The Perfectionists (18 page)

Julie spoke up. “We only came here because you promised we wouldn't get in any trouble if we had information about the murder. We know it was Mr. Granger. He had the weapon—the drugs—and the motive. All you have to do is prove it.”

Detective Peters smiled again. This time it wasn't the affable, easygoing grin but a cold, hard smile. “I assure you we'll look into Mr. Granger sexually assaulting students, ladies, and we'll talk to him about that. But I want to talk to
you
about Nolan. Nolan didn't die from the OxyContin. Nolan was murdered with cyanide poisoning.”

“
Cyanide
poisoning?” Mac blurted, though she hadn't meant to. Ava kicked her ever-so-softly under the table.

“That's right.” Peters closed his manila folder again, his gaze moving slowly and intently over each of them. “Now if you come up with any more theories, be sure to come see me right away. Or maybe I'll be paying you a visit before you have the chance.”

He looked at them like he knew everything. For a few seconds, nobody moved. Mac's brain cycled around the same word again and again and again.
Cyanide. Cyanide.

Then Caitlin stood up violently from the table, shoving her chair back. She walked heavily toward the door. Mackenzie jumped up and scrambled after her, and then the others followed.

Outside, they crowded next to Mackenzie's Ford Escape. Caitlin wiped angry tears from the corners of her eyes, then turned and kicked the curb.

“What the hell are we going to do?” Mackenzie's eyes were wide. “Should we confess the prank? We didn't lace that drink with cyanide. I don't even know what cyanide looks like, let alone how to
get
it.”

“No,” Julie insisted. “You saw him in there. He won't believe us.”

“Guys, what are the odds that someone killed Nolan
just like we planned
?” Caitlin said. Her face was red and her breath was coming rapidly like she was on the brink of hyperventilating. “There's no way that's a coincidence. None.”

“Definitely not. Granger
must
have overheard us,” Ava broke in. “It has to be him. Now we just need proof.” Her eyes darted back and forth. “And I think I know where.”

It was easy to get into Beacon Heights High, even late at night—so many overachievers came in for meetings and rehearsals that the security guards kept the doors open until after ten most nights. When Mac and Ava swept through the lobby, no one was even sitting at the front booth to sign them in. The halls were quiet and dark, their footsteps echoing down the empty hallways. The girls had decided it was best that only two of them went, and Mackenzie and Ava promised to call the others when they were done.

“Do you think we'll be able to find something?” Mackenzie asked as they came to a stop in front of Granger's door. They'd talked about breaking into his house but decided they'd start with the school. It seemed less extreme somehow.

“Only one way to find out.” But before she tried it, she looked curiously at Mac. “Those pictures on Nolan's phone the cops were talking about. He was blackmailing you, right?”

Mac lowered her eyes. “Not exactly. It was a dumb bet with his friends. And I was an idiot for falling for it.”

“We were
all
idiots when it came to him,” Ava said, gripping her hand and squeezing hard. “You shouldn't feel embarrassed. He did that to everyone. I heard he had the same sort of pictures of your friend Claire.”

“Claire?” Mac blinked. Claire had never told her that. “When?”

Ava shrugged. “It was when Nolan and I were dating. But who knows? He could have been lying. He said he had pictures of tons of girls.”

Mac turned and tried the knob. Locked. But she had a plan for that, too. Once, during a recital trip, a bassoon player from Oregon had taught her how to pick a lock with a reed. She glanced up and down the hall, then pulled the stiff wooden reed from her patchwork purse. She leaned down over the doorknob and fiddled with it. A moment later, Mackenzie heard a soft
click
. They were in.

“How do you know how to do that?” Ava breathed, astonished.

Mac smirked. “I'm full of surprises.” She slid the reed back in her pocket, and they closed the door carefully behind them.

The ghostly outlines of not-completely-erased words lingered on the chalkboard. Ava strode to Granger's office, which was locked, too. But Mac was able to pick that lock as well, and they pried the door open and went inside.

It was darker in here, and the office was dustier than the classroom. The air smelled faintly of the cucumber Aveda hand soap Granger used, and the shelves were piled with books and old photography equipment.

Mac jerked open the top drawer. It was full of paperwork—stacks of homework, a bundle of permission slips for their upcoming field trip to the Majestic Theater in Beacon, pens, and paper clips. In one compartment, they found a pack of cigarettes and an overripe apple.

“Nothing,” Ava muttered.

Mackenzie tugged on the handle of a drawer and found that it was locked. She crouched in front of it, fiddling with the pick.

“This one's tricky,” she muttered, shaking the shim in frustration.

Outside the door, someone whistled the melody to “Low Rider” off-key. The girls froze. A set of keys jingled musically, and something scraped in the keyhole.

Ava's eyes widened in the dark. “We have to get out of here.”

“I've almost got it!” Mac jiggled the pick one more time, and the drawer slid open.

The doorknob on the door jerked back and forth without turning. The keys jingled again as someone looked for the right one. Ava dug her fingernails in Mac's arm. “Come
on
!”

“Look,” Mac murmured.

The drawer had all the contraband from the past year inside. A Nintendo DS sat atop a comic book. A pearl-handled penknife, a Zippo, and a little silver flask were next to it. Ava dug through it, an anguished expression on her face.

“There's nothing here,” she mumbled. “Nothing even remotely suspicious.”

There was another rasping sound in the keyhole. Mackenzie jerked Ava away by the back of her shirt and ducked under the office desk just as the door swung open.

Randy, the school's hippie janitor, stood in the doorway. His head was cocked, and he looked around as though he could sense someone was there.

Mac pressed her lips together, trying not to breathe. Her heart pounded fast in her chest. What was
he
doing here so late at night? If Randy caught them here, digging around in Granger's office, he would tell Granger for sure. And then Granger would tell the cops.

Slowly, Randy walked toward the office. His footsteps thudded against the floor. His whistling had stopped. Mac couldn't see him, but she sensed he was standing in the doorway. She closed her eyes and tried not to move. Ava clutched her hand tightly. Mac was almost positive she could hear Randy holding his breath, assessing the situation.

But then he breathed out. She sensed him turn, and the footsteps started up again. There was the metallic
clang
of a trash can knocking against the big trash bin he pushed around school. Moments later, there were more footsteps, and the door eased shut.

Slowly, Mac stood and stared at the empty classroom before them. As soon as she knew it was safe, she darted toward the door, eager to get the hell out of there. That had been close—
too
close. With the cops already onto them, one wrong move could be the end of everything they'd all worked so hard for—graduation, college,
Juilliard
. One wrong move and their perfect lives would be over.

SATURDAY MORNING, PARKER SAT IN
Elliot's office, her hands gripping her knees. The room smelled faintly of a cinnamon candle, and a New Age song heavy on the wind chimes and didgeridoo tinkled faintly out of hidden speakers. The therapist offered Parker a gentle smile from across the room.

“So,” he said, “how has this week been?”

“Trying,” Parker admitted.

“Can you tell me why?”

Parker shut her eyes. “There have been a lot of police at school. It's awful.”

“Have any of them spoken to you?”

She tensed. “Why would they talk to me?”

Elliot held up two palms. “I assumed police officers talk to everyone in a case like this.”

Parker let her hair fall around her damaged face and twisted her mouth.
Way to go, idiot
, she thought.
Way to make yourself look super guilty. Why don't you just confess what you did?

She cleared her throat. Elliot was sitting across from her so patiently. She almost felt like she
could
tell him everything. She needed someone to listen, and she wanted it to be him. But then she thought of the other girls. They'd vowed to keep their secret.

“The police did talk to me, yes,” she mumbled.

Elliot tented his fingers together. “Did they ask you about your relationship with Nolan?”

Parker raised one shoulder. “Actually, they
didn't
.” The detective had gone through each girl's motives one by one, but he'd barely looked at Parker. “Maybe he felt sorry for me,” she muttered. For all she knew, he remembered her from when her dad was arrested.

Elliot crossed his legs and leaned forward. “Did you
want
him to ask you about Nolan?”

“No,” Parker said quickly. But then she glanced at the ceiling. “Maybe.”

“Is that because you want them to know what he did? That he was kind of responsible?”

Parker peeked at him. Tears began to fill her eyes, thinking how Nolan wouldn't even look at her when she'd returned to school after her time in the hospital.

“I just wish he would have said he was sorry,” she said. “We wouldn't have been friends after that, but I could have let it go.”

Elliot nodded thoughtfully. “Have you ever considered forgiving Nolan?”

Parker made a face. “I could never.”

“Hear me out, Parker. What happened has already happened; you can't take it back. Your dad is gone, Nolan is dead. Now you need to find a way to move forward.”

Parker cocked her head. “How do I do that?”

Elliot stood and held out his hand. “How about we take a field trip?”

“Don't you have another session?”

Elliot shook his head. “You're all I've got today, Parker Duvall. So you're stuck with me.”

He led her down the gray-carpeted hall and out a heavy door to the parking lot. Parker's bike was chained to the rack, but Elliot bypassed it, heading to a silver car with a couple of bumper stickers for car-racing companies on the back.

“Let's go for a drive,” Elliot said, opening the passenger door for Parker.

“O-okay,” she said, but her heart was thumping. She knew Elliot in the context of one safe room. Venturing out felt different—somehow foreign. But she trusted him.

Elliot slid behind the wheel and started the engine. In moments, a fast-paced, hard-rock song by a band Parker had never heard blared through the stereo. Elliot turned down the volume, casting Parker a sheepish grin. “Sorry.”

“It's cool,” Parker said, pushing her hair off her face for one moment. She caught a glimpse of herself in the side mirror and nearly gasped. The way the shadows angled, she almost looked . . .
normal.
She almost couldn't see her scars.

Elliot pulled onto the main road and drove a few miles over hilly terrain. They passed the main square and all the shops, several developments, the high school, and then the road Nolan had lived on, a road Parker had once known well. She looked at the turnoff, then back at Elliot.

“Uh, where are we going, anyway?” She'd thought they were going to park outside Nolan's house, and maybe Elliot would ask her to say good-bye to Nolan on his front lawn or something.

“You'll see,” Elliot announced, hitting the gas.

Parker shrugged. Maybe they would keep driving all the way to the sea. All the way out of her
life.

But Elliot was slowing to a stop. Parker frowned at the rolling green hills in front of her, then at the wrought iron gates to the left. In scrolled writing along the top read
MCALLISTER CEMETERY
.

Her heart froze.

Elliot shifted into park and cut the engine. He got out of the car, then swung around and opened Parker's door.

She stared at him. “What are you doing?” Her voice was flinty, sharp. Parker shook her head violently. “No. No way.”

Elliot frowned. “What do you mean?”

“I mean I'm not going in there.” Parker got out of the car and took a few big steps away from him.

“Why?” Elliot cocked his head. “What's happening in your mind right now?”

Parker wasn't sure what was happening—all she knew was that warning bells were going off like crazy. She saw flashes of light, then felt the painful twinge of an oncoming migraine. Nolan's face swam in her mind, his eyes narrowed. Then she saw her father's face above her. His hand coming down again and again. She heard someone screaming and only realized later that it was her. How she'd lain there, limp, lifeless, on the floor.

When she looked at Elliot, all she could do was shake her head. Pain seared from temple to temple. “I can't go in there,” she whispered, her eyes closed tightly. “I just can't.”

A crow flew overhead. Elliot's throat bobbed as he swallowed. “Okay,” he said faintly. “It's just that—”

“Parker?”

Parker whirled around. Julie stood behind her, looking angelic in a white diaphanous blouse and with her hair strewn around her shoulders. Her eyes were round with concern. “I was just on my way to town to get something for my mom and saw you here. What's going on?”

“Thank god you're here,” Parker said, collapsing against Julie.

“Come on,” Julie said, reaching out her hand. She glanced at Elliot. “I'm taking her home. We'll catch the next bus.”