Crushed

31 Forgiveness Has a Price

Spencer walked in the woods behind her house. Dusk had fallen, and prickly branches and split logs littered the forest floor. A stream rushed in the distance, and birds called from the trees. All of a sudden, the night grew darker than it had been even a few seconds before. Something howled close by. Then she heard a low, growling sound, then the crunch of footsteps.

A figure emerged from the trees, pushing back the stray branches. It was a blond girl with a heart-shaped face and glittering blue eyes—Ali.

Spencer gasped. Ali’s face was blistered with burns. She walked with a limp, and her right arm hung lifelessly by her side. She smiled at Spencer nastily. “I thought I might find you here.”

“Stay away,” Spencer warned, shielding her face and taking a big step backward.

Ali chuckled. “But haven’t you been looking for me? You were close, you know. Closer than I ever thought you’d get.” She covered her mouth with her hand. “But you didn’t find me!”

“H-how did you know I was looking for you?” Spencer demanded.

Ali rolled her eyes. “I know about everything. He tells me everything. He’s my lifeline.”

“Noel, you mean.” Spencer backed up so that her spine was pressed against a tree trunk. “We know everything, too. We know Noel’s been working with you.”

A proud smile spread across Ali’s lips. “Spencer, you’re so cute. Such a little Sherlock Holmes.”

“Are we right?” Spencer demanded.

“Sorry.” Ali shook her head. “If I told you, I’d have to kill you. Actually, that’s a good idea anyway.”

She lunged for Spencer and covered her like a net. Spencer screamed and sank to the mucky ground. Ali’s nails dug into Spencer’s flesh. She touched her shoulder with her charred hand. “Open your eyes,” she demanded in Spencer’s ear. “Open your eyes so you can see what I’m doing to you.”

Spencer opened her eyes with a gasp. Suddenly, she wasn’t in the woods anymore, but in a sleeping bag on the floor of her den. Emily leaned over her, touching the exact spot on Spencer’s shoulder where Ali’s hand had been moments before.

“Wake up,” Emily urged. “You’re having a dream.”

Spencer sat up and tried to catch her breath. Emily rested on her haunches. “Were you dreaming about Ali?” she asked.

“Yeah,” Spencer whispered.

“I could tell,” Emily said.

Aria and Hanna wriggled out of their sleeping bags. The clock on the cable box read 7:46 AM. Their prom dresses lay in a pile in the corner, shed haphazardly when they’d arrived here late last night after rescuing Aria. Shoes and bags were in a jumble near the door.

Aria lunged for her phone and winced when she saw the screen. “No messages or texts from the Kahns,” she croaked. Last night, she’d called Mrs. Kahn to ask her to call her if Noel showed up at home—she said he’d left prom without her, making it sound like a drunken evening instead of a scary almost-murder in the cemetery.

Hanna hugged her knees. “I guess that means he isn’t back. I doubt his family is trying to cover for him or anything. They probably don’t know a thing.”

“We need to tell the cops, guys,” Emily urged. “Noel tried to kill Aria last night in the graveyard before running off. They should know he’s dangerous.”

“And risk Noel retaliating by telling on us?” Spencer said. “Or worse—the truth? Aria’s still got that painting at her house . . . and Fuji knows about it. And we’re still connected to Tabitha. It’s too risky.”

Aria raked her fingers through her messy, hair-spray-sticky hair. “So you think it was Noel who told Fuji about the painting?”

Emily pulled a quilt around her shoulders. “I think so.”

“Why wouldn’t he just admit it was me, though? Why would he say it was one of us . . . and make Fuji threaten to search all our houses?”

“Because he’s A,” Spencer said. “It’s just another way to torture us.”

“This whole thing feels like a ticking time bomb,” Hanna said in a hushed voice. “After he left the cemetery, I bet Noel went to strategize with Ali about what to do. Maybe the best thing to do is to go to Fuji and come clean about everything before he gets to her first. Or what if he and Ali plan to hurt us? That note said we were next.”

“I say we nail Noel to the wall this minute,” Spencer said. “We have enough proof, from what Aria told us and from all our evidence, that he had something to do with all of Ali’s diabolical schemes—and now that he assaulted Aria, we have something to bring him in on.”

Hanna nodded. “The cops can do the rest of the forensic work to link him to the murders. I agree—we need to end this.”

There was a pained sound to her left. Aria covered her eyes with her hands. The girls exchanged a sympathetic look.

“Aria,” Emily said softly, shuffling over to her.

Hanna slung her arm around Aria’s shoulders. “It sucks, doesn’t it? It happened to me, too, remember? With Mona?”

“I just don’t want it to be true,” Aria sobbed. “I keep thinking he’s going to turn up and explain all of this to us in a way that makes sense.”

“I didn’t want to believe it was Mona, either,” Hanna said softly. “But Noel admitted he loved Ali. He knew about the switch for so long . . . and he never said a word. You shouldn’t feel sorry for him. You should feel angry.”

Aria nodded. “I know I should, but . . .” She gazed around at them, her eyes wet and red. “Can we give it a day? If I can’t track down Noel by then, we’ll tell Fuji everything.”

Spencer shut her eyes. “What if Fuji decides to search your house? Then what?”

“I’m willing to take that chance,” Aria said shakily.

Spencer leaned back on her palms. Hanna picked at a hangnail on her thumb. Emily gazed nervously out the window.

“How about six hours?” Spencer said. “So by”—she checked her watch—“two PM, if we don’t hear from Noel, we’re going to have to do something.”

Aria’s jaw trembled. “That’s no time at all!”

“If he’s innocent, he’ll reach out, don’t you think?” Spencer said.

“But . . .” Aria looked back and forth. Then she smoothed the tassels on the end of the afghan. “Okay,” she said. “Six hours.”

The girls stood and gathered up their belongings. After some coffee and toasted bagels, they headed out the door. Just as Hanna, Aria, and Emily pulled away, a black Jeep stopped at the curb. Spencer peered out the window, surprised someone was visiting that early. It was a guy she didn’t recognize.

He stepped on the porch and rang the bell. Spencer waited a beat, then pulled the door open. The guy in front of her wore jeans and a striped button-down. He was about Spencer’s height and well-built, and he had sharp green eyes and a sensual, pink full-lipped mouth. There were ugly white scars across his cheeks. There were more slashes on his hands. One of his ears was shriveled, barely there.

“Hey, Spencer,” he said.

She backed away from him. “W-who are you?”

“I’m Chase,” the guy said.

Spencer paused, waiting for the punch line. “No, you’re not,” she spat. “I know Chase.” She didn’t know what to think of Chase—even if he wasn’t A, maybe he was somehow working with Noel and Ali. How else could he have known about Jamaica?

She went to shut the door, but the guy caught her arm. “Actually, you know my brother. His name is Curtis. I sent him to meet you in my place. I’m the one you’ve really been talking to online. I’m the one who set up the Alison DiLaurentis website.”

Spots formed in front of Spencer’s eyes. A horn honked on the next street over, matching the dissonant sounds in her brain. She grabbed the cordless phone that sat on the table next to the door. “Leave right now, or I’ll call the police.”

The boy raised his hands in surrender. “Look, I’m sorry I lied to you. But we had such an amazing connection online, and I was so jazzed about you, but when I went to the Mütter Museum and saw how pretty you were, I just couldn’t go in there looking . . . you know . . . the way I look.” He gestured to his face, his ear. “My brother was in the car with me. So I sent him in instead, told him to be me. I told him what to say about the case. But he fell for you. And then when we found out that you were Spencer Hastings . . .” He paused and shook his head. “Then I really couldn’t show you who I was. I’ve had a crush on you since I read about you in People.”

Spencer didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. “You’re not making any sense.”

“I know.” Chase looked tormented. “But it’s the truth, I swear. Curtis texted me what you said during the meetings, and I told him what to say. We were both into you—Curtis and I actually got into a huge fight the night of prom because I thought we should come clean and he didn’t want to.”

Spencer’s head was whirling so fast it actually hurt. “He mentioned something I never told him—either of you.”

Chase blinked. “What did he bring up?”

Spencer swallowed hard. “Something about Jamaica,” she admitted. It hardly mattered who she told now—Noel was the guilty one, not her.

Chase’s brow furrowed, then a light came on in his eyes. “Oh—you were in Jamaica when Tabitha Clark died, is that it?”

Spencer’s eyes flashed, but she said nothing.

“I’ve gotten some requests to put the Tabitha Clark murder on my blog, since it’s local,” Chase said. “I looked into it a little. I also peeked at your Facebook page—some of your photos are public, including a few from The Cliffs in Jamaica last spring. Curtis was in the room when I was searching, and I might have said that you were there at the same time Tabitha was—it was such a weird and sad coincidence.” His big eyes filled with remorse. “But I’m sorry, Spencer. It’s a huge invasion of privacy. I should have never Googled you, never stalked your Facebook page. I should have been honest with you from the very start.”

The sun came out from behind a cloud, illuminating the scars on Chase’s cheek. Spencer shut her eyes and tried to process what Chase was saying. In some ways, it wasn’t really so different from what Their Ali did to them. She’d convinced them—everyone—that she was someone she wasn’t. And people trusted her because of it. People bought into her lies.

“Why should I believe anything you’re telling me?” she said stiffly. “You could be stalking me, too.”

“I’m not.” Chase shook his head. “I promise, Spencer, I’m not. I would never do that. This has happened to me, remember?”

“Exactly!” Spencer cried. “You know what being stalked was like. Or was that a lie, too?”

Chase set his jaw. “Look at me, Spencer. I’m not lying to you. And I’ll never lie to you again. My roommate slashed me—and even then, people didn’t believe he could do such a thing. You’re right: I shouldn’t have invaded your privacy like that, but I was just trying to help. As far as sending my brother in my place, tell me you wouldn’t have slunk away, creeped out by the scars. I saw your face when you met Curtis. We all judge a book by its cover. It’s just how life is.”

A gust of wind blew her hair sideways. How would she have reacted? Was she really that superficial?

Chase sighed heavily. “Look, I don’t expect to ever see you again, but I do want to assure you that everything on my site is for real. And I was serious yesterday when I had my brother say I found a picture of Alison on a surveillance video from a building not far from here. Look.”

He rummaged in his messenger bag. Spencer shifted, having forgotten what Curtis had mentioned in the car. Chase extracted a silver laptop, opened it up, and clicked on a folder. “I’m friends with a bunch of cops in Rosewood, Yarmouth, and a couple of other towns outside Philly. I was actually researching that case about the Rosewood Stalker—remember that? Someone thought they’d seen the stalker near Hollis. A cop friend gave me some surveillance videos, and I hit on this.”

The folder opened, and several pictures loaded. Spencer leaned down to look. A grainy, black-and-white shot of a Hollis street appeared. Garbage cans sat at the curb. A girl in a leather jacket was getting into her VW Beetle. There was nothing interesting in it, as far as she could tell.

But then Chase pointed to two shadowy figures in the top right corner. “Doesn’t that girl seem familiar?”

Spencer squinted. Even in black-and-white, she could make out the girl’s long blond hair. She had a heart-shaped face, too, and there was something about the angle of her chin that made her heart seize.

She stared at Chase. “Alison?”

“It looks like her, doesn’t it?” Chase clicked to the next photo. This one showed Ali’s back and more of her helper. The person was taller that she was, and broader, too—definitely a guy. Spencer pressed her face so close to the laptop her nose was almost touching the screen. It was impossible to tell, but that could definitely be Noel.

Nausea washed over her. She ran her hand over her forehead. All this time, Ali was in Hollis? This was a huge lead. She needed to show this to the cops. Or maybe she needed to stake Ali out on her own. She had to do something.

Chase shut the laptop and dropped it back into his bag. “I thought you should see that stuff. But as of now, I’m discontinuing the Alison investigation. I think it’s for the best.”

Spencer blinked hard, not expecting him to say that. “Oh,” was all she could murmur.

He looked up at Spencer, his eyes full of sorrow and longing. “I wish we could be friends, but I totally get why you never want to see me again. I just hope you find peace in all this. I hope you guys can nail her for real. That girl did terrible things to you. You’re too awesome to deserve something like that.”

Then he spun on his heel and stepped off the porch. His messenger bag banged against his hip as he headed for the car. His head was still down, and halfway across the yard, Chase’s shoulders rose and fell in a sigh. It tugged at Spencer’s heartstrings. Okay, so Chase was a little misguided, and he never should have Facebook-stalked her, but she could feel in her heart that he wasn’t a bad person. And if it weren’t for Chase and his connections, she wouldn’t know where Ali was potentially hiding.

And, if she was being honest, she’d tried to Google-stalk him, too.

“Wait!” she called after him. Chase stopped and turned. “We figured out that Ali’s boyfriend is definitely her helper,” she said. “It’s this guy who goes to our school, Noel Kahn.”

Chase’s eyes widened. “What are you going to do?”

The wind chimes knocked together. Leaves swirled on the street. “I don’t know,” Spencer admitted. “But maybe you shouldn’t stop the investigation so soon. We might need you.” I might need you, she was too afraid to add.

Chase walked back to her. “I’ll do anything.”

“Well, do you know the exact address of that house you just showed me?”

Chase nodded. “It’s on Atherton Street.”

“Maybe we could go there tomorrow. Just to see.”

“Of course. No matter how small or big. I’m here.”

Spencer pulled her bottom lip into her mouth. She needed someone like that right now, didn’t she? Someone who truly cared. Standing on the path, the sun at his back, Chase simply looked like he was a handsome college kid who liked her—really liked her. Slowly, her icy interior started to melt.

“Have you really had a crush on me since you saw me in People?” she asked in a small voice. And when she peeked up at Chase’s bashful, heartfelt, lovesick face, he didn’t even have to say anything. She already knew the answer.