Chapter 5 - The 'Flawless' Plan Fails

Roselia’s POV

I had made it past the exit and found the truck I was supposed to escape in. I waved to the guy sitting in the driver’s seat. I half expected him to wave back and then the weirdest thing happened.  He poked his head out the window and yelled for the patrolmen on guard. I was so confused for one second but then it clicked. It clicked quite quickly given the circumstances… but not quickly enough.

It was a fucking setup.

Horrified, I tried to make a run for it, my heart beating so loud, I couldn’t even hear my own pounding steps nor did I hear the shots that were fired until one hit me in the leg and I stumbled to the ground. I tried to get up as blood spurted from the wound in my shin. The bullet had passed through the flesh but still, there was so much blood. 

I could’ve still made it but the guards were too fast. I was on my feet and almost past the Clifford property’s boundary by the time they got a hold of me.

I didn’t struggle as they dragged me back into the mansion. I was in a haze, a million thoughts flying through my numb brain as my horrification at my failure increased manifold.

Fury, rage and disappointment burned within me. I couldn’t think, couldn’t process anything.

I thought of all the ways that this could’ve happened. Every possibility, every loose end, every single way my plan could’ve gone wrong.

All those thoughts were erased forever when the doors to the banquet opened and Abram’s conflicted gaze met mine. If you were anyone else, you would see a stoic, expressionless man but I noticed just the faintest tic of his jaw, the way his doleful eyes communicated how sorry he was. 

I mouthed the word “Why?” to him, the sound only barely coming out as my throat closed up on me. Abram quickly looked away.

My eyes watered but I blinked the moisture away. 

The whole room was silent. The only sound that could be heard was the faint trickle of my blood out of my gunshot wound onto the hardwood floor.

Until the heavy silence broke by the backstabbing bastard’s boarish voice.

“Boss, there’s more to the anonymous tip.” What Abram said next only cemented what I’d already been guessing. “They’re claiming that the orphan girl who’s been working here for the past six years poisoned the food that was to be served to the heir of the Clifford's family. They’re saying she’s Roselia Quinn, the Roselia Quinn, daughter of Henry Quinn. And given the fact that she was trying to escape just proved that….”       

Waylen moved a hand to silence Abram as he stood in front of me, eyeing me as if he was picturing how my head would look on a stick.

“Given that the Quinns and this family have had a bitter ongoing rivalry for decades, it does add up. And Derek’s arrival was just the opportune moment this pathetic, cowardly family was waiting for,” Waylen spit out, glaring daggers at me. 

He could rave all about my family he wanted. They were just as bad as him and Edwin, if not worse.

There was a faint creak of a chair scraping against the floor. I look up but then quickly lower my gaze when I noticed that the next member of the family to get up was him.

Heavy footsteps echoed through the banquet hall as they neared me.

“Who the fuck shot her?” His harsh voice boomed through the hall, startling everyone. 

I sucked in a breath when I saw him lower himself to his knees in front of me.

“Fuck! Lia, are you ok?” His voice took on the softest tone, sounding like whiskey and honey. I was so delirious from the blood loss and betrayal, I almost smiled at him.

“Shit. That was a stupid question. How could you be ok?” I almost couldn’t hear what he said. His face was screwed up in concern. Lines of worry marred his richly-tanned handsome face. I tried to smooth them with one hand. He was surprised but didn’t pull back. My heart almost dropped when his pursed lips relaxed and he leaned into my touch. 

“The bullet passed through, I’m fine.” I dropped my hand from his face as the delirious haze lifted from my mind before I could do anything even more stupid. He frowned and shook his head at me. His softened gaze grew very hard when it fell upon my wound.

“I’m still waiting for an answer.” The patrolmen flinched from his tone as he got up and walked up to one of them. 

“Who. The. Fuck. Shot. Her.” The man shivered beneath Derek’s towering gaze, his cold iceberg-like eyes screamed silent, fatal rage. All of the patrol guards were at least 6 feet tall but Derek still had at least over 5 inches on them. He was built like a giant iceberg. Given, he was a very lean, subtly muscled iceberg, the kind that attracted you to him like unlucky ships were attracted to icebergs capable of sinking them. 

Attractive icebergs?! I should be focused on figuring out an escape plan and I’m thinking about Derek Clifford - shaped icebergs. I have gone crazy.

“Son, what are you on about? They were doing their job. It remains to be seen what’s to be done with the girl.” Waylen eyed me again in the same way, like he was thinking of all the most painful ways he could put me in a grave.

  

“The girl has a name.” I know I was signing my own death warrant by mouthing off to one of the most dangerous people on the planet but after my massive failure which sent 6 years of planning down the drain, I really couldn’t care less. 

“Roselia has done nothing wrong,” Derek replied, shooting his father a meaningful look. 

“Are you suggesting the anonymous tip, the banquet in honour of your arrival and this wretched nuisance of a girl taking off in the middle of all this is just a big, fat coincidence?” 

“He’s got a point,” I interjected. Because of course, I was out of my mind. Derek gave me a ‘what-the-fuck’ look. I just shrugged at him. 

“Not a word out of you,” Waylen sneered at me. 

“She was not here to poison me. I ate the food and I am perfectly fine. As are all of us. So that tip was bullshit.”

 “Sir, there’s more to…..”, Abram starts to speak but is cut off by Derek.

“You…..”, Derek points to Jeremy as he stands closest to him. “Get a doctor and have her bandaged up.” When Jeremy doesn’t immediately react, Derek yells menacingly at him,” NOW!!”

Jeremy looks like he wants to punch Derek for bossing him around but then takes one look at me on the floor, clutching my limp leg and thinks better of it. 

As Jeremy leaves to phone the doctor, a pained groan escapes Derek. The whole family watches in deafening silence as Derek loses his balance, his eyes watering and struggling to stay open. 

Oh my fucking God?! But… how could this be? Those were all side effects of the poison I had tried to ingest Edwin with. I went to poison Edwin and instead I ended up poisoning Derek? But how could… my thoughts come to a halt when I notice Edwin giving me a perverted smirk…. my blood runs so cold, it feels like ice in my veins. I turn ashen white when I notice Abram give me a sympathetic look and then…. If it wasn’t clear enough to me, Edwin and Abram exchange a knowing look. 

My heart plummets so hard and deep, I expect it to stop beating altogether. 

Derek tries to grab a chair in order to steady himself but the chair falls to the floor and so does he. I almost cry out in horror as a gut-wrenching pain sears through my body, the realization of what I’d done… that I’d poisoned him wreaking havoc on my body.

I bite down so hard on my lip to keep myself from bursting into sobs that I taste blood in my mouth.

“Oh my god! She’s poisoned Derek,” his mother screams at me before quickly rushing to her son and placing his head in her lap. His father stands as his uncle Edwin kneels beside him. The whole family is thrown into utter chaos.

 “Derek?! Please stay with me, baby. Please stay,” his mother cries out, cradling his head in her lap. Her shoulders shake as her body is wracked with sobs.

I only barely make out an almost-unconscious Derek calling out to me. My heart almost jumps up to my throat when I hear his strangled words, ”Mom… please make sure she’s ok.” His mother fixes me with a venomous glare but when he further pleads,” Can you do that mom? For me?” 

She only faintly nods before Derek is out cold in her lap. 

My throat constricts, making it almost impossible for me to drag air into my lungs.

 His head lolls freely, his body seeming lifeless like he’s already gone.

 I’d always thought physical pain was the worst pain in the world.

But this pain made me not want to breathe and my heart to not beat anymore. This pain was so mind-numbingly painful, I wanted to fucking die. I deserved to fucking die. This was worse than any physical pain I’d ever had. 

I collapsed to the floor when my hands couldn’t hold me up anymore. I noticed Derek’s father take a feral step toward me from the corner of my eye. And before I went completely unconscious, I managed to squeeze out the words that would save his life - the fact that I’d hidden an extra vial of antidote in my room under a hollow floorboard. 

I thanked my fucking stars that I’d remembered that I’d kept an extra vial. 

I could only hope it wasn’t too late. If it was… I don’t know what the fuck I would do. 

My vision goes black as my heart beats another painful beat.