Never Have I Ever: A Lying Game Novel

“Of course not!” I pull at my door handle, too.

“Seriously?” Madeline yells.

“Seriously! Cross my heart, hope to die!” It’s our fail-safe code, the thing we’re supposed to yell out to show something is dead serious.

Madeline reaches over and stabs the center of the steering wheel. The horn bleats feebly, like a dying goat. Laurel dials a number on her cell phone.

“What are you doing?” I scream at her.

“What’s your emergency?” a voice squawks on speakerphone.

“We’re stuck on the train tracks of Orange Grove and I-ten!” Laurel screams. “We’re trapped in the car! The train’s about to run us down!”

The next few seconds are mayhem. Charlotte leans forward and pounds on the windshield. Gabby and Lili blubber uselessly. Laurel gives our details to the 911 operator. The train rockets toward us. I jiggle the keys in the ignition back and forth. The train barrels closer … closer … until I swear I can see the conductor’s panicked face.

Everyone screams. Our death is mere seconds away.

And that’s when I calmly reach to the dashboard and release the choke.

Gunning the engine, I roll us off the train tracks and spin out in a small, dusty area in the underpass. A moment later, I unlock the doors, and everyone falls to the dusty gravel, watching as the train thunders by just feet from their bodies.

“Gotcha, suckas!” I yell. My body is on fire. “Was that not the best prank ever?”

My friends stare at me, momentarily stunned. Tears streak their faces. Then their eyes blaze with anger. Madeline rises unsteadily to her feet. “What the fuck, Sutton? You used the fail-safe! You broke the rules!”

“Rules are meant to be broken, bitches. Wanna hear how I did it?” I can’t wait to explain. I’ve been planning this prank for weeks. It’s my pièce de résistance.

“I don’t care how you did it!” Charlotte screams. Her face is a knot of fury. Her hands twist at her sides. “No one thinks it’s funny!”

I look at my sister. But she just licks her lips and darts her eyes back and forth, like the prank has turned her into a mute.

Madeline is shaking with rage. “You know what, Sutton? I’m sick of this club. I’m sick of you.”

“Me, too,” Charlotte echoes. Lili looks back and forth, eating this up.

I tilt my chin. “Is that a threat? Do you want to quit?”

Madeline straightens up to her full five-foot-ten height. “Maybe.”

“Fine, then! Quit!” I say to Madeline and Charlotte. “There are plenty of girls who can replace you! Right?” I whirl around to glare at Lili and Gabby, but only Lili stares back. “Where’s Gabby?” I ask.

Charlotte, Madeline, Laurel, Lili, and I squint in the darkness.

But Gabby is gone.

8

TRUTH OR CONSEQUENCES

Emma scanned the rest of the police report.

Stalled mid-1960s Volvo 122 escaped collision with the Sunset Limited Amtrak train from San Antonio, Texas. Miss Mercer claims her car malfunctioned and failed to either accelerate over the tracks or unlock to allow passengers to safely exit. In speaking with passengers M. Vega, C. Chamberlain, and L. Mercer, all three backed up Miss Mercer’s claims that the car’s faulty electrical system was to blame. No charges filed at present. Hospitalization of one victim, G. Fiorello. Ambulance arrived at 10:01 P.M. and took her to the Oro Valley Hospital.

Emma’s spine turned to ice. Gabriella? Hospital?

Footsteps sounded in the hallway. Emma quickly shoved the papers back into the folder and pushed it away from her seat seconds before Quinlan swung the door open. He slammed a paper cup of water on the desk, little drops cascading over the side and splashing the table.

“Here you go. I hope you’re pleased.”

Emma hid a satisfied smile—she was pleased … but also puzzled. Her mind raced with what she’d found. Surely Sutton had stalled the car on purpose but the report listed the incident as an accident. How in the world did Sutton get the others to lie about something that had landed Gabby in the hospital? She wasn’t sure she’d met anyone as all-powerful as Sutton in her life—a girl who could silence her friends even in tragedy.

But I didn’t know the answer of how I got them to shut up either. Sure, I’d been powerful—but not that powerful. Madeline and Charlotte had been so furious in my memory, after all. Their white-hot rage scared me even now.

Emma took a sip of water. It was lukewarm and tasted like metal. The details of the prank still swirled in her head. How could Sutton put them all at risk like that in the first place? Stalling a car on the train tracks—was she insane?

I bristled at Emma’s thoughts. There were tons of risky things in life: riding your bike on the shoulder of the highway, diving into a canyon pool without knowing how deep the water was, touching a germy doorknob in a public bathroom. I must have known my car was going to come back to life as soon as I pulled the choke. I would never put my friends in that kind of danger … would I?

“So.” Quinlan pointed his fingers into a steeple. “Have you come up with a good explanation of why you decided to steal today, Miss Mercer?”

Emma took a deep breath, then suddenly felt drained. “Look, it was a really, really stupid mistake. I’ll pay for the purse, I promise. And I’ll change. No more pranks. No more shoplifting. I swear. I just want to go home.”

Quinlan let out a low whistle. “Well, sure, Sutton! Go on home! You’re totally absolved! No consequences at all! Hell, I won’t even tell your parents!” He didn’t even try to hide his sarcasm.

As if on cue, a knock sounded on the door. “Come in,” Quinlan barked.

The door opened, and Mr. and Mrs. Mercer entered. Mr. Mercer was in surgical scrubs and New Balance sneakers. Mrs. Mercer wore a black business suit and grape-tinted lipstick and carried a snakeskin briefcase. It was clear both of them had been yanked from work, probably from meetings or procedures. Neither looked happy.

One of the worst things about being dead was watching my parents’ reaction to me from a distance. Surely this wasn’t the first time they’d had to deal with a call from the police station. From my new vantage point, it looked like it broke their hearts. How many times had I hurt them like this? How many times hadn’t I cared?

Emma shrank down in her chair. She barely knew the Mercers yet, only that they were in their fifties, worked high-powered jobs, and stuck to the organic aisles in the grocery store. But if the scattered family photos in the foyer were any indication—the snapshots of them with Minnie Mouse at Disneyland, in scuba gear on the Florida Keys, and grinning next to the pyramid in front of the Louvre in Paris—it was clear Mr. and Mrs. Mercer tried to be good parents to their daughters and gave them everything they wanted. Certainly they hadn’t expected their adopted older child to become a criminal.

“Sit down.” Quinlan gestured to two seats across the table.

Neither of the Mercers took him up on the offer. Mrs. Mercer’s white knuckles clutched her briefcase. “Jesus, Sutton,” Mrs. Mercer hissed, turning her tired eyes to Emma. “What on earth is wrong with you?”

“I’m sorry,” Emma mumbled into her chest, pinching Sutton’s silver locket between her thumb and forefinger.

Mrs. Mercer shook her head, making her pearl tear-drop earrings wobble back and forth. “Didn’t you learn your lesson the first time you got caught?”

“It was stupid.” Emma hung her head. She’d gotten what she wanted, but when she looked up, she saw worry etched across the Mercers’ faces. Most of her foster parents wouldn’t have cared if she’d stolen unless it meant they had to fork over money for bail. In fact, most of them would’ve let her rot in jail for the night. She felt a knot of envy for the involved parenting Sutton got—something her sister didn’t seem to have appreciated while alive.

Mr. Mercer turned to Quinlan, speaking for the first time. “I am so sorry to trouble you like this.”

“I’m sorry, too.” Quinlan balled his fingers at his sternum. “Perhaps if you kept a better eye on Sutton—”

“We’re keeping a very careful eye on our daughter, thank you very much.” Mrs. Mercer’s voice was shrill. Her defensiveness reminded Emma of visits with social workers when, without fail, no matter whether or not it was true, foster parents defended what a good job they were doing with the kids in their care. Mrs. Mercer reached into her Gucci handbag for her wallet. “Is there a fine involved?”

Quinlan made an awkward sound in his throat like he’d swallowed a bug. “I don’t think a fine will cut it this time, Mrs. Mercer. If the boutique wants to press charges, it will go on Sutton’s permanent record. And there might be other consequences.”

Mrs. Mercer looked like she was about to faint. “What kind of consequences?”

“We’ll just have to wait and see what the boutique wants to do,” Quinlan answered. “They could issue a fine, or they could pursue a harsher punishment, especially because Sutton has shoplifted before. She might get community service. Or jail time.”

“Jail?” Emma’s head whipped up.

Quinlan shrugged. “You’re eighteen now, Sutton. It’s a whole new world.”

Emma shut her eyes. She’d forgotten that she’d just passed that milestone birthday. “B-but what about school?” she muttered, a bit stupidly. “What about tennis?” What she really wanted to ask was What about the investigation? What about finding Sutton’s killer?

The door squeaked as Quinlan pulled it open. “You should have thought about that before you stuffed that purse under your shirt.”

Quinlan held the door for Emma and the Mercers, and they exited into the parking lot. No one spoke. Emma was afraid to even breathe. Mrs. Mercer guided Emma by the elbow toward her waiting Mercedes with a PROUD HOLLIER TENNIS MOM sticker on the bumper.

“You’d better pray that boutique drops the charges,” Mrs. Mercer growled through her teeth as she slid into the driver’s seat. “I hope you’ve learned something valuable from all this.”

“I did,” Emma answered quietly, her mind spinning with everything she’d read in the file. She’d found a new motive, new leads, and a dangerous situation that would make even the most loyal friends furious.

9

DADDY’S LITTLE GIRL

The ride home from the police station was filled with a stony, implacable silence. The radio remained off. Mrs. Mercer didn’t even complain about the aggressive driver who merged in front of her. She stared straight ahead like a wax figure in Madame Tussauds, not looking at the girl she thought was her daughter slumped in the seat next to her. Emma kept her eyes on her lap, picking at the skin around her thumbs until a tiny red drop of blood slipped across her skin.

Mrs. Mercer pulled the Mercedes into the driveway behind her husband’s Acura, and everyone trudged into the house like prisoners on a chain gang. Laurel leapt up from the leather couch in the living room as soon as the door swung open. “What’s going on?”

“We need a minute with Sutton. Alone.” Mrs. Mercer flung her handbag onto the coat and umbrella stand that stood guard at the front door. Drake, the family’s Great Dane, bounded up to greet Mrs. Mercer, but she swished him away. Drake was more lovable doofus than guard dog, but he never failed to put Emma on edge. She’d been afraid of dogs her whole life after a foster parent’s chow chow used her arm as a chew toy when she was nine.

“What happened?” Laurel’s eyes were wide. No one answered. Laurel tried to meet Emma’s gaze, but Emma just studied the massive spider plant in the corner.

“Sit down, Sutton.” Mr. Mercer pointed to the couch. A glass of sparkling water sat on a wood coaster on the mesquite coffee table, and an upended copy of Teen Vogue lay on the floor. “Laurel, please. Give us some privacy.”

Laurel sighed, then tromped down the hall. Emma heard the soft sucking sound of the refrigerator door opening in the kitchen. She perched on the suede wing chair and stared helplessly around the room at the southwest chic design—lots of desert-y tans and reds, a zigzag Navajo blanket thrown over the leather couch, a white fluffy shag rug that was amazingly clean, despite Drake’s big and often-muddy paws, and a wood-beamed ceiling with several slowly rotating fans. A Steinway baby grand piano stood by the window. Emma wondered if Sutton and Laurel had taken lessons on something so exquisite. She felt another twinge of envy that her identical twin had been cared for so lovingly, given everything she wanted. If fate had dealt her a different hand, if Becky had abandoned Emma as a baby instead of Sutton, maybe Emma would’ve had this life instead. She definitely would’ve appreciated it more.

I felt the same flare of annoyance I always got whenever Emma passed judgment on me. How could any of us truly appreciate our lives if we had nothing else to compare them to? It was only after we lost something, after a mother abandoned us, after we died, that we realized what we were missing. Although that raised an interesting question: If Emma had lived my life, would she have died my death, too? Would she have been the one who’d been murdered instead of me? But as I bitterly mulled this over, a sinking feeling told me that my death had somehow been my fault—something I had done, the result of a choice Emma might not have made. It had nothing to do with fate.

Mrs. Mercer paced back and forth, her high heels clicking on the stone floor. Her face was drawn and her gray streak looked more prominent than ever. “First of all, you’re going to work off this punishment, Sutton. Chores. Errands. Whatever I ask you to do, you’re going to do it.”

“Okay,” Emma said softly.

“And second of all,” Mrs. Mercer went on, “don’t think you’re leaving the house for two weeks. Unless it’s for school, tennis, or community service, if that’s what they decide to give you. Let’s hope that’s what they give you.” She paused by the piano and placed a hand to her forehead, as though the thought made her woozy. “What do you think colleges are going to say about this? Did you even think about the consequences, or did you just grab whatever it was from that store and run?”

Laurel, who’d clearly been lurking, appeared in the doorway, an unopened bag of Smartfood popcorn in her hands. “But Homecoming is next week! You have to let Sutton go. She’s on the planning committee! And then there’s the camping trip after.”

Mrs. Mercer shook her head, then turned back to Emma. “Don’t try to sneak out either. I’m having someone put outside locks on your windows. I know you’ve been sneaking out that way. Yours, too, Laurel.”

“I haven’t been sneaking out!” Laurel protested.

“I noticed footprints all around the flower beds this morning,” Mrs. Mercer snapped.

Emma pressed her lips together. The footprints outside Laurel’s room were hers. She’d fled through Laurel’s window during her birthday party, right after she’d found the unedited version of the snuff film that showed Laurel, Madeline, and Charlotte pranking Sutton. But Sutton wouldn’t have admitted to trampling the flowers, and now, neither would she. Maybe she was becoming more like her twin than she realized.

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