Total pages in book: 119
Estimated words: 112638 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 563(@200wpm)___ 451(@250wpm)___ 375(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 112638 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 563(@200wpm)___ 451(@250wpm)___ 375(@300wpm)
I decided I wasn’t going to share Douglas Corbin’s fate. I wasn’t going to bleed for a Langston woman ever again.
“Pull me harder!” She moaned. “I’m slipping. Can’t you see?”
The soles of my feet scorched as I tried to yank her up the roof. The odds were against me. Physics too. I had to climb uphill over the wet shingles while pulling someone my own weight. “You need to hold on to the gutter. I have to call Dad.”
“I can’t!”
“We’re both gonna fall.”
“Don’t leave me!”
Did she think I wanted to kill her or something? I was about to tip over too.
“Look, I can hold you for a few more seconds and give your arms a rest, but then you gotta hold the gutter for a minute or two until they get here.”
She slipped away from my grasp an inch. Wriggled in the air like a worm. “No! Don’t leave me! I don’t want to die.”
“Don’t look down,” I roared, falling to my knees, pulling harder, with everything I had in me. It felt like my limbs were being ripped from my body. But she was too heavy, too wet. “Just . . . just look at me.”
The pressuring, unrelenting weight of her was gone suddenly. My body jerked backward. The back of my head slammed against the shingles. A distant splash assaulted my ears.
She fell.
She fell.
Frantic, I crawled along the gutter, squinting down, trying to see past the rain and the mud and the thick bushes. Grace had landed on the canopy covering the empty pool. The belly of it was deep, and there was water all around her.
Gracelynn didn’t move. Her legs were in weird angles, and I immediately knew, even before she started screaming, that it was all over for her.
No more fancy tulle costumes, Russian tutus, or dance camps in Zurich.
My stepsister’s ballet career was over.
And so was my life as I knew it.
The x-rays arrived minutes after Dad and I got to the hospital.
He hadn’t looked at me, not even once, the entire journey there. I relayed to him everything that had happened, maybe other than the part where I’d goaded her. No need to be holier than the pope. Besides, she survived, didn’t she?
“She’s going to be okay, though. Right?” I chased him down the linoleum corridor to her room now. I was so full of adrenaline I couldn’t even feel my legs.
“She better be, for your sake,” he snarled, staring ahead. “What did you two do up there, anyway?”
“Played a game.”
He let out a snort. “You play high stakes. Typical Corbin male.”
What did steaks have to do with all this? I’d always been a burger dude, anyway.
“Is that good or bad?” I asked.
“Plainly speaking, it’s an incurable condition stemming from too much money, too much ego, and too much time.” He plucked his leather gloves by the fingers. “We Corbins tend to be rebels with a cause. Hopefully, yours isn’t killing your sister. Rein in on your personality, child.”
This was the most he’d spoken to me in months, maybe even years, so I basked in it. It wasn’t that he ignored me per se. Dad was good about making sure I got excellent grades, attended my extracurricular activities, stuff like that. He just wasn’t about talking all that much.
The verdict came along with the x-rays. Gracelynn was suffering from two broken legs and a minor spinal dislocation that required surgery.
She also suffered from a bad case of being a shit bag.
The latter wasn’t a medical diagnosis, but true, nonetheless. As soon as the painkillers kicked in and her legs were cast, she pointed an accusing finger at me, narrowing her tar eyes. “It’s him. He did this to me. He pushed me, Mommy.”
It was the first time I was truly speechless. Pushed her? I’d tried to save her, and she damn well knew it.
“Bull crap! You ran on the ledge and fell,” I said hotly. “I tried to pull you back up. You almost tore my arms off. Here, I can prove it.”
Pushing my sleeves up, I turned to show Dad and Miranda the marks Gracelynn had left on my skin. They were red and deep and raw, already halfway turning into scars.
Gracelynn shook her head adamantly. “You tried to push me, so I fought you. You wanted to get rid of me. You said so yourself. You were tired of sharing Mom and Dad’s attention.”
This sounded exactly like the kind of thing she’d do. I hated getting attention from Dad and Miranda. It was always negative and got me in trouble.
My mouth hung open. “Why’re you lying?”
“Why’re you lying?” She bared her teeth. “You’ve been caught. Just fess up! You could’ve killed me.”
“Oh, my little dove. What’s this monster done to you?” Miranda buried her face in her daughter’s neck, throwing her arms around her. She sounded like she was crying, but I bet her eyes were dry.