That Night (40 page)

Hicks read me my rights again—another officer had already done it when I was first brought to the station.

“Let’s just get this over with,” I said.

“Okay, Toni. Take me through last night.”

“How are Ryan and Ashley?”

“Ryan’s in the hospital but it looks like he’ll make it. Ashley’s also going to be okay. What were you doing out there? And why were you carrying a knife?”

I’d violated multiple conditions of my parole, but it seemed I was screwed anyway, so I told him everything. How I’d discovered Nicole had had a secret boyfriend, about Shauna’s affair with the shop owner, and that I was positive she and her friends had killed Nicole because she was having an affair with Frank McKinney.

“Shauna said you were blackmailing her.”

“I told her I had Nicole’s diary, but that was just to get her out there. I recorded what happened on my phone.” Then I realized my cell was probably at the bottom of the lake. “Ashley said she filmed what happened too, and—”

“We’ll get to that in a minute. I want to hear what you have to say.”

I told him the rest of my theories, what I’d realized at the lake—that my sister must’ve been fooling around with Frank McKinney for months. I told him about McKinney driving her home, her sneaking out more after that, how her behavior had changed, about the missing necklace, which Shauna now claimed to have taken. I also told him how Ryan had jumped McKinney to protect me, then McKinney shot him.

At the end I said, “So what’s going to happen now? We get blamed for everything again?”

“You’re all under arrest. We’re taking statements from everyone involved, and we’re in the process of reviewing the video Ashley recorded. But you violated at least three conditions, so your parole will be suspended.”

“I’m going back to Rockland.” I said the words flat, resigned to my fate.

“If everything you’re telling me is true, you can appeal on the grounds that you have new evidence.”

I laughed. “If I live that long. Someone inside wants me dead.”

“We can put you in protective custody.”

“I’d rather die. What about Ryan?”

“He’ll be in the hospital until he recovers, then he’ll go back to Rockland. We know you two met on several occasions prior to this, which is a direct violation of your parole, and we found a knife strapped to his calf.”

“He was trying to protect
me.
This is such bullshit. You’ve seen the video, you know we’re innocent.” His eyes flicked to my arms, and I glanced down at the scratches. I looked back up at him. There’d been something in his expression, a realization. What was he thinking? Then I got it.

“You see now. You see how Ryan got those scratches the night Nicole died—it was from when we pushed our way through the bushes. I
told
you—”

“We’ll get to the truth, and if you and Ryan are innocent, you’ll be exonerated in due time. Meanwhile, we have to follow the law, which you broke when you carried a concealed weapon to meet a witness.” I hated him for his matter-of-factness, for being part of the system that had screwed me years ago.

“If anything else happens to me or Ryan, it’s on
your
head. You sent two kids away for years who didn’t do anything. Or is that what this is about? Did you help cover up for your buddy Frank McKinney?”

“I didn’t cover for anybody.” His face was an angry red. It was the first time I’d ever seen him show a strong emotion. I pushed harder.

“He was your friend. You were together that night.”

“He was my partner, but that doesn’t mean I won’t put him away if he broke the law.” Hicks stood up, but before he left, he said, “We
will
get to the truth—and the right people
will
be punished.”

CHAPTER THIRTY

R
OCKLAND
P
ENITENTIARY
, V
ANCOUVER

J
ULY
2013

I didn’t see Doug Hicks again. I spent the night at the station jail and was flown over to Rockland the next afternoon. Outside the station, media lined the road, trying to get a photo of me and shouting questions: “Toni, did Shauna McKinney murder your sister?” “Are you and Ryan back together again?” “Is it true that you’re innocent?” The sheriffs had to shield me from the cameras as they ushered me to the van. I wondered if what had happened at the lake had been on the late news the night before, if the girls in Rockland had heard I was coming back, if Helen was already planning her assault on me.

After I went through the intake process at the penitentiary, I was unpacking my stuff when Brenda and Amber appeared in the walkway outside my cell. I looked up with a smile. “Hey, guys.”

Neither of them smiled back, their faces serious. Thinking that they must have news about Helen, I said, “What’s up?”

Brenda tried to speak but stopped, tears in her eyes. I was starting to get a really bad feeling. I sat down on my bed.

“Where’s Margaret?” I said.

Amber spoke up, her voice high and anxious. “Helen and her haven’t been getting along since all that stuff happened when you were in here, and—”

“But it’s not your fault,” Brenda broke in. “Margaret hated her.”

“What
happened
?” I waited in horror, my heart thudding hard in my chest.

Amber’s words came out in a rush. “They were watching the news last night and Helen started saying how she was going to kick your ass when you came back. Margaret told her off, then later they met in the yard—we didn’t know Margaret planned on fighting her or we would’ve stopped her. Helen had a shank…” Amber was crying so hard she couldn’t finish.

“Did she stab her? Is she in the infirmary?”

Brenda was shaking her head, tears running down her face too. “She didn’t make it.”

I started to cry, deep gasping sobs. Both of the girls were still trying to fight their own tears, all of us helpless to comfort each other with an embrace, the security cameras watching. When I finally got control of myself, my sorrow had turned to pure rage.

“Where’s Helen?” I was going to fuck her up good.

“She’s in segregation,” Brenda said. “They’ll throw her into maximum now. She’ll never get out of Rockland.”

It meant I was safe. I should’ve been relieved. I got up and paced my cell.

“Why did Margaret fight her? She should have waited until I got back in here.”

“I don’t know,” Brenda said. “She was always telling us to walk away from stuff. And she was really tired lately—and sore. It doesn’t make sense that she’d take Helen on by herself.”

Amber said, “She left something for you in her cell before the fight. Her roommate gave it to us.” She glanced up at the nearest camera. “We’ll get it to you later.”

The guards called out, “Count!” and the girls went back to their cells, after we promised we’d see each other at chow in the morning.

Later, when lights were out, I thought of Margaret and how she’d managed to avoid fights the whole time she was in prison, until this last one. Then I remembered the last time I saw her, begging me for a massage, saying that she didn’t know how much longer she could live in there, her body in constant pain. Had she picked a fight with Helen knowing she’d lose? And knowing that it was the only way to make sure Helen could never hurt me again?

I was devastated, thinking that she might have sacrificed herself for me. Then I remembered something else Margaret had said, when we were talking about Nicole. “You can’t blame yourself for something someone else chose to do. You didn’t force her into that truck, and you didn’t kill her. Blaming yourself is just weak, and it pisses me off hearing you punish yourself, like you don’t deserve to ever be happy or something. I don’t want to hear that crap out of your mouth again.”

And so I tried to think of Margaret now, finally free from pain, maybe dancing with a gorgeous man, spinning around and around in a long, flowing dress, a beautiful smile on her face. She’d told me that death wasn’t the hard part, living was. I tried to find peace in knowing that the hard part was over for her.

*   *   *

Amber showed up at my cell the next day with some papers bundled together in a makeshift book. On the front Margaret had scrawled,
For Toni.
After Amber left, I took a breath and opened the book, wondering what had been so important that Margaret had made a point of leaving it for me. Inside the first page she’d tucked a note:

Toni, if you’re reading this, I guess the fight didn’t go so well. I just hope I took that bitch down with me!!! I planned on mailing this to you but didn’t get a chance to finish. You’ll do fine. See you on the other side, kid. Love, M.

My eyes filling with tears, I flipped through the pages and cried even harder when I saw what she had done. She’d jotted down recipes, household tips, life lessons, inspirational quotes, jokes, anything she thought would help me survive on the outside. Anything she thought a mother would tell her daughter.

For the next few days, I spent a lot of time in my cell, thinking about Margaret, how much she had meant to me. Brenda and Amber were also grieving, and we had a makeshift memorial for Margaret in the yard, sharing stories. Now that Helen was out of the picture none of her friends messed with me, but there was still some tension. I wondered how long it would take before my case would go before the Court of Appeals. Angus was trying to get a hearing, but he said it could take up to three months.

One day, when I’d been in for almost a week, I had a visitor. The visit wasn’t scheduled, so I was surprised when one of the guards came to get me. I was even more surprised to see my visitor was Suzanne.

“What’s going on?” I sat down across from her.

She eyed me from the other side of the table, which was covered with bags of chips, a couple of chocolate bars from the vending machine, and two cans of Coke. “You’ve lost more weight.”

I pulled at my shirt, made a face. “I’ve been under some stress.”

She pushed a chocolate bar and a bag of chips at me. “Here. Eat up.”

She was looking at me expectantly and I got the feeling she wasn’t going to say anything until I ate something, so I unwrapped the bar and took a small bite. The heavy sweetness made me feel sick. My lawyer had told me our chances of getting out looked good. Did Suzanne know something Angus didn’t?

She glanced at the guard watching the room and he gave her a nod. I was also getting the feeling this visit wasn’t on the books. Suzanne looked back at me.

Still unsure of what this was about, I kept my mouth shut. She said, “How much do you know about the investigation?”

“Not much. They’ve been keeping us in the dark.” I shared what I knew so far. My lawyer had told me Shauna and Frank McKinney had been denied bail, but McKinney was in protective custody because he’d been a cop. Once the police had reviewed Ashley’s tape and all our statements, they pulled in Kim and Rachel for questioning. “We know they were arrested,” I said, “but we don’t know what the charges were and haven’t heard anything since.”

Suzanne was nodding as I spoke. “I have some friends on the force. They told me Kim rolled right away on Shauna.”

“You know what really happened that night? Were they all involved?”

She nodded again, her eyes sad. “I’m bending the rules, but I wanted you to hear it from me.”

I sucked in a big lungful of air, bracing for what was coming next, then said, “How did they get her out of the truck?”

“Kim says that after Shauna told them Nicole had been messing with Rachel’s boyfriend, and that Nicole was the one who told Kim’s mom she was gay, they were furious. Shauna wanted to get back at Nicole, and the girls agreed.”

“Did they plan on killing her?”

“Doesn’t sound like it. They were just going to get her alone and humiliate her by stripping her down, taking photos, then spreading them around. They’d been harassing Nicole all week, phoning her, threatening that they were coming for her.” I thought of how thin Nicole had gotten those last few weeks, how she’d stolen the pills because she couldn’t sleep. I could well imagine how terrified she must have been, how alone she must have felt not being able to confide in anyone, how she hadn’t wanted to be home alone that Friday.

“They were waiting outside your house. When they saw you all leaving together, they followed you to the lake.” I remembered that night, the heat coming through the windows, Nicole’s bare leg brushing against mine, her face serious.

“They parked their car and snuck up on the truck,” Suzanne said. “When they realized you guys had left Nicole by herself, they figured you’d be gone awhile. They sent Cathy to lure Nicole out of the truck.”

Cathy, who’d spent the next seventeen years smoking and drinking everything in sight. I started tearing at the chocolate bar wrapper, ripping the corner off into little bits, my fingers itching to attack something, anything.

Suzanne’s voice got lower, more serious, her gaze flicking to my hands as she said, “Cathy told Nicole she’d been at the party below, seen her drive by, and just wanted to talk so they could clear the air.”

I felt sick. “That’s why she got out. She thought she could fix everything.…” Sunny, sweet Nicole, who wanted to be everyone’s friend.

Suzanne paused, letting me gather myself before she continued. “After Nicole was out of the truck the other girls rushed her and ordered her to take off her clothes. When she refused, Rachel punched her. Kim says Nicole tried to hit back, but then both Kim and Shauna attacked her, knocking her down.”

I stared at the little pile of ripped plastic in front of me, my eyes filling with tears as I saw my sister falling to the ground, imagined her desperate pleas, her eyes searching for Ryan and me, praying we’d come back and save her.

I could barely find my voice, whispering, “What else? What else did they do?”

Suzanne told me the rest of the terrible story. While Kim and Rachel slapped and kicked Nicole, Shauna grabbed the tire iron from behind the truck’s seat. The girls stopped, scared now, but stood frozen while Shauna, in a rage they didn’t understand, hit Nicole several times in the head and the face. By the time they finally pulled her off, Nicole was unconscious. Shauna told them they’d all go to jail for assault if Nicole lived, so they had to kill her. She made Rachel hit her with the tire iron too.