Killer. (Book Six)

Twenty-Nine: They Were All So Wrong.

It was 9 P.M., and Spencer had been rereading the same paragraph in The House of Mirth for an hour and a half. Lily Bart, the scrappy, eager New Yorker, was trying to make her way in high society at the turn of the twentieth century. Like Spencer, all Lily wanted was to find a way to escape from her dreary, uncertain life, but also like Spencer, Lily was getting nowhere fast. Spencer kept waiting for the part in the book where Lily finds out she's adopted, gets scammed by a wealthy woman claiming to be her mother, and loses the money in her dowry.

She laid the book down and gazed drearily around the barn apartment, which she'd retreated to as soon as she'd returned from New York. The fuchsia accent pillows splayed across the almond-colored couch looked washed-out and drab. The few bites of Asiago cheese Spencer had found in the fridge and eaten and eaten over the sink for dinner tasted like dust. In the shower, the water hadn't felt hot or cold, just lukewarm. All of Spencer's senses had been ripped away. The world was murky and joyless.

How could she have been so stupid? Andrew had warned her. All the signs that Olivia was scamming her were there. When she'd visited, Olivia hadn't let them stop in the apartment, not even for a minute. And Olivia had struggled with that big file folder, conveniently forgetting it when she boarded the helicopter. She'd probably snickered once she was airborne, knowing exactly what Spencer would do. And to think Spencer had looked into Olivia's eyes and thought they looked alike! She'd hugged Olivia tight before she left, finally feeling like she was connecting with a member of her family! Olivia probably wasn't even her real name. And Morgan Frick, Olivia's so-called husband, was definitely a fake. How could she have missed that? Morgan Frick was just the names of two New York museums sloppily shoved together.

The barn creaked and buckled. Spencer flipped on the TV. There were tons of shows in her sister's TiVo, not yet watched. Earlier this evening, Spencer had heard a woman from the Fermata spa leaving a message on Melissa's machine, saying Melissa had missed her appointment for an oxygen facial today, and did she want to reschedule. Why had her sister left in such a hurry? Had that been Melissa in the woods yesterday, searching for something?

Spencer turned the TV off again, not interested. Her gaze wandered to Melissa's bookshelves. They were piled with old textbooks from high school, among them the book she'd used for AP econ. Next to those was a leaf green Kate Spade boot box marked High School Notes. Spencer mustered up a small, sarcastic snort. Notes, as in the kind you passed back and forth in class? Prissy Melissa didn't seem the type.

She pulled out the boot box and opened the lid. A blue spiral-bound notebook that said Calculus was on top. Melissa must have meant notebooks. There were smiley faces on the cover, and Melissa's name and Ian's name doodled over the over in flowery cursive. Spencer opened the notebook to the first page. It was filled with math problems, diagrams, and proofs. Boring, Spencer thought.

On the next page, a shock of green ink caught her eye. There were notes in the margin written in two different-colored inks. It looked like a conversation between two people, passed back and forth from desk to desk. Spencer recognized Melissa's handwriting in black, and someone else's in green.

Guess who I made out with at the party last weekend? said the first message in Melissa's telltale scrawl. Below that was a bubbly, green question mark. JD, was Melissa's answer. Then came a green exclamation point. And then, Naughty, naughty! That boy is so in love with you...

Spencer held the page inches from her face, as if studying it closely would make it clear. JD? Her brain scrambled for a logical answer. Could that stand for Jason DiLaurentis? The day they tried to steal Ali's flag and Jason had stormed out of his house, he'd glowered at Melissa and Ian in Spencer's backyard. He'll get over it, Melissa had murmured to Ian later. Could Jason have been jealous that Melissa was dating Ian? Could he have secretly been in love with her?