Read Online Get Dirty by Gretchen McNeil - Free Book Online Page B

arms over his head, trying to get her attention.
    When he realized she’d seen him, John gestured for her to follow. Why would John want to talk to her?
    Olivia paused, considering her options. John had been a suspect in the murders, and even Bree had questioned his innocence at one point. The killer had just announced that he was back: maybe it really was John? Maybe he was trying to lure her away from her friends in order to make her the next victim?
    Then again, if anyone might have news of how Bree was doing, it would be John.
    “Ladies’ room,” Olivia said, pushing herself up from the table. “Back in a sec.” It was worth the chance that John might know something about Bree.
    He was waiting at the back of the science building near an alcove in front of what Olivia thought was the physics lab.
    He’s not going to kill you , Olivia said to herself as she approached the alcove. Still, she stood in the middle of the hallway, a good ten feet from John.
    “You wanted to see me?” she said, copping her best bitchy attitude.
    John leaned against the door jamb of the physics lab and smirked. “Wow, nice Mean Girls impression. Are you trying to make fetch happen, too?”
    Olivia was too good an actress to break character. “What do you want?”
    “Okay, fine. All business.” He pushed himself off the wall and held up in hands in surrender. “I come in peace. With a message from Bree.”
    Olivia felt the excitement bubbling up inside her, and tried desperately not to let it show on her face. She needed to warn Bree that the killer was back. If he’d gone after them in the warehouse, who knows what else he was capable of?
    But could she trust John? Was it worth the risk?
    “I can’t think of any reason,” she said, trying to sound glib, “why Bree Deringer would want to talk to me.”
    “Come off it, Olivia,” John said. “I know you’re a member of DGM.”
    Olivia froze. How could he know she was a member? Only the killer knew that.
    John seemed to read her mind. “I saw the way you reacted when Bree turned herself in, plus I found the photo of the four of you from freshman year. So just give up the act. This shit is serious.”
    First Ed the Head, now John Baggott. Part of her was freaked out that so many people were now privy to their carefully guarded secret. Still, Bree trusted John. Maybe she needed to as well.
    “What is it?” she asked. “What’s Bree’s message?”
    “She told me to tell you, ‘He’s not done with us.’”
    Olivia’s eyes grew wide. How did Bree know? Had he gone after her, too? “Is that all she said?”
    John nodded. “She was being hauled away by a Swedish bodybuilder named Olaf.”
    Olivia tilted her head to the side. “Juvie has Swedish bodybuilders?” Maybe her impression had been all wrong.
    John laughed. “No. She was released yesterday. She’s under house arrest.”
    “Oh my God!” Olivia cried. This was so amazing! House arrest probably didn’t mean she was entirely free from suspicion, but at least she wasn’t in jail anymore. Olivia threw her arms around John’s neck. “This is the best news ever!”
    “What are you doing?” a voice boomed.
    Olivia let her arms fall from around John’s neck and turned to find Amber teetering down the hall on her platform sandals, fists balled up at her side.
    John glanced Olivia. “Um, nothing?”
    Amber pulled up short, huffing and puffing from the exertion, and tried to look uninterested, as if she hadn’t followed Olivia but just happened upon her and John while out for a stroll in the science building. “Hi, John. How are you?”
    “Fiiine,” John said slowly, drawing out the vowel.
    Amber stood smiling at him, eyebrows raised in anticipation, as if she was waiting for him to say something else.
    “And, um, how are you?”
    She giggled. “I’m good! Even gooder now that I’ve seen you.” She paused, aware that something that had just come out of her mouth hadn’t made sense. “I mean, better now.