Get Even, page 28
Kitty took a deep, controlled breath. “I hope you’re right.”
FIFTY-SIX
“YOUR MASTER QUITS YOU,” LOGAN SAID, TAKING OLIVIA’S character by the hand. “And for your service done him, so much against the mettle of your sex . . .”
Margot didn’t need to look at the script during Orsino’s penultimate speech. Logan had never so much as stumbled over a line, let alone forgotten one, which meant she got to pay close attention to his performance, instead of hovering over the lines in the prompter’s corner.
He looked down at Olivia during that speech with so much love and tenderness it made Margot’s heart ache. Logan was amazing: smart, funny, talented. Margot still didn’t understand what he saw in her.
She flipped to the last page of the play as the actors prepared for the final musical number. Opening night was almost over, and no one had been attacked. Perhaps their bluff had worked?
Now they just had to figure out who they were dealing with, and gather enough evidence to turn him over to the police. She wondered what Ed had found out about Christopher Beeman that had made him so excited. Margot’s eyes drifted to Logan onstage, leading Olivia through the final dance sequence, smiling out at the audience. Suddenly, his face clouded, the smile replaced by a cross between confusion and fear, as if he’d seen something in the house that disturbed him.
The choreography shifted and Logan disappeared from her view. That nagging doubt about Logan flared up. Was it her logical brain telling her that Logan was the best candidate to be Christopher Beeman? Or was it her insecurity trying to sabotage her new relationship?
A creak from behind her broke Margot’s concentration. She spun around in her stool, but there was no one behind her. Clearly, thinking about a killer had made her paranoid, jumping at each and every sound.
She turned back to the stage. The play was almost finished and no one had been attacked. DGM had won.
Another creak. Closer this time.
Margot turned her head in time to see a dark shadow lunge at her.
As the final strains of the last Bangers and Mosh song faded into the heights of the theater, the applause washed over Olivia like sunshine piercing through the grayness on a cloudy day. She and Logan held their final pose from the dance finale for a count of three, then along with the rest of the cast, they lined up, hand in hand, across the stage for a group bow before breaking in the center and opening the stage for their individual curtain calls.
Olivia felt as if she’d emerged from a dream. From her first entrance until the final applause exploded throughout the house, Olivia’s memories were hazy and indistinct, as if they’d passed by her eyes on the opposite side of a foggy lens.
The band jammed on a reprise of the final song as one by one the cast members cycled through their individual bows. It had been a bone of contention at the final dress rehearsal as to who got the last bow. Usually it was reserved for the character with the largest role in the play, in the case of Twelfth Precinct, clearly Violent. But as with everything else in this production, Amber had pulled a variety of strings, and with a rambling explanation that no one quite understood, Mr. Cunningham had informed the cast that Amber would be getting the final bow, with Olivia directly preceding.
The audience was clapping along with the beat of the music, crescendoing politely as each cast member took their turn. Logan got a nice round of cheers and whistles, which made Olivia smile. He’d given a tremendous performance, one that actually made Olivia’s better, and she was glad the crowd recognized it.
Then it was her turn.
There was always a part of Olivia that expected crickets when she took center stage under the spotlight, that never assumed she’d touched the audience in the way that she’d hoped and would therefore be booed off the stage for her lackluster performance.
So when the audience vaulted to their feet for Olivia’s curtain call, her eyes welled up with tears. She bowed as a boy, since she was still in her boy’s costume, and took the opportunity to wipe the tear streaks from her cheeks.
Then she relinquished the stage to Amber, who swept in like an opera diva at the Met, and brandished her arm over her head before sinking into a deep curtsy.
Olivia noticed right away that though the crowd remained standing, their reception was politely enthusiastic at best.
Mr. Cunningham glided onto the stage, taking Amber and Olivia each by the hand to present them for one last bow. He led Amber forward first; the nasty look she shot him over her shoulder adequately expressed how she felt about that. Then with a wink, he brought Olivia forward.
The reaction was instantaneous. The applause, the whistles. In that moment it didn’t matter if Fitzgerald Conroy chose to work with her or not.
Olivia had already won.
Bree almost felt bad for Amber. She’d given a good performance, based on what Bree had seen in rehearsals, especially considering her notorious inability to remember her lines. Olivia, on the other hand, had literally stolen the show. Bree didn’t know shit about acting, but she knew watching Olivia under the lights that she was in the presence of something special. Whatever damage had gone down between them, Bree could say without prejudice that Olivia was an amazing actress.
As Olivia finished her second bow, a short older guy, dressed all in black with blindingly white hair, took the stage. This must have been the British director everyone had been drooling over since the start of production. He approached Olivia and took her hand, pressing it to his lips.
Even from Bree’s vantage point way up in the spotlight crow’s nest, she could see Amber turning bright red, a mix of embarrassment and rage. She stormed off the stage, much to the amazement of the rest of the cast, but Mr. Cunningham didn’t even bat an eyelash. He joined hands with Olivia and brought the cast together for another group bow, then gestured to the band.
Shane’s fist shot into the air, while Bangers and Mosh continued to jam. John didn’t look up, just focused on his Fender, but even he couldn’t ignore the riotous applause. His songs had been perfect, his performance immaculate.
Mr. Cunningham now started throwing nonverbal shout-outs to the crew, pointing to the stage manager, the lighting booth, even Bree in the crow’s nest, while the music and applause continued. In the end, Olivia, Shane, and John had all gotten what they wanted. Even Bree, in her way. She’d managed to keep their anonymous friend from ruining opening night. Now she just had to make sure—
A scream ripped through the theater.
FIFTY-SEVEN
KITTY ROCKETED TO HER FEET THE INSTANT SHE HEARD THE scream. It wasn’t a cry of triumph but of fear, and as the actors milled around onstage, trying to figure out what was going on, Mr. Cunningham marched into the wings.
He was back onstage in a split second. “We need a doctor backstage immediately. There’s been an accident!”
Accident? No way. Nothing that had happened in the last few weeks had been an accident.
“Where are you going?” Mika said, grabbing Kitty’s hand. “You’re not a doctor.”
Kitty shook her off without a word. She was safe, Olivia was onstage, Bree was in the back of the house manning a spotlight. That left only one person unaccounted for.
Turn yourselves in or else. You have until opening night.
Kitty’s stomach clenched. She’d assumed the “or else” was that their secrets would go public, or their roles in DGM would be exposed. But could the killer have meant something more ominous?
The cast had gathered in the wings as Kitty sprinted up the steps at the far side of the stage.
“Margot?” Logan cried. “Margot, can you hear me?”
Kitty’s stomach dropped as she approached the crowd. Logan was on his knees beside Margot’s unconscious body, grasping her hands in his. A stool and music stand had been knocked over, and a pool of blood had formed beneath her head. From where she stood, Kitty couldn’t tell whether Margot was breathing.
“The paramedics will be here any second,” Mr. Cunningham said, taking Logan by the shoulders. “Let them do their job.”
Logan’s face shot up. Tears streaked his stage makeup. “Who would do this? Who would want to hurt her?”
Kitty wished she knew.
Olivia stood behind Mr. Cunningham, her arms wrapped tightly around her body as if trying to protect herself from what was happening. She looked up and found Kitty in the crowd. The look on Olivia’s face was unmistakably helpless.
Bree was the last to arrive, her face a mix of pain and guilt. Kitty couldn’t even comfort them; she was totally and completely at a loss.
She stood there in shock with the rest of the cast until the paramedics arrived. The good news: no body bag, which meant Margot was still alive, for now. The bad news: they hustled her out on a gurney faster than she’d seen in most medical trauma shows on TV, which meant Margot was in critical condition.
“Will she be okay?” Logan asked the last paramedic as he followed the gurney off the stage.
“I don’t know yet, son. Only time will tell.”
Logan and Mr. Cunningham hurried after the paramedics, followed by some of the cast members. As the crowd thinned, Kitty found herself staring at the stricken faces of Bree and Olivia. They were lost. Scared. They needed a leader.
And that was Kitty’s job.
She nodded toward the wings and dashed to a corner of backstage, obscured by set pieces and curtains.
“This is my fault,” Kitty said as soon as Bree and Olivia joined her. She wasn’t so much looking for someone to contradict her, but saying the words out loud made them real, and steeled her for what she needed to do next.
“Did you attack Margot?” Bree asked.
Kitty rolled her eyes. “Of course not.”
“Then I don’t know how this is your fault.”
“We all know,” Olivia said, between sniffles, “that this is my fault.”
Bree sighed. “How do you figure?”
“Well.” Olivia paused, thinking through her reasoning, then seemed to come to a conclusion that pleased her. “It’s my fault she joined Don’t Get Mad in the first place,” Olivia said, sounding very satisfied with her argument. “If it wasn’t for me, she never would have been involved.”
“If I hadn’t started Don’t Get Mad,” Kitty said, “she never would have gotten involved.”
“Oh, come on, guys.” Bree stepped in front of them. “If her parents hadn’t birthed her, if God hadn’t rested on the seventh day. It’s ridiculous. None of us are to blame for what happened to Margot. We all knew the risks.”
“You shouldn’t have taunted our anonymous friend,” Olivia said. “I told you it was a bad idea.”
Bree set her teeth. “At least I did something. If it had been up to you two, we’d have sat around and let that guy turn us against each other while he continued killing people. I’m sorry, but I wasn’t going to let that happen.”
“That’s hilarious, coming from you,” Olivia said.
Olivia and Bree and their endless bickering. Kitty couldn’t take it anymore.
“Bree was right,” Kitty said. “We should all have been in it together from the beginning. We let that asshole tear us apart. And this is what happened.” She squeezed her eyes shut and pictured Margot speeding away toward an emergency room, her status and chances unknown. “We should have been a team on this one. I’m sorry.”
Bree looked taken aback by the apology. “It’s okay,” she said, all the fight gone out of her.
Kitty’s eyes flew open. “Tell that to Margot.”
The girls stared silently at one another as an ambulance siren faded into the distance.
“Any word from Ed the Head?” Kitty asked.
“Nope,” Bree said. “His cell phone goes straight to voice mail.”
“And you have no idea what it was he found in Arizona?”
Bree shook her head. “I wish.”
“Do you think he’s the killer?” Olivia asked.
“It’s possible,” Kitty said.
“But I’ve known Ed since fourth grade,” Olivia said. “He can’t be Christopher Beeman.”
“But he could have known about Christopher,” Kitty said. “And used that knowledge to throw us off the scent.” She sighed. “I’d say at this point, we can more definitively say who isn’t the killer.”
“Oh,” Olivia said.
Bree nodded. “You were onstage, I was manning the spotlight, Kitty was in the house.”
“And Logan was onstage with me,” Olivia added.
“And John was playing with the band,” Bree said quickly. “Which leaves Theo and Rex unaccounted for.”
“And Amber,” Kitty said. “She stormed off the stage before Margot’s body was found.”
“Or,” Bree added, shifting her feet, “someone totally off our radar.” She shook her head. “Whoever it is, the killer is still out there.”
“And coming for us,” Olivia added.
Kitty turned to them. “Not necessarily.”
Olivia looked confused. “What do you mean? Do you think he’ll just give up?”
“No.” Kitty set her jaw. She was the team leader. It was up to her to make the tough decisions and, if need be, the sacrifices. “I think he’ll give up if one of us turns ourselves in.”
Bree held up her hands in front of her. “Kitty, no way.”
“What are you talking about?” Olivia asked.
“You can’t do this,” Bree continued.
Olivia looked from Bree to Kitty and back. “You want us to turn ourselves in?”
Bree stared at her. “No, Olivia,” she said slowly, as if speaking to a child. “She wants to turn herself in.”
Olivia gasped. “But your college scholarship!”
“It is what it is,” Kitty said. “I started this with Don’t Get Mad. Now, I end it.” She turned to Bree and stuck out her hand. “It’s been a pleasure having you on my team.”
Bree opened her mouth to say something, thought better of it, and took Kitty’s outstretched hand. “Thank you for putting up with me.”
Olivia threw her arms around Kitty’s neck. “Don’t do this. There has to be another way.”
“There isn’t.”
“But—”
Kitty pried herself loose. “I won’t give them your names, so don’t worry. I’ll go to Father Uberti in the morning and confess. Just do me a favor.”
“Anything,” Olivia said impulsively.
“Don’t give up.” Then Kitty turned and marched out of the theater before either of them could convince her otherwise.
She prayed she’d have the strength to go through with it.
FIFTY-EIGHT
THE SURPRISE ALL-SCHOOL ASSEMBLY THE NEXT MORNING was less “surprise” and more “duh” as far as Bree was concerned. Actually, as far as the entire school was concerned. No one in first-period religion even unpacked their bags; they just waited for the perpetually flustered Sister Augustinia to make the announcement before they lined up and filed into the gym.
She passed Olivia in the bleachers. She was nervous, Bree could tell right away. She was biting her lower lip with a savagery that threatened to take off a layer of perfectly pink skin. Olivia was paler than usual too, with purple circles under her eyes that indicated how little sleep she’d gotten the night before.
John walked behind Bree in line, slow and steady, and shimmied onto the bench next to her. She wanted to breach the hideous silence that had descended between them. But what would she say? Sorry I’ve been such an idiot? I know I’ve lost my chance with you, but I hope you don’t hate me? It all sounded hollow and pointless and lame.
The gym was electric, but not in the same chattery way it had been on the first week of school when a similar assembly had played out. Today it was more like the entire student body was tensed, preparing for a punch in the face. No one more so than Bree.
It was surreal, in a way. Total déjà vu—Mr. Phillips setting up the microphone, the cadre of police officers, Father Uberti and members of the administration huddled together in conversation. Bree sat in practically the same row, John by her side, with the same knots in her stomach. And yet the world had changed so drastically in the last few weeks as to make the gym almost unrecognizable, and the excitement Bree had felt then had been replaced by sickening dread.
Bree spotted Kitty as soon as they took their seats. She was standing near Father Uberti, her hands clasped before her. Bree wondered when she planned to turn herself in.
Father Uberti left the school officials and approached the police officers for a quick chat. Looked like things were about to get hopping. Bree slipped her cell phone out of her pocket and looked at the prewritten text she had prepared. Yep, that would do nicely.
“If everyone would quiet down and take their seats,” Father Uberti said. The announcement was needless. Every butt was on a bench, every mouth was closed, every set of eyes trained on the microphone.
“Good,” he said. “Before we begin today, our student body vice president, Kitty Wei, has asked to say a few words.”
Shit. She was going to do it right this freaking second. It’s now or never. Bree hit Send on her phone, and sent two little words barreling out into the cybersphere.
My turn.
“What are you doing?” John whispered.
But Bree ignored him. She watched Kitty with bated breath, registered the moment her phone vibrated in her pocket, the instant she decided to see what it was.
“Kitty?” Father Uberti said, none too patiently. “We’re waiting.”
Then, the moment Bree had been waiting for. The moment Kitty realized what Bree was about to do.
Olivia turned around at the exact instant Bree shot to her feet.
“Don’t!” Olivia cried out. But it was too late.
Bree shouted into the silent gym. “I’m the one you’re looking for. I’m DGM.”
The entire gym pressed in on her at once. Voices shouted—some angry, some congratulatory, all extremely loud.
