“Jenni Pritchard.”
I felt my face do an involuntary scrunch.
Jenni Pritchard was our school’s answer to Snooki. Big hair, big boobs, big mouth. She was pulling a solid D average this semester and had failed our last lit assignment when she’d included a description of Keira Knightley’s dress in her Pride and Prejudice oral book report. The only reason she was even in the running for homecoming queen was that by virtue of her big mouth (and big boobs) everyone in the school knew who Jenni was.
“Wait a minute,” Chase said. “Isn’t Jenni dating Ben Fisher? I thought I saw their names on the ballot together.”
“Was dating Ben Fisher. She broke up with that guy when I asked her out.”
“So, let me get this straight,” I said, holding up a hand. “You dumped Sydney to steal Jenni away from Ben to win homecoming. Then you were gonna dump Jenni and get back together with Sydney?” I said.
He grinned. “Totally clever, right?”
I rolled my eyes.
But the gesture was lost on Connor, who continued to outline his plan. “No one ever uses the write in option to vote, so when Sydney got kicked off the court, I knew my chances of still winning were better if I was dating someone already on the ballot.”
“So, you were planning on getting back together with Sydney, but now that she’s dead…” Sam trailed off.
Connor shrugged. “I guess I’ll stay with Jenni. I mean, at least until winter formal. We have a good chance of king and queen there, too, with Sydney gone.”
He was a true romantic.
“Did Jenni know you were planning to dump her for Sydney again after homecoming?”
“No way!” Connor shook his head. “She totally wouldn’t have gone for it if she did.” He paused. “Wait-you guys aren’t, like, friends with her, are you?”
I shook my head and could see him sag with relief.
“Anyway, as you can see, I had no reason to want Sydney dead. I mean, she actually did me a favor by getting kicked off the ballot. My chances of winning are way better with Jenni anyway.”
His compassion for the dead girl was overwhelming.
“So, just for the record… where were you the afternoon that she died?” Chase asked.
“School,” he said. “Then football practice. I didn’t even hear she was dead until that night.”
I nodded. Dozens of people must have seen him at practice. Still, it would have been pretty easy to show up, be seen, then slip away for a few minutes, off Sydney, and slip back before anyone noticed he was gone.
Though as we left Nickel City, I had to admit he didn’t seem like he had much of a motive, either. Which I voiced to Sam and Chase in the parking lot.
“True,” Sam agreed. “But if he’s telling the truth, it opens up motive for someone else.”
Chase raised a questioning eyebrow at her. “Jenni?”
She nodded. “Connor says Jenni didn’t know about his plan to get back together with Sydney, but what if she found out-”
“And decided to take Sydney out of the picture?” I finished for her. It was certainly a possibility.
One I fully intended to explore when I saw Jenni at school tomorrow.
When I got home, Mom was, predictably, sitting in front of the computer. Only this time she wasn’t wearing the intent frown of someone trying to figure out a dating site. She was smiling. And giggling. And blushing.
I was scared.
“Hey, Mom,” I said tentatively.
Mom’s head whipped up and instant guilt spread across her cheeks in a bright pink stain.
Uh-oh.
“Hartley. I didn’t hear you come in.”
“Whatcha doin’?” I asked, coming around the kitchen table to see her screen.
But before I could catch a glimpse of anything, she quickly closed the laptop.
“Nothing.”
“It looked like you were doing something.”
“Just typing.”
“Typing what?”
“You’re a nosy little one today, aren’t you?”
I put my hands on my hips, doing the best imitation I could of her stern face, the one she always pulled out when it was time to clean my room. “Mom…”
She grinned and threw her hands up in a mock surrender gesture. “Okay, fine. If you must know, Miss Nosy, I was IM’ing with someone.”
I scrunched up my nose. “Since when do you know how to IM?” I asked.
“Ha-ha. Very funny, Hart.”
“Okay, maybe a better question is who were you IM’ing with?” I asked.
“Not that it’s any of your business,” she answered, “but a man.”
I knew I was going to regret this but…
“A man from Match dot com?”
She nodded. “Yes.”
“Oh God, please tell me it’s not Mr. Candlelit Dinners.”
“Hartley!” she said, swatting me. “There’s nothing wrong with a man being a romantic.”
“Right,” I said. “Long walks on the beach are totally cool. If your name is Fabio.”
Mom swatted me again. “It’s not him, okay? It’s… someone else.”
“Someone else, who? Can I see his profile?” I asked, reaching for her laptop lid.
But Mom quickly put her hand on top of it. “No.”
I raised an eyebrow her way.
“I mean… it’s private. This is a private conversation.”
“Ew. You’re not, like, sending dirty messages or anything, are you?”
Mom rolled her eyes at me. “We’re having a perfectly normal adult conversation.”
“‘Adult’ as in ‘R-rated’?”
“Hartley…” Mom warned.
My turn to put my hands up. “Okay, okay. I’m just trying to look out for you, you know. There are a lot of perverts online.”
She shot me a look. “He’s not a pervert. And besides, we’re just talking.”
“That’s how it starts…”
“Hartley!”
“I’m just saying, that’s all!”
“Look, don’t you have some homework to do?” Mom said, making a shooing motion with her hands.
“It’s Sunday.”
“Then don’t you have some friends to Facebook with?”
“I’m not sure ‘Facebook’ is a verb.”
“Hart…” That warning tone crept into her voice again.
I nodded. “Okay. Fine. But don’t say I didn’t warn you when Mr. CyberLove starts sexting you!”
“Hartley!”
“I’m going,” I said, backing out of the kitchen. As I hit the stairs, I heard the distinct sound of the laptop opening and fingers clicking on the keyboard again.
Yep. I was definitely scared.
Chapter Eleven
I SPENT THE REST OF THE DAY DOING MORE STUDYING FOR our upcoming AG midterm, more theorizing that went nowhere, and typing up my story for Monday’s edition of the Homepage, as scant as it was. I pursed my lips, reading back through the copy. There was nothing here that was new: mostly just a vague recapping of Sydney’s death, along with Mr. Tipkins’s remarks from our interview on the cheating scandal. I had to turn in something to fill space in this week’s edition, but it was fluff and I knew it.
I reluctantly emailed it to Chase just under the evening deadline, cringing as I waited for his reply.
It finally came in the form of a Facebook IM as I was tending my FarmVille plot that night, laptop on my legs while I lay back on my bed, digesting the last of Mom’s gluten-free corn spaghetti with texturized vegetable protein balls.
got ur article, it said.
I paused, ready to defend its contents.
u happy with it? he asked.
I bit my lip. But any defense I had fell flat on my own ears, so instead of faking it, I told the truth.
it was fluff.
*grin,* he typed back.
i’ll have something better soon. i swear!
i know.
Something about his confidence in me suddenly made the TVP balls in my stomach roll over one another. Especially since the faith was totally misplaced. Truth was, I had a lot of theories, but no real evidence that pointed to anyone as the Twittercidal maniac that had killed Sydney. And I was at a total dead end when it came to how Nicky had gotten those test answers, or if the two were even connected.