Hanna’s stomach dropped. “Did she … die?” She braced herself for the answer. Or for Naomi to start screaming that she knew everything and wanted Hanna dead.
Naomi glanced at Hanna for a long moment, almost as though she were sizing her up. But before she could answer, the beginning notes of “California Gurls” boomed through the space, and the lyrics appeared on the screen behind the stage.
Naomi leapt up. “God, I’m such a buzzkill! C’mon. Let’s forget about this and have fun.”
They rushed up to the front and grabbed the microphones. But when Hanna opened her mouth to sing, her voice sounded unsteady and thin. She kept picturing Madison in a hospital bed, post-crash, one of those horrible masks on her face breathing for her. She pictured Naomi, Madison’s favorite cousin, sitting by her side, a blubbering mess. Finding out that someone else was to blame would drive anyone to revenge. But how was Naomi able to play it so cool right now?
She glanced over at Naomi now. Her eyes were clear, her tears gone, and she was singing gleefully into the microphone as though she’d put the pain behind her. As the peppy chorus began, a bunch of kids in the audience sang along. Naomi’s voice rose. She turned around and slapped her butt. Hanna couldn’t help but snicker.
Then Hanna threw her head back and sang louder, too. Her voice sounded good blended with Naomi’s. When she opened her eyes, Naomi grabbed her hands and spun her around. She flipped her skirt, and Hanna grabbed two glowsticks from a nearby table, pretending firecrackers were exploding from her boobs. The crowd cheered. When Hanna looked out at their faces, even Graham was smiling.
When the song ended, a bunch of guys sitting along the wall chanted, “En-core! En-core!”
“The public loves us!” Hanna giggled as they stepped off the stage.
“That’s because we’re awesome!” Naomi looped her arm through Hanna’s elbow. “We should perform that at the talent show, don’t you think?”
“Um, sure,” Hanna said, remembering her promise to Spencer and the others to do the hula with them. But it wasn’t like she could say no—not to the girl who was potentially A.
And then, as if on cue, when she got back to her seat, her cell phone light was blinking. There was a new text message.
Naomi’s head had turned and she was talking to Ursula Tippington, paying no attention. Hanna cast a glance at Naomi’s phone on the table beside her. All she had to do was reach over and grab it, but her limbs felt as if they were filled with sand. Swallowing hard, she opened her text.
Hanna Marin got in a crash
Moved a girl to cover her ass
Hanna Marin fled the scene
But someone saw it all—me.
—A
13
PEOPLE WHO FLOAT IN GLASS BOATS SHOULDN’T THROW STONES
“Welcome to Puerto Rico!” Jeremy boomed over the loudspeaker on Thursday morning. He said it with a flamboyant Spanish accent, rolling the rs.
Emily watched as a lot of kids waved scarves at the people on shore. An acoustic, dreamy version of “Over the Rainbow” tinkled over the loudspeakers, and everyone groaned. That same song had played when they’d pulled out of Newark, then the following morning at sea, then to summon them to dinner the night before. It was getting a little old.
She sat down on a bench, inhaling the humid air. Jordan had left her a note on her bedside table earlier, saying she was grabbing coffee but that Emily should meet her. When her phone rang, she expected to see Jordan’s name, but it was Hanna instead.
“I have Spencer and Aria on the phone, too,” Hanna said as soon as Emily answered. “I hung out with Naomi. She doesn’t seem to know that we were involved in Madison’s accident—but someone does. A sent me another note about it.”
“Did you find out if Madison died?” Emily asked, her heart stopping in her chest. Please say she didn’t, she thought. If someone else died because of her, she wasn’t sure how she could go on. But then, finding out that Madison hadn’t been just passed-out drunk, as they’d all thought, was enough of a mind game. How could she have fled the scene, leaving a hurt, innocent girl behind? Emily kept picturing the police reading her charges, the looks on her parents’ faces. Her mother would probably keel over dead—and that would be yet another death Emily was responsible for.
“I don’t know if she died yet,” Hanna admitted. “We were interrupted before I could get to that, and I felt weird pushing it.”
“You have to try to find out what happened, Hanna,” Aria urged. “If she did die, or if she was hurt, that makes a stronger case for Naomi being A.”
“I know, I know.” Hanna sounded distraught. Then she sighed. “But I’m confused. Naomi seems so poised and innocent. Could she be that good of an actress?”