17. Sister Sister #2
I couldn’t stop staring. Because suddenly everything made sense.
The face, her eyes, and her smile. The guys who would drunkenly tell us we looked alike.
Memories of me birthing a fetus on our dorm room floor, and her panicking and telling the EMT we were sisters so she could see me in the hospital.
That bitch, Janessa, had been planted to ruin my life the whole time.
The same girl people constantly mistook for my sister, the girl who introduced me to alcohol, the one who shopped for my pills to make sure they were safe, was probably lacing my shit with God knows what.
The girl who always seemed weirdly interested in my life and my relationships had been Cameron the whole fuckin’ time.
“Oh my God,” I said again.
“Chanel?”
“Janessa was never Janessa.” My voice barely worked.
For a long moment, neither one of us spoke. I just stood there, staring at that picture, while my entire college experience replayed in my head differently. My stomach twisted so violently I thought I might throw up.
“That bitch was watching me.”
Kenya’s expression darkened immediately.
“From the beginning.”
I nodded. “From the beginning.”
My voice sounded hollow. Janessa wasn’t the wild girl who liked to party; she wasn’t the girl who encouraged me to loosen up.
She wasn’t the friend who let me cry over Charles.
She wasn’t the girl who stood beside me while I planned my future.
She was Cameron, the entire fuckin’ time, and although I also learned that Charles’ betrayal ran deeper than I knew, this somehow felt worse.
At least Charles was six feet under now.
Kenya blinked back at me and stared at the picture again. “And this means Charles was a Price, too?”
I nodded my head.
“This is some sick shit, Chanel.”
The rage building inside me felt different than the anger I felt after Jared got shot. This felt personal.
“You know what makes me sick?” I whispered.
Kenya followed me into what looked like Alan’s study.
“She knew my insecurities.” I laughed bitterly. “She knew when I was struggling.”
I pointed toward the photographs covering the wall. “She knew exactly how broken I was after prison stole Xavier.” My throat tightened. “She knew how badly I wanted love.”
Kenya cursed under her breath. Because now she saw it, too. This wasn’t a random case of revenge. This was an obsession. Years and years of obsession.
I opened a desk drawer in Alan’s office, and inside sat dozens of files. I went through the folders and found dozens of photos. My blood ran cold.
“Kenya.”
She moved beside me immediately.
“What is it?”
I pulled out one photograph after another.
There were photos of our family throughout the decades.
Recent ones of Jared visiting Jazzy at Cherry.
Photos of YaYa leaving her dance studio, and me in court.
Photos of Zayden at JoJo’s basketball game.
There were images of my dad leaving church.
The oldest one was of Xavier standing over Dez’s body, and me looking horrified in the alleyway outside of the skating rink.
There were years’ worth of surveillance.
“Oh, my God.” The words barely left my mouth. Because Alan Price hadn’t been hiding. He’d been studying us, as if we were some damn research project.
Kenya grabbed another folder, then another, and another.
“These people are sick.”
“They’re worse than sick,” I added while staring down at the photos. “They’re psychotic.”
Kenya’s phone vibrated. Both of us froze. She mouthed Alex, and I relaxed a bit.
She answered immediately.
“What’s up?”
Her entire expression changed.
“Where?” She nodded and ended the call.
I straightened up. “What happened?”
“Alan teaches a night class twice a week.”
My pulse sped up immediately.
“Tonight?”
Kenya nodded.”Yes, tonight.”
We both understood what that meant. There was an opportunity to get rid of all of this shit since he wouldn’t be home. We could get some form of justice. I looked around that study one last time. I looked at the photos, the files, and all of the years of manipulation.
“We’re ending this.”
I snatched the photo of the happy family from the wall and pulled it from the glass. I didn’t know who the third sibling was, but we would find that bitch.
Together, we went to the van. Kenya called one of the three soldiers she had trailing us, just in case. They waited at the end of the block with strict instructions to stay alert.
She called Liem and told him, “It’s a cool night. Have the kids turn the heat up.” She hung up the phone, and as we drove away, I began to see smoke rise from the block we were on. Every physical piece of evidence Alan had just went up in flames.
The sun had fully disappeared by the time we parked near the university hours later.
Students moved between buildings, laughing and living normal lives.
Meanwhile, Alan Price walked toward the faculty parking lot carrying a briefcase like he wasn’t responsible for generations of destruction.
I watched him from the darkness. I watched him unlock his BMW and place his briefcase inside. I watched him prepare to drive away.
And for the first time in my life, I felt absolutely nothing when I knew I should have felt guilt. I had no sympathy or hesitation. I actually felt at peace.
Kenya looked over at me. “You sure?”
I thought about keeping Genny and the rest of my nieces and nephews safe. I thought about all the lives Alan Price ruined because he and Sharon believed they were smarter than everybody else.
Then I nodded. “Yeah.”
Kenya began to drive away, and from our van, she pushed a button on her bracelet, and Alan’s BMW exploded, the flames lit up the night sky seconds later.
The force shook the parking lot. Glass shattered behind us.
Fire swallowed the vehicle almost instantly.
And as orange flames climbed toward the darkness above us, I realized something terrifying: I would do whatever it fuckin’ took to wipe the whole Price family off the map. Two were gone; we had two more to go.