What happened, guys? Only two reviews last chapter? You'll hurt my feelings. Remember that I've finished writing this, so the more interest people show in it, the more quickly I'll update. So show me you guys are interested and I'll update as often as I can. Here's the next chapter, and please don't forget to review; if you like it enough to read, you should like it enough to review. Here you go...
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Of all the things A had done to the girls, this was arguably the most damaging. Nothing A had done before had made Emily feel so utterly lost and helpless, and as she stared at the woman she loved, she was cursing the enemy who had torn them apart. And, although she wouldn't admit it, she was also cursing herself, wondering if there was some way she could have pretended this, something she should have done or said to stop them from reaching this point.
Seeing that Hanna wasn't going to speak, Emily began cautiously, "What A did…" Even without specifics, the mere mention of what had just transpired was enough to cause pain to shoot through Hanna's eyes. Realizing she didn't know what she was actually going to say, Emily just gave an apologetic half-shrug, wishing she could take Hanna up in her arms and hold her until all the hurt faded. But they were past that now, way past it.
"It was awful," Hanna said, filling the silence with words that were even worse than the lack of them. "And it wouldn't have happened if I'd just listened to you and come out when we first started dating."
Emily's mouth fell open. In all their time together, Hanna had never shown any indication of wanting to come out; every time Emily had mentioned it, Hanna had shied away or flat-out refused. But here she was, admitting she'd made a mistake. So maybe there was still hope, maybe this wasn't the end. "It's not too late," Emily said. "Now that everyone knows, maybe we can finally be open about it. We can finally be a real couple."
Hanna chewed on her lip for a moment, a solitary tear trickling down her cheek. She looked so vulnerable, so scared, and Emily wanted nothing more than to comfort her. But she knew this was a choice that Hanna had to make on her own, so she stayed silent and let her girlfriend – if she could even call her that – make her call. Wiping away the tear, Hanna said briskly, "It was never going to be that simple, Em. You might be ready to deal with the backlash, but I'm not."
"It doesn't matter whether you're ready," Emily said, trying not to show how hurt she was; that brief flicker of hope had quickly died, leaving her colder than before. "You're going to have to deal with it. Everyone knows, Hanna. We can't change that. All we can do is deal with it."
"And I think the only way for me to do that," Hanna said, her voice still filled with confidence that neither of them believed, "is alone."
If Emily hadn't already been leaning against the sink she would have taken a step back, so stung was she by these words. Hanna Marin, the girl she'd had a crush on for as long as she could remember, was saying that she didn't want to be with her anymore. Had she screwed up her one shot to be with the girl she loved? "But we could do it together," Emily said shakily. "We're stronger together, we always have been. There's nothing I can't do with you by my side, remember?" she added, referencing something she'd said on one of their very first dates. And, she now added silently, there's nothing I can do without you by my side.
"That's not true." Hanna folded her arms, seeming ever smaller and more vulnerable, making Emily's heart ache. "I don't think we can get through this if we're still… together."
"Are…" Emily paused, swallowed around the lump in her throat, and went on, "Are you saying you don't want to be with me?"
Hanna took a deep, shaky breath, and Emily felt her heart miss a beat. Maybe Hanna was about to apologize, admit she was wrong, say they could work things out. Then the blonde-haired girl lowered her head and said, "That's exactly what I'm saying."
"No." The world fell from Emily's lips before she even had time to think it. It was the only word that mattered, the only thing that could be said in this situation. She'd waited for Hanna for months, hoping that if she just gave her space Hanna would finally come to her senses and be open about who she really was. This wasn't how their story was supposed to end. There were meant to be a hundred more dates, nights spent curled up together on the couch, laying outside in the spring sunshine, talking late into the night until one of them fell asleep on the other end of the phone. It wasn't supposed to be like this; it couldn't end here.
"Don't make this harder than it has to be," Hanna said, and without thinking Emily took a step forward. In an instant Hanna had stepped back, and that was when Emily knew it was over.
"Please," she said, her heart not letting her believe what her brain already knew. "Hanna, please. We can work through this. We can't let A tear us apart -"
"Do you really think it was just A?" Hanna interrupted, and the confidence in her voice was gone, replaced by a resigned kind of sadness. "Do you think we would have lasted even if A hadn't interfered?"
Emily's first instinct was to say yes, but the strength of her feelings alone wouldn't have been enough to see them through. Not wanting to admit the truth that was staring her right in the face, she avoided the direct question. "We can still work through this," she said, fighting back tears. "I'll do anything for you, Hanna. I'll do anything to make this work. And as long as you still love me -"
"I don't."
The words stopped Emily dead in her tracks, washing away all her words and any coherent thoughts. "You don't mean that," she said in disbelief. "You can't."
"I do mean it," Hanna said, wrapping her arms more tightly around herself as if that would cut her off from the person standing in front of her with tears in her eyes. "I don't love you anymore, Em. I'm sorry."
Without another word Hanna strode from the room, and it was only when the door slammed behind her that Emily was broken from her stunned reverie and the tears started to fall. She whirled around, trying to find something to hold onto lest she just crumple to the ground. Her fingers latched onto the edge of the sink and she closed her eyes, her breath catching on a sob. When she finally opened her eyes, she saw herself in the mirror. Every tiny little detail, every tear stain and smudge mark and hair out of place, and suddenly it was painfully clear. She knew why Hanna had left. A was never the problem; Emily was.
She stared at herself in the mirror and vowed to do whatever it took to win Hanna back.
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For a long moment Paige didn't speak. She met each of the girl's eyes, opened and closed her mouth for a few times, and then finally began. "Caleb and I have been looking into it ever since we got that message," she said, shifting her weight so she was in a more comfortable position. Resting her hands in her lap, clenching them together so hard that Hanna thought she might actually draw blood, Paige went on, "We had no idea who this 'A' person was, so we started looking for suspects."
Spencer nodded, encouraging; that's what they'd done at first too. Hanna, however, slumped back slightly. Why had she thought that Paige might have been able to find out something they didn't know? They'd been looking for months, so it didn't make sense to even hope that Paige and Caleb had been able to come up with something overnight. Aria stayed silent, looking down at her lap as if she couldn't even stand to face the truth.
"What did you find?" Hanna asked finally, and Paige gave her a sympathetic look before continuing.
"Well, we figured that this seemed like a pretty targeted attack." Paige flicked through her phone until she found the picture of Emily, but then she quickly looked away again. "The person who sent this didn't ask for anything, not money or even documents. This wasn't a random thing; they chose Emily specifically."
"So you figured it had to be someone who was connected to her," Spencer said.
Paige nodded. "And it sounds like you guys have been dealing with A for a while, right?"
The girls shared a look and then Aria nodded in confirmation. "A has been… watching us for a few months. Since just before Ali's body was found."
"Which probably means our hunches were correct," Paige said, but the news did nothing to cheer her. "We started by looking through people in our grade at school. Caleb managed to get into the school records, and we came up with a few suspects."
She fell silent again, and Hanna had a feeling she knew what she was thinking; Hanna was thinking the same thing herself. They were both wondering how much to trust the other. If Paige was on their side, her information could help them find Emily. But if she wasn't, giving up their information might be enough to get Emily killed.
"You show us yours and we'll show you ours," Spencer said, with a wry smile.
Paige half-smiled in response, and then turned her attention her phone. She scrolled through a few pictures before finding the one she was looking for. But before showing it to the girls, she said, "I don't mean to sound paranoid, but…"
"You're wondering if you can trust us," Aria surmised.
Paige ducked her head, clearly embarrassed by the mere thought. "I know you guys love Em, but somebody hates her enough to kidnap her. And it's probably someone close to her, so…"
"It's okay," Spencer said reassuringly, but Hanna thought she could detect a faint hint of indignation in her voice. "But you can trust us. We would never do anything to hurt Emily."
Paige hesitated, evidently turning the words over in her mind, and then she relaxed, some of the tension visibly lifting from her shoulders. "I know," she said at last. "And if we're going to get Em back, we need to trust each other."
The thought didn't sit well with Hanna, but there didn't seem to be much of a choice. "So what did you and Caleb find out?" she prompted.
Paige held out her phone, and the other three crowded around to see it. The screen was filled with an image, a document of some kind, and even when Hanna had read it she didn't feel any more enlightened. "What is it?" she asked finally.
Spencer took the phone and scanned the document again. "It's the school financial records," she said, confused. "It looks like Mona's parents donated a lot of money to the school."
Aria tilted her head, looking at Paige as Spencer handed the phone back to its owner. "That in itself doesn't mean anything."
"There's more." Paige navigated to the next picture and handed the phone back to Spencer, whose mouth fell open as she saw the contents.
Hanna was so tired and wound up that she doubted she would even be able to read any of the words, so she waited for Spencer to relay the message.
"Mona was close to getting expelled," Spencer said in a kind of awed whisper. "See the dates here? This letter to her parents was sent only a week before they donated to the school."
"So the donation was actually a bribe?" Aria asked, but she didn't sound shocked; she and Mona had never really been close.
Hanna, however, found this story hard to believe. "But how would kidnapping Emily help?"
"A while ago I heard Mona talking to Lucas," Paige said slowly. "All I heard was that she was in trouble with the school, and it was because of someone on the swim team."
"So that could have been Emily," Spencer said. "In which case this is revenge."
"Mona wouldn't do something like that," Hanna cut in. "She's my friend. And why would she give us the chance to save Emily, if this was all about revenge?"
Paige shrugged, clearly not wanting to aggravate Hanna further when she was already in a vulnerable state. "I don't know," she said. "It was just a theory."
"Then give me another one," Hanna said, not even trying to keep the venom out of her voice. It was bad enough that her former girlfriend was missing, but to have someone accuse one of her closest friends of being the cause for it? That was too much.
Without missing a beat, Paige took the phone back and scrolled to another picture. "Suspect number two," she announced, handing the phone back to Spencer. "Noel Kahn."
"It looks like his position was untenable too," Spencer said, almost to herself. "He's been suspended for fighting twice, and told if he gets in trouble again he'll be expelled."
"So this is, what, some kind of outlet for his frustration?" Aria asked. "He can't risk letting his anger get the best of him at school, so he takes it out on Emily?"
"Do we have a stronger motive? Why he'd choose Emily in particular?" Spencer asked, and Paige shook her head. "Well," she went on thoughtfully, "at the very least this shows that he has a violent streak – the kind that might cause him to kidnap someone. Do we have any other suspects?"
"One more," Paige said. "There's not as much evidence for this one, but given her history with Ali, it's entirely possible."
"Who is it?" Aria asked.
"Jenna." Paige took her phone back and tucked it into her pocket before addressing the girls again. "We know she hated Ali, so she might not be too happy about you guys either; and in the past couple of weeks her grades have seriously dropped."
"Like she's been distracted by something," Spencer said, catching onto Paige's train of thought.
"Like planning on kidnapping someone," Aria added.
Hanna couldn't quite find her voice, but the last two suspects were definitely plausible, so she just nodded slightly. While the others continued discussing the options, Hanna's attention drifted. She was jerked back into the present moment by the buzzing of her phone. The other girls were still talking, so she pulled her phone out of her pocket and read the message.
We need to talk. It's urgent. Call me. –Toby
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Any guesses as to what Toby wants to talk to Hanna about? Or about who A is? Let me know in the reviews, and I'll see you next time.