Read Online Social Suicide by Gemma Halliday - Free Book Online Page A

balls.
    “Not only that,” Sam went on, “but we have to compete against these cheaters to get into good colleges. Chris is my Stanford competition. How can I compete with someone who’s buying all the fudging answers?”
    I raised an eyebrow at her. “‘Fudging’?”
    “What? You liked ‘fluffin’’ better?”
    I shrugged. “Either way, I don’t think Chris is much competition for you, stolen answers or no,” I said, recalling our encounter.
    “So, what do we do now?” Sam asked.
    “Well . . .” I hedged. “Chase had an idea last night.”
    “What?” Sam asked.
    “He thought we should set up a sting. Try to catch the guy in action again.”
    Sam nodded. “Sounds like a reasonable plan.”
    “Only, we’re going to need someone to contact him about getting test answers.”
    “Right.”
    “And it can’t be me or Chase because everyone already knows we’re working on the story for the paper.”
    “True.”
    “So we’re going to need a third person to make the contact with the guy selling cheats.”
    “Good point. But it could be hard to find someone willing to do that.”
    I stared pointedly at Sam.
    She blinked back at me. “What?”
    I bit my lip and stared some more.
    Realization slowly dawned behind her brown eyes. “Oh no. Oh, no way, Hartley. I am not going to be your bait!”
    “Please, Sam,” I pleaded. “You’re perfect. Everyone knows how grade-driven you are, and you said yourself that we’re in trouble with the midterm coming up in American Government.”
    Sam shook her head so violently that her blond hair whipped at her cheeks. “No way. Big capital N-O. What if I get caught? Teachers are totally looking for cheaters now with the whole Sydney thing. I cannot get caught cheating!”
    “You won’t get caught,” I assured her. “You’re not actually going to cheat. We’re just buying the answers. Heck, you won’t even see the answers. If all goes well, we’ll catch this guy in the act of grabbing the money before he even has a chance to drop the flash drive.”
    Sam bit her lip. “This feels like a really bad idea, Hartley.”
    My turn to shake my head. “No. It feels like a really good story. A good story that I need to jump on now before someone else does,” I said, remembering Ashley’s total ton of hits. “And one that no one else is pursuing because everyone thinks Sydney killed herself. Her killer’s going to go free to commit Twittercide again unless we figure out who he is,” I pointed out, trying to butter her up with her own phrase. “Please, Sam. For Sydney?”
    Sam clenched her jaw. Then she finally threw her hands up. “Okay, fine. I’ll be your bait.”
    “Thank you!” I squealed, coming in for a hug.
    “But,” she said quickly, “if I get caught, I’m so pulling a Sydney and ratting you out to save my own GPA.”
    I nodded. “Deal. Fine. You rock, Sam.”
    “Yeah,” she said, grabbing her cell phone. “Let’s just hope I don’t rock it all the way to fudging suspension. What’s the guy’s number?”
    I rattled off the digits that I’d extracted from Chris last night and watched as Sam punched them into her phone.
    “What should I say?” Sam asked, turning to me.
    “Hmm.” I thought a second. “Say that you got his number from a friend.”
    Sam nodded, texting as I dictated.
    “And that you have too many honors classes to keep up right now. You need the answers to Bleaker’s American Government midterm.”
    I watched Sam’s thumbs fly across the mini keyboard as the words appeared on the small screen. I reread it over her shoulder, then we hit Send.
    “How long do you think it will take to hear back?” Sam asked.
    I shrugged. “Let’s hope not long.”
    We settled in to do our American Government homework together (if we weren’t really going to cheat, we did really need to study) and waited, Sam checking her phone every couple of minutes to make sure we hadn’t missed him.
    About twenty minutes later, just as we