Page 58 of How to Kill Your Rival

He looks at the seedling. ‘Because I don’t need her to worry.’

‘It’s tough. She’s so tightly wound.’

‘I also know what she’d do,’ Fraser says. ‘And when I find the fucker, I want to string him up myself.’

Can’t blame him.

He goes back to his seedlings.

‘If you have information about what’s been happening to her contracts, then you should tell her. She deserves to have the people around her supporting her.’

What I want to say is, Why does everyone in this family handle everything alone?

Fraser gives me a look that could strip wallpaper.

‘So it’s someone here,’ I say. ‘With physical access.’

‘Or remote access to the network,’ he says.

‘The Kavanagh infrastructure has to be the connection. I’m fairly certain of that. But the origin⁠—’

‘Is here,’ Fraser says.

He’s looking at the journal, turning a page to a diagram of something I don’t recognise, his mother’s tiny handwriting in the margins.

‘How long have you known?’ I ask.

‘Known what exactly?’ he says.

‘That someone close is targeting your sister.’

He’s quiet for a moment.

‘A while,’ he says.

The greenhouse is stifling in its heat, even though it’s only late spring. I wipe my forehead on my sleeve. Fraser seems entirely unbothered by the heat.

‘You should talk to her.’

‘I told you,’ he says. ‘I want to⁠—’

‘I know what you want,’ I say, slamming a hand on the table in my frustration. ‘But I’m telling you, she needs people on her side. Even if she won’t admit it.’

He turns another page in the journal, his jaw ticking.

When he looks at me, he narrows his eyes.

‘You’re not angry because of anything I’m doing,’ Fraser says.

I don’t say anything.

‘You’re angry because you care about her.’

We both know he’s right. But how much does he know?

‘It isn’t me doing this,’ he says.

‘I needed to check.’