Chapter 1

'Our little town Hill Crest has gone through thick and thin over the past 100 years of it's existence but none as tragic as the death of Miss Susan Myers, the friendly baker lady. She only died yesterday and the whole town has gone silent and cold. 

The sun hardly shines, not that it ever did here. Hill Crest is one of those silent towns, few robberies, one suicide case, many tragic accidents but never a homicide, at least not that i know of. 

The sheriff has Susan's whole family on the suspect list, only problem is, everyone in Susan's family is out of town... far out of town. The only relative she has here in Hill Crest is her daughter Marnie who hasn't been seen, a few days before Susan turned up dead.

Susan's body was found in her bakery behind the cash register which was empty which leads us to believe it was all just a poorly planned robbery... for now anyway. She has a shot wound to the heart but no sign of blood around which makes us think, was her body moved? Or the criminals where desperate enough to try to clean up their mess but bailed. 

So far the sheriff is convinced it's a robbery which went rogue but me, my mind is open to all the possibilities. 

As for Marnie, rumor has it she got sent off to boarding school a day before her mother died, but the question is, which boarding school? And why didn't Susan tell any of her friends? Does Marnie know?'

"Coffee?" Mr. Caesar, the owner of Caesar's cafe asks as he leans over the booth to peer at the screen of my laptop. "Haven't finished the one Mindy poured for me an hour ago" I say silently as i turn back to the letters that stand on the screen and blinking cursor indicating unfinished thoughts. 

"You know, normal teens spend a Sunday afternoon out with their friends" Mr. Caesar whispers as he forces himself to stand upright. 

"What friends? And besides, someone died yesterday, no one's out" I sigh and bite my bottom lip in frustration.

"Normal kids don't worry about that, they also have a book as their journal, not their laptops" He chortles and ruffles my hair. 

"Well i think we've established the point that i'm not normal" I huff before slamming my laptop shut and shuffle out of the booth. 

"Leaving so soon?" He asks gesturing to the door. 

"Yeah" I answer as i stuff my laptop into my backpack and sling it over my shoulder, "I have somewhere to be". 

"Bye then, see you this evening?"

"Don't you always?" I respond hitching the arm of my bag higher up my shoulder and then turning to the exit. "But maybe not today though, mom has dinner plans" I sigh before leaving.

"Get the plates and set them right, oh and the forks and knives and..." My mom, Moira Hart rambles.

"Spoons!" My elder sister Charlie finishes moms sentence.

"Hey!" I greet as i enter the kitchen to where my 45 year old mother and 19 year old sister set the table. Charlie's only home to help mom adjust to her new life of a single mom and a recent divorcee. Step father or should i say ex-step father was cheating on mom with an Asian 20 year old which i knew of but just didn't decide to tell mom or anybody for that matter. She should be back in New York by Tuesday if mom allows it. 

"Anayis where have you been? Your sisters benefactor should be here soon!" My mom hollers. Ah... my sister's benefactor, Mr. Granger. The richest devil in Hill Crest and probably the whole of North Carolina. He'll probably- no will bring his whole damn family with him, the Granger's are the most popular people in Hill Crest but also the most sickening and irritating, especially the little devil herself India. Daughter of Martin Granger and Melissa Granger. Only child fortunately.

"I was... nowhere never mind" I whisper. "Oh stop brooding and help with the plates" Charlie laughs and hands me some forks and a few knives. "Get the spoons" She winks before walking off. I scoff and roll my eyes before walking off and doing as told. 

"So, how has school been? For both of you?" Mr. Granger aka the devil in a bow tie asks as he impales his cut up bits of chicken and slips them off his fork and gently in his mouth and begins to chew slowly as if his tongue must not taste.

"Good" My sister speaks cheekily whereas i hum quietly to recycle her answer. 

Through out the dinner India glares at me while i honestly couldn't be less bothered and pick my greens with my fork and my mom and sister engage in a conversation with Mr and Mrs Granger and they honestly wanted the night to end so they could retreat back to their mansion on the far west side of Hill Crest. The condescending jerks feel superior to everyone, no matter your status, and my mom and sister stupidly fell victims to their charm. 

Personally the Granger's have nothing on me but the perks of being a wallflower is the ability to see what others don't. The Granger's have a secret, not long before like all the other Granger's before them, leaks. And everyone in Hill Crest will find out. 

"Ana?" Carter, a girl i used to once call my friend calls as she stalks closer to where i stand pulling books out of my backpack and pushing them into my locker. I turn and stare at her blank faced before turning back to my half empty locker. 

"There's a party at Claire's place tonight, i was wondering if you'd like to come? It's a two for enter invite so i want you to be my company" She smiles weakly while cracking her knuckles, a habit of hers when she gets nervous.

"Did Charlie put you up to this?" I ask after staring at her for a long time emotionless portraying in my facial expression.

She opens her mouth to say something, most likely deny it but no words come out. "Of course she did" I scoff and roll my eyes before turning back to my locker.

"Look i would actually really love it if you came with me" She blurts out quickly.

I glance at her briefly before letting my eyes fall to my backpack hanging on my fingers before saying "Busy, plus, isn't Claire's place right next to Susan Myers's house? A little disrespectful don't you think? She's dead for Pete's sake and your throwing a party?"

"No it's not like that, it's sort of a... wake or something. No disrespect!"

"Maybe" I whisper before slinging my backpack over my shoulder and shutting my locker.

"Thanks" She says shooting me a weak smile before walking off. I let out a sigh then head to my next class just as the tardy bell rings.

"Hey Ana!" A voice calls my name as i step out of my last class for today. I whirl around to see who it is then sigh. "Adam?" I reply in question then continue to walk down the hall to the exit. "What do you want?" I ask in a cold tone as i stop in front of my locker to retrieve and put in books from and into my bag. "We've become distant and i have no idea, the summer..."

"The summer wasn't the problem" I interrupt before slamming my locker shut.

"Then what was, we were friends what happened?" He asks following me outside.

"Hmm let's see, you had an affair with Marnie who is now MIA when her mom is dead when you were dating Megan who is now in South Colombia and Carter just suddenly stopped talking to me after she left me publicly humiliated by telling everyone that i'm gay, so ask me again why we're not friends but don't expect a different answer" I summarize then roll my eyes and walk away.

"Okay yeah i know we screwed up but you aren't gay, i know that" He says catching up to me.

"Yeah tell the rest of the world that, and i don't really care if people think hell about me, i'm already socially awkward you can't make it worse, i'm upset that she didn't care enough to apologize or correct her mistake"

"But she has apologized and she did try to correct..."

"I don't care about apologies i just wanted her to understand that i do have feelings even though my heart is cold" I snap.

"And me?" He asks in a whisper with his head down avoiding eye contact.

"I'm just mad that you're a douche Adam" I sigh, "My friends are jackasses and i'm an antisocial pessimist, so if you guys are screwed, where does that leave me?". And with that i begin to walk off. 

"Tell Carter i'll be at the stupid party slash wake thing okay?" I yell before getting in my car and driving off.  

Wake and respect my ass! This is a full blown party with over 4 dozen people in one house. I've never spoken to Claire before but everyone knows her parties are sick, and sick for me is sick as in sick sick. Parties are not my thing, i've only ever attended three parties in my whole life. This one and two other mistakes.

"You came" Carter exclaims cheerily once i make my way into the house and past the throng of dancing drunk bodies and into the kitchen. 

"Didn't really have a choice, Charlie and mom wouldn't let me stay home" I sigh as a barely sober Adam walks in. "Hey Ana!" He exclaims and rests his hand on the kitchen island to steady himself from tipping over from complete intoxication. 

"Hey Adam!" I say silently shooting him a weak smile. 

"Some of us are heading over to late Susan's place to pay our respects wanna come?" He asks tipping a little.

"Why not" Carter says throwing her hands up and stepping forward.

"Seriously? That place is still to be searched you can't evade, you might be wandering into a crime scene" I retort grabbing hold of Carter's arm.

"There's no cop tape around there is there?" Adam asks flipping his hair to the side. 

"We're just paying our respects Anne, relax" Carter huffs dragging her hand out of mine.

I follow silently behind the stupid group of drunk teens heading to Susan Myers's house to make sure Adam and Carter don't do something stupid. 

The door creeks open slowly as a drunk boy with a beer bottle in hand pushes against it. We turn on the lights and move around a bit. 

Not how i imagined my night but i anticipated this though. Her house was neat but several papers littered around and many vases and ceramics broken on the floor, stationary sprawled around, unlike Susan, she always kept her bakery very clean because she hated it when things got missing or when dishes got broken so this is weird. In fact, this is too weird, it's as if her house was trashed... or raided! 

"Bottles up Susan, rest in piece alright" Dylan a jerk face slash drunkie laughs as he empties two bottles of beer and alcohol on her couch at the same time. "You ass what's wrong with you!" I snap at him but he and the rest of the idiots here laugh and join in spraying the furniture with beer. 

I open my mouth to yell at them to stop when a scream comes from the kitchen. "Sounds like Carter!" Adam says before racing ahead of me towards the kitchen area. I follow behind until i see Carter on the floor beside something horrific. The body of Marnie Myers, daughter of late Susan Myers.

This wasn't a robbery, this was cold blooded murder!

"Call someone, the cops, ambulance, anybody!" A voice screams in the background as everyone runs about and out of the house as i stand and stare at Carter and Marnie's cold and lifeless body covered in blood and another puddle of blood a far way from her body. 

Hill Crest just got flung into the dark ages, fear is, how will everyone react? Because nothing will ever be the same again.