Page 95 of Wicked Salvation

Raised voices—sharpened like knives. My mother’s tone is clipped and venom-laced, the way it gets when she thinks she’s losing control. My father’s is lower, harder to catch, but the strain it pulls me like a string. I know that sound.

I heard it the night he saved me from Silas, too.

It’s the rare creak of a man who’s spent his life swallowing words.

My hand trembles on the doorknob. I shouldn’t be here. I should be in bed, curled up and obedient, waiting patiently untileither of them decides to speak to me about what happened last night. But something in me refuses.

Maybe it’s the fever.

Maybe it’s the truth rotting inside my chest like spoiled fruit.

Maybe it’s the pile of letters and photographs I’ve read a dozen times in the dark last night from Magnolia’s journal, each one whispering the same blasphemy.

I throw open the door.

The wood slams against the wall with a crack, and both their heads jerk toward me.

Evelyn’s lips part in horror, then narrow into a scowl. She turns to face me, ready to reprimand me. But I’m done playing by her rules. My father—standing near the hearth, with a glass of brandy in his hand—blanches.

“What are you doing in here, you insolent child?” Evelyn snaps. “You should be packing your bags. You’ll return to Augustine this evening. I’ve arranged for a car to take you. Whatever happens to you there is none of my concern because of the disgraces that you’ve brought on this family. You made a mockery of us and?—

“Don’t.” My voice is hoarse, but it cuts through the room like a blade. “Don’t tell me what I should be doing. Not you. Not anymore.”

I step inside, closing the door behind me like I might never come out again.

She moves to slap me across the face but I pivot out of her way. I always could’ve. But some fucked up part of me believed that this was my destiny. That punishment from my mother was Holy, and accepting it would bring me closer to God.

But I’ve cried far too many tears.

Heaven is empty.

Evelyn lifts her chin. “You’ve embarrassed this family beyond comprehension. What would you have us do with youthen, Eden? Parade you through society after you brought the Lockhart name into such disrepute?” She’s shaking with anger now. “You madeinternationalnews. People who’ve never heard of us know how stupid you are.” Then she adds with a huff. “The family cannot live this down with you as a part of it.”

“You’re the one who forced me into finding a husband,” I spit. “I didn’t ask for any of this to happen.”

“And yet here you are,” she says coldly, “infecting this household with scandal. Bleeding all over our name.”

My fingers tighten around the object I’ve been holding this whole time.

Magnolia’s journal.

I walk over to the desk and throw it down.

It lands with a thud. Papers scatter. Photographs slide like snow across polished wood.

Evelyn’s face goes still.

My father looks down—and pales.

“What is this?” I demand, my voice shaking now.

My father doesn’t respond. Neither does Evelyn.

“Tell me,” I hiss. “Do you recognize her?”

I point to the photograph of Magnolia Thompson—young, dark-haired, with a face so much like mine it physically hurts to look at her. She’s dressed in an immaculate Augustine uniform, her arms wrapped around the waist of a man who isobviouslymy father.

Evelyn is the one who speaks first.