Total pages in book: 148
Estimated words: 135517 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 678(@200wpm)___ 542(@250wpm)___ 452(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 135517 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 678(@200wpm)___ 542(@250wpm)___ 452(@300wpm)
“How do they know? Who has been talking to these people? You still think this is some little girl, you fool?”
“I don’t even understand what any of this means.” I looked at Mary’s phone screen, where the latest post from the night before was breaking the internet.
“That’s because you’ve only ever been interested in your own means.”
“You never gave a damn about anyone else. But if you think I’m going to burn along with my girls while you go off into the sunset, then you’re more of an imbecile than I thought. Remember, if I go down for this, so will your parents. None of you will be safe.”
“What do my parents have to do with this? What’s this friend of Alice and down the rabbit hole nonsense?”
“You keep pretending. I guess you’re practicing for what to say in front of the cameras. But don’t forget I have evidence. If I go down, we all go down. So, you’d better think of something to head this off fast, or we’re all going to end up in a very bad way.”
I didn’t flinch, didn’t do anything to let her know the fear that was coursing through me. Another minute and my knees are going to give out. How had everything come to this? How had I not seen that this could be the end result of everything that we had done?
Years; this plan had been in the works for years, and all the adults had made sure that it was foolproof. When it all started, I was too young to do much. All I had was my love for Ryder, something I knew even then was real.
When Dad offered to help, with the promise that he’d make sure I got the boy I wanted when it was time to marry, it was like all my dreams came true. What little girl grows up knowing that her every wish is going to be met as soon as she is old enough?
It had been hell waiting for the day, especially when Ryder went on with his life, not even knowing that I existed. Watching him with all the women who came and went in his life had been like dying a little bit each time. But none of them had scared me more than Elena. Even as a young teen, the love they had for each other was plain to see.
To combat the agony, I felt I pretended to admire their relationship. Since I couldn’t tell my peers at the private school I attended how I truly felt, since everyone was rooting for them and their relationship, I’d gone the extra mile, pretending to be a super fan.
No one knew how I died inside each time their names were mentioned together or how many times I’d destroyed my room whenever they were on the front of some magazine. But that was before Mom told me that this was perfect, the perfect way for one of her spells to work.
Since then, I have never questioned anything I was told to do to win Ryder on my own. If I was told to dress like Elena, I did; if I was ordered to mirror her in any way at all, I did it, and the proof that it worked was my wedding day.
Though things still carried on after that day, with the matching tattoos that everyone noticed after a while, I didn’t mind. Mom said I had to let those things be seen and noticed by the public because it would only strengthen the spell. I was literally stealing Elena’s life force right in front of the world, and no one could stop me.
I think Mom and the aunts came up with that idea after it was ascertained that Ryder still wasn’t over her, so, instead of just taking him for my own, the plan had changed, and now I had to erase her completely, which I didn’t mind in the least.
I hated that she still had a hold on him, that he still lusted for and pined after her. So, when the idea of destroying her life was mentioned, I was all in. I thought after she became ill that our plans were working, and I’d be rid of her. But everything seems to have gone to hell, and I have gained none of the things I dreamt of.
Sure, the world knows me as Ryder’s wife, but no one ever really respected our marriage. I have yet to live one day without her name being mentioned with his, and now the little bitch has been stirring up trouble each time I blink. I have my own shit to deal with, so I don’t see why Mary would think that I have time to deal with hers.
Now she’s here threatening me as if I don’t have enough on my plate to deal with. Her words, though, were not to be taken lightly. I can’t have Ryder if I’m behind bars, and some of the things I’d done in the past to get my way just might land me in jail if they ever got out. I felt sickening fear begin in my tummy and spread to the rest of my body.