AS OLIVIA SCREECHED HER MOM’S CIVIC TO A HALT IN FRONT of the school, she was greeted by the sight of hundreds of people pouring out of the Bishop DuMaine gym.
Spectators and volleyball players alike exited through the two exterior doors, moving onto the lawn in a leisurely, unhurried kind of way. What had happened?
She sprinted across the grass toward a group of blue Bishop DuMaine athletic uniforms. The girls’ volleyball team. She spotted Kitty behind the team, talking to two girls.
“Stay here,” Kitty was saying to the girls as Olivia raced up to her, “with Coach Miles until Mom arrives. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Kitty,” the girls said in unison. Kitty’s twin sisters.
She caught sight of Olivia and her eyes grew wide. “Good,” she said to her sisters. “I’ll be right back.” Then she grabbed Olivia by the arm and moved them out of earshot.
“What’s going on?” Olivia asked, panting. “Why are you all outside?”
“Someone pulled the fire alarm,” Kitty said.
Ed was trying to clear the Bishop DuMaine gym. Why?
“You won’t believe it,” Olivia said, panting. “But I know who the killer is.”
Kitty eyed her. “Um, yeah. Sergeant Callahan, remember?”
Olivia’s stomach clenched as she slowly shook her head.
The words tumbled out of her mouth as she quickly and calmly explained Ed’s betrayal. She watched the same series of emotions pass across Kitty’s face that she’d felt when she realized what had happened: confusion, surprise, anger, and finally, fear.
“I saw John with Ed about ten minutes ago,” Kitty said, her face instantly pale. “They went into the maintenance corridor behind the gym.”
“There you are!” Bree sprinted up to them. “You heard?”
Kitty nodded.
Olivia grabbed Bree’s arm. “Are the police coming?”
Bree smiled wickedly and pointed to her anklet. “Oh, they’re coming. They’ll follow this baby to the ends of the earth.”
Olivia heaved a sigh of relief. “Good.” She looked from Kitty to Bree and smiled, trying to appear significantly braver than she felt. “Shall we go save Margot?”
Kitty had never been in the gym when it was totally empty. The flashing lights and blaring sirens filled the cavernous space, accentuating the loneliness. It felt like she was alone in the middle of a zombie apocalypse and there was no one left on earth to silence the fire alarm.
No, not alone. Bree and Olivia stood by her side.
None of them said a word, but Kitty reached out and found their hands—Olivia’s on one side, Bree’s on the other—and grasped them firmly in her own. They’d started this journey together. They’d understood the risks, and they’d carried out their DGM missions faithfully, each for her own reasons. They’d weathered long-kept secrets, betrayals, lies, and jealousy. They’d bent but they hadn’t broken, and, together, they were going to face the enemy who’d been so close to them all along, and now held the lives of their friends in his hands.
And this is how it would end.
There was a part of her that was almost relieved. Ed the Head had deceived them all, and though he was a murderer and a sociopath, he was also their peer, not an adult, not a cop like Sergeant Callahan. Somehow, that made it seem easier, more feasible. Like they had a chance this time. Ed didn’t know they were coming for him. For once, they had the upper hand.
Kitty took a deep breath, then in one unified motion, they all walked toward the door marked “Access Restricted” that led to the maintenance corridor.
No one was surprised to find the door unlocked.
Once inside the short hallway with the door closed behind them, the pulsating blare of the fire alarm was muted, and Kitty could finally hear herself think. The so-called maintenance corridor was about ten feet long, with two closets and a door at the far end.
“Any idea where that goes?” she asked.
“Basement,” Bree said. “I was down there during the prank on Melissa Barndorfer. It’s a mix of pipes and ducts, some storage, electrical, water, gas, air-conditioning. And the boiler room tucked away downstairs in the back.”
“How big?” Kitty asked.
Bree scrunched up her face, thinking. “Spans the whole area beneath the gym and locker rooms, I think. But I haven’t seen all of it.”
“Where it all began,” Olivia mused, quoting Ed’s last message. “What do you think he means?”
“It all began with Christopher Beeman,” Bree said.
Kitty nodded. “And he hung himself in the boiler room at Archway.”
Olivia stared at the door to the basement. “Any chance the basement isn’t the creepiest place I’ve ever been?”
“Nope,” Bree said.
“Come on.” Swallowing her fear, Kitty marched up to the basement door and yanked it open.
The stairwell to the basement was significantly darker than the brightly lit hall above, and Kitty paused at the top of the stairs as her eyes adjusted to the dimness. Bree and Olivia filed in behind and the door slammed shut, blocking out the majority of the light with one jarring thud.
There was another door at the bottom of the stairs, and Kitty could just make out a dim yellow glow beneath it, seeping into the darkened staircase. The basement lights were on, which somehow gave her the courage to reach for the handle and swing the door open.
The dim lighting was the result of yellow bulbs screwed directly into sockets in the low ceiling, and though it was better than the darkness of the staircase, they still didn’t provide enough illumination to penetrate the shadowy recesses.
And shadowy it was. The long, open basement was packed with crap. Old chairs and tables from a variety of historical eras were piled haphazardly along with several rows of plush theater seats. An ancient floor polisher, more rust than metal. Dusty file cabinets and long-forgotten book boxes. A basketball scoreboard from the 1950s, the kind a scorekeeper needed to change by hand. Bags of cement, cans of paint, and a variety of brushes, brooms, mops, and tools. Sixty years of Bishop DuMaine castoffs shoved into one space.
Kitty paused, listening for any sign of life. Nothing.
“Where’s the boiler room?” Olivia whispered. Her voice sounded small in the seemingly endless expanse of the basement.
“Stairs at the far end,” Bree said.
The closeness of the basement combined with limited light and the odd, disconcerting shapes of piled-up junk made Kitty feel like they were being watched. She kept thinking she heard noises—the creaky springs of an old theater chair, the clanging of pipes, and the soft fall of footsteps. Once or twice she could have sworn she saw something move, a quick dash of motion from behind the stacks of garbage. She felt the girls press in close behind her as she crept toward the boiler room stairs, and her speed slowed down as fear overtook her.
That’s when she heard it.
“Ooooooh.”
Kitty froze.
“What the hell was that?” Olivia’s voice was little more than a strangled squeak.
Kitty swallowed. “I . . . I don’t—”
“My head.”
Bree caught her breath. “John?”
“How can you tell that’s John?” Olivia asked.
“Bree?”
“John!” Bree turned, and dashed around a set of old file cabinets. “John, it’s me!”
Kitty raced after her, Olivia close behind. As they rounded some giant metal cabinets, they saw Bree crouched on the floor, her arms around John, who was sitting up against the wall next to a pile of old carpet rolls.
“Are you okay?” Bree cried. Her voice shook.
“Okay,” John said.
“What happened?” Kitty asked.
“We split up in the basement,” John said. He jabbed his thumb behind him. “I was snooping around and found them. Thought I heard someone behind me and then . . .” He shrugged. “Guess I got clobbered.”
“What do you mean, ‘found them’?” Kitty asked.
John turned, one hand pressed to the back of his head, and swept his arm across the rolls of old carpet behind him. “Them.”
Bree scrambled over to the nearest bundle and pulled away a blanket, uncovering a face. Even in the dim light, Kitty recognized her.
“Tammi Barnes!” Kitty and Olivia dashed to the other bundles, yanking their covering away to reveal Xavier Hathaway, Wendy Marshall, and the Gertler twins.
“Are they dead?” Olivia asked.
Kitty pressed her fingers to Wendy’s neck. “No,” she said with a sigh of relief. “Drugged I think, but alive.”
Bree pulled out her phone. “We have to call the cops.”
John shook his head. “No signal down here. I already tried.”
“Thank God Ed didn’t kill them,” Olivia said.
“Ed the Head is the killer?” John looked incredulous. “I don’t believe it.”
“Believe it,” Olivia said.
“I’ll explain later,” Bree said. “Right now, we need to find him.”
“Okay.” John pushed himself to his feet, steadied by Bree. “Which way?”
“Nuh-uh,” Bree said. “You’re getting out of here.”
“Without you?” John said with a laugh. “Hell no.”
“John,” Kitty said. “We need you to find the police. Convince them that their missing persons are down here.” Kitty glanced from Bree to Olivia. “We’re going to need backup.”
John gripped Bree’s shoulders. “I don’t want to leave you.”
“I know,” she said.
He took a deep breath, then gave Bree a swift kiss on the lips, and staggered back the way they had come. Kitty prayed that they could stall Ed long enough so that John could return with the authorities. It was their only chance.
They waited until the sound of John’s footsteps disappeared into the depths of the basement before they continued. The door at the end was closed, just like in every horror movie Kitty had ever seen. Opening a closed door in a situation like this was never, ever a good thing. But somewhere on the other side, Margot was in trouble, might need her help. And Kitty had to get to her no matter what.
With a sharp intake of breath, she threw the door open and rushed inside.
She stood on a small landing overlooking the boiler room. Four or five metal stairs led down to the concrete floor, where a tangled mass of pipes snaked out of what looked like an enormous furnace. Bound and gagged on the concrete floor in front of the boiler was Margot.
“Margot!” Olivia raced down the steps, Kitty and Bree close behind, and began to pull at the ropes tied around Margot’s wrists. “Are you okay?”
“Mmumff mum,” Margot cried through her gag.
Olivia pulled down her gag.
“Get out of here,” Margot said. Her voice shook. “Hurry.”
Kitty loosened the rest of her bonds. “Not without you.”
Bree grabbed Margot’s hand. “Where’s Logan? We’ve got to get out of here before Ed comes back.”
“Ed?” Margot said, obviously confused.
“Yeah,” Kitty said, eyeing her. “He’s the one who kidnapped you. It was Ed all along.”
Margot slowly shook her head from side to side as a massive tear rolled down her cheek. “No, it wasn’t.”
“What?”
“I’m afraid Margot’s right,” a voice said from behind them.
Kitty spun around. Blocking the only exit at the top of the stairs, gun casually pointed at them, was Logan.
