"Who?"
Thunder cracked overhead. Rain hammered the roof.
Peyton's gaze fixed on mine. "Chloe," she said. "It's all Chloe."
Chapter Forty-Five
"Chloe," I said.
Peyton held my gaze. "Yes. Chloe."
The name landed like a stone dropped into still water. For one beat, I couldn't process it. Then the ripples spread, reordering every assumption, every piece of evidence I assembled.
Whitney hovered a foot from her daughter, her hand rising toward Peyton's arm again, and then dropping. "Peyton, don't?—"
"No." Peyton's voice was flat, final. "I'm done."
I kept my eyes locked on Peyton. "What does Chloe have to do with Taylor Everett?"
Peyton shifted, half-facing the pool. Its pristine surface rippled in the rain. Something had broken in her, some last thread of loyalty. Or fear. "Chloe came up with it. The whole thing."
Whitney made a strangled sound. "Stop. Please."
But Peyton didn't stop. The words came faster, like a dam breaking. "She said Taylor had to go, that she was in my way. My times were good, but Taylor's were better. Mom had all these plans—elite scouts coming to watch, recruitment letters, everything riding on me making captain, on being number one. Chloe said she'd help me, we could make it so Taylor didn't compete in the next meet, which meant she wouldn'tbe first."
"How?"
"Sedatives. Sleeping pills. I crushed them up and slipped them into her fruit punch at the pool party Mom does every year, just to make her sick enough to miss the end-of-season meet the next day. That's all it was supposed to be. To embarrass her, too, and make her look stupid in front of everyone. It was supposed to be funny. How was I supposed to know what it would do to her? Or that she'd be so out of it she'd fall in the pool and like, forget how to swim."
The air felt thinner, deprived of oxygen. I couldn't get a full breath. I glanced at the blue water shimmering in the rain. This very pool is where Taylor Everett nearly died. Where she was permanently brain-damaged from lack of oxygen.
My stomach heaved. I couldn't afford to be sick. Not here. Not now. "Where did you get the pills?"
"Alexis got them. Her mom has bottles of everything. Uppers, downers. Meds for anxiety, for sleep, for pain. Alexis sells them sometimes, at school. Her mom is so drunk most of the time that she doesn't even notice what's missing. Chloe paid her for half a bottle of lorazepam."
I thought of the prescription bottle in Whitney's trash, Brooke's name on the label. Everything connected. "What happened?"
"Taylor started acting weird. Dizzy, confused. We thought it was hilarious. She was stumbling around, slurring her words. Then she wandered toward the pool. The music was loud, and everyone was distracted. The adults were drinking like they always do, gossiping by the lounge chairs. The dads were grilling. It happened so fast that no one saw it. She fell into the deep end. She hit her head on the side of the pool and just… drifted down to the bottom. By the time Chloe saw her and screamed, she'd been under for like four minutes or something. Leah's dad pulled her out and called the ambulance. Mrs. Everett wouldn't stop screaming."
I closed my eyes. They'd laughed. While Taylor stumbled and slurred, disoriented and vulnerable, these girls had found it amusing. Entertainment at a pool party while the adults sipped wine twenty feet away.
"She was in the hospital for a week, in a coma. She's basically like a zombie now. Chloe told me that if I told anyone, we'd both go down. But it would be worse for me because I was the one who gave Taylor the drink. I had the motive. Everyone would believe it was my idea."
Whitney stood frozen, her face gray. Not shocked. Not horrified at the confession, but chagrined that I knew, not that it had happened.
Peyton sneered. "Mom paid them off and made them sign papers, an NDA, so they wouldn't sue us. They moved away, like, two weeks later."
"Peyton, please." Whitney's lips pressed into a thin bloodless line. She refused to meet my eyes, but she didn't deny it. We were past that point. "It was standard. Our lawyers recommended it," she attempted weakly, wringing her hands.
We both knew she was full of it.
Whitney had known. Maybe not the precise mechanics—who crushed the pills, whose hand tipped the cup—but she'd known enough. That her daughter had done something terrible. Instead of accountability, instead of facing it, she'd opened her checkbook and made a family disappear.
I'd envied her. Her confidence, her belonging, her effortless authority in this community. I'd wanted Mia to have what Peyton had. How could I not have seen who she truly was?
"Peyton, that's enough." Whitney's spine went rigid like she was bracing for a blow. Or preparing to give one. "You're exposing us to potential lawsuits?—"
"Shut up!" Peyton's gaze was cold with fury. "You thought I did it, didn't you, Mom? You thought I was guilty this whole time!"
