People Like Us(49)
Nola hands me her laptop, opened to a local news website. “First of all, you were right about Maddy. The police are investigating it as a homicide. Possibly linked to Jessica’s.”
I pull the comforter around me, shivering. “The police think it’s the same killer?”
“Same place, same pattern. Maddy overdosed, but she died by drowning. No note, no indication that she wanted to die. Jessica didn’t leave a note either. That’s today’s breaking news. If the same person killed Jessica and Maddy, that proves that the killer wrote the revenge website. F. J. has been masterminding this whole thing and manipulating every move we’ve made.”
“F. J. is?”
“Fake Jessica. The blogger.” There are dark shadows under her eyes, and I wonder whether she slept at all last night. She’s no longer wearing the silky nightgown. Instead she’s dressed in a conservative black button-down shirt with a white Peter Pan collar and a knee-length wool skirt and knee socks. I’m embarrassed about the short-circuited kiss from last night, but it’s suffocated by the shock and numbness I feel about Maddy’s death and guilt about the message I left Brie.
“We can’t just assume Maddy and Jessica were killed by the same person.” I try to keep my voice steady. “They’re two very different people. They had nothing in common. And what about Greg? He has no connection to Maddy.”
“Well, maybe Greg didn’t do it,” Nola says quietly.
I take Nola’s laptop without a word and open the revenge website. We unlock the password and click on the link to the main course. It goes dark and the oven opens, revealing the final recipe poem.
Oh Kay Dead Meat Pie
Chop her, mince her, grind her up
Call the cops to drink and sup
The recipes are writ and posted
Hope you’ve liked the meal I’ve hosted
Two things left—to book and cuff
Katie can’t suffer enough.
I suddenly notice the kitchen timer flying at breakneck speed. “What’s going on?”
She clicks on it a few times but it keeps moving. “Hold on.” She types something into the password box, but nothing happens. “Um.”
Fifteen seconds. I grab the laptop from her. “What happens at zero?” I shriek.
“How am I supposed to know?”
I watch helplessly as the timer ticks to zero, and then the website disappears and the words Server not found appear on the screen. “What just happened?” I ask, a panic rising in my stomach.
She stares at the computer incredulously. “The site’s been taken down. It must have been set to expire a certain amount of time after the password was unlocked. It’s gone. For good.”
I sink back against the wall. “I’m being set up. And that was the only evidence.”
Nola takes a deep breath. “I think I have an idea who F. J. might be.”
I close my eyes and cover my face with my hands. “It’s not Spencer.”
She gapes at me. “How did you know?”
“He’s the only one who calls me Katie. He knows every person on the revenge blog. Plus Jessica. Intimately. He even has a reason to want to hurt me.”
“The incident Cori mentioned, I presume.”
“Obviously. But if Spencer wanted to get back at me, he could have just killed me. And he had no reason to hurt Maddy.”
Nola rolls her eyes. “You’re a revenge amateur.” She tosses me her phone. “And Spencer had every reason to hurt Maddy. To shut her up. Funny how she dropped dead hours after he tried to get back together with you.”
I look down at an unfamiliar Instagram account showing pictures of Spencer and Maddy cuddling and making out at a party, dated shortly after our breakup. And then everything makes sense. Maddy being so nice to me. Constantly asking if I’d spoken to Spencer. Brie acting cold toward her all of a sudden, and Tai and the others giving her that new nickname, Notorious R.B.G. Rebound girl. Maddy and Spencer. This doesn’t just strengthen Spencer’s motive, though. It pretty much doubles mine. And when you consider that Spencer and I met alone the day she was found dead, it’s absolutely damning. But I know I didn’t do it, and the fact is, Spencer might have.
I am suddenly hit with a vivid memory of the night we met, the moment that cemented our friendship. I had finally relented to his suggestion that we find an unoccupied bedroom, and we really did stay there all night drinking and playing I Never, no funny business, at least much less funny than our public display for Brie’s benefit. The game had started so blandly and rapidly escalated until the final three.
“I never broke a person’s heart.” Neither of us drank.
“Liar,” I said, watching the ceiling spin in circles as I hugged a flannel pillow to my chest.
“Appearances can be deceiving. No tears shed over me, Katie.”
I already regretted telling him my nickname from back home earlier in the game. I Never had a nickname.
The next one slid off my tongue before my waltzing mind had time to process it.
“I never committed a felony.” I crawled over to him on my elbows and took a swig of his gin and tonic before the better part of me, the smarter part of me, had time to shut it down, to scream at me to stop and go home. He stared down at me, took the drink out of my hand, and drained half the glass.