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Her mother whirled around, her eyes wild, her lipstick smudged. “You honestly think I could have killed that girl?” she hissed. “Am I really that much of a monster to you?”
“No!” Spencer squeaked in a tiny voice. “I just—”
“You just nothing,” her mother growled, shaking a finger at her so violently, Spencer took a couple of frightened steps back into the flower beds. “You know why I told you we should never talk about that night, Spencer? Because your best friend went missing. Because Ali’s disappearance has taken over your life and you need to move on. Not because I murdered her!”
“I’m sorry!” Spencer wailed. “It was just that . . . I mean, Melissa couldn’t find you that night and she seemed so—”
“I was out with friends,” her mother boomed. “Late. And the only reason I even remember that is because the police asked me about it nearly fifty times over the next few days!”
There was a cough behind them. Melissa was crumpled next to a small topiary. Spencer grabbed her arm. “Why did you tell Dad over and over that you needed to find Mom?”
Melissa shook her head, baffled. “What?”
“You guys were at the door that night and you kept saying, ‘We need to find Mom. We need to find Mom.’”
Melissa gaped at Spencer helplessly. Then, her eyes doubled in size, the memory coming to her. “You mean when I asked Dad about needing a ride to the airport to catch my flight to Prague?” she said weakly. “I knew I’d be too hungover, but Dad basically told me tough luck. I should’ve thought about that before getting drunk.” She blinked at Spencer in bewilderment.
A family with a young girl got out of a minivan. The husband and wife were holding hands, smiling at each other. The girl stared curiously at Spencer, her thumb in her mouth, before following her parents inside the restaurant.
“But . . .” Spencer felt dizzy. The smell of olive oil floating from the restaurant was suddenly overpoweringly putrid. She searched her sister’s stricken face. “You weren’t fighting with Dad because Mom found out about the affair? You didn’t run back to Ian and say, ‘My dad is having an affair with Mrs. DiLaurentis, and I think my mom went and did something horrible’ ?”
“Ian?” Melissa interrupted, her eyebrows shooting up. “I never said that. When did he tell you that?”
Spencer ground to a halt. “Today. He said he’s been IMing you, too.”
“What?” Melissa exploded.
Spencer clutched the sides of her head, feeling disoriented. Ian, Melissa, and her mother’s words mixed together in a hazy swirl, twisting and blending until she had no idea what was the truth.
Was Spencer even IMing Ian at all? She’d been IMing someone who claimed he was Ian, but did she really know for sure?
“But what about what you and Mom have been whispering about all week?” Spencer begged, desperate to make sense of the situation, to justify what she’d just done.
“We were planning a special dinner for you.” Her mom looked up, the fight suddenly draining from her voice. Melissa uttered a sigh of disgust and walked away. “Andrew and Kristen Cullen are in there. We were going to take you all to the new production of The Importance of Being Earnest at the Walnut Street Theater.”
Goose bumps rose on Spencer’s arms. Her stomach roiled. Her family had been trying to show how much they loved her, and look what she’d done.
Tears began to cascade down Spencer’s cheeks. Of course her mother hadn’t killed Alison. Her mother hadn’t even known about the affair. Whoever had IMed her had lied.
A shadow fell over her. When she turned, she saw a gray-haired, stern-looking Rosewood cop. His gun gleamed in his belt.
“Miss Hastings,” the cop said, shaking his head solemnly. “You’re going to have to come with me.”
“W-what?” Spencer shrieked. “Why?”
“It would be better if you did this quietly,” the cop murmured. Wordlessly, he stepped in front of her, nudging her mother out of the way. He pinned Spencer’s hands behind her back, and she felt cold, hard metal on her wrists.
“No!” Spencer cried. It was happening so quickly. She looked over her shoulder. Her mother just stood there, mascara running down her cheeks, her mouth a small O. “Why are you doing this?” she begged the officer.
“Communicating with a criminal on the lam is a serious crime,” he said. “Conspiracy after the fact. And we have the IMs to prove it.”
“IMs?” Spencer repeated, her heart sinking into her gut. The IMs from Ian. Had one of the cops overheard what she just said to her family? Had Melissa run to the police and told on her?
“You don’t understand!” she pleaded. “I wasn’t conspiring with anyone! I don’t even think those IMs are from Ian!”
But the cop wasn’t paying any attention. He opened the door to the backseat, placed a hand on Spencer’s head, and shoved her inside. He slammed his own door shut, then pulled out of the lot, sirens blaring, lights flashing, heading straight to the Rosewood police station.
Chapter 28
Now Who’s the Crazy One?
Hanna skidded down the Preserve hall past the cafeteria, arriving at the entrance to Iris’s secret lair. “Let me in, Iris,” she snarled. She pressed her ear to the door, but there weren’t any sounds from upstairs.
Hanna had been looking for Iris for the past hour, but Iris seemed to have vanished. She wasn’t in the theater watching Ella Enchanted with the other patients. She wasn’t in the dining room, the gym, or the spa. Aggravated, Hanna leaned against the locked door. There were a few doodles on the jamb. At the top left corner was the name Courtney, Iris’s old roommate. Next to Courtney’s name was a winking smiley face. Hanna was dying to get back inside the attic and see the drawing of Ali—she had no idea how she’d missed it when she was up there.
