Page 103 of Raise Hell

Maybe I was wrong.

My thoughts are moving so fast it’s impossible to keep up with them. If I don’t get some release soon, my head might just explode.

I wait until evening mass is over to go to the chapel when it’s more likely to be empty. Attendance at services isn’t required for students but is strongly encouraged. I’m sure my sister never missed a single one.

But as I keep having to remind myself, I’m not the real Olivia Pratt. Even if the lines between us have become impossibly blurred. Inhabiting her life, pretending to be her for so long, makes it feel like I’m losing pieces of myself in the process.

Maybe I am.

Which is why I need the absolution of confession to wash away the stain of my quickly accumulating sins. Nobody would ever say that doing work better left for heaven would be easy.

Or that I would survive it with my soul intact.

Is Drake my enemy or my hidden ally?

If he saved my sister, I don’t have to hate myself for falling in love with the person I thought he was pretending to be.

Maybe, that Drake is actually the real one.

Or maybe I have entirely lost my mind.

The confessional is grounding, giving me the opportunity to focus on something outside of myself. While I’m saying Hail Marys and making the sign of the cross, I’m not thinking about the quagmire that is this situation.

Absolution feels good, even if it only lasts until the next sin I commit.

That sense of peace and calm last for about five seconds.

Nolan stands up from one of the front pews as I exit the confession booth.

My heart beats painfully with unhappy shock to see him there.

Though it affords some privacy, I know that wooden sides of the confession booth aren’t completely soundproof. There is a one hundred percent chance that he has been listening in. Since that first day at St. Bart’s, I’ve refrained from confessing anything that might ruin my plans if it were overhead.

But that doesn’t mean I want him to know what I confessed.

He won’t have heard anything truly secret, thankfully. The only sins I confessed to Father Murphy tonight were ones of lust.

Which doesn’t make me feel any better to see him here.

“It’s a little late for the confessional, don’t you think?” His voice echoes off the high ceilings. “You have to actually be contrite for confession to work.”

Nolan hasn’t said more than a word to me since I arrived. I haven’t exactly gotten good vibes from the guy, but he had seemed content just avoiding me.

But the look on his face as he looks me up and down is nothing short of hatred.

“Maybe you should worry about your own eternal soul,” I murmur, feeling uneasy. “I’ll leave you to it.”

Nolan smoothly steps into the narrow aisle between the pews, blocking my path. “You were in there for awhile. Did you tell the Father anything good?”

“You and I both know that answering that question kind of destroys the point of a confessional in the first place.” Crossing my arms over my chest, I regard him with a bored expression. “Are you going to get out of my way?”

“Something is different about you, but I can’t quite put my finger on what it is.” His gaze narrows on my lips, and not all the heat there is from anger. “But I guess you’re the kind of girl who needs to learn the same lesson more than once before it sticks.”

“You Havoc Boys seem to really get off on making threats.” I take a step closer, forcing him to move or let me well into his personal space. Nolan takes the smallest half-step back, and my smile widens. “I’m still waiting for someone to back it up with action.”

“Be careful what you wish for, baby bird. You just might get it.”

He only steps back far enough for me to squeeze past him. His body looms over mine as I move around him, half-expecting him to grab for me in the middle of the chapel.

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