Killer (15 page)

Olivia tilted her head, her eyes lighting up. “I know. I wish you could too. But it must be so nice out in Pennsylvania. All that space and clean air.” She touched Spencer’s hand.

“Rosewood is nice.” Spencer swirled her wine and weighed her words carefully. “But my family…isn’t.”

Olivia opened her mouth, a concerned look on her face. “They just don’t care about me,” Spencer clarified. “I’d give anything not to live there anymore. They wouldn’t even miss me.”

There was a peppery feeling in her nose that she always got when she was about to cry. She looked stubbornly into her lap, trying to harness her emotions.

Olivia stroked Spencer’s arm. “I’d give anything for you to live here,” she said. “But I have a confession to make. Morgan has a hard time trusting people—some close friends have used him for his money in the past, and now he’s very careful about people he doesn’t know. I haven’t told him about you yet—he knew I gave up a baby when I was young, but he didn’t know I was searching for you. I wanted to make sure this was real first.”

Spencer nodded. She certainly understood why Olivia hadn’t told Morgan they were meeting—it wasn’t like she’d told people either.

“I’m going to tell him about you in Paris,” Olivia added. “And once he meets you, I know he’ll adore you.”

Spencer bit off a crust of bread, considering her options. “If I moved here, I wouldn’t even have to live with you guys,” she sounded out. “I could get my own place.”

Olivia got a hopeful look on her face. “Could you handle living on your own?”

Spencer shrugged. “Sure.” Her parents were barely around these days; she was practically living on her own as it was.

“I
would
love to have you here,” Olivia admitted, her eyes bright. “Just think—you could get a one-bedroom in the Village near us. I’m sure our Realtor, Michael, could find you something really special.”

“I could start college next year, a year early,” Spencer added, her excitement beginning to build. “I was thinking about doing that anyway.” When she’d secretly dated Wren, Melissa’s boyfriend, she’d considered applying to Penn early to get out of the house and be with him. In fact, she’d already spoken to the Rosewood Day administration about graduating as a junior. With all the AP classes she’d taken, she was more than qualified.

Olivia breathed in, about to say something else, but then stopped, took a long sip of wine, and held out her palms, as if to say,
Hold up
. “I shouldn’t be getting so excited,” she said. “I’m supposed to be the responsible one here. You should stay with your family, Spencer. Let’s stick to visits for now at least, okay?” She patted Spencer’s hand, probably noting Spencer’s disappointed look. “Don’t worry. I’ve only just found you, and I don’t want to lose you again.”

After polishing off the bottle of wine and two orders of pasta puttanesca, they strolled to the helipad on the Hudson River, acting more like best friends than mother and daughter. When Spencer saw Olivia’s helicopter waiting, she clutched her arm. “I’m going to miss you.”

Olivia’s bottom lip quivered. “I’ll be back soon. And we’ll make plans to do this again. Maybe a Madison Avenue shopping trip next time? You’ll die over the Louboutin store.”

“It’s a deal.” Spencer wrapped her arms around Olivia. She smelled like Narciso Rodriguez, one of Spencer’s favorite perfumes. Olivia blew a kiss and boarded the helicopter. The propeller began to whirl, and Spencer pivoted and looked back at the city. Cabs zoomed up the West Side Highway. People jogged down the West Side path, even though it was past 10
P.M.
Lights twinkled in the apartment windows. A party boat on the Hudson drifted by, guests dressed in elegant suits and gowns clearly visible on the deck.

She was
dying
to live here. Now she had a reason to.

The helicopter lifted off the ground. Olivia slid big headphones over her ears, leaned out the window, and waved enthusiastically at Spencer. “Bon voyage!” Spencer cried. When she hefted her bag higher on her shoulder, something poked her arm. Olivia’s accordion folder.

She pulled it out and waved it over her head. “You forgot this!” But Olivia was saying something to the pilot, her eyes on the skyline. Spencer waved until the helicopter was a tiny dot on the horizon, finally lowering her arms and turning away. At least she had an excuse to see Olivia again.

14

AND ON A WESTBOUND TRAIN THE NEXT DAY…

The following afternoon, Aria stood on the westbound SEPTA platform in Yarmouth, a town a few miles from Rosewood. The sun was still high in the sky, but the air was chilly, and Aria’s fingers had gone numb. She craned her neck and looked down the tracks. The train was a few stops away, glimmering in the distance. Her heart sped up.

After she’d seen not one but
two
hot girls fawn over Mike yesterday, she’d decided that life was too short to brood. She distinctly remembered Jason telling her that he got out of Thursday classes early enough to catch the 3
P.M.
bullet train back to Yarmouth. Which meant she knew just where to find him now.

She turned and looked at the houses across the tracks. Many had junk on their porches and peeling paint around the windows, and none had been converted into antique shops or upscale spas like the old houses around the Rosewood station. Nor was there a fancy Wawa or Starbucks nearby, just a dingy head shop that offered palm readings and “other psychic services”—whatever that meant—and a bar called the Yee-Haw Saloon, with a big placard out front that said
CHUG ALL YOU CAN FOR
$5! Even the spindly trees didn’t seem as picturesque. Aria understood why the DiLaurentises wouldn’t have wanted to move back to Rosewood for the duration of the trial, but why had they chosen Yarmouth?

She heard a snort behind her. As she turned, a shadow slipped behind the station on the other side of the tracks. Aria stood on her tiptoes, blinking hard, but she couldn’t make out who it was. She thought about seeing Jenna Cavanaugh in her front yard yesterday. It had seemed as if Jenna was about to tell Aria something…but then decided against it. On top of that, Emily had forwarded Aria a text from A, a photo of Ali and Jenna together that Aria had never seen.
See?
said Emily’s text.
It looks like Ali and Jenna were friends.
But wasn’t it possible that Ali was
pretending
to be Jenna’s friend, in order to get Jenna to trust her? It was just like Ali to bring someone into her inner circle only to steal all her secrets.

The train roared into the station and screeched to a halt. The conductor banged the door open, and people slowly climbed down the metal stairs. When Aria saw Jason’s blond hair and gray jacket, her mouth went dry. She ran to him and touched his elbow. “Jason?”

Jason turned around with a jerk, seemingly on guard. When he saw it was Aria, he relaxed. “Oh,” he said. “Hey.” His eyes flickered back and forth. “What are you doing here?”

Aria cleared her throat, resisting the urge to turn around, run back to her car, and drive away. “Maybe I’m making a fool out of myself, but I liked talking to you the other day. And…I wanted to know if we could hang out some time. But if not, that’s cool too.”

Jason grinned, looking impressed. He stepped out of the way of a crowd of businessmen. “You’re not making a fool out of yourself,” he said, meeting Aria’s eyes.

“I’m not?” Aria’s heart flipped over.

Jason checked his oversize watch. “Do you want to get a drink right now? I’ve got some time.”

“S-sure,” Aria stammered, her voice cracking.

“I know the perfect place in Hollis,” Jason said. “You can follow me there, okay?”

Aria nodded, grateful he hadn’t suggested the Yee-Haw Saloon down the street. Jason let her go first up the narrow stairs that led to the station. As they walked to their cars, something flickered in Aria’s peripheral vision. The figure she’d seen earlier was standing at the station window, looking out. Whoever it was wore big sunglasses and a puffy coat with the hood pulled tight, obscuring his or her facial features. Even so, Aria had the distinct sense that the person was staring right at her.

Aria followed Jason’s black BMW into Hollis. She made a point to check his back bumper for any big dents, remembering what Emily had said about her and Jason’s altercation the other day. But as far as she could tell, the bumper was flawless and dent-free.

After they both found parking spaces on the street, Jason led her down a narrow alley and up the stairs of an old Victorian house with the word
BATES
hanging on a sign over the front porch. There was a creaky black rocking chair off to the right, as spindly as a skeleton.

“
This
is a bar?” Aria looked around. The Hollis bars
she
knew, like Snooker’s and the Victory Brewery, were dark, foul-smelling places that had no decoration besides a few neon Guinness and Budweiser signs. Bates, on the other hand, had stained-glass windows, a brass knocker on the front door, and a bunch of long-dead hanging plants swinging from the porch ceiling. It reminded Aria of the creaky mansion her Reykjavík piano teacher, Brynja, lived in.

The door swung open, leading to an enormous parquet-floored parlor. Red velvet couches lined the sides of the room, and dramatic curtains billowed over the windows. “Supposedly the place is haunted,” Jason whispered to her. “That’s why they call it Bates, like the Bates Motel from
Psycho
.” He walked up to the bar and sat on a stool.

Aria looked away. Back before Ali’s body had been found, she’d thought A was Ali—or maybe her ghost. The blond flashes she’d seen had probably been Mona, who’d stalked each of them for their dirtiest secrets. But now that Mona was dead, Aria still sometimes swore she saw someone with blond hair just like Ali’s duck behind trees and appear at windows, watching her from beyond the grave.

A short-haired bartender dressed in black took their orders. Aria asked for pinot noir—she thought it seemed sophisticated—and Jason ordered a gimlet. When he noticed Aria’s confused expression, he said, “It’s vodka and lime juice. A girlfriend at Yale got me into it.”

“Oh.” Aria ducked her head at the word
girlfriend.

“She’s not my girlfriend anymore,” Jason added, which made Aria blush more.

They got their drinks, and Jason slid his gimlet over to her. “Try it.” She took a dainty sip. “It’s good,” she said. It tasted like Sprite, except way more fun.

Jason folded his hands, a curious smile on his lips. “You seem awfully comfortable drinking in a bar.” He dropped his voice to a whisper. “You almost have me fooled that you’re twenty-one.”

Aria slid the gimlet back to him. “I spent the last three years in Iceland. They’re not as strict about drinking, and my parents were pretty lenient. Plus, I never had to drive home, either—my house was a couple of blocks away from the main drag. The worst thing that happened was I once tripped over the cobblestones after having too much Brennivín schnapps and skinned my knee.”

“Europe seemed to really change you.” Jason leaned back and appraised her. “I remember you as this awkward kid. Now, you’re…” He trailed off.

Aria’s heart pounded. She was…
what?
“I fit in better in Iceland,” she admitted when it was clear he wasn’t going to finish his sentence.

“How so?”

“Well…” Aria stared at the oil portraits around the room of old aristocratic women. Underneath each of their portraits were their birth and death dates. “Guys, for one. In Iceland, they didn’t care if I was popular. They cared about what music I listened to or what books I liked to read. In Rosewood, guys only like one kind of girl.”

Jason propped his elbows on the bar. “A girl like my sister, you mean.”

Aria shrugged, looking away. That
was
what she meant, but she hadn’t wanted to say Ali’s name out loud.

An expression Aria couldn’t parse floated over Jason’s face. She wondered if Jason knew the effect Ali had had on guys—even older ones. Had Jason known about Ali’s secret relationship with Ian at the time, or had that come as a surprise after he was arrested? How did Jason feel about it?

Jason sipped his gimlet, his serious look gone. “So did you fall in love a lot in Iceland?”

Aria shook her head. “I had some boyfriends, but I’ve only been in love once.” She clumsily took another swig of wine. She’d hardly eaten anything today, and the wine was taking hold fast. “It was with my AP English teacher. Maybe you heard about it.”

A crease formed between Jason’s eyes. Maybe he hadn’t.

“It’s over now,” she said. “Honestly, it was a disaster. He was asked to leave his teaching position…because of me. He left town a couple of months ago and said he’d keep in touch, but I haven’t heard from him.”

Jason nodded sympathetically. Aria was surprised how comfortable it felt to tell him this. Something about him made her feel safe, like he wasn’t going to judge her.

“Have you ever been in love?” she asked.

“Only once.” Jason tipped his head back and swallowed the rest of his drink. The ice rattled against the empty glass. “She broke my heart.”

“Who was it?”

Jason shrugged. “No one important. Not now, at least.”

The bartender brought Jason another gimlet. Then Jason poked Aria’s arm. “You know, I thought you were going to say the person you were in love with was
me
.”

Aria’s mouth fell open. Jason…
knew?
“I guess it was really obvious.”

Jason smiled. “Nah. I’m just really perceptive.”

Aria signaled the bartender to refill her wine, too, her cheeks blazing. She’d always taken extra precaution to hide her crush from Jason, certain she’d die if he ever found out. Now she kind of wanted to crawl under the bar.

“I remember this one time when you were waiting outside the journalism barn at Rosewood Day,” Jason explained gently. “I noticed you right away. You were looking around…and when you saw me, your eyes lit up.”

Aria gripped the bulky wooden lip of the bar. For a second, she’d almost thought Jason was going to bring up the time he gave her Ali’s Time Capsule flag. But he was referencing the day she’d waited outside his journalism class, wanting to show him her dad’s signed copy of
Slaughterhouse-Five
. That had happened the Friday before they all sneaked into Ali’s backyard.