Page 160 of Wicked Brutal

Arthur watches Delilah. “So why did you say you could’ve saved me two hours?”

“Because you’re looking for something wrong with the school. There isn’t.” She says it with complete certainty.

Arthur’s eyebrows rise. “You seem confident.”

“I know girls who’ve gone there.”

Danny frowns. “We know girls who went to boarding school in Switzerland?”

Delilah gives him a pitying look. “Danny, you spend most of high school either in a laboratory or committing felonies with your friends. Our social experiences have not been the same.”

Delilah continues before he can answer. “Sainte-Catherine is a very good school. That’s part of why it works.”

Saoirse looks up from Ally’s paperwork. “Works for what?”

Delilah hesitates then she waves one manicured hand. “Scandals.” Mom immediately reaches for her pen. Delilah sees it. “Cassandra.”

“What?”

“You cannot quote me.”

“I’m not writing an article.”

“You’re always writing an article in your heart.”

Dad coughs into his fist. Mom gives him a look.

Arthur says, “What kind of scandals?”

“All kinds.” Delilah sits back. “Nudes get leaked. Sex tapes. Somebody gets caught sleeping with somebody they really shouldn’t be sleeping with. Drugs. Addiction. A famous kid gets arrested. Parents have a spectacularly ugly divorce and suddenly their daughter is being followed by photographers. Family financial scandal. Pregnancy. Somebody has a breakdown in public. Whatever.”

“Jesus,” Danny mutters.

“What? Rich people are messy.”

Iz looks around the table. “Breaking news.”

Delilah ignores him. “The point isn’t that every girl there has some dark secret. Most don’t. It’s a normal elite boarding school. But if something does happen, it’s one of the places families like ours know about.”

“Why?” Gideon asks.

“Privacy.” His expression changes slightly. That word means something different to someone who makes a living in public relations. “The security is ridiculous,” she continues. “The campus is controlled. Visitors are approved. Student information is private. Press access is basically nonexistent. They don’t talk about who attends, why somebody enrolled halfway through a term, why they left their last school, any of it.”

Mom taps her pen against the table. “So if a celebrity’s daughter becomes tabloid news—“

“She disappears to Switzerland for a semester and six months later comes home with better French and a rebrand.”

Penny laughs. “That is horrifyingly efficient.”

Delilah’s expression sobers. “It’s not a punishment school. That’s important. Nobody is chaining girls to radiators. It’s probably nicer than Edgewood. But it is extremely secure and extremely private.”

Arthur nods. “Which matches what I found.”

“So the school isn’t the problem,” Dad says.

“No,” Arthur replies.

Delilah picks up her coffee. “Sainte-Catherine is just where you send the problem.” That kills the humor. I look at her. She seems to realize how it sounded. “I don’t mean Ally is the problem.”