There was silence.
Bilal stared at the ground, processing, while Fola’s expression was unreadablenow. As was Octavius’s, since the sunglasses he was wearing were obscuring much of his face. Romeo was standing next to Perdita, chewing his lip nervously.
The siblings had all been told the story of their births and their adoptions long ago. Of how their father had found them all in different orphanages across the world, adopting them for his experimentation. They’d been told that their birth mothers had been women trapped in circumstances that meant they could not raise the children they had birthed.
Perdita’s truth had ripped this belief to shreds.
The cruel nature of their father was not a revelation. It was how he’d molded them into who they were today, with a ruthless, heavy hand. Still, it was hard to process the fact that someone,Perdita’s mother, his first experiment, haddiedbecause of him. Their murdered father was himself a murderer. That was the most shocking revelation of all. It went beyond what they knew him to be capable of.
“I wonder what else Father was lying about?” Bilal muttered, mostly to himself.
“As far as I could tell from his notes, my birth mom was the only one he did this to. For the rest of us, he really did seek us out in orphanages.”
“So…thisis why you got the largest inheritance,” Fola said finally, her voice void of emotion. “Because you’re hisrealdaughter, and the rest of us are counterfeit chess pieces.Fabulous.” Perdita could see all the hurt on Fola’s face, like an open bloody wound.
“We’reallhis real children, Fola. Just because we’re adopted doesn’t make any of us less real. The tabloids say terrible, untruthful things all the time. Even Father, in his own sick way, raised us to behischildren. Regardless of whose blood is flowing through us, we are Buttons,” Perdita said, but Fola did not look any less wounded. “I know I sound like a hypocrite, but I didn’t want any of this. I told him last night when he told me about the inheritance—”
“You knew about the inheritancebefore he died?” Fola’s vulnerable expression was gone in an instant, replaced once more with a vicious mask.
Perdita shook her head, eyes widening. “I swear I only found out about the inheritance last night. He told me when I went to confront him about my birth mother. Thorin had just informed me about the results of the paternity test and I honestly couldn’t wait until after the ball to confront him. I just wanted him to know that I knew who he was. Who I was. It was there on the yacht that I warned him of my plans to expose what he did, show the world who hereallyis. What he’s done. To vulnerable women. To us. I told him that I would no longer parade around his stupid balls, promoting his twisted methods. That I was done. He didn’t seem scared by my threats, not in the slightest. Instead, he seemed happy that I knew and said that he’d planned to tell me the truth when I turned eighteen next year.Thentold me all about the inheritance, about how I was his… his true heir. It was like he expected me to be grateful to him for sharing his blood with me. I wish I didn’t have the inheritance or his blood. It’s poison.”
Fola’s irritation didn’t seem to disappear at this explanation; in fact she seemed to grow even more annoyed.
“Did you tell the police any of this?” Bilal asked, his voice softening, aware of the people and cops that were still in close range, even though the siblings were outside.
Bilal had always been the most levelheaded of the bunch. Where Fola always acted with unbending black-and-white logic, and their other siblings led with emotion, Bilal often managed to wield both logic and emotion at once.
Perdita shook her head and Bilal nodded. “Of course not,” he said, looking exhausted. “They wouldn’t understand. Who knows what they would even think.”
“Well, I’m pretty sure they would think that she killed Dad,” Octavius said, stating the obvious in his usual unhelpful fashion.
Before any of them could respond, they were interrupted by a loud sound coming from the direction of the drawing room. There was a rise and fall ofnoise as the doors, which had been open for who knows how long, were shut once again. This time, two figures were standing by the entryway. Perdita felt her heart plunge into her stomach at the thought that they could have been overheard.Maybe we should have been quieter.
The tension in her shoulders eased a little once she realized that she recognized the intruders. One was Anwar, Bilal’s ex, and the other…Evie. Perdita’s eyebrows rose a little in surprise at the sight of her. She hadn’t seen Evie since… well, since Adam’s tragic passing a few years ago.
“Sorry to interrupt…,” Anwar began, clearly nervous, his gaze mostly concentrated on Bilal, who for some reason was not looking at Anwar at all. Instead her brother was just staring strangely at Evie. “Just wanted to see if everything was okay.”
“I’m also here for the same reason,” Evie said.
“We’re fine. Just dealing with a small family matter,” Fola said, folding her arms.
Neither of them looked convinced, and Perdita did not blame them.
“Are you sure?” Evie asked, taking in the tense scene she’d clearly just walked into. “Whatever’s going on here doesn’t seem small.”
No one said anything, and so Evie clearly took this as her cue to add more fuel to the fire. “I just wanted to say, I’m really sorry for your loss. And with everything going on I wanted to offer any help I can. I can’t even imagine how today’s been for you all,” Evie continued.
She can’t even imagine the half of it, Perdita thought.
“And how exactly would you go about helping us?” Fola said. Her question was obviously rhetorical because she didn’t give Evie a chance to answer. “Again, all of this is a family matter. We’re here trying to deal with the fact that our father is gone forever. That not only is he gone, he wasmurdered. And that someoneherein our home probably has something to do with it. So your sympathies are nice and all but unless you can deliver the culprit, you and your condolences are pretty useless.” Despite the viciousness in Fola’s words,they did not have their usual bite; tears were streaming down her face as she spoke.
Perdita knew that her sister hated when people felt sorry for her, but it was hard not to right now. Out of all of them, Fola had been the closest to their father. She’d idolized him and made no decision without his approval. It was clear her sister was really hurting, and Perdita wanted so desperately to comfort her.
“And no offense, but you are both also suspects in this murder case. So quite frankly I’d rather not discuss the particulars of our family with two unknown variables,” Fola finished coldly with a sniff.
Everything was still for a few moments in the garden. The only sound was the sudden distant tolling of the bell inside, which overtook the space where an answer should be. The ring signaled that more guests were being set free from the Manor; ants fleeing the nest, leaving an even smaller pool of people for the police to scrutinize under a microscope.
“I was actually dismissed a few hours ago, so I’m not technically a suspect anymore,” Anwar finally spoke up.
