Never Have I Ever (7 page)

The water suddenly felt like ice on Emma’s skin. This was all happening too fast. “Um . . .” she muttered, turning and swimming away.

Ethan twisted awkwardly, too, wiping water from his face.

“
Ugh!
” I screamed at them. Talk about frustrating!

Emma moved to the ladder. “We should probably get out.”

“Yeah.” Ethan pushed out of the pool. He looked at the flower beds and the cone-shaped bird feeder that hung from a birch tree—anywhere but at Emma.

They stood wet and shivering and almost naked on the deck. Emma wished she could think of something to dispel the tension, but her mind felt blank and waterlogged.

A deep groan made her turn. Lights shone through the slats in the fence. A car idled on the street. Emma grabbed Ethan’s arm. “Someone’s here!”

“Shit.” Ethan tucked his shoes and clothes under his arm and ran barefoot to the back of the block fence. Emma shimmied into her pajama pants, wrung out her camisole, and ran after him. He gave Emma a boost, then climbed over himself. On the other side of the Paulsons’ backyard was a dried-out creek bed filled with random sticks and rocks, tumbleweeds, and overgrown cacti. The Mercer house was to the left, but Ethan veered right.

“I should get home,” he said.

“You walked here?” Emma asked, surprised.

“Jogged, actually. I like jogging at night.”

The car’s engine idled on the street. Emma squinted in the darkness. The desert went on forever. “Are you sure you’ll be all right?”

“I’ll be fine. Catch you later.”

Emma watched Ethan until she could no longer see the reflective patches on the back of his sneakers. Then she followed the path to Sutton’s backyard, crept close to the edge of the fence, and emerged onto the driveway next to Laurel’s Jetta. When she looked over, she fully expected to see a car in the Paulsons’ driveway, maybe even Mr. Paulson prowling around the property with a baseball bat. But the driveway was empty. The newspapers lay in the exact same spots they’d been an hour before. No lights were on inside the house either.

A cold, slimy realization washed over Emma’s skin. The car didn’t belong to the Paulsons at all. Whoever had been idling there, watching them, had been someone else entirely.

Chapter 11
Nothing Like a Threat at 2
A.M.

A few minutes later, Emma scampered up the front walk of the Mercers’ house. The tree outside Sutton’s bedroom window didn’t have a low enough branch to climb back up, so the only way she could get back inside was through the front door.

The key was under a large rock beneath a desert hackberry tree, just as it had been the first night Emma had entered the Mercer home. She slid it into the lock, praying that the Mercers hadn’t set an alarm tonight. The lock turned. Silence.
Score.

The door swung open easily, and Emma scuttled inside. The AC was on full blast, and goose bumps warped her damp skin. The glass panes over the family portraits glimmered in the pale streetlight. Detective Quinlan’s card sat on the console table by the door, just where Sutton’s mother had left it that afternoon. Emma cupped her palm over her wrist and remembered what it had felt like when Ethan rested his fingers there. She shut her eyes and leaned her head against the wall.

What was
wrong
with her? I wanted to ask. Why hadn’t she kissed him?

Creak.
Emma froze. Was that a footstep?

Creak. Creeaaaak.
A shadow appeared at the end of the hall. Feet tapped the floor, getting louder and louder, until Laurel stepped into the light. Emma jumped back and suppressed a scream.

“Whoa!” Laurel held up her hands. “Someone’s jumpy!” She stared closer at Emma. “Why are you all wet?”

Emma glanced down at the soggy camisole clinging to her skin. “I just took a shower,” she said.

“In your
clothes
?”

Emma walked into the powder room and dried her face with a sea-green hand towel. When she glanced at her reflection, she saw Laurel watching her in the mirror. Had Laurel seen her and Ethan in the pool? Had she heard their conversation? Was
she
the one who’d turned the headlights on them?

It seemed possible. From the flashes I’d seen of my past, Laurel was a hanger-on, a snoop, a spy. I didn’t know why we’d let her into the Lying Game, but I knew I hadn’t supported it. I think, deep down, I was jealous. Laurel was my parents’ real daughter, clearly loved more than me. I didn’t want my friends to love her more, too.

Laurel padded into the powder room and sat down on the closed toilet seat. “So when were you going to tell me?”

“About what?” Emma pretended to be fascinated with the mini soaps lined up on the edge of the sink.

“About who you’ve been seeing. About who you were talking to outside just now.”

Nerves snapped under Emma’s skin. So Laurel
had
seen. And if Laurel had killed Sutton, if Laurel knew Emma was with Ethan, Emma might have just risked Ethan’s life, too. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Her voice trembled slightly.

“Come on,” Laurel snapped. “You were with someone named Alex, weren’t you?”

Alex?
Emma let the towel go slack in her hands, racking her brain for someone named Alex at Hollier. The only Alex she knew was her friend from Henderson. . . .

“I saw that text on your phone in Ceramics,” Laurel said, crossing her arms and staring at Emma’s face in the mirror. “Someone named Alex wrote to you. He said he was
thinking of you
.” Her eyes sparkled. “Was this the guy you vanished with at your party, too?”

Emma’s head spun. “Alex is a girl,” she blurted.

“Uh-huh.” Laurel rolled her eyes. “When are you ever going to trust me again?” she asked in a low voice. Something painful passed between the two of them, something Emma couldn’t quite get a grip on. Sutton had hurt Laurel in the past—of that Emma was sure—and it seemed that maybe Laurel had hurt Sutton, too.

“She
is
a girl
.
” Emma wheeled around, banging her hip against the edge of the sink. “And . . . and that’s not cool that you looked at my phone.”

Laurel lowered her chin and gave her a knowing smirk. “Like you don’t look at mine all the time? So who is this Alex guy? Someone from Valencia Prep? U of A? Were you guys skinny-dipping? Good thing the Paulsons are in Hawaii!”

“I wasn’t in the pool,” Emma repeated, but then she looked down at herself. Droplets of water from the ends of her hair cascaded down her shoulders. She reeked of chlorine. “Okay. Fine. I was in the pool. But I was alone.”

Laurel traced her fingers on top of a wrought-iron sculpture of the words
LIVE, LAUGH, LOVE
that sat on the back of the toilet. “Why won’t you tell me the truth?” she said, sounding injured. “I won’t tell anyone. I promise. I can keep a secret.”

Emma lowered her eyes. The only person she could trust in Tucson was Ethan. “I was alone in the pool, I swear. I was hot, I was awake . . . end of story. And Alex is a girl I met at tennis camp.” Hopefully, Sutton had gone to tennis camp . . . and hopefully Laurel hadn’t gone with her. Then, trying to act annoyed and aloof, she pushed around Laurel and into the hall.

“Sutton, wait.”

Emma turned around. Laurel stood behind her, a dangerous smile on her lips. “I’m onto you. You’re going to tell me what you’re up to. Or else . . .”

The words hung in the air, almost palpable. “Or else
what
?”

Laurel was so close Emma could smell her lemony shampoo. Her shoulders were square and strong. Her broad hands curled at her sides. All at once, Emma was transported back to that awful night in Charlotte’s house when someone had grabbed her from behind and nearly killed her
.
Laurel was taller than Emma, about the right height of the person who’d assaulted her. And there was a solid strength about her, a sureness that made Emma think she could be capable of such a thing. After all, Emma had watched Laurel violently choke Sutton in the fake snuff film.

Laurel stepped even closer, and Emma flinched and looked away. “You’d better tell me what you’re up to soon, or I’ll really give you something to be scared about. You think the train prank is something to laugh about now? What if I tell Mom and Dad all about it? What if I tell them what
really
happened?”

Emma stepped back in surprise.
Please tell
me
what really happened
, she silently willed. But Laurel just spun around and marched up the stairs, leaving Emma alone in the darkness.

Chapter 12
A Secret of a Different Kind

“
Ich war in Arizona geboren
,” Emma whispered to herself, the German IV textbook in her lap and a series of note cards in her hands. She frowned at how the guttural syllables sounded. German reminded her of an old man hacking up phlegm.

It was Tuesday, and Emma was sitting at a round outdoor lunch table in the courtyard, which was reserved for seniors and a few cool juniors; everyone else had to sit inside the stuffy cafeteria, which had the unfortunate tang of fish tacos. Charlotte, Madeline, and Laurel were due to meet her any minute, and Emma passed the time by reviewing German notes for a big chapter test tomorrow. Even though Sutton had probably never studied a day in her life, Emma couldn’t blow off even the littlest quiz. She’d been a straight-A student since first grade, and she wasn’t going to stop now.

I chafed under my twin’s judgment. Maybe I was distracted with other things, too busy to study. Or maybe I was secretly smart but just didn’t see the point.

The German chapter test covered the stages of life: being born, living, dying. “
Ich war in Arizona geboren
,” Emma mouthed again.
I was born in Arizona.
That would be Sutton’s answer—but was it really true? Becky had always told Emma she was born in New Mexico—meaning Sutton had been, too.

“
Sutton starb in Arizona
,” Emma mouthed quietly, reading the next vocabulary word.
Sutton died in Arizona.
Just saying it, even in another language, made Emma’s stomach clench. She leafed through the glossary in the back of the book, but the German IV text didn’t offer a more accurate verb like
murdered
,
killed
,
slaughtered
, or
strangled
.

“Have you bought your tickets to the Homecoming dance?”

Emma jumped at the chirpy voice above her. A girl with green face paint, a fake nose, an Elvira beehive wig, and a long black dress that looked like it was infested with bedbugs pushed a flyer that said
HALLOWEEN HOMECOMING DANCE! BE THERE OR BE SCARED!
into Emma’s lap
.
When she saw who Emma was, her manic smile drooped and she stepped away. “Oh! Um, I mean, I’m sure
you
have, Sutton. Have an awesome time!”

Before Emma could say a word, Elvira skittered across the courtyard. This wasn’t the first time a dork had shied away from Emma, giving her a wide berth in the hallways or scurrying out of the girls’ bathroom just as Emma walked in.
Just another part of being Sutton Mercer
, Emma realized, suddenly wondering if the way people reacted to her had ever made her twin feel lonely. Did Sutton ever truly let anyone in?

I didn’t know how to answer Emma’s question. But considering it looked like someone close to me took my life, maybe I was right not to trust anyone.

Emma shut the German text. As she stared at the fake-happy, lederhosen-wearing German couple on the cover, she felt the distinct and prickly sensation that someone was watching her. She slowly turned around. A table of football players laughed boisterously at a guy pantomiming some joke across the patio. At the next table sat a boy and a girl. Their mouths were angry red slashes, and their gazes were squarely fixed on Emma.

Garrett and Nisha.

Today, Nisha wore a fitted kelly-green tennis sweater and Lacoste sneakers and a glare that made Emma’s blood run cold. Even though Emma hadn’t realized they were friends, Garrett sat hip-to-hip with Nisha, his needling gaze on Emma, too. His disgusted expression seemed to say
I know about you. I know about Ethan.

Could
Garrett know? Had he been the one idling outside the Paulsons’ pool last night? Maybe he and Nisha had been there together. Emma gave Garrett a small, hopeful wave, but Garrett just shook his head ever so slightly and whispered something into Nisha’s ear. Nisha giggled at whatever Garrett said and smirked at Emma.

Suddenly, Emma couldn’t take their little secrets anymore. Balling her fist, she glared at the petite, dark-haired girl. “Can I help you with something, Nisha?” she asked, not bothering to hide her sarcasm.

Nisha flashed a saccharine smile and inched closer to Garrett, resting her bloodred fingernails possessively on his arm. “I was just about to remind you that the mandatory team dinner is at my house on Friday. I mean, I would’ve involved you in the planning, but who knows if you’ll even show?”

Emma bristled. “Well, maybe I’d show if you ever threw something worth attending.”

Good for you, Em
, I thought. Emma was getting better at standing her ground and summoning her inner me. Maybe there was some truth to that nature versus nurture debate after all.

Then Nisha’s gaze brightened at someone behind Emma. “You’re coming, aren’t you, Laurel? Or will Sutton not allow it?”

Emma turned to see Laurel plopping her lunch tray down on the table. Laurel shot daggers in Nisha’s direction, saying nothing. “Since when are team dinners mandatory?” she muttered under her breath. “Someone needs to tell her that just because she’s cocaptain doesn’t make her queen.”

“She’s just pissed because Sutton didn’t show up last time.” Charlotte dropped into a seat, too, slapping a striped canvas lunch bag on the table. She looked at Emma. “If you don’t want us to go to this one, Sutton, we won’t.”

Laurel turned to Emma and nodded, too. Emma had noticed that, as the de facto Lying Game leader, Sutton’s friends always deferred to her.

But I wasn’t sure they were thrilled about that. Charlotte stared at Emma wearily, as though she was tired of Sutton Mercer’s mercurial rules and regulations.

“So where
were
you today?” Madeline interrupted, sliding into the bench next to Emma. “Why weren’t you at The Hub?”

Emma squinted. “We were supposed to meet at The Hub?” That was the name of the school store and coffee bar next to the cafeteria. The place mostly sold Hollier sweatshirts, dance raffle tickets, and Number 2 pencils.

“For Court planning, yes! Hello, tradition?” Madeline handed Emma a coffee from a cardboard carrier. “Whatever. I got a latte for you. I guess someone’s a little distracted today, huh? Perhaps from her time in the slammer last night?”

Laurel opened her Sprite Zero with a sharp
thwock
. “I told them about it this morning.” She held Emma’s gaze, innocently batting her eyelashes as if to say,
And guess what else I’ll tell?

“Apparently
you
weren’t going to.” Charlotte rested her hands on a Tupperware container full of spinach salad. “What happened?”

Madeline fidgeted with a plastic knife, running her fingers along the jagged edge. “Since when do you shoplift without us?” She looked annoyed, like Emma had slighted her.

“And getting caught at Clique?” Charlotte clucked her tongue. “We had that place mastered by eighth grade!”

“Laurel told me you took a Tori Burch clutch.” Madeline wrinkled her nose. “Sutton, Tori is
not
worth stealing.”

Emma removed the top from her coffee cup, and steam billowed into her face. “You know how it is when you’ve just
got
to have something,” she said vaguely. “I would’ve totally gotten away with it, too, if the bitch working the register had been actually doing her job instead of obsessing over me. I think she has a little crush.”

“Someone’s losing her touch,” Charlotte sing-songed, biting into a carrot with a decisive crunch. She seemed almost happy Emma had gotten caught.

Emma took a dainty sip of the latte and winced—it was piping hot. “I’ve blown my chances for going to Homecoming. I’m grounded for the next millennium.”

“Oh please. You’re going.” Madeline popped a yogurt-covered raisin into her mouth. “We’ll find a way. And you’re going camping with us afterward, too.”

Then, Madeline snickered at something behind her. “CourtZillas at twelve o’clock.”

Even though the twins traditionally dressed like opposites—Gabby had a Stepford Wife thing going, with preppy headbands and grosgrain-piped everything, and Lili went for the Taylor Momsen look, with plaid flannels, über-short skirts, and lots of raccoonish eye makeup—today they both wore tight-fitting pink dresses with frothy tulle skirts and mile-high platform heels that laced up their thin ankles. As usual, they clutched their iPhones. Everyone—from the band kids in the corner to the sullen, arty types by the stucco wall—stared at them.

“Hi, girls!” Gabby trilled as she reached their table.

“
Ciao!
” Lili said. “Did someone say camping? Where are we going this year?”

“
We
are camping at Mount Lemmon,” Charlotte said pointedly. “I don’t know where
you
are camping.”

“That’s too bad,” Lili said just as pointedly back. “Because we’re the only ones who know where the best hot springs are.”

“And we’ve got an adorable little hibachi grill. We could make s’mores,” Gabby added.

“I don’t know if starting a fire in the desert is the best idea.” Laurel smirked.

Emma ran her tongue over her teeth as she stared at the girls, thinking of their car slowly passing Sutton’s house. Had
they
been the ones lurking outside Sutton’s house last night, watching her and Ethan swim?

Madeline appraised their outfits. “Voting for court already
happened
, ladies. You don’t have to dress like Homecoming Barbies anymore.”

“Maybe we like it.” Lili put her hands on her bony hips. “So, girls. Have you figured out the plans for our ceremony yet?”

“It’d better be good,” Gabby jumped in, chomping hard on a piece of gum. The scent of watermelon wafted through the air. “Servants . . . awesome food and music . . . and perhaps a Lying Game initiation ceremony as the cherry on top?” Gabby ticked off each request on her fingers.

“We have some killer prank ideas,” Lili said, a glint dancing in her light eyes.

“We’d be an asset to the group,” Gabby said in a low voice, staring directly at Emma. Emma drew back slightly, her heart speeding up just a tick. Gabby pulled a tiny bottle from the pocket of her dress, flicked open the pink lid, and placed a round pill on her tongue. Her throat rose as she swallowed. Her gaze never left Emma’s, as though passing an unspoken message between them.

“No can do on the Lying Game invite, ladies,” Emma said, trying to sound confident and poised. Sutton hadn’t allowed Gabby and Lili into the club before—maybe for a good reason.

Gabby’s eyes flickered over Emma’s body, as if sizing her up for a fight. “We’ll see about that, won’t we?” she said, her words suddenly hard.

Lili lightly touched Gabby’s wrist. “Chill, Gabs,” she said in a hushed voice. Then she yanked Gabby across the patio. “No autographs!” she called to their gaping classmates, shielding her face as though she was being chased by the paparazzi. As soon as Lili let go of her, Gabby spun around and made her finger into a gun, pointing at Emma and pretending to shoot. Emma’s mouth fell open.

A flash instantly swarmed my vision of me ushering the twins out of my room at a sleepover, simpering, “Sorry, girls. We have private Lying Game stuff to discuss. Stay out in the den with the other nobodies.” Gabby’s knuckles had gone white as she clutched her iPhone tighter. Then Lili had risen to full height. “Mark my words, Sutton,
it won’t always be this way
,” she’d spat.

But now, Madeline just rolled her eyes at the Twitter Twins. “Something’s gotten into those two lately. They’re crazier than ever.”

“That’s for sure,” Charlotte said, sipping her coffee and staring at the double doors the twins had disappeared through. “But they do have a point—we have to plan their ceremony.”

“Let’s do it Saturday.” Madeline stuffed her empty Tupperware container into her purse. “My house?”

“I can’t,” Emma said. “I’m grounded, remember?”

Charlotte let out a snort. “When has that ever stopped you?”

The bell rang, and everyone rose en masse, tossed their leftovers into the trash, and headed back into the school. Laurel and Charlotte split off in opposite directions, but Madeline hung back and waited for Emma to pack her bag so they could walk together.

They turned a corner into the music wing. Off-key notes blared from open doorways. At the end of the hall, Elvira handed out more flyers for the Homecoming dance. Her fake nose threatened to fall off her face, and a couple of kids snickered as they passed. Madeline glanced at Emma out of the corner of her eye.

“What’s with you lately?” Madeline asked, slowing their pace.

“What do you mean?” Emma replied, startled.

Madeline skirted around a girl struggling with a tuba case. “You’ve been . . . weird. Cautious, disappearing and not explaining why, shoplifting by yourself . . . Char and I think an alien life-form has come down and taken over your body.”

Emma felt a flush creep over her face and chest.
Calm down
, she said silently. She tugged on Sutton’s necklace, fighting for composure. And then she had an idea. “I guess I’m upset because you and Char seem to be really close lately,” she said in a pinched voice, trying to sound petulant and jealous. “Am I being replaced as your BFF?” She eyed Madeline’s tall ballet-dancer frame, clad in skinny cargo pants and a gray dolman-sleeve sweater, hoping she’d take the bait.

Madeline’s finely drawn features tightened. “Char and I have always been friends.”

“Yeah, but something has changed between you two,” Emma goaded. “You seem tight now
.
Does this have to do with the night before Nisha’s party? I
know
you were together, Mads.”

Madeline stopped short in the hall, letting students stream around them. A vein at her temple pulsed. “Would you lay off about that night?”

Emma blinked. A fire raging in her belly fueled her forward. “Why?”

“Because I don’t want to talk about it, okay?”

“But . . .”

“Just leave it, Sutton!” Madeline turned and blindly pushed through the nearest door, which led to the school library.

Emma shoved her shoulder against the library door and followed Madeline inside. Kids hunched over homework at long, wide desks. Computer screens glowed behind a wall of glass. The big room smelled like old books and the disinfectant spray-cleaner Travis used to huff.