Page 60 of Violent Reign (Violent Kingdom)

“Let’s go over there,” I suggest. “It’s prettier. More private.”

Nathan thinks about that for a moment, glancing around the perimeter of the large property. He’s probably wondering if I’m hatching a plot to kill him. After a few moments he catches up to me, falling into step beside me.

“Scared I’m leading you into a trap?” I ask, as we walk. “Getting you into the best spot for a sniper?”

Nathan laughs. “Any sniper who wants to get me at this table could just as easily get me back there. Besides, you can’t kill me. I’ve got too many secrets you want the answers to.”

We reach the table, Nathan waiting for me to choose a seat first. I pick the left one, sitting down, watching carefully as Nathan sits down across from me. The chairs are angled so that both of us have an unrivaled view of the ocean. It’s a spot where one might propose marriage, or renew vows, or scatter ashes of a loved one.

But we’re here to unearth darker things.

“Tell me about Adeline,” I say. “About the night she died. I want to know.”

Nathan’s expression takes on a far-away quality. He thinks for a few moments, as I watch him. Anxiety gnaws at me. My breathing quickens.Tighter or looser?But I’m not that girl anymore. I don’t need to be held while I spiral into a panic attack. I’m the queen of the castle now, and I’m in control of myself. I slow my breathing before I descend into madness.

Truthfully, I don’t want to know about my sister’s final moments, so much as I need to know. I need to know what happened in the moments before she died, before I happened upon her dead body floating in that pool all those years ago.

“She was going to leave that night,” Nathan says. “She had just had a sonogram earlier that day. She asked me to help her get out. She trusted me, you know? Even though she was leaving me. She never believed I would hurt her.”

“But you did hurt her.”

He nods. “I told her to meet me in the indoor pool room. It was private. No cameras. It made sense. I heard her coming. I got in the pool, floated on my stomach, played dead. You remember how we always used to see who could hold their breath the longest when we were kids?”

“You always won,” I say emptily.

“I never cared as much as you two if I lived or died,” Nathan replies. “That’s how I always won. You girls never would let yourselves get as close to passing out as me. So that’s what I did that night, waiting for Addie. I played dead, and that’s how Adeline found me. She was screaming my name, but you know that room - it’s virtually soundproof. Nobody heard her screaming. I wasn’t sure if she was going to jump in to get me, but she did. She jumped right in and came to my rescue, and when she saw I was okay, she laughed.” His expression darkens. “She stopped laughing when I begged her to stay. I fucking begged her, Avery. It was pathetic.”

“What did she say?” I ask.

“She just said… no. I even asked if I could go with her. If she could take me away, too. Because I didn’t want my fate just as much as she didn’t want her fate. I’d already lived so many horrors in that basement, already seen so many awful fucking things that my parents made me watch. The things they made me do. You can’t ever undo those things, you understand? Adeline knew some of what they did to me, and she was still going to leave me with them.”

“And that’s when you…” I trail off.

“That’s when I drowned her,” Nathan confirms, his expression taking on a far-away quality. “I was so angry, Aves. You have no idea. I loved her. I’d never loved anybody before, not like that. I thought she would never leave me. Your sister and I, we were like… two parts of the same soul. Twin flames, she used to call us. She promised she’d never leave me, not until the day she died. But then, all of a sudden, she was going to leave me and never come back. It was like a switch flipped inside her. It was like I couldn’t hold onto her anymore, she was just slipping through my fingers, and… I couldn’t lose her. I couldn’t let her get away and leave me in that fucking family.” Nathan swallows painfully. “I wanted to die with her. I just wrapped my arms around her and pulled us both under. She barely had time to get a breath in. She fought me the whole time, but I was always stronger than her. I could hold my breath longer than her. I held her under, and I didn’t let go. Not until I watched her take the first breath of water into her lungs. Drowning isn’t peaceful when you fight it. Adeline fought it with everything she had.”

I nod slowly, wiping my eyes with the edge of my index finger. I stare at the ocean, thinking of my sister, when Nathan’s shocked laugh shakes me from my thoughts, drawing my attention back to him.

“And here I was looking for snipers in the bushes,” he says. A thin thread of crimson blood drips down from his nose, beading on the top of his lip. “Poison?” He touches his fingers to the blood and pulls them away to look. “How very Shakespeare of you.” His expression isn’t shocked, or angry. Nathaniel Capulet looks impressed. “The coffee,” he guesses. “But you drank it, too, love. I’m intrigued.”

“The sugar cubes,” I say. “You always did have a sweet tooth.”

He nods, smiling as he makes an odd choking sound, a fine sheen of sweat on his forehead. “Bravo, Avery. You’re smarter than I gave you credit for. How long do I have?”

Relief and sadness flood my soul. “Not long.” I watch, mesmerized, as more blood drips from his nose onto the table.

“Well. I guess you’d better ask me whatever else it is you came here to ask me.”

I take a folded newspaper clipping from my pocket and smooth it out on the table, pushing it toward Nathan. SERIAL KILLER ON THE LOOSE, the title screams. I point to the date.

“I found this article in your father’s safe,” I say. “The XO Killer’s first victim. I noticed the date. You would have been eleven years old. But you didn’t come out of that place to live with them until you were twelve.”

Nathan nods ruefully. “Yup.”

I choke back a sob. “You killed this woman when you were eleven years old?”

Nathan grunts in amusement. “Come on, Avery,” he says. “Every apple has to fall from some tree, right? Even the most rotten ones came from some branch, once upon a time, shiny and new. Who do you think taught me to kill?”

Horrified, I pull the crumpled newspaper article back toward me, looking at the face. “Enzo,” I guess.

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