Sara Shepard - Toxic

Emily blinked hard. Her fingers loosened around her phone, and it slipped from her palm. “Pardon?” she asked faintly, lifting it back to her ear.

His words were hurried. “There was an altercation with an inmate named Robin Cook. . . . I don’t know who she is or what their relationship was. But Jordan is gone. Her parents have already identified her body.”

Bile rose in Emily’s throat. “Why would someone want to kill her?”

“I don’t know. But Robin Cook was found missing from her jail cell this morning. She’s the one who escaped.”

“ What ?” Emily shrieked.

“I’m really sorry to be the one to tell you this, Emily,” he said quietly. Then he hung up.

Spots formed in front of Emily’s eyes. It’s a lie , she thought. It had to be. Jordan couldn’t be dead. Emily had just seen her.

She stood in the silent, empty bedroom, staring at her bureau, then her desk, then her bed. She’d had this same stuff since she was a child, but it suddenly seemed so unfamiliar. Everything seemed so unfamiliar, even her shaking hands, even the old Rosewood Day T-shirt she was wearing.

Jordan is dead. Jordan is dead.

Like a zombie, she walked toward the closet and opened it. She kicked aside the shoes strewn at the bottom and ducked through her hanging pants and dresses. She sat down on the floor, curling her knees in. And then she pulled the door shut behind her. The closet was dark. It smelled like rubber. It felt like a grave. Her thoughts tried to veer to Jordan, but she couldn’t go there. Her mind actually stopped moving forward, as if a physical wall were up. Her body wasn’t remotely ready to cry, either. It wasn’t really even ready to breathe.

Then Spencer’s text from last night swirled back to her. Ali is in New York. Emily had received that text at about nine o’clock. Ulster Prison was only an hour or so away from the city . . . and according to the lawyer, Jordan had died last night. Emily’s heart began to pound.

None of that seemed like a coincidence.

Hanna drove as fast as she could to Ashland, the back roads mercifully light on traffic. Many of the turns were sharp, and the CD she was listening to skipped when she sailed over the rickety covered bridge. She couldn’t think of a single thing on the drive, though there were several good reasons for that. One, she had a staggering hangover—she’d taken the latest Amtrak back to Rosewood last night and had gotten only four hours of sleep. In the only fitful dream she recalled, she’d been on a date with Mike and had leaned over to kiss him, but when she drew back, it had been Jared smiling at her instead. Why had she let Jared kiss her at all ? What if Mike found out?

But more than that, she was distracted because of Emily’s tearful, blubbering, almost-unintelligible voice mail this morning: Jordan’s dead. I think Ali did it.

After what seemed like a zillion miles of highway, Turkey Hill loomed in the distance. Hanna flicked on her turn signal to pull into the gas station. The mini-mart was empty. Hanna searched the register area, hoping to see the same woman from the other day behind the counter, but there was a large guy with a long goatee instead. She wasn’t sure why Emily wanted to meet all of them here to discuss Jordan’s death, but she certainly wasn’t going to argue with a girl who’d lost her true love.

As she drove past the gas pumps, her phone beeped. It was Hailey. Last nite was so fun! Check it out!

She’d sent several pictures of them at the premiere party. The very last one was of Hanna and Jared in lip-lock. Hanna squeezed her phone in horror. Please delete that! she texted back immediately.

Got it. Your secret’s safe with me. Hailey added a winking emoticon. And then: Hey, can you talk right now?

Hanna was about to call Hailey, but then she noticed Emily’s car in the lot. It was in the last space near the Dumpsters. Hanna could make out Emily’s silhouette in the driver’s seat through the window. She was staring straight ahead, totally expressionless.

Sorry, Hanna replied to Hailey, and dropped her phone on the seat, climbed out of the car, and jogged to Emily, the strings of her Ugg slippers flapping on the pavement—she’d been so scattered this morning that she’d forgotten to put on proper shoes. The Volvo’s engine was still running, and the air blew into Emily’s face. Even so, Emily was shivering. Tears ran down her cheeks. Hanna’s heart broke into a thousand pieces.

Tires screeched behind her. Spencer and Aria, in Spencer’s car, skidded into the lot, got out, and ran to Emily, too. Like Hanna, both of them looked exhausted. Aria was still wearing a lot of makeup, presumably from her art opening the night before. Spencer wore jean shorts and an oversize black sweater; there were dark circles under her eyes. Hanna wanted to ask them how their evenings were—they’d both had big, exciting nights. But it seemed inappropriate, considering what had happened to Emily.

Hanna flung Emily’s door open. Her friend didn’t even look up at her. “Em,” Hanna said, taking Emily’s hand. It was freezing cold. “I’m so sorry. What happened?”

More tears spilled down Emily’s cheeks. “It’s all lies,” she said emptily. “Jordan’s lawyer is saying it was senseless prison violence. An accident. But I know the truth. This was Ali. She was in New York—Spencer saw her on the subway. She must have gone to the prison afterward. She got in, and she murdered Jordan.”

Hanna blinked hard. That didn’t make any sense. “So you’re saying she, like, broke into prison and killed Jordan?” she asked gently.

“Yes,” Emily said, setting her jaw. She sounded so certain.

“But aren’t prisons really secure?” Aria asked, climbing into the backseat. “You’re saying that Ali not only got inside the place, but also made it back to the prison cells themselves?”

“I guess so,” Emily said stubbornly. “Or maybe an Ali Cat did it.”

Spencer sniffed. “You think one of them is in prison?”

“I don’t know!” Emily sounded exasperated. She paused to wipe the tears from her face with a Kleenex from a small, snowman-printed package. “Didn’t you read that post on the Ali Cat site I sent you? It was about how some of them hate whoever hates Ali, and how they’re willing to hurt any of Ali’s enemies. Maybe they’re crazy enough to murder for her. Ali has to be behind this, you guys. She saw that I was happy, and she needed to ruin that.” She paused and swallowed hard. “When she cornered me in the pool, she was like, Say you still love me. I couldn’t do it. All I could think of was Jordan. And the look on her face when I said no—well, she was furious. That’s why she pushed me under, but it’s also why she let me go. Killing me wouldn’t have been satisfying. She had to kill the person that I was now in love with. She wanted me to live and suffer.”

“Oh my God.” Hanna clapped her hand over her mouth. The others looked just as stricken. Emily hadn’t told them about the “Say you still love me” stuff before.

Emily looked around ominously at the others. Her chin was shaking wildly. “She’s going to ruin your happiness, too. Mark my words.”

Hanna shivered, her thoughts instantly zinging to the kiss with Jared last night. Ali couldn’t know about that , could she?

Emily pulled another Kleenex from the pack. “We have to get her, you guys. Before she does anything else.”

“How?” Spencer asked. “The hoodie was a dead end, remember? We have no idea where she’s living or how she’s tracking us. We’re stuck until we see her again.”