The Perfectionists (17 page)

Julie shook her head. “That's easier said than done. Think about what happened to Ava.” Even though Ava was smart and pretty and popular, it'd been easy for Nolan to taint her reputation, even if everyone knew deep down he was full of it.

“Or even you,” Julie added, looking at her friend. Parker had been the most admired girl in school before her dad attacked her. Even as a freshman, she'd been on almost every page in the yearbook. But now, just because her dad had gone to jail, just because there were scars on her face, she was persona non grata.

If
their
reputations had been so easy to damage, Julie didn't stand a chance.

Suddenly, Katy Perry's “Firework” came blasting out of her cell phone. She jumped, then picked it up and frowned down at the caller ID. Speak of the devil. Ava was calling. As soon as Julie picked up, she could hear Ava saying “oh my god, oh my god” over and over. She glanced nervously at Parker.

“Hey, what's up?” Julie said tentatively.

Ava stopped
oh-my-god-
ing. “I think Granger killed Nolan.”

Julie froze, her fingers clutching the phone. “Our
teacher
Granger?”

“I'm almost sure of it.” Ava's voice was hushed and trembling. Julie motioned Parker over, then put the phone on speaker.

“I was in Granger's house,” Ava went on. “He offered to help with a paper, although that was bullshit—he's a complete perv. I shouldn't have gone, but that's another story. Anyway, I found . . . pictures. On his phone . . .” She trailed off. It sounded like she was crying.

Slowly, Julie was able to get out of Ava what the pictures were of. Then Ava told her about the Nolan video where he'd threatened Granger. Julie's heart gave a lurch in her chest. “That's probable cause,” she said slowly. “But you really think he could have done it?”

“He wanted to kiss me when I left today,” Ava explained. “And when I said no, his face—” She broke off and sobbed. “It was
awful.
And he has an Oxy prescription. I saw it in his bathroom.”

“I can't believe you went to his
house
,” Parker blurted.

“I know how it looks,” Ava wailed. “But I was just trying to get help with my paper. Honest.”

“We believe you,” Julie insisted. She stood up off her bed and started to pace. Granger had seemed so
nice.
So . . . supportive. It was shocking that he could be such a jerk. She thought back to the day in his class once more.
Could
he have overheard?

Caitlin had leaned forward across the desk excitedly. “Oxy. Everyone knows it's his drug of choice,” Caitlin had said. “Or cyanide. He'd be dead in minutes.”

Julie had cleared her throat, her gaze drifting to Nolan across the room. He was in a group with Ursula; Ava's boyfriend, Alex; and a meek girl named Renee Foley, and they all looked miserable. “We
are
just kidding, right?” she asked nervously.

“Of course,” Mackenzie said quickly, her laugh shrill.

Then Parker leaned forward, caging her fingertips together thoughtfully. “Though we don't have to kill him to take him down.”

“What do you mean?” Ava asked slowly.

Parker thought for a moment. “Well, the next time he hosts a party, we can prank him. Obviously we won't use cyanide, but what about Oxy? He loves the stuff anyway. Not too much—just enough to knock him out. Just enough to take some incriminating pictures.”

A gleam of excitement dawned in Caitlin's eyes. “We could take pictures of him with his pants down. Or Sharpie his face.”

Mackenzie shifted. “Everyone hates him. They're all just too scared to admit it. We'd be heroes if we pranked him.”

Ava straightened her back and lifted her chin. “Should we do it?”

“I'm in,” Mackenzie whispered.

“Me too.” Caitlin nodded.

The girls had looked at Julie. As much as she wanted to take part, it
so
wasn't her. But she took a deep breath. “Where do we get the Oxy?”

At that moment, a shadow fell over her. Parker shot her friend a warning look, and Julie wrenched around in her seat to gaze up at Mr. Granger. For a moment, Julie was sure their teacher had heard everything. Sometimes, he had this way of sitting in on conversations as though he were a fly on the wall. Julie, like all the other girls, was flattered and a little unnerved by his attention—he was
so
good-looking and charming, and he had a vast, impressive knowledge of amazing films. But that day, he'd stared down at her with an unreadable expression on his face.

But then he'd said, “So how's the discussion going over here, ladies?” And given them a big smile.

Now Julie swallowed, her throat dry. “He
did
come over right at the end of our conversation,” she said worriedly to Ava.

“Maybe he did hear everything,” Ava said.

“So how do you think this went down?” Julie thought aloud. “Granger slipped upstairs and gave Nolan more Oxy after we left? And how? Shoved it down his throat and made him swallow?”

“Maybe Nolan woke up after we left,” Ava suggested.

“And you think Granger was watching us the whole time? Like he
heard
our conversation in class and decided to, like, piggyback off our plan?”

“Why would he pin it on us?” Parker asked. “I mean, he doesn't seem like
that
bad a guy.”

“Uh, hello?” Ava interrupted. “Didn't you just hear my story?”

“True,” Julie said. “But what did
we
do? Why would Granger have it out for us? Was it simply out of convenience? Is he that much of a psycho?”

“You should go to the cops with this,” Parker said firmly.

“I can't go by myself!” Ava shrieked. “You have to come with me. I already talked to Caitlin and Mackenzie—they said they'd come, too. I'll even pick you up.”

“No!” Julie almost screamed. Parker looked at her warningly. “I mean, I'm not home. I'll just meet you at the station.”

Twenty minutes later, she and Parker pulled into the parking lot of the police station. The asphalt was cracked and uneven, and she stepped into a deep puddle as she got out of her car, soaking her sneakers. They ran toward the awning outside the glass double doors, where Mackenzie, Ava, and Caitlin were already huddled together.

Ava's face was swollen from crying, her makeup smeared. Caitlin had an arm around her shoulder and looked nervous but determined. Julie's hands clenched slightly, a hot rush of anger toward Mr. Granger spiking through her.

“Are you okay?” she asked Ava fiercely.

“Fine.” Ava looked miserable. “I'm just . . . pissed off. And scared.” She glanced at the others. “I think he realized I'd seen his phone.”

Julie glanced around, half expecting Granger to be sitting in the parking lot, staring at them. But there were only rows and rows of police cars.

She turned toward the door. “Let's go,” she said. “You need to turn this asshole in, Ava.”

She led them into the station. It was nearly nine, and the waiting area was almost empty. A young officer with a dramatically waxed mustache sat alone at the desk, snickering at something on his computer screen. When he saw them, he raised an eyebrow.

“What can I do for you, ladies?” He leaned over the desk, looking them all up and down. Julie dug her nails into her palms. The last thing Parker needed was some idiot in uniform staring at her.

Julie jutted a finger at Ava. “She needs to talk to someone about the Nolan Hotchkiss murder,” she said, her voice ringing clearly through the room.

The cop stared from one to the other of them, gulping like a landed fish. But before he could recover, a deep baritone spoke from farther back behind the desk. “Send them back, Deputy.”

It was Detective Peters—the one who had been going from classroom to classroom questioning the kids. He'd come to Julie's calculus class, and she'd masked her handwriting as best she could, hoping it looked nothing like the happy, bubbly letters she'd penned on Nolan's face.

Silently, the deputy opened a little gate in the desk to let them through. He led them into a large interrogation room with venetian blinds across a big one-way mirror. Julie felt Parker stiffen—the farther they got from an escape path, the tenser she got. Julie touched Parker's arm comfortingly, willing her to relax.

They sat down on uncomfortable folding chairs on one side of a rectangular table. The detective sat across from them. The room smelled faintly moldy, like something moist had gotten into the heating vent. A large poster showing Mount St. Helens exploding hung on one wall.

“Sorry to make you sit in interrogation. My office isn't big enough for all of us.” Detective Peters smiled and leaned back slightly in his chair. “Now, what did you want to tell me about?”

Julie shifted her weight uneasily. She'd talked to enough cops after Parker's hospitalization to know that Peters was trying to coax them into telling more than they'd planned.

Julie exchanged glances with the others. Mackenzie pressed her fingertips together in quick, nervous patterns, her dirty-blond hair in a messy side braid. Caitlin's lips were a thin line on her face. She looked even smaller than usual in an oversize USA soccer sweatshirt. Parker gripped the edge of the table as if she were on the edge of a cliff, and it was the only thing for her to hold on to.

Ava finally spoke up. “I think I know who killed Nolan Hotchkiss.” Her voice was so soft Julie could barely hear.

Detective Peters's eyebrows shot up.

“I think it was Mr. Granger,” Julie added. “Our advanced film studies teacher.”

The detective licked his lips, clasping his hands together on the table in front of him. “That's a very serious accusation, Miss Jalali,” he said finally. “Why would you say such a thing?”

“He's been . . .
intimate
with a lot of the girls in our class,” Ava said. “And Nolan knew it. He was blackmailing him.”

“I see,” said Detective Peters soberly. “Do you have any proof of this?”

“He came on to me,” Ava said miserably. “Today.”

“I've heard it happening with other girls, too,” Julie pointed out, even though this was all news to her.

“And how do you know Nolan knew?”

This time, Parker cleared her throat. “Because I used to be friends with him. He told me he knew. He said Granger kept pictures of girls on his iPhone.”

Julie stared at Parker, astonished by her quick thinking. They hadn't rehearsed this. The other girls looked surprised and pleased, too.

The detective scratched his head. He glanced at Parker, then quickly looked away, perhaps put off by her face. “I see.”

“You should search his phone,” Ava piped up. “A-and you should look through his house. For evidence of Oxy.”

“And you should at least arrest him for what he's doing to these students,” Julie added. “It's wrong.”

Detective Peters tapped on the top of his desk. Finally, he shook his head. “Perhaps Granger has some things to answer for, but as far as we're concerned, Nolan's death isn't one of them.” Then he leaned back in his chair again and gave them a long look that was hard to decipher. “But we
do
have some questions for all of you.”

WE
DO
HAVE SOME QUESTIONS
for all of you.
The words reverberated through Mackenzie's mind, but before she had the chance to wonder what he was talking about—what
type
of questions he might ask—Peters went on.

“We looked through Nolan's phone shortly after his death. We found some pretty steamy pictures of you there, Miss Wright,” he said, looking straight at Mackenzie.

Her stomach dropped. She lowered her head, too humiliated to make eye contact with the others. By their gasps, it was clear they didn't know what he was talking about. “Nolan does that to everyone,” she mumbled.

Peters didn't look impressed. “We also tracked down the IP address of the individual who sent out the photos of Mr. Hotchkiss . . .
defaced
. . . at that party, to an internet café. Several people say a blond girl with your height and build was seen at the time in question.”

Mac felt her cheeks turn red. “It wasn't me.”

Then the detective turned to Ava. “We also found a death threat from you.”

Ava blinked. “What are you talking about?”

He opened the manila file on the table in front of him and took out a thick folder. When he opened it, the first page showed a printout of text messages.

“‘If you keep telling lies about me, I'll kill you,'” he read out loud.

Ava's lips turned downward. “He was spreading rumors about me. I just wanted him to stop.”

“Twenty different kids told me they saw you heading upstairs with him the night of the party, Miss Jalali.” He gave a mock-confused smile. “I guess you were a little mixed-up the last time we talked, huh?”

Then the detective looked at Caitlin. “It's no secret why
you
might want him dead, Miss Martell-Lewis. But killing a bully isn't the way to deal with a problem.”

Caitlin turned pale. “You don't know anything about me,” she spat.

“And I saved the best for last.” The detective then held up a photo. It was a close-up showing the word
Monster
on his face. Julie gasped. “We're still waiting for a final report from forensics, but you see that funny-looking
M
, with a loop-de-loop up the middle? Familiar, huh?”

Then the detective stood. “Look. I don't know what all this means, but I do know you ladies are lying. I don't know why, but I'll give you a break: Tell me the truth
now
, and we can work something out. It's better to get everything out in the open before things get really crazy.”

The room was dead silent. From down the hall, they heard a phone ring. Mac's hands twitched in her lap. She considered confessing about helping to put Oxy in that drink. It was a simple prank, after all—nothing more than that. They weren't
killers.