I hadn’t seen Grace’s crazy-ass boyfriend since the fall when he’d officially been expelled for being a drug-addled, crazy person. Honestly, can’t say that I’d missed him much.
His face was dark with stubble, and the flickering candle in his hand made his eyes look black in their sockets. Wait, not just one candle, but hundreds, lining the floors, propped up on a bent wooden box, surrounding the window.
“Sorry about the lights. Not like I could call the electric company.” Cameron laughed but it sounded more like a growl. “Good to see you again, my friend. We’ve been waiting for you to come around.”
Being in Grace’s room surrounded by candles and hearing Cameron speak was enough to lift me out of the haze of memories. What was out of focus before snapped crisply together, and I realized that there was a very real possibility that I might never make it out of Grace’s house alive.
I stepped backward with my hands raised in surrender. “I…I want to leave. I need to get out of here right now.” Porter blocked my path, and my back hit his front.
“Infiltrating the Sisterhood was genius, Kate. Genius,” Cameron said, gripping my shoulders too hard. “I mean, you had everyone right where we wanted them.”
I shrugged away from his touch, shivers raising the hairs on my arm like a rash.
“We tried to help you,” he began, his glassy blue eyes wide and crazed. “The journal entries, those stupid cards getting the Brotherhood to off themselves. They were all reminders, Kate!” Cameron swayed on his feet and came dangerously close to knocking over a candle. I couldn’t breathe. “It was your job. You promised to avenge her death. You were the only one who could honor her memory, and you failed.”
The gravity of the words Cameron barked out at me settled on my shoulders like a metric ton. Cameron, the loser who had been MIA for at least four months, thought I was a failure? I wanted to laugh. And now he was back and thought that putting people in danger, killing people, was helping. And then it dawned on me. Alistair. They’d killed Alistair. How could Porter live with himself?
I spun around to face him. “How could you do that to your brother? How could you sit back and let him hurt himself? For what?” I could feel my face getting red, the blood rushing to my cheeks and spreading out. I felt dangerously close to tears, and all I wanted was to get the hell out of this place and make good on my promise to stay out of things from now on. I was done. Grace was gone, and I was done.
Porter’s eyes flashed to Cameron’s in silent desperation. “I…we…I just…he never let me in…he tortured me…it was just supposed to scare him.” Porter stuttered through the broken explanation, taking steps back toward the door in defense. He lifted his hands. “I tried. I mean, I wanted to stop.” He looked at Cameron then. Pleading. “Kate’s right. It’s time to go.”
Cameron’s face darkened, and he laughed even though nothing was remotely funny. “You think anyone will believe you, Porter? We’ve already been through this. If you back out now, I’ll tell everyone you forced me to help you kill your brother.” He raised his eyebrows. “I’ll even throw in the ex-headmaster. Still feel like leaving?”
Porter began to backpedal then. “We didn’t kill Alistair. Don’t you see?” Porter leaned toward me, and I noticed how bloodshot his eyes were. “The Brotherhood killed him. He couldn’t stand up to them. He could never say no. It doesn’t matter who sent the Factum Virtus. His loyalty killed him the same way it killed Grace. It has to stop.” I wondered how long Porter had been trying to convince himself of his innocence. He was wringing his hands like Lady-freaking-Macbeth. No way was he sleeping at night.
“So we’re making a statement,” Cameron said, running his fingers through his greasy hair. “Tonight. In this house. A letter has already been sent to the papers, and it’s only a matter of time before it’s picked up everywhere. People love a good story. Tragic End in an Effort to Abolish Secret Societies. Man, that really has a nice ring to it, am I right?”
My mind was spinning. What kind of tragic end was Cameron referring to? I wished I could access my phone telepathically, send a message to Liam or Seth, Maddie, Naomi, or Bradley. My freaking parents. Anyone. I needed help.
“They’ll have to do something. Shut down the societies, close the school, honor the dead. It’s only fair,” Porter continued.
Panic flared in my chest, and my hand reached for the phone in my pocket reflexively. But the movement set both of them off, and suddenly they were on me in a flash of arms and hands and elbows. My phone fell to the floor of Grace’s bedroom, knocking a candle on the way. Hot wax pooled on the scuffed hardwood floor, and my breath caught in my throat. But the candle sputtered out. Relief coursed through my veins until Cameron bent and lit a page from Grace’s journal on fire, a cruel smile twisting his lips. The flame licked at the orange writing hungrily, working its way toward Cameron’s fingers.
And then he let go.