Page 32 of Dead Girls Can't Tell Secrets

She doesn’t answer, only stands there, brown eyes glinting.

“Come on, Jace,” Noah pleads. “You can’t honestly think I would threaten anyone.”

For a moment, she looks up at him with an expression that starts as a question but morphs into stunned anguish. Then she strides toward me, ducking through the tent opening.

I exhale, throwing Noah one last warning look before following her inside.

I zip the door shut, turning to find Jacey sitting in the corner, knees pulled up to her chest. “He didn’t do this,” she says, but she isn’t looking at me.

“The evidence says otherwise.”

“I shouldn’t have just left him like that. He wouldn’t do this. I know him—weknow him, Savannah.”

I wish I could agree with her. But if I’m any indication, you never really know people the way you think you do.

At this thought, a horrible sensation grabs hold of me. It’s like the tent walls have blown down, leaving me exposed to the elements. Like there’s no ground beneath me. I’m just floating out here on my own.

I reach for my sleeping bag to try to cover myself, but my mind slips back to my bedroom.

To that day.

I’d locked my bedroom door behind me, tugged on my headphones, turned on music, and buried myself beneath the covers. But even in my own private space, an exposed feeling wrapped around me. Everyone would see through this. Through me.

Piper had been called to Mr. Davis’s office. I’d heard her name crackle over the loudspeaker and watched her walk over there, confusion etched on her forehead. Then I left her. Took the car and drove home without her. I panicked. Like a criminal.

I knew that as soon as she told Mr. Davis what happened, he’d believe she had nothing to do with changing the grades. Even if he doubted her story, Piper could just tell my parents the truth. They’d never let their precious gifted one go down for it.

My eyes were wide open in the suffocating midday darkness of my room. The music pulsed, each note unnerving. I kept envisioning the disappointed looks on my parents’ faces when they learned the truth. That not only was I going to be expelled, but I’d also nearly taken Piper down with me.

Excuses tumbled around in my head, but they didn’t land. Just spun into oblivion.

A thump resounded over the music, and I jolted upright. More thumping. I peeled the headphones away from one ear. Someone was knocking on the door. I willed the noise to stop, for whoever it was to go away. When they didn’t, I turned off the music and pried myself out of bed.

I cracked the door open enough to spot a few strands of frizzy blond hair before it swung open all the way, knocking me backward.

Piper burst into the room, her pink complexion flushed a deep crimson. “Thanks for stranding me at school!” she snarled. “I had to walk all the way here!”

“I was going to come back for you,” I lied. “Why are you home early?”

“Could ask you the same thing, but I’ll settle for letting you know that I’m suspended.”

“What are you talking about?” I aimed for the apathetic tone I always used when Piper got too passionate about something. Then I collapsed back onto the bed and browsed through my phone.

“You know exactly what I’m talking about.” She leaned over me, snatching my phone away.

“Hey!” I took a deep breath. Let it out slowly. “You can’t be suspended. Tell me what happened.” My stomach rioted as I patted the spot on the bed beside me.

Piper’s eyes narrowed, and her lips pinched. “You’re really going to pretend like you didn’t have anything to do with the chemistry grades?”

I gave her my best incredulous look. “What do you mean?”

“Mr. Davis says there’s anissuewith last week’s test scores.” Little drops of spittle bubbled in the corners of her mouth, like she was a rabid animal. “For a handful of kids, the numbers in the grading program don’t match the tests. When he asked Lucy Dawes if she knew anything about it, she started crying. She said theTAoffered to bump her grade for a hundred bucks.”

My clueless expression faltered. Something flickered in Piper’s seething glare.

I’d expected her to be angry. But as she stood over me, her face wilting and her head dropping, I recognized that flicker. It was worse than the way she’d looked at age seven, when she’d found our guinea pig lying still at the bottom of the cage.

It was gutting. Despite our differences, I was her sister—herbigsister. She’d never anticipated this level of betrayal.

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