The mall parking lot was about an hour away from Ezra's cabin, and so far neither of the men in the truck had said a word to each other. Ezra shifted in his seat awkwardly, they still had forty minutes to go until they reached the cabin.
"How have you been" He asked, looking at Toby timidly.
"I've been pretty fucking miserable actually." Toby snapped back at him, before Ezra could respond Toby started up again.
"Ezra, what were you thinking? That god damn book! I bet you thought it was just the best idea in the universe when you decided to move to Rosewood huh- how could you do that to Aria? Use her like that? You knew she was going to be your student when you met her, you've made her life hell for the past 2 years, and now you've broken her heart. Out of all the girls in the world you had to pick the most hopeless romantic to destroy." Toby shook his head "What the hell were you thinking Ezra"
Ezra looked out the window. He thought his self-hatred had reached its peak, but again he was wrong. Despite being the oldest one in the group Ezra often felt like he didn't know what he was doing.
"I swear it wasn't like that. Yes, I knew that Aria was going to be my student, and yes I started talking her because I thought she could give me information for my book, but I fell in love with her Toby. By the end of that day the book was the last thing on my mind" Ezra looked at Toby pleadingly "I never wanted to hurt her, she's the most important thing in my life"
Toby glanced at Ezra quickly and then focused on the road again. It was so hard to stay mad at Ezra. Before Toby had found out about the book Ezra, Toby, and Caleb had become really good friends. They would go over to Ezra's apartment to watch soccer games every weekend and had started an ultimate Frisbee team for Thursdays when their girlfriends had 'girl's night'
"Ezra you have caused so much trouble for us" Toby said shaking his head, Ezra looked down at his hands he knew Toby was never going to forgive him. "But I actually happen to like you" Toby laughed. Ezra's face brightened. "God Spencer is going to kill me when she finds out I've forgiven you, and you better watch out for Hannah when Caleb decides to give you a second chance."
"When he decides to give me a second chance?" Ezra raised his eyebrows and grinned at Toby
Toby threw his head back and laughed "The thing is, Ezra, Caleb and I have always been loners. You may be a grade-A jackass but you will always be our friend." Toby got a serious look on his face again "But once we get the girls back you better make everything up to Aria and never fuck her up like this again." Over the past two years Aria had become like a little sister to Toby and he knew Caleb felt the same way about her. Their group of friends had become very loyal to one another.
"once we get the girls back…" Ezra murmured.
"We are going to get the girls back" Toby said firmly, keeping his eyes straight ahead.
When Toby and Ezra got back to the cabin, they found Caleb passed out at Ezra's computer desk. Caleb had been trying to back-trace a message Hannah had received via email from A a couple of weeks ago. Ezra walked over to Caleb and shook him awake.
"Wha-" Caleb exclaimed jerking up with a startled look on his face.
"Hey" Ezra grimaced, he had walked over to a dauntingly high stack of boxes on the kitchen table. Caleb stood up, stretched, and walked over to the sink and splashed his face with bitter cold water.
"Did you guys find anything? What are you looking for?" Caleb asked, walking over to Ezra and Toby who were now both concentrating on locating the box with the Radley files in them.
"When we got to the car we found these" Toby said, carefully dropping the four cellphones onto the kitchen table. "Each of the girls got the same message"
Welcome to the Dollhouse… Bitches
A
"Ezra thinks he say that phrase 'The Dollhouse' in one of the files he took from Radley."
"Wait so Hannah's car was actually there?" Caleb clarified
"Yeah" Toby said distractedly, he had returned to rummaging through the boxes.
"So did you guys bring it back or did you just leave it in the middle of nowhere?" Caleb asked, looking at them incredulously.
"Caleb, I'm still a police officer" Toby said looking up "I honestly can't believe that the Rosewood P.D. hasn't found her car yet, but we can't tamper with evidence. We could get in serious trouble and the last thing we need is to be thrown in jail."
"That's true" Caleb said, shrugging. He picked up the phones and sauntered back to the computer table. "I'm going to see if I can get any information off of these"