“A man has a right to protect his family,” Baron says. “You were scheming on us.”
“Did you know?” she asks, turning to Duke.
He grits his teeth and glances at Baron.
“No,” Baron says. “He didn’t know. Someone who works for Dad saw the letters from your mom before we knew who you were. We tracked her down, and then found out who you were, and I hacked into the FHS computers to talk to you. As soon as you made an account onOnlyWords, I hacked into it and turned your location on so we could follow you.”
“I know all that,” she says.
“Then what do you want to know?” he asks.
“I don’t know,” she admits. “I guess… Why?”
“Why what?” Baron asks, like he genuinely doesn’t know. The guy is smart—criminally so—but sometimes he misses the obvious things.
“Why me?” she asks. “Why take it so far? Why give me a scholarship? And why pretend it was someone else when you told Royal?”
Baron braces his hands on the railing beside him. “Why not? At first, we were just going to fuck with you a little. We got that video, and we figured we’d release it at FHS, ruin your reputation, and move on to the next Darling. Dad was the one who said we should give you a scholarship.”
“So it wasn’t just you,” Harper says, nodding.
“I was Mr. D,” Baron says. “Dad just pulled some strings, got them to add an extra scholarship. He’s the one who brought you to our school.”
“To keep us off Lindsey,” I say.
He shrugs. “Sure.”
“But you were the one talking to me all that time?” Harper asks.
“Yeah. I figured I’d fuck with you a little more, probably let my brothers in on it, since you were at our school. It was never supposed to go past the video leaking. We figured we’d just leak it at Willow Heights and ruin your reputation there instead of at your old school. It’s not like we murder the Darlings. We just wanted to ruin you, and that seemed like enough. It could have just ended there, with you being a social pariah like Colt.”
“But?” she asks.
“But Royal got some idea in his head about you being his.” He turns to me. “You’re the one who cut us out. We never cut you out. You were there all along with Mabel.”
“I didn’t give a fuck about Mabel,” I snap.
“We let you in on it,” he says, glaring back at me. “And you kept us from going after her.”
“She left,” I say bluntly. “She didn’t want to be here. I pulled her out of the river for you.”
“You wouldn’t let us follow her.”
We stare at each other a long minute. “You’re in school,” I say finally. “Yeah, you weren’t going to drop out to chase some Darling snake across the country. You can go find her as soon as you graduate. I don’t give a fuck about her.”
“If we couldn’t have her, why should you have Harper?” he asks. “Why did you get to keep her when we couldn’t keep Mabel?”
“So that’s it?” I ask. “You’re fucking petty, you know that?”
“I kept track of your bitch when you didn’t,” Baron says. “She was pulling shady shit all along, and you were too blinded by your dick to notice. So don’t give me shit. I’m not the bad guy here. I was doing your job all along—looking out for our family. Looking out for you.”
“I didn’t ask you to keep tabs on my girl.”
“Someone had to.”
I’m so pissed I want to put the asshole in the river, but I won’t. I’ve already killed one sibling, and I won’t lose more of my family than I have. Especially when I know that he’s speaking the truth. I got wrapped up in her, lost my head. I lost sight of the goal. Baron never did.
“You lied to us,” Harper says. “You would have gotten me killed.”