She felt a hand on her shoulder. Aria was on the stairs behind her, dressed in a bikini and her grass hula skirt and drenched in sweat. Hanna and Spencer were there, too, dressed normally but looking hysterical.
“What’s going on?” Emily asked.
Aria glanced back and forth at all the kids on the stairs, then dragged Emily onto the landing, which was cool, dark, and empty. Kids swarmed past, but no one seemed to notice they were there.
“Look.” Aria fished the round gold locket she’d been wearing all week out of her pocket and dangled it under Emily’s nose. The two halves of the pendant splayed open. Emily squinted at the two girls in the picture inside. One of the girls was Ali. When she realized who the other one was, she stepped away, confused.
“Is that Tabitha?” she whispered.
“This was her necklace,” Aria said. “Noel found it on the beach, but I checked the pictures of Tabitha online, and it was definitely hers.”
Spencer shook her head, stunned. “I bet Naomi planted it for Noel to find and give to Aria.”
“Or maybe Graham did,” Aria said, still breathing hard. She looked like she was about to burst into tears. “I was wrong about him, guys. He stared right at the necklace like he knew what it was, and then gave me this look like he knew everything I’d done. I ran from him and shut myself in the boiler room, but he screamed at me through the door. I screamed out an apology for what we did to Tabitha, but it didn’t make him stop. He said he was watching me, and he mentioned a picture. I think he was the one who set off the bomb, too. He mentioned gunpowder once when we were talking—he would have known how to make an explosion.”
Spencer clapped a hand over her mouth. “You could have been killed!”
“I know.” Aria swallowed hard.
Emily trembled. “What picture do you think he was talking about?”
“I don’t know,” Aria said. “Maybe the one of Tabitha on the beach. I think he’s the one working with Naomi.”
“Oh my God.” Spencer sank onto a stair, looking woozy.
“But why would Naomi—or Graham, or whoever—plant that necklace for Noel to give to Aria?” Hanna asked.
“It proves we killed Tabitha,” Spencer said, leaning closer so that a bunch of boys clamoring down the stairs wouldn’t hear. “It connects us to her and that night. A is trying to build an airtight case.”
Emily wilted against the wall. “I don’t get it. Why would A need to build even more of a case on us? A—both of them—have the pictures. One of the As saw us. And we did do it. Why does A need to gather extra evidence?”
Spencer shrugged, the emergency light flashing red across her face. “I don’t know. But the FBI is nearby, looking for that girl who jumped overboard.” She glanced at Emily when she said this, then looked away. “This would be a perfect time to tell. We could be arrested within hours, especially if we have this necklace on us.”
Hanna looked at Aria. “Where is Graham now?”
Aria tapped her nails against the railing. “I’m not sure. He disappeared after the explosion.”
Spencer frowned. “That’s strange, don’t you think?”
Aria shrugged. “I’m glad he’s gone. I was afraid he was going to jump out and hurt me.”
“That would make the most sense, don’t you think?” Spencer hugged her knees. “I mean, I’m glad you’re safe, but why wasn’t he waiting for you after the bomb went off? Why did he leave?”
Emily thought for a moment, absently watching as more kids streamed down the stairs. “Maybe he miscalculated where he set off the bomb, and he had to run from it so he didn’t get hurt himself.”
“Or what if Graham wasn’t sure it was us on the roof that night?” Hanna asked, pausing to cough. “Even those pictures of us are pretty blurry. But maybe when you ran from him, Aria, he got his proof. Maybe he and Naomi are going to tell the cops.”
Spencer used the railing to hoist herself to standing. “The necklace will definitely connect us to the crime. The cops will think we tore it off Tabitha that night.”
Hanna nodded. “We have to ditch this necklace now. We don’t need anything connecting us to Tabitha—especially with the FBI here.”
“You should have gotten rid of it as soon as you realized what it was,” Emily said to Aria. “Why didn’t you throw it overboard?”
Aria looked dazed. The fluorescent light in the stairwell made her already-pale skin look even ghostlier. “I wasn’t exactly thinking clearly.”
“It’s good you didn’t throw it overboard,” Hanna said forcefully. “There are a zillion cops dredging the harbor. One of them could have found it. All sorts of people saw you wearing it, Aria—they’d connect it to you in a heartbeat, and then A would make sure that they linked it to Tabitha, too. We need to throw this thing away for good so that it doesn’t come back to haunt us. We should weigh it down with something so that no one ever finds it.”
There was a screech of feedback through the speakers, and the girls looked up. Jeremy breathed into the microphone. “Once again, that’s the Royal Arms Hotel. We’re sending an e-mail out to everyone in case you forget.”
“I have an idea,” Spencer said after the announcement clicked off. “There’s a diving cove not far from here—my diving group went out near it this afternoon. Apparently it’s really deep. What if we took one of the life rafts and headed for it? We could swim to the bottom and bury the necklace under the coral.”