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Jealousy rippled through her once more, but she quickly brushed it aside and thought again of the note. Sutton’s dead. Emma would never have a family dinner with her sister.
Everyone was silent for a while, forks clanking against plates, spoons scraping against serving dishes. Mr. Mercer’s beeper went off; he checked it and slid it back in its holster. Emma caught him staring at her a few more times. Finally he pressed his palms to the table. “Okay, this is driving me nuts. When did you get that scar on your chin?”
Emma’s heart shot to her throat. Everyone turned and looked at her. “Uh, what scar?”
“There.” He pointed across the table. “I’ve never seen that before.”
Laurel squinted. “Oh yeah. Weird!”
Mrs. Mercer frowned.
Emma touched her chin. She’d gotten the scar when she’d fallen off the Hamburglar at McDonald’s Playland. She’d blacked out for a couple of seconds, and when she came to, she’d expected to see Becky standing over her comfortingly. Instead Becky was nowhere in sight. Emma finally found her on the other side of Playland, crying her eyes out while rocking back and forth on a Fry Guy ride, her knees jackknifed up so that her feet fit in the little stirrups. When Becky saw the blood gushing from Emma’s chin, it just made her cry harder.
Emma couldn’t very well tell Mr. Mercer that. She lifted her water glass to her lips. “It’s been there for a while. I guess you don’t know me as well as you think you do.”
“Is that because you’re some girl named Emma?” Sutton’s mom quipped.
Emma nearly choked on her water. There was a wry, almost devious smile on Sutton’s mom’s face. “And how is Emma today, by the way?” Mr. Mercer added with a wink.
Mrs. Mercer gazed at Emma, waiting for her answer. She was kidding, wasn’t she? Emma was no longer sure. She wasn’t sure about anything. “Uh, Emma’s a little disoriented,” she said quietly.
Little did my family know how true that answer really was.
Chapter 13
THE BODY ON THE GROUND
An hour and a half later, Emma walked down the front path from Sutton’s house and made a right turn toward the big park at the end of the development. After some thought, she’d decided to take Mrs. Mercer’s advice and practice her tennis swing. Maybe she’d miraculously improve and kick Nisha’s perky, tennis-skirted ass tomorrow—or, at the very least, she wouldn’t do a face-plant while trying for a drop shot.
Her BlackBerry, nestled in the tennis bag along with Sutton’s iPhone, beeped. ALEX, said the Caller ID.
“So you are alive!” Alex cried when Emma answered. “You were supposed to check in with me last night! I thought you fell into the canyon!”
Emma laughed grimly. “No, I’m still here.”
“So?” Alex said. “How is it? Is your sister awesome? Have you bonded?”
“Uh . . .” Emma sidestepped a Razor Scooter a kid had abandoned on the sidewalk. It was hard to believe she’d only been here for a day. “She’s great. We’re having a great time.” She hoped her voice didn’t sound forced. On instinct she looked behind her, sure someone was listening.
“So are you going to stay there for a while? Are you going to move in with her? Are you just dying?”
Emma swallowed hard, the menacing SUTTON’S DEAD note flashing through her mind for the billionth time. Something like that. “We’ll see.”
“I’m so thrilled for you!” The phone cut out for a second. “Ugh, I’ve got another call,” Alex said. “I’ll talk to you later, okay? You’ll have to tell me everything!”
And then she hung up. Emma held the warm phone to her ear for a few seconds more, the guilt gushing inside her like a broken fire hydrant. She’d never lied to Alex before, especially about something so momentous. Not that she really had a choice.
A snapping noise made Emma freeze. Was that . . . a footstep? She slowly turned around, the silence ringing in her ears. The night had grown dark and still. A red security system light blinked from the dash of an SUV at the curb. Something moved by the front wheel, and Emma leapt back. A sand-colored lizard skittered from underneath the car and raced around a large wheeled trash bin.
She ran her hands down the length of her face, trying to calm down. The park loomed at the end of the street, a large expanse of well-manicured grass, playgrounds, and ball fields. She jogged the rest of the way, the tennis bag jostling against her hip. A couple of sweaty, shirtless guys were packing up their gear on the basketball court. Two joggers stretched by a large green trash receptacle.
A silver parking meter–style machine stood outside the chain-link entrance to the tennis courts. SEVENTY-FIVE CENTS FOR THIRTY MINUTES, said a small sign on the post. Emma glanced around nervously. The basketball players had left abruptly, taking most of the noise with them. Wind swished in her ears. There was another tiny sound to her left, like someone swallowing. “Hello?” Emma called softly. No answer.
Get a grip, she told herself. Squaring her shoulders, she shoved a couple of quarters into the narrow slots of the meter. Floodlights snapped on overhead, so blinding that Emma winced and shielded her eyes. She opened the chain-link door and looked out onto the blue-green courts. And then . . . she saw it. A guy splayed face-up in the middle of the court, his arms and legs stretched out in an X.
Emma screamed. The guy shot up, which made Emma scream even louder and toss the racket toward his head. It clanged against the court and landed near the net. The guy squinted hard at her face.
