“Uh, my computer has a virus,” Spencer said.
Her dad stopped pacing. Melissa looked up. Her mother jumped and whirled around. The corners of her mouth turned down. She turned back to the drawer.
“Mom?” Spencer tried again. “My computer. It’s…dead.”
Mrs. Hastings didn’t turn. “And?”
Spencer ran her fingers along the slightly wilted floral arrangement on the island until she realized where she’d seen the flowers last—on Nana’s casket. She pulled her hand away fast. “Well, I need it to do my homework. Can I call Geek Squad?”
Her mother turned and examined Spencer for a few long beats. When Spencer gazed back helplessly, Mrs. Hastings began to laugh.
“What?” Spencer asked, confused. Beatrice raised her head, then put it down again.
“Why should I pay for someone to come fix your computer when I should make you pay for what happened to the garage?” Mrs. Hastings crowed.
Spencer blinked fast. “The…garage?”
Her mother snorted. “Don’t tell me you didn’t see it.”
Spencer looked back and forth from one parent to the other, clueless. Then she ran to the front door and stepped out into the yard in her socks, even though the ground was frosty and soggy. A light had been turned on over the garage. When Spencer saw what was there, she clapped her hand over her mouth.
Across both garage doors, in bloodred paint, was the word KILLER.
It hadn’t been here when she’d come home from school today. Spencer looked around, gripped with the distinct feeling that someone was watching from the woods. Did a tree branch just move? Did someone just duck behind a shrub? Was it…A?
She faced her mother, who had marched up beside her. “Did you call the police?”
Mrs. Hastings barked out another laugh. “Do you think the police really want to speak to us right now? Do you think they’re going to care that someone did this to our house?”
Spencer widened her eyes. “Wait, you believe what the cops are saying?”
Her mom sank onto one hip. “We both know there wasn’t ever anything in those woods.”
The world started to spin. Spencer’s mouth felt dry. “Mom, I saw Ian. I really did.”
Her mother brought her face inches from Spencer’s. “Do you know how much it’s going to cost to refinish those doors? They’re one of a kind—we got them off an old barn in Maine.”
Spencer’s eyes filled with tears. “I’m sorry to be such a liability.” She whirled around, stomped onto the porch, and marched up the stairs without bothering to wipe her muddy socks on the doormat. Her eyes stung with hot tears as she walked up the stairs and flung open the door to her bedroom. Why did it surprise her that her mother was siding with the cops? Why should she have expected anything different?
“Spence?”
Melissa poked her head into the room. She was wearing a pale yellow cashmere twinset and dark, boot-cut jeans. Her hair was held back by a velvet ribbon, and her eyes looked tired and puffy, as if she’d been crying.
“Go away,” Spencer mumbled.
Melissa sighed. “I just wanted to let you know that you can use my old laptop if you need it. It’s in the barn. I have a new computer at the town house. I’m moving there tonight.”
Spencer turned slightly, frowning. “The renovations are done?” Melissa’s Philadelphia town house overhaul seemed to have no end—she kept tweaking the designs.
Melissa stared at the creamy Berber carpet that spread across Spencer’s bedroom floor. “I have to get out of here.” Her voice cracked.
“Is everything…okay?” Spencer asked.
Melissa pulled her sleeves over her hands. “Yeah. Fine.”
Spencer shifted in her seat. She’d tried to talk to Melissa about Ian’s body at Nana’s funeral on Sunday, but Melissa kept waving her away. Her sister had to have some thoughts about it—when Ian was released on house arrest, Melissa had seemed sympathetic to his plight. She’d even tried to convince Spencer that Ian was innocent. Maybe, like the police, she believed that Ian’s body had never been there. It would be just like Melissa to trust a bunch of possibly crooked cops over her sister, all because she didn’t want to accept that her beloved might be dead.
“Really, I’m fine,” Melissa urged, as if she could read Spencer’s thoughts. “I just don’t want to be here if there are going to be search parties and news vans.”
“But the cops aren’t searching here anymore,” Spencer told her. “They just called it off.”
A startled look crossed Melissa’s face. Then she shrugged and turned around without answering. Spencer listened to her padding down the stairs.
The front door slammed, and Spencer could hear Mrs. Hastings murmuring quietly and kindly to Melissa in the foyer. Her real daughter. Spencer winced, gathered up her books, shrugged into her coat and boots, and walked out the back door to Melissa’s barn. As she crossed the cold, vast yard, she noticed something to the left and stopped. Someone had sprayed LIAR on the windmill in the same red paint as the graffiti on the garage. A glob of red dripped from the bottom edge of the L to the dead grass. It looked as if it were bleeding.
Spencer glanced back at the house, considering, then pulled her books into her chest and pressed on. Her parents would see it soon enough. She certainly didn’t want to be the one to break the news.
Melissa had left the barn in a hurry. There was a half-drunk bottle of wine on the counter, and a half-filled water glass her normally anal sister hadn’t washed out. A lot of her clothes were still in the closet, and there was a big book called The Principles of Mergers and Acquisitions flung on the bed, a University of Pennsylvania bookmark wedged between the pages.