Chapter 81 Flora
Flora
Flora stared at her sister’s Instagram story: Isabelle in a red dress at some fancy house. Isabelle looked beautiful. Sophisticated. But something in her sister’s eyes looked fake, as if Isabelle were an actress who was too scared to play her starring part.
Flora analyzed the outfit she had worn to meet her friends for an early coffee.
Round glasses, hair in a boring ponytail, wearing a T-shirt and jeans that screamed Loser!
No wonder no one noticed her other than the White Hat Hackers.
There was nothing to see. Flora frowned.
She went to change into her pajamas, then changed her mind.
Flora decided to track the address from where Isabelle had posted the photo of herself with her hand on her hip, like she belonged in a world of wealth and privilege. Well, if one Willingham sister belonged, the other could, too.
Flora threw open Isabelle’s closet and found a tight black miniskirt and a sequined tube top. She yanked them on, took off her glasses, squinted at her reflection. Better.
She found Isabelle’s makeup bag and started experimenting—foundation to even out her skin, mascara to make her eyes look bigger, lipstick in a shade called Midnight Rose that made her mouth look huge.
Flora had watched Isabelle use her curling iron hundreds of times, but doing it herself was different.
She burned her finger twice before getting the hang of it, but eventually her straight hair fell in soft waves around her shoulders.
The girl looking back at her was a stranger—someone who might actually belong at a party in Psychiko. She grabbed Isabelle’s leather jacket and exited the apartment, feeling both terror and excitement.
Isabelle had posted from a mansion with iron gates and manicured gardens. This wasn’t a bunch of kids—this was a serious adult gathering.
Flora almost turned around. Almost got back on the metro and went home to her homework and the empty apartment and her invisible, safe existence.
But the thought of spending another night without anyone to talk to, the good girl who never got chosen—it made her walk all the way to the mansion’s front door and ring the bell.
A man answered—older, with the kind of smile that made her skin crawl even as she tried to return it. “You are looking for Spyros?” he said in accented English.
Flora nodded.
“You are a bit late but it’s OK. You are eighteen, my dear?” Flora nodded again, hoping he didn’t ask for ID.
She was finally somewhere that mattered.
He led her through rooms that belonged in a museum, past other men who looked at her with expressions she couldn’t quite read but that made her pull Isabelle’s jacket around herself. The living room was full of girls who looked like models, beautiful and completely at ease, smoking.
Where was Isabelle?
“Wine?” A man appeared beside her with a glass already full. “Welcome dear. I’m Spyros. You look like you could use something to relax. This wine is from my family’s vineyard on Naxos.”
The first sip made her cough. It was strong, bitter and sharp and nothing like the wine coolers she’d tried once in Savannah.
“It’s an acquired taste.” Spyros’s smile was understanding, paternal. “But you seem mature for your age—I think you’ll appreciate it.”
Mature. The word sent a thrill through Flora.
“You’re very quiet,” he said, settling into the chair beside her. “Thoughtful. I like that in a young woman. Still waters run deep, as they say.”
His knee brushed against hers, and Flora moved away instinctively. But there was nowhere to go—she was trapped in the corner. “I should probably find my sister,” Flora said.
“Sister?” Spyros’s eyes sharpened. “What’s her name?”
“Isabelle. Isabelle Willingham.”
Something flickered across his face—surprise, then calculation. “Ah. Yes. She’s…working right now. But what’s the rush? You’ve only just arrived.”
Working?
Over the man’s shoulder, Flora scanned for Isabelle’s familiar face among the strangers. The house was bigger than she’d realized, with hallways leading to rooms she couldn’t see.
“Maybe you’d like to audition too?” he said.
“Audition?”
He touched her face and gazed at her. Flora had never wanted to be invisible more in her entire life. But it was too late.