Ruthless pll-10

by Sara Shepard

  Ezra looked startled. “Well, I’ve only published one poem—in a foreign journal.”

  “Was it called ‘B-26’?” Klaudia’s eyes brightened.

  “Well, yeah.” Ezra’s smile grew broader and more skeptical. “You’ve . . . read that?”

  “Se tytto, se laulu!” Klaudia quoted in melodic Finnish. “Is beautiful! I have it pinned up on bedroom wall in Helsinki!”

  Ezra’s mouth hung open. He glanced at Aria in an amazed way as if to say, Can you believe it? I have a fan! Aria wanted to smack him upside the head. Didn’t he see that this was merely part of Klaudia’s sex kitten act? She’d never read his poetry—she’d probably seen his name on the manuscript at the library earlier today and Googled him!

  “I’ve read that poem, too,” Aria boasted, suddenly feeling competitive. “It was really beautiful.”

  “Oh, but it even prettier translated into Finnish,” Klaudia insisted.

  A barista approached and Klaudia moved closer to Ezra to let him pass. “I have always wanted to be a writer, so this is very exciting for me to talk to a real published poet! Have you written other beautiful poetries?”

  “I don’t know how beautiful they are,” Ezra said mock-bashfully, clearly enjoying being admired. “I’m working on a novel right now.” He pointed at the manuscript that now sat on the ottoman next to them.

  “Oof!” Klaudia pressed her hand to her ample chest. “A whole novel? Is amazing! I hope to read it someday!”

  “Well, actually, if you’re really interested . . .” He placed the novel in Klaudia’s hands. “I’d love to hear your thoughts.”

  “What?” Aria shrieked. “She can’t read it!”

  Klaudia’s eyes widened innocently. Ezra cocked his head, looking stricken. “Why not?” he asked, sounding hurt.

  “Because . . .” Aria trailed off, trying to communicate with her eyes that Klaudia was a psychopath. Because it’s my novel, not hers, she wanted to say, but she realized how petty and immature that sounded. Still, the novel was so personal. Aria didn’t want Klaudia reading it, knowing about the most important relationship of her life.

  Ezra waved his hand. “It’s a rough draft,” he said gently. “I need as many people giving me feedback as I can.” He turned to Klaudia and smiled. “Maybe you’ll like it as much as ‘B-26.’”

  “I’m sure I love it!” Klaudia cradled the manuscript in her hands. She backed away, giving Ezra a three-finger wave. “Okay, I go now! Sorry I bother you! See you in school tomorrow, Aria!”

  “You were no bother,” Ezra called, waving back. There was a slight, satisfied smile on his face, and his gaze followed Klaudia as she sashayed out of the café and through the bookstore. Aria reached for his hand again, but he squeezed only lightly and distractedly, like there were far more important things—or perhaps girls—on his mind.

  Chapter 20

  ALL LOVING FATHERS STICK THEIR DAUGHTERS IN TALL TOWERS

  Mr. Marin flung open the door to his house and greeted Hanna with a huge smile. “Come in, come in!”

  “Thanks.” Hanna dragged a Jack Spade duffel, stuffed with enough clothes for a three-night stay, over the threshold. Then she picked up the little doggie carrier that held Dot, her miniature Doberman, and hustled him inside, too. “Do you mind letting him out of there?”

  “No problem.” Mr. Marin bent over and unlocked the metal latch. The little dog, which Hanna had dressed in a Chanel-logo sweater, immediately scuttled out of the carrier and ran crazily around the living room, sniffing everything.

  “Uch,” a voice said. Isabel, whose salmon-colored twin set matched her orangey, fake-tanned skin, glared at Dot as though he were a sewer rat. “That thing doesn’t shed, does it?”

  “No, he doesn’t,” Hanna said in the most friendly voice she could muster. “Perhaps you remember Dot from when you stayed in my house?”

  “I suppose,” Isabel said absently. Isabel had been wary of Dot when she’d lived at Hanna’s when Ms. Marin went to Singapore on business, wrinkling her nose when he lifted his leg on the trees in the backyard, pretending to gag when Hanna spooned organic doggie food into his ceramic bowl, and always backing away from him like he was about to bite her. Hanna wished Dot would bite Isabel, but Dot loved everyone.

  “Well, we’re glad to have you,” Isabel went on in a tone Hanna wasn’t sure was sincere.

  “Glad to be here,” Hanna said, peeking at her father’s expression. He looked so happy that she was honoring his request to stay with them a couple nights a week. It seemed like impeccably bad timing, though, what with her new entanglement with Liam. What if Hanna yelled out his name in her sleep? What if her dad scrolled through her phone and found all their texts to one another, including the steamy ones Liam had sent today?

  “C’mon, I’ll show you your room.” Mr. Marin hefted Hanna’s bags and started up the curved staircase. The house had a fussy, Christmas-store smell about it—Hanna had forgotten how obsessed Isabel was with putting lavender sachets into the drawers and bowls of potpourri on every available surface.

  Her dad passed the second level, then started up the third. “The bedrooms are all the way up here?” Hanna asked nervously. When she was little, she’d had an irrational fear that their house was going to catch on fire and lobbied to have their bedrooms on the first floor for easy escape—not that her parents went for it. Maybe she had a sixth sense, even back then, that someday she’d be trapped in a burning building.

  “Ours are on the second floor, but the guest room is on the third.” Mr. Marin glanced over his shoulder and raised his eyebrows. “We call it the loft.” He opened a door at the end of the hall. “Here we are.”

  They entered a plain, white room with sloping ceilings and small, square windows. It felt like he was a father in a fairy tale, sticking Hanna in a tall tower, but the room did have a hotel-quality duvet on the queen bed, a huge bureau, an ample-sized closet, and a flat-screen TV mounted on the wall. And was that . . . a Juliet balcony? Hanna rushed across the room and opened the French doors. Sure enough, a tiny balcony protruded from the room, offering a view of the landscaped backyard. She’d always wanted one of those.

  “Is it okay?” Mr. Marin asked.

  “It’s great.” It was definitely private, anyway.

  “Glad you think so.” Mr. Marin dropped Hanna’s bags by the closet, patted Dot on the head, and turned on his heel toward the door. “Now, c’mon. We’re going to review the new campaign commercials. I’d love your input.”

  Hanna followed him back down the stairs. On the third riser from the bottom, she noticed a flicker out the window. It was pitch-black outside, not exactly prime time for a stroll around the neighborhood. Her thoughts flashed back to A’s latest note: Both of them die in Act V. Was that a threat?

  Her father led her into the family room, which contained a cognac-colored leather sectional, a matching leather ottoman/coffee table, and a large television against the wall tuned to CNN. Kate sat in the corner of one of the couches, her coltish legs tucked under her. Sitting next to her, his hand entwined in Kate’s, was none other than Sean Ackard.

  “Oh,” Hanna said, stopping short.

  Sean’s face paled, too. “Hanna. I didn’t know you’d be here.”

  Hanna looked at Kate, and Kate gave her a saccharine smile. It was clear she knew Hanna was coming . . . and that she had invited Sean to reemphasize that he was hers now.

  “Hey, Sean,” Hanna said coolly, throwing back her shoulders and sitting as far away from the happy couple as she could. What did she care if Kate and Sean were dating? She had an amazing boyfriend now, too, after all.

  Not that she could tell anyone about him.

  She peeked at Kate again. Her stepsister’s brow was furrowed as though she’d expected more of a reaction. She tilted her body toward Sean and nuzzled her chin into his neck. Sean flinched, looking uncomfortable. Hanna wished she could drop a hint about seeing them at the V Club meeting, but she didn’t dare.

  Suddenly,
a familiar girl popped on the TV screen, and Hanna almost screamed. It was a photo of Tabitha. “Drinking during spring break: Should we crack down?” the anchor said. Hanna jumped up and pressed a button on the remote, and the TV went blank. Kate gave her a bizarre look.

  “I guess someone’s ready to see my commercials,” Mr. Marin joked. He pushed a DVD into the player, and his new campaign commercials popped onto the screen. Hanna sat back on the couch, trying to calm her nerves. Whenever she closed her eyes she saw an imprint of Tabitha’s picture in her mind.

  The first commercial was done with quick camera cuts, like an action film. The second one was done in mock-umentary style, like The Office. “I want everyone to give me their honest opinion,” Mr. Marin said. “Do you think young people will respond to these?”

  “They’re really fun and creative,” Kate said thoughtfully, leaning forward. “But I’m not sure kids really watch commercials. They usually DVR right through them.”

  “You could post them on YouTube, though,” Hanna said shakily, finding her voice.

  Mr. Marin looked stressed. “We should keep tweeting though, right? And should we stage more flash mobs? The one last week worked so well.”

  “It did, didn’t it, Hanna?” Kate simpered, glancing at Hanna pointedly. Hanna flinched. What did that look mean? Had Kate noticed that Hanna wasn’t there for most of the presentation? Had she seen the guy Hanna had run off with?

  “We could try Hollis this time.” Mr. Marin stopped the video. “Or maybe Bryn Mawr? Or we could go into the city, try Temple or Drexel.”

  Kate raked her hand through her long chestnut hair. “What does the competition think about the flash mobs?” Yet again, she stared straight at Hanna.

  Hanna’s skin prickled. “How should I know?”

  Kate shrugged. “I wasn’t asking you specifically.”

  Biting her lip, Hanna reviewed the various times she’d been with Liam. Had Kate seen them at the church after all? Did she know?

  Hanna stared at her. Kate stared back as if daring Hanna to blink. Sean tugged on his collar, his gaze ping-ponging between the girls. Mr. Marin shifted his weight, one eyebrow raised. “What’s going on, girls?”

  “Nothing,” Hanna said quickly.

  “Don’t ask me.” Kate threw up her hands. “She’s the one acting weird.”

  Suddenly, Hanna felt overwhelmed. She was hiding way too much. “Um, I have to . . .” Hanna jumped up from the couch and ran toward the door. Kate let out a half sniff, half sigh behind her.

  She rushed down the hall and paused outside the powder room, noticing a half-unpacked box and something propped on the back of the living room sofa. It was a well-worn stuffed Rottweiler, one of its ears almost missing and a patch of fur on its back worn away. Her father had bought Hanna this stuffed dog after they made up the Cornelius Maximilian dog character, a long-running inside joke between them. Hanna had lost track of the stuffed Cornelius through the years and figured he’d been lost forever. Had her dad really hung on to him this long?

  She touched Cornelius’s plush head, guilt and regret surging through her veins. Her dad was trying to make an effort to restore their relationship, and Hanna was paying him back by fraternizing with the enemy. She needed to break it off with Liam now, before she got in deeper. She was juggling too many secrets right now. It was all catching up with her.

  She reached into her pocket for her phone. But when she opened a new text message, she stopped. The thought of never seeing Liam again made her stomach tighten and tears well in her eyes.

  A hand touched Hanna’s arm, and she squealed and whirled around. Kate stood behind her, hand on one hip. “Everything okay?” she asked in a faux-concerned voice. Her gaze flicked from Hanna’s face to her cell phone.

  “Everything’s fine,” Hanna said tightly, covering the screen with her fingers. Thankfully, she hadn’t pulled up Liam’s information yet.

  “Uh huh.” Kate narrowed her eyes. “You don’t look fine.”

  “Why do you care?”

  Kate stepped closer, and Hanna could smell her Jo Malone Fig and Cassis body lotion. “You’re hiding something, aren’t you?”

  Hanna looked away, trying to remain calm. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  A nasty smile wriggled onto Kate’s face. “You heard what Tom said,” she warned, shaking her finger. “If any of us have secrets, the enemy will find them out. You don’t want that to happen, do you?”

  And then, before Hanna could answer, Kate tossed her long chestnut hair, spun around, and strolled back to the family room. She let out a high, lilting giggle as she walked, a sound that made every cell in Hanna’s body quiver.

  It sounded exactly like Ali’s. A’s.

  Chapter 21

  SAME BAG, SCARIER CONTENTS

  “Let’s take it from the eighth measure.” Amelia’s voice floated out from the den as Spencer walked in the door and dropped her bag by the umbrella stand the following afternoon. A few seconds later, clarinets tooted and violins screeched. The classical piece lumbered forward, sounding like a funereal mess. Then it stopped abruptly. “Maybe we should take a break,” another voice said.

  Spencer froze. Kelsey was here. Again.

  Part of her wanted to run up to her bedroom and slam the door tight, but she remembered her promise to the others—and herself. If she studied Kelsey carefully enough, maybe she’d be able to figure out what Kelsey knew about last summer—and if she really was A.

  Slowly, she crept toward the den. The door was slightly ajar. Inside the room, Amelia fingered her clarinet. Kelsey held her violin in her lap. Then, as if sensing a presence, Kelsey raised her head, saw Spencer, and flinched. Her mouth made a small O.

  Spencer shot back and pressed her body against the wall. Some spy she was. But after taking several deep breaths, she peeked around the doorway and looked again. Kelsey’s head was down now, concentrating on the sheet music. There was a tiny flower tattoo behind her ear—perhaps temporary, or perhaps real. Spencer wondered if she’d gotten it in juvie.

  She thought about the night of their arrest. It had begun like any other. Spencer had grabbed her books from her desk and climbed one floor to Kelsey’s room. The dorm was trying out a new keypad system of entry into the rooms instead of keys, and Kelsey had given Spencer her room’s code. She’d typed it in and let herself into the empty room—Kelsey was still at the gym. Spencer decided that she might as well pop an Easy A now so it would kick in when they were starting to cram. But when she rifled through her purse, the pill bottle was empty. She checked inside Kelsey’s Buddha statue, where she always kept her stash. Kelsey was out of pills, too.

  Panic overcame her. Their AP exams were in three days, and she was only through chapter seventeen of thirty-one in AP Ancient History. Phineas had warned her that if she went off the pills cold turkey, she’d suffer a major crash. The most logical thing to do was call Phineas for more, but Spencer had no idea where he’d gone. Two days ago, he didn’t show up to class. When Spencer and Kelsey went to his dorm room, it was empty, the sheets stripped from the bed, the clothes removed from the hangers in the closet. Spencer had tried his cell phone, but there was no answer. An automated voice said that his voice mail inbox was full.

  A beep of the room’s electronic keypad entry system sounded, and Kelsey let herself in, looking fresh-faced and relaxed. Spencer sprang to her feet. “We’re out of pills,” she blurted. “We need to get more.”

  Kelsey frowned. “How?”

  Spencer tapped her lips, thinking. Phineas had mentioned reputable dealers in North Philly and given her one of the guy’s cards in case of emergencies. She pulled it out and started dialing the number. Kelsey stared at her. “What are you doing?”

  “We need those pills to study,” Spencer said.

  Kelsey shifted her weight. “Maybe we can do this without them, Spence.”

  But then someone answered on the other end. Spencer straightened up, uttered the code words Phineas said would
gain the guy’s trust, and then told him what she wanted. He gave her his address, and they arranged to meet. “We’re set,” she said after a moment, hanging up. “Come on.”

  Kelsey remained on the bed, her shoes off. “I think I’ll stay here.”

  “I can’t do this alone.” Spencer pulled her car keys out of her pocket. “It’ll take a half hour, tops.”

  But Kelsey shook her head. “I’m fine without the pills, Spence.”

  Groaning, Spencer stomped over to Kelsey and pulled her to her feet. “You won’t be saying that a few hours from now. Put on your flip-flops. Let’s go.”

  Finally, Kelsey relented. They drove through the dark streets into a derelict neighborhood, passing boarded-up windows and graffiti-marred walls. Kids sat on stoops, glaring at everything. A fight broke out on the corner, and Kelsey whimpered. Spencer wondered if she’d been right—maybe this was a bad idea.

  But soon enough they were back in the car, pill bottle in hand, heading toward campus once more. Spencer handed Kelsey an Easy A, and they both washed them down with warm Diet Sprite. As they rolled into a safer neighborhood, Kelsey let out a long sigh. “We’re never doing that again.”

  “Agreed,” Spencer said.

  They were pulling through the Penn gates when two bright lights hit the rear-view mirror. Sirens blared. Kelsey and Spencer turned around to see the campus police bearing down on them. “Shit,” Spencer hissed, tossing the bottle of pills out the window.

  The police car pulled over and signaled for Spencer to do the same. Kelsey looked at Spencer, her eyes bulging wide. “What the hell are we going to do?”

  Spencer stared into Kelsey’s frantic face. Suddenly, a calm feeling washed over her. Everything she’d been through with Ali, all those A notes and near-death experiences she’d had to endure, made this moment seem manageable in comparison. “Listen,” she said forcefully to Kelsey. “We didn’t do anything wrong.”