The Good Girls

Chapter 32

JANE RACED FROM ROOM TO room, screaming Lonnie's name. Please let her still be inside, please let her still be inside, she thought frantically. People were streaming out in the opposite direction, fleeing from the police. Outside, cop cars were parked on the curb, sirens blazing. Jane heard screams and thundering footsteps, but they were fading away. Everyone was heading for the woods, desperate not to be caught. Was Lonnie there, too?

She stumbled into the front yard. The officers were forming a loose circle around the lawn, trying to contain the sprawling mess of running kids. One officer had a bullhorn to his lips. It echoed with feedback. "If you have been drinking or are otherwise impaired, do not get behind the wheel of your car. We will get you home. I repeat . . ."

"Lonnie?" Jane called out, thinking she saw her old friend's head in a clump of kids. No one turned. More kids whooshed past. Jane looked around for Evie, too, but she'd also vanished. Her heart thudded hard.

Jane still couldn't wrap her mind around the fact that Evie thought Mal was still alive—and more than that, that Mal had been with them, a fifth girl in their group. She'd claimed that Mal had been the one who named Crystal in film studies that day, but Evie had said Crystal's name herself. So . . . what did that mean? Was Mal a personality of Evie's? Did Evie walk around half the time thinking she was in Mal's skin?

Jane was astonished that they'd missed something so severe right under their noses. In hindsight, there had been times where it had seemed like Evie was contradicting herself, but Jane had just thought she was arguing a problem through from both angles. And it wasn't like Evie had any parents to notice what was going on—her mom probably never even knew where she was. She could slip here and there as she pleased. If only they'd kept better tabs on her. Looked out for her more. Could they have prevented this? And worse, where was Evie now?

A shadow darted past Jane on the street, headed in the opposite direction of the cop cars. Jane took in the colorful costume and gasped—it was Lonnie, and now she was standing all alone in the middle of the road, staring at something on her phone.

"Hey!" Jane called out, running toward her. "Lonnie!"

Lonnie looked up, but her eyes were glassy. Her nose wrinkled at the sight of Jane. "Go away, already," she said in a bored voice.

"Get out of the street!" Jane screamed. Lonnie made a face. "Why?"

Just then, Jane heard the rumble of a car engine. "Lonnie!" Jane cried as she advanced. The car revved again. An acid-like smell rose in the air. And suddenly, from out of nowhere, a car shot forward, straight for Lonnie's body.

"No!" Jane sprinted for Lonnie. Headlights blazed in the road as bright as a flashbulb, illuminating them both in the glare. The car was moving fast, seemingly oblivious to the fact that the cops were only a hundred or so yards behind them. Finally, Lonnie looked up. She seemed blinded by the white light. Her mouth hung open and her limbs were slack.

"Move!" Jane screamed. She reached Lonnie a millisecond before the car did, throwing herself against Lonnie's body and tackling her to the grass. They landed together on the other side of the street, slamming into the curb with painful force. Lonnie screamed. Jane momentarily couldn't breathe. The car screeched past them, just inches away, down the block and around the corner.

Jane heard a low whimpering behind her and turned. Lonnie had sat up, but she was hunched over, looking dazed. She cradled her left hand in the crook of her right arm. Then she turned and stared at Jane, her eyes widening as she seemed to realize that Jane had saved her.

Wordlessly, Lonnie looked back at her hand. Jane looked, too. Lonnie's fingers were mangled, twisted over one another in an unnatural configuration. Her pinky stuck out at a horrible angle, clearly broken in more than one place.

"Oh my god," Jane said. "Lonnie. Your fingers."

Lonnie's face was pale. She opened her mouth as if to speak, but then her eyelids fluttered closed, and she slumped to the grass.