Erin would have told her that she should have taken the job anyway. “What you should have done is wait there until the Tomlinsons were off to dinner and then pack the baby up and bring him here with you.” But they were all too unhappy for this kind of patter.

  Britney was worried about her place in the group. Now that Ricky was gone, she feared the other girls might gradually distance themselves from her. They’d all been friends forever, since freshman year at least, and she knew from experience—from all those times before she’d been accepted when Erin had seen her in the halls and called out to her mockingly, “Hey, I love your blouse. Where’d you get it? Wal-Mart?”—how cruel they could be if they wanted to.

  “Well, it looks like Troy’s not getting any perks tonight,” Erin said as she munched on a stale nacho coated in liquid cheese.

  The other girls nodded sagely.

  Erin could turn on people so quickly, and since she was without question the leader, if she decided Britney was no longer worthy, the other girls would all follow suit.

  She’d have to go back to sitting at the games with her father and Melissa. She loved them both, and sitting with them wouldn’t be that horrible, except now all Melissa wanted to do was talk to Adam, and Britney didn’t think she could tolerate that. Earlier in the game, when it still looked like the Raccoons had a chance, she’d popped up to say hi, and Melissa—who was making herself more attractive by the day, styling her hair and wearing more and more fashionable clothes—had been so engrossed in Adam’s inane chatter about “the best album ever” that she barely acknowledged Britney’s presence.

  “Hey, everybody,” she said, trying to pull the hockey wives into a huddle. “Don’t you think we should make some noise? Let the guys know we’re still behind them?” The shrugs and signs that greeted this idea were just about what she’d expected. “Well, if nobody else will, I’ll do it.”

  “You can do what you want,” said Daphney, “but it’s not going to help. I just hope this game doesn’t ruin the party.”

  “Oh, it’ll ruin the party,” said Erin. “You can count on that.”

  Britney was sick of this. She was sick of everything.

  Jumping to her feet, she began to shout. “Come on, Raccoons, show us what you’re made of.” Her voice was strong and when she raised it, it climbed up the register. It pierced the silence of the stands. She could feel people turning to look at her, but nobody was joining in yet.

  The wives all had their heads in their hands. Well, if they’re too embarrassed to support their boyfriends, thought Britney, that’s their problem. I’m going to make sure the guys know I appreciate them.

  “Do it for Ricky!” she shouted. She liked the sound of that. She liked the idea that anyone who looked would see her, in Ricky’s oversized letter jacket, shouting his name. She said it again.

  “Do it for Ricky.”

  Digger, who was on the team bench just across the glass from Britney, craned his thick neck to look back at her. Everything about him was big, but still, he had an especially large mouth, which naturally turned down at the corners. When he’d been younger, the upperclassmen called him Fish Face, but now there was no one left who could beat him up. When he did grin, his face was all teeth. He was grinning now. He raised a clenched fist in Britney’s direction, a show of unity and strength. Then he started chanting with her.

  “Do it for Ricky.”

  Seeing Digger chant, Cindy joined in. She didn’t want him to think she didn’t care. She was a big girl, tall and wide-hipped, and though most people saw her as one of the cutest girls in school, she’d confided in Britney once that she believed Digger, with his beefy thuggish looks, was the best she’d ever be able to do for herself. She was jumpy when he was around, always trying to do whatever she thought he might think she should be doing.

  “Do it for Ricky.”

  A few more people joined in with each recitation.

  “Do it for Ricky.”

  And the team began to play with more vigor. They got meaner. They bodychecked. They looked for one another on the pass and set up for face-offs like they actually cared. Within a minute, they’d scored their first goal.

  The stands erupted. Everyone was chanting now. Clapping. Hooting and hollering.

  As the chant made its way around the rink, it gradually morphed. Britney almost couldn’t believe what she was hearing.

  “Do it for Britney. Do it for Britney.”

  They stomped their feet in rhythm with the chant, and so many people had joined in that the stands vibrated like they were going to collapse.

  When Digger was put back into the game, he immediately elbowed one of the Possums’ forwards in the j
aw. The refs didn’t see it, but they saw the Possum retaliate, grabbing Digger by the neck and punching at his face. Digger was a whole lot bigger than the guy; he just shrugged him off. He could have beaten the guy to a bloody pulp, but he’d already gotten what he was after. The guy was thrown in the penalty box, and the Raccoons had a one-man advantage. They capitalized five seconds later, getting their second goal.

  From then on out, they had the Possums on the run. The tide had turned. Final score: 4-3, Raccoons.

  As they skated off the ice, each Raccoon in turn pointed a finger in Britney’s direction.

  “Well, Britney,” Erin said, a little wryly, “you’re getting big props tonight.”

  Britney beamed.

  For the first time since Ricky died, she felt almost normal again.

  Almost.

  Just as everyone was getting up to leave, an explosion of gunshots filled the air. They echoed off the walls and, a second later, one of the two scoreboards hanging at either end of the rink exploded in sparks.

  There was utter chaos. Everyone screaming. Rushing for the exits. Standing on tiptoes in search of the shooter. Bodies pressed and pushing up against bodies in a jumble by the doors.

  Britney thought she saw Detective Russell, blond hair flying at her back as she ran in the opposite direction, toward the place where the shots seemed to have come from.

  The hockey wives clung to one another’s coats, huddled together in hopes of feeling safer. Jodi and Daphney were crying. Erin kept repeating, “I can’t believe this. I can’t believe this. I can’t believe this.” Britney held tight to them.

  She knew those shots had been meant for her. As she and the other hockey wives ran across the parking lot toward Erin’s SUV, she had the feeling that someone was watching her, waiting for the opportunity to get her alone, and then …

  It sent chills down her back just thinking about it.

  Twice she heard footsteps running toward her back, and both times she spun around to find no one there.

  When small groups of people moved past her, she thought she heard them whispering her name. She couldn’t tell if this was her imagination or if it was real. She kept thinking she heard them say things like, “Not now … but soon.”