Chapter 3

Cordelia's POV

Something cracked in my mother's eyes. But my father's jaw only hardened.

"Enough. You're standing here in one piece, aren't you? Yes, Camille did wrong. But you're an Ashcroft now. You have everything that used to be hers. What do you have left to be bitter about? We're asking for an apology. We're not asking you to die."

My eyes filled. I couldn't stop it.

Julian finally moved. "Cora—"

I looked at him. "You too?" I said. "You think the same thing."

He went rigid. He didn't answer.

My phone buzzed in my palm. One message from an unknown number.

Your placement is confirmed and will not be revoked. We'll collect you tomorrow night at eight.

I smiled. It felt like the first honest thing I'd done in weeks.

"All right," I said. "I'll confess."

The whole room relaxed at once. My mother's eyes lit up with relief—"I knew you were our good girl"—and my father let out a breath. "Don't worry. We'll make it up to you. I promise." Julian pulled me into his arms and held on like he was the one about to lose something.

The night of the gala, the ballroom blazed with light.

My parents stood at Camille's side. My mother smoothed the lines of Camille's gown with her own hands, her eyes soft with a tenderness she'd never quite managed to turn toward me. Spencer hovered one step away, refusing to leave her for even a second, as if one wrong word might shatter her.

And Julian—in a tux chosen to match Camille's dress—stood beside her as her escort, her hand tucked into the crook of his arm. From across the room, they looked like a magazine spread. A perfect pair.

He spotted me, and for a moment something flinched behind his face—guilt, and something that looked like pain. He took a half-step toward me on instinct.

Camille went pale on cue, pressed a hand to her chest, and swayed. "Julian… I don't feel well…"

He stopped. And then, without even seeming to decide, he turned, caught her, and swept her out of the room.

I watched them go and felt something inside me go quiet. It was almost funny.

Spencer came at me in long strides, grabbed my wrist, and marched me up onto the stage. The moment I was up there, the whispers rippled across the room.

"That's the long-lost real daughter?"

"She was jealous of the other one, so she faked videos to ruin her. What a snake."

Spencer shoved a sheet of paper into my hand. "Read it."

I looked down.

"I, Cordelia Pryce, out of jealousy toward Camille, maliciously circulated private footage of her and deliberately destroyed her reputation—"

A wave of contempt rolled through the crowd, every pair of eyes turned up at me. My mother had gone a little pale but said nothing. My father frowned and shot Spencer a look that wasn't quite approval. Julian's fists were white at his sides.

None of them stopped it.

I lowered the page and began to kneel—

And the ballroom doors slammed open.

A man in a low-pulled cap burst through at a run, a gas can swinging from his fist.

My mother saw his face, and all the color drained out of hers.

"Stop!" she screamed, lunging forward. "I told you we didn't need you anymore! I told you not to come! Somebody stop him—please—"

Too late. A long arc of gasoline flew up and over me, soaking through my gown, my hair.

At that exact moment, the stage pyrotechnics went off overhead. A spark fell.

The fire went up with a sound like the world ripping apart.

Flames climbed the air in a single breath and reached for me, the heat alive, with teeth. The hem of Camille's gown—she'd come back in and was standing closest—caught fire, and she shrieked.

And my parents, who had half-turned toward me, turned the rest of the way—toward her. They threw themselves at Camille on pure instinct. The only fire blanket, in Julian's hands, went around her shoulders before he'd even thought about it.

By the time any of them remembered me, the fire already had all of me.

"CORA!" My mother's voice broke in two.

Julian's eyes went red, and he threw himself toward the flames. "CORDELIA!"

But I stood in the middle of all that light, and I smiled.

"You said I owed her," I said—to no one, to all of them. "So here. My life. Is that finally enough?"

Then I turned and walked into the heart of the fire.