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Antony’s face darkens. “And if I disappear, he’ll never stop hunting me, and I’ll lead him straight to you. This is only going to work because you happen to look like this Harrington Hills bitch. I don’t have a handy doppelgänger, so I’m going back to Tartarus Oaks. I’m not worried about convincing Brutus to trust me. He already believes I’m on his side. That’s how I found you tonight.”
“You knew he was going to move against Daddy?” My hands ball into fists. “How could you stand by and do nothing?”
“Because if I did it would’ve been both of us in that coffin tonight,” Antony shoots back. “I didn’t do nothing. I got you out. Protecting you is my job. That’s what Uncle Julian wanted. That’s why I have to go back – we know there’s at least one other person out there who knows what you look like.”
His words slice the air in half, severing the chains that tether me to that particular box of memories. I shove them away, sending them bobbing untethered in the vast ocean of my pain. I breathe hard, forcing myself to remember the stale air in the coffin, the panic of feeling those walls closing in on me. I need to not think about what’s inside that box.
“This doesn’t make any sense.” I gesture to the enormous room, desperate to leave the box untethered. “Why is this house just abandoned like this? It’s too easy. What if the family isn’t dead? What if they come back?”
“The word is that they’re not coming back.” Antony gives me a wink. I wonder if my father had anything to do with their disappearance.
“What do you know?”
“Nothing more than that, but I trust my sources.” There’s more to the story, but he won’t tell me. Antony takes his oath to my father seriously – if Daddy said he wasn’t to tell, then he wouldn’t. But I don’t like the fact that Daddy’s keeping secrets from me in his grave.
I’m not convinced by his assurances. “What about other relatives? Lawyers? Someone trying to sell this place off?”
“Nope. Apparently, no one wants to touch it. And I can help with expert legal advice if they try.” Antony cracks his knuckles. “If we do run into any problems, don’t forget – you’re the spitting image of our young Malloy heiress. You’re our secret weapon. If someone tries to claim the house, in rolls Ms. Mackenzie Malloy, haughty-as-fuck, and scares them off. I’m betting we won’t need to do that, but it’s in our arsenal if required.”
Despite my reservations, excitement glissades down my spine at the thought of pulling this off. Maybe it’s the lure of gold and antiques and riches around every corner. Maybe it’s the fact I woke up in my own grave and I understand that my life will never be the same again. Or maybe it’s the idea that I have a chance to make a home for myself on my own terms, that I don’t have to follow Daddy’s rules or be beholden to our family business. Behind the battlements of Malloy Manor, I could truly be queen.
I pick up a bottle of Champagne from a silver ice bucket on the coffee table. The ice inside has long since melted into brackish water. I start to untwist the cork. “Let’s say I agree to this insane idea, and I’m not saying I will. But if I did, I’d have one condition.”
Antony rolls his eyes. “You are so your father’s daughter. Saving your ass was a favor. You’re supposed to owe me one.”
“And you’re asking me to live alone in this house of horrors and pretend to be a ghost so that in five years we can be millionaires. So yeah, you owe me. Luckily, I think even you’ll agree to this. If we pull this off, you’re getting out of the family business, Antony.” I shudder to think of my cousin buried alive in a pine coffin. My father was one of the most powerful men in Emerald Beach, and that didn’t protect him. I won’t let Antony share his fate. “We take the money and we pay whatever we need to stop the family coming after us. And we get the fuck out of Emerald Beach forever.”
Antony frowns. “You know it’s not that easy. I’ve sworn loyalty to Brutus and can’t back out, and you—”
I give up on the bottle and hand it to him. “I know who I am. We’ll find a way. A lot can happen in five years. As Daddy would say, alea iacta est – let the die be cast.”
Antony sighs, but he pops the cork and fills two glasses. “So be it.”
I sip my lukewarm Champagne and try to stomp down the terrifying sensation of the coffin walls closing in on me. As cages went, this one was pretty magnificent. Five years. Five years of waiting and hiding and hoping. If that’s all it takes for a chance at getting out of the hell my legacy has gifted me, then I’m all in.
Just call me Mackenzie Malloy, the Ice Queen of Emerald Beach.
Eli
“That’s not Howard and Ainsley Malloy in these photographs. You’re not Mackenzie Malloy. Who the fuck are you?”
Not-Mackenzie freezes, her lips pressing together in a pout that might have been utterly irresistible if she was actually the person she says she is. But she’s not. All these weeks, she let me live with the hope of finding her again. But it was all a lie, a confidence trick.
Killer.
Liar.
I don’t know which one is worse.
Pain arcs across my chest. I’m splitting in two – my ears ringing, my insides tearing apart.
She’s even worse than my father.
Not-Mackenzie’s shoulders sag. She doesn’t look upset, only resigned. “If I don’t explain, you’re going to the cops, right?”
The Ice Queen returns. That’s all she thinks about – whether I’m spilling the beans on her perfect plan to steal Mackenzie’s life. She doesn’t care about what this will do to Noah. To Gabe.
To me.
