Deadly

by Sara Shepard

Page 31

 

  She cocked her ear. If you weren’t paying attention, if you didn’t know what you were listening for, that first part kind of sounded like Mo, Mo.

  “No more!” the first voice said through the bullhorn.

  “No more murders in Rosewood!” echoed the protesters again, waving their picket signs.

  Hanna clapped a hand over her mouth. “Guys. ” She wheeled around and motioned for Spencer, Emily, and Aria to come to the window. They moved toward her, their brows furrowed.

  “The protesters,” Hanna said. She peered all the way to the left, and there they were, making a big circle on the front lawn. No more murders in Rosewood, they chanted. “That’s the announcement from Ali’s voicemail,” Hanna said.

  Emily blinked hard. “Really?”

  Hanna nodded, suddenly never more sure of anything in her life. “It’s the same voice. The same protest message. We only had a piece of it before Ali hung up. But this is it. ”

  Spencer made a face. “Ali was in the middle of a protest march . . . about the murders she committed?”

  “Maybe she was near a march,” Hanna said.

  Spencer paced around the room. “There have been marches all over Rosewood for the past week. When did you receive that message, Emily?”

  “Last Friday. ”

  Aria looked at Spencer. “Is there any way we could figure out where the protesters were that day?”

  Hanna suddenly realized something. “I know where they were. ” The last time she’d gone to his office, he’d been more concerned with whether the protesters had seen her come in than with the fact that she needed his help.

  When she explained this to her friends, Spencer gasped. “You’re sure?”

  “Positive. ” Hanna’s heart beat faster and faster. “She was calling from near my dad’s campaign office. ”

  Hanna gazed at her friends, a tiny candle of hope burning inside her. They had one more day until they were going to Jamaica. One more night to stake this out. It would be next to impossible to get out of the house, but they had to, somehow. When she saw the determined expressions on her friends’ faces, she knew they were thinking the exact same thing.

  Spencer’s gaze flicked toward the trees. “One AM?”

  Hanna nodded. It was on.

  31

  FINDING HER

  At 12:20 AM, Spencer’s phone alarm buzzed on her nightstand. Her eyes popped open, and her body was suddenly alert. Though her bedroom was dark and she was tucked under the covers, she was fully dressed in a black hoodie, black tights, and even black New Balance running sneakers she’d found in the closet in Melissa’s old bedroom. She was ready.

  She slid the covers back and tiptoed to the door. The house was silent. Her mom and Mr. Pennythistle were presumably sleeping, probably zonked out on Xanax. Spencer padded over to the window that faced the front of the house. There was no police car at the curb.

  Spencer made a lump of pillows in her bed to look like she was still sleeping. Then she snuck downstairs, opened the alarm unit on the main floor, and disarmed one of the exits, silencing it before any sort of announcement could be made to the rest of the house. Finally, she crept to the only unfinished room in the basement, which held cases of wine and an extra fridge the Hastings used for big parties. Normally, Spencer didn’t like going into the room—it smelled musty, was full of spiders, and was where Melissa used to “banish” her when they played Evil Queen and Prisoner when they were little. But tucked into the corner was a small set of stairs that led to a flat door flush with the backyard. No one would be watching it. The cops probably had no idea it was there.

  Her heart pounded as she climbed the dark cellar stairs toward the door. She didn’t dare breathe as she pushed it up and open. A sprinkler hissed pleasantly. The hot tub bubbled to the left. Spencer squeezed out, keeping low to the ground and out of the floodlights as she dashed to the woods. From there, she was free.

  It was at least three miles to Hanna’s dad’s campaign office, which was in a building on Lancaster Avenue near the train station. Spencer had considered taking her bike, but she hadn’t had time to plant it in the woods behind her house, so she had to go on foot. She shot into the next development, ran on the streets for a while, but ducked into a yard whenever a car turned onto the road. Every footfall was like a chant: Must Get Ali. Must Get Ali.

  Running along Lancaster was much more difficult—even though it was late, there was still some traffic, and Spencer had to keep on the inside of the guardrail at all times. Whenever she saw headlights, she ducked behind a tree or a strip-mall sign. Once, when she saw a cop car at the intersection, she hid in a ditch. Still, she arrived at the office shortly before 1:00 AM. A thin sheen of sweat covered her body. Dirt caked her tights and shoes. She was pretty sure she’d twisted an ankle diving into a ditch. But it didn’t matter. She was here.

  She stared at her reflection in the building’s flat panes of glass. Exit lights above the doors glowed, but otherwise the atrium was dark. She peered at the underground parking lot, then at the woods in the back, and then at the neon sign of Jessica’s Consignment Shop next door, where the Rosewood Day Drama Department sometimes got costumes for school plays. Was it really possible Ali was around here? How could she have hidden somewhere so public for so long?

  “I bet you’re thinking what I’m thinking. ”

  Hanna stood behind her, similarly dressed in black and breathing heavily as if she’d run here, too. “Ali isn’t here, right? She wouldn’t hide near an office building right in the middle of Rosewood. ”

  Spencer shrugged one shoulder. “It doesn’t seem very likely. ”

  Hanna sat down on the planter next to the front door. “This is where the protests were on Friday. This is where she called Emily from. ”

  Within minutes, Aria and Emily arrived on bikes. Spencer filled them in on what they were talking about. “I’ve thought about this being a mistake, too,” Aria admitted, carefully stashing her bike in a shrub. “I mean, if we’re wrong, what are the cops going to do when they find us?”

  “It’s not like they can punish us any more,” Spencer said emptily.

  Emily looked at Hanna. “What if Ali was only here for a little while? Maybe she knew you’d figure it out, Hanna, and she called from here just to send us on a wild-goose chase?”

  “But what if she didn’t?” Hanna said. “It’s worth the risk. ”

  Spencer pulled at the bar on the front door, but it was locked tight. “So where do we go from here? It’s not like we can get inside and check if Ali’s in any of the offices. ”

  “She wouldn’t be,” Hanna said thoughtfully. “I’ve been here so often that I know everyone in all of the offices throughout this building—no one is hiding Ali in a back room, I’m sure of it. ”

  “What about the basement?” Emily suggested.

  Hanna shook her head. “There are maintenance guys patrolling this place during the day—I doubt she’s set up camp there. ”

  Spencer put her hands on her hips and did a full circle, once again taking in the building, the parking lot, and the road.

  Hanna’s gaze fixed on the lot next door. “What about that building?”

  Everyone turned and looked. “Jessica’s Consignment Shop?” Emily asked.

  “No, the thing before Jessica’s. ” Hanna pointed at a cluster of trees that made a barrier between the office building and the consignment store’s parking lot. And suddenly, Spencer saw it: Set back from the road, peeking out above the brambles, was what looked like a rooftop.

  “Oh my God,” Aria breathed.

  “I noticed it when I was here the other day, talking to my dad,” Hanna whispered. “I don’t know what it is, though. ”

  They walked closer, down a path hidden in the tall grass. A hundred yards back, mostly concealed by overgrown trees, loomed a building—a fallen-down barn, perhaps, or an old stone house left to disintegrate. Spencer opened the flashlight app on her i
Phone and shone it against the weathered clapboard frame, a broken window, a drooping gutter. The ground was overrun with weeds, as if no one had touched it in years.

  Hanna squinted. “Gross. ”

  A hush fell over the group. They peered at the looming house. A shiver slunk up Spencer’s spine. Suddenly, this felt like it. “Come on,” she whispered. “Let’s go. ”

  32

  THE BOY

  One by one, Hanna and the others climbed through the hedges. Up close, it was even more disgusting than it had looked from the parking lot. The windows were boarded up with rotted pieces of wood, and a front porch was covered in spiderwebs and trash. A rusted, rooster-shaped weathervane on the roof spun slowly and creakily with the wind. Vines and weeds grew up and into the walls as if they were trying to swallow the house completely. The foul stench of a rotting animal carcass wafted out from somewhere inside.

  Hanna covered her nose with her sleeve. “How could she live in a place like this?”

  “The same way she could kill five people,” Aria reminded her. “She’s crazy. ”

  Spencer climbed up a crumbling ridge to the front door. The hinges were so old that it gave way easily, letting out a loud screech as it opened. Hanna bristled and covered her head as though a bomb were about to go off. After a few seconds, she dared to open her eyes. The door was ajar. No one was there. Spencer was stock-still in the doorway, her face a mask of fear.

  Emily scurried up the ridge next to Spencer. Hanna followed, and they all peered inside. It was very dark. The dead-animal smell was stronger, though, almost dizzying.

  “Ugh,” Hanna said, turning away.

  “It’s really bad. ” Spencer gagged. Emily pulled the collar of her shirt over her nose.

  Aria pulled out her phone and shone the light around the room. The floors were covered in dust, plaster, pieces of wood, and dirt. When she shone the light into a corner, something skittered out of the way, squeaking as it went. The girls screamed and jumped back again.

  “It’s just a mouse,” Spencer hissed.

  Trying not to breathe, Hanna took a tentative step into the room. The floor seemed to hold her weight, so she ventured a few more steps through an archway. The next room contained an old metal sink and a black, three-legged stove like something out of “Hansel and Gretel. ” An old newspaper lay near a huge hole in the wall that might have once been a back door. She picked it up and squinted at the headlines, but the page was so faded, she couldn’t tell what it said.

  She poked her head into a bathroom. A rusted bathtub sat in the corner, a toilet without a seat against the wall. There were holes where a sink might have been, and much of the tile was chipped away. A window was propped open, the stiff breeze blowing in. Hanna stepped back. The air smelled dirty and contaminated.

  The other girls wandered the rooms, peeking into closets. They would have climbed the stairs to the second floor, but half the risers were missing. “There’s no one here,” Spencer whispered. “It’s totally empty. ”

  “Is there a basement?” Emily suggested.