Get Dirty (3 page)

Olivia gasped and rushed over to one of the computers. “Oh my God! We have to unsend that email.”

“Email?” Ed asked.

Kitty ran her fingers through her hair. “We sent an anonymous email to Sergeant Callahan with all our evidence against Christopher Beeman.”

Ed whistled low. “Yeah, they’re going to delete that in about ten seconds.”

“I don’t understand,” Olivia said. She took the death report from Kitty’s hand and looked through it again. “All the clues, the missing yearbook photos, the deaths—everything pointed to Christopher Beeman.”

“Someone wanted you to believe you were dealing with
Christopher,” Ed said simply. “Pretty epic snow job if you ask me.”

“What are we going to do?” Olivia asked.

“Stay calm,” Kitty said, sounding anything but. “The killer doesn’t know we found out about this.”

Olivia bit her lip. “Okay . . .”

“So while he lays low, thinking this is all over, we go back and look at our suspects again,” Kitty explained.

“Yeah,” Ed snorted. “Beat that dead horse.”

Kitty narrowed her eyes. “You have a better idea?”

“Actually, yes.” Ed threaded his fingers together and rested them on his knee. “Aren’t you guys missing the most obvious suspects of all?”

Olivia cocked her pretty head. “I don’t get it.”

Ed smiled at her. “I know.”

“Spit it out, Ed,” Kitty snapped.

These girls had no imagination. “Did you ever think that maybe your DGM exploits are coming back to haunt you?”

“You think one of our DGM targets is behind this,” Kitty said, catching on. Better late than never.

“They do kinda have a reason to hate you,” Ed said. “Like a lot.”

“But why would one of them kill Ronny?” Kitty asked. “Or Coach Creed?”

“At least Christopher had a reason,” Olivia said.

Ed snapped his fingers in front of Olivia’s face. “Wake up! Unless he’s a vengeful spirit hunting down his tormentors, he didn’t kill anyone.”

Olivia’s brow clouded. “I guess.”

You guess?
“But what if someone was trying to frame you by going after other DGM targets?” Ed leaned back. “Creed and the Ronster were the most recent.”

Kitty sighed. “It’s worth looking into.” She pointed at the nearest computer. “Ed, I need your Google-fu.”

Ed swung around and poised his fingers over the keyboard. “Ready.”

“Let’s start with DGM’s first target,” Kitty said. “Wendy Marshall.”

Ed got a hit right away. “Senior at St. Francis High School. Updated her Twitter feed this morning.”

“That’s practically down the street,” Olivia said.

Kitty pulled a sheet of paper from the printer and scribbled down Wendy’s name. “Now look for Christina Huang.”

Again, Ed got a result within seconds. “Looks like her parents shipped her back east to Choate.”

“Still alive?” Olivia asked.

Ed shrugged. “If you can call Choate Rosemary Hall alive.”

“Okay,” Kitty said. “But she lives like four thousand miles away. Probably not our killer.”

“Try Xavier Hathaway,” Olivia suggested.

“That douche who used to stick my head in a toilet and flush it freshman year?” Ed asked.

Olivia nodded. “They didn’t call him the Swirlie King for nothing.”

Xavier didn’t have a Facebook page, so it took Ed longer to
find a reference. The result, however, was unexpectedly gratifying. “Looks like he works for the Hayward Department of Sanitation.” He looked up, smiling broadly. “That is the best thing I’ve ever heard.”

“And he might be a killer,” Kitty added. She clearly didn’t appreciate the irony of Xavier’s craptastic job.

“Coach Creed and Ronny are dead, so that leaves three more,” Olivia said, counting them off on her fingers. “The Gertler twins, Melissa Barndorfer, and Tammi Barnes.”

Ed cocked an eyebrow. “That’s four.”

“Just look them up!” Kitty cried.

“Fine.” Ed quickly sought online references to DGM targets three through six. “The Gertlers work at a surf shop in Mountain View, and according to Melissa’s Facebook page, she’s in Prague with some Eurotrash boyfriend.”

“And Tammi?” Olivia asked.

“Working on it.” Ed typed furiously, cycling through all of his stalkery internet go-tos. One by one, they all came up blank. He slumped back in his chair. “I can’t find any current info on her.”

“Nothing?” Kitty asked.

“That’s what I said.”

“Okay.” Kitty glanced at her watch. “We’ll look into it later.” She held up her list of suspects. “Wendy, Xavier, Maxwell and Maven Gertler, and Tammi Barnes. Plus person or persons unknown, connected to Christopher Beeman. All of them are possible suspects.”

Olivia threw her arms wide in despair. “We’re never going to figure this out. Bree’s going to rot in jail. She’ll shave off all her hair, take over a prison gang, and start calling herself Bitchslap.”

Ed smirked. “That sounds like a great porno.”

“Look,” Kitty said, grabbing Olivia by the shoulders. “We can’t panic and we can’t give up. We have to keep fighting for Margot and Bree.”

“How?”

“We start with this list. Initiate contact, see what we can learn,” Kitty said.

Olivia sniffled. “Okay.”

“And don’t forget Amber and Rex,” Kitty added. “We still don’t know what they were doing in Ronny’s room the night he died.”

Olivia nodded, her lips pressed together as if she was trying to steel herself against an unpleasant task. “I’ll try.”

“And I,” Ed the Head said with a flourish of his arm, “will look into Christopher’s family and friends.” He wasn’t going to trust either of them with that task.

Kitty looked at him suspiciously. “We don’t need your help, Ed.”

This time, his laugh was completely genuine. “You need it now more than ever.”

Olivia placed her hand on Kitty’s arm. “Maybe we should let him? Margot . . .” Olivia paused, her lip quivering. “Margot trusts Ed. And she doesn’t trust anyone.”

“Fine.” Kitty pulled him to his feet. “But there’s something you have to do first.”

“Blood pact?” he asked, feigning excitement. “Initiation ritual? Do I get a DGM pin or a secret decoder ring?”

Kitty took a deep breath, then she thrust her hand forward.

“I, Kitty Wei, do solemnly swear, no secrets—ever—shall leave this square.”

He watched intently as Olivia grasped Kitty’s wrist.

“I, Olivia Hayes, do solemnly swear, no secrets—ever—shall leave this square.”

Together, they turned to him. “I dig, I dig,” he said. “Secret oath. I’m in.”

He grabbed Olivia’s wrist and then moved his arm closer to Kitty so she could link to him.

“I, Ed the Head—”

“You don’t have a last name?” Kitty asked.

Ed sighed. “Fine.” He cleared his throat dramatically. “
I, Edward Headley, do solemnly swear—
”

Olivia giggled. “Headley? Are you serious?”

“Do you want me to finish or not?” Ed asked.

“Sorry,” Olivia smirked.

“
I, Edward Headley, do solemnly swear, no secrets—ever—shall leave this square
. Er, triangle. Whatever.”

“Good enough.”

“Yay.” Ed cheered with fake enthusiasm. “Now shouldn’t we get out of here before those ’Maine Men goons defile this corridor with their V-D crap?”

Kitty didn’t answer, but her eyes hardened as she looked at
him. “We’ll meet at the warehouse tonight to debrief, understood?”

Olivia nodded, while Ed just winked.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” she said. “Now, let’s get our hands dirty.”

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

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THE BLACK STRAP OF THE ANKLE MONITOR FIT SNUGLY AROUND
the base of Bree’s shin, just above the joint, and the attached GPS tracker looked like an old flip phone had been duct taped to her leg.

“The band is a conductive circuit,” the guard explained as he tightened the strap. “If you tamper with it in any way, the authorities will be alerted.”

“Can I get it wet and feed it after midnight?” Bree joked.

The guard glanced up, unamused. “The tracker is waterproof.”

“Oh.” Clearly not a fan of
Gremlins
. Or senses of humor.

“The GPS unit is calibrated for your parents’ house,” he continued. “If you move beyond the one-hundred-meter radius of the perimeter, the authorities will be alerted.”

Great. She’d be a prisoner in her own home. Still better than being stuck in juvie for another day.

Once the monitor was securely in place, the guard led Bree into the holding area, where a tall, expensively dressed woman
was deep in conversation with another officer.

Bree didn’t recognize her mom at first. The sun-streaked hair and deep tan threw her off. And the conservative vest and pantsuit made it look as if her mom were a legal consultant on a twenty-four-hour news network rather than a dilettante homemaker who’d run away to the French Riviera.

But her personality hadn’t changed one bit. The sparkling voice, the easy manners—Bree’s mom possessed the singular talent of making everyone feel instantly comfortable, from CEOs to panhandlers. The trick, Bree had observed, was flirtation. Male or female, gay, straight, or other, anyone was fair game for her mom’s shameless flirting. And it almost always got her what she wanted.

“She’ll have to wear the anklet all the time?” her mom asked, eyes wide, voice plaintive.

“Yes, ma’am,” said the young officer.

“I can’t even take her out to dinner?” her mom pressed. “Or to the movies?”

The officer shook his head. “I’m afraid not.”

She sighed in resignation, then turned and looked directly at her daughter.

Bree expected some kind of recognition, but after a few seconds, her mom glanced down at her wristwatch. “Any idea when my daughter will be ready?”

The guard eyed Bree. “Um . . .”

“Hey, Mom,” Bree said, hoping her voice sounded as unenthusiastic as she felt.

Her mom started, and slowly returned her gaze to Bree. She
stared, confused, for a full ten seconds, before her face lit up.

“Darling!” Bree’s mother flew across the room and embraced her daughter, encircling her with the aromatic mix of Jean Patou and gin. “I’ve been so worried.”

So worried that it took you three full days to fly back from Europe
?

“Let me look at you.” Her mom pulled away and gripped Bree’s head on either side of her face. “When did you cut off your hair? Is that a prison thing?”

Bree narrowed her eyes. “Six months ago.”

“Oh.” Her mom pursed her lips. “Well, no wonder I didn’t recognize you.”

Right, not the fact that you haven’t been home since Christmas.

“Mrs. Deringer,” the processing attendant said. “There are just a few forms you need to sign, accepting custody of your daughter.”

With a dramatic sigh, as if signing her name a half-dozen times was some kind of supreme sacrifice, Bree’s mom finished the paperwork, and then she and Bree were escorted from the building.

Neither of them said a word as they followed the guard across the courtyard. Bree wasn’t going to make things easy on her mom by opening the conversation, and Mrs. Deringer seemed content with the silence.

An enormous black Cadillac Escalade with tinted windows was parked just outside the fence. It looked like the kind of car used by drug cartels. Or the CIA. As soon as the entry gate began to roll, the driver’s side door burst open and an equally
enormous blond man emerged.

He looked like a Norse god: bronzed skin, flowing hair, and muscles practically ripping through the taut fabric of his black jacket. The skinny tie that encircled his neck resembled a piece of dental floss trying to contain a hot air balloon, and as he walked around the car, Bree was pretty sure she could feel the earth tremble with each mighty step.

Without a word, he whisked open the rear passenger door and offered a hand to Bree’s mom, which she accepted with a dainty coquettishness that made Bree’s stomach churn.

“Thank you, Olaf.”

Olaf?

He nodded, and without offering Bree the same courtesy, he closed the door in her face.

“Yeah,” Bree muttered, stomping around to the other side of the car. “Thanks, Olaf.”

As soon as Olaf eased the SUV away from the curb, her mom’s demeanor changed.

“Do you want to explain to me,” she began, “how you thought it was a good idea to confess to a murder?”

“Two murders,” Bree corrected, smiling sweetly as she pulled the seat belt across her body. “And I didn’t confess to them.”

Her mom rolled her eyes. “Whatever.” She pressed a button on the door and a minibar slid out from between the passenger seats. Crystal decanters of fluid, clear and dark brown, tinkled and sloshed with the movement of the car, but Bree’s mom poured a cocktail from a shaker into a martini glass without spillage. “Wretched place,” she said, dropping two olives into the
glass. “I’ll have to burn this outfit when we get home.”

Bree jabbed the tongue of the seat belt into the buckle. It refused to click into place, merely sliding out with each attempt. “Sorry to be so much trouble,” Bree said coldly, as she searched for an alternate buckle. “You’re welcome to go back to Nice or Cannes or wherever the hell you’ve been living.”

“Villefranche-sur-Mer,” her mother said wistfully. “Didn’t you read the postcards I sent?”

Not before dumping them in the trash.
“Go back,” Bree said through clenched teeth. She tossed the seat belt away, annoyed by her futile attempts to get it secured. “I don’t need you.”

Bree’s mom laughed. “Of course you don’t
need
me. I raised you so that you wouldn’t need anyone.”

The word “raised” might have been a stretch, considering how little her mother had been around, especially since Henry Jr. went off to college.

“But at the moment,” her mom continued, “someone has to be here to keep an eye on you. Apparently, parental custody means that either your father or I have to supervise your house arrest. And since the senator has oh-so-important policy to not be making in Sacramento, the job fell to me.”

“Really feeling the love, Mom.”