Two Truths and a Lie: A Lying Game Novel. Sara Shepard
Читать онлайн книгу.
id="uc3ee88a1-ffa5-5d15-9fe9-fe80b619c84b">
TWO
TRUTHS
AND
A LIE
A LYING GAME NOVEL
BY
SARA SHEPARD
Harper
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd. 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF
Copyright © 2012 by Alloy Entertainment and Sara Shepard
Sara Shepard asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins ebooks
HarperCollinsPublishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication
Source ISBN: 9780007433001
Ebook Edition © APRIL 2012 ISBN: 9780007461448 Version: 2016-11-16
Contents
Copyright
Epigraph
PROLOGUE : AN UNWANTED VISITOR
CHAPTER 1 : SHE’S SEEN HIM
CHAPTER 2 : A BOY NAMED TROUBLE
CHAPTER 3 : EVERYONE LOVES A POET
CHAPTER 4 : HOMECOMING HANGOVER
CHAPTER 5 : GAME, SET, OUTMATCHED
CHAPTER 6 : LITTLE EMMA IN THE BIG WOODS
CHAPTER 7 : NIGHT HIKING
CHAPTER 8 : WHAT NOW?
CHAPTER 9 : STARSTRUCK
CHAPTER 10 : GONNA GETCHA
CHAPTER 11 : PARTY OF FOUR
CHAPTER 12 : I AM WOMAN, HEAR ME ROAR
CHAPTER 13 : LOVE, S.
CHAPTER 14 : IF THE KEY FITS
CHAPTER 15 : PROJECT: RUN AWAY
CHAPTER 16 : THE MAKEUP
CHAPTER 17 : THE FALSE BOTTOM
CHAPTER 18 : VISITOR FOR VEGA
CHAPTER 19 : CATCH ME IF YOU CAN
CHAPTER 20 : BLOOD DOESN’T LIE
CHAPTER 21 : MOTHER KNOWS BEST
CHAPTER 22 : SEEK AND YE SHALL FIND
CHAPTER 23 : THE PSYCHOPATH TEST
CHAPTER 24 : WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?
CHAPTER 25 : SOUND THE AL ARM
CHAPTER 26 : FORECLOSED BUT NOT FORGOTTEN
CHAPTER 27 : ONE FLEW THE COOP
CHAPTER 28 : WE ALL FALL DOWN
CHAPTER 29 : LIKE POISON
CHAPTER 30 : CHEESE, MILK, AND EX-CONS
CHAPTER 31 : MEET THE MERCERS
EPILOGUE
Acknowledgements
Also by Sara Shepard
A half-truth is a whole lie.
—YIDDISH PROVERB
PROLOGUE
AN UNWANTED VISITOR
If anyone had peeked through my window, they would have thought it was just a normal slumber party, a festive night that involved popcorn, manicures, and six gorgeous girls from the most exclusive clique at Hollier High giving each other makeovers, sharing juicy gossip, and plotting their next prank for the Lying Game. My iPhone had dozens of photos of past sleepovers that looked exactly like it: a shot of my best friend, Madeline, holding up a picture of a model with fringe bangs and asking if the look would flatter her heart-shaped face; one of my other besties, Charlotte, sucking in her cheeks to apply the new shade of blush she’d bought at Sephora; one of my adoptive sister, Laurel, snickering at a D-list celeb in Us Weekly; and plenty of photos of me, Sutton Mercer, looking like the glamorous, powerful “It girl” I was.
But on this particular night, something was different . . . and five out of the six girls didn’t even know it. The girl my best friends were laughing with, the girl they thought was me . . . wasn’t. Because I was dead. My BFFs were talking to my long-lost twin, Emma, who’d taken my place.
I’d died a month ago and was now perched somewhere between the land of the living and the great beyond, watching my life continue, but with Emma as the star. Everywhere she went, I went, like we were still sharing the same womb. Bizarre, right? I didn’t think the afterlife would be like this either.
That night, I watched as my twin sister sat among my friends. Her legs were curled beneath her on the plush white sofa in the exact same way I used to sit. Her heavy-lidded eyes sparkled with my favorite silver MAC shadow. She even laughed the same way I did—loud, staccato, and a bit sarcastic. Over the past month she had perfected my mannerisms, answered to my name, and worn my clothes, all with the aim of being me until my murderer was exposed.
The worst part? I didn’t even remember who killed me. There were whole chunks of my life that had been wiped clean from my mind, and I was left wondering who I’d been, what I’d done, and who I’d pissed off so much that they’d murdered me and then tricked my sister into assuming my identity. Every once in a while I would get a sudden flash of lucidity and a whole scene would snap into brilliant clarity, but the moments before and after it? Complete blanks. It was like getting a few random screen-grabs from a ninety-minute movie and trying to make sense of the entire plot. If I wanted to find out what had happened to me, I would have to rely on Emma . . . and hope that she caught my killer before my killer caught her.
There were some things Emma and I had figured out: My friends all had alibis for the night I died. As did Laurel, meaning they were all cleared. But there were so many suspects left. A particular one lingered in both our minds: Thayer Vega, Madeline’s estranged brother, who’d skipped town last spring. His name kept popping up, and rumors swirled that he and I were somehow involved. Naturally, I couldn’t remember a thing about