Chapter Thirty-Eight
THIRTY-EIGHT
Time freezes, and I’m still dropping, as if in slow motion. I hit the ground and my injured arm makes me yelp in pain. I register Maddox over me, his hands on my hips, pushing me down, his mouth open as if shouting, the sound swallowed by that shot.
It’s not even a loud shot. It’s more of a pfft. But it’s all I can hear. And then Maddox’s face isn’t right over mine. His head whips back, and blood sprays and I scream and we hit the ground, him slumped over me.
My insides go wild, my brain screaming an endless, wordless scream.
I scramble from under him and—
Blood. There’s blood, spattered over me, and I know it’s not mine and I can’t see where he’s shot. He’s face down on the ground and…and…
He’s not moving.
“Stop,” a voice says.
I don’t stop. I grab Maddox’s shoulder, calling his name, lifting him—
“Stop or he gets another one.”
I freeze, arms shaking, hands still on Maddox’s shoulder.
“I’m not kidding,” the voice growls. “Leave him or I finish the job.”
Finish the job. That means Maddox isn’t…isn’t…
I squeeze my eyes shut and swallow hard. Then I very slowly release Maddox’s shoulder, feeling the heat of it disappear, my fingers stretching involuntarily, seeking that heat.
“J-just let me—” I begin.
“Back away.”
“P-please.”
“Back away or else.”
I turn, the movement taking so much effort. A gun barrel points at Maddox, and I see his chest rise, still breathing.
He’s alive, and I will do nothing—nothing—to change that.
I scramble back, my gaze still on Maddox. The only movement is that rise and fall of his chest. I see smatters of blood, but wherever he’s shot, I can’t see that.
“Keep backing up,” the voice says.
I do that until the gun lowers. Then I turn my gaze to see the shooter.
I think I know who it is. I can’t process the voice—my brain is beyond that—but the answer seems obvious.
Cecilia. She took us from Westdale. She had us get out of the Jeep so she could make phone calls. She’d even said, “Go for a romantic walk in the woods or something.” And after what Theo just texted us and what Maddox just pointed out, the answer seems obvious.
But the person holding the gun is not Cecilia. It’s…
My mind stutters, and for a moment, I see Isolde. Pale skin. Red curls. A smattering of freckles.
Tristan Brandt.
I remember meeting him in that hospital, seeing Theo walking over to him. They’d been about the same height, the same build.
A tall, broad figure in a dark hallway at a club. A guy who chased Isolde and me out the door and attacked her and later she said it was Theo, and the size did fit but…
I remember the look in her eyes when she said she didn’t want to go home while he was there, and I’d taken it for typical sibling rivalry, but no. It was fear. Fear and hate, quickly masked with a joke.
He’s perfect. I hate him. Ha-ha.
Not a joke at all. Not the hate part, at least.
Then I remember the video.
It was just supposed to be a cut, and he says he slipped, but he didn’t. He did this on purpose.
I open my mouth to accuse him. Then I shut it. Tristan’s standing there, holding a gun, and Maddox is a few feet away, shot and unconscious.
I need to divert Tristan. I’ve read enough mysteries to understand this part. Get him talking, explaining, and then I might have a chance to…
To what? I’m not Polly. I don’t have hidden martial arts skills.
No, what I need is a chance to think. Lean into my strengths. Think of a way out.
“Why Maddox?” I ask.
“I was aiming for you, heiress,” he says. “He must have seen something, and apparently, when he was saying how paranoid he is, he wasn’t kidding. But it’s fine. I need both of you dead. Murder-suicide. He’s…”
He taps his temple with his free hand. “Fucked up. Everyone knows it. He spent time in a mental hospital. Guess he snapped and killed his girlfriend.” He leans in and mock-whispers, “I heard she was screwing around with his best friend.” He tsks. “Can’t blame him for snapping.”
Tristan advances on me. “You ask why him? Because he was here. I followed the tracker I put on your car, watched you two go into the forest, and got an idea. Otherwise, I don’t give a shit about the kid.”
“Because the target is me,” I say. “The heiress no one actually wanted found, and now they need to kill her before she turns eighteen and changes her will.”
His head tilts. “Isolde said you were smart. Nicely done.”
I keep talking to distract him. “You shot at me by the roadside stand. And then you and Cosmo had Jayden push me down the stairs.”
He makes a “wrong answer” buzz. “You were doing well there. Yes to the roadside stand—you turned around at the last second and ruined my shot. No to the stairs.”
“You’re telling me you had nothing to do with that? That you—or your family—weren’t behind it?”
He snorts. “We’d never be that sloppy. I’d have shoved you down the stairs myself and made sure you didn’t get up again. But after those idiot kids went after you, I couldn’t try killing you inside the house again.”
“Again,” I say. “Because you tried once, on my first night, coming through the attic. No one expected me to have changed my door code yet. You’d have found a way to kill me that looked natural.
But after Jayden shoved me down the stairs, you didn’t dare try killing me at Westdale.
First you tried the gala and then the alley. ”
“The alley was a sure thing until someone…” He slowly glances at Maddox.
“Fuck. It was him, wasn’t it. Well, in that case, forget what I said.
I do have a reason to kill him. He screwed everything up.
I lost my chance, and then my useless sister lost her nerve.
I told our parents Isolde was weak, but they never listened. ”
“Y-you killed your own sister?”
“She would have told you everything. But also it was just a good excuse to knock out my own competition. Sibling competition.” He actually winks at me, and my stomach drops.
“And Maddox’s sister? Did you kill her, too?”
“Who?” He stops, and his whole face lights up before he starts laughing.
“Oh god, I didn’t make the connection. Maddox Moreno.
Jenna Moreno was his sister. Man, that’s rich.
Yeah, we were in the same year. Jenna didn’t know how the game is played either.
If you’re going to poke around, asking questions, accusing me of things, you need to be someone important.
Otherwise, no one gives a shit when, whoops, you die. ”
“You killed Jenna. Just like you killed Isolde. On your own. Without your family knowing.”
“They wouldn’t have agreed to it. They can get sticky about shit like that. Luckily, they have me.”
He flashes a grin, and that grin snaps something in me.
I don’t even think. All I see is Jenna in those photos, so happy, and Maddox’s grief and now Maddox lying here, barely breathing, while this monster laughs at them for giving a shit about others. Jenna trying to find out who hurt Taylor. Maddox taking a literal bullet for me.
The moment I launch myself at Tristan, I realize my mistake and I don’t care.
Grief and rage wash over me, and it’s not just for Jenna and Maddox. It’s for my parents and all they went through and now they’re gone.
I didn’t want to be a fucking heiress.
I wanted my parents back, and if I couldn’t have them, I wanted someone. And I got that. Goddamn it, I got that, and it’s more precious to me than all the heaps of gold my grandparents are sitting on.
I got Allegra and Polly, the first friends I’ve had in so long.
I got Theo, the dazzling star who shone his light on me and made me feel seen.
I got Isolde, now dead, murdered by her own brother.
And I got Maddox. My broken, brilliant Maddox, lying on the forest floor because he tried to save me. Again and again, he tried to save me.
Tristan swings the gun. He doesn’t fire, though—I’m too close. Instead, he slams the pistol into my cheekbone, and the world bursts into stars. I hit the ground without even knowing I’m falling.
I land beside Maddox. His hand is outstretched, as if reaching for me, and I take it, and it’s warm. His back still rises and falls.
“Try that again—”
Tristan doesn’t finish, because I’m already leaping up. What the hell does he think he’s threatening me with? He already said he plans to kill us both.
I run at him, and the confusion on his face is beautiful. His eyes are wide, as if he can’t process what he’s seeing. He has a gun—a gun—and this girl half his size is charging him, screaming in fury.
I punch him in the stomach. As he doubles over, I kick him between the legs. I’m fighting for our lives. Mine and Maddox’s. I will do everything and anything to stop this bastard.
The gun rises, but Tristan is still bent over, the gun wobbling in his unsteady hand. I grab his wrist. He seems to understand that’s not good, and he begins to recover, but I yank his arm back—in the direction arms aren’t supposed to bend.
He yowls. His grip loosens. I grab the gun, but he doesn’t let go, and he pulls the trigger. The shot fires harmlessly into the air, and then I have the gun. I throw it. Maybe not the best idea, but I just want it away from us.
“You think that’s going to help?” Tristan wheezes. “I don’t need a gun to kill you, little girl.”
He grabs me, and before I can blink, I’m on the ground, his bulk over me, knees pinning me.
My injured arm screams as he grips it, and something in my brain goes wild, frothing frenzy, and I’m kicking, hitting, clawing.
My nails scrape his face, and he hisses, head jerking to one side, blood welling.
My hand smacks the ground, searching for something, anything.
It comes back with a rock, and I force myself to wait, breathing hard as he leans over me, lips curled.
Then I slam the rock into the side of his head.
As he falls back, I hit him again, this time in the eye.
The pain seems to shock him, and he falls back enough for me to scramble out from under him.
I run for the gun. He’s right that he doesn’t need it—he’s big enough to kill me with his bare hands. But I do need it.
I don’t see it, though, lost in the long grass where I threw it, and panic ignites. I hear him staggering toward me, breath coming hard and ragged and I need—
There! A shimmer of silver in the grass.
I grab the gun and swing the barrel around.
“Who ordered you to kill me?” I say. “Who wants me dead?”
Tristan only smirks, hands raised in mock surrender. “Do you even know how to use that, heiress?”
“Pull the trigger while pointing it at you.”
He snorts. “You won’t. You’ll hesitate and then—”
A shot fires. For a second, I think I did pull the trigger, that it’s so sensitive I did it without realizing it. But that wasn’t the pfft of a silenced shot. It was a full-blown gun blast, the sound still echoing in the silence.
Tristan still stands there, mouth working, blood blossoming on his shoulder.
Then he drops, and Cecilia is behind him, gun raised.
I stare at her. Then I slowly step back, my hands up, gun pointed at her.
“Lili?”
“He never told me who hired him to kill me,” I say. “He just confirmed it was for my inheritance.”
“Okay, we’ll figure this out.”
“You inherit if I die,” I say. “You’re on the list. Your trust.”
She blinks. “Yes? I am but—”
“Were you at the hospital the day I visited Isolde?”
Cecilia goes still and then winces. “Theo saw me, didn’t he. After what happened, I wasn’t keen on you leaving Westdale. I was there, in case of trouble.”
“I haven’t spoken to my grandparents. Haven’t seen them on video. How do I know you didn’t set all this up? Find me, bring me to Westdale, make sure I don’t see my eighteenth birthday.”
“You think I was stalking you? You think I’m trying to kill you?”
On the ground, Tristan starts to laugh. He’s soon wheezing, blood flowing from his shoulder, but he can’t stop laughing.
“Her?” he says. “The lawyer? You think I’d work for her? To get what, a few scraps of the scraps she gets? I don’t work for anyone.”
“The Brandts work with the Dimitriou family,” I say. “Which means it was them after all.”
His lips press together, and that tells me everything I need to know, as did the confusion on Cecilia’s face. Then I see Maddox, lying there, and I grab my phone, dial 911, and run to his side.