Flawless by Sara Shepard Page A

saw that the sun was just coming up, and she could smell fresh bagels and scrambled eggs wafting up from the street.
    She looked next to her, and it all made sense. Wren slept on his back, one arm thrown over his face, his chest bare. Wren’s father was Korean and his mother was British, so his skin was this perfect, golden shade. There was a scar above his lip; he had freckles across his nose, and shaggy blue-black hair, and smelled like Adidas deodorant and Tide. The thick silver ring he wore on his right pointer finger glinted in the morning sun. He pulled his arm off his face and opened his gorgeous almond-shaped eyes.
    “Hey.” He slowly grabbed Spencer around her waist and pulled her toward him.
    “Hey,” she whispered, hanging back. She could still hear the voice from her dream: It’s time for Spencer to die! It was Toby’s voice.
    Wren frowned. “What’s wrong?”
    “Nothing,” Spencer said quietly. She pressed her fingers to the base of her neck and felt her pulse race. “Just…bad dream.”
    “You want to share?”
    Spencer hesitated. She wished she could. Then she shook her head.
    “Well, then. C’mere.”
    They spent a few minutes kissing, and Spencer got a relieved, grateful rush. Everything was going to be all right. She was safe.
    This was the first time Spencer had slept— and stayed over—in a guy’s bed. Last night, she’d sped into Philly, parked on the street, and hadn’t even bothered with the Club; her parents were probably planning on repossessing her car, anyway. She and Wren had fallen into bed immediately and hadn’t gotten up since except to answer the door for the Chinese takeout delivery boy. Later on, she called and left a message on her parents’ machine that she was staying the night at her hockey friend Kirsten’s house. She felt silly, trying to be all responsible when she was really being so irresponsible , but whatever.
    For the first time since her first A note, she’d slept like a baby. It was partly because she was in Philadelphia and not Rosewood, next door to Toby, but it was also because of Wren. Before they went to sleep, they’d talked about Ali—their friendship, what it had been like when Ali went missing, that someone had killed her—for an hour. He’d also let her choose the “crickets chirping” sound on the sound machine, even though it was his second–least favorite noise, after “babbling brook.”
    Spencer began kissing him more forcefully now, and slid out of his oversize Penn T-shirt, which she was wearing as a nightgown. Wren traced her naked collarbone, then pushed himself up onto his hands and knees. “Do you want to…?” he asked.
    “I think so,” Spencer whispered.
    “Are you sure ?”
    “Uh-huh.” She wriggled out of her underwear. Wren pulled his shirt over his head. Spencer’s heart pounded. She was a virgin, and was as discriminating about sex as she was about everything else in her life—she had to do it with the perfect person.
    But Wren was the right person. She knew she was passing the Point of No Return—if her parents found out, they’d never pay for anything ever, ever, ever again. Or pay attention to her. Or send her to college. Or feed her, possibly. So what? Wren made her feel safe.
     
    One Sesame Street , one Dragon Tales , and a half an Arthur later, Spencer rolled onto her back, staring blissfully at the ceiling. So much for going slow. Then she propped herself up on her elbows and looked at the clock. “Shit,” she whispered. It was seven-twenty. School started at eight; she was going to miss first period at the very least.
    “I have to go.” She leaped out of bed and surveyed her plaid skirt, blazer, undies, cami, and boots, all in a haphazard pile on the floor. “ And I’m going to have to go home.”
    Wren sat on the bed, watching her. “Why?”
    “I can’t wear the same outfit two days in a row.”
    Wren was obviously trying not to laugh at her. “But it’s a uniform, right?”
    “Yes, but