Nine Liars (Truly Devious, #5)(11)

It took about four hours, and many cups of coffee, but by the end of the night, they had collectively hammered out something that looked like a legitimate case—a detailed day-by-day schedule in spreadsheet format, listing cultural and historical locations of interest and what they intended to do there and how this related to their individual academic goals. They reviewed the plan until midnight, at which point they emailed it to Dr. Quinn, the head of school. They weren’t expecting anything else to happen until tomorrow, but she replied within ten minutes to everyone with the following words: My office. Tomorrow. Six p.m.

Stevie was going to England. Maybe. If Dr. Quinn said it was okay. Which was not a guarantee. Because of things like the murders and Stevie’s propensity to get involved in them.

She just needed a yes.





June 23, 1995

11:00 p.m.

“THERE YOU ARE, MY DARLINGS!” SEBASTIAN SAID AS SOOZ SHEPHERDED Angela into the sitting room. He popped a bottle of champagne and put the foaming mess to his lips. Some of it made it inside his mouth; the rest went down the slim-fitting deep purple shirt he was wearing. He used his champagne-sticky hand to sweep his dyed black hair back off his face.

“We’re seriously going to play when it’s pissing down?” Yash said from the sofa.

“Of course!” Sebastian intoned. “We are not cowards!”

“Don’t speak for me.”

Angela sat next to Yash, sinking deep into the cushions. This was a proper old sitting room sofa, the kind that enfolded you in soft flocked fabric and broken-down filling, inviting you to stay for hour after hour, drinking and reading and enjoying the fire.

“We could stay inside,” Yash said. “Like normal people. We could drink.”

“Sounds like someone’s worried,” Peter said, coming into the room with a tarnished horn he’d picked up from one of Merryweather’s countless displays of antiquities. He tooted it speculatively, but it only made a spluttering fart noise.

“I don’t even know why we have to play this game every time we are here,” Yash went on.

“Tradition!” Sebastian said.

“How’s it a tradition if we’ve only been here three times? That’s not even a habit. It barely qualifies as a trend.”

Noel threw himself over the back of the sofa and slid down between Yash and Angela. Noel rejoiced in weird movements and liked to throw himself around the furniture, down the stairs, up into the rafters.

“Now,” Sebastian said as he grabbed a bag and began distributing small packages containing disposable clear rain ponchos. “I’m the starting seeker. I’ll count to a hundred to give you all time. As I find you, you’ll join the seeker team. I’ll give you a yellow poncho to show you’ve switched sides.”

He held up a yellow poncho as an example.

“When you find people, bring them to me for the poncho. Oh, and don’t even bother with the outbuildings. . . .”

He reached down into the front of his trousers and fished around for a moment.

“The evening has taken a turn,” Yash said. “It’s a bit early to get your cock out, Sebastian. Even for you.”

Sebastian jerked his arm up and triumphantly displayed a set of keys. “Everything’s locked, and these are the only keys.”

He held them aloft, stared at them for a moment as if he wanted to question them about the nature of keys and locks and how they fit in to the grand plan of the universe, then shoved them back down the front of his trousers with a roughness that made everyone wince.

“There,” Sebastian went on, wobbling a bit. “The keys are now down with the other family treasures.”

“Why?” Yash said. “Why there?”

“Didn’t fit in the pocket. Throws off the line of the trousers. So, no outbuildings. The boundaries are anything within the proper grounds—the house, any of the gardens, any wooded area within the stone boundary wall, and nothing beyond the ha-ha. We have to put some limits on it or we’ll be doing this all week.”

“So you’re going to sit in here, nice and dry?” Noel said.

“No, darling. I’m a good sport. I’ll use the folly by the pond as a base. And we’ll make it a rule—once anyone leaves the main house, there’s no going back in until the game is over.”

“We get torches, don’t we?” Sooz asked.

“Torches are for seekers!” Peter said. “That’s always been the rule.”

“Correct,” Sebastian replied. “Last person to be found is the winner. Where is Rosie? It’s time to start.”

“Having a slash,” Sooz said. “She’s coming.”

Sure enough, there was the sound of rapid footfall down the stairs and Rosie appeared at the door, looking a bit distracted.

“Right!” Sebastian said. “Now we can start. The count begins. One, two, three . . .”

The group scattered. Theo and Yash remained inside, but the others all went for the many doors that led to the outside. There were certainly plenty of places to hide inside Merryweather—the house had many bedrooms and reception rooms, multiple all-purpose rooms for washing and household use, box rooms, crawl spaces, closets, a cluttered and rambling attic, and a genuinely cavernous basement. If one ventured outside, there were acres of gardens with tall borders, an orchard, and dozens of dark pockets and nooks between trees and behind buildings. An ambitious player could hide indefinitely.