The irony is almost poetic—how the architect of ten years of carnage will never realize the devastation he caused was for nothing. For the wrong fucking girl. Nothing about that incident fit neatly, but snatching the wrong kid? That’s a new level of incompetence, even for Robert Berkeley.
Which still leaves one question hanging in the air. If not her… who? And how much does Daniel Etheridge know?
“Just so I’m abundantly clear.” Daniel leans back on the sofa and strokes the armchair as if it were his own. “If my sister is hurt, in any way, the truce is off. For good.”
“If she’s hurt, it will be because of your secrets, not ours,” Alessia replies. “I’m sure your parents taught you to take responsibility for your actions.”
“My familyis none of your business,” he spits.
Reginald’s jaw ticks at his tone, but he clenches his teeth. Mostly because Alessia doesn’t need help putting dicks like him in their place.
“It became my business when you touched my son, torso.” She snorts. “I wouldn’t think about doing that again if I were you. I trust you know my background well.”
“As a matter of fact, I do.” He nods. “And that is reason alone why Eva will never have anything to do with this family.”
My phone pings, loud enough to demand everyone’s attention.
I slide the screen up and freeze.
Hugo
She took off. Flying a helicopter! Can you believe it?
Can I believe it? I could tell him the exact location where Elton Etheridge arranged her first flying lesson when she turned sixteen. Where she didallher lessons. Same as her brother. All sixty hours of it. Which also tells me the most likely location she’ll land. Their beach house in Dorset.
Hugo
Mason’s fucking lost it. He’s coming for the Etheridge prince.
How long do I have?
Hugo
15 if you’re lucky.
“Any news?” Reginald asks from his Chesterfield armchair.
Daniel’s gaze fixes on me.
I shake my head and secure my phone in my pocket. Daniel, unconvinced, continues to stare at me, dissecting my face for information he won’t find.
Mason says I know everything. All the fucking time. He calls it my super-annoyance. The idiot would know it’s only attention to detail if only he had a longer attention span than a toddler’s. Except when it comes to the princess. Then he is fucking Einstein.
But I don’t know everything. If I did, I would have solved this clusterfuck already.
This is bigger than Fort. It’s bigger than Etheridge.
It’s tangled up, carefully, purposefully.
Every avenue leads to ten different avenues that all end up in dead ends. I have two live trails left to follow, but nothing more to go on with. And, if we are going to get ourselves out of this unscathed, I need to know what Daniel Etheridge knows.
So, I must convince him, it wasn’t one of us who killed his parents. It was one ofthem.
In fifteen minutes.
Fuck my life.
38
