Page 49 of A Violet Obsession

She doesn’t answer.

Her green eyes hold mine, and in them, I see every wall she’s ever built slam into place at once.

“Was it the warehouse guard?” I try to keep the edge from my voice, but I know I’m unsuccessful when her whole body tenses.

“Don’t lie to me.”

Tears well in her eyes, and a look of resignation settles over her features. “How much do you already know?”

16

LILY

“How much do you already know?” Shame makes me want to throw up.

A muscle jumps in his jaw. “I know someone placed a fourteen-year-old girl with a man who had already served two separate prison terms.” I can feel his muscles coiled tight beside me. “And I know your uncle was killed in a botched warehouse robbery and that you cut a deal with the Fulton County DA in exchange for testimony against the others.”

Air rushes out of me in a whoosh. “Well. That’s pretty much everything.”

His chest flexes against my shoulder. “I want to know all of it. You were shot in the robbery, too, weren’t you?”

“Yeah,” I mumble. “The guard shot me, too.”

I know the moment has come. I’m almost relieved. Even if Finn never looks at me the same again, or calls me Butterfly, at least I can stop hiding.

“It won’t make sense if I don’t start at the beginning.” I risk a look, and he gives me a tense nod. I inhale a deep breath. “Living with Scott was like nothing I’d experienced before.” I keep my voice even. If I pretend I’m telling someone else’s story, it’s much easier to get through.

“I learned pretty quickly that my uncle was a sleazeball, and I kept my distance as much as I could. Which worked perfectly for both of us. He was there if I needed an adult to show up in person for something, but everything else—” I shrug. “I learned that teachers and doctors don’t look carefully at signatures. As long as it looks like a signature, nobody asks questions.”

Finn’s body is stiff beside me. I can feel him processing the information, weeding through what I’ve said, and trying to figure out what I’m leaving out. But the details don’t add anything to the story and only bring back memories I’ve worked hard to bury.

“I started shoplifting about a year after Scott took me. He’d burned through my parents’ money—gambling, drugs, hookers.” I make a face. “At least he didn’t bring them to the apartment. Well, not after the first time when I thought someone was being murdered in the next room and burst in on him.”

A muscle ticks in Finn’s jaw. I avert my eyes to the far wall and take a breath.

“Anyway, money was tight, and Scott wasn’t interested in providing me with much, and when he was in jail, I was on my own. The first time I got busted for shoplifting, he was pissed.” I let out a humorless laugh. “Not because I’d done it, but because I’d been caught. It’s the most attention he ever gave me—when he was trying to turn me into a better thief.”

The words land in the silence between us, and I freeze, hearing what I’ve just said.

“I’m not a thief.”

“I know you aren’t.” No hesitation.

I swallow hard. “When I turned sixteen, I could get a job. It was minimum wage and a lot of late nights.”

I stop. The memories of having to walk past the gauntlet of Scott and his friends when I got back to the apartment burns through me—the comments, the suggestions of how much more I could earn if I used my body, how I could make a lot of money if I wasn’t such a frigid bitch. I shove them down.

Not that. Not yet.

“Believe it or not, I was an honors student.” I’m not sure why it’s important to me that he knows that, but it is. Maybe I need him to understand that the girl who drove the getaway car and the girl who stayed up until two a.m. studying for AP exams existed in the same body. That one doesn’t erase the other.

“I knew what my uncle was and what he thought I should be. My only way out was a scholarship. So, I worked my ass off, and I actually got one.”

I wait for the pain that always comes at this part of the story, but it’s duller than I expect. An old bruise. Still there, but the sharp edge has begun to heal.

“About a month before graduation, my uncle was going to pull a job. His normal crew—Keith, who was their regular driver, Keith’s brother Pete, and a guy named Joey.” I pick at the seam of the sheet. “Keith got food poisoning at the last minute, so Scott decided I would fill in.”

I shut my eyes. The memory hits in fragments—the blow to my face, fingers around my neck, Scott’s desperate eyes inches from mine even as he cut off my air.