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She lets out a string of curses. “I know you have a point but I really don’t want to admit it.”
Her bravery and daring might be what I like most about her. I’ve spent so much of my life planning every step that it’s amazing to be with someone who never hesitates. But the willingness to dive in headfirst is going to get her killed if I let it.
“I’ll go alone to talk to him. He won’t be suspicious at first, so maybe I can get him to say something incriminating. You have to let me handle this.”
“I hate this.”
Evangeline slumps against the wooden pew, her face so dejected that I almost change my mind about making her stay here. Then I remember how I felt when I came to the scene of that car accident, when I thought I would see her being carried away in a body bag and my resolve hardens.
“And I hate the idea of you ending up in a coma next to Olivia, or something even worse.”
She opens her mouth like she wants to make a sharp retort, but the sound that comes out is more like a sob.
I look her over, concern overtaking my annoyance at her pigheadedness. “You’re shaking.”
A slight tremor runs through her and quickly turns into a full body shudder. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
“Come here.”
Enveloping her in my arms feels better than it should, considering that she seems on the verge of a breakdown. There is something fragile and lonely beneath the tough girl exterior that she shows to the world.
“What am I supposed to do when this is all over?” she whispers against my chest.
My breath huffs out in a laugh. “Take back your identity, for one. I’m getting sick of calling you Olivia. Evangeline is a way better name.”
“Gigi,” she corrects. Her nose wrinkles, gaze moving away as if she is seeing something from her memory. “I used to hate my name. It always seemed so old-fashioned. Whenever we’d stop at those kiosks with personalized keychains, they always had Olivia’s name, but never mine. I used to get so jealous. Looking back, it seems like such a stupid thing to get upset about. So what that she could buy some crappy t-shirt with her name printed on it and I couldn’t? It shouldn’t have mattered.”
I realize that I’ve never asked her about her relationship with her sister. Instead, I’d assumed that they must have been close if she would do all of this. “Did you guys fight a lot?”
“Not, really. Nobody fights with Olivia. It would be like trying to get mad at a puppy. She would just give you these wide eyes until you weren’t mad at her anymore.” Evangeline smiles, but the expression is obviously forced. These memories aren’t happy ones. “She was always the sweet one, even when we were little kids. If someone even looked like they were upset, she would do anything to make it better. Livi is the last person in the world who deserves to get hurt. She was…she is...good.”
“So are you,” I point out.
“If you say so.”
“I’m sure Olivia would agree.”
“You don’t know that. Neither do I. Sometimes, it feels like nobody really knew her. Just because she and I have the same face, doesn’t mean it should have been this easy for me to take her place. Pretty much nobody noticed that I’m not the same girl.” Evangeline hesitates for a bare second and makes a face, annoyance briefly overcoming her melancholy. “Except for Vaughn, I guess. But he didn’t even care enough to tell his friends about her.”
“The guy royally fucked up.”
She turns to stare at me, obviously hearing something in my tone. “You sound like you want to defend him.”
“He is my best friend,” I point out. “And you have no idea how messed up his family is. The Ashbridges are basically American royalty. Vaughn’s father has extremely high exceptions of him that he will never meet. No one could. Even if he was madly in love with Olivia, being with her would have cost him everything if his family didn’t approve. They would have cut him off at the knees.”
“I thought my father was bad,” she huffs.
“Vaughn has two older brothers and he still constantly gets regularly to live up to the family name.”
“I’m my father’s greatest disappointment, according to him. But I also never worked that hard to get in his good graces. That was always Livi’s thing. I wonder what he’s going to do if she dies and I’m all he has left.”
“Maybe the two of you could reconcile,” I offer.
“Not fucking likely. You don’t reconcile with someone who accuses you of making up a rape for attention.”
Evangeline tells me the story of her uncle in clipped terms, like she is reciting the recap of a movie she watched.
A red haze filters over my vision as she describes the way he seemed to flop like a dead fish on top of Olivia while she tried to push him away.
