her green Corolla. I wondered about the story sheâd write, how something like this looked when it happened in your town and you were seventeen.
Then Iâd made two phone calls. The first was to Morgan Reed.
He answered the phone himself with a sullen, âHello.â
âBill Smith,â I said. âCops leave yet?â
âMan, what the fuck are you calling for?â Rage boiled through the phone. âDid you tell them to come here?â
âDonât be stupid. Detective Sullivan took one look at that house, you were the first name that sprang to mind.â
âGo fuck yourself.â
âDonât hang up on me, Morgan, Iâll just come over. I want to know if Gary Russell was at Tory Wesleyâs party Saturday night.â
âOh, fuck that party! I wish I never went to that fucking party!â
âBut you did go?â I said it as a question, but neither of us thought it was.
âItâs a fucking joke, too, because like I told Sullivan, I was so fucking wasted, I came home early. People were still coming when I left. Maybe Gary got there, maybe he didnât. I didnât see him. Who cares?â
âI guess Jim Sullivan already asked you if you killed her?â
âFuck you!â
âDid you know she was dead?â
âNo!â His voice tamped down. âI knew shit like that, Iâd tell somebody.â
Thatâs what you say, I thought, until you know shit like that, and you know people youâre tied up with are involved, will be in trouble if you tell somebody. I watched a car pull into the space Stacie Phillips had pulled out of. All right, I told myself, let it go. I asked Morgan Reed, âDo you know who killed her?â
âHow could I, I didnât know she was dead?â The sneer was back. Another victory over a dumb adult.
âDid the reason Gary Russell went to New York have something to do with what happened at Tory Wesleyâs?â
âI donât know. I got no idea why he went and guess what? I donât give a shit.â
âI donât buy it,â I said. âYouâre a quarterback, heâs your receiver. I didnât play, but I remember who was tight.â
âThe guyâs new,â Morgan snapped. âAnd him and me, we donât start.â Meaning the thing that would tie them together, these boys, create a bond they would both remember as the best friendship theyâd ever had: that thing hadnât happened yet.
âOkay,â I said, and then because he was still a fifteen-year-old kid and some things were important to him, I said, âHave a good practice.â
âI canât go to practice!â The real reason for his fury came out in a blast of outrage at the scale of the injustice. âMy mom was so pissed when that asshole Sullivan came here and she found out about the party, Iâm fucking grounded.â
I called Lydia.
âThat camp,â I said. âSomeone there has got to know something about this girlâs death, what happened at that party. It might be one of them who killed her.â I told Lydia about Stacie Phillips. âShe said they were all bound to have been there, including Gary. And that Reed kid just about confirmed it. Whatever Garyâs up to, itâs got to have something to do with what happened there.â
âI tried to call that kid at the camp, the one you wanted me to talk to, Randy Macpherson, but guess whatâyou canât talk to the kids.â
âWhile theyâre at practice?â
âAt all. No phone calls while theyâre at camp, except for certified emergencies.â
âYouâre kidding.â
âIt sounded weird to me, too, but I decided it must be a guy thing. A football thing. You know, for building men.â
âA lot of sarcasm going around today.â
âFootball brings that out in me. What do you want me to do?â
âAbout that,
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