You'll Miss Me When I'm Gone (31 page)

Tanya's mouth twisted to one side. She nodded. “A couple of weeks before the explosion, I had a feeling Damon had made another friend, someone he didn't tell me about.”

Spencer was pretty sure she was telling the truth.

“I have absolutely nothing to back it up, but it was a feeling I got. It was like he started to cut me out of his life.” She shrugged. “Then again, maybe he was already thinking about what he was going to do, and he didn't want me catching on . . .”

“You must have been hurt when he pulled away,” Spencer said.

Tanya nodded.

“From everything you've told me—and what I read in his journal—you were a good friend to Damon.”

“I was,” she murmured.

“Here you go, folks,” interrupted the waitress with the rabbit ears and nose. She set their plates in front of them. “Short stack for the lady, and eggs and bacon for the gentleman.”

“Thank you,” Spencer said.

Tanya didn't say anything. She didn't even look up. She had tears in her eyes.

The waitress set a syrup dispenser by Tanya. “Anything else for you folks?”

“No thanks, this is great,” Spencer said. He watched the waitress walk away—her bunny tail wagging. Neither he nor Tanya picked up a fork.

“I know you're involved in these murders somehow,” he said quietly. “Even if it's remotely, you're involved, Tanya. How well do you know Troy Slattery? Be honest with me . . .”

“I was telling you the truth. I hardly know the guy.” With a sigh, she poured some syrup over her hotcakes. “Do you really think a slick guy like him would hang around with me? Give me a break . . .”

Spencer watched her eat a couple of forkfuls of her pancakes. “Did Damon hire a couple of professional hit men before he killed himself? Did he give you the list of the people he wanted them to kill? Is that it?”

Tanya rolled her eyes and shook her head.

But Spencer thought he was on to something. “Did he make some sort of arrangement with you before he killed himself? Did he ask you to contact anyone or—or—”

“No, God!” she said. Her fork clanked on her plate as she put it down. “I already told you, I had no idea he was planning anything like that.”

Spencer frowned at her. He started to eat his breakfast. “Okay, fine,” he muttered between bites. “You realize you're helping to set me up for Ron's murder, don't you? Someone's using you. And you're taking a big chance getting involved with a couple of killers. Damon doesn't deserve your loyalty. Some of the stuff he wrote about you in his journal wasn't exactly nice.”

“What do you mean?” she asked, suddenly sitting up.

Spencer could tell he'd struck a nerve. He stopped eating. “I don't want to repeat it. Just believe me when I tell you, it wasn't very flattering.”

“Give me an example,” she pressed.

He sighed. “All right, he mentioned that sometimes he was embarrassed to be seen with you.”

“What else?” she asked. “What else did he say?”

“He said the way you dressed made you look ‘frumpy,' and that you did it for attention, but it just made you subject to ridicule.” Spencer didn't want to go on. He could see she was hurt, bristling.

“Well, don't stop now,” she said with a tremor in her voice. “You're just getting started . . .”

“Okay, he sometimes blamed you for the fact that people didn't like him,” Spencer said. “He wondered if he'd be better off if the two of you weren't friends . . .”

“That bastard,” she grumbled. Her face was turning red. “He's going to have to explain—”

“What did you say?” Spencer asked.

Tanya hesitated, and then took a deep breath. “Sometimes, I—I forget he's dead. It—it's wrong of you to quote Damon when he's not here to defend himself.”

Spencer just stared at her.

Tanya shook her head. “I know what you're thinking, and you're wrong.”

“My God,” he whispered.

Tanya grabbed her purse. The table rocked and silverware clattered as she quickly scooted out of the booth. Weaving around tables, she made her way to the door and hurried outside. Through the restaurant's big picture window, Spencer watched her almost knock someone over as she ran down the sidewalk.

He knew once she was far enough away, once she caught her breath, Tanya would call her only real friend.

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

 

I
t started raining as she pulled onto Dexter Avenue.

Andrea switched on the windshield wipers and then tightly gripped the steering wheel again. She told herself to focus on the road and watch the speed limit. If she had an accident or a cop stopped her, it would just delay her getting to the hospital. Luke was going to be all right. All this was just a precaution.

A fat, three-ring blue binder with “Estate Planning Portfolio” on the cover sat on the passenger seat. She'd found it in the closet in Luke's study. She was pretty certain he hadn't changed his will recently. He'd probably left everything to poor Damon. She didn't bother to check it. There was no time.

She kept resisting the impulse to press harder on the accelerator. The rain made the road slick, and besides, it felt like something was wrong with the car.

Andrea couldn't tell what it was, but she'd noticed an odd buckling after she'd left the restaurant—almost like she'd run over an object in the road and it had somehow wedged itself under the car. When she'd gotten home, she'd quickly checked the tires, but hadn't found anything. Then again, she hadn't been very thorough.

Luke couldn't really be dying. Hospitals knew how to keep a fever in check, didn't they? What happened when someone's temperature went up to 105? Didn't they go into convulsions or something? She imagined getting to the hospital in time to see them trying to resuscitate Luke with one of those machines, the doctor with a pair of electrified paddles, hovering over Luke's broken, unresponsive body:
“Clear!”

Andrea pushed harder on the accelerator. The rain was coming down faster now. She switched the windshield wipers to high.

She hadn't been thinking straight when she'd left the 5 Spot. She should have taken Spencer with her. Just because the doctor had said she should come alone, it didn't mean Spencer couldn't sit in the waiting room. She shouldn't have left him there in the restaurant. She couldn't be sure he'd actually go directly home after his meeting with Tanya. What if Troy Slattery was waiting for him when he got to the town house? Or maybe the police would come to question or arrest him while he was there all by himself. What if he tried to run away?

“Shit,” she said under her breath.

Once she reached the hospital, she would call him and have him take a cab there.

Andrea sped up and sailed through a light as it turned yellow. It felt like a tiny victory. She'd get to the hospital one minute sooner.

But then the car suddenly lurched and skidded. For an awful moment, the wheel seemed to lock on her. The VW veered into the oncoming lane. A minivan headed straight for her. A horn blared. Andrea pulled at the wheel again and swerved back into her own lane. She heard the tires screech. The blue binder flew off the seat and fell to the passenger floor. The car tilted to one side and rattled so much Andrea felt as if she were driving over a series of speed bumps. She realized one of the tires must have blown. Trying to get her breath, she tapped the brake to slow down. She switched on her indicator and pulled over to the side of the road.

Though she'd come to a stop, Andrea still clung white-knuckled to the wheel. She couldn't stop shaking. She told herself there was no time to start crying. She knew how to change a tire. She'd done it before—and in good time, too. She just hadn't ever changed a tire in the rain before—while someone she loved lay dying in the hospital.

She sat in the car for another minute, collecting herself. The windshield wipers squeaked a bit. Rain tapped on the roof, and other cars whooshed by. Andrea turned off the engine and switched on the hazard lights. She took a deep breath, then reached down under the dash and popped the trunk. Opening the door, she stepped outside and felt the cold rain hammering down on her.

She hurried around to the front of the car and opened the hood. Raindrops started to cover the spare tire—and something else that was in the VW's trunk, something that didn't belong in there. It was a navy blue and gray jacket, Spencer's school colors. The jacket wasn't his. It was a varsity jacket for someone on the football or basketball team.

Andrea picked it up and a few feet of slightly tattered rope fell out of the jacket folds. There was a big knot in the rope—like it might have been tied around someone's wrists or ankles.

She saw the
QA
sewn on the back of the jacket—a varsity letter.

“Ron Jarvis,” she murmured.

She remembered Spencer's muddy shoes when he'd come home last night. And she remembered what he'd told her happened to Ron:
They found him strung up from a tree in the woods.

Had Spencer's shoes gotten dirty in those woods?

With cars sailing by, Andrea stood in the rain in front of her crippled VW and started to sob.

* * *

Spencer lingered outside the 5 Spot—in the shelter of its awning. The rain fell steadily around him, but he was dry.

He kept thinking of how Tanya had started talking about Damon as if he were alive. Spencer now knew that when she'd made that slip of the tongue, Tanya hadn't really forgotten that Damon was dead.

No, she'd forgotten for a moment
to pretend
he was dead.

Spencer studied the video on his smart phone.

It had taken him a while to find Damon's webcast. The video had gone viral, but then was pulled off the Internet less than a day later because of its violent content less. Still, Spencer knew if he searched hard enough for it, he'd eventually find the uncensored video on some Web site. It was that way with practically everything on the Internet.

After only ten minutes, he'd found a site,
www.grist-4-d-mill.com
, with the headline:
Uncensored: Teen Suicide Webcast—Bullied High School Student Blows Up Mother & Self in Car!
Spencer hoped he didn't pick up some kind of virus downloading the video. The videocast was just over seventeen minutes long.

He moved the arrow at the bottom of the image until it was close to the end. He started at 15:40—fifteen minutes and forty seconds into the webcast.

It wasn't intentional, but Spencer started the video at the moment in which Damon was on the phone with his dad and mentioned Spencer: “You can marry that other woman—and be like a father to what's-his-name—Spencer.” Though he was snide with that
what's-his-name
crack, Damon still seemed so sad and resigned to what he was about to do. His voice was a bit fuzzy on the video, and hard to hear over all the rain. “He's more like the son you always wanted than I ever could be. At the end of the day, you'll come out better than anyone else. And just think of the publicity, Dad. All those people who have never heard of you and never seen your plays, they'll know you after today . . .”

Damon fell silent as his father spoke to him on the phone. Spencer could only guess how much Luke was pleading with his son not to kill himself—or anyone else. With the phone to his ear, Damon kept nodding over and over. He looked so glum.

But then—at sixteen minutes and twenty-eight seconds—Damon suddenly hurled the phone into the woods. He opened the front door of the BMW, and then stepped to one side—out of camera range. After a moment, everything went out of focus as Damon repositioned the camera. It was directed toward the passenger side now. Damon stepped back into the shot, walking around to the front of the BMW to the door he'd opened on the driver's side. He bent down to climb into the front seat.

Spencer held the phone close to his face, trying to see inside the car. But it was too dark. Had Damon actually gotten in the front seat?

The driver's door slammed shut.

Spencer couldn't see any shadows or movement inside or outside the car.

Even though he knew it was coming, the bright flash still startled him. He paused the video just as the car burst into flames.

He told himself that this video had been seen by thousands of people. If anything about it had been faked, wouldn't someone have noticed? Or had most people watched it on the tiny screens of their smart phones? Had anyone carefully studied this video?

Spencer moved the arrow back to 16:42 and played it again. But his phone screen was too small to get a good look at every move Damon had made in those final seconds.

Switching over to phone mode, he dialed Bonnie Middleton's number.

She answered before the second ring. She didn't bother to say hello. “What did Tanya say? Did you meet with her?”

“Yeah, we met,” he said. “And I think she ended up telling me a lot more than she intended to. Listen. Do you live anywhere near the Five Spot?”

“My house is about six blocks away. Why?”

“Are you home?” he asked. “Or are you on your way to cheerleading?”

“I'm home. There's nothing to cheer-lead. They canceled the game, because of Ron—and the rain.”

“Do you have a computer in your bedroom—with a big screen?”

“Yeah, I guess, eighteen inches,” she replied. “It's not exactly enormous.”

“Can I come over?”

“What for? Why are you asking about the size of my computer screen?”

“Because I want to watch Damon's suicide webcast,” Spencer replied.

“You want to look at that
again
?”

“No, I want to look at it for the first time—on a big screen,” he said. “I want to see if he actually got into that car before it blew up.”

* * *

“I don't want to do this anymore,” Tanya said into her phone.

It had started raining on her way home, and she didn't have an umbrella with her. So Tanya was cold and drenched as she turned down her block. Her sneakers from the Salvation Army were already soaked through, and her socks were wet. She was miserable—and hating herself for that slip she'd made in front of Spencer earlier. She was almost certain he'd caught on.

She just wanted to get out of this. It had already gone way too far. She was tired of being a decoy and coconspirator.

She'd phoned twice and gotten the generic voice mail that came with those pay-as-you-go phones he was now using. Pimps and drug dealers used those types of phones. Other criminals used them, too. And that's what he'd become now. She'd become one, too:
an accessory to murder
.

On this third attempt to get ahold of him, she'd left a message. And the message was that she'd had enough.

“I could end up going to jail for my part in this,” she said. She kept her head down—staring at the leaves on the wet sidewalk. Her hair was in damp tangles. “Spencer is starting to figure out what you're doing. It's obvious you're trying to frame him. And you know something? He doesn't deserve it. He never did anything to you—or me. He's a hell of a lot nicer to me than you've been lately . . .”

Tanya started to cry. “You won't even show your face to me! And listen, I know you're working with someone else. You've been lying to me about that. I want to see you . . .”

She took a deep, fortifying breath as she neared the walkway to her house. “I want to meet in person with you today—I mean it,
today,
face-to-face! Otherwise, tomorrow I'm going to the police and telling them everything. I'll cut a deal with them. I mean it . . .”

* * *

Spencer saw her standing under an umbrella on the corner at the end of her block. Bonnie wore jeans and a dark blue jacket with a hood. She waved to him.

“God, you're drenched,” she said as he approached her.

She offered to share the umbrella with him, which was sweet—but not really necessary. He couldn't have gotten any wetter if he'd gone swimming in his clothes. Still, Spencer didn't pass up the chance to huddle close to her. “Thanks,” he said.

As they started down the sidewalk together, Bonnie warily looked around. “Like I told you over the phone, you're taking a real chance coming here,” she said. “The police are still patrolling the neighborhood. And I have a feeling they're on the lookout for you in particular.”

“Why? What do you mean?” Spencer asked.

“Last night at the party, Ron was going on and on about ‘kicking your ass' to anyone who would listen. I guess enough people have told the police about it. It's clear Ron was jealous of you, at least the police think so. They figure where there's smoke . . .”

“I still don't get it,” he said.

She looked at him and sighed. “I'm pretty sure the police think I'm your girlfriend. And they're expecting you to contact me.”

“Oh,” he heard himself say. “Wow.”

“I'll take that as a compliment,” Bonnie said. She glanced over her shoulder, and then across the street. “My mom's out. And my dad and brothers are down in the basement, watching TV. At least they were there when I snuck out of the house a few minutes ago. I'll go in first and make sure the coast is clear—”

“Why should we have to sneak around?” Spencer asked. “Why don't you just introduce me as one of the guys on the football team or something?”

“The police have your picture. It looked a few years old, but it's still a good likeness. Anyway, they showed it to my parents. I guess they wanted to make sure I didn't lie about you never coming over to the house. Anyway, that's why we have to sneak around.”

She stopped in front of a driveway and nodded at a large, old Tudor-style house. “Here's us. I'll go in first. Wait here for me to signal to you, okay?”