Sara Shepard - Ruthless

Ruthless

PRETTY LITTLE LIARS NOVEL

SARA SHEPARD

To Farrin, Kari, Christina, Marisa, and the rest of the fabulous Harper crew

Suspicion always haunts the guilty mind.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

Contents

Have you ever gotten away with something really, really bad? Like when you hooked up with that cute guy you work with at the bagel shop... and never told your boyfriend. Or when you stole that patterned scarf from your favorite boutique... and the security alarms didnt go off. Or when you created an anonymous Twitter profile and posted a vicious rumor about your BFF... and said nothing when she blamed it on the bitchy girl who sat in front of her in Algebra III.

At first, not getting caught might have felt amazing. But as time went by, maybe you felt a slow, sick roll in the pit of your stomach. Had you really done that ? What if anyone ever found out? Sometimes the anticipation is worse than the punishment itself, and the guilt can eat you alive.

Youve probably heard the phrase She got away with murder a thousand times and thought nothing of it, but four pretty girls in Rosewood actually did get away with murder. And thats not even all theyve done. Their dangerous secrets are slowly eating them from the inside out. And now, someone knows everything.

Karmas a bitch. Especially in Rosewood, where secrets never stay buried for long.

Even though it was almost 10:30 P.M. on July 31 in Rosewood, Pennsylvania, a wealthy, bucolic suburb twenty miles outside Philadelphia, the air was still muggy, oppressively hot, and full of mosquitoes. The flawlessly manicured lawns had turned a dry, dull brown, the flowers in the beds had withered, and many of the leaves on the trees had shriveled up and fallen to the ground. Residents swam languidly in their lime-rocked pools, gobbled up homemade peach ice cream from the open-till-midnight local organic farmstand, or retreated indoors to lie in front of their air conditioners and pretend it was February. It was one of the few times all year the town didnt look like a picture-perfect postcard.

Aria Montgomery sat on her back porch, slowly dragging an ice cube across the back of her neck and contemplating going to bed. Her mother, Ella, was next to her, balancing a glass of white wine between her knees. Arent you thrilled about going back to Iceland in a few days? Ella asked.

Aria tried to muster up enthusiasm, but deep down, she felt a niggling sense of unrest. She adored Icelandshed lived there from eighth to eleventh gradebut she was returning with her boyfriend, Noel Kahn, her brother, Mike, and her old friend Hanna Marin. The last time Aria had traveled with all of themand her two close friends Spencer Hastings and Emily Fieldswas when theyd gone to Jamaica on spring break. Something awful had happened there. Something Aria would never be able to forget.

At the very same time, Hanna Marin was in her bedroom packing for the trip to Iceland. Was a country full of weird, pale Vikings who were all related to one another worthy of her Elizabeth and James high-heeled booties? She threw in a pair of Toms slip-ons instead; as they landed in the bottom of the suitcase, a sharp scent of coconut sunscreen wafted out from the lining, conjuring up images of a sun-drenched beach, rocky cliffs, and a cerulean Jamaican sea. Just like Aria, Hanna was also transported back to the fateful spring break trip shed taken with her old best friends. Dont think about it , a voice inside her urged. Dont ever think about it again.

The heat in Center City Philadelphia was no less punishing. The dormitories on the Temple University campus were shoddily air-conditioned, and summer students propped up box fans in their dorm windows and submerged themselves in the fountain in the middle of the quad, even though there was a rumor that drunken junior and senior boys peed in it regularly.

Emily Fields unlocked her sisters dorm room, where she was hiding out for the summer. She dropped her keys in the stanford swimming mug on the counter and stripped off a sweaty, fried-food-smelling T-shirt, rumpled black pants, and a pirates hat shed worn to her waitress job at Poseidons, a gimmicky seafood restaurant on Penns Landing. All Emily wanted to do was to lie on her sisters bed and take a few long, deep breaths, but the lock turned in the door almost as soon as shed shut it. Carolyn swept into the room, her arms full of textbooks. Even though there was no hiding her pregnancy anymore, Emily covered her bare stomach with her T-shirt. Carolyns gaze automatically went to it anyway. A disgusted look settled over her features, and Emily turned away in shame.

A half mile away, near the University of Pennsylvania campus, Spencer Hastings staggered into a small room in the local police precinct. A thin trickle of sweat dripped down her spine. When she ran her hand through her dirty-blond hair, she felt greasy, snarled strands. She caught a glimpse of her reflection in the window in the door, and a gaunt girl with hollowed-out, lusterless eyes and a turned-down mouth stared back. She looked like a dirty corpse. When had she last showered?

A tall, sandy-haired cop entered the room behind Spencer, pulled the door closed, and glared at her menacingly. Youre in Penns summer program, arent you?

Spencer nodded. She was afraid if she spoke, shed burst into tears.

The cop pulled an unmarked bottle of pills from his pocket and shook it in Spencers face. Im going to ask you one more time. Is this yours?

The bottle blurred before Spencers eyes. As the cop leaned close, she caught a whiff of Polo cologne. It made her think, suddenly, about how her old best friend Alison DiLaurentiss brother, Jason, went through a Polo phase when he was in high school, drenching himself in the stuff before he went to parties. Ugh, Ive been Polod , Ali would always groan when Jason passed by, and Spencer and her old best friends Aria, Hanna, and Emily would burst into giggles.

You think this is funny? the cop growled now. Because I assure you, you are not going to be laughing when were done with you.

Spencer pressed her lips together, realizing shed been smirking. Im sorry, she whispered. How could she think about her dead friend Aliaka Courtney, Alis secret twinat a time like this? Next shed be thinking about the real Alison DiLaurentis, a girl Spencer had never been friends with, a girl whod returned to Rosewood from a mental hospital and murdered her own twin sister, Ian Thomas, Jenna Cavanaugh, and almost Spencer, too.

Surely these scattered thoughts were a side effect of the pill shed swallowed an hour before. It was just kicking in, and her mind was speeding at a million miles a minute. Her eyes darted all over the place, and her hands twitched. You got the Easy A shakes! her friend Kelsey would say, if she and Spencer were in Kelseys dorm room at Penn instead of locked in two separate interrogation cells in this dingy station. And Spencer would laugh, swat Kelsey with her notebook, and then return to cramming nine months worth of AP Chemistry III information into her already jam-packed head.

When it was clear Spencer wasnt going to own up to the pills, the cop sighed and slipped the bottle back into his pocket. Just so you know, your friends been talking up a storm, he said, his voice hard. She says it was all your ideathat she was just along for the ride.

Spencer gasped. She said what?

A knock sounded on the door. Stay here, he growled. Ill be back.

He exited the cell. Spencer looked around the tiny room. The cinder-block walls had been painted puke-green. Suspicious yellowish-brown stains marred the beige carpet, and the overhead lights gave off a high-pitched hum that made her teeth hurt. Footsteps sounded outside the door, and she sat very still, listening. Was the cop taking Kelseys statement right now? And what exactly was Kelsey saying about Spencer? It wasnt like theyd rehearsed what theyd say if they got caught. They never thought they would get caught. That police car had come out of nowhere....