Chapter Twenty-Three
The week after Alex and I made our peace, and made love in a truck, I lay down in Sue’s bed, mulling over all the things that had happened, and would.
It had been a long and terrible road for all of us, but finally, our new start was beginning. Alex and I went back to the hotel and announced to Rhodes and Micah that we were leaving Lantana.
Enough of living in a miserable, haunted house. We were selling the thing, taking the multimillion-dollar check, and making the manor someone else’s problem. With the money from the house sale in our pockets, we’d have enough to return to New York.
Rhodes could devote himself full-time to the New York office—the most profitable branch.
Micah would quadruple his potential client pool.
Alex would apply to med school—finally embracing his life as Alexander Montgomery without the fear of Fritz Calloway taking everything good away.
And I’d stay home with Lily while doing my captioning work during school hours.
Together, we’d build something real, faithful, and happy for all five of us—leaving the ghosts of Lantana behind.
Micah and Rhodes agreed so fast, they had their bag packed before we finished our speech.
I smiled up at the ceiling, content in a way I’d never been in this house before. When I sat beside that totaled car, wishing Sarang Kim had died instead, I had given up on myself in every way. I truly believed there was nothing else for me. Nothing left to fight for.
I thought I was dragging myself away from that accident to hide in my nightmares until hate and revenge helped me eke out a new path.
How wrong I was.
So much more was waiting for me here. Everything was waiting for me here.
Love, understanding, and hope. The trust and innocence of a sweet, perfect child looking at me to guide her. A second chance, all too brief, to laugh and make good memories with my mother. Sharing laughs on the couch with the sister I had all along.
Everything I thought I lost in this house, I got back again, and now I could walk away with no regrets.
There was finally something to look forward to.
Splash.
A noise sounded outside my door. Checking the clock, I saw it was pushing two in the morning.
I gave it a few minutes before getting up, putting on my slippers, and padding out the door. The gasoline fumes punched me in the nose—scrunching my face and making me cover half of it with the sleeve of my robe.
Still, I didn’t slow—following the splashes through the darkened hallway and silently down the stairs.
I truly was a specter following them unseen through the gloom as they made their way to the kitchen.
Stepping inside right behind them, I threw on the light—beaming at the round-eyed, pale face that whirled around on me, snapping the gas container behind her back like I couldn’t see and smell the evidence.
“Hello, sis,” I chirped. “About time you showed up. I almost fell asleep waiting for you.”
Soo Min gaped at me, frozen amid the puddles of gasoline she’d been splashing about our kitchen.
“So how you been?” I leaned against the wall, folding my arms. “The afterlife been treating you okay?”
Sue’s eyes rolled in her head, flicking from side to side calculating her chances of getting to a safe distance, lighting the match, throwing it, and beating it out of here before I chased her down and stomped her into the floor.
“This— This isn’t what you think—”
“You know, I’ve been hearing that a lot lately, and most of the time, it wasn’t what I thought,” I admitted, “but what I’m thinking now is that you’re trying to burn down the manor with the last of your family inside”—I stared pointedly at the container—“and I’m pretty sure I’m right.”
“You’re not!” she shrieked.
Soo Min looked pretty fucking stupid. Not that there was ever a time that I didn’t think she looked like a drooling moron—my biological copy be damned.
But still, standing there in her big rubber boots; tight, black romper; hair piled on top of her head in a messy bun; a white mask covering her face and mouth; and a yellow fanny pack hanging around her middle, I could once again only think—
Drooling moron.
“You have no idea what’s going on here, you gutter-trash bitch. You couldn’t possibly understand—!”
“That you murdered our mother and got your accomplice, Reynard, to frame Courtney for it?”
Her jaw went slack behind the mask.
“And that was after you murdered Mrs. Prado and that poor girl from the post office, Tracy Williams?” I beamed even wider when she dropped the container, stumbling back. “See? I understand just fine.”
Sue’s jaw worked. “H— How—”
“How did I figure it out?” I tsked. “See, this is the problem with narcissists. You get so hopped up on your own supply, deluding yourself into thinking you really are smarter than everyone, that you seriously underestimate your opponents.”
I rolled my eyes. “Sue, I was onto you since three days after you killed Omma—when the call from the lawyer sent me into her office armed with her password. I found quite a bit tucked in the many files on her computer. Quite a fucking bit. But still,” I said, “I probably still might have been fooled if you hadn’t told me your motive straight to my face, and put the proof in my hands. ”
“What? What the fuck are you talking about! I never did anything like that!”
“But of course you did.” My airy tone didn’t waver. “Don’t you remember? It was on the very day that we were reunited for the first time in ten years. You handed me the reason Omma had to die—her will. The will... that disinherited you.”
Her eyes narrowed. “So what? Fuck that will, I didn’t care about that. What’s ten thousand dollars, a shit car, and some rotting furniture mean to me? SueNaturals is a global brand. I make ten thousand dollars in a week.”
No, bitch, you literally don’t! Hera in heaven, you can’t stop lying for ten seconds. “Whether or not that’s true—and we both know it’s not—”
“Yes, it is!”
“No, it’s not!”
“Is,” she shrieked. “Is, is, is!”
“Agh, you’re such a fucking child,” I exploded—losing my cool, chill gotcha vibe fast. “I know ShitNaturals is in the toilet—pun intended. Bird-shit face cream, anyone? What the hell were you even thinking?”
“It’s not my fault!” Incensed eyes burned me over the mask. “Asian cultures have been making face creams from bird droppings for centuries. How was I supposed to know people would get a fucking rash?”
“Because they were using the droppings from a specific species after it had been sterilized! They didn’t just scrape Polly Wanna Cracker’s shit off the newspaper and dump it in a jar!”
“Well, I know that now!”
“Ugh!” I screamed, throwing up my hands.
“Enough of this. It doesn’t even matter except it’s probably one of the many reasons Omma decided to disown you.
You’d become a massive embarrassment that made Omma the joke of the charity clique.
The real reason she started hiding away in the last year is because of you.
” I scoffed. “Not that you gave a shit about that or her feelings.
“You only started to care when you discovered what it truly meant to be disowned by Omma. What she personally had to leave didn’t matter.
It was all about Appa, and the estate.” Holding up a finger, I gestured for her to wait while I fished my phone out of my robe and pulled up the photo I took three days after losing my mother.
“I, Jong Woo Kim, leave the entirety of my estate to my daughters, Sarang Kim and Soo Min Kim, to be transferred to them upon the death of my wife, Ha-eun Kim—”
I raised my eyes, my grim sneer returning. “Upon the condition that my wife hasn’t disinherited one or both of them. If she disinherits one, the entirety of my estate is to be bequeathed to the other. If she disinherits both, my entire estate is to be liquidated and donated to—
“Blah, blah, blah,” I finished, turning off my phone.
“We both get the gist. When Omma cut you out of her will, she didn’t just rob you of ten thousand dollars and some rotting furniture.
She snatched over eight hundred and seventy-two million dollars out of your greedy little grasp, and you couldn’t have that. ”
“No.”
I raised a brow. “No?”
“That’s right. No.” Sue straightened, ripping off her mask.
“You think you’re so clever. Think you’re going to get me to incriminate myself?
Ha! Nice try, but you’re not recording some big, blubbering confession from me on the other phone you’re hiding underneath that incredibly unflattering robe.
” She gave me a nasty smile. “I didn’t touch Omma, and I never even knew Appa’s will had that clause in it.
None of this had to do with me. You’re making this up like you make up scary clowns and secret plots against you.
It is just another ploy in your endless bid for attention. ”
I weathered her speech patiently. “Fine. If you don’t want to explain how we got here, then I’ll do it for you.
When Omma decided to change her will and cut you out, she didn’t go to her friends and ask them to witness the new will.
She couldn’t. She was still isolating out of pride, and she didn’t want our family drama to be the main topic trending on the Ajumma Gossip Network.
“So, she did what many people do, she called the post office and set an appointment with the notary, and during that appointment, one of the postal employees offered to sign her will as Omma’s second witness”—my gaze sharpened—“Tracy Williams.”
If I expected Sue to gasp or give some kind of reaction to my reveal, I was sorely disappointed.
“The other witness,” I went on, “was Mrs. Prado. Of course she was. Omma trusted her. She ran our house with an expert hand for years. She was also a good, honest woman. She would make sure Omma’s wishes were carried out.
That’s why it was always your plan to kill her, but when Reynard heard that we were hiring her back, the first thing he did was call and warn you.