Noel Kahn’s father tapped Ella on her shoulder, and Aria’s mother turned to talk to him. Xavier moved closer to Aria and placed his hand on her hip. “I’ve missed you,” he said. His breath was hot and smelled like whiskey. “Have you missed me?”
“I have to go now,” Aria said loudly, feeling color rise to her cheeks. She shot away from Xavier fast, ducking around a woman in a fluffy mink stole. She heard Ella call out, “Aria?” There was hurt and disappointment in her voice. But Aria kept going.
She came to a stop in front of a large stained-glass window that featured a portrait of a pie-faced minstrel and his lute. When she felt a second tug on her arm, she cringed, worried Xavier had followed her. But it was only Emily. A few strands of her red-gold hair had loosened from her French twist, and her cheeks were flushed. “I’ve been looking all over for you,” Emily exclaimed.
“I just got here,” Aria said. “Traffic was horrible.”
Emily pulled a large, dusty green book from under her arm. Its pages were gilt-edged, and it reminded Aria of a volume of an encyclopedia. “Look at this.” Emily opened it up and pointed to a name in cursive. Jason DiLaurentis. There was a date and time next to his name from seven years ago.
“I found it upstairs,” Emily explained. “This must be a sign-in book from back when this place was a mental hospital.”
Aria blinked in disbelief. She raised her head, looking around. A handsome silver-haired man, presumably the hotel owner, glided through the crowd, looking pleased with his handiwork. There were displays throughout the ballroom describing the multimillion-dollar gym that had been built on the second floor, and the state-of-the-art spa facilities. She had heard something about this place once being a hospital for mentally ill children, but it was hard to believe that now.
“Look.” Emily leafed from page to page. “Jason’s name is here, and then here, and then here. It goes on like this for years. It stops right before we staked out Ali for her flag.” Emily lowered the book to her hip, giving Aria a plaintive look. “I know you have a thing for Jason. But this is weird. Do you think maybe he was…a patient?”
Aria ran her hands through her hair. Is this some kind of joke? Jason had asked when Aria had shown him the Radley invitation. Her heart sank. Maybe he’d once been a patient here. Maybe he thought Aria was taunting him with the invite, paranoid that Aria knew way more about him than she’d let on.
“Oh my God,” Aria croaked. “A sent me a text a couple days ago. It said Jason was hiding something from me, and I didn’t want to know what. I sort of…ignored it.” She lowered her eyes. “I thought A was messing with me. But…I…I went out with Jason a couple times. On one of our dates, he got really uncomfortable when I told him I was coming to a party here. He also told me that he saw a psychiatrist at Rosewood Day. Maybe that was in addition to the doctor he saw…here.” She stared at the book again. Jason’s name was written in achingly neat cursive, each letter looped and even.
Emily nodded. “And I’ve been trying to tell you all day that A sent me a note last night telling me to go to Ali’s old neighborhood. I saw Jason in Jenna’s house. Yelling at her.”
Aria sank down into the velvet chair next to the stained-glass window, filled with even more dread. “What were they saying?”
Emily shook her head. “I don’t know. But they seemed upset. Maybe he really had done something terrible to Ali—and that’s why he was sent here.”
Aria stared down at the polished marble floor. She could see a haloed reflection of her peacock-blue dress in the tiles. This whole week, Aria had been so irritated with Emily, convinced she wasn’t looking at the Ali and Jason situation objectively. But maybe Aria wasn’t either.
Emily sighed. “We should probably talk to Wilden about this.”
“We can’t go to Wilden,” a voice interrupted.
They both turned. Hanna stood behind them, a frazzled look on her face. “Wilden’s the last person we should go to with anything.”
Emily leaned against the window. “Why?”
Hanna settled onto the chaise. “You remember when we met in Ali’s backyard to steal her flag? After she went back inside, I saw this car sitting at her curb. It seemed like whoever was inside was casing the place. And the other day, I went running, and I saw Wilden standing in front of Ali’s house again, even though the cops called off the search. He gave me a ride home…but he wasn’t driving his squad car. He was driving the same car I saw years ago in front of Ali’s house. What if he was stalking her?”
Emily gazed at her quizzically. “Are you sure it’s the same car?”
Hanna nodded. “It’s this old vintage thing from the sixties. I can’t believe I didn’t make the connection before tonight. And then, when I was in Wilden’s car, I saw this old sticker with a fish on it. It said Day Pass. You know the last time I saw that exact same sticker? On Ali’s dad’s SUV, when we used to go up to the Poconos. Remember?”
Aria rubbed her jaw, trying to keep up. Ali used to bring Aria and the others to her family’s Poconos house a lot. Once, Aria had helped the family pack their belongings into the car. After Mrs. DiLaurentis loaded the suitcases, she’d crouched down at the back bumper and pasted a new Poconos season pass right on top of the almost identical pass from the year before.
Aria nodded slowly. “But what does that mean?”
Hanna’s head bobbed feverishly. The DJ had turned on a strobe light, and Hanna’s face went from light to shadow and back. It looked as though she were disappearing and reappearing. “What if Wilden got hold of a pass a long time ago? What if he used to drive up to the Poconos to spy on Ali? What if…what if he had some weird crush on her, a crush way weirder than Ian’s? Don’t you think he’s behaved strangely lately? He was so quick to arrest Ian when Spencer came forward with—let’s be honest—kind of shaky evidence. What if he’s hiding something? What if he’s the one who did it?”
Aria waved her hands, stopping Hanna. “But Wilden could’ve gotten the pass from Jason. Did you know Jason and Wilden were friends?”
The corners of Hanna’s mouth turned down. Emily pressed her hand to her bare collarbone.
“I know it sounds crazy,” Aria admitted. “Today, I got an e-mail from Jason, telling me to meet him at his parents’ house in Yarmouth. I got there, but he wasn’t home. He didn’t send me the text at all…someone else did. Probably A. But while I was waiting in his apartment, I found an old Rosewood Day yearbook from Jason’s senior year. Wilden signed right over Ian’s picture. And he drew an arrow to Ian’s head and wrote, I can’t believe what that asshole did. My offer still stands.”
Emily clapped her hand over her mouth, her brown eyes wide.
Hanna sprang up on her toes, placing both hands on the top of her head. “You’re totally right. They were friends. That black car I was talking about? The old thing Wilden was driving around? I saw it one other time, too. Remember the day Time Capsule was announced? We were standing in the courtyard, and Ian said he was going to kill Ali to get her Time Capsule piece? Jason came up, and he and Ian had that weird fight. And then Jason…”
“Ran up to a black car,” Aria whispered, remembering that day.
“And he said, Just drive.” Emily’s voice was soft. She pulled out her cell phone and scrolled through her photos. “It works with this, too.” She showed them the photo they’d already seen, the one of Wilden leaving a confession booth, a guilty look on his face. I guess we all have things to feel guilty about, huh?
“It’s so weird that A is sending stuff that actually…makes sense,” Aria murmured.
“Yeah, that doesn’t really seem like A,” Hanna agreed.
“What if A isn’t malicious?” Emily hissed. “What if A’s trying to help?”
Hanna snorted. “Yeah. We help A…or A ruins our lives.”
The DJ shut off the strobe light and launched into another dance song. Partygoers staggered onto the dance floor. Parents clinked wineglasses, toasting another new hotel to escape to on weekends. Aria even noticed Mr. and Mrs. DiLaurentis across the ballroom, talking jovially to Mr. and Mrs. Byers as if nothing was wrong.
She glanced at the ledger in Emily’s hands. The DiLaurentis parents could have been sending Jason to therapists for years, keeping it a well-guarded secret. Maybe they’d been hiding other things about Jason, too. Jason had been so angry today. Could he be one of those people who hid his anger expertly, seeming so sweet and mild until he suddenly…erupted? Maybe Wilden was one of those people too.
“What if Jason found out Ali and Ian were dating?” Aria suggested. “That day he came up to Ian and Ali in the courtyard, he was really protective of her, like he knew something was up. Maybe that’s what Wilden meant by I can’t believe what that asshole did. I would guess an older brother would want to kill the guy taking advantage of his sister.”
Hanna crossed her legs, her face crumpled in thought. “Ian said in his IMs that they wanted to hurt him. What if they are Wilden and Jason?”
“But Ian implied that whoever drove him out of town were the ones who were really behind it,” Emily said. “So that would mean…”
“Jason and Wilden had something to do with Ali’s murder,” Hanna whispered. “Maybe it was an accident. Maybe something horrible happened that they hadn’t planned.”
Aria felt sick. Was that possible? She looked at the others. “The only person who knows the truth is Ian. Do you think we could talk to him on IM? Do you think he’d tell us?”
They exchanged uneasy glances, not sure what to do. The bass pumped on in the background. The scents of grilled shrimp and filet mignon filled the air, making Aria’s vegetarian stomach turn. She breathed hard, her nerves standing on end. Her eyes landed on Hanna’s piece of her Time Capsule flag, which she’d tied around the chain of her purse. She pointed to the black blob in the corner, remembering how Hanna had described it to Kate at Meredith’s baby shower. “Why did you draw a manga frog on your flag?”
Hanna blinked hard, as though confused at Aria’s change of subject. Then she stretched the flag out and showed them the entire piece. Also on it was a Chanel logo, a field hockey girl, and the Louis Vuitton pattern. “I decorated it in Ali’s honor with the things she’d drawn on hers before it was stolen.”
Aria bit her thumbnail. “Hanna, Ali didn’t draw a manga frog on her flag.”
Hanna looked startled. “Yes she did. I went home that afternoon and wrote down everything she said.”
A tingly feeling crept up Aria’s back. “She didn’t draw a manga frog,” she protested. “She didn’t draw any animals at all.”
Hanna’s eyes flickered back and forth, her face draining of color. Emily pushed a strand of hair behind her ears, looking worried. “How do you know that?”