I know he’s thinking of the little black book.
The holy grail, and the one thing capable of ending this once and for all.
Jane’s shoulders slump. “I don’t know.” She laughs weakly, the sound breaking halfway through. “That’s the problem. We may have been sisters, but we weren’t friends. She didn’t invite me into her inner world. And it’s not like my parents will be of any help. They haven’t spoken to her in years either. She has her own life. We have ours. Hell, they probably are in on this too. I just didn’t think…” She swallows.
Piper tilts her head, trying to lighten the mood again. “Well. Look at it this way—you’re technically Ellie’s aunt.”
Jane goes pale. Not figuratively. Her skinliterallydrains of color so fast, I half expect her to faint. “Don’t—don’t joke about that.”
“Okay,” Piper says quickly. She holds her hands up placatingly. “Too soon. Wayyyy too soon.”
I drag my attention back to the photos before the room collapses under the weight of what-ifs.
“Aria collected everything,” Landon says, his mind churning. “Articles going back decades. Interviews Ellie’s parents gavebefore Ellie was even born. She didn’t just research them—she curated them.”
“Which raises the question,” Victoria says, “of motive.”
Piper frowns. “If she cared about them that much, she wouldn’t have killed them.”
The words hang there, stark and brutal.
“Unless,” Landon says, pushing away from the counter, “she didn’t see it as killing. More like… preserving something. Ending a narrative before it changed. You know she would do anything to protect the Paragons of Prosperity.”
I mull that over, turning the words around and around, looking at them from every angle, studying them extensively.
Landon could be right, but…
Something isn’t adding up.
I shove my chair back and stand. “I want to go back to Aria’s apartment.”
Raymond looks up sharply. “Now?”
“Yes. Tonight. There’s more there. A secret room, a false wall, something. People like her don’t stop at one shrine.”
“I’ll come,” Landon says immediately.
I give my brother a curt nod. I wouldn’t have it any other way. There’s no one else here I would trust to watch my back.
Before anyone can argue, the air shifts.
It’s subtle at first—a pressure change, like the room inhales and forgets how to exhale. Then the front door of the hotel slams open.
Shouts. Boots. Masks.
“Down!” someone yells—Teak, I think, who has been standing against the wall, a silent sentry—but it’s already too late.
Canisters bounce across the floor, metal clattering like dropped cutlery. A sharp hiss cuts through the chaos, and whitesmoke erupts, burning my eyes on contact. Tear gas. My lungs seize like they’ve forgotten their job.
“Move!” Piper coughs.
I reach for something, anything, I can use as a weapon and collide with someone instead. Hands grab my arm. I swing blindly but connect with nothing but fabric. My vision tunnels, eyes streaming, throat on fire.
Landon rasps out my name.
Someone fires a gun, and I see Teak fall over dead, blood pooling from a wound on his forehead.
I stagger, trip over a chair, and hit the floor hard. The shrine photo slides off the table and curls at the edges as the gas eats at my vision.