Prom House by Chelsea Mueller

Author:Chelsea Mueller [Mueller, Chelsea]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Random House Children's Books
Published: 2021-05-04T00:00:00+00:00

eighteen

IT SAID something about how shell-shocked we all were that no one protested. Sage-green candle wax dripped onto the rug with muffled plops. My boyfriend’s lips were parted, and in the dull orange glow of candlelight, I could imagine his exhale of disbelief catching the fire.

My friends’ startled gasps reshaped the room. They stretched to the corners of the house and slipped above the still blades of the ceiling fan. I’d spat the truth out in the open, and that brazen act had choked all responses.

Was that a good thing? Once I’d tottered home drunk and Dad caught me. I’d given him a very detailed story about where I’d been and how I could not have possibly ever ingested such an evil elixir as alcohol. It had seemed like a good idea at the time.

Lies were big. They billowed and bloomed in the available space.

A heavy boom resounded to my left. The windows rattled. An uprooted speed limit sign clapped against the glass. The black graffiti in the lower corner was illegible but familiar. It scraped down across the glass, making a horrifying screech. Rory scrabbled away from the window, knocking into the heavy coffee table. Aubrey, Vic, and Holli covered their ears. The roar of the storm ebbed, and the sign fell away from the window.

There was a small, persistent hiss. I could only stare at the crack in the glass.

Rory tracked my gaze. “We need to get out of here.”

“We’re fine,” Noah said automatically.

Vic backpedaled until his shoulders hit a chair, and then he pushed up to sit in it. “Kylie just accused one of us of being a murderer. I’m nowhere near fine.”

“She didn’t say that.” Liam jumping to my defense should have warmed me. The taste of him still clung to my lips, the faint buzz from his kisses last night still lingering.

“I—” I tried to deny it, but that was exactly what I’d said. It was exactly what I’d meant.

I scanned the room, looking for anything to prove me wrong. Some obvious evidence there’d been an intruder. I’d never wanted a person to break into my house, but today that news would have been great.

There were tears in Rory’s eyes. Holli’s arms were wrapped tight around her torso, her hands disappearing into the extra-long sleeves of her pullover. Hudson’s icy visage was trained on his hands. He twirled a ring hanging from a chain around his neck. Dani’s? One after another, as I looked around the living room, I found worried faces and anxious twitches. Everyone was as freaked as me. Noah and Liam, though? They’d relaxed into mirror positions. Elbows on their knees, like this was a game-day huddle. Like our friends hadn’t just been murdered.

Any of them could have done this. The realization chilled my bones. Hudson had fought with Dani. Noah had loomed over her body. Rory had hated Cam. Aubrey had been sick of his ditching and drinking. Even Liam was big enough to have been able to take Cam down.

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