Page 38 of Merciless Prince

She sighed. “Look, Shay… even if Killian and those other people found your bracelet that night, why would they assume that onlyyousneaked into the grotto and saw them? They’d probably assume you were with me and the other girls, because they would’ve seen us together at the party before the whole thing happened.”

“But we didn’thang out together at the party. We weren’t allowed to do that, remember? We were paid to mingle with Raymond Knight’s real guests.”

“Oh.” Cori’s forehead creased. “That’s right.”

I leaned closer. “Please believe me. I know I’ve been messed up lately, but you know I’m not crazy,” I said. “I really think something happened in that grotto. Even if that guy isn’t really dead, Killian and his friends were still up to something that they don’t want anyone to know about. Otherwise they wouldn’t be targeting me like this.”

“All right.” Cori let out another reluctant sigh and reached over to squeeze my hand. “I’ll send Killian’s name to my guy as well, and we’ll see what he comes up with.”

My shoulders sagged with relief. “Thank you,” I said softly.

Cori gnawed on the inside of her cheek for a few seconds. “Here’s an idea. If that guy on the altar was really stabbed to death that night, there should be some record of his disappearance, right? His friends and family wouldn’t just let him go missing without saying something.”

I nodded. “I guess so.”

“Do you remember his name?”

I thought back to the night in the grotto with a frown. Killian had said something like ‘Are you ready to face judgment?’ to the man on the altar, but the name he spoke before that was completely eluding me.

“No. Didn’t you google him after we saw the whole thing?” I asked. “You found him and said he was an actor, right?”

“I think he was a lawyer, but his Facebook page made it look like he was an amateur actor,” she said with a nod. “I think his first name might’ve been Joseph. Or was it just Joe?”

“I’m not sure. Is it in your search history?”

“Oh, good idea.” Cori’s brows drew together as she looked down at her phone screen. “Shit. It auto-deletes my history after a month, so it’s gone.”

“Damn.”

Her face brightened. “Oh, I know what we can do. We can ask Francesca!” she said. Her fingers flew over her keypad again. “Look, she’s online now. We could ask her if she’s free to meet up to chat about auditions or something, and then we can ask her what the hell we saw that night. If we put her on the spot, she won’t be able to lie. Even if she tries, we’ll know. No one isthatgood of an actor.”

“That’s a good idea,” I said, mentally kicking myself for not thinking of it.

“Here,” she said, passing her phone to me. “You can log into your account and ask her yourself. That way you can word it however you want.”

“Thanks.”

I logged into my Instagram and tapped out a short message to Francesca.Hey, Francesca! How are you doing? I was just wondering if we could meet up to chat about some stuff. Are you free tonight or tomorrow? Or even this afternoon if that works for you?

I hit send. The read receipt was activated a few seconds later, and then three dots appeared to let me know that Francesca was typing a reply.

“She just said she’s free for dinner tomorrow night,” I said, glancing up from the phone screen.

“Damn, I can’t do that,” Cori said, shoulders sagging.

“How come?”

“I have a politico party to go to while Mom and Robert are in town for the week. I totally forgot about it until Mom reminded me this morning.” She briefly rolled her eyes upward. “We have to go and schmooze with a bunch of senators and other bigwigs. Make Robert look cool.”

“Oh. Okay. I’ll just go and see Francesca by myself, then,” I said. “The sooner we find out why she was there that night, the better.”

Cori squeezed my arm. “Are you sure you don’t mind going alone?” she asked, eyes flickering with concern. “I mean, you seem really freaked out by this whole thing.”

I steeled my jaw and nodded, fortified by the need to figure out exactly what was happening to me, andwhy.

“Don’t worry,” I said firmly. “I’ll be fine.”

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