The Lost Sister (25 page)

“You have no idea how much it costs to be an Endicott, do you? Of course you don’t. When you have nothing, you don’t realize how much it costs to be rich. It’s a chore, really. Keeping up appearances when you’re flat broke. Ha! So we knew we had to torch this place for the insurance money. It was the only way to avoid getting caught.”

“You burned this place down?” Finn asked, horrified at what he was hearing.

“Of course,” Kiki answered in a matter-of-fact tone, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. “Unfortunately, this building was stubborn—like you. It just refused to give up the ghost, so to speak. Which is why tonight, you, my friend, are going to help me burn this place down for good. And do you know how I’m so sure it will work this time?”

Finn shook his head. She had clearly lost her mind and was now involving him in her crazy games.

“Because you are going to stay here and watch it burn—make sure it burns to the ground.”

“You want me to get in trouble for arson? I’m not going to just stand outside and watch this place burn down.”

“Of course you aren’t,” she said sweetly. “You’re going to watch it from the inside. It’s a pity that since you killed Darcy and Bronwyn and are so consumed with guilt, you have no choice but to take your own life.” She stopped talking and smiled as the realization hit his face. “Yes, Finn, this is your last night, your grand finale, your big good-bye. It’s quite fitting that it’s taking place right here in the place that you fought so hard to keep standing, don’t you think?”

“You’re crazy,” he said, his voice cracking. “I had nothing to do with what happened to Darcy and Bronwyn. I didn’t kill them. I swear!”

“Of course you didn’t kill them, darling Finn,” she cooed. “I did.”

“D
o you think it makes sense for us to go out there by ourselves?” Maddie asked Cordelia as she drove the VW Bug so fast it almost tipped over as it took every corner. Maddie was rocking back and forth in the passenger seat, rubbing her hands together trying to get the icy, numbing sensation out of her system. The heat in the old car wasn’t working, and the girls were shaking out of fear, adrenaline, and the bitter cold of the wintry night.

“Finn is there. Wasn’t he the one who saved you the last time?” Cordelia asked. When Maddie nodded, Cordelia then said, “Well, now it’s our turn to return the favor.”

“But we have no idea why he’s going there. Who is he meeting? Why in the middle of the night at Ravenswood? Why go alone?”

“Those are all awesome questions. Really awesome. So why don’t we go and ask Finn ourselves, shall we?”

Maddie realized that nothing was going to stop Cordelia—nothing could make her turn back from saving Finn. After everything he’d done for them, there was no way she was going to back down from this challenge. Which was why Maddie left the note for Abigail about where they were headed. Cordelia was adamant that they tell no one for fear of getting Finn hurt, but Maddie had been at Ravenswood in the dead of night and she knew the madhouse feel—the fact that spirits were more alive there than probably anywhere else in the world. It would be too much for them to take, and she didn’t want to risk their lives again. So when Cordelia was searching for her keys, Maddie took the time to leave the note for her mother, shoving it under her bedroom door. She knew that once Abigail saw the note, she’d call the police and they would be safe. Unless, of course, it was the police who had called Finn to meet them at Ravenswood that night. In Hawthorne, anything was possible.

Finn’s old car was parked at the front gate of Ravenswood.

“Why wouldn’t he drive up to the building?” Cordelia asked.

“I don’t know, but I’m not walking, so pull up to the front of the building,” Maddie said. Her hands were blue from the cold.

“Sorry, sister. No way. Whoever called Finn out here in the middle of the night obviously wanted him to come alone. I’m not going to risk him getting killed just because it’s too cold for us to walk a few hundred steps.”

When Maddie started to protest, Cordelia snapped, “Come on, Maddie, it’ll warm you up. Get the blood moving. Let’s go!”

The girls raced up the winding road, the snow crunching beneath their feet. The monstrous Ravenswood seemed to be grinning at them.

Welcome back, Maddie
, it seemed to say to her as a shudder went down her back.
Let the fun begin
.

“You killed Darcy and Bronwyn?” Finn said incredulously. “Wh—why?” Everything was happening so fast, he couldn’t wrap his mind around it.

Kiki seemed to be happy to finally tell someone the truth. As she spoke, it appeared as though a weight was being lifted off her chest. She seemed almost giddy, like a little girl sharing a secret with her best friend. “Well, I didn’t mean to kill Darcy. It’s actually your fault, come to think of it.”

“My fault? How could it possibly be my fault?” Finn asked.

“She was wearing your jacket that night out on Misery Island. She was all hunched over—now I know she had gotten her heel stuck in some rocks—that silly thing. Serves her right for sneaking out behind the tent to go look for my daughter’s boyfriend. Oh, you thought I didn’t know about Darcy and Trevor? You underestimate me and my daughter. In any case, since that little tramp had your leather jacket on, I thought it was you. It was only after I struck her with the tent stake that I realized my error. But at that point, there really wasn’t much I could have done. She’d been knocked unconscious, blood was everywhere, so I just nudged her over the rocks and into the ocean. I figured that when and if she was found, your leather jacket would get you put away. I had some sympathy for the poor girl, but I thought it was a win-win situation. Since I wasn’t able to kill you as I’d planned, I’d at least be able to frame you for murder. And there were other reasons that her death was—how shall I put this?—convenient.”

She inspected her nails in the dim light that surrounded them and seemed annoyed that her polish was chipped. She looked up and obviously saw the confusion in his face mixed with horror. “I can’t really explain why it was convenient.” She whisked her hands upward in a
Why bother?
manner. “Some things are better left unsaid, don’t you agree?”

Finn’s jaw dropped open. She was talking about her murderous actions as if she were discussing a PTA meeting or a luncheon event. “Why kill me?”

“Oh, well, you know I was really angry with you. You were royally screwing up my plans. I just—I just didn’t want you around anymore. And there you were at the Winter Gala—stirring up even more trouble—and I just couldn’t help myself. It wasn’t premeditated. It was pure rage. I wanted you dead. It’s as simple as that. But then, of course, I made that little mistake and things got messy. It’s a pity I didn’t just hire someone to do it. I learned from my mistakes, you know. Murder is a task best left to professionals,” she said with an evil grin.

Finn noticed a stirring at the entrance. It was Cordelia and Maddie. They were sneaking in, trying not to cry out in shock as they saw the situation unfolding in front of them.

Finn knew he needed to keep Kiki’s attention firmly on him, so that she didn’t notice the girls entering the building.

He walked around to the other side, appearing like he was pacing, trying to understand what she had done and why she had done it. He knew from watching television shows on psychopaths that they reveled in discussing their crimes at length, especially if they knew they would get away with it. “So you hired someone to kill Bronwyn. Why? What did she do?”

“She saw me,” Kiki said flatly. “The night of the gala.” She looked down at her shoulder and brushed away a hair or stray piece of lint. “Or at least I thought she did. In any case, I couldn’t risk having someone out there knowing the truth about what happened to Darcy. And then it hit me. I could have her kidnapped. Hire a professional to kidnap her and use her to extort money from her family. Do you have any idea how much money that family has?”

Finn tried to keep his eyes firmly locked on Kiki, afraid that if he looked away and dropped her gaze for even a moment, she would turn and see the girls creeping along the shadowy walls. He moved to the opposite wall from where the girls were now hiding, so that Kiki had turned completely in his direction.

“There was never any ransom request for Bronwyn,” Finn said.

“Actually, yes, there was. But once we got the money, we realized that we couldn’t let Bronwyn go. She knew all about my involvement. That was my stupidity, really. Once the man I hired found out how much money was involved, he got greedy and told Bronwyn who he was working for. That was a big mistake on his part. But one less groundskeeper at our house was never going to be missed.”

Finn continued to stare at her in disbelief. The way she was talking about having people killed, extorting money, torching buildings for insurance money, it was obvious that she had no conscience.

“So I had to kill her. There really was nothing else to do. But I hadn’t planned on her being found here. When I had the fires set, my intention was for the entire place to go up in flames. But unfortunately this stubborn building”—she held a fist up in the air as if she were challenging Ravenswood to a fight—“it just wouldn’t burn the way it was supposed to.” She cackled, her voice echoing off the walls. That’s when Finn noticed the gasoline tang in the air. She must have already set the place to go up like a firecracker. All she needed was to light the spark.

“So why burn the place down now? I’m sure that you got all the money you needed—from the original insurance claim, from your investors, and from Bronwyn’s family. Why do you need to burn down Ravenswood? And why do you need me to go down with the place? It sounds like you’ve got your story set in place. Obviously, you have the best lawyers that money can buy. Why not just frame me for everything? For Darcy’s death, for Bronwyn, for arson? Why kill me?”

“Because you’re a smart little bastard, Finnegan O’Malley. Somehow you would find a way to screw all of this up for me again. And this time, I’m not taking any risks. Bronwyn’s family isn’t going to give up until they find out who killed their precious little girl, so I need to hand over an explanation to them tied up in a nice, tidy little bow.”

“How will killing me and burning this place up possibly clean things up? Won’t it make you look more suspicious? All of these deaths and tragedies happening around you?”

“Here,” she said, holding a piece of paper. “It’s a suicide note. As soon as I leave here, it will be sent to the police, to the newspapers, to Bronwyn and Darcy’s families. It explains how you were so tormented and angry with everyone in town. How you blamed everyone for Cordelia’s disappearance, for the terrible things done to her on Misery Island. So you killed Darcy and then when Bronwyn confronted you about it, you kidnapped and ultimately killed her. You burned down Ravenswood the first time to cover your tracks, but when the part of the asylum that contained her body remained unscathed, you knew it was only a matter of time before the evidence pointed in your direction. In a final fit of desperation, you admit to your crimes in this suicide note and douse yourself and this blasted building in kerosene and Poof! You have paid for all of your sins.”

She laughed gaily at her well-thought-out plan, waving the letter around like a victory flag.

“Who else knows about this?” Finn asked. In the dim light of the lantern, he could see streams of tears on Maddie’s and Cordelia’s faces. He needed to get them out of there.

“No one,” Kiki said. “It’s too tiresome to get more people involved. So much cleaning up to do, you know?”

Realizing that he wasn’t buying it, she sheepishly added, “Well, maybe Kate had an inkling of knowledge, but you know that nothing is stronger than a mother-daughter bond.”

“Which is why you deserve this!” Cordelia screamed, barreling out of the corner at Kiki, throwing her whole body weight against her, causing them to fall to the floor. The gun was knocked loose from Kiki’s hands as Maddie ran to retrieve it.

“No!” Kiki screamed.

“Cordelia, don’t!” Finn yelled.

Kiki threw Cordelia off her and managed to wrangle the gun out of Maddie’s hands. Kiki appeared thrown for a moment, but was able to regain her composure, waving the gun back and forth at them.

“You stupid boy,” she snarled. “I told you to come alone.”

“I did,” he pleaded. “Kiki, this is between you and me. Let the girls go.”

“No, no, no,” Kiki said, scratching her chin with the tip of the loaded gun. “You know that I can’t have any loose ends. Let me see, why would the three of you be here together? Aha! A lovers’ triangle. Of course. It makes it that much more dramatic. Maddie discovers Finn’s secret and tries to talk him out of killing himself, while Cordelia arrives here in a jealous rage—furious that Maddie and Finn are having a clandestine affair. After all, she’s still angry about everything that happened last year, and she still blames Finn and Maddie for not being able to save Rebecca from the asylum. It’s perfect. Cordelia, clearly unbalanced, decides that they are all going to go together. A suicide pact. It’s brilliant. I don’t know why I didn’t think of it in the first place. That way, I don’t have you girls digging around trying to figure out why and how Finn could have done such a terrible thing. Ah yes, three birds, one massive stone. Perfect!”

Kiki’s voice was echoing through the abandoned hallways, curling around pockmarked corners, and swirling into the void in the monstrous belly of Ravenswood

Maddie tried reasoning with Kiki.

“You don’t know what you’re doing. You can’t do this!”

Finn angrily shouted, “Leave the girls out of this. I’m the one you have a problem with. I’m the one you want. Let them go!”

“How can I possibly let them go now?” Kiki asked, her eyes wild and maniacal. “They know my secrets. All my secrets. The secrets of the Sisterhood. The secret of my crimes, my misfortunes.”

Cordelia started to weep. It all seemed helpless.

Kiki moved the gun back and forth at each of them. If anyone made the slightest movement, one of them would get shot.

Maddie looked at Cordelia and Finn and realized how much they had put themselves at risk for her, how much they’d done for her. She knew what she had to do, what she was meant to do. It was as if Tess were there whispering in her ear.
You can make up for how you’ve wronged Cordelia in the past. This is your chance. You are strong and now it is time for you to show your strength
.

With a growl and a surge of energy that seemed to emerge from her very core, Maddie lunged at Kiki, knowing full well that the moment she did it, the gun would go off and possibly end her life. None of it seemed to matter anymore. As she leapt into the line of fire, images of Luke, Reed, Finn, and Cordelia, of her mother and Rebecca, and even the horrible night out on Misery Island—all of it flooded her brain. The bullet seared through her skin with such intense heat she felt like her body was on fire. She knocked into Kiki, hurling them both to the floor, but it wasn’t enough to keep the gun from firing the bullet deep into Maddie’s shoulder. She heard Cordelia scream and Finn shout, “No!”