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“She’s not so bad, you guys,” Lili piped up. “I’m in P.E. with her and she’s actually pretty fun.”
“Whatever,” Charlotte said. “You can invite her when you see her this afternoon, Lili. Just tell her not to wear a whipped cream dress or something insane, okay?”
Emma sipped tentatively at her own coffee and winced. Sutton drank hers black, with just a hint of Splenda, and she still wasn’t used to the bitterness.
Madeline nudged her. “Someone’s quiet this morning.”
“Yeah, what are you planning?” Charlotte lowered her shades and peered sternly out at her over the tops of the frames. “I do not want pig blood anywhere near my parents’ Persian rug, Sutton, so don’t even think about it.”
Emma tossed her hair with what she hoped was convincing hauteur. “Relax, Char, I’m not planning anything for the party. Except showing the rest of you up, that is.”
“That’s not a plan, that’s just your terrible personality,” Laurel teased.
Before Emma could come up with a retort, someone placed an icy hand on her shoulder. “Ladies,” said a cool female voice.
Emma yelped in surprise. Her balance swayed violently, and before she knew it she was on the ground splayed out next to the low wall, looking up at Nisha’s startled face.
Everyone burst into hysterics. Tears of mirth poured down Laurel’s face. Charlotte and Madeline were paralyzed with laughter, clutching their stomachs. Lili and Gabby had fallen into each other’s arms. Nisha was the one to lean down and help Emma to her feet. “Sorry,” she said, sounding mortified. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”
Emma’s face burned. “Don’t worry about it,” she said, trying to shrug it off. “I just … thought you were someone else, that’s all.”
Yeah, my murderer. But Emma needed to keep her wits about her. The killer could be watching her right now. Not to mention that she was making me look bad.
The others stopped laughing long enough to catch their breath, and Nisha stepped forward. “I just wanted to show you what I made,” she said, pulling a piece of paper out of her coral messenger bag and handing it to Emma. The others leaned in over her shoulders to see what it said.
Across the top of the flyer, twenty-point Gothic script read CONFERENCE OF THE DEAD. Below it was a clip-art picture of a tombstone.
“‘Penetrate the mysteries beyond the veil of the living,’” Charlotte read out loud. “‘Join us Sunday evening in Sabino Canyon as we call upon the spirits to reveal themselves. Masks and cloaks required for entrance.’” There was an e-mail address at the bottom for an RSVP. Charlotte grinned.
“Oh, that’s too perfect,” Madeline said. “She’s going to eat it up.”
“Who?” Gabby asked, staring at it.
“Celeste,” Charlotte said. “She’s our next victim.”
Lili looked confused. “That hippie chick? Since when?”
“Since she started seriously creeping me out,” Emma explained. “And Nisha is helping us. It was her idea.”
Gabby and Lili raised their eyebrows, but neither said a word. For once, their fingers were still hovering over their phone keypads.
Laurel pointed at the invite. “What’s with the masks?”
“That way she won’t recognize us and leave right away,” Nisha explained. “Plus, masks are scary, right? All part of the smoke and mirrors.”
“We’ll meet at Sutton and Laurel’s on Sunday to finalize everything,” Charlotte said, tossing her cup in the garbage and standing up.
“We’re doing it in Sabino Canyon?” Emma couldn’t keep a note of dismay out of her voice. The less she had to be at the scene of her sister’s murder, the better.
“It’s close to my house,” Nisha explained. “I thought that afterward we could order takeout and celebrate our success. If you guys want to, that is,” she added.
“Sabino is totally perfect,” Madeline said, squeezing Emma’s elbow. “It’s so spooky out there, it’ll be the perfect place for a séance. That freak is going to be sorry she ever tried to mess with you.”
Emma’s gaze traveled across the courtyard to where Celeste sat in a half-lotus pose. Today she was wearing hemp pants and knotted rope sandals, with a five-point Wiccan star on a chain around her neck. For a moment, Emma felt almost bad about the prank—Celeste reminded her of a weirder version of Erin Featherstone, a girl at her school in Henderson who was a devout Buddhist and cried whenever bugs died. But then Celeste looked up and met Emma’s gaze. A slow, dreamy smirk came to her lips, and her eyes narrowed dangerously. It didn’t matter what Emma thought, she realized—right now she was Sutton Mercer, and no one messed with Sutton.
She turned to the others. “Let’s do this.”
Damn right, I agreed.
Everyone got up and headed to Celeste’s locker, which was in the fine arts hall between the auditorium and the dance studio. They nominated Charlotte to shove the invitation through the ventilation slats, then ran behind a corner and waited breathlessly for Celeste to appear, choking back their laughter.
The cacophonous warm-up of the school orchestra crashed out from the music room down the hall. The smell of turpentine was pungent in the air. “She’s coming!” Laurel whispered, and they all craned their necks around the corner to watch.
Celeste drifted toward her locker. Even her walk was dreamy, as though she wasn’t entirely touching the ground. She swung open the locker door and the flyer fluttered out. Laurel bit down on her knuckles to stifle her giggles as Celeste leaned over to pick it up.
