The Complete Private Collection: Private; Invitation Only; Untouchable; Confessions; Inner Circle; Legacy; Ambition; Revelation; Last Christmas; Paradise ... The Book of Spells; Ominous; Vengeance (171 page)

Ivy shook her head. “Damn, Reed. Not that it’s any of your business, but I got the box in the mail from Cheyenne’s mom about two weeks after she died. She knew it was mine and figured I might want it back. I don’t even know how the necklace got inside.”

I turned and dropped down on the edge of my bed, resting my face in my hands and my elbows on my knees. “I was so sure it was you,” I said through my fingers. “I was so sure it was over.”

“Well, I’m sorry to disappoint,” Ivy said sardonically. “But I’m not a murderer
or
a stalker.”

“Then who?” I said, dropping my arms down and looking up at her, my back hunched in exhaustion. “Who the hell killed her? Who’s doing all this?”

Ivy gave me a look like it was so completely obvious. “Oh, I don’t know . . . Noelle?”

A laugh escaped my throat. “Not this again.”

“Why not? She had the motive—wanting to get back into Billings. She knows all the secret ways to get on and off campus. Plus we all know she’s evil
and
she has a reason to mess with both of us—me because I turned down her precious invite to Billings, you because you tried to take over while she was gone. Not to mention scoring with
Dash,” Ivy said matter-of-factly, leaning back against my dresser. “Nice work on that one, by the way. He is
hot.
”

“She’s not evil, just powerful,” I said, ignoring her last comment. “There’s a difference.”

Ivy rolled her eyes and scoffed. “You really need to open your eyes and see her for what she is, Reed. This whole loyalty thing is pretty pathetic at this point,” she said, gesturing at my room to remind me of how I’d gotten there.

“Whether I’m pathetic or not, Noelle has an alibi that’s almost as airtight as yours,” I said, grabbing my pillows and folding them behind me so I could prop myself up. “She was at a charity event in the city all night, and there are pictures to prove it.”

“No way,” Ivy said.

“Way,” I replied.

“Dammit,” she said under her breath. I knew the tone. She was as disappointed that it wasn’t Noelle as I was that it wasn’t her.

“I can’t believe we’re having this conversation,” I mused.

She looked at me and smirked. “Yeah. Neither can I.” She took in a breath and let it out audibly, then stood up straight. “Well, if it wasn’t Noelle, and it wasn’t
me
,” she said facetiously, holding her hands up to her chest, “then who the hell was it? Because if you take the indomitable Ms. Lange out of the equation, you’re looking like a pretty good suspect.”

I felt as if I had just been slapped and sat up straight. “Excuse me?”

“Hey, if you dish it, be prepared to take it,” Ivy said, lifting her palms. “You stood to gain the most from her death. You guys were
publicly feuding. You lived right down the freaking hall from her. Who better?”

“It wasn’t me,” I told her, though I had no real proof. “I mean, I know that sounds lame, but . . . Cheyenne was moving out. She was out of my life. I had no reason to kill her. I—”

“Don’t stress. I don’t really think it was you,” Ivy said, looking me up and down. “You’re far too . . . Little Orphan Annie.”

Whatever that meant.

“I’ve looked into a few people, but I’m at a serious disadvantage since I wasn’t here last year,” Ivy said, strolling the two steps to peer into my broken closet. “I don’t really know who she was hanging out with . . . who she was dating. . . .”

“I could fill in some of the blanks there,” I offered, without really thinking.

She turned to me, eyebrows raised. “Could you?”

I felt a slight surge of excitement—tentative excitement—and stood. “And you could fill in the blanks from the years before,” I said slowly. “Anyone who might be holding a long grudge. People I don’t even know about.”

For a long moment we eyed each other, neither one of us willing to make the next move. Just looking at her, I was still having trouble wrapping my brain around the fact that she wasn’t the enemy. That she hadn’t been the one to plant all those awful little gifts and send the e-mails. Ivy Slade was innocent. And, like me, she was also a victim.

“Do you think you could do it?” Ivy asked finally, squaring off with
me. “Do you think you could work with your ex’s girlfriend?”

Oh, right. There was still the little matter of the fact that she was routinely tonguing the love of my life. It took all my self-control not to cringe.

“If it puts an end to all this crap, then I’ll try,” I said. “Two heads are better than one, right?”

After the briefest hesitation, Ivy stuck out her slim white hand. “So they say.”

We shook on it and part of me felt as if I were making a pact with the devil. But then, the devil would probably have ways of getting things done that I could never even dream of. Maybe a marriage of good and evil was exactly what we needed to figure this thing out. Before our stalker decided it was time to get rid of us—for good.

I spent most of breakfast on Saturday morning watching Josh and Ivy and trying to read their body language. Had she told him about our new arrangement? What had he thought of the gift I’d given him? Had he even gotten it? I took small bites of my oatmeal and willed him to look over at me just once, but he never did. He seemed captivated by Ivy.

Which, of course, sucked.

Plus there was no way I could even attempt to get him alone after breakfast, because Ivy and I had agreed to meet back at my room as soon as we were done and try to figure out what our next move would be. I said good-bye to Diana and the others, who were headed to the library to study for finals, and hightailed it back to Pemberly, keeping my head bent against the cold. After making it through the crack security in the lobby, I only had to wait in my room for five minutes before Ivy arrived. She knocked and actually waited for me to open the door. That almost never happened in Billings.

“Hey,” she said, shedding her white coat and cabbie hat as she breezed by me into the room.

“Hi.”

I waited nervously for her to say something about my gift to Josh. To confront me about making a play for her boyfriend. Just thinking of her being proprietary about him left a sour taste on my tongue.

“I brought my list of suspects,” she said, yanking a piece of paper out of her black and white tweed bag. “Of course they’ve all been crossed off now except you.”

She was acting completely normal. So either Josh hadn’t received my gift after all, or he’d decided not to tell her about it—which could be interesting. If he was keeping it a secret, that meant it had touched him—that it meant something to him. Trying not to hope, I looked her list over. It was well worn, with notes in the margin and a coffee stain at the top. Clearly she had been working on this as hard as both Marc and I had. Apparently she really did care about Cheyenne.

“I wonder how many other people have taken this up as a hobby,” I said, turning and sitting down at my desk.

“What do you mean? Is there someone else?” Ivy asked. She perched on the edge of my bed, tugging down on her short black skirt.

“Marc Alberro. He used to have a thing for Cheyenne. Plus he kind of thinks he’s going to be the
New York Times
’ next ace reporter,” I explained. “So he was investigating too.”

“Never heard of him,” Ivy said with a shrug.

“I guess that’s me filling in the blanks then,” I replied.

“I guess so.” She leaned back on her hands. “So let’s see your list.”

I handed mine over. Ivy smirked as she took it in. “So you
did
investigate some of the Billings Girls.”

My face turned pink, though I wasn’t sure why. I focused on my computer, bringing up a Google search screen in case we needed it. “Of course I did.”

“I’m just surprised. I thought you guys were all about sisterhood and loyalty,” she said, her words dripping with disdain.

“I’m not an idiot,” I told her, snatching the list back from her. “One of my ‘sisters’ tried to kill me last year, in case you hadn’t heard.”

“Oh. Right,” she said with a trace of chagrin. “Ariana. Who knew she would turn out to be such a psycho?” She looked at me sideways and sat up straight. “Maybe she’s the one who’s been stalking you. Or us.”

My heart skipped a terrified beat. The very idea of Ariana lurking in the shadows of my life made my skin crawl. But I brushed the feeling aside. “Not possible. She’s locked up in some asylum or something.”

“Or so they say,” Ivy said with a leading smile.

I could tell by the twinkle in her eye that she didn’t believe that Ariana was really behind this—that she was just joking around. But I didn’t like it. The girl had tried to toss me off the roof of Billings last December. That wasn’t something I was ready to joke about.

“What if she’s on campus somewhere this very second?” Ivy suggested.

With a rush of fresh fear, I recalled those few times early in the semester when I had felt like I was being watched. When I could have sworn I had seen a pair of cold blue eyes staring at me from the stacks in the library, but when I went to investigate, no one was there. Leaving all those things in my room, sending that e-mail . . . those were exactly the kinds of insane things that Ariana might do.

But it wasn’t possible. She was safely locked away. Far away.

“Stranger things have happened, right?” Ivy said, loving her spooky conspiracy theory.

“Can I ask you a question?” I blurted.

“Sure.”

“Why the hell did you have that picture above your bed?” I said, turning sideways in my chair. “I mean, you hated Noelle and Ariana, looking at Cheyenne’s face every day couldn’t have been fun, and it was taken on basically the worst day of your life.”

Ivy arched one perfect eyebrow. “You have done your homework.” She looked down and picked an invisible piece of lint from her skirt, flicking it on the floor. “I kept that picture for two reasons. One, I actually had a good time that day, cleaning up the park. We all did. It’s the last good memory I have of Cheyenne, and even of . . . the other two.” A blush lit her face for a brief moment and she looked me in the eye. “And two, every time I looked at it, it reminded me that no matter how much
fun
you have with people, they can turn on you in a second.”

Her comment hit my heart with the force of a gunshot. She was right, after all. The Billings Girls had turned on me just like that. But
then, I had done something awful to one of our own. Ivy had never done anything to hurt anyone.

Unreal. Ivy was actually more innocent than I was.

“Maybe we should get back to what we were doing,” I suggested.

“Works for me,” Ivy replied, crossing her arms over her chest. “So you looked into some of the Billings Girls, but not all.”

“Why would I look into all of them?” I asked, my face screwing up in consternation. “Some of them have no motive whatsoever.”

“Oh, I don’t know, because they all had the opportunity?” Ivy suggested with a shrug. “Better opportunity than anyone else. I mean, when it comes down to it, the obvious choice is someone who lives in Billings. A random stranger would have a tough time breaking in there in the middle of the night without any of you guys noticing.”

“They wouldn’t have to break in. It’s pretty easy to get a key card for any dorm on campus,” I said.

“I know this. All you’ve gotta do is get into that lockbox in Ms. Lewis’s desk,” Ivy said. “But—”

“How do you know about that?” I interrupted.

“It was one of our ‘tasks’ for Billings,” Ivy replied, tossing in some air quotes. “We had to make Ketlar keys for all the sisters. It was the easiest thing they had us do. But even if someone had a key, it’s not like you guys wouldn’t notice that person didn’t belong in your dorm. There are only sixteen of you.”

I hated to admit it, but the girl had a point.

“I say we check out all the Billings Girls,” Ivy added. “Especially considering we have no other suspects at the moment.”

Honestly, it seemed like a wise idea, even though I wouldn’t be sharing that thought with Ivy. After all, Ariana had been one of my best friends, and I never would have suspected her of Thomas’s murder. Never in a million years. So wasn’t it just as possible that there was someone else inside Billings who seemed just as innocent, but was capable of horrible things?

“Damn, I wish I still had that disc,” I said under my breath, leaning my elbow on the desk.

“What disc?” Ivy asked.

I hesitated for a second but realized there was no point in keeping the disc a secret from her. We were supposed to be partners here. And besides, there was no chance of her ever seeing what had been in those secret files. The disc was long gone. I took a deep breath and turned in my seat, lacing my fingers together between my knees.

“I used to have this disc with all this insider info on all the girls in Billings,” I told her. “They gave it to me when I was president. I don’t really know why, but . . . Well, anyway, I destroyed it.”

“What? Why?” Ivy asked.

“Because I didn’t want to have to give it to Noelle, basically,” I replied. “It was a whole saving-face thing.”

“And you never made a copy?” Ivy said.

“No,” I replied, embarrassed once again by my lack of forethought.

“Good thinking, genius girl,” she said, getting up.

My face flushed with heat and I actually wanted to pull her hair. Working with her was not going to be easy.

“Did you ever even look at it?”

“Yeah, once. I looked up myself.”

“Nice.” Ivy rolled her eyes. “On that computer?”

“Only one I got,” I said, wondering where this was going.

“Here,” she said, gesturing at me to move from my chair. “Let me try something.”

She had to be kidding. Like I was going to let her on my computer? Ivy rolled her eyes.

“God, you really are paranoid, aren’t you? I’m not going to do anything to it,” she said condescendingly. “I just want to see something. You can watch every keystroke, I promise.”

She was already trying to sit down and if I didn’t move, she was going to end up half on my lap. I slid out of there as quickly as I could and stepped back. Ivy opened a couple of windows and double clicked on a file marked “Temporary Files.”