Sara Shepard - Wicked

Melissa sat down next to her. “I just don’t understand it. I’ve been going over and over it, and I don’t know why Nana would leave you out of her will.”

“She hated me,” Spencer said flatly, her nose getting that peppery, about-to-sneeze feeling it always did whenever she was about to start bawling. “I stole your paper. Then I admitted I stole it. I’m a huge disgrace.”

“I don’t think it has anything to do with that.” Melissa leaned closer. Spencer could smell Neutrogena sunscreen—Melissa was so anal, she put on sunscreen even when she was going to be spending the entire day indoors. “Something about it was really suspect.”

Spencer lowered the napkin from her eyes. “Suspect…how?”

Melissa scraped the chair closer. “Nana left money to each of her natural-born grandchildren .” She tapped the kitchen table three times to emphasize the last three words, and then stared at Spencer searchingly, as if Spencer was supposed to deduce something from this. Then Melissa glanced out the window, where their mother was still unloading groceries from the car. “I think there are a lot of secrets in this family,” she whispered. “Things you and I aren’t allowed to know. Everything has to look all perfect on the outside, but…” She trailed off.

Spencer squinted. Even though she had no idea what Melissa was talking about, a sick, swooping feeling began to wash over her. “Will you just spit out what you’re trying to say?”

Melissa sat back. “ Natural-born grandchildren ,” she repeated. “Spence…maybe you were adopted.”

Wednesday morning, Hanna burrowed under her down comforter, trying to drown out the sound of Kate singing scales in the shower. “She’s so sure she’s going to get the lead in the play,” Hanna grumbled into her BlackBerry. “I wish I could see her face when the director tells her it’s Shakespeare, not a musical.”

Lucas chuckled. “Did she seriously threaten to tell on you when you weren’t going to give her a tour of the school?”

“Basically,” Hanna growled. “Can I move in with you until we graduate?”

“I wish,” Lucas murmured. “Although we’d have to share a bedroom.”

“I wouldn’t mind,” Hanna purred.

“Me neither.” Hanna could tell he was smiling.

There was a knock at the door, and Isabel poked her head in. Before she’d gotten engaged to Hanna’s father, she’d been an ER nurse, and she still wore hospital-issue scrubs to bed. Yecch. “Hanna?” Isabel’s eyes were even droopier than usual. “No talking on the phone if you haven’t made your bed, remember?”

Hanna scowled. “ Fine ,” she said under her breath. Seconds after Isabel had hauled in her Tumi luggage and replaced the custom-made plantation shutters with purple, crushed-velvet drapes, she’d laid down all these rules: No Internet after 9 P.M. No talking on cell phones if chores weren’t finished. Absolutely no boys in the house when Isabel and Hanna’s father weren’t home. Hanna was basically living in a police state.

“I’m being forced to get off the phone,” Hanna said into her BlackBerry, loud enough for Isabel to hear.

“It’s okay,” Lucas said. “I need to get moving. Photography club meets this morning.”

He made a kissing sound and hung up. Hanna wiggled her toes, all of her irritations and worries melting away. Lucas was a way better boyfriend than Sean Ackard, and he almost made up for the fact that Hanna was essentially girlfriendless. He understood how hard she was taking what Mona had done to her, and he always snickered at her evil Kate stories. Plus, with a new salon haircut and a Jack Spade messenger bag to replace his ratty JanSport backpack, Lucas wasn’t half as dorky as he’d been when they first became friends.

Once Hanna was certain Isabel had retreated down the hall to the bedroom she and Hanna’s father shared—double ughh —she crawled out of bed, haphazardly pulling up the covers so it looked like she’d made it. She then sat down at her makeup table and snapped on her LCD TV. The Action News Morning Report song blared out of the speakers. ROSEWOOD REACTS TO IAN THOMAS’S TEMPORARY RELEASE flashed in big black block letters at the bottom of the screen. Hanna paused. As much as she didn’t want to watch the report, she couldn’t tear her eyes away.

A petite, redheaded news reporter was at the local SEPTA train station, canvassing commuters for their thoughts about the trial. “It’s despicable,” said a thin, stately older woman in a high-necked cashmere coat. “They shouldn’t let that boy out for even a minute after what he did to that poor girl.”

The camera moved to a dark-haired girl in her twenties. Her name, Alexandra Pratt, appeared below her face. Hanna recognized her. She’d once been Rosewood Day’s star field hockey player, but had graduated when Hanna was in sixth grade, a year ahead of Ian, Melissa Hastings, and Ali’s brother, Jason. “He’s definitely guilty,” Alexandra said, not bothering to take off her enormous Valentino sunglasses. “Alison occasionally played field hockey with a group of us on the weekends. Ian sometimes talked to Ali after the games. I never knew Ali that well, but I think he made her uncomfortable. I mean, she was so young.”

Hanna uncapped her Mederma scar cream. That wasn’t how she remembered it. Ali’s cheeks flushed and her eyes lit up any time Ian was around. At one of their sleepovers, when they were practicing kissing on the monkey pillow Ali had sewn in sixth-grade home ec, Spencer had made each of them confess which boy they wanted to kiss in real life. “Ian Thomas,” Ali had blurted out, and then quickly covered her mouth.

Ian’s senior picture was now on the screen, his smile so white, wide…and fake. Hanna looked away. Yesterday, after another awkward dinner with her new family, Hanna had dug out Officer Wilden’s business card from the bottom of her bag. She wanted to ask him how strict Ian’s house arrest was going to be. Would he be chained to his bed? Would he have on one of those ankle bracelet thingies that Martha Stewart had to wear? She wanted to believe Wilden was right about yesterday’s A note—that it was just a copycat—but every bit of reassurance would help. Plus, she thought Wilden might give her a little extra info. He’d always tried to be buddy-buddy with her back when he and her mom were dating.

Only useless Wilden had said, “Sorry, Hanna, but I’m really not allowed to discuss the case.” Then, as Hanna was about to hang up, Wilden had cleared his throat. “Look, I want him to fry as much as you do. Ian deserves to be locked up for a long, long time for what he did.”

Hanna clicked off the TV as the morning news moved on to a story about an E. coli scare in local grocery store lettuce. After a few more layers of Mederma, foundation, and powder, Hanna decided her scar was as hidden as it was going to get. She spritzed herself with Narciso Rodriguez perfume, straightened her uniform skirt, threw all her crap into her Fendi-logo tote, and walked downstairs.

Kate was already at the breakfast table. When she saw Hanna, her whole face broke into a dazzling smile. “Omigod, Hanna!” she cried. “Tom brought this amazing organic honeydew at Fresh Fields last night. You have to try it.”

Hanna hated how Kate called her father Tom, like he was their age. It wasn’t like Hanna called Isabel by her first name. Actually, she avoided calling Isabel anything at all. Hanna walked across the kitchen and poured herself a cup of coffee. “I hate honeydew,” she said primly. “It tastes like sperm.”

“ Hanna ,” her father scolded. Hanna hadn’t noticed him by the kitchen island, finishing a slice of buttered toast. Isabel was next to him, still in those hideous puke-green scrubs, looking particularly faux-tan orange.