Pretty Little Liars #14 (3 page)

He sighed. “I don't know. I felt sorry for her.”

“How did you know she was at The Preserve?”

He shifted under the blankets. “My parents had me talk to someone after my brother committed suicide. It was a therapist who worked in an outpatient building at The Preserve. One day, I bumped into this girl going in when I was coming out—it was Alison. She was really cagey, and I thought it was, you know, the girl I knew from school. The next time I went, she was there again—and I was really confused, because the sixth-grade field hockey team had a game that day, and Mason, who was watching the game, had just texted me that Ali had scored a goal.”

Aria nodded. “Got it.”

Noel paused to take a breath. “I kind of put it all together in my head as I was looking at Ali come out of the therapist's office. She realized it, because she waited for me after my appointment and confessed who she really was. She told me she was Ali's twin, trapped in a hospital, blah blah blah.”

“And you
believed
her?”

“Well, sure. She didn't seem crazy. Just . . . a victim.”

Aria pinched the bridge of her nose. “So that's where you guys got to know each other? Outside the shrink's office?”

Noel looked ashamed. “No. After that, I . . . I visited her at the hospital.”

A pain shot through her. “How often?”

“Regularly.”

“
Why
?”

He twisted his mouth. “She made me feel heard. Important.”

Sucker
. Ali
—both
Alis—had a way of making you feel very, very special. But it was always for their own selfish needs. “And let me guess, she made it out like Courtney was the crazy one?” Aria spat.

Noel nodded. “Pretty much.”

“You had no problem hanging out with Courtney, though,” Aria pointed out, remembering how Noel had attended every party Their Ali threw. He'd sat at their lunch table and winged Cheetos at Ali's head. He'd partnered with Ali for a three-legged race during the sixth-grade field day, laughing hysterically when they'd stumbled over the finish line. “In fact, in seventh grade, you even went out with her!”

Noel cocked his head. “No, I didn't.”

“You did, too! I know because
Ali—Courtney—told
you
I
liked you first—but you came back and said you liked her instead. She liked you, too—but then dumped you after a few dates.” It was something she and Noel had never gotten into, but Aria could remember the incident as clear as day. Ali had broken Aria's heart when she'd announced Noel was into her.

Noel shifted in the bed, wincing as he twisted his torso. “Courtney never told me about you. I never liked her. She probably said that I liked her just to piss you off.”

That
was
something Their Ali would do, but Aria didn't want to give Noel the satisfaction of being right. “If you really thought Courtney was dangerous, why didn't you warn anyone?”

For a moment, there were only the sounds of the beeps on Noel's monitors. “Because she didn't really seem dangerous. I stayed out of it. Besides, Ali told me not to tell a soul the truth. I kept my promise.”

“And that's why you didn't tell me? Your
girlfriend
?”

Noel cut his gaze away. “I wanted to so many times. But . . .” He sighed. “I'm sorry.”

She balled up a fist in her lap.
Sorry?
“So, at the end of seventh grade, did you know that the real Ali was out of the hospital for a few days?”

Noel took a sip from the plastic cup on the tray next to his bed. “I went to the DiLaurentis house the day before graduation. I only saw Ali, though. I didn't see Courtney.”

Aria wondered if Their Ali had been home at the time. If she wasn't, she was probably out with Aria and the others . . . or else her new, older friends from field hockey. Had she been doing something completely innocent, like shopping at the King James Mall or hanging out at Spencer's? Little did she know she was going to die the next day.

“When Courtney went missing, did you suspect Ali?” Aria asked.

“No way,” Noel said forcefully. “She seemed really happy that weekend, not like she was planning anything crazy. I really thought Courtney ran away. And when everyone found out about Ian, it made sense. I saw Courtney flirting with him. That guy could be a real asshole.”

“Did Ali contact you when she was back in The Preserve?”

There was a loud
ding
, and Noel glanced at the monitor next to his bed. A heart flashed red, then vanished. “She wrote a letter saying that sending her back to The Preserve was a huge mistake,” he said. “She seemed so worried about her sister going missing and so shocked that they couldn't find her. I fell for it.”

“And you visited her again, for years.”

“Yeah.” Noel sounded ashamed. “Until Ian Thomas was convicted and Ali came back.”

“Did you meet Tabitha Clark while you visited The Preserve?”

Noel swallowed hard. “I saw Tabitha around, but I didn't hang out with her except for this one time when Ali was released for a weekend. Her parents didn't want to see her, so she stayed with Tabitha in New Jersey. I took the train there and went to the movies with them.”

Aria shut her eyes. Last week, she'd found a ticket stub for
Spider-Man
from a theater in Maplewood, New Jersey, where Tabitha was from. There had been handwriting on the back:
Thanks for believing in me
. So it
was
from Ali. “Did you meet anyone else at The Preserve?”

Noel raised his eyes to the ceiling. “A girl named Iris. Super-skinny, really blond.”

That made sense. Last week, Emily had checked Iris out of the hospital for a few days to pump her for information. Iris was the one who'd explained that Ali had a secret boyfriend. When she saw a picture of Noel, she said she was sure it was him.

“How about any guy friends?” Aria asked.

Noel thought for a moment. “I can't think of a single one. Why?”

“Ali had a boyfriend.”

She waited for the impact, expecting Noel to look shattered and betrayed. But he just blinked. “I never met him.”

“Did she ever
talk
about him?”

“Nope.” He shook his head.

She stared at her hands in her lap. “So last year, when Ian was arrested and they let Ali out, she contacted you again, right?”

“We met once before that press conference.”

“At Keppler Creek?” Iris had told Emily that while Ali was still at The Preserve, she talked on and on about how she was going to have a secret meeting at a park near Delaware.

Noel tilted his head. “No. At my house. She said that everyone would know about her soon enough. And then you guys did. When all of you seemed so friendly with one another, I thought it was great. She seemed really happy, too. A happy ending.”

Aria narrowed her eyes. “Did she tell you she lied to us? Told us she was
our
Ali?”

“Of course not.” Noel very gingerly sat up in bed, his face contorting. “Like I said, I had no idea until after the fire.”

“What about the kiss?” Ali and Noel had shared a kiss at the Valentine's Dance the night of the Poconos fire. Ali had acted like Noel had hit on her, not the other way around. Aria had been so mad at Noel, she'd joined Ali and her friends on their trip to the Poconos house.

“I wasn't helping her in her master plan, I swear,” Noel urged. “She kissed
me
.”

“And what about telling Agent Fuji I was lying?”

Noel squinted. “What are you talking about?”

“I saw an e-mail exchange between you and Agent Fuji.”

“She let you read her e-mails?”

“No, I read
your
e-mails.” Aria hated to admit it. “You told Fuji you thought someone had lied to her about Tabitha's murder. Why did you say that? Were you trying to get her to investigate me?”

Noel stared at her like a third ear had sprouted out of her forehead. “I had exactly one conversation with Agent Fuji where I told her I didn't know Tabitha and I didn't know anything.
I
was the one lying. And why would I want her to investigate
you
?”

Aria pretended to fix a kink in her pant leg. Could Noel honestly not know about Tabitha? “I'm supposed to believe that someone hacked into your e-mail account and wrote fake messages to Fuji?”

Noel threw up his hands. “I don't know. And while we're talking about it, who
is
this someone who's hacking into things and stalking you and beating me up? Do you really think Ali's still alive? Why didn't you tell me before?”

Aria scoffed. “I didn't tell you because I was trying to keep you safe.”

“But . . .” Noel looked like he was going to say something else, then shut his mouth tight.

“But
what
?” Aria asked.

Noel shook his head. “Nothing. Forget it.”

He was breathing hard by now, and his machine started to beep. Aria stared at it, grateful to have something to look at instead of his face.

A nurse swept into the room and checked the monitor. “I think you should probably get going,” she said to Aria.

She ushered Aria toward the door. Aria peeked back at Noel's drawn expression, but she didn't wave.

She felt disoriented and dizzy. For so long, Noel had been the only thing in Rosewood that was keeping her going . . . but now he was a stranger. How could she continue on here? How was she going to live in Rosewood, go to Rosewood Day, even enter rooms in her house without a Noel memory rearing its head?

She needed to get out of this place, once and for all. Leave Rosewood behind and never come back. But as she took a few faltering steps, her knees collapsed and her legs felt heavy. Right now, it was a challenge just to get out of the hallway and back to her friends.

AN EMPTY ROOM

Spencer, Hanna, and Emily shot to their feet as soon as Aria returned to the waiting room. Aria avoided their gazes and trudged straight to the drinks station, her shoulders hunched.

“What did Noel say?” Spencer asked breathlessly, following her. “Did he see who hurt him?”

“No,” Aria mumbled, grabbing a cup from the stack.

“Are you sure?” Hanna asked. “How well did he know Ali, anyway? Were they friends—or more?”

Aria busied herself at the coffee machine. Her eyes were red, and she kept making little hiccupping sighs like she'd been crying. Spencer hated pushing her for answers, but they needed to know.

Reluctantly, Aria relayed what Noel had told her, including how he'd visited Ali at The Preserve. When she got to the part about Noel not meeting anyone else there except for Tabitha and Iris, Spencer grumbled. “He didn't see one single guy? Ali
never
talked about someone she liked?”

Aria shrugged. “I think Ali wanted Noel to think she liked
him
.”

Emily groaned. “That makes sense. It was her way of keeping him on her side.”

Aria took a sip of coffee. “Noel said he heard a guy's voice when he was attacked. But that's it.”

“I wish we could take down Ali and her helper once and for all.” Spencer plopped into a chair.

“Maybe we could go back to The Preserve,” Hanna suggested. “Ask them if there were any guy patients whose names started with
N
.”

Emily looked unsure. “It seems so risky.”

Hanna furrowed her brow. “You want to give up?”

“Maybe we should,” Spencer said. Just last week, in an attempt to catch Ali and her helper, they'd gone rogue, putting away their phones, which A had hacked dozens of times, and buying burner cells. Then they'd met in a panic room in Spencer's stepfather's model home for Who-Is-A brainstorming meetings. They'd created a list of people who might have been helping Ali. They'd drawn lines through each name as they ruled people out. Finally, only Noel remained . . . and they'd thought they were one step ahead of A, until A's text yesterday included a picture of the suspect list. Spencer had no idea how
Ali found the
thing, as she'd had it hidden under her bed.
Noel as A? Not it! the
note had said.

“What about the cops?” Hanna reshaped her auburn ponytail. “Should I hand over Ali's note from the burn clinic?”

Spencer thought it over. If they showed the cops the note, Ali and Helper A might come after them. If they didn't, the cops might accuse them of obstructing justice. “What if you handed it over but told them nothing about A?” she suggested. “It's signed in Kyla's name, not Ali's. The cops don't have to know she's one and the same. To be honest,
we
don't even know for sure.”

“That could work,” Hanna murmured.

“What do we do about our burner phones?” Aria asked. “A hacked them, too. Do we keep them?”

“We might as well use our old phones,” Emily suggested. “No matter what we do, she finds us. Let's just not make calls or send texts unless we absolutely have to.”

“If we change our passwords on our e-mail daily, that could be okay to use,” Spencer said. “But we shouldn't discuss anything about Ali or Helper A over e-mail or text.”

“What if we get another A note?” Hanna whispered. “Can we still talk about it?”

Spencer glanced around the room, almost afraid A was listening. “Yeah,” she whispered. “Maybe we could use a code word if we want to meet and talk about Ali. How about . . .” Her gaze clapped on the handsome, silver-haired figure on the TV screen. “Anderson Cooper.”

“Done,” Aria said.

Hanna leaned in closer. “What do you think A's next move is going to be?”

Spencer's stomach flipped over. How many times had they wondered
that
? “It could be anything. A's still watching us. We just need to keep our eyes and ears open.”

Everyone nodded, looking even more terrified than before. But there was nothing else to say, so Spencer grabbed her purse, fished out her keys, and started for the elevators, eager to head home and take a long, hot shower.