Hide and Seek (14 page)

Dirt crunched beneath Emma’s feet as she raced along a desert path. What she wanted, right this second, was to be as far away from Mr. Mercer as possible. She’d seen that look before, in the angry eyes of foster dads. With everything else going on, the last thing she needed was to do battle with him, too.

But maybe my sister’s battle
was
with my father. I desperately hoped that I’d misinterpreted the memory I’d just seen. Maybe my dead-girl brain was playing tricks on me. Maybe it was just a dream I was remembering. My dad had never looked at me like that in his life—had never, ever grabbed me or hurt me.
Never.
And yet that night he had.

Soon the sounds of the party faded away, and all Emma could hear was her thudding heartbeat and the sandy gravel under her feet. Slowly, she replayed everything she’d heard between Mr. Mercer and his mother, their cutting argument echoing in her mind. Mr. Mercer was having an affair. Was it serious?

There was a smooth rock ahead, dappled with moonlight. Emma dropped down to sit on it, her limbs aching from running in high heels. As she traced the tiny fissures in the rock’s surface, a memory came back to her from her childhood. Occasionally, her mother had had boyfriends, and even though Becky had abandoned Emma when she was five, Emma still remembered a few of them.

Most of the guys worked as truckers, shifty salesmen, or didn’t have jobs at all, but there was one guy Becky particularly loved named Joe, and Emma had liked him, too. He’d watched cartoons with her and brought her candy and little toys from the 7-Eleven, where he worked the graveyard shift. He was so much nicer than the other guys Becky dated that Emma began to hope Joe was her father—she was dying for one. But then, one day, Joe stopped coming around, and Becky stopped talking about him. “That jerk cheated on me,” Becky snapped when Emma asked where he was. Emma didn’t know what Becky meant—in her world,
cheating
meant moving your
game piece extra spaces in Candy Land. She’d never even
seen
Becky and Joe play Candy Land together.

Heaving a sigh, Emma slipped off the rock and stretched, knowing she’d have to get back to the party before anyone started asking questions.

A hand clapped down on her shoulder, and Emma jumped.
Laurel.
It had to be. Images of the bloody tennis racket shot through Emma’s mind. She spun around, certain she’d see Sutton’s sister behind her. But it was Thayer’s hazel eyes that blinked back at her.

“Oh!” Emma whispered, wheeling backward.

Thayer’s white button-down had come untucked at the waist of his trousers. “Are you okay? Did you…hear them?”

“Yeah,” she admitted. “I heard everything.”

Thayer reached out as if to hug her, then clearly remembering their relationship had changed, awkwardly stuck his hands in his pockets instead. “This was what I was trying to protect you from that night at Sabino,” he said. “I saw your dad on the trail with…well, someone who wasn’t your mom. That’s why I tried to keep you away from them—and why I told you to run.”

Emma’s head snapped up. She’d not been expecting him to say that. “Wait. It was my
dad
on the trail?”

Thayer exhaled loudly. “Yeah. That’s why your dad ran after us. He’d realized I’d seen him,” he went on, sounding
tormented. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. I was going to…but then I was in the hospital, and then I went back to rehab, and then you stopped returning my emails.”

My head was spinning right along with Emma’s. That desert dust I’d seen on my father. I’d been
right.
It
was
him we were running from. Him and some awful, home-wrecking woman. That was why he demanded to know what I saw. But had he come after me to bribe me to stay quiet—or shut me up for good?

“I haven’t told Laurel,” Thayer went on, pausing to wipe sweat from his brow. “And I don’t think you should either.”

Emma stared at him, feeling like her head was stuffed with cotton. “Why not?”

He bit his lip. “She isn’t as strong as you are. I just found out she was a complete mess after she took me to the hospital.”

“Well, she was really angry at me,” Emma pointed out. “You said you thought she wanted to kill me.”

Thayer shook his head. “Yeah, but I was at physical therapy this morning, and a nurse asked me how my girlfriend was. I thought she meant you at first, but she was talking about ‘the blond girl, the girl who stayed the night I was hurt.’ Apparently, even though I told her to go, Laurel stayed in the waiting room, sobbing.” Thayer took a breath, then ran his hand through his hair. “The nurse
said she was so hysterical that they gave her a sedative and kept her in the hospital overnight for observation. They didn’t want her driving in that condition.”

Emma blinked as Thayer’s words started to sink in. She laced her hands behind her neck, trying to get her bearings. “Hold on. Laurel was in the hospital all night…and it was my
dad
at the canyon that night,” she repeated.

“Yeah,” Thayer said softly.

An owl hooted in the distance. A cloud passed over the moon. Emma looked at him. “Did my dad ever say anything about that night to you? Any kind of explanation for why he was there?”

Thayer’s eyes narrowed, and he made a small, incredulous noise at the back of his throat. “I’d say him running me down with your car was a pretty clear indication that he never wanted me mentioning that night again.”

Emma bolted upright, her limbs on fire. “
He
hit you?”

This isn’t happening
, I thought.
This cannot be happening. What I saw was no dream.
Every last gritty, horrifying detail was real.

Thayer looked at Emma and shrugged. “Who else could it be? Your dad was chasing after us. And whoever hit me was driving
your
car. He has your keys, right?”

I had dropped my keys beside my car that night, but my dad definitely had a spare set, too.

Emma’s mind reeled, and suddenly everything she had
thought to be true was turned on its head, and another picture began to click into place. So Laurel
didn’t
do it. But someone else was there the night Sutton died. Someone who had a motive to keep Sutton quiet. Mr. Mercer. And then something else occurred to her. What if Mr. Mercer wasn’t just trying to protect his affair? What if Sutton had threatened to tell the police that he’d run down Thayer? What if he’d killed her to shut her up?

But Mr. Mercer was Sutton’s
father
. Could it really be true?

Emma sank back onto the rock, placed her head in her hands, then, unexpectedly, burst into sobs. Maybe it was the stress of holding it together for so long, but suddenly, tears were streaming down her face fast and furious.

I wished I could cry, too. From shock. From numbness. From the unfairness of it all. But as hard as I tried, I couldn’t muster a single tear.

“Is this why my dad wanted Laurel and me to stay away from you?” she asked, her voice muffled through her fingers. “Because you’d tell us he’s cheating?”
And because you’d tell me he’d hit you with his car and then killed the twin I didn’t even know I’d had?
she added silently.

“I don’t know,” Thayer said softly. He took a small step toward Emma. “But maybe.” And then he sat down, pulled her close, and hugged her tight. “You’ll be fine. I promise,” he whispered ever so softly into her ear.

At first, Emma’s body was stiff, but Thayer felt so good against her that she began to relax. She needed someone to hug her right now. She needed someone to tell her it was going to be okay. Emma allowed herself to cry for a few minutes until the tears died out and the sobs were just little hiccups.

I stared at the two of them, feeling an uneasiness that had nothing to do with what I’d just learned about my dad. Thayer was hugging a girl who looked just like me…but
wasn’t
me, and there was nothing I could do to stop it.

After a moment, Emma broke free from Thayer, feeling awkward. “I should…I need to be alone,” she mumbled, brushing the tears from her face. It was true, but she needed to be away from him, too. It wasn’t fair to Ethan to be taking comfort in another boy’s arms—especially when that boy was Thayer.

Thayer stared after her, his eyes soft in the moonlight. “You know I’m always here for you, Sutton.”

“Thank you,” Emma said faintly, then moved down the path toward the hotel, taking even breaths as she processed everything Thayer had just told her. Mr. Mercer had killed his own daughter because she’d known what he did.

But I
hadn’t
known it was him—not until he showed up in his own car. It had been so dark that night, and I hadn’t seen the driver. And I hadn’t seen him with his
mistress because Thayer had protected me from the truth. He’d done what my dad was supposed to do—take care of me and keep me out of harm’s way. How could my father live with himself? Didn’t he
love
me? But then the memory I’d just seen flared in my head again. As much as I wanted to erase it, it only got darker, inkier. That car heading for me. Those harsh words,
Get in the car, Sutton!
That hand around my wrist, those strong muscles dragging me in the dirt.

Even though no one could hear me, I opened my mouth and wailed. My killer was my father.

That night Emma lay in Sutton’s bed, wide awake. She’d fled from the party after her discussion with Thayer, not wanting to face Mr. Mercer. She’d sent Sutton’s friends quick texts before she left, saying she didn’t feel well, but she knew it probably looked crazy. Once she’d gotten back to the Mercers’, she’d had a long call with Ethan, discussing everything she’d learned. He’d wanted to come over immediately and only backed down when Emma promised him she’d call him first thing tomorrow; she couldn’t risk Mr. Mercer realizing that Ethan knew about him, too.

Then she’d locked herself in her bedroom, pushed Sutton’s dresser in front of the door, and thrown the covers
over her head. Mrs. Mercer had knocked on Emma’s door an hour ago and asked if she was okay, but Emma had pretended to be sleeping.
It was probably something she ate,
she’d heard Sutton’s mom whisper in the hall.
Or something she drank,
Grandma Mercer groaned. Emma didn’t hear Mr. Mercer at all.

She knew the sick excuse wouldn’t hold for long—she’d have to face the family sometime. Mr. Mercer knew she’d heard him. But did he know that she’d put the pieces together? And what was Mr. Mercer waiting for—why hadn’t he killed her already? He had to know how much snooping she’d done. Would he make it look like she’d died in an accident? That way, both Emma and Sutton would be gone in one fell swoop.

I’d also wondered if my murderer was biding his time, figuring out the best way to kill Emma so that it seemed like an accident—a car wreck, overdose, nasty fall. My dad was a doctor and had access to all kinds of drugs. Was he planning to poison Emma in her sleep, then play the role of grieving father for the rest of the world?

The white curtains billowed like ghosts. Sutton’s cavernous closet was ajar, revealing neatly hung dresses and blouses. Her computer flashed a rotating screen saver of her best friends. Now that Emma had uploaded new photos, pictures of both her and Sutton flashed across the screen. There was one with Sutton in her Hollier tennis
uniform. The next one captured Emma and Charlotte at La Encantada, posing in crazy outfits in the Neiman’s dressing room. The only difference in the twins’ smiling faces was the tiny scar on Emma’s chin, which Emma had gotten from falling off the Hamburglar at a McDonald’s PlayPlace when she was little.

Emma sat straight up. Mr. Mercer had pointed out that scar the very first morning she’d eaten breakfast with the family. Maybe it was some kind of warning, that the smallest difference could blow her secret if she wasn’t careful.

She flopped back in bed, filled with dread and fear and heavy sadness. Mr. Mercer seemed so sweet and caring, like the kind of man who’d do anything for his daughters, which made it all the more heartbreaking that he’d done something so terrible.

I squeezed my eyes shut, disgusted at the whole idea of it. Of everything that’d happened since my death, this was the hardest to process. I felt like I was drowning every time I thought of the ways my father had let me down. How could he cheat on my mother? He had to know it would destroy our family. And how could he kill me? How could my father squeeze the life out of me, his daughter? Maybe he’d never loved me. Maybe I was just some adopted daughter he’d never really wanted in the first place.

With sleep nowhere in sight, Emma rolled over and
pulled out her Sutton investigation notebook from under the bed and opened it to an empty page.
Mr. Mercer,
she wrote at the top. It pained her to even pen such a thing.

Then she leaned back to think. Had he known about Emma all along? Had Becky mentioned that Sutton was a twin when she put her up for adoption? Had he put that video of Sutton getting strangled on the Internet, hoping Emma would see it and come forward? Emma had always thought it was some sick coincidence that Travis, her then–foster brother, had found the snuff video that led Emma to Sutton the very night Sutton died. But Mr. Mercer must have gone through Laurel’s Lying Game videos and found one that would get someone’s attention. And then he’d hijacked Sutton’s Facebook account and written back to Emma. Sutton kept herself auto-logged in. It all would have been so easy.

Then Emma thought again about that first morning she’d eaten breakfast with the Mercers. Mr. Mercer had disappeared from the house in the middle of coffee, saying he was grabbing the paper. He had time to affix the
Sutton’s dead
note to Laurel’s car. He was friends with Mr. Chamberlain, and if Sutton and her friends knew the Chamberlains’ alarm code, it was definitely possible that Mr. Mercer did as well. For all Emma knew, the Mercers housesat for the Chamberlains when they went on vacation. Emma wasn’t sure how he could have gotten into the school auditorium unnoticed to
drop the light on her, but Sutton’s father was agile—he went for runs every morning before work and sometimes hiked on the weekends. He was probably capable of a lot.

A creak sounded in the hallway, and panic welled inside Emma’s chest. What if that was Sutton’s dad? There was another loud creak, definitely a footstep. Emma stifled a small sob. It had been terrifying living under the same roof as Laurel when Emma thought she’d killed Sutton. But Mr. Mercer was twice her size. Emma wouldn’t stand a chance.

The doorknob started to turn. Heart in her throat, Emma waited for the door to open and bang into the oak bureau, but then Drake let out a yelping bark, and the doorknob turned back into place.

Emma’s pulse was still racing as the footsteps retreated along the hall. She stared up at the ceiling. Moonlight illuminated a miniscule web of cracks that fanned out from the light fixture overhead. Emma counted them over and over, wondering if she’d ever be able to sleep again.