THE CONFESSION
“I took her place from that moment on. It wasn’t hard to pretend to be devastated, I was. And I told the police Damien had been distraught, that I thought he killed himself. I didn’t think it was fair to brand Sylvia a murderer when her daughter was the psychotic one.
“I managed to sneak back home a couple of days later and found my mum dead on the couch. The needle was still in her arm. No way to know if Ashlyn was responsible or it was just her time, but either way, everyone was gone. Everything was done. I had no real alternatives after that but to follow through on Ashlyn’s grand plan.
“You, Dean, made it so easy on me. I appreciate that. You showed such compassion.”
Ford Julianne Westhaven has never wanted to run away from Goode so much as she does at this moment. But she has no choice, she must stay. She must find out why Becca Curtis is dangling on the gates, her photo being shot from every angle before she is carefully, gently, moved to a horizontal plane.
She must learn why Ash Carlisle is standing in her office, staring out the window, telling a story as insane and twisted as any she’s ever heard.
No, this girl is not Ash. She is the impostor they’ve been worried about. Alexandria Pine. Damien Carr’s illegitimate daughter.
Ford has to decide if she believes the tale she’s being told. Is this girl the real monster? Or is there another, far worse, lurking somewhere on the grounds? The Grendel in their forest?
“It all started over the summer. Ashlyn decided she didn’t want to do all the work it would entail to get a degree. She just wanted the money. She knew I craved an education desperately, more than anything in my life. And she knew I would never, ever, have the opportunities she did. This is what happens when you’re illegitimate. Your agency is ripped away and you’re stuck with the scraps thrown from the real family’s table.
“I had no idea the lengths she would go to, but when I realized how crazy she really is, I knew the best thing for me to do was play along and get as far away from her as I possibly could. If I hadn’t agreed to impersonate her, I have no doubt she would have killed me, too. As she did our brother, our father, and her mother. Possibly my mother, as well. I’ll never know unless she tells me, but even then...” She turns from the window, resolve etched on her face.
“She killed Camille. And Becca, too. Anyone who gets in her way, who she can’t manipulate, she simply eliminates. We’re all in danger.”
Tony isn’t buying it; incredulity is written across his strong features. “You’re telling me a sixteen-year-old girl masterminded an identity scam and killed six people?”
“Six people so far,” Kate says, calmly. “That we know of. Are there more?”
“I don’t know. And I don’t think we can say Ashlyn did all the masterminding. It was her idea from the start for us to switch places, yes, but I’m the one who did all the legwork. The paperwork. But that’s all I’ve done. I swear to you, I had nothing to do with the murders. Ashlyn kept telling me she was going to handle things, but I never in a million years guessed murder was her solution. And don’t forget, she practically had a gun to my head the whole time. She made it quite clear I had no choice in the matter.”
“Why didn’t you go to the police?” Ford asks.
When Alex smiles, Ford is reminded of the flatness of a snake’s eyes. “What would they have done? She’s a master manipulator. She would have told them I cooked up the whole thing, that I murdered her parents, that I held her hostage. That’s what she told me last night, at least. That she was going to tell you I held her hostage if I didn’t go along with her.”
“What does she want from you?” Kate asks.
Alexandria Pine takes a seat and lifts the teacup to her lips, contemplative. Gone is the hesitant, meek Ash. Alex is tall, straight, calm, focused. How had Ford missed this phoenix, hidden in the ashes?
“The money. It’s always been about the money. She found out about the codicil to the will Damien created and came here to get me to transfer my portion of the estate immediately.”
“Why didn’t you?” Ford asks, almost curious now.
“I tried. The DNA test the solicitor did will show who I really am. I told Ashlyn the simplest thing for us to do was Freaky Friday this whole deal in reverse. I offered to let her pretend to be me to the solicitors, and I’d just switch the DNA results in the computers. It would make the switch official, and no one had to get hurt. She doesn’t want to share the estate. But she isn’t thinking clearly. She’s been doing a lot of drugs. It’s addled her mind. And her mind was twisted to start with.”
Ford still can’t even believe what she’s hearing. “Why would she hurt Becca?”
“Because Becca hurt me.” Alex raises her shirt and Ford sees the bandage on her rib cage. A small part of her whispers in silent agony. She, too, was branded, something the Ivy Bound society is expressly forbidden to do anymore. What was Becca Curtis thinking? She’s brought back every hazing ritual outlawed by Ford when she came on board a decade ago.
Rumi told Ford she was naive. Maybe they’ve been doing this all along and she’s simply not been paying attention. Or maybe Becca Curtis thought she could get away with it because of who she was.
“It’s not only the brand,” Alex says. “Or the hazing. Becca broke my heart, too. Ashlyn was furious yesterday and looking for someone to take it out on. She couldn’t torture and kill me, not until I made things right, so she went after the one thing, the one person, I give a damn about. Becca.”
She turns to Kate. “How did you figure it out?”
“A photograph from the crime scene, of a family portrait. After that, it was only a matter of finding someone from the household still alive to look at the photo from your customs entry. The cook confirmed for us who you really were.”
“Dorsey,” Alex says, smiling. “She was always so kind to me. Never sent me home hungry. I always wondered if she knew I was Damien’s, or if she was just a soft touch. He treated her abominably. Another innocent caught in Ashlyn’s crossfire.”
“This is all very heartwarming, but where is Ashlyn now?” Tony asks.
“I don’t know. I saw her in the graveyard last night—did you know there’s a tunnel out from the sophomores’ hall? It’s down the stairs from the storage room across from mine. So convenient, these tunnels. She’s been moving about freely for days, nicking food, lurking, snooping, stealing. She realized Camille was trying to spy on my computer, and though there wasn’t much to see, Ashlyn couldn’t risk it. She had to find out what she knew.”
“So you’re saying she killed Camille.”
“Yes. It’s the only logical explanation.”
“Did she admit this to you?” Tony asks.
“She didn’t have to. I don’t know exactly what happened that night, I was being tapped for Ivy Bound. The shirt is the key, though. Becca gave it to me, I found it on my bed after I took a shower. I assumed it was put there in that fifteen-minute window, but then I realized, it could have been there the whole tap. Which means Ashlyn, who was moving in and out of the buildings at will, would have had access to the shirt and my room for a few hours. I assume she wrote the summons and got Camille upstairs, questioned her, pushed her off the ledge, then hurried back and put the shirt on the bed.
“It was a good plan, to make it look like either Becca or I were responsible. Unless she confesses, though, we may never know what really happened.”
“This is quite a tale, Alex,” Ford says. An impossible, ridiculous tale.
“It is. But it’s the truth. I have no reason to lie anymore.”
Ford wants to believe her. But there’s something so strange about her story, something missing.
The convenient specter of a psychotic missing sister.
Something niggles at the back of her brain.
“The piano. You gave up the piano. Muriel told me you were just having an off day.”
Alex smiles, delighted with this tiny bit of proof. “Not an off day. I never had proper lessons, only school lessons. Ashlyn taught me how to get through the meeting with Muriel. She is an amazing pianist, total natural. Do you know how hard I had to work to at least make it seem like I had the tiniest spark of talent? I learned enough to make it seem like I was just out of practice. It was a right pain in the arse, I’ll tell you that. But Muriel, she wasn’t fooled. Not really. She knew something was wrong that went deeper. She saw it within the first few minutes, when I set my fingers on the wrong keys to start and had to shift over an octave. God, what a stupid mistake. I might have even stuck with it, pretended until she taught me more, but after that, I knew she’d be watching too closely. I had to quit.”
The story is a good one. It might very possibly be true. Except...
“And then she died,” Tony says, the words Ford is thinking. “Is this Ashlyn’s doing, too?”
Alex’s face falls. “I don’t think so. I think that was just a terrible, horrible coincidence.”
Is this girl capable of the lies, the deceit, it would take to pull off a stunt of this magnitude? Is Ford staring into the eyes of a killer?
Or is she some sort of split personality, and moments from now, the other part of her will claw its way to the surface and laugh at their pain?
And what is that smell?