I had a captive audience, so I continued, “Looks like there’s conveniently no one else
left alive but you to take over the reins. First my brother, now Cameron. How many people do you
have to kill before you figure out that you’re not smart enough to lead anything or anyone?”
Spider’s jawbone protruded as he clenched his teeth together. Even if he coolly tried to ignore
me, I knew that he was listening to my every word. I was on a path to self-destruction—if he
wasn’t planning on killing me, I would make him change his mind or make him regret his decision
to let me live.
“What you did won’t change a thing. You’ll never be anything like Cameron or my brother. You
’re just another power-hungry street thug with more gunpowder than brains.” My voice was
acidic.
Spider’s lips were stretched thin. “You’ve got a pretty big mouth for a little girl stuck in
a car with four guys who aren’t afraid of using their guns.”
“I’m not afraid of you.” There was nothing else that Spider could ever do to me that would
change this. “I won’t let you control me like you did Cameron.”
Spider huffed crossly. “Control Cameron? No one controls Cameron except for you. You’re a
parasite. If it wasn’t for you, none of this would have happened. Things started going wrong
from the day you got here. You took Cameron’s focus away—and the business started suffering
because of it. If we didn’t do this, you would have gotten all of us killed.”
“We?” I asked incredulously. “I only saw one person holding the gun.”
Spider turned and pointed his finger at me. “You didn’t see a thing. And if you know what’s
good for you, you’ll keep your mouth shut and stay the hell away from us. Or I swear to God, I
will hunt you down and squeeze the life out of you myself—rich girl or not. I’ll take your
whole prissy family down too if I have to. None of this ever happened. Forget we ever existed.”
I wasn’t scared. There was a hole in Spider’s plan, and I was happy to bring this to his
attention. “What am I supposed to do when Victor comes knocking at my door? Pretend I’ve never
seen him before?”
“I don’t care what you do,” he spat back coldly. “Besides, Shield won’t come back. You’re
no longer useful to him now that Cameron …” He didn’t finish his sentence.
I looked at him carefully. I had noticed something change in his face as he had said this. He
was hiding something.
“You and Victor were in on this the whole time,” I said.
When Spider uneasily shifted in his seat and turned his face as far away from me as possible, I
knew I was on the right track. I thought back at that day, in the church, when Spider had
finally convinced Cameron to leave me behind. This had provided Victor with the perfect
opportunity to take me.
The Shadow-of-Emily pounced. “You were setting Cameron up to fail so that you would have enough
to take him out without getting in trouble with the leaders. This was your plan, wasn’t it? To
force him to come after me and show that he was a risk because of me. That’s why you let Victor
go today.”
Spider chuckled nervously, but refused to look at me. “You don’t know a thing, girl. That’s
the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. Cameron was becoming a risk, but it had nothing to do with
me and everything to do with you. We had to recruit other gang factions because you were stupid
enough to get yourself caught by Shield. With half our fleet dead, it was the only way that we
would be able to overtake Shield’s guards and get you out.” After a moment, he added, “As far
as I know, you and Shield were the ones who were playing all of us. He was your uncle, not mine.
I had nothing to do with Shield.”
I was far from being convinced. Spider would have been ecstatic to have Cameron show his
weakness by going to other gangs and plead for their help in order to save a girl. This had only
enhanced Spider’s chances at getting Cameron out of the picture and taking his place at the
head of the table without too much huff from the leaders. I glared at the back of Spider’s
head. If looks could kill, Spider would have had a stake through his neck by now.
“I’m going to kill you,” I promised. The coldness in my voice left nothing to doubt that I
had meant this with every fiber of my being.
Spider didn’t look back. “I’d like to see you try.”
It took me a while to realize that the car had stopped. The third guard had pulled up next to
the unleveled sidewalk in front of my house. I had no idea how I had gotten there—everything
had been a blur up to that point. But looking at my house was like the nightmare had suddenly
poured into my reality, or at least the reality of the old Emily.
The new now being connected with the familiar had only heightened the pain—Cameron hadn’t been
just a dream. He had been a real person whom I loved and who had, inexplicably, loved me. Now he
was gone because of love, because of me. I was the one who was supposed to die. Not him. There
was no waking up from that nightmarish feeling of pain and utter desperation.