The Girl in the Wall Read online

  “Hey, I’m Hunter Winters,” Hudson says.

  I laugh but no one else does. Hudson glances back at me, as do most of my classmates, and I am mortified that I didn’t just nod coolly at the joke. I stare down at my hands, my cheeks hot.

  “I’m going to start with—” Hudson continues.

  Mr. Barett coughs loudly and Hudson stops.

  “Right, yeah, happy birthday Ariel,” he says, his voice flat. “Sorry I don’t do birthday songs.” As he launches into his break-out song, “Wanting You,” I notice Ariel and Bianca switching seats, their identical blond hair shimmering in the dim light as they resettle. And then I forget Ariel and her followers, that I’m stuck in this terrible place for the entire weekend, and I just sink into the music.

  But just as Hudson begins the chorus, the room goes pitch black, the shades falling silently over the windows as the lights are switched off.

  Hudson’s voice and guitar trail off into an eerie quiet. A girl giggles and for a moment I think it must be some kind of weird joke. It is dark for about thirty seconds and then I hear a sharp popping sound and the lights flare back on.

  I see the body first, a crumpled form by the front of the stage, a growing pool of blood coming from underneath it. It’s Hudson’s bodyguard. In that moment Hudson leaps off the stool and goes to him.

  “Everyone on the floor, now,” someone barks.

  The room is chaos as people dive off their chairs to lie flat on the floor.

  I stretch out on my belly, my heart thumping violently in the compressed space between my chest and the floor. I lift my head the tiniest bit to look around, trying to make sense of this thing that makes no sense. The room is filled with the men I thought were Hudson’s security team, the ones wearing cargo pants and T-shirts, the ones who now have stocking caps pulled low over their faces. The ones who are carrying guns.

  Two of them stride over to where Mr. Barett and Ariel lie prone and pull them up. They expertly fold Mr. Barett and Ariel’s arms behind their backs with one hand while holding guns to their temples with the other. I can’t see their faces, just Ariel’s long hair swishing as she is jerked toward the door of the living room.

  For a moment everyone else is frozen, but then Ella Kim screams and the person holding Mr. Barett flinches. In that millisecond Mr. Barett shakes free and grabs for the gun. I see his fingers wrap around the barrel just as more shots ring out. I instinctively scrunch down squeezing my eyes shut. I expect to hear more screaming but now silence pulsates like a living thing.

  I don’t want to see what has happened, but not knowing is even worse so I slowly raise my head. My classmates are where they were, still plastered to the floor. For a moment I think everything is okay, or at least the same, but then I look toward the front of the room.

  Two more people are lying on the floor, both at odd angles. Each has blood running from a head wound, so fast and thick it’s like a faucet has been turned on. My breath is stuck in my chest and for a moment the lack of oxygen makes me light-headed, like I will faint, but still I can’t look away from the bodies on the floor. The bodies that are most surely dead.

  The bodies that are Mr. Barett and Ariel.

  CHAPTER 2

  Ariel

  When the room goes black I feel my energy coil. It’s been a while since I was in actual physical danger but my body remembers and it is prepared. There is a slight rustle behind me and then the shot, loud, makes me jump and leaves the smoky scent of burnt paper in the air. I am up before my mind processes what it was, heading to the fireplace. My fingers are sure as I reach for the catch that springs open the secret door that leads to the hidden passages that wind through my old house. As the lights flicker on I am inside, grate closed firmly behind me. It’s only then that I realize I am panting and my heart is pounding with a sickening heaviness inside my chest.

  I lean back against the wall of the tunnel and close my eyes. These tunnels go all over the house, at least the old part. The addition my dad had put on, the one with his office suite, doesn’t have any. I’m not sure why they are here—the Underground Railroad maybe?—but I also don’t think anyone else knows about them. Which means I’m safe for the moment, while I try to figure out what is happening.

  I peek out through one of the openings in the grate and gasp. I see a body on the floor. It’s not until Hudson rushes over that I realize it’s his bodyguard. Someone must be trying to kidnap Hudson. But when I look around to see who’s coming for him, I see it’s not Hudson they’re after at all. It’s my dad and Bianca who are being hustled from the room, guns pressed to their temples. For a moment Bianca throws a wild look behind her and I see pure terror in her eyes. Does she know it’s me they want, not her? If so, she needs to say something, now.

  That’s when the screaming starts and I see my dad pulling free, grabbing for the gun. Then it’s in his hands, he actually has the gun, can do something, can fight back.

  I don’t see who fires the shots but I see them fall, first my dad, then Bianca.

  And now two more bodies lie on the floor. My dad’s head is steadily pumping out blood. Next to him is Bianca, her blond hair matted with red and little flecks of gray, the heart necklace I gave her wet with blood.

  I stumble backwards, retching, bile burning the back of my throat. But burning even hotter is the thought that screams in my head. That is supposed to be me on the floor, bleeding to death next to my father. Bianca switched seats with me at the last minute so she could have the better view of Hudson Winters. The chain of my own heart necklace is suddenly searing into me and I tear it off, ripping the delicate links, and throw it in a far corner where it’s hidden in shadow.

  I am alive and Bianca is dead. And my father—

  There is something wet on my face and I realize it’s tears. I am crying, which is weird because I don’t actually feel anything, just a cold numbness at my core. But tears are there and my nose is started to get stuffed up. Still, I feel nothing, just the surreal emptiness, like a dark cavern where my insides used to be. And the knowledge that I will not look out again at the bodies.

  Another shot rings out and I scramble over to the grate, my heart in my throat. I see my classmates stumbling around, crying, a few sitting clumped together on the floor. It takes a minute to see that no one has been hurt. The shot was fired by another man in Army pants and a black ski mask. He is probably the man who shot my father. I am looking at the guy who just made me an orphan. I should probably be crying or hysterical but all I feel is this emptiness, like wind is blowing through a cavern in my center. That and a profound thankfulness that my sister Abby isn’t here. Her mother is a pathetic caretaker, but right now I couldn’t be happier that Abby is with her instead of here, in the room where her dad was just killed.

  A shiver runs down my spine because if Abby was here, she would probably have been killed too, and that is unthinkable.

  “I said to shut up,” the guy says, calmly.

  Everybody shuts up. The sight of a gun cradled in the arms of a guy who just shot two people will have that effect. Two other people with stocking caps are efficiently wrapping a tarp around the bodies that used to be Bianca and my father like they are meat in a butcher shop. My stomach lurches and I look away.

  “Everyone sit down and keep quiet,” the guy standing in front says.

  Once again, everyone obeys. I glance over to the spot by the microphone and the wrapped bodies are already gone. The rug has been pulled forward to cover any lingering stains. It’s as if nothing happened. What’s really weird is that now it almost feels like nothing happened, even though rationally I know my entire life has just changed completely. Does this not-feeling mean I am in shock?

  It’s only then that I think about John Avery. I’ve known John since I was born. John is the same age as my dad, fifty-five, but he’s slight and frail from having bad asthma and looks about ten years older, with his wispy salt-and-pepper hair and deep wrinkles from spending way too much time working. He was the one who c
ame to my kindergarten graduation when my dad had a last-minute business trip to Bermuda. He’s the one who brought me roses when I had the lead in the middle school musical and yet again my dad was away. And he’s the one who made sure I had follow-up medical attention after the stuff happened in Mexico. I’m not deluded enough to think he did it out of the kindness of his heart—he did it because his job is to do what my dad says and my dad told him to go film the graduation and the musical and to make sure the Mexico thing was handled. But I think the roses were John’s idea. And he really did look proud when I walked across the stage when I was five.

  I scan the room but then I remember he left before the concert, not toward the front door but toward the back stairs that lead to the upstairs office suite. He is up there now, probably working on something for my dad, with no idea what is going on down here. Unless they’ve already killed him too.

  And now I finally feel something. First comes fear, with a sharp, metallic taste in my mouth. Then briefly a piercing, biting pain slices down so deep it takes my breath away. Then comes the anger. That one is familiar, my default setting. That one I can handle. It burns icy cold in my belly but we’re old friends and I welcome the anger. Anger makes me act and I like action. It’s sitting around feeling things like fear and pain that I can’t handle.

  So I lean back toward the grate, ready to hear what the guy who assassinated my dad has to say for himself.

  “This is a hostage situation,” he says. “Be aware that the house and grounds are heavily guarded. There is no escape. But no one will hurt you and soon you will be free, as long as you do what we say, when we say it.” He pauses, as though to let this sink in. Like anyone is going to go against their orders. They’ve taken pampered high school students hostage, not Navy SEALS.

  “You are free to be in this room, and with permission, the bathroom, and the kitchen. Anyone who steps outside of these rooms will be shot.” One of the girls gasps. It is surprising to hear him say those words in the same exact tone he used to assure everyone that no one would get hurt. “Right now we need your cell phones, cameras, and computers. The agent in back will collect those.”

  The agent in back has a big bag and he or she begins walking around the room. I look back at the first gunman, the one who murdered my dad and Bianca. Years ago Sera and I watched a movie on late-night cable about a guy who terrorized a small town, shooting defenseless people point blank on the street, and they called him The Assassin. That’s who this guy is.

  It’s probably weird that I’m sitting around thinking about an old movie when my dad is dead (not thinking about that) and my party is being held hostage. But then according to the psychiatrist my dad made me see after the Mexico stuff, I have issues with handling “vulnerable” feelings.

  The Assassin watches closely as the agent in back goes around, but everyone is eager to do exactly what they are told and soon the agent in back is filling a bag with the newest, most expensive technology money can buy.

  As the collection continues I think about what The Assassin said. It’s a good plan. The party is supposed to last all weekend so by the time any parents would expect their kids home or call to check up on them, The Assassin, his boss, and his agents will be long gone. I wonder how they knew about the party—the details were under wraps for security reasons. I’m guessing they paid off one of the household staff to find out the exact plan. My dad isn’t exactly the nicest boss so it probably wouldn’t have even taken that much. And if they somehow came in under the guise of being security for Hudson Winters, then it was really the perfect opportunity. They sweep in, take their hostages and—

  Wait. Their hostage was supposed to be me. Wasn’t it? I know Hudson Winters is probably a millionaire, as are a bunch of kids in my class, but that’s loose change to my dad, whose company brings in billions every quarter. We are beyond rich so if they’re coming in here with machine guns, we are the obvious ones to take. Which is why we were being led from the room at gunpoint. Well, my dad and the person they thought was me. So what happens now, when their hostage is gone and the source of their money is dead? How could they have killed the person who was going to give them what they wanted?

  The answer I come up with has me suddenly shivering in a cold sweat. There is one last party guest still to arrive tonight, one who wasn’t planning to show up until after the concert because he said “teenager music” gives him a headache. My dad told him that was a surprise considering he lived his life like an eternal teenager but he just laughed, like he always does. That’s my Uncle Marc. Immature, yes, but seriously the nicest guy. And the only person besides my dad who can touch the company funds. I don’t even want to know what they’d do to get him to sign over the money but Marc is pretty wimpy. I don’t see him holding out very long if they start pulling out his fingernails or whatever it is guys like this do to get what they want.

  I have to do something to warn him. He was supposed to get here around eight but knowing Marc that means nine. That gives me—I check my watch—two hours. I stand up, ready to start making a plan, but then I hear The Assassin’s voice again. He is holding the bag stuffed with phones.

  “Just in case anyone thought it might be a clever idea to hold back a phone or computer device, we have cut off all Internet service to the house,” The Assassin announces. “And anyone caught with a cell phone will be shot, though first we will shoot the two people nearest to you, just so you understand our feelings about your lack of respect for our orders.”

  Wow, these guys are so not here to play. But then why would they be? What’s at stake is a multibillion-dollar fortune.

  “Every room is guarded including the bathroom so the only thing you will not have is privacy. But eat, talk quietly, and sleep, whatever you want. In twenty-four hours it will be over and you will be safe and sound back in your mansions.” He gives a small salute and heads out, leaving the other agents to watch over the group.

  I stagger back against the wall. Twenty-four hours. He said we’d be kept hostage for twenty-four hours. Earlier, when he said “soon” I assumed they’d be finished and out of here by midnight. But twenty-four hours means they will still be here tomorrow at noon. That’s when Stella is dropping off Abby so she can help me celebrate my birthday.

  I close my eyes as I think of Abby, with her timid brown eyes, fuzzy brown curls, and the rabbit I gave her when she turned three, Mr. Ears. She takes Mr. Ears with her everywhere, even though he’s stained and smells bad and Stella keeps trying to bribe her to take up with a sleeker toy. I think of the last time I saw her, two weeks ago, her eyes full of tears when she told me her mom was going away to a California spa less than two days after getting back from a three-week shopping spree in Paris. I took her up to my room and we had a tea party with Mr. Ears, complete with make-believe fairy cake and sparkle tea. It doesn’t take much to make Abby beam like the world is the greatest place ever and it kills me that her mom can’t do it more. But not the way it kills me to think of her being dropped off in the middle of this to take my place as a hostage.

  My stomach burns as I think about what I can do to stop this. There has to be something. I start walking, hoping that will help me think. The tunnels are dim but there are enough grates along the way that it’s never actually dark inside them, not unless all the lights in the house are off. With their chipping plaster walls the tunnels are about as wide as a doorway so they’re easy to navigate. The ceiling is low but high enough that someone a few inches taller than my five feet five inches could still stand upright. It goes without saying they are also dusty and full of cobwebs and mice droppings. My feet kick up small dust clouds as I go.

  My dad is such a neat freak he’d flip if he knew any part of his house looked like this. The thought comes from out of nowhere and hits me like a baseball bat. My dad was a neat freak. I can’t breathe. I put my head down and try to pull air into my lungs. This is not my first panic attack but they don’t really get easier. And there’s this thing in my belly, this wail or p
rimal grief that I have to tamp down or it might destroy me. I breathe furiously, focusing my mind on this moment, on the need to put one foot in front of the other and start doing something. I can’t fall apart, not when Abby is going to be dropped off in the middle of this. I have to keep it together for her. After a few moments my breathing slows and I can move again.

  I walk straight back until I hit the stairs, then I go up and turn left. My bedroom is the third grate down. Some of the grates are in the hall and they look like grates for the heating system, wrought iron with carved flowers and leaves. But mine is like the one I climbed into—it’s the back of a fireplace. All of them have small metal latches so they can be easily opened and closed.

  My room is dark, with light spilling in through the half-open door. I open the grate as quietly as I can and step silently into the fireplace. Then I walk into the room and that’s when I realize I am not alone. Someone else is in here, someone dressed in cargo pants and a white T-shirt, and he turns when he hears me.

  CHAPTER 3

  Sera

  My insides are churning and my skin feels funny, like it doesn’t fit right. My mind is like a scratched DVD, playing one image, then suddenly skipping, out of order, to another. Mr. Barett bleeding on the floor. Bianca, her head a soggy mess of red and gray. The guys who look like soldiers guarding the doorways of the house I practically grew up in. And that awful man who reminds me of The Assassin from that old movie calmly telling us that we’ll get shot if we step out of the west wing. How did this night go from birthday party to hostage situation? It’s too much to take in, to understand, so my mind just keeps skipping back and forth from image to image.