I shrug into my coat and start walking toward Rookwood. I take a shortcut through the forest, fighting through the overgrown branches until I reach the hidden spot where the cabin is concealed.
The entire area has been cordoned off with yellow police tape that’s fluttering in the shallow breeze. The cabin’s windows have all been boarded up, and there’s more tape crisscrossing the door. Something about this place gives me chills. It seems eerie in the shadows of the bowed trees. Even the air hangs heavily around it, full of ghosts.
“Serena?” I call.
The wind howls back at me, and I shiver. This doesn’t feel right. Serious red flags.
I take out my phone and call Kate. It goes straight to voice mail.
“Hey, Kate,” I say after the beep. “It’s me. Just letting you know that I’m meeting Serena at the Rookwood cabin. Sorry. Don’t hate me. I’ll explain later.”
With a deep breath, I sidestep the overgrown ivy and try the handle on the door. It eases open. I duck beneath the tape and step inside.
The cabin is cold, still scattered with empty bottles and crumpled plastic cups from its last party. I press my coat sleeve to my nose to block the smell of stale cigarette smoke and beer.
There’s a muffled cry from across the room.
I spin on my heel.
Serena. Her eyes are wide and wild.
My breath catches in my throat.
She’s tied to a chair, and a strip of duct tape is covering her mouth.
ADAM
The cops will be here by now, probably waiting for me in Principal Lomax’s office.
I rummage around my side of the dorm room, searching for my cell. Tommy’s still in bed. He looks half-asleep, heavy-eyed and yawning, but he’s sitting upright.
“Hey.” His voice is groggy. “Why are you up so early? Class doesn’t start for half an hour.”
I shake my bedcover, and my phone thumps to the floor. “I’ve got a date with the cops,” I tell Tommy. “And my dad, apparently.”
“What? Why are you meeting the cops?”
“Because they want to bust me for Max.”
He sits up straighter. “What? But you gave me as your alibi, right?”
“Nope.”
“Why not?”
“Because it’s a lie. You’re not my alibi.”
“So? I’ll tell them. I’m coming with you.” He moves to stand up, but I stop him.
“Don’t get involved, Tommy. I’m not going to drag you into this.”
“Adam, come on.” He slaps his hand to his brow. “We’re in this together. Just like we have been from the start.”
I can’t bring myself to look at him. “This isn’t your problem. If we get caught lying, we’ll both be screwed. You know that.”
“I’m not going to bail on you.”
I glance at him. “She has a theory, you know.”
He blinks back at me. “Who?”
“Jenna.”
Tommy shakes his head, confused. “A theory about what?”
“About Max, Colleen, everything.”
There’s silence while he waits for me to elaborate.
“Max cheated on Serena last summer. Did you know about that?”
He runs a hand over his brow. “No, but I’m not exactly surprised.”
“Yeah. Well, it’s looking like he cheated with one of Serena’s friends. One of the Preston girls.”
He nods slowly.
I pause, thinking about Max and the last time I saw him alive. I swallow against a burning sensation in my throat when I remember our last conversation, only a couple of hours before his body was pulled from the water. He was drunk that night, yeah, but he was in control. He wasn’t high. He never was. And damn sure he wasn’t so wasted that he couldn’t get out of a sinking car.
“Did you sell anything to Max on Friday night?” I ask Tommy.
“Nothing. You know Max wouldn’t touch the stuff anyway.”
“What about the girls? Did you sell anything to any of the girls who were here that night?”
He stares back at me. His jaw tenses. “You think someone drugged Max?”
“They must have, right? Why wouldn’t he get out of a sinking car, Tommy? He must have been on something. Something strong enough to knock him out cold.”
Tommy rubs his brow. He mutters something under his breath.
My pulse quickens. “What?”
“One of the girls bought something off me. But I swear it was the last of my stash. I was just trying to get rid of it all. I was going to stop selling—”
“What did she buy?”
His eyes squeeze shut for a second. “Rohypnol.”
I feel like my heart just dropped through the floorboards. “Tommy...”
“I know,” he mutters. “I’m sorry. I know.”
My voice comes out in a rasp. “You were selling a date-rape drug to people?”
“My dad...” He’s stuttering now, fumbling. “My dad needed me to sell it. But I was only giving it to some of the guys with insomnia, just to help them sleep, I swear, not to...”
My skin crawls at the thought.
“It was the last of it,” he says. “I was going to stop. You’ve got to believe me, Adam. I never meant for Max... I never thought that anyone would give it to Max. Shit.”
“Who did you sell it to?”
“There was a girl. I sold it to a girl.”
“What was her name?” My mind jumps back to Friday night, before my fight with Max. I remember seeing a girl at the cabin, after Serena had gone home. I remember seeing her before, too, talking to Tommy in the shadows of the room. It was the same girl I once saw Max share a cigarette with while Serena looked on. The same girl that Max couldn’t take his eyes off when she walked past us at Colleen’s vigil.
“She’s a friend of Serena’s.” Tommy’s voice is shaking. “I’ve seen them together.”
“What’s her name?”
For Jenna’s sake, I pray he doesn’t say Hollie.
And he doesn’t.
I try calling Jenna. But she doesn’t pick up.
JENNA
Someone grabs my hair from behind. My phone hits the floor and skids across the planks. Out the corner of my eye, I see Adam’s name flash across the screen as it rings.
But I’m gripped by a searing pain as the person behind me pulls me to the ground. My palms hit the floorboards with a smack.
Across the room, Serena is hysterical. Tears are spilling down her cheeks, but her sobs are muffled behind the tape covering her mouth.
I know whose hands are pressing down on me, restraining me. I know because I saw her. It wasn’t Colleen gazing adoringly at Max in the photos. Or Hollie fixating on the mystery Rook guy she’d met at a party.
In every photo, this girl’s eyes were trained on him. I saw it, her unwavering purpose captured in the still frame.
“Imogen,” I say. “Let us go.”
She flinches at my voice and loosens her grip for a second. It’s long enough for me to struggle free of her and grab my phone. But it’s only a moment before I feel a smack to my skull. A dull ache spreads across the back of my head. My cell slips from my hand and hits the floor again. The screen blurs as my eyes lose focus.
I’m pushed back down to the floor. In my foggy vision, the pool table spins, Serena turns fuzzy, and all I see clearly is Imogen standing over me. I blink fast, trying to focus on only her, trying to drown out Serena’s stifled cries.
“Imogen,” I manage again. “You can’t do this. You have to let us out of here.”
“No.” Her voice is trembling. “No, Jenna. I can’t.”
The color has drained from her face, and she’s shaking. I’ve never seen her look so out of control—perfect, pretty Imogen is gone. She’s holding a glass vase, an
d she lifts it a little higher.
I shrink back. One more hit with that and it’s over for me.
“Imogen, please...”
“I had to get you both here.” She starts rambling, muttering almost to herself. “It’s the only way I can make this work.”
I draw in a rough breath. “Make what work?”
“Does anyone else know?” She’s panting, blond hair flying across her face, disturbed by the rasps of her breath. “You have to tell me. I need to know the names of anyone else who knows.”
I stare back at her, trying to find my voice through my fear.
“You knew...” She aims her index finger at me. “And now she knows.” Imogen gestures to Serena. “Who else knows about Max and me?”
I shake my head. “No one.”
“Did you tell your aunt? Adam?”
“No. I don’t know anything, Imogen. Whatever you think—”
“You don’t understand. Colleen was going to tell Serena.” Her voice warbles with the words. “Colleen found out about us, and she was going to tell Serena.”
I take a quick breath. “She caught you last summer, didn’t she? Colleen caught you and Max together?”
Her fingers clench on the vase.
I forge on. “But your relationship with Max didn’t end then?” I already know the answer.
“You don’t understand,” she whispers.
I say quickly, “Talk to me, Imogen. I get it. I can only imagine how hard it must have been for you, having to watch Serena and Max together. Your fling with Max didn’t end last summer, did it?”
Her eyes snap to me. “It wasn’t a fling, Jenna.”
“Then what was it? A few hookups? A secret relationship?”
Her jaw tightens. “He was mine,” she murmurs. “He was always supposed to be mine.”
Serena lets out a stifled scream.
Imogen’s words hang in the air, and goose bumps spread along my arms.
“You knew him,” I murmur. Suddenly the missing pieces start to fit. “You told me that. You told me you knew Max from your neighborhood. You two went to school together, before Preston and Rookwood.”
Her lips part, and her eyes glaze over as though she’s suddenly lost in the past. “Even after Max was sent to Rookwood, I still thought about him sometimes. I just didn’t realize how I felt about him until it was too late.”
“Too late?” I ball my hands to stop them from shaking. “You mean, because he was already in love with Serena?”
Her eyebrows pinch together. “He didn’t love her,” she seethes through her teeth. “I know he didn’t. Max and I, we’re from the same world. Serena could never compete with that. It was real with us. It was inevitable.” She bites her lower lip. “It was intense.”
“So how come Max didn’t just break up with Serena last summer? Then the two of you wouldn’t have had to hide anymore.”
Imogen’s focus jumps back to me. “It wasn’t that simple.” She starts pacing in small circles, her footsteps tapping fast on the floorboards. “Serena was his free ride out of this shithole town. He needed her. That bitch Colleen almost ruined everything for him.”
I manage another uneven breath. “So that’s why you killed Colleen, to keep her quiet?”
“No!” Imogen stops pacing. She’s trembling. “No, it wasn’t like that. Colleen caught Max and I together in the forest, again. I tried to run, but Max called me and told me that Colleen had seen me and was going to talk this time, so I went after her. I just wanted to reason with her. I’d worked so hard to keep this quiet, for Max’s sake. For his future—our future.”
Serena chokes out another bitter sound.
“You killed Colleen.” My words sound hollow. “You had to stop her before she got to Serena?”
Imogen shakes her head, and her ice-blond hair falls limply over her face. “Colleen was my friend, not Serena’s. I found her on the cliff path, and I tried talking to her. But she was just being so stubborn. She was going to tell Serena everything. There was nothing I could do to stop her.”
My voice sounds hoarse as it leaves my lips. “But there was something you could do. There was something you did.”
She shifts the weight of the vase in her hands, and I flinch on reflex. “It was an accident. Colleen and I got into a fight. She told me I was trash for doing this to Serena, and she pushed me, so I pushed her back. It just...escalated.”
I wince, my eyes still locked on the vase. If Imogen was capable of grabbing Colleen by the throat and pushing her from Rookwood cliff, I have no doubt she’d bring that vase down over my head if I dare to make one wrong move. But I can’t stop now. I have to keep going. “And Max?” I press on. “What happened to Max, Imogen?”
Her eyes skate over Serena again. “I never meant to hurt him,” she whispers. “We were soul mates.”
With that, Serena starts thrashing her body, kicking her legs and throwing her shoulders in an attempt to break free from the cable ties binding her wrists. The chair rocks with her.
“Imogen.” I draw her eyes back to me. “What happened to Max?”
“He was going to end it.” All of a sudden, her wild blue eyes glisten, and her voice fractures with emotion. “Last weekend. He told me that one of Serena’s friends had found out about us and he was going to be honest with Serena. He felt guilty about everything, and he was going to choose her.” A single tear rolls down her cheek. “It was your fault,” she spits at me. “You were the one who found out. If it wasn’t for you, Max would still be here.”
Of course she’d known that it was me. That’s why I’d had a text from Imogen in the early hours of the morning, asking where I was. Max had told her. Was he already dead by then? Was her plan to move on to me next?
I shuffle backward until my spine is pressed up against the sofa. “I only knew that Max had cheated,” I fumble. “I never had your name.”
“Serena was on to me. I know she was,” Imogen says, blinking fast. “She was freezing me out. That’s why I asked her to meet me here last night. I wouldn’t have gotten you involved, Jenna. But then I read that text message you sent to Serena this morning.” She dips her gaze, and her long eyelashes sweep downward. “This has to end here, with the two of you.”
The back of my head is throbbing, and I can feel something trickling down the nape of my neck—blood. Everything is starting to feel foggy. I clench my teeth, fighting to stay conscious.
She sucks in her cheeks. “What happened to Max wasn’t my fault.”
“I know,” I manage. “I believe you, Imogen.”
“Max wanted to talk.” Her words start coming out faster, her eyes darting from left to right as she relived the memory in her mind. “Just the two of us. So we went to Adam’s car.”
My heart feels as though it’s about to beat out of my chest. “Were you guys high?”
“I gave Max a little something to relax him, in a drink. He was so stressed out, and I had to buy some time. I knew he was pulling away from me. Ever since Colleen...”
“Did he know what you did?” My hands press down on the floorboards as I struggle to keep myself upright. “Did Max know what happened with Colleen?”
“No. But I think he suspected.” She starts gnawing on her lip. “He must have because that’s when it all went wrong. He started to pull away from me after that. After Colleen.” She rests her brow on the vase and chokes out a sob. “He knew, and it ruined everything.”
I swallow hard. “That’s why you drugged Max, to stop him from coming clean to Serena?”
“No!” Her face screws up, and she shakes the memory away. “I didn’t mean to give him much. Just enough to calm him down. He was so freaked out about you knowing he’d been cheating. But then he started to get really out of it...”
I cringe at the sound of Serena’s cries. “He passed out in Adam’s car?”
“It was too much. Way too much.” Imogen’s hands tighten around the glass vase, her fingers turning white from the force with which she’s gripping it. Across the cabin, Serena is suddenly quiet, apart from her quick, shallow breaths. I still can’t bring myself to look at her. I can’t bring myself to break eye contact with Imogen. I’m afraid that the second I do, that vase will come down onto my skull.
“You drove Adam’s car into the harbor,” I murmur.
“Max was going to tell Serena about Colleen catching us together. That would have made me a suspect, Jenna. I would have gone down for it. Gotten a life sentence. It was an accident!”
My breath falters. “So you drove the car into the harbor, swam free, and left Max to drown.”
She stares back at me, vacant. Her voice becomes hoarse. “It was an accident.”
I grope for a response, but nothing comes out.
“Shit,” Imogen rasps. “Shit. I have to end this.” She takes a step closer to me and raises the vase.
“Imogen, no.” I shrink back, bracing myself. “You can’t kill us. Four victims? You’ll get caught.”
“I won’t. I haven’t so far. Everyone will think he did it.”
My eyebrows pull together. “Who?”
“Your guy. Adam. The one who killed his mom. Max told me all about it one night when he was drunk. Adam must be a little unhinged, and it was his car. It’s obvious that he drove Max into the harbor. No one will even question it. No one questioned it when I leaked Hollie’s text messages, and no one would question Adam driving his own car, right?”
“No, Imogen,” I whisper. “Please don’t do this.”
“This is why I had to get you and Serena here together. I’m going to say Adam was hooking up with Serena. And everyone knows he was having a thing with you. I’ll say I heard you and Serena talking about a three-way with him, here, last night. His DNA is already everywhere. And, oops, he killed you both.” She holds her fingers like a gun.
“Don’t do this,” I plead.
“Too late. It’s already done.” She takes a step closer to me and raises the vase. “Sorry, Jenna.”
This Is Why We Lie Page 21