Vanished Read online

“Wow. That last evil stare glanced off you and hit me,” he joked, shifting in his seat. “But what do you mean, the reject table? Since when are those guys rejects? I mean, I know Missy isn’t your favorite person, but I thought you and Constance were all buddy-buddy, at least.”

  My heart skipped ten thousand beats. Josh didn’t know about the Billings Literary Society. It was, after all, a secret. But almost all my prime suspects, as he called them, were somehow related to the BLS. If he was going to help me find Noelle, he had to know. Not everything, but at least the basics.

  I took a deep breath and sat forward. “I kind of started a secret society,” I whispered.

  “What?!” Josh blurted.

  Half the dining hall went silent and turned to stare. Josh’s face turned bright red and he leaned forward, so close our foreheads almost touched.

  “What?” he hissed quietly.

  “It’s a long story,” I said. “But basically, there are only eleven members, so some of my friends”—I pronounced the last word through my teeth as I cast my glance toward the reject table—“didn’t get in.”

  “Whoa.”

  Josh picked up a doughnut, and took a big bite. “That’s a motive.”

  “Kind of, yeah,” I said, chewing on my bottom lip.

  “You are going to tell me more about this later,” he said, powdered sugar clinging to his lips.

  “We’ll see,” I said hesitantly.

  “Okay. Who else?” he asked.

  “Well, some of the Billings Alumnae threatened us recently,” I said, poking at a few Cheerios with my spoon. “They blame us for Billings House being torn down.”

  “Which ones?” Josh asked.

  “Paige Ryan, Susan Llewellyn, and Demetria Rosewell,” I replied.

  Another whistle from Josh. “Can’t get more connected than that. The Rosewells own half the defense contracts in the country. She could probably order up her own team of Navy SEALs if she wanted. Could you imagine if a team of SEALs grabbed Noelle? She could be in Kuwait by now.”

  I dropped my spoon. It clanged loudly against the edge of my bowl. “Really not making me feel better here, Josh,” I said.

  “Sorry. Sorry.” He placed what was left of his doughnut down on his plate and raised his hands in surrender. “Anyone else?”

  Just then there was a loud, familiar guffaw from the direction of the food line. I turned to look and saw Gage Coolidge yucking it up with Sawyer and Graham Hathaway—two guys who had been my friends until Graham had pummeled Josh for a past offense against his sister, Jen, who passed away last summer. And until I had broken Sawyer’s heart by getting back together with Josh. All three of them froze in their tracks and stopped laughing when they saw me and Josh. Then Gage slapped Graham’s chest with the back of his hand and led him off in the opposite direction. Sawyer stood there for a moment, looking at me in this sort of forlorn way, before ducking his blond head and trudging after them.

  “I guess he kind of hates me right now,” I said, facing forward again.

  “Sawyer?” Josh asked. “You think he’s the evil mastermind behind this?”

  I gave him a small, sad, smile. “Not really. But I’ve been fooled before.”

  Josh and I looked at each other for a long moment, thinking of all the people we’d lost … and of all the people we’d trusted who’d turned out to be completely bat-crap crazy.

  “Well, if it makes you feel any better, I guess Gage has chosen the Hathaway brothers over me,” Josh said.

  “Wow. A major loss,” I joked flatly.

  “It’s definitely a blow,” Josh replied, a teasing glint in his eye.

  We both smiled wanly at our halfhearted attempt at lightness. Then I took a sip of my juice and looked away, feeling guilty for even trying when Noelle was out there somewhere suffering.

  “I’d say this Billings Alumnae thing is your best bet,” Josh said, wiping his fingers on a napkin. “Those women have money, power, connections, and a crap load of time on their hands. Plus, if they still care about a dorm enough to threaten you, then clearly they’ve got some serious issues.”

  “You’re right,” I said. “One of them just might be crazy enough to do something like this.” A slight thrill of excitement edged out some of the dread from my heart. Now we were getting somewhere. If I could go on the offensive, take some control over the situation, maybe I could end this thing before it even really got started. “I’ll see what I can find out.”

  “Just be careful, Reed,” Josh said. “These people clearly aren’t messing around. I don’t think I could take it if you disappeared on me.”

  “Understood,” I said, reaching for his hand and lacing my fingers through his. “But don’t worry. I promise I’ve put my damsel in distress days behind me.”

  This was probably a very bad idea. An extremely very bad idea. But as I trudged through the woods alone that night, my hood drawn over my head, my face bent toward the ground against the swirling snow, I was certain it was also the right thing to do. Paige Ryan knew something. Why else would she have agreed to meet me so easily? Why else would she have even picked up the phone when I’d called? The girl hated my guts for “stealing” Upton Giles away from her and her friends down on St. Barths over Christmas break. She hated me for the fact that her mother had been locked up for trying—repeatedly—to murder me.

  Yeah. The girl had a skewed sense of right and wrong.

  But the point is, there was no reason for her to take a call from me. Which could only mean one thing: Paige knew where Noelle was. And tonight, I was going to get her to tell me. I’d already had to lie to Headmaster Hathaway today when he’d cornered me after classes, asking why Noelle had missed the entire day. Call me crazy, but I had a feeling he didn’t actually believe me when I’d told him she’d taken a mental health day and gone to Bliss Spa in the city. I had to find Noelle fast, because if he kept asking, I wasn’t going to be able to keep up the “tell no one” rule for very long. And if I cracked, the kidnappers were clear on what would happen. The words “SHE DIES” were pretty much permanently emblazoned across my mind’s eye.

  As I stepped into the freezing cold Billings Chapel, I felt a surge of strength. This was my home turf, and they’d come in here and sullied it. Snatched away my best friend right out from under my nose. Just by telling Paige to meet me here I was reclaiming the upper ground. Showing them I would not be intimidated. That I wasn’t afraid.

  A loud creak sounded in the darkness to my right and I screeched, nearly jumping out of my skin.

  Okay, so maybe I was a little bit afraid.

  The wind howled overhead and I took a breath.

  “There’s a storm, you idiot,” I whispered to myself. “Things in this old building are going to creak and moan. Just calm down.”

  I pulled out a book of matches from my coat pocket and walked to the first wall sconce near the back right pew. My ankles shook, but I stayed the course and lit the candle, then quickly walked along the wall, headed toward the pulpit at the front, lighting half a dozen more along the way.

  I looked across the small chapel. The freshly waxed dark wood pews shone and the plank floors were free of grime. The soft glow of the candlelight lent a distinct warmth to the cozy room. I stood there for a moment, closed my eyes, and took a deep breath, waiting for a sense of calm to descend over me. Waiting to feel that comforting, looked-after feeling I always had here. As if the original Billings Girls were looking down on me, encouraging me. As if they were on my side.

  But I felt nothing—nothing but a chill that shot through me by a stiff wind from a broken window.

  I opened my eyes and sat down hard on the raised platform around the pulpit. Alone. I was totally and completely alone. And so was Noelle. She was out there somewhere, terrified, waiting for someone to come save her. I knew exactly what that felt like. That incredible sense of desperation. When I had been left to die on a deserted island in St. Barths I had started to hallucinate. Started to think I would be better off dead.
Started to think no one out in the real world even cared I was gone. That depth of despair was not something I would wish upon my worst enemy, let alone my best friend.

  I hugged my knees to my chest and rested my chin between them.

  I’m going to find you, Noelle. Just stay strong.

  Then the wind whistled through the eaves again. Up in the rafters, a pair of crows I hadn’t noticed before flapped their wings noisily, as if mocking me.

  “Oh, why don’t you just fly south for the winter already?” I shouted up at them.

  They were wrong. Paige was going to tell me what she knew. I was going to make sure of that. This would all be over by morning.

  The arched chapel door creaked open and Paige stepped inside, cursing under her breath. She shoved the door closed with some effort, blocking out the wind. I jumped to my feet, adrenaline pumping as she dusted snow off the sleeves of her black cashmere coat. Finally, she drew the gray knit cap from her auburn hair as she turned around.

  “God! Could this place be more impossible to get to?” she snapped. Her stiletto-heeled boots—not exactly the best gear for hiking snow-covered hills at night—click-clacked against the floor, the sound echoing through the chapel as she walked to the center of the aisle. “I could have died out there.”

  There were just way too many good comebacks to that one. About Noelle potentially dying out there right now. About the number of times I’d almost died at her mother’s hand. About how I’d like to wring her throat for all the crap she’d pulled on the island, not to mention her current crime. But I just swallowed all the words cramming my throat. I said nothing, hoping my silence and serious glare would intimidate her.

  “So?” she said, turning her gloved palms out. “Let’s have it.”

  I blinked. “Have what?”

  “Your capitulation,” Paige said. “That is why you called me, right?”

  “My capitulation? What the hell are you talking about?” I demanded, stepping toward her. “I called you about Noelle.”

  “Noelle? Why? Is she here?” Paige looked around and then laughed. “Oh, this’ll be good. I’d love to get an apology from Her Majesty. Noelle!” she sang. “Come out, come out wherever you are!”

  I was so confused I actually stood there for a moment with my jaw hanging open. So much for the position of authority. I looked like the town idiot, the dumbfounded subject of the punch line.

  “If this is your idea of a joke—”

  “Reed, you’re the one who called me, remember?” Paige replied, whipping her cell phone out of her Prada bag and checking for messages. “Now, clearly you’ve decided to give up your little Billings project, whatever that was, but clearly I wouldn’t be here unless you wanted something in return. So what is it? What are your petty little demands?”

  “My petty little …” I gritted my teeth together, clenched my fists, and prayed for patience. “Paige, this isn’t a joke. Where the hell is Noelle?”

  “She’s not here?” Paige said blankly, jerking her head to look behind her. Her auburn curls twitched around her face.

  A cold sense of realization washed through me. I was utterly and completely wrong. Paige had no idea where Noelle was. Had no idea she was even missing. There was no way she was a good enough actress to fake this level of cluelessness. She thought that I’d merely summoned her here to tell her I was giving up the BLS—that the lame-ass threats she and her fellow alums had made against me and my sisters had worked. This whole undertaking was pointless.

  “I have to go,” I said, brushing by her.

  “Wait. You have got to be kidding me,” Paige said. “That’s it? You have nothing else to say to me?”

  I turned on my heel to look at her, my face aflame with anger, frustration, and despair. “Yeah. The next time you’re visiting the prison down in Virginia, tell your mom I said ‘Hi.’”

  Then I turned and stormed out into the cold, not even bothering to cover up this time. The Billings Alums didn’t have Noelle. Or if they did, they hadn’t told Paige about it. So who the hell had done this? And where were they keeping Noelle?

  I emerged from the tree line, the stone buildings and winking lights of the Easton campus spread out below me at the bottom of the snow-covered hill, as if all were right in the world. Then I heard a jingle. My breath caught and I paused. Nothing. It was just the wind playing tricks on me. But then I heard it again. It was my phone. I was so riled up that I didn’t even recognize the sound of my own phone. Biting down on my tongue, I fumbled in my pocket for my cell, nearly dropping it in the snowdrift. Snowflakes clung to my eyelashes and the wind bit at my nose as I narrowed my blurred eyes and tried to read.

  THE GAME BEGINS NOW. IF YOU EVER WANT TO SEE NOELLE ALIVE AGAIN, YOU WILL HAVE TO COMPLETE FOUR ASSIGNMENTS. DO EXACTLY AS WE SAY AND TELL NO ONE. ASSIGNMENT NUMBER ONE: HAVE GRANDMOTHER LANGE SIGN A LETTER EXCUSING NOELLE FROM SCHOOL FOR THE NEXT TWO WEEKS. NO FAXING, TEXTING, OR E-MAILS ALLOWED. GRANDMOTHER LANGE MUST BE APPROACHED IN PERSON. THE LETTER MUST BE AN ORIGINAL, WITH AN ORIGINAL SIGNATURE. NO FORGERIES ACCEPTED. WE’LL BE WATCHING YOU.

  My lungs completely emptied out, ice-cold dread seeping through my body. I glanced over my shoulder at the snow-laden trees. Could Paige have sent this text? She’d had her phone out when I’d walked away from her. Maybe she was screwing with me. If someone was watching me right now, it had to be her. She was the only one out here.

  Or was she?

  I closed my eyes against a crippling stab of terror and told myself to breathe. No one else was out here. No one even knew where I was other than Josh. The kidnappers were just trying to scare me. And I was not going to let them.

  When I opened my eyes again and looked around, all I saw were trees, snow, and the campus below. Paige could not have sent the text. I had to go with my gut. The girl knew nothing. She knew less than nothing.

  A gust of wind knocked me sideways and I reached back, pulling my hood over my head. Huddling against the wide trunk of an old elm tree, I bent over the phone and read the message again. This made no sense. Okay, yes, I understood why the kidnapper wanted Noelle excused from school. If she wasn’t, the faculty and administration would get suspicious and start asking questions—especially at Easton, where they had been trained by experience to be severely paranoid. But why would they want me to get a note from Grandma Lange? Noelle had two parents, alive and well. Shouldn’t they be the ones to get her excused from school?

  I gritted my teeth. It didn’t matter whether it made sense. It was my task, and I had to complete it. Noelle’s life was on the line.

  I put my phone away, ducked my head, and started the long trudge back to campus, trying all the way not to look back over my shoulder. Trying to ignore the sinking sense that someone was, in fact, watching my every step.

  “Reed! Oh my God! You have to stop them!”

  Amberly Carmichael accosted me the second I speed-walked through the door to Pemberly, and as tense as I was, my heart practically vaulted up my throat and out my mouth.

  “Stop who?” I said, clenching my fists to keep from bursting into flames or tears or just screaming my head off. I inhaled slowly then exhaled, trying to calm my frayed, paranoid nerves.

  “Them!” Amberly threw her hand out toward the lounge. That was when I saw that she was not alone. Kiki Rosen, Astrid Chou, Vienna Clarke, and Tiffany Goubourne were all seated on the old, fading brocade couches, coats off, Coffee Carma cups on the coffee table before them. “They’re totally plotting against Noelle.”

  My head went light as I stepped into the room. Join the club.

  Tiffany rolled her brown eyes toward the ceiling. “We’re not plotting against her. We just want our revenge,” she said with a conspiratorial smile.

  The door slammed behind me and I jumped.

  “Revenge on whom?” Ivy asked. She’d just come in from outside and was now hovering behind me in her white coat. She tugged her black leather gloves from her fingers and gave me a questioning look.

  �
�Noelle,” Astrid replied, popping her gum.

  Ivy laughed, her eyes bright. “I’m so very in.” She walked over to the nearest couch and sat down next to Tiffany.

  My stomach twisted itself up like a cats’ cradle, changing formations every two seconds. I lowered myself into an empty chair, weak from the many scares of the past ten minutes. “Revenge for what?”

  “For that ridiculous prank she played on us last night,” Vienna said, like it was so obvious. She flicked her thick, highlighted hair over her shoulder and crossed her skinny-jeans-clad legs at the knee. “I mean, I practically had a heart attack.”

  “I think I did have a heart attack,” Amberly said, touching her fingertips to her neck. She walked up behind my chair. “See? My pulse is still elevated.”

  “Then I don’t get why you won’t let us use you,” Kiki said, lifting her legs and dropping her feet, one at a time, atop the coffee table. Her heavy black boots each came down with a bang. The coffee cups jumped.

  “Because! I think what you’re planning is unusually cruel and besides … it’s Noelle,” Amberly said, flouncing around my chair and sitting down on the arm.

  “So you’re just afraid of Noelle,” Astrid said. “You’re a patsy, is what you’re saying.”

  The other girls snickered.

  “I’m not afraid of her,” Amberly pouted, sliding her long blond hair through her fingers over and over again. “It’s just that she’s been one of my best friends for, like, ever.”

  Tiffany and I exchanged a look. We both knew Noelle didn’t think of Amberly as a friend so much as a lap dog.

  “I don’t want to do this to her,” Amberly added.

  “Do what, exactly?” I asked wearily.

  Tiffany sat forward at this. “We were thinking that when she gets back, we should tell her that Amberly’s in the hospital. That the whole ordeal fried her delicate nerves and she had to be medicated.”

  “Vienna’s boyfriend’s brother is interning at Easton Hospital and he said he could get us an empty room and hook up some machines to beep and stuff. Make it look real,” Astrid added.