Sara Shepard - Stunning

Tabitha rolled her eyes. “Do I have to spell everything out for you? I thought you were smart. You got into Princeton, after all. Not that you’ll be going there now.”

Spencer’s eyes widened. “W-why not?”

Tabitha’s smile was crooked and strange. “Because you’re dead .” And then she leaned over and touched Spencer’s eyes, as if to close them. “Say good-bye!”

Spencer shrieked and fought to keep her eyes open, kicking against the leather restraints. When she opened her eyes again, she was in a different room. The walls were green, not pink. An IV pole and a bunch of whirring machines stood next to her bed, measuring her blood pressure and pulse. Just within reach was a small tray table containing a yellow plastic pitcher, her cell phone, and three round white pills. When Spencer looked at the cotton gown she was wearing, it was printed with the words PROPERTY OF PRINCETON GENERAL HOSPITAL.

Tabitha’s voice reverberated in Spencer’s mind. It’s because of what you did. What all of you did. She told me you’d pay for this, and she was right. Was Tabitha talking about Gayle? But how did she and Gayle know each other? Or did she mean Real Ali?

More importantly, what the hell was she doing in a hospital? All she remembered was wandering to Ivy’s backyard and hearing something in the woods. There had been footsteps . . . someone had grabbed her . . . and then what?

Her monitor chirped. As if on cue, a nurse wearing blue scrubs and a terry-cloth headband entered the room. “Ah, you’re up.” The nurse looked at the machines, then shone a light in Spencer’s eyes. “Your name’s Spencer Hastings, right? Your driver’s license says you’re from Pennsylvania. Do you know what day it is?”

Spencer blinked. Everything was moving too quickly. “Um, Sunday?”

“That’s right.” The nurse wrote something down on the clipboard she was holding.

“W-what happened to me?” Spencer squeaked.

The nurse placed a blood pressure cuff on Spencer’s arm. “You overdosed on a dangerous mix of drugs. We had to pump your stomach about an hour ago.”

“What?” Spencer sat up in bed. “That’s impossible!”

The nurse sighed. “Well, your blood tested positive for marijuana, Ritalin, and LSD. The tox screen for the twenty-six other kids at the same party also tested positive for those substances, but they keep telling me they didn’t do any drugs, either.” She rolled her eyes. “I wish one of you would have just admitted it when we brought you in. It would’ve made our lives a lot easier.”

Spencer licked her lips, which were so dry they hurt. More people from the party were here? “Is everyone okay?”

“Everyone’s fine, but you all had a serious scare.” The nurse wrote something down on her clipboard, then patted Spencer’s leg. “You rest now, okay? Your body has been through a lot.”

The door clicked closed, and Spencer was alone once more. She shifted around in the bed, making sure her legs weren’t strapped to the bed like they were in her dream. How did all of those other drugs get into her system? Not just hers, but twenty-six other kids, as well?

Spencer closed her eyes and thought of the bizarre debauchery that had taken place at the potluck. How so many kids had paired up and disappeared upstairs. Straight-A students had stripped off their clothes and run naked through the house. Harper had started to trash the place, and others had followed. Even Spencer had done things she wouldn’t normally do. The whole experience was so . . . unhinged. Bizarre.

“Oh my God,” Spencer blurted, a crack suddenly opening in her brain. Could it have been because of the brownies? They were the only thing she’d eaten. She pictured Reefer proffering her an enormous clump of pot, claiming it was really mellow and perfect for baking. He’d smiled at her, as though completely guileless and honest, then said all that stuff about Ivy. Maybe this was his idea of civil disobedience. He was sticking it to those old-fart-y institutions for being so staid, boring, and exclusionary.

Spencer twisted her body to reach the cell phone on the little table and dialed Reefer’s phone number. It rang a few times, and then Reefer picked up, letting out a cautious hello.

“You almost killed us,” she growled.

“Um, excuse me?” Reefer said.

“We’re all in the hospital because of you! Do you really hate Ivy that much?”

There was a pause on the line. “What are you talking about?” Reefer sounded confused.

“I’m talking about the LSD and Ritalin that was in your mellow pot,” Spencer said through her teeth, noting that her pulse on the monitor was rising. “You spiked it to screw with us, right?”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Reefer interrupted. “I don’t do that stuff. And I certainly wouldn’t lace it into my pot. I gave you the tamest thing I had, Spencer. I swear.”

Spencer frowned. Reefer sounded blindsided by the accusation. Was he telling the truth? Could someone else have tampered with the brownies? The food at the party was out in plain sight, though—it would have been difficult for someone to stealthily sprinkle various poisons into the brownie dish. And Spencer hadn’t let the pot or the brownies out of her sight since she’d baked them the night before.

She widened her eyes. Actually, she had let them out of her sight—she’d fallen asleep while they were baking. Was it possible someone could have crept into the motel at that very moment and sabotaged her dish? There had also been more pans at the party than she remembered bringing—were some of the brownies smuggled in and passed off as hers?

“Spencer?” Reefer’s voice came through the line.

“Uh, I’ll call you back,” Spencer croaked, then hung up. Suddenly, it was so cold in the room that her skin broke out in goose bumps.

Her cell phone, which she was still holding, let out a bloop. She looked at the screen. Her vital signs on the monitor spiked again. New message from Anonymous.

Talk about a bad trip, huh? That’s what you get for leaving your potluck goodies unattended. —A

“Are you sure there isn’t anything we can do to help?” Hanna asked her father as he restraightened his tie in the lobby of the Hollis Gemological Museum, the site of the fund-raiser ball. It was a huge, beautiful space with marble floors, mosaic-tiled walls, and tons of display cases full of priceless diamonds, rubies, sapphires, emeralds, meteorites, and geodes. The place was immaculate and gorgeous, with white linens on the two dozen tables set up around the room, massive bouquets of flowers everywhere, and a silent auction area featuring a Fabergé egg, a vintage Louis Vuitton sable coat, and a three-month-long sailboat charter around the world.

“Yes, Tom, please let us do something.” Kate, dressed in an aubergine gown and black velvet strappy heels, began preening in front of the mirror, too.

Mr. Marin smiled at the girls. “You two have done so much.” He thought for a moment, then raised one finger. “You could show Ms. Riggs a good time. You used to come to this museum all the time, didn’t you, Hanna? You could point out the displays.”

Hanna bit back a grimace. It was true she used to go to the museum with Ali in sixth grade, but playing tour guide with Gayle was just about the last thing she wanted to do. But it would give her an opening to steal Gayle’s phone and prove she was A. Now, there was even more of a reason to do so: Spencer had called on the way over, telling Hanna she was in the hospital—A had drugged her and a bunch of kids at Princeton, and if they could prove A was Gayle and that Gayle definitely spiked the brownies, they could put her away for a long time.