“Oh, I bet you are,” Vic replies, just as smoothly. His eyes slip past his mother to land on Tom. The slimy weasel is wearing an elephant mask with tusks that I’m certain are real ivory. It makes me hate him even more. I bet he’s the type of dude who goes trophy hunting and then frames pictures of him with dead, exotic animals. The rarer, the better. Preferably near extinction.

I take two huge swallows of champagne before I hand the bottle to Callum. He isn’t looking at me though as he takes it. Instead, his eyes scan the room and the hideous collection of art on display. I kid you not, I’ve seen Heather paint prettier pictures with her fingers.

Ophelia finally deigns to give me her attention, studying my dress before lifting her gaze to take in the diamond necklace around my throat, the one that we stole from her at the beach house. Her fingers tighten almost imperceptibly on her champagne flute. The way she holds it reminds me of Pamela, of that awful night when Penelope admitted to stealing that dress.

“The question is,” Vic begins, maintaining a smile that’s eerily similar to his mother’s. If I thought he looked terrifying in the southside, dressed in ragged jeans and wifebeaters, he’s twice as scary in a tux. “Why did you want us here? You already failed to kill Aaron when you had him,” he whispers, leaning down near her diamond studded ear. She keeps smiling the entire time, lifting her hand now and again to wave at a passing acquaintance. “Now, you better start trying harder because the first chance I get, I’m going to kill you.”

“You can certainly try,” Ophelia purrs as Victor stands up straight and Cal passes the champagne over to Aaron. He looks right at Ophelia, but she doesn’t bother glancing his way. The dismissal makes me even more furious than if she’d told him to fuck all the way off. To Ophelia Mars, the only adversary in this room that matters is her son. That’s her mistake though, now isn’t it? “But first, I’d like you to meet someone.”

“Another of your pedophilic friends?” Vic suggests as I stand back, surveying the room and everyone in it. Nobody is looking at us anymore, but I can tell by the way they’re leaning in toward each other that everyone’s still talking.

I wonder if that’s a good thing, pausing to take a chocolate strawberry off of a waiter’s passing tray. The idea of poison crosses my mind, but I dismiss it just as quick. Too obvious. Too many people, too many cameras. I take a bite and the sweetness of the damn thing assaults my tongue.

“Any one of these people could afford to hire a professional hitman,” I murmur and Cal laughs.

“I am a professional hitman,” he whispers back as I glance his way and find him glorious and understated against a backdrop of idiotic idealization. The paintings really are a pile of crap, just tax shelters for the rich. Find a painter, call him a genius, buy his painting for several hundred thousand dollars, and then donate said painting to a museum. Voila, tax write-off. I take another bite of strawberry, but it doesn’t taste nearly so sweet as it did before.

Callum rescues the fruit from my fingers, pausing to lick the sticky juice from the tips as I stare at him, a blue-eyed menace who must’ve, at some point, stolen the fairy-tale prince’s skin and marred it with ink.

“What about the girls?” I ask as Vic is led away and the rest of us follow along behind him, a trail of Havoc to disturb the genteel beauty of the gallery. The atmosphere here is so different it’s almost scary. I’ve done the very opposite of what I needed to do to keep Heather safe. All of these rich people, with their weird games and their fucked-up self-interests, would not hesitate to kill my sister to keep the fact that they’ve been purchasing little girls quiet.

I think about Alyssa, over at the Peters’ house where Oscar lives, and then take another sip of champagne. I’ve grown up on drugstore champagne, and the five dollar a bottle shit they sell at Winco. It all tastes the same. I know it does because now, not only have I tasted both and can’t discern a fucking difference, but Pam used to buy it and refill expensive bottles she stole from her friends’ parties. Things like Dom Perignon and Veuve Clicquot, worth hundreds of dollars, refilled and then brought along as gifts to new events.

Pam always made sure to hide the missing cork with ribbon, to pour the champagne quick, before the bubbles gave out.

I take another sip.

“We’ll keep the girls safe,” Callum promises me, and he sounds so goddamn sure of himself that I almost believe him. Almost. Because while I know he isn’t lying—in his blackest heart of hearts, he believes he’s telling me the truth—there are some things in life we have no control over.

This time, when I take a swig, I down enough in one go that I feel momentarily lightheaded.

I offer the bottle to Oscar, even though I’m certain he isn’t going to take it. To my surprise, he does, swigging it like he’s as repulsed by this place as the rest of us. He looks like he belongs here though, even more so than Vic.

“Are you okay?” I ask, noticing the faintest sheen of sweat on his forehead.

“I’m fine,” he murmurs, but there’s something off in his silver gaze that tells me he isn’t being entirely truthful. “This whole scene … it reminds me of my father.” He takes another drink, shoving the bottle into Aaron’s hands and then moving forward to rejoin Vic.

“His father …” I murmur as Aaron glances my way. I feel like he should be nervous, seeing Tom and Ophelia again, but instead, he just seems pissed off. His mouth is set in a thin line, his shoulders taut. I stare at his tattooed hand as he curls it into a fist around the neck of the champagne bottle, stretching and twisting the letters of HAVOC that are inked into his flesh.

“His dad ran in these same sorts of circles,” he offers, but no more. He’s as aware as I am that Oscar’s story is his to tell. Aaron turns his green-gold eyes from me to something just ahead of us and then frowns, letting me take the champagne from him. “Who the fuck is that?”

There’s a pit in my stomach that hurts, even before I see that what he’s looking at. Turning my head, I notice a pretty young girl with hair like gold and a face carved by expensive moisturizer, a nutritionist, and a professional trainer. Motherfucker. She looks right at me as we approach, the same way that Sara Young did, like she hates me for no reason at all. It’s called internalized misogyny, and it’s a hell of a bitch. Even though I know it’s there, even though I try my best to control it, I feel it, too.

Get the fuck away from my men, I think as the girl saunters up to Vic and Oscar in a gold dress that swishes when she walks. That’s the type of dress Penelope always liked to wear, one with movement. But when she did it, she walked like the whole world was fun. This girl walks like the whole world owes her a favor.

I scowl, and Callum chuckles, finishing my strawberry and flicking the stem onto the passing tray of a different waiter. It’s covered in empty cups and toothpicks.

“Go, defend your territory,” he tells me, so I do, stepping forward to stand at Vic’s side just as his mother introduces the newcomer.

“Victor, this is Trinity Jade,” Ophelia says, smiling sweetly as she lazily flicks her fingers at the young woman. The fact that she won’t even acknowledge my existence or my place as Victor’s wife puts a seed of hate deep into my heart.

But that’s part of the game, isn’t it? The most important part really, to pretend that you’re not playing it at all.

“Trinity,” Vic says as he nods once in greeting then turns back to his mother. “What is this? Your pathetic, too-late attempt to set me up with someone?” Based on Trinity’s reaction or rather, the fact that she has no reaction at all, I can tell she’s already been briefed on the situation. “Thanks, but no thanks.” Without him having to say a single word, I know what Victor wants. I take his arm, standing opposite Oscar on his right side. Hael has already wandered away to look up at paintings that are two stories tall and bathed in too-white light. In reality, I think he’s canvassing the place for possible exits, cameras, and guards. “Have you met my wife, Bernadette?” Vic gestures at me with a tattooed hand as I try to hide the sheer pleasure I get at hearing him use the word wife.

It’s a traditional term, steeped more in pain and servitude than anything else, but I like the way we’ve twisted it. I’m married to Victor Channing, but I’m fucking four other guys. I hide my lascivious smile in the champagne, snatching another strawberry off a tray.

When I take a bite of it, I look Trinity right in the eyes.

Hers are brown, but not a honey-almond color like Hael’s. Nor are they dark as pitch, like Victor’s. More like … an endless stretch of sand on a deserted coastal beach, wet and covered in seaweed. She gives me nothing in response, even when I eat the strawberry the way I might suck a dick.

“Trinity’s mother is the head of the Save These Precious Children League.” Ophelia delivers the words the way any normal person might, like she’s actually interested in a charity that helps kids. The two women exchange looks and smiles before Ophelia turns back to her son. “She’s grooming her to be the head of the charity after she graduates college.”

“Oh, I’m sure she’s ‘groomed’ her—just not for that,” Vic says with a laugh that makes the hair on the back of my neck raise up. His double meaning of the word ‘groomed’ doesn’t escape any of us. Ophelia’s mouth tightens imperceptibly, just enough to give her a single tiny tension wrinkle on one side. Victor looks like he was made to own the world; the rest of the people in here wish they did. Some of them might even think they do. “What’s your point, Mother? Please get to it and quickly, and we’ll pretend you’re not trying to kill my wife or that you didn’t kidnap my brother.”

Vic takes the drink from me and chugs the remainder of it, handing the empty bottle over to Oscar before he takes a step forward. Ophelia’s face doesn’t register a word of what her son is saying, but I notice her eyes stray to the necklace of diamonds at my throat again.