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“I didn’t do it!” Laurel quickly protested. “Cross my heart and hope to die!”
Everyone quickly repeated the safe word. They looked uncertainly at one another.
“Okay,” said Charlotte, rolling her eyes. Her robe hung open, revealing a pink sequined camisole. “It’s obviously just Celeste.”
Madeline slapped her forehead. “Oh my God, you’re right.”
“But we heard her leave.” Emma frowned.
Charlotte raised an eyebrow. “Excuse me, are you new to this? She circled around somehow. There are trails all through here—it wouldn’t be hard. She’s just trying to make us think there’s some evil spirit on the loose.”
“I can’t believe she’s asking for seconds,” Laurel said.
“Just ignore her,” Charlotte said. “I’m so over that weirdo.”
The explanation seemed to be enough for the other girls. Nisha turned the music back up. The Twitter Twins replayed the whole séance on their new iPad, reading the comments that had already popped up on YouTube. “Spaceman77 says, ‘Who’s the babe in the satyr horns, she’s hawt!!’” Gabby turned to Emma, but Emma hardly noticed.
They were probably right—it must be Celeste, hoping to get back at them. But what if someone was hurt? The voice had sounded like it was crying. What if someone had gotten injured out in the woods?
Or … what if Becky had come back to the scene of the crime and taken another victim?
Emma imagined Sutton bleeding and running through the woods, trying to get away from Becky. What if someone had been in the clearing that night? What if someone could have helped her but had ignored her instead? Sutton could be alive now, at the fire with the rest of them. She couldn’t let Becky get away with it again.
She stood up and dusted off her butt. Out beyond the cheerful firelight the canyon was pitch-black. She peered up the trail in the direction she’d heard the crying.
“What are you doing?” Madeline asked, staring at her.
Emma glanced around at her friends. There was safety in numbers, in the clearing. But then she set her jaw in determination.
“I’m going to go prank Celeste back,” she said. “You guys stay here.”
“Wait, we want to come,” Gabby and Lili said, starting to stand up, but Emma held out a hand.
“I’m invoking Executive Diva privilege,” she announced, citing Sutton’s official Lying Game title. “You can hear about it later. I’ll give you an exclusive.” She tried to be lighthearted, but her heart was hammering. No matter how much she didn’t want to go out there alone, she would never be able to live with herself if she got one of her friends hurt.
“Okay, raise your hand if you don’t think it’s a brilliant idea for Sutton to go wandering in the woods by herself,” Laurel said, throwing her own hand in the air. Emma snorted.
“Whatever, guys,” she said, starting up the path with a flashlight.
“All right, but if you get murdered in the woods, I’m going to say I told you so,” Charlotte’s voice rang out behind her.
Touché, I thought.
The pale beam of the flashlight swept over the brush on either side, small bushes and cacti casting deep shadows. Emma stopped and listened for the sounds again. From farther away than before came another whimper, a rustle of leaves. She started jogging along the trail, trying to land softly on her feet so she could hear where the sound was coming from. A human groan echoed off the desert rocks. The trail led her higher up the mountain. She moved in silence for several minutes, until the bonfire glittered far below her, a tiny pinprick of light shining through the sparse trees.
Emma arrived at an overlook, with a park bench facing the neighborhood where Ethan and Nisha lived. She thought she could just make out Ethan’s porch light. Was he looking at the stars? She wished she could run all the way down the mountain and into his arms.
While Emma stared out over the city, I saw a figure step quietly out from the shadows. It was a gaunt woman, mascara and tears trickling down her cheeks. She watched Emma for a moment, chewing her lip. An old hospital bracelet still stuck to her wrist, as if she’d forgotten to cut it off.
Becky.
Emma’s back was to her. I couldn’t believe how silently our mother could move when she wanted to—just a moment ago she’d been crashing around through the underbrush, but there was nothing here to trip her up. She stepped toward Emma, eyes glued to her back.
A few pebbles dribbled down the side of the mountain from where Emma’s feet displaced them. It was a sheer drop to the next overhang, forty feet or more. Becky kept advancing, her eyes glowing strangely in the darkness, like a mountain lion’s.
“Emma!” I screamed, as loudly as I could.
Emma cocked her head. “Hello?” she whispered. The voice that had called her was so tiny, so faint it was almost like a breeze.
My knuckles clenched. She’d heard me. I was right—I was stronger here, for some reason.
“It’s Becky!” I shrieked, focusing every fiber of my ghostly being on the words. “She’s right behind you!”
“Sutton?” Emma breathed. But before I could answer, before Emma could make another move, a hand clamped on her arm. Emma’s body spun forcefully around so she was looking into Becky’s face.
And just like that, something snapped into place at the back of my mind. That familiar feeling came over me, of something unknown finally making sense, and a memory tugged me backward in time …
