Chapter 28
Chapter Twenty-Eight
VICKY
It seems fitting that the sky is dark and gray, with the odd spots of rain that promise a downpour any time soon. The weather at funerals should be miserable. A dazzling, cloudless blue sky feels like a slap in the face to the deceased and the mourners.
As I enter the church, my hand tucked into Nicholas’s, the memories of Beth’s passing hit me like a tidal wave. It’s almost three months now since she died. The world continues to turn, the sun rises and sets, but there’s a hole, a gaping chasm, and every time I find myself enjoying a period of happiness, a torrent of guilt almost drowns me.
The church organist plays a mournful tune while the congregation takes their seats. The entire De Vil family have turned out, as well as some representatives from The Consortium. I’ve hardly seen Nicholas these past two weeks, his time taken up with helping to manage the fallout from the building collapse. Christian may head up that part of the vast De Vil empire, but the whole family has rallied around.
Two people lost their lives; the lead architect and the head of the construction firm who, in a ghastly twist of fate, happened to be married to one another. Christian isn’t sure what they were even doing in the building, especially as it was long after hours. I guess now, we’ll never know. From what I’ve gleaned in snatches of conversation, they were diligent, hardworking people who were in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Nicholas grips my elbow and guides me to a seat next to Imogen. Alexander’s profile is grim, his jaw locked, a muscle flickering along the sharp angle there. The rest of the family sit in the pew in front, everyone’s backs ramrod straight, their expressions more serious than I’ve ever seen them.
Before I became a part of this family, I’d assumed they were all unfeeling robots, interested only in making money and misery, but Christian’s slumped posture and disheveled hair where he keeps raking his fingers through it tell the story of his devastation at the turn of events. The cause of the collapse remains a mystery, and I don’t think he’ll sleep a wink until he gets to the bottom of what happened.
The deceased’s children are the last to enter. The daughter dressed all in black, with a veil covering her face, clings to her brother’s arm as though she’ll collapse without his support. His eyes hold a murderous glint as he glances around, and his gaze falls on the two pews where we’re sitting. For a second, I think he’s on the verge of throwing us out, but he passes by and helps his sister to a seat at the front.
It’s understandable that he blames the De Vils. If I was in their shoes, I’d do the same. Hell, I was in their shoes. I initially blamed Nicholas for Beth’s murder. If anyone understands the violent urge to hit out, to offload your crippling grief onto someone else, and to find sense in it all, it’s me. I hope for their sakes the answers are forthcoming soon.
The service is short, and it isn’t long before the grieving brother and sister make their way down the center aisle. The rest of the mourners take their turn, one pew at a time, to file out behind them like well-behaved passengers exiting an airplane row by row.
A line forms for well-wishers to pay their respects, and it takes a few minutes before we reach the front. Christian takes the lead, holding his hand out to the brother, who lets it hang in mid-air, hatred blazing from every pore in his body. Christian moves on to the sister.
“Grace, I’m truly sorry for your loss.”
She keeps her eyes lowered, her face still hidden by the thick black veil. “You shouldn’t have come.” Her voice is barely audible. “You’re not welcome here.”
Christian opens his mouth to say something else, but he must think better of it. He moves away, his posture even more slumped than it was when we arrived. It’s clear to me he’s suffering from crushing guilt over the collapse of the building that left two young adults orphaned.
I murmur how sorry I am to Grace, too. She barely dips her chin in acknowledgement. I take a deep breath as I exit the church, sucking cold, damp air into my lungs.
“That was rough.” I rest my head on Nicholas’s shoulder.
“You okay?” He slides his arm around my waist and squeezes my hip.
I nestle into his proprietary touch, using his strength to ward off the demons this funeral has stirred; echoes of my own crushing loss.
“Yeah, I?—”
The world comes to a shuddering halt. The bustling sounds of passersby streaming past fade away, leaving only a face I thought I’d never see again coming into sharp focus across the street.
Beth?
It can’t be. It… It’s impossible.
I squeeze my eyes closed. It’s another vision, my subconscious playing tricks on me. My desperation for hope manifesting itself in an impossibility.
My breath lodges in my throat. I open my eyes. She’s still there. She’s still there. I can’t look away. Daren’t look away. The thought that I’m losing my mind, seeing things that aren’t real, is a terrifying one.
I blink several times at the figure standing beneath a tree bare of leaves. My heart pounds, each painful beat rattling my ribcage and echoing in my ears. A chill races down my spine, a gust of wind blowing my hair over my face, momentarily blinding me. I shove it away, expecting the vision of my dead sister to have vanished.
“Victoria.” Nicholas’s hand shifts to the nape of my neck, and he grips me firmly. “You’re white as a sheet. What’s wrong?”
Questions race through my mind, each one striking with the power of a bolt of lightning. How is this possible? I was there when she died. I was right there .
My legs weaken, and I slump against Nicholas. He’s saying something to me, but whatever it is, the words are whisked away on the wind.
“Beth,” I croak, my voice rasping like my voice box is constricted. “It’s Beth.”
Lifting a shaky arm, I point. Nicholas’s gaze tracks my finger.
“ What the fuck? ”
That’s the moment I know it’s not a dream or an apparition. She’s here. She’s really here. Alive.
Pushing away from my husband, I dart across the street. When I reach the other side, I stop a few feet from her.
She lifts a hand in greeting. “Hi, Vic.”
I open my mouth, but nothing comes out. I shut it again, trying for a second time. Nope. Nothing. As I make a third attempt, Nicholas skids to a halt beside me, his face flushed crimson. Like me, he seems incapable of speech.
“Hello, Nicholas.” Beth gives him a tight smile. “I’m sure you want answers, and you’ll get them, but for now, I need to speak with my sister. Alone.”
“Not a fucking chance,” he snaps, his arm sliding around my waist again, anchoring me to his side. “I don’t know what kind of game you’re playing, but whatever it is, you don’t get to speak to her. You gave up that right when you… what? Faked your own death.” He expels a single note laugh filled with bitterness and incredulity. “Jesus Christ.”
Beth lifts her chin, defiant in spite of the shocking circumstances. “Yes, that’s exactly what I did. I had my reasons, but the person who deserves to know them first is my sister. Not you.”
“Fuck you.” He looms over her, his free hand fisted at his side. A jolt of fear zips through my bloodstream, and for a split second, I consider the thought he might throttle her, or punch her.
“Nicholas.” I grab the sleeve of his jacket and tug, then insert myself between them, my back to Beth. Cupping his face, I bring his eyes to mine. Once they’re locked on, I stand on tiptoes and brush my lips over his. “It’s okay. I’m okay. Let me do this. I need to do this. If she’ll only talk to me, then we have to deal with that. I have to have answers, Nicholas. We need answers.”
A pulse thrums in his cheek, and I’m sure I can hear the grinding sound of enamel on enamel. He draws in several deep breaths, his struggle to maintain composure visible even to me. God only knows what’s going on inside his head.
“Andrew goes with you.”
“Of course.”
I can tell he’d rather peel the skin from his body than allow me to face this alone, but it’s the way it has to be. God, Beth is alive. It’s impossible yet irrefutable.
The volley of whys pelts me like icy needles of rain, and a violent shiver racks me. A car pulls into the curb, and Andrew alights from the passenger seat. I didn’t even see Nicholas call for him.
Andrew opens the back door and signals to Beth. “Miss Montague.”
Her gaze travels to me, then Nicholas, before she gets in. As I make a move to follow her, Nicholas yanks me into his body and slams his mouth over mine. His tongue demands entry, his hold on the back of my neck bordering on painful. It’s as though he’s claiming me, reminding me I belong to him, and he belongs to me, and it’s in that moment I realize what he’s doing. He’s reassuring me nothing has changed. Beth returning from the dead doesn’t mean anything for us.
Until now, I hadn’t considered it might have, but those thoughts would have come, and probably when we were apart. He’s preempting any doubts that might have crept in, and I love him for it.
I love him. I do. It’s time to face facts. I love him so much, even if I’ll never be able to tell him. Even if I’ll never hear him say those words to me. I can’t allow that to matter, because dammit, this has to be enough. He cares for me, he puts me first, he defends me against my parents. He’s my rock in a storm.
He’s mine.
He breaks off the kiss and presses his forehead to mine. “You need me, you call. I’m there.”
A rush of gratitude fills my chest. “I know, and I adore you for it.” It’s as close as I can get to sharing my true feelings, but the smile he gives me makes the risk worth it.
Freeing myself from his hold, I climb into the car, and he closes the door, cocooning me and Beth inside the warm cabin.
“Do Mum and Dad know?”
“No. I came to you first.”
“Lucky me.”
Her cheeks bloom with color. “Let’s get a coffee. Or maybe something stronger. I think we both need it.”
The driver takes us to a cozy café a mile down the road that also has a liquor license. I order an Americano and a whiskey chaser for the shock. I down it in one, wincing at the fiery burn, but when Beth asks if I want another, I decline. Clear thinking is what’s needed here. Whatever made my sister put us through sheer fucking hell for the last three months is a story I want to be stone cold sober for.
Beth nibbles on her nails—a habit she gave up years ago. As I did back then, I tug her hand away from her mouth. “Don’t do that. It’s a horrible habit.”
Her soft smile sparks a wave of emotion, and a raft of tears rush to the surface of my eyes. I blink them away and harden my heart. My innocent sister isn’t as innocent as I thought.
“You always hated it when I did that.”
“I still do.” I blow across the top of my coffee and sip. “Floor’s yours, Beth.”
She wrings her hands, then sits on them. “Where to start?”
“Oh, I don’t know.” I can’t help being sarcastic. “How about the part where we all thought a bomb blew you to smithereens?”
Color fills her cheeks, and she pulls her eyes away from mine. “I never wanted to do that. I’ve had nightmares over it ever since, wondering how I can make it right.”
“And this is what you came up with?” A biting laugh breaks through my stupor. “Turning up out of the blue several months after we put you in the ground?” I stuff the heels of my palms into my eye sockets, then fling my hands up in despair. “Put someone in the ground. Who the hell did we bury, Beth?”
Plucking at a loose thread on her coat, she avoids my gaze. “It’s a long story. I think it’s best if I start at the beginning.” Her lips purse as she blows out a long, unsteady breath, her chin wobbling. “About a month after Nicholas chose to marry me, I met this guy. Quite by accident. I bumped into him in the street and spilled hot coffee all over his pristine shirt.”
She smiles at the memory, but it falls when she meets my stupefied gaze. Clearing her throat, she continues.
“I didn’t mean for it to happen, but I fell in love with him, and he fell in love with me. I knew there was no future in it, and I told him as much. Even though I never hid my impending marriage to Nicholas, he still wanted to keep on seeing me.” She shrugs. “So we did.”
“You cheated on Nicholas?”
“Yes.” More plucking until the thread unravels. She snaps it loose. “Although I never saw it as cheating. Nicholas and I never slept together. Hell, we barely kissed. He couldn’t have made it more obvious he wasn’t at all attracted to me.” Winding the broken thread around her finger, she beseeches me with her eyes. “I didn’t want to marry Nicholas, but Dad gave me no choice.”
A sliver of empathy burrows into my heart for that part at least. She accepted her fate so graciously that I never considered she was dreading her upcoming wedding.
“You never said.”
“What good would it have done?”
It’s such a Beth thing to say. Keep the peace, don’t rock the boat. Hell, she’s rocked the boat now, enough that the damn thing is sinking. “Dad said you knew about the trouble his business was in.”
“Yes. He was upfront about it as soon as Nicholas picked me.”
That’s twice now she’s mentioned Nicholas choosing her over me, and it’s like a dagger to my heart. The old demons raise their heads, that feeling of never being good enough, of always coming second to beautiful, perfect Beth.
Except she isn’t perfect, is she? Not in the way I always thought she was. She’s selfish and self-serving. Only a monster would pretend they were dead and put their family through a grieving process that wasn’t real.
“Keep going.” My voice sounds like my vocal cords are wrapped in barbed wire.
“I had every intention of going through with the wedding. After all, what choice did I have? Then I overheard something that changed my whole perspective.”
I can’t help it. I lean forward. “What?”
“Remember the night you accidentally spilled a glass of wine over Imogen?”
It was no accident, but I keep that to myself and nod. “I do.”
“Well, I followed you. I wanted to help, but instead I overheard the two of you talking about Nicholas.” She reaches across the table for my hand. I tug it out of her reach, valiantly trying to recall the details of that conversation. It comes to me at the same time as Beth speaks.
“I heard you saying you were in love with him, and that’s when an escape route opened up right in front of me. It wouldn’t be easy to pull off but, God, Vic, I had to try. I knew if I was out of the picture, Dad would push for you to marry Nicholas instead. I’d get my freedom, and we’d both get to be with the men we loved.”
Except I didn’t love Nicholas. Oh, I thought I did, but it was more obsession than love. Now , it’s love. My feelings now don’t compare to my feelings back then, but there’s little point in telling Beth that.
I pinch the bridge of my nose, my temples pounding. “Beth, you faked your own death. Who the fuck does that?”
“A girl who’s frightened and desperately unhappy and knows that being trapped in a loveless marriage would slowly crush her to death.”
“Yet you’re happy for me to be the one trapped in a loveless marriage.” A snort shoots out of me. “How touching.”
She frowns. “What do you mean? You love Nicholas. I watched the two of you as you exited that church. It’s obvious you love him.”
God, Beth. The innocence. It’s not obvious to Nicholas. “Yes, I love Nicholas, but he doesn’t love me. Oh, don’t get me wrong, he’s kind, caring, and he likes me, and we enjoy spending time together. But love? No, Beth. And you know what’s worse than being trapped in a loveless marriage? A marriage where one side would die for the other because they love them so fiercely, but the other party doesn’t feel the same way. That’s torture. That’s being slowly crushed to death.”
“You’re wrong, Vic. I know what I saw. It’s right there in his eyes. He loves you. Trust me.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about. I do. It’s my life. I’m the one living it.” I rub my forehead. “We’ve shifted off track. I want to know how you made us all think you were dead.”
Cupping her coffee mug with both hands, she brings it to her mouth and sips before setting it back down. She keeps her hands around it, though, as if she needs a touchstone to steady her. She’s not the only one. I feel like I’ve been thrown into a tumble dryer and it’s aimlessly tossing me around.
“The night I heard you tell Imogen how you felt about Nicholas, as soon as I got home, I locked my bedroom door, turned on some music to drown out my voice, and called Joel. That’s his name, by the way.” Her eyes mist over, and her lips form a small, secretive smile. “I told him I had a way out. Between us we devised a plan to kill me.” She lifts her gaze to me, her eyes filled with sorrow. “I am sorry, Vic, to you most of all, but I thought I was doing the right thing. You have to believe me.”
“Beth, Jesus Christ. We thought you were dead. Dead. We buried you. I spoke at your funeral, blaming Nicholas for killing you. I was convinced he said something to you that night to make you get in that cab alone. I cried for you. I grieved for you. I’m still grieving, yet you’re sitting here, breathing the same air as me.”
I shove my hands beneath my thighs in case I break something. Hot fury fills my veins. The cruelty of what she did is something I’m not sure I’ll ever recover from, no matter what her reasons were.
A sob breaks from her throat, strangled and filled with pain. I harden my heart in case I end up comforting her. I don’t want to comfort her. I want to hit her, rail on her, scream at her.
“The taxi driver. That was Joel?”
She nods.
“And the woman we buried. Who the fuck is she, Beth? Because somewhere out there is a family grieving a missing loved one.”
“She didn’t have any family. We checked.”
I cover my face with my hands, incredulous. This is like something out of a crime novel.
“Joel’s brother, Max, is a coroner. He knows people. We brought him in on our plan, and he agreed to help us. There was this girl who came under his jurisdiction. She died of exposure. Homeless. Terribly sad, but we checked, and she didn’t appear to have any family or anyone who would miss her. Max agreed to keep her in the mortuary until we could put our plan into action.”
Propping my elbows on the table, I plant my hands on top of my head and take several deep breaths.
“Beth, have you heard yourself? You do know you’ve committed a crime? That all of you will be in terrible trouble if this gets out.”
“I know the risk I’m taking coming back, but I don’t have a choice.”
I narrow my eyes at her. “What does that mean?”
“Let me finish first. I owe you a full explanation, then I’ll tell you why I’m here.”
“I can’t wait.”
Beth flinches at my retort, but I don’t care. This is all so… unbelievable. Horrific. I feel like I’m floating above it all, watching from a great distance.
“The night it happened, Nicholas called to invite me to go clubbing with you all. I instantly knew this was my shot. I called Joel, and he and Max loaded the body into the footwell of the car we’d stolen and hidden a few weeks earlier in preparation. He waited around the corner for my signal. You and Imogen were dancing, and Nicholas was too busy talking to Alexander to notice me sneak off. You weren’t supposed to see me sitting in the cab. You were only supposed to find out about it afterward, but I was in too deep by then. It had to happen that night. I was running out of time. As the cab rounded the corner, Max was waiting for us. It only took seconds for me to dive out of the cab and for Max and Joel to put the body on the backseat. We threw ourselves into Max’s car, and he floored it. A few seconds later, Joel remote detonated the bomb.”
I’m slap bang in the middle of a Michael Connolly book. I must be. This can’t be real. God, all that grief she caused, the heartache. The guilt I suffered through knowing I married her fiancé. At times it choked me until I felt as though I was drowning in it, yet it was all for nothing. I had nothing to feel guilty about.
“But… but…” I jam two fingers into my temples. “They did tests. They all came back as your DNA. How is that possible?”
“Like I said, Max knows people. He arranged to have the results altered.”
“Good God.” My sweet, innocent sister is a master criminal. I can’t take it in.
“Vicky, look at me. Please.”
I can’t look at her. My mind’s swimming. I feel sick, dizzy, disoriented. Scrambling to my feet, I lurch for the door. Beth rushes after me and grabs my arm before I can reach the handle. Andrew, who’s posted himself a foot inside the café, reaches for my other arm.
“Mrs. De Vil. Are you all right?”
“I have to get out of here.” My mouth is dry as the desert, and I lick my lips. “Get the car, Andrew.”
“Vicky, no, please. Hear me out. I’m begging you.”
“I can’t, Beth. I can’t be around you right now.”
“Vic.” Her plaintive voice reaches right into my heart and yanks it out of my chest. “Please, I need your help. It’s urgent.”
At the desperate edge to her tone, I freeze, then slowly pivot. “Help for what?”
Her throat bobs as she swallows. “My kidneys have failed, and without a transplant, I’ll die. For real this time.”
“What?”
The room spins, and I grip a nearby chair to steady myself. It’s too much. It’s all too much. My sister comes back from the dead and tells this fantastical story, and now she’s dying for real. I can’t deal with this. I just can’t.
“Vic.” Beth’s fingers are ice cold as she takes hold of my hand. “The doctors tell me you’re my best bet for a match. Will you do it? Will you give me one of your kidneys?”