Page 66 of Dead Girls Can't Tell Secrets

“Hey, guys.”

I startle, my sneaker sending a rock skidding toward Grant’s foot. Alexandra skirts the corner of the tent, her pink notebook tucked beneath one arm. She smiles brightly until she takes in the tableau: Jacey, Grant, and me. Not the prettiest picture any way you try to paint it.

Jacey smiles back, extra wide, and tugs at the neck of her pullover. “Hey, Alexandra. What’s up?”

“Mr. Davis is wondering why this tent is still standing. He’s antsy to head back down.”

“I’m on it,” Grant says, looking relieved to get off the topic of Piper.

I watch him as he bends over, yanking the last stake from the earth. Alexandra mouths,What’s going on?I tip my head toward the woods and motion for her and Jacey to follow me.

I proceed to fill Alexandra in on Grant’s version of events as she jots things down in her notebook. When I finish, she looks up at me, biting her lip. “It fits. Piper was following the story, and it led her to Sam.”

“One thing doesn’t fit,” I counter. “In what universe would Piper approach a drug dealer, expecting him to spill?”

Alexandra shrugs, shutting the notebook. “She was desperate after what happened with the chemistry tests. She decided to throw herself into this story despite the risks. Maybe she thought getting a statement from Sam on the record would seal everything.”

“I don’t know.” I run my tongue along my gums, feeling the grit on my teeth. “I can’t picture it.”

“Maybe it wasn’t Sam she spoke to,” Jacey offers. “Maybe she tried to get info from Abby. They were close, remember? And Abby didn’t hesitate to throw me under the bus when Savannah questioned her. Maybe she was trying to get everyone to look at me instead of at her and her boyfriend.”

Ah, Abby the walking musical. She certainly seems like the more approachable of the pair.

“So, they could’ve done something to Piper together,” Alexandra says. She scribbles away in her notebook, teeth clamped on to her lower lip.

“It’s a possibility,” Jacey says.

I scratch at my hairline, scalp itchy now beneath the hood. “What do we do?”

Alexandra caps her pen. “We should try to find his phone so we can prove there’s a connection between him and some of the soccer guys. And maybe we can track his activity if we see his texts from the day Piper fell.”

“What if he wiped his texts from that day?” I ask.

“Then I would find that extremely suspicious, and I think the cops would too.”

“How do we get his phone?” It won’t be lying around. Pretty much everyone’s wearing their packs, ready to hike back down.

“We should create a situation,” Jacey says. “Something to distract Sam and Abby.”

“Hmm, and what would distract our friendly neighborhood drug-dealing murderers?” I attempt to finger comb my hair, wincing when it snags on a broken nail.

A tangle of mischief and pride lights Jacey’s eyes. “I think I have an idea.”

After the way she totally screwed me over with her last plan, I naturally say, “Fine.”

Chapter 27

We all get into position. I’m by the fire ring, resting the way I should’ve been this entire time.

I know I’ve kept secrets—especially where Piper is concerned—but I never imagined Grant was hiding things from me about the day she fell. I was so worried he’d find out about the grading scam; turns out he’s just as duplicitous as I am. He helped his team cheat, and he lied about the day of Piper’s accident.

And then there’s whatever happened when he backed me into the tent. That look in his eyes—everything familiar and gentle leeched from them, replaced by something unknown. Something savage. A shiver racks my body despite the warming weather. Whoever Grant really is, I sacrificed everything to be with him at Mount Liberty next year.

And now I’m not sure I can ever feel safe in his arms again.

I dig my fingers into my pocket, checking that the necklace is still coiled inside. Then I glance down at the ash in the fire ring, not knowing what to hope for but feeling like if I don’t find something, I’ll collapse into the dirt and never get up again. I’m on my way back to parents who will always resent me for being the one still here, with a boyfriend I no longer trust.

So I stare at the ashes, wishing for answers. Wishing for a home that doesn’t exist. Wishing for Piper.

---