72

THE CONVINCING

I’ve convinced her. I can see it in her eyes. Even as she scurries away, back through the tunnel into the school, she is already plotting.

She’s going to find a way, she always does. Alexandria is the brains of the family. She is going to find us a path out like she found us a path in, and I will have my fortunes restored. Once that happens, she can go on living whatever life she wants. I have no reason to kill her.

Well, none good enough. Not yet.

She is the one who most resembles Damien. She has his face and brains, yes, but she’s been gifted with his ability to manipulate, too.

I make my way back to the abandoned cabin I’ve been sleeping in. It has a tunnel directly into the school, like most I’ve managed to sneak into, which makes it so easy to enter after dark, once everyone is asleep, and creep, creep, creep around. Did you know the dean leaves her safe unlocked? What an idiot. Probably can’t remember her combination.

I’m telling you, while the school itself is okay, Marchburg is a shit of a town. Who would want to live here? There’s nothing to do. The only thing it has going for it is a view, but hell, you can get a view off a cliff in Italy. Why would you saddle yourself to a stupid little nothing town in the Blue Ridge Mountains?

Alex wanted this. She wanted it so badly I couldn’t resist trying to make her dreams come true. But she’s changed. She’s no longer the sweet, adorable little Lexie who would do anything for me growing up. Now she’s my sister, my flesh and blood. She’s complicit. She knows the truth, all of it. And she has a power that I don’t—the power of altering records. That changes everything.

Everything.

I had to come. I had to have her make this right.

But before I handle Alexandria, I need to deal with that bitch who’s been hurting my sister.