“Well, don’t breathe on me.” Charlotte formed her arms into an X and held them out in Madeline’s direction. “I don’t want anything ruining my chances of hooking up with Noah.”

“Who are you taking, Laurel?” Madeline asked.

Laurel ran a hand over a snag in the carpet. “Caleb Rosen.”

“Don’t know him,” Charlotte announced in a loud voice.

Madeline gave Laurel a tepid smile. “I have math with him,” she said. Her monotone made it unclear whether she approved or disapproved.

Emma blinked. “You guys have dates?”

Madeline ashed out the window. “You mean you don’t?”

“Well, I was going with Garrett,” Emma said, remembering the ticket Garrett had given her when they broke up. He and Sutton must have planned it before she vanished. “But then I got grounded. So I didn’t ask anyone else.”

Madeline blew a plume of smoke out the window. “Just ask someone, Sutton. Tons of guys would be thrilled to go with you.”

Emma stared at the back issues of National Geographic and Motor Trend that lined the bookshelf. She wondered if school dances were Ethan’s thing. “I can’t think of anyone,” she said after a moment.

I wanted to elbow her. Sutton Mercer did not go stag to dances. Madeline gestured a wide arc with her cigarette like she was doing the top half of a ballet move. “Really, Sutton? You don’t even have a little crush on someone?”

“Nope.”

Charlotte smacked Emma with a pillow. “Stop lying. Laurel told us.”

Emma stared at Laurel, but Laurel just raised her shoulders unapologetically. “I know you snuck into that pool with someone. I heard you guys.”

“Spill it!” Madeline’s eyes twinkled.

Heat flooded Emma’s cheeks. “It’s no one, I swear.”

“Come on, Sutton!” Laurel pressed her palms together. “You can tell us!”

Emma ran her tongue over her teeth. Did she dare tell them about Ethan? They were Sutton’s friends, after all, not her murderers. And now that Emma had cleared them, they’d begun to feel like her friends, too.

Tell them, I wished I could say. My friends would probably encourage Emma to get over her oh-so-un-Sutton-Mercer shyness and ask Ethan out. Sure Ethan was a loner, but he was a hot loner.

Suddenly, the front door slammed. “Hello?” a man’s voice called out.

Madeline leapt up, stabbed out the cigarette on the windowsill, and fanned the fumes outside. There were footsteps, and then Mr. Vega peered into the den. “Oh. Hello, girls. Madeline didn’t tell me you were coming over today.”

“They’re just here to plan the Homecoming dance, Daddy,” Madeline said, jumping from the window seat to the La-Z-Boy chair. Her face was even paler than usual.