Private Killer Read online

  “Frank!” I yelled into the walkie-talkie. “We’ve got a fire! And I can’t get in!”

  Frank here. Thankfully I was waiting for Destiny down below. She must have smelled the fire, because before I even made it to the entrance of the tunnel, she came flying down! I slammed the door behind her and barricaded it closed with some wood we had assembled down here for just that reason.

  Destiny collapsed in a coughing fit behind me. After a few seconds she was able to catch her breath. “I was in the shower when I heard someone behind me. I turned off the water, and that’s when I smelled the smoke.”

  Destiny had inhaled a lot of smoke, and I had to help her to the other end of the tunnel. Suddenly, someone slammed into the door and pounded on it for a minute, then stopped.

  I radioed up to Joe. “They’re still inside the house!”

  Not to worry though. I had it all in hand topside.

  Like I was saying—I tried to get in the front, but I couldn’t. That’s when Frank hit me up on the walkie-talkie. I backed off and began circling the house with Killer. Sure enough, a minute later, someone was trying to crawl out of one of the upstairs windows. I waited until they’d leaped to the ground, then released Killer. They made it all of about two feet before Killer had them pinned.

  Frank and Destiny came up behind me right as the culprit started screaming. “Get this dog off of me! Help!”

  Destiny flinched when she heard the voice. “Casey?”

  Two seconds later Casey no longer needed to worry about Killer hurting him—because Destiny had shoved Killer out of the way, and was busy kicking Casey into the ground. Frank had to wrestle her off of him, while I pinned him down to stop him from running away. Finally we got them separated.

  “You were my friend! You jerk! Why would you do this?”

  “You ruined my life!” screamed Casey.

  “What are you talking about? I didn’t even know you before you transferred here.”

  “Yeah, but you knew Lydia—remember her?”

  “Lydia? From the soccer team? What about her?”

  “You made her miserable for years. You shaved her head! She quit school after that, because she was too embarrassed to come back! She was my girlfriend. You ruined her life, and you ruined my life, and then you come here and you play against our team. Someone had to stop you from hurting more people!”

  Destiny looked like she was about to run over and kick Casey in the face again. “Lydia smashed my computer! She stole stuff from me all the time. She made my life miserable too! She got what she deserved.”

  There was no point in letting this go any further. I broke in on the two of them.

  “Destiny—the game’s about to start. You need to get over to the field!”

  For a moment Destiny looked as though she’d forgotten all about the game. Then, with a last evil look at Casey, she went sprinting to the soccer field. I looked at Casey. Of course it was Casey, I thought—he was close to Destiny so he could hide the things in her bag, he was also new to Firth Academy and would have needed a map of the campus, and he had ample opportunity to steal her scrunchie and plant it at the scene of the crime. He must have stolen the key to the changing house from Destiny, and been waiting overnight for her to come in.

  While Frank called Dr. Darity, I got a full confession from Casey. There were a few things he said he didn’t do—the graffiti with her blood, the truck that nearly squashed her—but for the most part, he owned up to everything. Casey said he was sorry that Mill got hurt, but if Destiny had just dropped out of the game earlier, he wouldn’t have been forced to go to such extreme measures. It was all her fault, Casey kept repeating.

  To think all of this and to still pretend to be her friend . . . Casey must have been really messed up in the head.

  Thankfully Dr. Darity and the police arrived soon. When we explained everything that had happened, they took him away almost immediately.

  “Thank you boys,” said Dr. Darity. “This makes twice now that you’ve saved my school—and once that you’ve saved my family. I don’t know how I could repay you.”

  “All in a day’s work, Dr. D.,” I said.

  “Just doing our job,” chimed in Frank. “Now let’s go watch Destiny kick some butt on the soccer field!”

  We headed over to the field together, Killer tugging on his leash. Finally this case was over and we could relax. Once the big game was done, we’d pack up our stuff and head back home. Which meant back to school for me, which I was trying not to think about—at least I’d be eating homemade food again. The cafeteria here was getting a little old.

  By the time we got to the game, there was no question which team was going to win. Firth was running the field. The Blair team hadn’t been able to score a single goal on Destiny. Lee had scored two of the three points that Firth had on the board. As we watched, a fast moving Blair player tried to sneak the ball up the inside through the Firth defenses. They made it right up next to the goal. They kicked—and Destiny just seemed to be there. She moved so fast I didn’t even see her run. One second she was at the other end of the goal, the next, she was blocking the ball with her chest. Her team got it on the rebound, and Lee drove it straight up the middle of the field and into the opposite goal. It was now four to nothing, Firth.

  In the cheering and whooping and shouting that followed the big win, everyone seemed to have forgotten the terrible events of the last few weeks. For once people seemed happy and calm on the Firth campus. They’d even left behind the rivalry that had kept them from embracing Destiny as one of their own. The team lifted her and Lee up on their shoulders and chanted their names. Being the MVPs had its perks.

  The winner’s cup—a giant, two-handled silver vessel—was brought over. It was a tradition that the best player of the game drank punch from the cup. They tried to give it to Lee, but he shook his head and pointed at Destiny. They tried to give it to her, but she just pointed back at Lee. Everyone laughed, and finally someone from the crowd shouted that they should just share it. The two groups of students who were holding Lee and Destiny up brought them closer together, and, holding hands, they both drank deeply from the cup.

  The crowd went wild. Even the Blair team cheered their opponents. Destiny must have spotted her Dad standing over with us, because she waved for the students to put her down. She began running over this way.

  But something was wrong. She was running funny, sort of sideways, like she couldn’t keep her balance. She opened her mouth to yell—and she collapsed to the ground. People started to scream. I looked behind her just in time to see Lee swaying in place where the students had put him down. Suddenly he collapsed as well!

  I took off running toward Destiny and Lee, with Frank and Dr. Darity right behind me. I only hoped we weren’t too late already.