Crushed (11 page)

Hanna shoved her hands in her pockets, the light from the digital clock on the wall glowing red on her face. “Well, he wasn’t in bed when I woke up. And I didn’t see him in the hall, which is where I was for most of the conversation. He came inside from the back when we got home, though. He said he was smoking a joint, but he didn’t smell like weed at all.”

Aria’s eyes blazed. “Now you’re against me, too?”

“Of course I’m not against you!” Hanna said. “But, Aria, it
is
weird.”

Spencer shifted forward in the chair. “Remember how strange Noel was when ‘Courtney’ came to Rosewood?” she asked. “He was in a support group with her. He urged you guys to be friends. And you caught them making out at the Valentine’s Day dance. . . .”

Aria slapped her arms to her sides. “Ali
ambushed
him! Noel didn’t want to kiss her. She just made it look like he did.”

“Are you sure?” Spencer asked. “It was that kiss that made you get in the car to go with us to the Poconos. What if Noel was in on it?”

Aria’s mouth hung open. “I can’t believe you.”

One of the surveillance monitors went dark. Everyone’s gaze shot to it. There was fuzz, but then the image reappeared. The yard was empty. A few leaves drifted past the camera, and that was all.

Spencer shook her head. “I’m sorry, Aria. I don’t want it to be Noel, either. I just wish we could rule Noel out for good. The article says Olaf was killed at the beginning of January. Do you know where Noel was around then?”

Aria ran her tongue over her teeth. “Switzerland. His family was skiing. He asked me to go, but I wanted to stay home and spend time with Lola.”

“Are you
sure
they were skiing? Switzerland isn’t
that
far from Iceland.”

Aria pounded a fist on the arm of the sofa. “He posted a ton of pictures on Facebook! Do you honestly think Noel flew to Iceland, killed a guy, and came home the next day like nothing ever happened? You think he’s
that
good of a liar?”

“Just see if you can find a lift ticket or something from January fourth, okay? And ask him where he was yesterday when someone snuck that painting into your house. It must have been while we were at school, right? So, basically, Noel will tell you he was in eighth period or whatever, and tons of people will vouch for him.”

A worried look crossed Aria’s face, but then she shook her head. “I’m not interrogating my boyfriend. If he finds out why I’m asking him these questions, he’ll dump me.”

“No one wants you guys to break up,” Emily said quickly.

“Look, the rest of us will see what we can discover,” Spencer said, slumping against the wall. “Until then, don’t do anything with the painting, okay, Aria?”

Aria’s mouth made an O. “I’m supposed to keep it in my closet?”

“Just hide it.” Spencer glanced at Hanna. “What’s going on with the burn clinic?”

Hanna sighed. “I
really
don’t want to volunteer there. But I’m talking to Sean’s dad about it tomorrow.”

“And how about Iris?” Spencer asked Emily.

Emily chewed her bottom lip. “I haven’t found out anything about Ali yet. But Iris has been at The Preserve for four years without a break, so there’s no way she can be Ali’s helper.”

“Good.” Spencer stood up, uncapped the marker she’d brought, and crossed Iris’s name off their list. “Hopefully she’ll tell you who
is
.”

Aria placed her hands on her hips. “And how is
your
investigation going, Spence?” she asked, a bitter tone in her voice. “Why haven’t you tracked down Ali yet?”

Spencer bristled. “Um, I’m working on it.” She could feel Aria’s gaze on her, but she didn’t know what else to say.

They shut off the lights in the panic room. Since Spencer had driven, she offered to take the girls who had come in cabs back home. As they walked out the door of the panic room, Spencer stared at Aria’s straight back and wondered what was going through her mind. She felt kind of . . . betrayed. After all that had happened, after A had tormented them about so many things, how had Aria kept quiet about the painting? And now Olaf, whoever he was, was missing and maybe even dead. Aria was right: They all
could
go to jail for knowing where a stolen painting was hidden and not coming forward with the information.

Ping.

It was Spencer’s old phone, still connected via WiFi. She cautiously looked at the screen. It was an e-mail on her newly created account. The return sender was
PHILADELPHIA CONSPIRACY THEORIES
.

She glanced at her friends. Hanna was peeking out the window. Aria was staring into space, lost in her own world. Emily was looking at her own phone with a glazed-over expression. Head lowered, Spencer clicked
OPEN
and read the two sentences.
We should definitely talk. There’s a lot you need to know.

She hit
REPLY
.
I’m available whenever
, she wrote back.
The sooner, the better.

10
Just Like Old Times

The sky turned gloomy as Hanna steered the Prius into the parking lot of the William Atlantic Plastic Surgery and Burn Rehabilitation Clinic. She shut off the engine and looked at the squat, übermodern building. Was she seriously doing this? Part of her wanted to call up Spencer and beg for a different mission.

Her old phone bleated a new message from her school e-mail account. It was from Chassey Bledsoe:
VOTE CHASSEY FOR QUEEN!

Hanna squeezed the phone between her hands, wishing she could send an alert, too. How else would people know what an awesome queen she’d make?
And
she’d heard that, as part of the
Starry Night
theme, the queen’s crown would be even more bejeweled than ever.

The Starry Night.
Her insides twisted. It was such an eerie coincidence that the very painting Aria had stolen was this year’s prom theme—if it was a coincidence at all. All A would have to do was tip the cops off that the painting was in Aria’s closet and she’d be done for. And though the police might not ever know that Spencer and Emily knew about the theft, there were Hanna’s phone records from that night in Iceland. She’d be ruined, too. Who knew, maybe A would even figure out a way to blame them for Olaf’s death.

What had Aria seen in Olaf, anyway? His beard was nasty. The cap he wore looked like it was from a Dumpster. But Aria was always into those grungy dudes—Hanna had been surprised, actually, when she started dating Noel. Neither of them were each other’s types—a few boys on the lacrosse team even joked for a while that Noel was dating Aria because her dad, Byron, had access to good pot. Hanna was pretty sure that wasn’t true, but what if Noel
did
have an ulterior motive to go for Aria? What if someone had put him up to it? Someone like . . .
Ali
? Could Noel be Ali’s helper?

Hanna hated to think it, but Ali having a helper made a lot of sense. It also fit that Noel was that person—for a lot of different reasons. At the beginning of sixth grade, when Real Ali was still around and Hanna was still a loserish nothing, her BFF was Scott Chin. Scott was out of the closet even then, and he had a raging crush on Noel and was always jealous of his girlfriends. “What does he see in Alison DiLaurentis?” he whined at lunch one day when he spied Ali and Noel giggling at the cool table. “She’s such a butter face. Everything about her is pretty . . .
but her face
.”

Hanna rolled her eyes. “She’s not a butter face.” Alison was the most beautiful girl ever. She’d modeled at the King James Mall spring and fall runway shows, and rumor had it she’d even been tapped by a big agency in New York City.

“Oh please, yes, she is.” Scott’s eyebrows, which Hanna suspected he plucked, knitted together. “I wonder if Noel has to close his eyes when he makes out with her.”

Hanna lowered her PB&J. “Do you think they actually make out?” Kissing was still exotic to her. She couldn’t believe kids her age were doing it.

“Oh, yeah.” Scott had nodded. “I saw them doing it in the woods behind the playground.”

Sighing, Hanna returned to the present and pushed through the double doors. Instantly, the familiar odor of gauze, antiseptic, and something that could only be described as burnt skin hit her like a tidal wave. She looked around, taking in the fake flowers on the tables and the patient art on the walls. Everything was the same as the last time she’d been here, down to the peppermints in the dish on the front desk. She remembered, suddenly, running into Mona in this lobby. Mona had acted all weird and cagey about why she was there, not admitting she was getting treatment for the burns from the prank-gone-wrong that Ali, Hanna, and the others had played on Toby Cavanaugh. In all the time they’d been friends, Hanna had never known Mona had been at the Cavanaughs that night, watching Ali shoot that firework into the tree house, witnessing Jenna getting blinded, maybe even hearing the fight Ali and Toby had afterward. Of course, Mona’s silence had been intentional.

“Hanna?”

She looked up and saw Sean Ackard’s rounded cheeks, burning blue eyes, and do-gooder smile. He stood in the doorway of one of the offices, wearing a crisp blue button-down that looked like it had come straight from his father’s closet.

“Hey, good to see you!” Sean said. “Why don’t you step in here so we can talk?”

Hanna fiddled with a tissue box on the front desk. “I’m waiting to see your dad.”

Sean rapped on the doorjamb. “Nope. Your interview is with me.”

Hanna bit down hard on the inside of her mouth. She hadn’t really spoken to Sean since things crashed and burned last year. These days, he was going out with Kate. Total weirdness.

Shrugging, she followed Sean into the room and sat down on a couch. Sean sat at a desk that was populated with stacks of papers, a flat-screen computer, and empty coffee mugs. An Elmo stuffed animal sat on a shelf behind him. There was a picture of Sean shaking the hand of the governor of Pennsylvania. “Do you work here now?” Hanna asked in confusion.

“On the weekends, just to help my dad.” Sean straightened some papers. “We’re so overcrowded right now—a couple of local hospitals closed their burn clinics because of budget cuts.” He exhaled heavily, then looked at Hanna. “So how’s Mike?”

Hanna blinked, startled. “Uh, fine.”

The mention of Mike made her feel squirmy. It wasn’t like he knew she was here; he’d never, ever understand why she was back to beg for her old job. Every story she’d told him about the place was more disgusting than the last. She’d told him she had a hair appointment today to practice for her prom updo, but all he had to do was call up Fermata, the salon, and catch her in the lie.

“Good.” Sean smiled. “So you actually want to come back?”

Hanna shifted. “I feel bad about cutting my volunteer time short,” she lied. “After everything that has happened to me, I thought I should give back a little, you know?”

Sean arched an eyebrow. “Didn’t you hate it here?”

Hanna clasped her hands together, trying to look earnest. “I’ve changed. Volunteering means a lot to me. I have a friend in here right now, actually, someone I met on the cruise. Graham Pratt?”

Sean sat back in his chair. “Yeah, Graham came in a few days ago.” He shook his head solemnly. “That cruise sounded like a nightmare. I heard about what happened to you guys, too—about that life raft. Some people were saying it was a suicide pact.”

Hanna didn’t dignify that with a response. “It was scary to have to evacuate . . . and then get stranded at sea. I sort of had an epiphany when I almost drowned—life’s too short, I’d better make it count. So . . . please, can I help out?”

Sean bounced a pencil, eraser down, on the desk. “Well, my dad said you could volunteer again as long as you work hard.”

“I can do that!”

“Okay,” Sean said. He extended his hand to Hanna, and she shook it. Then, his expression suddenly became almost mournful. “You know, I never got to tell you how awful I felt about all that Ali stuff.”

“Oh, uh, thanks.”

“I can’t even imagine what that must have been like,” Sean went on.

Hanna’s eyes filled with tears. It was one thing for a friend, a parent, a complete
stranger
to offer sympathy, but there was something both touching and weird about Sean saying it. “Thanks,” she mumbled.

Sean stepped forward, wrapped his arms around her, and gave her a quick hug. He smelled familiar, like cinnamon and deodorant and the potpourri his mom used generously around the house. It was a nice smell, a comfortable smell. Suddenly, Hanna didn’t hate him as much.

She left his office for the women’s staff room, where she changed out of her Rachel Zoe print dress and snakeskin flats into hideous, oversized scrubs that smelled like puke. Then she went back to Sean’s office.

“Ms. Marin?” A woman in pink scrubs appeared from around the corner. “I’m Kelly, one of the head nurses. I’m here to show you the ropes.”

“Kelly’s one of our best,” Sean said proudly.

“What would you like me to do?” Hanna asked pertly.

“How do you feel about bedpans?” Kelly asked.

Hanna winced, but it wasn’t like she could complain with Sean still standing right there. “I
love
bedpans.”

“Well, great!” Kelly pumped her fist in the air. “Let me show you what to do!”

Kelly helped her with the first bedpan, giving Hanna the opportunity to carry the pee-filled thing down the hall. A male nurse passed her going the opposite direction. Hanna couldn’t help but stare—he was tall, built, and extremely handsome, with a shaved head and gleaming blue eyes.

“Hey,” the nurse said to Hanna, widening his eyes at Hanna’s boobs.

“H-hey,” Hanna stammered back, then followed the nurse’s gaze. He wasn’t staring at her boobs. He was looking at the bedpan. Pee sloshed over the sides, splashing dangerously close to Hanna’s scrubs. She squealed and almost dropped the thing on the floor.

Kelly giggled. “Jeff
always
has that effect on people.”

They continued into the next room. Sean was right about the place being overcrowded: There were burn victims everywhere she looked. In the halls. Crammed three to a room. There was even a bed in one of the waiting areas.