Prologue

The knife burns cold in my trembling hand.

I lock Blaine’s door with a soft click so no one can follow me into his bedroom. The others are busy getting dressed for cocktail hour, but it would be unforgivable to take any risks now that I’ve come this far.

The antique shower plumbing whistles and bangs as loudly as the rusty boiler in Marian Academy’s basement. Even so, I hold my breath as I creep toward the bathroom. I hide behind the cracked door and peer through the gap. Blaine is standing in the canary-yellow tub, with a sheer shower curtain drawn around him, his head and chest barely visible through the swirling steam. The vintage wool bathing suit he’d worn to the beach is in a heap on the mosaic tile.

Each bathroom in Ashwood Manor has been meticulously preserved, and Blaine’s is decorated with golden art deco mirrors.

I look at the gold blade of my knife.

They match.

If I were the kind of person who believed in signs, I might think the universe approved of the crime I was about to commit.

But I’m not that kind of person. That person would have spilled their secret to Kassidy weeks ago, hoping the universe would repay their good deed. I’m more of a don’t-fuck-with-my-future-if-you-don’t-want-to-meet-my-knife kind of girl. At least I want to be. My shaking hands tell a different story.

Blaine’s eyes are closed, his head tipped up to the water as it cascades down with the delicate patter typical of old houses, a quiet contrast to the thumping plumbing in the walls. It’s a soothing sound, like spring rain, and I briefly flash back to the day before prom, when Blaine danced in my apartment building’s courtyard during a storm while my family and I laughed from the sidewalk.

He looked vulnerable and young then, just as he does now, standing naked and defenseless in the shower. I’ve been waiting for this moment. Obsessing over the details in my head for days. But as Blaine runs his hands through his ginger hair, slowly pushing a stream of water off his forehead and down his freckled back, a burning guilt spreads through my arms, almost making me drop the knife.

Blaine doesn’t deserve this—not really. But neither do I. And I can’t sit back and let him destroy my life.

I grip the knife tighter and step through the doorway.