Sara Shepard - Burned

Aria began to tremble. Was it possible? All the warnings her friends had given her, all the times they’d said he had motive, and there she was, by his side, making excuses for him. He did have motive. He could have gotten in touch with Naomi, somehow, after the crash, and recruited her onto his team.

He could be a murderer. A torturer. And now she was trapped in this room with him on the other side.

The door thumped and thudded with Graham’s pounding fists and kicking feet. When Aria shut her eyes, she saw Tabitha’s terrified face as she fell. She pictured her broken body on the sand, kissed by the incoming tide. Aria was a terrible person. She deserved Graham to be mad at her. But she didn’t deserve what he’d done as A.

Boom .

Aria screamed and covered her head. The sound was so close, and the room vibrated. The lights flickered overhead, and the sound of metal hitting the ground clanged all around her. She let out a breath and peeked through her fingers. Had something exploded? There was as horrible smell in the air of gunpowder and charred electronics. It sort of reminded her of a firework. Or, perhaps, a homemade bomb.

A fire alarm started to blare. “Everyone!” Jeremy’s voice crackled over the loudspeaker after about a minute. “We need you to evacuate right now! Please go to your lifeboat stations in an orderly fashion!”

Evacuate? Aria’s heart started to pound. She wasn’t even opening the door .

She cocked her ear, waiting for Graham to start pounding again. A few seconds passed, and then a minute. Finally, Aria opened the door a crack. Emergency lights flashed overhead. The room was thick with smoke. A boiler had tipped over. Pieces of metal were strewn all over the floor. Black smoke was pouring out from seemingly everywhere, and flames leapt to the ceiling. The explosion had definitely occurred right there in that room.

She let out a scream, then wrenched open the door. She had to get out of there. She looked around for Graham, expecting him to grab her. But even through the haze, the realization dawned on her fast.

Graham was gone.

Emily followed the stream of kids toward the stairs, her nostrils burning with smoke. Above her, emergency lights flashed. Kids were screaming about the strange explosion, laughing hysterically, or making nervous comparisons to Titanic . And even though they’d attended a safety meeting the very first day on the boat, no one seemed to remember where their lifeboat stations were.

“Everyone!” Jeremy yelled over the loudspeaker. “If we get separated, please remember to meet us at the Royal Arms Hotel in Hamilton, Bermuda.”

Jeremy repeated the message three times more. As Emily waited to go down the stairs, she glanced at the sky. A plane zoomed overhead, coming from the Bermuda airport, which was now a ten-minute boat trip away. Was it the plane she and Jordan were supposed to be on? She pictured the people sitting in their seats, the stewardesses cruising up the aisles, the smell of fresh-brewed coffee wafting through the cabin—and the two unoccupied seats meant for her and Jordan.

The line moved up a little, and a few more kids made it through the stairwell door. A girl in front of Emily with cornrows in her hair nudged her friend. “I heard terrorists blew up the cafeteria.”

“No, these two guys who were in the talent show did it,” her friend replied knowingly. “They knew their act sucked, so they decided to bomb the place and steal the Vespa.”

“You’re making that up.” Cornrows rolled her eyes.

“Maybe it was that girl who jumped overboard earlier,” another voice said. “Maybe this was revenge for whoever ratted her out to the Feds.”

“That’s crazy.” Someone sounded annoyed. “That girl never came up for air. She’s dead.”

“Can you believe she was on this ship the whole time? Who do you think turned her in?”

Stop talking about her! Emily wanted to scream. It was like Jordan was an infamous celebrity, someone weird and unknowable. She likes a lot of milk in her coffee , she thought. She’s fearless. She’s the most amazing girl I’ve ever met .

She shut her eyes and considered Jordan’s body sinking down, down, down, to the depths of the bay, just like Tabitha’s had. She wanted to strangle A with her bare hands. Why couldn’t A have just let them go? Why did A have to ruin Every. Single. Thing?

She felt a hand on her shoulder. Aria was on the stairs behind her, dressed in a bikini and her grass hula skirt and drenched in sweat. Hanna and Spencer were there, too, dressed normally but looking hysterical.

“What’s going on?” Emily asked.

Aria glanced back and forth at all the kids on the stairs, then dragged Emily onto the landing, which was cool, dark, and empty. Kids swarmed past, but no one seemed to notice they were there.

“ Look .” Aria fished the round gold locket she’d been wearing all week out of her pocket and dangled it under Emily’s nose. The two halves of the pendant splayed open. Emily squinted at the two girls in the picture inside. One of the girls was Ali. When she realized who the other one was, she stepped away, confused.

“Is that Tabitha ?” she whispered.

“This was her necklace,” Aria said. “Noel found it on the beach, but I checked the pictures of Tabitha online, and it was definitely hers.”

Spencer shook her head, stunned. “I bet Naomi planted it for Noel to find and give to Aria.”

“Or maybe Graham did,” Aria said, still breathing hard. She looked like she was about to burst into tears. “I was wrong about him, guys. He stared right at the necklace like he knew what it was, and then gave me this look like he knew everything I’d done. I ran from him and shut myself in the boiler room, but he screamed at me through the door. I screamed out an apology for what we did to Tabitha, but it didn’t make him stop. He said he was watching me, and he mentioned a picture. I think he was the one who set off the bomb, too. He mentioned gunpowder once when we were talking—he would have known how to make an explosion.”

Spencer clapped a hand over her mouth. “You could have been killed!”

“I know.” Aria swallowed hard.

Emily trembled. “What picture do you think he was talking about?”

“I don’t know,” Aria said. “Maybe the one of Tabitha on the beach. I think he’s the one working with Naomi.”

“Oh my God.” Spencer sank onto a stair, looking woozy.

“But why would Naomi—or Graham, or whoever—plant that necklace for Noel to give to Aria?” Hanna asked.

“It proves we killed Tabitha,” Spencer said, leaning closer so that a bunch of boys clamoring down the stairs wouldn’t hear. “It connects us to her and that night. A is trying to build an airtight case.”

Emily wilted against the wall. “I don’t get it. Why would A need to build even more of a case on us? A—both of them—have the pictures. One of the As saw us. And we did do it. Why does A need to gather extra evidence?”

Spencer shrugged, the emergency light flashing red across her face. “I don’t know. But the FBI is nearby, looking for that girl who jumped overboard.” She glanced at Emily when she said this, then looked away. “This would be a perfect time to tell. We could be arrested within hours, especially if we have this necklace on us.”

Hanna looked at Aria. “Where is Graham now?”

Aria tapped her nails against the railing. “I’m not sure. He disappeared after the explosion.”

Spencer frowned. “That’s strange, don’t you think?”

Aria shrugged. “I’m glad he’s gone. I was afraid he was going to jump out and hurt me.”