Griffin_H:It’s the same girl LOL looks like she still doesn’t have her shit together
I’m gripping Annica’s phone so hard it feels like I could shatter it in my palm.
“You have five minutes to explain to us what the fuck is going on.” Annica crosses her arms.
Chapter 25
“Get ready with me while I tell you guys all about the suspected murderer on my campus. Her name is Sloane Sawyer,” Marissa’s voice echoes from my phone. Dani sent me the TikTok Marissa made about me and I watch it in silence while the three of us sit at our table at the Bean.
“That fucking bitch,” I mutter. I bet she just couldn’t wait to post that.
“She’s probably just off the rails because Wes broke up with her after the ski trip, though I don’t know if he told her why exactly,” Dani says.
“It sounds like he told her.” I hand Dani’s phone back to her.
“Forget about that,” Annica snaps. “Start explaining.”
I tell them everything. Well, noteverything,but almost.
I explain the murders and the journal pages, and I tell them that me and Asher being together was only because he caught me trying to throw out evidence, and that there was never a real relationship, hence why he’s been “cheating” on me the whole time. I do not, however, mention that it was a two-sided deal, the other side being to manipulate Wesley into passing on the resort. I knowAnnica too well, and she would rat me out to Wes in a heartbeat. I also admit to her that I’ve liked Wes for years, and this past summer really was not intentional—I never meant to hurt her or him or anyone.
“Wow,” Dani says, wide-eyed, when I’m done explaining. “Why did you feel like you couldn’t tell us any of this?”
I fiddle with the handle of the coffee mug, turning it this way and that. “I didn’t want you guys to get hurt. People have died. I figured the less people involved the better.”
Annica crosses her arms, glaring at me. “But you sought out Asher instead?”
I try not to roll my eyes at her. “I didn’t seek him out. I told you he caught me in the act. I had to clue him in. He said he’d help me.”
“In exchange for what?” she asks.
I think of something on the spot. “To pretend to date him in front of his family, to win him points with his grandfather.”
She narrows her eyes at me. “Well, that’s over with, so why did he sleep here last night? And what are you doing about Wes—are you guys going to be together or what?”
My god, I tell her the most unbelievable story, about murder no less, and all she wants to know is what my relationship status is.
“Asher stayed over because Miles pushed his way into my apartment and tried to...”
Dani gasps. “Oh my god, was he trying to kill you?”
“No, he was trying to... convince me to love him? He’s obsessed. It’s scary.”
“Well then, it makes sense that he would be the killer,” Annica says.
“That’s what I thought at first too, but then why try to pin it on me? If I’m in jail we can’t be together, so why would he be trying to send me there?”
“If he can’t have you, no one can?” Dani suggests.
“Maybe. But then at the hotel, it was a woman who put the gun in our room. His ex-wife, Kate Holland. Either way, the police have all this information and should be looking into both of them. Especially after last night.”
“I wonder who was taking pictures of you outside the station and sent them to the gossip page,” Dani says. “How did they even know you’d be there?”
“It was probably Marissa,” I say. “Get ready with me to go frame Sloane for murder!” I mock her annoying high-pitched tone. Though it could’ve also been Colton, as he made it crystal clear he was going to make sure I was branded as a killer all over social media.
“Sounds like something Asher would do,” Annica mutters.
“It wasn’t him, trust me.”
