Page 87 of A Secret to Die For

Last night had been terrifying and devastating and utterly humiliating. After I’d nearly died and then broken up with the man I’d loved with my whole heart, I’d been forced to ask Brooke for help with the wax because the stupid stuff was still stuck all over me, and she’d ended up scraping it off with a library card while I sobbed in the shower.

Aaron had kept watch with a gun while we grabbed a few hours’ sleep, but now he’d gone to The Lookout to help Deck board up the broken windows at the pool house and collect some of my clothes. Luca was on guard duty now, keeping a wary eye from the other side of the kitchen as he chopped fruit.

“I loved him. I thought he loved me.”

Blue shrugged. “Maybe he does love you and he’s just an idiot?”

“Thanks, that’s really helping.”

“Look on the bright side; he kept you alive.”

“Can you please stop talking? I have a headache, and if he loved me, he wouldn’t have put my life at risk in the first place.”

“Playing devil’s advocate, you don’t know for certain that he was the root cause for last night’s incident.”

“Even he thinks he started it, and the only other person who was raking through my past was you. Are you saying you did something?”

She considered the question for a moment. “I don’t think so. I only spoke with one guy, and I’ve known him for years. He’s careful. Let the cops identify the dead guy, and then we might get a clearer picture of what happened.”

“Why are you taking Garrett’s side in this?”

“I’m not. I’m just saying that you finally found a guy you actually liked, and it seems dumb to throw away what you had if last night’s incident was totally unrelated. But he has a hell of a lot of grovelling to do. I’m talking down on his knees, kissing-your-feet begging.”

“He still lied to me.”

“By omission.”

“That doesn’t make it better.”

“Okay, then look at it this way. Say Garrett’s heavy-handed investigator did set the chain of events into motion. That means we at least know who’s behind the attempt to kill you, and possibly your parents’ murder too. Garrett wasn’t the one who tried to break in last night, sweetie. You can be upset with him for breaking your trust, but the blame for your attempted murder lies squarely with the guy in the morgue and whoever was pulling his strings.”

“How can you be so…so…”

“Rational? Objective? Because it’s my job. I’ll still kick Garrett in the nuts for you if you want. He deserves that much.”

“Thanks?”

I actually felt kind of numb. Years ago, I’d made the decision to keep my secrets to myself, both out of fear I’d die and fear I wouldn’t be believed. I’d been right on both counts, but I took no pleasure in it. For two months, I’d learned what it was like to live, really live, and now… Now, I had no idea. I couldn’t simply hide from the light again. The monster knew I’d talked.

“Blue’s right,” Luca said. “We’ve gotten nowhere with the Delaware connection, but the dead guy gives us a whole new avenue of investigation to work with.”

The dead guy. I shuddered. “Don’t you understand? They’re always three steps ahead. If you go after these people, someone else is going to wind up in a casket.”

Probably me.

Until last night, I’d assumed—well, hoped—that the monster was working alone. His was the only face I’d seen when I was nine. But now it had become clear there were more of them—two monsters at least, plus somebody directing them. And if Garrett’s tenuous theory was correct, the puppet master was a powerful politician, insulated from justice by wealth and privilege. We stood no hope of bringing him down.

Of course, Blue ignored all the obvious issues.

“You know what’s bugging me?” she asked.

I groaned and buried my head in my arms. “No, and I don’t want to.”

“This started when your parents died. But why them? What had they done that meant running them off the road was the only option?”

“How should I know? I was a child. My life consisted of school, dance classes, and play dates.”

“It’s something to do with your mom, I bet. Politics. It has to be. Your dad was just collateral damage.”

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