Rubens shook his head. “She left before they could attach her monitor.”
Spencer ran her hand over her hair. Aria had had the same idea she did—except she’d followed through on it. It was a brilliant plan, maybe one that Spencer should have thought of. Brilliant, but reckless. Escaping to Europe without taking the proper steps to disappear seemed really foolhardy. Aria was going to get in major trouble. She wondered, too, if this was why her account was frozen. The authorities thought—with good reason—that she was going to do the same thing.
She glanced at Hanna, and Hanna met her eyes for a second. Spencer considered saying something to break the ice. This was way bigger than their stupid fight, after all. She wondered, too, if Hanna had seen the Ali Cats outside.
But then she had a thought and turned to Rubens. “Will the jury judge us because of this?”
Rubens made a face. “Well, it doesn’t exactly look good for the two of you. One of you commits suicide, the other flees to Europe? That’s not exactly innocent-person behavior.”
Spencer closed her eyes. That was what she’d feared he’d say.
Rubens leaned in. “We’re going to continue with the hearing anyway. Aria will be tried in absentia. The police are going to want to question you girls about it after court adjourns today, though.”
Spencer wrinkled her nose. “I didn’t have anything to do with Aria’s escape.”
“Me neither,” Hanna piped up.
“You all took off to New Jersey together. You’re her number-one accomplices. Just tell them the truth, and there won’t be any trouble.”
The judge banged his gavel and called the lawyers to his bench. After some talk, Seth and the DA introduced themselves to the jury, and then it was time for opening statements. Spencer’s heart pounded. It was happening. Their trial for murder was about to start.
The prosecution went first. Dressed in a pinstriped suit and expensive-looking loafers, his hair slicked back from his face and his skin oddly tanned, Brice Reginald, the District Attorney, sidled up to the jury box and gave each of the jurors a smile Spencer could only describe as icky. “We all know about Alison DiLaurentis,” he began. “It’s hard not to, isn’t it? Pretty girl goes missing, on the cover of People magazine, captivates the country’s attention . . . and then we find out her mentally unstable twin—the real Alison—killed her. Or . . . did she?” He looked at the jurors, his eyes dramatically wide. “Was Alison Courtney’s killer? Was she really the monster people think she is? Or was she an innocent victim, first played by her manipulative and unstable boyfriend, Nicholas, and then tormented by the four young women who were her sister’s best friends?”
At this point, his attention turned to Spencer and Hanna. Naturally, the jury stared at them, too. Spencer put her head down, feeling even her scalp burn. Never had she felt quite so shamed.
“What is real in this case, and what is made up?” the lawyer went on. “Who is playing for sympathy, and who is the true victim? Over the next few days, I am going to tell you who Alison really was. A girl who was sent to a mental hospital by concerned parents . . . but who was browbeaten there. A girl who escaped from a hellish situation only to fall in with a young man who forced her to abet in murder after murder, and who escaped from him only to fall prey to four girls who wanted revenge at any cost. And I’m going to tell you about four girls from Rosewood who had a vendetta they wanted to settle. On the surface, they seem like sweet teenagers who were at the wrong place at the wrong time. But if we dig deeper, this is who they really are.”
He turned to a TV screen by the judge’s bench and pressed PLAY on the DVD player. A surveillance tape appeared. It was the feed they’d set up to watch the pool house—Spencer recognized the rickety front porch and spidery tree branch. There, on the screen, was Emily, whirling around the room, smashing various things to pieces.
Her stomach clenched. It was heartbreaking to see Emily alive again, whole and real and also . . . crazy. Emily’s eyes were wild as she wheeled about the space. Her nostrils flared, and she actually growled. And at the end of her rampage, she looked straight into the surveillance camera, teeth bared. “I will never love you! Never, ever! And I will kill you! You will pay for this!”