Sara Shepard - Crushed

She signed it Concerned in Rosewood. In the space where the template asked for her e-mail, she used an address she’d created that morning, its password so nonsensical and impossible-to-crack that she almost forgot it as soon as she made it up.

“Spencer?”

Aria’s face loomed on the other side of the window. Spencer shot out the door and pulled her inside. A cab pulled up seconds later, and Hanna tumbled out. Emily drove up at almost the same time. Spencer led them down the hall and opened the heavy door to the panic room. The video monitors flickered. The room still smelled faintly of the microwave popcorn they’d made the last time they were here. Spencer fished out the list of potential Ali’s helpers and taped it back on the door. The remaining suspects glared at her. Iris. Darren Wilden. Melissa. Jason. Graham. Noel.

“This had better be good,” Emily grumbled as she peeled off her jacket. “I had to leave Iris at my house for this. Who knows what sort of insane things she’s going to tell my folks?”

“Iris is at your house ?” Hanna repeated, staring at her.

Emily nodded, then explained how Iris would only give her Ali intel if Emily signed her out for a while. “I told my parents she’s a low-income student from inner-city Philadelphia who’s going through some tough times at home right now, and I’m doing this as an outreach program through Rosewood Day. Amazingly, they bought it.”

Spencer looked at Aria. “So what’s going on?”

Aria whipped out two things from her yak-fur bag. One looked like a newspaper article. The second was a handwritten note. Spencer recognized the scrawl immediately.

Aria showed the article to Hanna. “Recognize this guy?”

Hanna shook her head, but then her face paled. “Wait. Is that . . . O-Olaf?” she stammered. Her eyes scanned the article. “He’s missing?”

Aria nodded. “This happened in January.”

“Who’s Olaf?” Emily asked, hugging her knees.

“A guy I met in Iceland.” Aria swallowed hard.

Hanna lowered her chin. “You didn’t just meet him.”

“Okay, I kind of hooked up with him,” Aria mumbled. “I was really drunk.”

Spencer’s eyebrows shot up. Aria seemed so happy with Noel—Spencer never would have guessed that she’d cheated on him.

A crow landed near one of the video cameras, its body huge on the monitor. Spencer looked at the scrawl on the little piece of paper Aria had found. Isn’t seeing good art truly liberating? “What does that mean?”

Aria looked back and forth nervously. “Well, Olaf and I did more than just hook up. We sort of . . . stole a painting together.”

Spencer blinked. “You what ?”

“What kind of painting?” Emily breathed, her hands at her mouth.

Spencer tried to listen as Aria laid out what had happened, but her brain stalled out once she heard the name Van Gogh. “How did I not know this?” she gasped. Then she glanced at Hanna, who had a guilty expression. “ You knew?”

“It’s not like I wanted to know,” Hanna said, crossing her arms over her chest. “She called me in a panic when the police came—I picked her up. But we decided to keep it quiet.”

“I figured the less people who knew, the better,” Aria said softly, picking at the hem of her sweater. “And for a while, it was fine—the cops never caught Olaf, the painting was never found, and nobody ever connected it to me. But when I came home from school yesterday, that article was on my bed and the painting was in my closet. I’m sure A put it there.”

Spencer’s heart stopped. “A priceless Van Gogh is in your closet ?”

Aria’s eyes filled with tears. “The article says the authorities couldn’t find the painting when they searched Olaf’s house. Ali must have gone there, chopped up Olaf—the article says blood was all over the floor—moved his body somewhere, ransacked his place, and taken it. And then she brought it back here.”

Hanna frowned. “I’m not sure if Ali could have done all that. How could she have gotten a passport? And Olaf was over six feet. It’s like the Ian thing—Ali couldn’t have been strong enough to strangle him all by herself.”

Aria shrugged. “Maybe her helper did it, then. It doesn’t change the fact that Team A killed Olaf so that they could get the painting. And now, one well-placed call from A, and I’ll have a SWAT team on my lawn.”

“Whoa,” Emily whispered.

“Maybe you should turn the painting in anonymously,” Hanna suggested, wrapping a piece of hair around and around her finger nervously.

Spencer’s eyes widened. “Art theft is, like, a major crime. You could be on a surveillance camera. You could get in serious trouble.”

“And now you guys could get in trouble, too,” Aria cried. “All of you know what I did now. You know where a stolen painting is.” Tears welled in her eyes. “You can turn me in if you want. I understand.”

Emily touched her arm. “We aren’t going to do that.”

“We’ll figure this out without any of us getting in trouble, okay?” Spencer added. “I just don’t understand how A knew what you did.”

“I guess A followed us to Iceland,” Hanna concluded.

“And followed me to the chateau?” Aria held her palms to the ceiling. “There weren’t any other cars even on the road until the police came. I suppose A could have come on foot, but—”

“What if A listened in on our call on my end?” Hanna interrupted.

Aria pushed a strand of hair out of her face. “You think A was staying in our guesthouse?”

Spencer leaned back in the chair and shut her eyes. Her head was throbbing, and she felt that same old rising panic that had plagued her many times before. How could A be in so many places at once? How could A know everything ?

Then she opened her eyes. “Aria, maybe A was staying in your room .”

She must have had a telling tone, because Aria set her mouth in a line. “A is not Noel.”

“Are you sure ?” Spencer threw up her hands. “Aria, Noel has been everywhere bad stuff has happened to us. Jamaica. The cruise. Now Iceland. Do you really think that’s just a coincidence?”

“Noel was dead-drunk that night,” Aria protested, her voice going high.

Spencer paced back and forth around the little room. “Maybe it was just an act. Hanna, do you remember where Noel was when you talked to Aria?”

Hanna shoved her hands in her pockets, the light from the digital clock on the wall glowing red on her face. “Well, he wasn’t in bed when I woke up. And I didn’t see him in the hall, which is where I was for most of the conversation. He came inside from the back when we got home, though. He said he was smoking a joint, but he didn’t smell like weed at all.”

Aria’s eyes blazed. “Now you’re against me, too?”

“Of course I’m not against you!” Hanna said. “But, Aria, it is weird.”

Spencer shifted forward in the chair. “Remember how strange Noel was when ‘Courtney’ came to Rosewood?” she asked. “He was in a support group with her. He urged you guys to be friends. And you caught them making out at the Valentine’s Day dance. . . .”

Aria slapped her arms to her sides. “Ali ambushed him! Noel didn’t want to kiss her. She just made it look like he did.”

“Are you sure?” Spencer asked. “It was that kiss that made you get in the car to go with us to the Poconos. What if Noel was in on it?”

Aria’s mouth hung open. “I can’t believe you.”

One of the surveillance monitors went dark. Everyone’s gaze shot to it. There was fuzz, but then the image reappeared. The yard was empty. A few leaves drifted past the camera, and that was all.