Third Time's a Charm (Crimson Cove Mysteries Book 3) Read online

  “I’m sorry.” She turned to look at me. “I wish it had been me that got taken.”

  “I don’t.” I shook my head and sat on the edge of my bed. “I’m not glad it was me. I just would have done anything for it not to have been you guys.” I meant it. Even if my voice was broken and weak, the resolve behind it was strong.

  “I hope we become sisters. Real ones.” She sniffled a little bit. I knew she was still trying to cope with our parents and their thing.

  “Sage, you’re already my sister.”

  She started to cry.

  It was a moment I never imagined either of us would have.

  She was the prude and I was the whore and never the twain shall meet. Except at the end of a miserable tragedy. Our friendship becoming more was almost cliché.

  “Sierra!”

  I cringed when I heard his voice.

  “Go away, Finn!” Sage looked and shouted out the window.

  “I need to explain. I’m coming up!”

  “I’m calling the police.” She pulled out her cell phone but I lifted a hand.

  “Wait. I want to ask him something.” I left the room and headed for the front door. I wasn’t quiet about my disgust or anger as I made my way to the foyer.

  I rounded the corner to the grand staircase and paused as the butler got the door. He glanced up, checking with me. “He can come in.”

  Finn seemed weird, different. He wasn’t wearing his glasses and his dark-blue eyes were wide, panicked. “Let me explain.” His face was filled with emotions.

  “You have one minute and then you will answer all the questions I have.” I leaned against the railing. “Stay down there and explain. Don’t come up here.”

  “Sierra.” He stepped forward, his hands shaking.

  “I mean it, one minute.”

  “We went to the same orphanage in New York. I met her when I was seven years old. She was four when they brought her in, an orphan. We were like brother and sister for years. Neither of us got adopted. When I was seventeen I left the orphanage early and went to MIT on full scholarship, just like I said. She would come and visit me sometimes, and I would give her money but it was nothing. Nothing more than siblings.” He shook his head, sounding rattled. “I had no idea what was happening to you. I didn’t know she was doing this. I didn’t keep tabs on her. When I met you, I never knew you were anyone but a socialite who drank too much. I worked for your dad. That’s how I knew you. I swear it.”

  “When did she bring you into this?”

  “She didn’t bring me into it. Your dad did.”

  “WHEN?”

  “The cell.” He flinched when he said it.

  Tears blinded me. “You knew I was in there?” My voice cracked.

  “No!” he pleaded. “She didn’t bring me into it. I never knew until you went missing. Your father hired me and I started searching for you. I sat on the institute at Hatton Head and I saw her. I pieced together her time at Engelmann with Andrew. I tracked you down by following her. I’m the one who opened the door. I let you out while she was away. I cut the hole and contacted the doctors so they would find you and save you.”

  “You were there?” I dropped to my knees, clutching to the railing as tears poured down my face. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.

  “Don’t you see? I cut you out and freed you and made it so your dad and Lainey found you and the video footage. It was my idea to check into Silver Hills to make sure you were okay. I watched you day and night, making sure she never got to you again. I sleep in the cold in the damned garden outside your window for God’s sake.” He sounded scared, genuinely.

  But it wasn’t enough.

  “You lied. You pretended to like me.” The tears rolled but the nothing took over. I detached from everything, the pain and him and the blurry way I saw everything.

  His eyes welled as he looked at my arm. “Please, don’t do that.” He took a step forward. “I never pretended. I did like you. I do. I love you, Sierra. I will never lie to you again. Please. Just don’t do this.”

  “Make him leave.” I nodded at Sebastian, the butler. He grabbed Finn by the arm and pulled him toward the door.

  “Don’t do this. Please.”

  I closed my eyes and pushed away the sight of him leaving. The warmth of Sage wrapped around me as she whispered, “I told you he likes you.”

  I didn’t listen to her. I heard the giant “I told you so” flashing in my head. The one that convinced me I was a pawn in his scheming.

  A trickle of something brought my gaze down to my arm where he’d been looking. Blood dripped from where my fingers were dug in.

  I stumbled to my bed and stayed there, in the dark with Sage holding me, until I fell asleep.

  When I woke I felt like I’d had the worst dream but the faces of my friends staring at me proved it had all been real. Even Rita was there with a worried look.

  My eyes were puffy from crying. My throat hurt from sobbing. My stomach ached with hunger but was sick from the heartache. My arm hurt where I’d ripped the skin.

  “Hey.” Sage gave me a soft smile as she brushed her hand along my wounded arm, the way old Sage would have before Rachel died. “You’re awake.”

  I blinked and refused to believe this was a real event or that Finn was a real scoundrel. I loved him. I still loved him. I knew that because I hated him more than I hated the girl with the dar—Hailey.

  She needed to have a name so she wasn’t a ghost in my head.

  I blinked and tried to convince myself it was all a bad dream. Not just Finn but all of it, starting with the party at Rachel’s and ending with me sobbing myself to sleep last night. I wished everything was back to normal, back to before.

  But the tired faces looking at me told me it would never be normal again.

  The way they stared made me uncomfortable. It was as if they were all waiting for something—maybe for me to break down again.

  But I wasn’t going to.

  I was done crying and feeling and being hurt. I’d learned my lesson. One I didn't think I needed to learn. But the truth was, for the first time I’d let my guard down and let myself believe that maybe . . .

  Maybe was a lie.

  The ultimate truth was there was no such thing as a nice guy.

  They didn’t exist.

  And if they did, they were too weak to defend the women they loved. Too weak to resist the darkness of the world. And not worth falling for.

  No.

  We all lived in Gotham City and there were no heroes here.

  Just a dark city with something evil lurking in all the shadows.

  No Batman or Superman or anything even close.

  Clark Kent was a lie, one I’d made the mistake of believing.

  Love was fake and pain was everything.

  The safest bet was to close your heart—harden yourself to the world.

  “My father is the way he is because of this,” I whispered after so much back thought I hadn’t revealed that they all looked even more confused. “I mean, like, he’s hard and mean and cruel and cold because the world sucks. But I bet he was nice before. Sort of like once upon a time, my dad wasn't a dick. I bet they all were nice. And just like us, there was a moment like this one, where all our moms and dads were sitting on their beds and they were scared. And it changed everything.” My chest was so tight the words barely left with any sound. “Before.” I scoffed. There were so many befores in this world. I had a before. I bet Gotham City had a before once too.

  Everything was before.

  “I bet you’re right.” Lainey smiled softly, offering actual understanding, even though I wasn’t making sense. “Whatever it is linking them to this story changed them to the cold, detached people they are now. There’s no way they were always this terrible.”

  “Look, I hate to change the subject when you two are being all philosophical and shit, but we need to focus. Finn is one of them. This is huge. He knows everything we know. He’s heard the story.” Li
nds darted her eyes at mine. “I told Vincent every tiny detail except about his mother. I told my dad everything too. I couldn't keep it from them. I couldn't stand either of them thinking I was being insane for one more minute.”

  “I told my dad and Finn everything too.”

  Lainey nodded. “I told Jake. I never told my mom or dad everything, but they both know a lot.”

  Sage’s eyes widened. “I never told anyone. God, you guys suck.”

  Rita swallowed hard. “I told my mom everything. And Ashton already knew the shit.” Her eyes darted to Lainey for a second.

  “Right. So back to the main point: Finn is on that bitch Hailey’s side and he knows everything.” Lindsey’s eyes expressed her rage.

  “I don't think so.” Sage shook her head. “I think he honestly got dragged in.” She smiled at me, trying to fix my broken heart with a positive thought. “He didn't know. He figured it out and he mad scrambled to help us, but he didn't know early on.”

  “Well, there’s only one way to figure that out. And we know you don’t want to talk about it, Sierra, but you sort of have to.” Linds tried not to sound like an ass but it was hard, especially for her. “We need the details so we can piece it together.”

  “I don’t want to talk about it. I just want to sleep. I want to be alone.”

  Linds looked like she might press me but held back.

  “You aren’t going to be alone. And none of us should be worrying about this today. We can’t change anything right now. And to be honest I think we need a day of grace. Actually, we need the holidays as grace. Hailey and whoever is doing this has to respect it’s the holidays. Nothing else is going to happen right now. She’s dropped her big bombs. She killed Rachel. She abducted Jake. She and Andrew killed his dad and every servant in their house and Jake’s. She abducted Sierra. She’s out of moves for a while. None of us is going anywhere alone until this is solved. We’re onto who she is. She can text us all she wants but she can’t actually do anything else for the holidays.” She sounded like she was trying to convince herself.

  “Dude.” Linds tilted her head to the side.

  “What? It’s true. If anything, we’re ahead of the game for a while. We need to stop talking about it for a couple of weeks and try to get through the season.” Sage heaved her breaths and bit her lip like she might start to scream or have a nervous breakdown, but she caught it just in time. “Instead of moping around here, we need to do something fun. Something to get past this. Or at least pretend it isn’t happening.” She waggled her eyebrows. “Just for the next couple of weeks.”

  We all stared at her for a moment before Lain finally spoke, “Uhhhhh, no. I think we need to focus.” She cocked an eyebrow. “She could drop another bomb—”

  “Shhh.” Sage lifted her phone and dialed. “Hello. This is Sage Miller. Yes. Book me five full packages for this afternoon.” She paused, listening to the person on the other end. “Tell Rudolpho to expect us in three hours.” She hung up the phone, scoffing. “She must be new. She tried to tell me they were booked up.” She laughed; it was the fake one I never liked. But Sage looked like she might snap any second. The pressure was getting to her.

  “We can’t go to Manhattan today, Sage. We have to figure out what the hell is going on with Finn and we need to find Hailey.” Lindsey’s eyes widened. “We have to piece together these new clues.”

  “Didn’t she say she would be working in the city and going to school?” Rita’s eyes narrowed as she changed the subject to something none of us understood.

  “What?”

  “Hailey. Didn't she say she was going to work at a coffee shop in the city?” Rita nodded as she spoke, “Remember she said this?”

  “Yeah. So what?” Linds argued. “She probably lied. She’s insane.”

  “Maybe Rita’s right. If we’re in the city we could go to some of the coffeehouses that are a bit more hipster and see if anyone’s seen her.” Lainey shrugged. “I mean, she has to make money. Right? And she has got one skill, honestly, besides killing and torturing. The girl makes a mean latte.”

  I cringed but Sage spoke before I could say anything, “Do you know how many coffeehouses there are on the Upper East Side alone? And she’s a Village kind of barista, so that’s worse.” Sage tilted her head. “A lot. That’s how many.”

  “I bet I could guess closer than you could.” Lain stuck her tongue out.

  “I was thinking we could take Hailey’s photo to the Shack and see if they know something. They might be able to give us an idea of which coffee shop she went to. And we could surprise her. And then get a pedi.” Rita tried to sound excited like Sage was.

  “You want us to go to the Shack?” Sage grimaced.

  “You can sit in the car. I’d hate for you to insult anyone.” Linds rolled her eyes. “I’ll end up with spit in my next latte if I’m seen there with you.”

  Rita and Lain laughed while Sage glowered.

  I sat, not answering or saying anything. I didn’t want to do any of it. I wanted to sit alone in my room and cry and listen to mopey music and write poetry that made me feel worse. I didn’t want to go to Rudolpho’s and get a pedicure. I didn't want to hunt Hailey. She’d won. Again.

  I was stuck in Gotham City, wishing my Clark Kent had actually turned out to be Superman.

  “We aren’t letting you sit here like a lump.” Sage lifted me to standing, scolding as if she were listening to my thoughts. “We need to get moving.” She marched me past my closet and out into the hall. “I’m declaring the holidays started. We have one week of school left and it’s friggin’ Christmas. She can’t possibly mean to attack during the holidays. And if she does, maybe we’ll all be too drunk to notice the next servant is dead.”

  “Sage, I can’t leave the house like this. I look homeless. And I will notice if anyone else dies. Servant or not.” Her comment made me mad.

  “Shhhh.” She pushed harder. She was in full-fledged denial now. There was no point in arguing. She wasn't going to give in.

  We walked down the stairs to the door. No one was there to open it for us. Sebastian, the butler, wasn’t at his usual spot. He was probably traumatized from the previous night’s episode. I vaguely recalled him carrying me to bed as I sobbed into his chest.

  When we got outside, the guards on the house followed us, three of them walking to the car. The English driver opened the door to the limo. He seemed frightening and stern when he spoke, “Miss Casey.”

  I contemplated telling him we shouldn’t go, but I caught a glimpse of a dark-haired boy with glasses in my garden around the side of the house. Clark Kent was watching me. I closed my eyes and whispered, “Gotham City,” before I let my friend push me into the car.

  I tried not to look in the direction of the garden, nor see his face.

  “I’ll meet you at the Shack!” Linds ran from the car in the direction of Finn.

  My phone rang as the car started, flashing my father’s face. “Hello?”

  “Where are you going?” He sounded like he’d just woken up.

  “I’m being abducted.”

  “WHAT!”

  “Wait, I mean Sage is making me go to the city for a facial. Not like abducted abducted.” I took a deep breath. “Sorry. I didn’t mean that.”

  “Sierra.” He heaved into the phone. “There are some words we might want stricken from our vocabularies.”

  “Okay.”

  “Take the guards. They stay with you all day. Call me every hour. Go to the house in the city if anything goes wrong.”

  “Dad, I’ll look like a bloody Kardashian.”

  “The guards go or you don’t,” he growled.

  “Fine! I wish you would just chill out a little.”

  “Stop acting like you genuinely want this girl to kill you and I might do that one day,” he snapped and hung up the phone.

  “We should Christmas shop afterward.” Rita grinned wide as the door closed. “If we’re declaring the holidays as a sacred time, where she isn
’t allowed to torment us. I don't have anything for anyone. I’ve been too stressed to shop.” She said it like it was the worst thing that had ever happened to her.

  Lainey gave me a worried look.

  “Fine.” I sighed and nodded. “Whatever.”

  “Oh my God, we should stay in the city and hang at my place. We could go out and club.” Rita nudged me. “Make this a whole thing. A night of just us and fun and no more Hailey and her bullshit. Plus, if we do impromptu things she can’t plan attacks for them.”

  My eyes were locked on Lindsey talking to the guy who I had once believed was Superman. “Fine,” I agreed. Getting drunk and screwing around with someone else might make the pain go away. Or, at the very least, change the pain I was feeling. I hadn’t had a good dose of self-hatred in a while.

  The car moved but my eyes didn’t.

  He seemed upset, emotional still. Every single bit of me wished I were there to see him upset, every single bit except the common sense part that saw only the liar. Or just knew I was too in love with him to be near him.

  As we rounded the corner of the driveway, I exhaled, not even aware I’d been holding my breath. But breathing was like tiny knives being stabbed into my chest.

  My gaze lowered to the floor as Lainey’s small hand slipped into mine. She squeezed and I fought my tears.

  I fought so hard I didn’t notice we’d stopped. Not until Sage hopped out and dragged me with her.

  “Come on. If I have to go in here, I’m not going alone.” She pulled Lainey and I. “I’m not getting a drink. It probably comes with scabies. We go in, we ask about that little barista girl, and then we leave.”

  Rita gave me a look. “Maybe Lainey should go in, sort of quietly. She’s been here before. If we all march in there, like us, they might notice or get nervous.”

  “Yeah.” I pulled Sage back. “Rita’s right. Lain, you came here with Linds, didn’t you?”

  “Against my will.” She folded her arms.

  “Use my phone and show the picture of Hailey.”

  “They won’t need the picture.” Lain laughed. “They’ll know her.” She looked at me. “You should come. You’re better at lying.”