Two Truths and a Lie tlg-3

by Sara Shepard

  She sat up straighter, a firm sense of resolve settling over her. She just needed to stick to her plan. She was going to prove that Thayer murdered her sister. That way, she could go back to being Emma Paxton. But in the meantime, she was going to behave in a way she could be proud of, even if her actions weren’t one hundred percent Sutton-like.

  Emma stood up and hugged Mrs. Mercer. “Thanks, Mom. That was just what I needed to hear.”

  Mrs. Mercer hugged her for a moment, then leaned back and looked at the girl she thought was her daughter with surprise. “That’s the first time you’ve ever thanked me for giving you advice.”

  “Well, maybe I should have thanked you a long time ago.”

  As my mom corralled Drake and led him back up the stairs, I felt a guilty pang. Given what my mother had just said, and what I’d already gleaned about my relationship with my parents, I doubted my mom and I had ever had late-night heart-to-hearts when I was alive. I didn’t value my parents’ opinions at all, and maybe that was a mistake—yet another in a long list of regrets I couldn’t rectify.

  I turned my attention back to Emma, who was sitting with her chin cupped in her hand, a distant smile on her face. Even though I knew it was wrong, a bitter edge of resentment flowed through me. Emma was having trouble remembering who she was, but at least she still had a body, an identity. Actually, she had two identities—hers and mine. And now she had to live for the both of us.

  22

  SEEK AND YE SHALL FIND

  For the next two days, Emma tried to stick with her decision, keep her head up, and do random acts of Emma Kindness, even if they weren’t completely Sutton-esque. She retweeted the Twitter Twins’ latest posts about the difficulty of finding clothes worthy of their hotness with an LOL. She complimented Charlotte’s backhand during tennis practice. She even told Nisha Banerjee that her hair tie was cute. Nisha had looked astonished—and a little suspicious—but thanked Emma.

  Emma hadn’t had any success with Ethan or Laurel, though. On Wednesday she’d let Laurel have the last pomegranate-flavored yogurt in the fridge compartment in the cafeteria line, knowing it was Laurel’s favorite, but Laurel just grunted and greedily took it. When Emma caught sight of Ethan in the hall, he’d yanked his backpack higher on his shoulder and darted across the hall to avoid her.

  On Thursday after tennis practice she scanned the cars in the parking lot and realized that a certain VW wasn’t in its regular parking space. She let out a long groan.

  “Laurel ditch you again?” Madeline appeared behind Emma, carrying a stack of books. Her blue eyes were bright and feather earrings grazed her shoulders.

  “Yep,” Emma said, unable to hide her irritation. “She’s being a real bitch this week.”

  Madeline let out the first real laugh Emma had heard from her in weeks. “She sure is.” She touched Emma’s elbow. “Don’t worry. She’ll get over it. I did.”

  Two freshman boys passed behind her, clutching Roller-blades and elbowing each other. One caught Emma’s eye and his face broke into a massive grin. He nodded in her direction and picked up his hand in a slow wave. Emma smiled back in another act of Emma Kindness.

  Madeline pulled her car keys out of her leather purse. “Want a ride home?”

  Emma eyed Madeline’s keychain. “Actually I’m just going to the police station. I’m going to finally get my car.”

  Madeline flinched a little at the words police station, then frowned. “Isn’t it at the impound?”

  A dart of nerves shot through Emma’s stomach. Sutton’s friends thought that her car had been impounded because she racked up too many tickets and she simply hadn’t picked it up yet. They didn’t know Sutton had retrieved her car the day she died. Or used it to pick up Thayer. Or perhaps hit Thayer with it.

  “Uh, the impound was full, so they moved it to the lot behind the police station,” Emma fudged, crossing her fingers that Madeline would buy it. She hated lying, but she wasn’t about to say that Sutton’s car was actually in evidence with Madeline’s brother’s blood on it. Luckily, Madeline just shrugged and unlocked her SUV with two loud bleeps.

  “Get in. I’ll save you the two-block walk.”

  Emma climbed in, resting her bag on her lap.

  “So, excited for Charlotte’s tomorrow?” Madeline asked as she turned the ignition. “It’s been a while since we’ve had a dinner at the Chamberlains’. I’ve missed Cornelia’s cooking. Wouldn’t it be amazing to have a personal chef?”

  Emma made an mm of agreement, remembering that the girls had arranged to spend the evening at Charlotte’s for dinner. She wasn’t surprised the Chamberlains had a personal chef—their house was enormous.

  “Of course, I shouldn’t say that.” Madeline made a wry face. “If my dad heard me talking about how much I wanted a personal chef, he’d probably say I was acting spoiled and greedy.” She rolled her eyes and tried to laugh lightly, but her face kind of crumpled.

  Emma pulled her bottom lip into her mouth, sensing Madeline’s pain. “You know, if you want to talk more about your dad, I’m here.”

  “Thanks,” Madeline said softly. She reached into her hot pink metallic Not Rational handbag, yanked her sunglasses from their case, and slipped them over her eyes.

  “Is everything going okay? Is it getting better?” Emma pressed.

  Madeline waited until she left the parking lot before she spoke again. “It’s pretty much the same, I guess. I hate going home. My dad stomps around everywhere and he and my mom aren’t talking right now. I don’t think they’re even sleeping in the same room.” Her glossy lips tightened into a straight line.

  “You’re always welcome at my house, you know,” Emma offered.

  Madeline looked at her gratefully. “Thank you,” she breathed. Then she touched Emma’s arm. “You’ve never offered that before.”

  I felt a zing of annoyance. I would have offered if I would have known Madeline needed it.

  A minute later they pulled up to the precinct, and Madeline dropped Emma off at the curb. “Sutton?” she said, leaning out the window. “I’m really glad we made up. I probably don’t say it enough, but you’re my best friend.”

  “I’m so glad, too,” Emma said, her heart warming.

  When she went inside, the same receptionist who had been there the last time looked up from her tabloid and considered Emma. “You again?” she asked in a bored voice.

  How professional. “I’m here to pick up my car from evidence,” Emma said crisply.

  The receptionist turned and picked up the receiver of her phone. “One moment.”

  Emma pivoted and stared at the bulletin board. The MISSING poster of Thayer had been taken down and replaced with an advertisement for HECTOR, THE HONEST MECHANIC YOU TELL YOUR FRIENDS ABOUT.

  After a moment, the receptionist pointed outside where a squat guard stood in front of a chain-link fence. “Officer Moriarty will help you,” she said, twisting her tongue to blow a purple bubble. A sugary grape smell wafted through the air of the waiting room.

  Emma walked back outside, met up with Officer Moriarty, and signed the paperwork for Sutton’s car. Officer Moriarty unlocked the fence and led her down a dusty row of vehicles. BMWs and Range Rovers sat proudly next to broken-down clunkers that looked like they wouldn’t make it another five miles.

  “Here we are,” Officer Moriarty said, gesturing to a green vintage car with brightly polished chrome. Emma took in the car, impressed. It had sleek lines and a retro feel, the kind of car she might have chosen herself if she could’ve afforded one. It was beyond cool.

  Of course it was cool. I squealed as I saw my car again. But the feeling was bittersweet. I couldn’t feel the soft leather against my thighs as I sat in the driver’s seat. I couldn’t shift gears and feel the car respond. I couldn’t feel the wind in my hair as I drove down Route 10 with the windows down.

  Emma took the keys from the cop. She inspected the exterior of the car, looking for the telltale blood the cops had found, but she saw not
hing beyond a slight dent where Sutton had probably made contact with Thayer’s leg. Perhaps they’d cleaned it off. Then she opened the driver’s door and plopped down on the leather seat. A strange sensation came over her. Something about this car felt so distinctly Sutton, as though her twin were suddenly present. She shut her eyes and could almost picture her twin behind the wheel, tossing her hair, and laughing at something Charlotte or Madeline said. Emma toyed with a silver guardian angel charm that hung on the rearview mirror, swearing she could smell a trace of Sutton’s perfume lingering in the air. She knew how much it would’ve annoyed her twin for the car to be in the police department’s probing hands.

  I’ll take good care of her for you, Emma thought as she tapped her fingers on the leather-wrapped steering wheel.

  I smiled. She’d better.

  Knuckles rapped the glass. Emma flinched and looked up to see Officer Moriarty. She slowly rolled down the window.

  “Can I help you with anything else, Miss Mercer?” he asked gruffly.

  “No, officer, I’m fine,” Emma said, forcing an innocent, trust-me tone into her voice. “Thanks so much for your help.”

  “Then it’s best if you left the premises,” the officer said, his thumb hooked through a belt loop.

  Emma nodded and rolled up the window, then eased the key into the ignition. She didn’t need to adjust the mirror or the seats—they fit her perfectly, just like they’d fit Sutton. As she was pulling out of the lot, something on the seat next to her caught her eye. There was something lodged in the leather crease where the back of the seat met the bottom. It looked like a tiny piece of paper.

  She drove down the road until the police station was out of view, then pulled over at the curb and put the car in park. Her attention turned to the paper wedged in the seat. She pulled at it, her brow wrinkled. Finally, it broke free. It was a tiny scrap of paper with the words DR. SHELDON ROSE scrawled across it. She recognized the angular writing immediately from the letter she’d found at the bottom of Sutton’s sports locker. It was Thayer’s.

  Her heart pounded. She glanced over her shoulder just as a police car turned out of the parking lot, its sirens blazing. For a few agonizing seconds, she was sure the cops were coming for her—maybe planting this important piece of evidence in the car was a test, and she was in trouble for not volunteering it. But then the car zipped past her, the officer at the wheel staring straight ahead. She let out a long breath. The cops weren’t after her. They didn’t even know what she’d found.

  I only hoped it led to an answer.

  23

  THE PSYCHOPATH TEST

  Emma drove exactly one and a half miles before she pulled over again, this time in the parking lot of the Tucson Botanical Gardens. Brightly colored blooms could be seen behind the gates. Hummingbirds flitted to feeders. But the gardens were closed for the afternoon, and the lot was almost empty. It seemed like the perfect place to sit and think. There was no way she could wait to look up Dr. Sheldon Rose until she got home. She had to investigate this now.

  Grabbing Sutton’s iPhone from the passenger’s seat, Emma typed DR. SHELDON ROSE into the search engine. In seconds, the results appeared, listing dozens of doctors across the country. Gastroenterologists. Cardiologists. Some guy who did “Chakra Cleansing.” There were client testimonials, locations, and telephone numbers. Papers authored by various doctors named Sheldon Rose popped up with titles like “The Brain in Motion” and “Healthy Liver, Healthy Life.” And then there were PhD doctors—a Sheldon Rose who taught Victorian literature at the University of Virginia, a Sheldon Rose who worked on smoking cessation therapy in New Hampshire, and one who headed up the MIT computer science department.

  Emma clicked on the link to a primary care doctor; maybe Thayer had caught some kind of flu or infection while he was in hiding. The website showed six doctors who worked in a white brick medical facility called Wyoming Health. Dr. Sheldon Rose of Casper, Wyoming, stared back at her with a smug look on his pockmarked face. It didn’t seem like the right answer.

  A car honked on the street. A bunch of kids rode by on BMX bikes. A shadow around the side of a gas station across the street caught Emma’s eye, but when she looked closer, she didn’t see anyone there. Calm down, she thought. No one followed you. No one knows you’re here.

  She scrolled through the next page of search results. She wasn’t sure exactly what she was looking for—or how long it would take to find it—but there had to be something, and she’d know it when she saw it. She clicked on link after link, dead end after dead end. After ten minutes, she was about to give up, when suddenly she came upon a website for a Dr. Sheldon Rose in Seattle, Washington. When she opened it, her breath caught in her throat. The home page featured an emblem of an eagle with its wings stretched wide and its head tipped up and to the left. There were tiny initials below its talons that read SPH. It looked like the very same eagle in Thayer’s tattoo.

  Her pulse raced as she clicked on the links. A photo of Dr. Sheldon Rose gazed back at her with black eyes nearly hidden behind thick, red-framed glasses. His shaved head and wide jaw made him look more like a bouncer at a motorcycle bar than a doctor. A sick feeling slivered through Emma’s stomach as she scanned his bio: DR. SHELDON ROSE IS A PSYCHIATRIST WHO SPECIALIZES IN PSYCHOPATHIC BEHAVIOR AND OTHER EXTREME MENTAL DISORDERS. He treated his patients at Seattle Psychiatric Hospital—SPH. A mental hospital. The words on the tiny screen blurred before Emma’s eyes. Had Thayer been admitted to a mental hospital? Is that why he had a tattoo of an eagle on his arm? And what did that say about the state he’d been in on the night of Sutton’s disappearance?

  I thought again about how furious Thayer had been when he’d chased me down the trail. It was like something in him had truly snapped. Or maybe like he’d gone off his medication.

  Emma picked up Sutton’s cell with shaking fingers and dialed the main number listed for the hospital. A ring sounded in her ear before a woman picked up and announced, “Seattle Psychiatric.”

  “I’m calling to see if you’ve treated a patient there,” Emma said. “His name is—”

  “I’m sorry, ma’am. That’s confidential. We can’t give out patients’ names.” An annoyed click sounded from the other end.

  Duh. Of course they weren’t going to give out that kind of information. Emma ran a hand through her hair, wondering how she was going to find this out. A garbage truck rumbled past. The wind kicked up, bringing with it the mingled scents of rotting trash and flowers from the gardens. Emma peered at the gas station across the street again, searching for the phantom shadow. When she was certain no one was there, she cleared her throat and redialed the same number.

  “Seattle Psychiatric.” This time it was a man’s voice.

  “I’m calling to speak to Dr. Sheldon Rose,” Emma said, assuming a professional tone.

  “Can I tell him who’s calling?” The voice sounded bored, as though he wanted to be anywhere in the world other than a reception desk.

  “Dr. Carole Sweeney,” Emma said, pulling a doctor’s name out of thin air. It was the name of her favorite pediatrician—and she’d had at least a dozen of them. During the ten months she’d lived with a foster family in northern Nevada, Dr. Sweeney treated Emma and the six other children in the foster home. Their foster mom couldn’t afford a babysitter, so every time one of the six got sick, she lugged them all to her office. Dr. Sweeney’s waiting room was full of rainbow-colored building blocks, tattered stuffed animals, and coloring books scattered across a red plastic table in the center. When Emma and her foster siblings used to chase each other around the table, making tons of noise, Dr. Sweeney never yelled at them.

  “Please hold,” said the male voice.

  Emma’s heart pounded. Piano music tinkled through the phone as she waited.

  “Dr. Rose’s office,” a woman’s voice said.

  “Is the doctor available?” Emma tried to sound rushed and important.

  “No, he’s not in, can I take a message?”r />
  “Who am I speaking with?” Emma asked.

  There was a sharp intake of breath on the other line. “This is Penny, Dr. Rose’s nurse,” the voice finally said.

  “This is Dr. Carole Sweeney from Tucson Medical,” Emma blurted. She kept her voice urgent, as though she was in the middle of a life-or-death situation. “I’ve just admitted a patient by the name of Thayer Vega. He’s in bad shape.”

  “Bad shape? What do you mean?”

  Emma felt a twinge of guilt. She hated lying like this.

  But I was impressed. Was this the same girl who used to question the morality of the Lying Game and the pranks we pulled? And here she was impersonating a doctor—which had to be illegal—while trying to learn confidential medical information. My, my, how playing Sutton Mercer had changed her.

  “He’s, um, unconscious,” Emma went on. “I just need to know the date he was released from your care.”

  The nurse let out an aggravated breath. “One moment.” Her fingers clicked across computer keys. “Aha. Thayer Vega was in and out of treatment and was released for good on September twenty-first of this year—against doctor’s orders. Now, what did you say your name was? What hospital are you at?”

  Emma quickly hit end. She was suddenly trembling so badly that the phone tumbled from her hands and into the foot well. Disbelief and fear mingled in her mind. It was true. Thayer had been in a psychiatric hospital … and he’d been in and out of treatment, and then left against doctor’s orders. Uncured. On the loose. He might have been—he might be—a psychopath.

  And I might have picked the wrong guy to mess with.

  24

  WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?

  “Tonight is going to be awesome,” Charlotte said on Friday morning as she and Emma walked down the Hollier science wing. The air smelled like charred chemicals and gas from Bunsen burners. “Cornelia is planning an awesome meal for us. We’ll meet at my place, eat and get ready, and then head over to set up for the secret party. Sound good?”