Chapter 6: Poor Melinda

I stood over Jared's second phone for as long as it took the screen to go dark.

It asked for a face and a passcode, and I had neither.

So I went looking for the one device in the house that Shea never locked.

At midnight, the whole villa was quiet except for the pool pump.

Shea's tablet was on the kitchen island, plugged in beside a bowl of green apples.

She had used the same password since she was fourteen.

I had watched her type it on the family computer a hundred times, with her tongue between her teeth.

Pickles2012.

It was the name of the dog we had buried together behind her mother's garage.

The screen opened.

I carried it into the bathroom and locked the door.

I sat on the edge of the tub with my own phone ready to photograph everything.

The page was already open, because she had been watching it.

At the top it said: "INNER CIRCLE by Shea Dunning. $29 a month. 4,212 members."

Under that, in a smaller font: "The Poor Melinda Files."

I read the line twice.

It had a profile picture of me.

It was from last Christmas, when I was holding a mug and laughing at something Jared had said off camera.

Below it ran a list of episodes.

"Ep. 1: She'll Say Yes Twice."

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