LOGINChapter 42
ELENA"It's an alarm," I said.The words came out of my mouth before I even thought them. Fast and smooth and easy. Like I had been lying my whole life.Maybe I had."An alarm," Maria said."For my pills." I pulled my hand out of my pocket, empty, and pressed it to the side of my head. "The doctor wants me to take them at the same time every day. Theo gave me the phone. So I don't forget." I made myself laugh. A small, tired laugh. "I forget everythingChapter 63 ElenaI hadn’t slept since the incident. Every time I closed my eye, I could hear the recording starting over and over again, the sound of my voice coming alive and growing to fill up the ballroom as every eye turned towards me. I had told myself that the recording wasn’t true, it must have been doctored but I wasn’t so sure about that stance when morning found me on my bed.I moved to the dressing table and began grooming my hair. The door opened and Kade came in, already dressed for school. My heart was filled with warm that he had come to me. The warmth gave way to trepidation when I saw the glint in his eyes. He hadn’t taken another step further. "Everyone knows now," he said.I lowered the brush. "What does everyone know sweetheart?""Everyone heard what you said. Mummy Maria told us. She said you never wanted us and wished we were never born." His voice was flat, as he obviously tried to bury the hurt he was feeling.My fingers clutche
Chapter 62 – DamienThe garage was heavily laden with the greasy smell of oil as I stood beside Elena’s car with my hands in my pockets. They were only in there because I didn’t trust they would remain still.Tomas had spent the last thirty minutes under the car, when he finally rolled out, his face told me all I needed to know.“The lines were cut. It was a cut thick enough to make the brakes failed when she had gotten some miles in.”I asked to repeat it again though I heard him clearly the first time."Someone cut the brakes. There is no planet this wasn’t an accident."I could hear my blood pumping as I remembered the black cat with no headlights almost ran her down if it weren’t for Marcus quick reflex."Do you have any idea when this was done?""I can’t say but it should pretty close because the brake fluid is pretty much intact.""Photograph everything and this is be
Chapter 61ELENA I saw Damien. Standing exactly where I had left him. Very still. His face was white. His eyes were on me. I could not read them. I could not read anything.I saw Theo. He had pushed out from the crowd near the stage. He was coming after me, fast, his face worried.And I saw Luca grab his arm.Luca held him. Hard. Pulled him back. Said something in his ear, quick and sharp. I could see his mouth move. Don't. Not here. Everyone's watching.Theo pulled. Luca held.Then Theo turned his head and looked at him. Just looked. I do not know what was in that look. But Luca's face changed. His hand loosened. He let go.And then they were both coming. Theo first. Luca right behind him.I did not wait. I pushed through the doors and out.The hall outside was long and empty and full of mirrors. I saw myself in all of them as I ran. A woman in a dark blue dress with her hair coming down and her face wet. Running and running. I did not know
Chapter 60ELENAThe voice did not stop.It went on and on, out of the speakers, filling up the whole gold room. My voice. I knew it was mine. I had heard it every day since I woke up. In the hospital. In my bedroom. Talking to Grace. Talking to Kayden over a little white table.But I had never heard it like this."I wish they were never born! I wish I never had them! Three of them, three, screaming all night, every night, and he doesn't even look at me! He looks at them. He loves them. He doesn't love me. They ruined my life! They ruined everything!"Loud. Ugly. Cracking at the edges. Wet with crying, or drink, or both.I could not move.I stood in the dark with my hand pressed against my stomach and listened to myself say it. And somewhere deep inside me, in the black hole where my memories should be, nothing moved. Nothing answered. No little light came on. No voice said, yes, I remember, I said that.Nothing.Just the words. Going on and o
Chapter 59DAMIEN"Damien! There you are!"I knew that voice. I closed my eyes for half a second.Nico.My cousin came through the crowd with his arms wide open and a glass of whiskey in one hand. He was my father's brother's son. Thirty-two, two years younger than me. Same dark hair as me, but longer, falling into his eyes. Same gray eyes as me, but warmer. Always laughing. He wore a white jacket when everyone else was in black, because Nico always wore what everyone else was not wearing.He threw his arm around my neck and pulled me into a hug. Whiskey sloshed over his glass."Cousin," he said into my ear. "You look like death. Who died?""Nobody yet."He laughed. He let me go and slapped my shoulder. Then he turned and saw Elena.His eyebrows went up. All the way up."Well," he said. "Well, well, well. Look who it is." He bowed. Low. Too low. A joke bow. "Elena. Back from the dead. Or from wherever you've been this time." He
Chapter 58DAMIENHe was gone before I got to her.I saw him go. A gray shape at the far end of the balcony. He did not run. He walked. Easy. Slow. Like a man leaving a party a little early. He turned at the corner where the stone stairs went down the side of the building, into the garden below. He looked back at me once, over his shoulder.He smiled.Then he went down the stairs, and the dark took him.I could have gone after him. I wanted to. Every part of my body wanted to. I could feel it in my legs, in my hands, that old hot pull, the one my father had beaten into me and then trained like a dog. Go. Catch him. Put him on the ground.I did not go.Because Elena was standing at the railing with her back to the city, and her face was white as the moon, and she was holding something in her hand.I walked toward her. Slowly. My shoes were loud on the stone.She did not move. She did not try to hide it. Maybe she could not. Her finger







