Chapter Twenty-Five II

Staring at her father and her stepmother in bewilderment, she somehow had no urge to struggle. Not after their last altercation. Or the one that left her with a scarred cheek. Instead, she stumbled alongside him, feet feeling awfully heavy. And did her utmost not to land splat on her face lest he lose his patience and do away with her in the hallway. The fact that five million dollars had done little more than buy her plane ticket to the Maldives was completely out of her comprehension.

Try as she might, no part of Blue was really to accept that the whole ordeal wasn’t a fever dream. And again, she wondered if she’d wake up from it all—though not in bed with Richard. Instead, she’d awake on the morning of her birthday party. Richard and Vincent had both been figments of her imagination. Manifestations of her fear of money and her desire to live quietly. Two opposites; one good and one evil. Considering one had shot her father in