When she opens those curtains in the morning, the first thing she’s going to see is my face.Smizing.Holding the very stick she stole, across my chest, like a man who misses something he’s perfectly fine without.
I step back into the yard and admire my work.
Then I walk home with my hands in my pockets, whistling.
Back in my room, I open the laptop again, go to the team’s shared drive, and find the broadcast cut from Friday night. Not tonight’s. Friday’s, specifically, on purpose — because Friday is when I had my stick. And because Friday is the scene of the crime.
I trim it down, and I save it. Linwood_Game1_FullTape.mp4.
Then I open the thread with her — Linwood, A. — where my texts from this afternoon are still sitting there, gray, unanswered, exactly as I knew they’d be.
Me:For your reports.
I attach the tape.
Send.
I set the phone on my nightstand, where I’ll see it light up if it does. Which is –– you know –– just in case.
I strip down to a t-shirt and shorts and climb into bed and flop onto my back and stare at the ceiling for exactly two seconds.
Then I close my eyes, and I smile.
I sleep like a baby on the nights I win.
Tonight, three doors down and on every scoreboard that matters, I’m winning.
Chapter 8
Aspen
I wake before the sun comes up and roll out of bed. The first thing I do is get coffee, and then I trail back to my bedroom and sit at my desk. I open my laptop and start with homework. I love a good Sunday. It’s the perfect day to relax and do nothing. I get to lie around and reset for the week. Eventually, I take my laptop to my bed and stretch across my comforter. My coffee goes cold, and the sun rises, so I get up and start cleaning my room.
I glance at Stanley’s hockey stick near my closet door. I don’t really know what I’m doing with it, transferring it between my car and my room over and over. And it’s crazy that he doesn’t seem to mind –– at least he’s acting that way, so I’m going to draw this out to see what’ll happen.
Once all my clothes are folded and put away neatly, I reach for my curtains because there’s enough sunlight to fill the room. As soon as I pull the curtain back, I jump.
Stanley Ermington’s face is taped to the outside of my glass.
Six times.
Six laminated copies of the same photo — a magazine shoot, a real one, the man holding a hockey stick and staring directly into my bedroom at eight in the morning — pressed flat to my window in a neat grid, top corners and bottom corners, taped down so the wind wouldn’t take them.
My brain does nothing at all for a second. Total static. And then it catches up to my eyes, and I step back from the window.
And I laugh. Out loud. A real one. I clap a hand over my own mouth, because what in God’s name am I doing laughing at this? This is psychotic behavior. This is a man who needs a restraining order and a hobby.
I step up to the glass and read it.
MISSING.
Last seen Friday night, Camden Arena. Believed to be taken by a known accomplice operating out of Hawthorne Street.
REWARD:A moment of my time.
“Asshole.”
He is so unbelievably arrogant that I almost have to admire the engineering of it. I grab my hoodie and throw it on. I pull up my sweats and march outside barefoot. I peel all six laminated papers off my window. The lamination does it for me. He knew they’d get wet in this weather. He was fully committed to the crime, and when did he put them up? When I was asleep.Ooh, that creep!
