The Lying Game #5: Cross My Heart, Hope to Die Read online

  Ethan was passing by the general store, squinting into the afternoon sun. Her knees weakened slightly as she took in his broad shoulders, muscular legs, and dark, piercing blue eyes. He wore a pair of camouflage cargo shorts and a black sweatshirt, and his dark hair had a cute tousled look that made her want to run her fingers through it. His shadow stretched out toward her in the sunset as he approached.

  “Reach for the sky, partner!” she said, jumping up and aiming her fingers at him like twin pistols.

  Eyes round with mock terror, Ethan lifted his hands, then quick-drew an imaginary gun from inside an imaginary coat. “Bang!” he said.

  She clutched her chest and staggered backward, sinking to her knees. Then, despite all of the drama that had unfurled that day, she started giggling. That was one of the things she liked most about Ethan—she could be herself with him, goofy Emma Paxton of Las Vegas, Nevada. The girl who wrote a secret newspaper about her life, who kept detailed lists of snarky comebacks she should have said to people who’d been rude to her, the girl who hadn’t known Marc Jacobs from Michael Kors before she stepped into Sutton’s shoes. Ethan didn’t judge her for any of that—he liked her just the way she was. No one had ever accepted her at face value before. Even back when she’d been herself, everyone had immediately made assumptions about her because she was a foster child.

  Ethan strode over to her bowlegged, like a cowboy, and drew her close. Their lips met in a brief kiss. Emma felt as though her body might melt.

  When they parted, she glanced around them. “I’ve never been on a movie set before.”

  Ethan turned around. “I keep forgetting you didn’t grow up here. We used to come to the studio on school trips all the time.” Ethan took her hand in his, and together they strolled down the dusty street. He pointed at the saloon, where a red-faced man with a beard was wiping down a bar covered in bottles of whiskey. “They built that for Rio Bravo. And they shot a bunch of Gunsmoke and Bonanza episodes out here in the sixties.”

  “On one of the signs out front it says Little House on the Prairie was filmed here,” Emma said. “I used to love that show.”

  Ethan looked surprised. “I didn’t take you for the Little House type.”

  Emma shrugged. “I watched reruns of it after school. I think I liked it because even though they were poor, the family was so loving and happy. Ma and Pa would do anything for their children.”

  Ethan glanced at her sideways. “And what do you think about the Mercers? Are they a good family like that?”

  Emma nodded slowly, knowing that Ethan was referring to her recent discovery that the Mercers were her family, for real. It was still unbelievable that Mr. and Mrs. Mercer were her grandparents—and Laurel her aunt. She felt grateful to have finally found them, but in some ways, it had made things even more complicated. The Mercers didn’t know they had two grandchildren. Nor did they know the granddaughter they’d raised as their own child was dead. What would they do if they found out? What would they say if they discovered Emma had been impersonating Sutton, that she had known Sutton was dead all this time?

  It was something I thought about a lot, too. I wanted my parents to embrace Emma, I really did. I wished that I could help explain everything to them. But lies can hurt, especially a lie this huge.

  “So.” Ethan took Emma’s hand, leading her to a bench across from a church. This part of the lot looked completely abandoned. “Why did you want to meet?”

  Emma took a deep breath. “I saw my mom earlier,” she admitted, biting the corner of her lip. “My real mom. Becky.”

  His eyebrows shot up. “Where?”

  “She drove past me. I tried to run after her, but she gunned it. I guess she didn’t want to talk.”

  Ethan turned Emma so that she was facing him. “Are you okay?”

  She shrugged, forcing a smile. “It’s not me she’s avoiding, right? It’s Sutton she doesn’t want to talk to.”

  Ethan scratched his chin. He opened his mouth like he was about to say something, and then closed it.

  “What?” Emma asked.

  He shook his head. “Nothing.”

  Emma cocked her head to one side. “Say it.”

  He took a deep breath. “Well, you said Becky was kind of … crazy, right?”

  Emma nodded slowly. She had told Ethan about how erratic her mother had seemed when Emma was just a little girl. Some days Becky would take Emma to the park, or let her have ice cream for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Other days she stayed in bed with the blinds drawn, crying into her pillow. The summer before she’d abandoned Emma, Becky had taped cardboard from cereal boxes all over the windows, certain that someone was watching them at night. Emma still cringed when she saw the Captain Crunch logo.

  Ethan scuffed the edge of one Chuck Taylor against the other. “Do you have the letter she left you at the diner?”

  Without speaking, Emma pulled Sutton’s wallet from the Madewell messenger bag over her shoulder and unfolded the note, wincing once more at Becky’s handwriting, which was familiar even after all these years. It didn’t say much; just I wish things had gone differently that night in the canyon, and some vague advice for Sutton not to make the same mistakes she had. Emma wished it had said more.

  I did, too. It was the first note my mother ever wrote to me. I wished it said how much she loved me, how much she regretted the decision to give me up.

  Emma held it out to Ethan, who studied it intensely. Finally, he looked up and handed the note back to her. “Have you noticed that this isn’t addressed to Sutton?” He turned it over. “Not on the front. Not in the greeting. Not anywhere.”

  “So?” Emma asked.

  “What if that letter was written to you? What if she knows you’re not Sutton?”

  Emma’s body went rigid. “The only person who knows that is the murderer.”

  Ethan’s expression didn’t change. Emma shook her head. “Becky’s unstable, but she’s no murderer. She sent me on treasure hunts all over our apartment complex. She helped me paint big colorful murals on the walls of one of my bedrooms. She’s my mom.”

  But even as the words spilled from Emma’s mouth, a different type of woman came to mind. Manic Becky. Mad Becky. She pulled out Jane Eyre and looked at the cover. It was the same edition she’d had when she’d first read the book, back in Nevada when she was twelve. On the cover was the twisted face of the madwoman Mr. Rochester hid in his attic: her eyes scrunched shut, her face pale, her mouth open in a scream. The image was an archetype of mental illness. Emma remembered how she used to look at that face and shiver with fear—but also something else, something she couldn’t quite put her finger on. Now she understood what it was: recognition. Bertha Mason’s face reminded her of her mother.

  She shut her eyes, pushing away the memories. Her mom had been under a lot of stress. It didn’t make her a murderer. What motive would she have for killing Sutton?

  I hoped Emma was right. I’d dreamed of meeting my birth mom since I was a little girl. The idea that she could have wanted me dead left me with a deep, hollow ache. I fumbled again at the elusive memory—had I met Becky? Had something happened between us? But it remained maddeningly out of reach.

  “Forget I mentioned it,” Ethan said quickly. He pulled Emma tight to his chest. She just stood there, shell-shocked. “Emma, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to freak you out. I don’t know anything about your mom. It’s a stupid idea.”

  She buried her face in his sweatshirt, listening to the thud of his heart as the sunset blazed bright pink over the mountains. She hadn’t wanted to admit it to herself before, but Becky had looked deranged as she drove past the café. She was suddenly glad it had been Thayer with her and not Ethan. If Ethan had seen her, she couldn’t have denied the possibility that Becky could be dangerous.

  “Can I ask you something?” he asked, his fingers playing lightly with her hair.

  “Anything.”

  “Do you think you’ll get to stay here? You know, after Sutton’s case i
s solved?”

  Emma paused. It was something she’d fantasized about since the first moment she’d discovered that she had a twin. She had never fit in anywhere before—even her best and most well-intentioned foster parents had never made her feel like part of a family. Now she had the loving family she’d always dreamed of … but would all that change when they found out how many lies she’d told?

  “I hope they’ll understand why I did this, when it’s all said and done,” she said quietly. “I’d hate to leave them.”

  “I’ve been thinking.” Ethan sounded almost shy. “We’re both eighteen. Other than finishing up school, we’re free to do whatever we want. So if for some reason your living situation with the Mercers doesn’t work out, we could … I mean, maybe we could get a place.”

  She blinked. His cheeks burned scarlet even in the dark. For a moment she wasn’t sure she’d understood him.

  “Together,” he added. “As a backup plan, I mean. I don’t want to rush you into anything. But it’s not like my mom would really miss me.” A sad look came over his face, then he met her eyes again. “And Emma, I couldn’t stand it if you left. If I lost you.”

  Emma smiled bashfully. She wasn’t sure she was ready to move in with anyone, but the fact that he’d been thinking about their future together brought a warm glow to her heart. She traced the contour of his cheek with one finger, then leaned up and pressed her lips to his.

  The world glittered behind her closed eyelids. She wound her fingers into his thick hair and pulled him closer. His breath made her skin hum with excitement. She had never realized how much she longed to be touched by someone who truly cared about her. She had never realized how little she had been touched at all. Now that Ethan was in her life, she sometimes felt as if the only thing keeping her grounded was the promise of another kiss.

  I knew the feeling. Thayer used to have that effect on me.

  A rustling came from the weeds behind the church steps. Emma looked up. “What was that?”

  Ethan tilted his head. “What was what?”

  Emma stared at the church’s facade, and then strode across the dry street to look around it. Nothing. The desert stretched out beyond, empty except for a few scattered cacti. If someone had been spying, he’d slipped away.

  Ethan put an arm around her shoulder and squinted into the sunset. But it no longer seemed beautiful to Emma. Somewhere out there, a killer was watching her every move. Somewhere her sister’s body lay undiscovered, unmourned.

  She turned to Ethan. “I’m pretty wiped out. We’d better get home and rest up for the big flag football game tomorrow.” She reached for his hand. “You’re still coming, right?”

  “I wouldn’t miss it,” Ethan promised. The sand crunched beneath their feet as they walked past the busy part of the town, where tourists were buying handkerchiefs and Stetsons.

  Sutton’s Volvo was at the far end of the parking lot, but Emma spied the note folded under her windshield wiper immediately. Her heart seized in her chest. She ran for the note and snatched it off the glass. The muscles in Ethan’s face were taut as she unfolded the note.

  “Oh my God.” Emma gasped, looking around the empty desert. The message was in the same familiar handwriting that had greeted her on her first morning in Tucson, the same scrawl that had announced her sister was dead, and she had to play along or she’d be next.

  You should thank me. Before you came here you had nothing. Now you have everything you want. Just don’t slip up. Sutton thought she could have everything she wanted, too.

  For once, Emma and I were thinking the exact same thing: Those footsteps by the church had been real. My killer was still watching Emma’s every move.

  3

  THE FACE THAT LAUNCHED A THOUSAND FISTS

  “These shirts are so lame,” Laurel whined, pulling at the collar of her blue cotton tee. “Why couldn’t they have gotten American Apparel instead of Hanes Beefy-Ts?”

  It was a beautiful Sunday afternoon, and Emma, Sutton’s friends, and the Mercer family were gathered in Saguaro National Park for the annual Hollier High Parent-Student Football Fun Fest—that was what the banner arching over their heads called it, anyway. An artificially green swath of grass splayed out before them, and a bunch of families flipped burgers on the public barbecues and loaded plates with potato salad and watermelon slices. Little kids tumbled across the freshly chalked lines of the football field, playing freeze tag. Mr. Mercer tossed a U-of-A-branded football in the air, seeming pumped for the flag football game that was about to begin.

  Emma laughed, tucking her own red shirt into Sutton’s mesh Adidas shorts. “It’s a fund-raiser. I’m sure the shirts were donated.”

  Charlotte Chamberlain rolled her eyes. “My mom does plenty of fund-raisers. Everyone knows if you want to get big money, you have to spend big money. Last year she held a raffle for a vintage Chanel coat and got three times what it was worth.”

  “What was the charity?” asked Madeline Vega, another one of Sutton’s friends, who was tall and lithe next to Charlotte’s short and curvy frame.

  Charlotte shrugged, pulling her reddish curls into a ponytail. “Does it matter?”

  There was shuffling and giggling behind them, and the girls turned. The Twitter Twins, Gabriella and Lilianna Fiorello, twirled over. They’d come dressed in short cheerleader outfits—Lili in black and red, with giant safety pins pierced through the skirt, and Gabby in sky blue and white, her blond hair in a high ponytail. Both of them carried sparkly pompoms and made a lot of noise when they shook them.

  “Oh my God, what are you guys wearing?” Madeline snickered.

  “It’s ironic, duh,” Gabby trilled, lifting a pompom high in the air.

  Emma smiled at all of them. These were Sutton’s friends, but she’d begun to think of them as her friends, too. Aside from Alex, her best friend from Henderson, she’d never been close to any girls, let alone a whole group of them. It was a nice feeling, even if she couldn’t talk to them about her actual problems.

  I wasn’t sure I had talked to my friends about my serious problems either. We loved each other with a fierce loyalty, but we weren’t the best at saying it. I think we were all so focused on maintaining our fabulous images that we forgot they weren’t always real.

  Emma pulled her hair into a knot and did some deep knee bends to stretch. Her legs still ached from chasing Becky’s car, but she’d gotten a lot stronger while pretending to be Sutton—she’d had tennis practice almost every day.

  “Oh my God, Sutton, are you actually playing this year?” Madeline asked, incredulous.

  “I thought I’d try something new,” Emma said lightly. Though football clearly hadn’t been Sutton’s thing, she was actually looking forward to this game. The closest thing to a family outing she’d ever had in foster care was a trip to the recycling center to turn in soda cans. She loved that the Mercers had annual traditions like this. Plus, it was just the kind of distraction she needed after the panic of receiving another note from Sutton’s murderer.

  “But you always complain about how much you hate grass stains and that Dad’s end-zone shuffle makes you want to die of embarrassment,” Laurel said cautiously.

  Emma elbowed Laurel, grinning. “Scared I’ll beat you, little sis?”

  “You wish.” Laurel laughed. “Bring it on!”

  Emma surveyed the field. Besides Sutton’s friends, plenty of other kids from Hollier were gathered to play. Emma waved at Nisha Banerjee, who sipped an iced tea under the awning, and Nisha gave her a friendly wave back. Nisha and Sutton had been rivals, both on the tennis court and off, but Emma had recently forged a tentative friendship with her. Sutton’s ex-boyfriend Garrett Austin was here, too, sharing a hot dog with his younger sister, a sophomore with Buddy Holly glasses and purple hair. Emma avoided catching his eye—she’d broken his heart after he’d offered his willing body to her on her birthday.

  Charlotte grabbed her by the elbow. “Don’t look now, but you have an admirer.”
r />   Emma glanced around, looking for Ethan, but it was Thayer whose eyes she met. He stood in a group of guys across the field. The other boys were punching each other on the arm and horsing around, but Thayer just stared at Emma. When she caught his eye, he grinned bashfully and looked down.

  He meant that look for me, I repeated to myself, but knowing it didn’t make it any easier to watch.

  “Here we go again,” Madeline groaned.

  “What?” Emma turned to her friends. They were all watching her with varying degrees of skepticism on their faces. She swallowed nervously. It wasn’t that hard to guess what they were thinking—that something was going on between her and Thayer. Ever since he’d returned to Tucson, things between Emma and Sutton’s friends had been a bit tense. Charlotte hated the fact that Sutton always seemed to get all the guys—which Sutton hadn’t exactly helped when she’d stolen Garrett from Charlotte several months ago. Madeline didn’t think Sutton was good for Thayer, who was recovering from his alcohol addiction. And as for Laurel, she and Thayer had been best friends for a long time. She’d always had a crush on him, which had made it especially humiliating when Sutton decided to go for him. Emma could only imagine how upset Laurel had been when she found out Thayer was meeting her sister in secret the whole time he was supposedly missing.

  “You guys, it’s not like that!” Emma said, hoping to avoid what was clearly a touchy subject. “Thayer and I are just friends.”

  “Oh yeah?” Charlotte looked across the field at Thayer, whose eyes were still locked on Emma. “That’s a friendly look he’s sending you.”

  Emma felt her face getting warm. Fending off boys was a new experience for her. She’d never stayed in one school long enough to connect with any would-be boyfriends. She leaned over to retie her shoelaces, trying to ignore Charlotte’s accusing glance.

  When she straightened, she noticed another familiar figure on the other side of the field, and her heart lifted. She waved at Ethan, but he didn’t seem to see her. Then she caught his expression. He was watching Thayer with fire in his eyes. Emma recoiled. She knew he was jealous of Thayer, but she had never seen him look so venomous before.