Page 71 of The Game Is Afoot

I’m safely three blocks away when my heart slows down enough for me to process the call I missed. Knoll. Why would Pearl’s school be calling me? She has theater class after school today, right? Yes, Iknowshe does, because we had a whole long talk about not announcing the mystery I solved to the whole cast ofAnnie. So it’s not even time for her to be picked up yet. Plus, it’s Corey’s day, anyway—that’s why I made plans with Jack this evening.

My stomach drops as my mind immediately jumps to all of the reasons why they could be calling me, things that could have gone wrong. But my phone starts ringing again, and I pull over, picking it up just before it goes to voice mail again.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Ms. Miller.” I recognize Ms. Lilliam’s perpetually annoyed voice. “You need to come pick up Pearl.”

“Did something happen? Is she okay?”

“Oh yeah, she’s fine. But Mr. Forest isn’t.” Ms. Lilliam makes a noise that I can’t identify. If I didn’t know better, I would think it was a giggle—but there’s no way Ms. Lilliam has ever giggled in her life. “He had to leave early. It was a code brown.”

“A code brown? Oh my god!” I don’t know what that means, but code anything sounds bad. I need to get there, immediately, and call Corey after. “I’m on my way—”

“He’s dropping Yule logs down the chimney, if you knowwhat I mean.” She makes that noise again, and okay, I do know whatthatmeans…but I wish I didn’t.

“Ms. Lilliam—”

“He’s stocking the lake with the brown trout.”

“I—”

“He’s birthing a behind baby.”

“I’m going to hang up now.”

I hear Ms. Lilliam giggling—unmistakably, uncontrollably—before she hangs up on me herself.

I’m about to pull out onto the road again when I remember the text that came through. Was that Lilliam, too? But as I click into my messages, I see it’s not from the school, or anyone else I know. The text is from a number I don’t recognize, with an area code that’s not Beachwood’s. My heart speeds up again as I read it.

YOU BETTER STOP—OR ELSE

Twenty

“It’s from Bethany. It hasto be!”

Jack and I are on the couch, eating the sushi takeout he brought over for dinner. But I’m still so keyed up, like I drank one of Cole’s energy drinks, that I can’t stop to get a full bite. Polly inches closer to claim the rolls for herself each minute I leave them unattended.

“I saw her text someone from a burner phone right then. And it ends the same way as the one Cole got, too, so it basically proves she also sent that one.”

“What I’m still not following,” Jack says, setting his chopsticks down, while Polly circles around the coffee table to sniff them, “is how you know it was a burner. Maybe she just has an old phone?”

“Because her iPhone was in her purse. It was definitely a burner.”

Jack rubs the side of his jaw and squints at me. “Mavis…how do you know what was in her purse?”

“Hmm?” I pick up my giant water bottle and take aconvenient, long swig, avoiding Jack’s stare. “Anyway, it wasn’t even a good threat. It was very vague. Like, how am I supposed to knowwhatto stop? She really should have given me more explicit directions.”

“Um, let’s pause this critique of her threat and go back to the purse? Did she see you? Because—”

“No, I don’t think so. But if I hadn’t got that call about Mr. Forest getting the runs and had to go pick up Pearl early—”

Jack laughs, despite the concern rippling across his face. “He is not livingthatdown in the teachers’ lounge anytime soon.” He shakes his head. “Okay, but again, the purse. I really feel like we need to go back to the purse.”

“If I hadn’t gotten the call, if I had read the text right then—I think I could have confronted her. Then I would have proof that she sent it.”

Jack laughs again, but it quickly dies when he realizes I’m not joining. “No, Mavis, you wouldn’t! Because that isn’t safe. You need to tell Detective De La Rosa all of this. Why don’t we call him now? You have plenty to pass on.”

I’m shaking my head before he even finishes his sentence. “He won’t believe me. And she probably has gotten rid of it already—I doubt this was even the same phone she sent Cole a text on. She’s a professional, clearly. I needmore.”

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