Lies Like Poison

by Chelsea Pitcher

  “I think she’s hiding from her mother,” Raven replied, striding through the door.

  “You’re probably right.” Belle watched him disappear into the house. “Or she’s hiding something for her mother,” she murmured, softly closing the door behind Raven. “Something that will scare him. Make him want to disappear.”

  “Belle,” Jack began, a warning.

  “If Lily heard us talking, our plan will be ruined,” Belle pointed out, jogging down the steps of the wraparound porch. Then she was off. She darted through the orchard, racing toward the girl with white-blond hair. Poor Lily had barely pulled herself into the branches of a tree when Belle grabbed her by the ankle, yanking her toward the ground.

  Lily fell.

  She screamed, scrabbling to escape, but Belle pounced on her, pinning her arms above her head. “What did you hear, you creepy little spy? Are you going to tattle on us to your mommy?”

  At this, Lily stopped struggling. At this, Lily smiled. “It isn’t what I heard,” she said, just loud enough for Jack to pick up the words. “It’s what I read. One petal of belladonna. One petal of poppy.”

  “Shit.” Belle scowled, heat flooding her cheeks. “Where is it?” she demanded, tightening her grip on Lily’s wrists. The smaller girl, to her credit, had not stopped squirming against her.

  Now, against all odds, she managed to shrug. “Where is what?”

  “The recipe for our witches’ brew,” Belle said calmly, her dark eyes revealing nothing. “It was part of the game. The potion I used to kill Prince Raven.”

  “Raven doesn’t drink tea,” Lily taunted. “The recipe called for dropping two petals into a cup of tea, and she’s the only one who drinks tea in this household.”

  “She?” Jack asked innocently, because Belle’s recipe had not included that word. No “he” or “she,” no “stepmother” or “Evelyn.”

  “You know who I mean,” Lily said, blowing a white-blond strand out of her face. “The one who loves torturing my stepbrother.”

  Jack’s stomach dipped at the words, and she knelt beside the two girls. “Have you seen her hurt Raven? Do you have proof?”

  “There will never be proof,” Lily said, an edge in her voice. Her arms trembled where Belle had them pinned. “The wickedest monsters know better than to leave footprints.”

  “You think she’s a monster?” Jack’s gaze shifted to Belle as the moon slipped behind the clouds. “Maybe—”

  “She’s lying,” Belle snarled, leaning down to whisper in Lily’s ear. “I know you’ve been spying on Raven for weeks.”

  “I’ve been trying to help him! To find out what she’s been doing!”

  “Jack may fall for that, but she sees the best in everyone.” Belle pulled back, still holding Lily’s wrists. “I see the truth. The second I let you go, you’re going to run right to your mother.”

  “I’m not!” Lily squealed, kicking out her legs like a rabbit. “I can prove it. Next month is the Apple Blossom Festival, and half the girls in town will be wearing flower garlands. If you wove a couple of belladonna blossoms into yours, no one would think anything of it.”

  Belle narrowed her eyes but said nothing.

  “And you,” Lily added, turning to Jack, “could add poppies to your garland. I could add lilies. They’re poisonous too, you know. If we leave blossoms all over her kitchen table, where she drinks her tea, everyone will think it’s an accident if a few petals fall—”

  “You hardly even know Raven,” Jack broke in, the blood rushing through her ears. This plan was getting too specific. Too possible. “Why would you choose him over your own mother?”

  Lily chuckled, and Jack felt fingers tickling her spine. “I’m not doing this for Raven. I’m doing it for myself.”

  Jack swallowed, searching for bruises on Lily’s hands and feet. Cuts. Scars. “Is your mother hurting you, too?” she asked, as Belle leaned back on her haunches, letting go of Lily’s wrists.

  Lily slid out from under her, clambering to her feet. “You could search me with a magnifying glass and you wouldn’t be able to find my wounds,” she said, striding toward the house.

  “Wait!” Jack hurried after her. Belle followed more slowly, a wolf studying a rabbit she was saving for later. “What did you do with—”

  “The recipe?” Lily asked cheerfully, and it was funny, how innocent that word sounded. Like they could talk about it in front of Raven, and he’d never know what they were planning. They could talk about it in front of his stepmother, the woman they were plotting to poison.

  To kill.

  “Oh, I tucked it somewhere safe,” Lily said, waving a hand. “It’s my protection, in case you decide to blame me for the entire thing. It has to look like an accident, and we have to be equally guilty.”

  “We don’t need your help,” Belle said, joining them in the yard. The orchard sat at their backs; the great stone manor sprawled out before them. And on the wraparound porch, Raven held a tray of four drinks in his hands, one for each of them.

  Including his stepsister.

  “We do need her help,” Jack murmured, linking her arm through Belle’s. From a distance, they must’ve looked like a couple of school kids, gossiping and sharing secrets. And they were. “People in town know that we’re Raven’s best friends, and they might’ve heard us talking about his stepmom. They might suspect us if poppy and belladonna are the only flowers in her tea. But lilies? Named after her flesh and blood?”

  The girls turned to Lily then, stopping her before she reached the steps to the porch. “Why are you helping us?” Jack whispered, her back to the house, and to Raven. “You could’ve let us take care of the problem. You could’ve kept your hands clean.”

  Lily swallowed, staring at the dirt on her fingers. “If you’d grown up with my mother, you’d want to do more than get your hands dirty,” she said, as the moon broke free from the clouds, painting her a specter against the darkness. White hair. White skin. White teeth. “You’d want to bury her alive.”

  4

  Callous Lily

  In the light Lily had withered, but in the darkness she bloomed. Hidden away in this gated place, she’d eaten to her heart’s content, never worrying about who was looking over her shoulder. No fingernails dug into her arm. No voice whispered in her ear to play the game a little longer, do as she was told, be a good girl.

  Lily was not a good girl.

  Being good led to obedience, and obedience led to being hurt. For the past three years, Lily had lived free of rules and free of pain. Well, there were some rules in the Rose Hollow Wellness Facility, but they were centered around not hurting people, and Lily was fine with that. She didn’t want to hurt anyone, didn’t want to lie or deceive.

  But sometimes she didn’t have a choice. Like this evening, for example. Lily was sitting on the lip of a fountain, waiting for Jack to arrive at the facility. Jack had been calling her all day, but places like this restricted cell phone usage, so Lily had pretended to be unavailable for most of that time. Her phone had lit up at one o’clock. Three o’clock. Five. Finally, at seven thirty, Lily had answered.

  Then she’d gone to wait in the courtyard.

  Now she trailed her fingers through the water of the fountain’s pool, twirling the water lilies that floated on the surface. This courtyard had been her solace over the past few years. She’d come out here as often as possible, tending to the flowers or letting the coolness of the water soothe her skin.

  It was unfortunate that she’d had to leave it behind.

  There was a tinkling sound to her left, as someone pushed through the back door of the facility. Lily turned in time to see Jack approaching. Her old friend was hesitant, worry lining her face.

  Or was it fear?

  Lily pushed to her feet, racing toward her. Before Jack could even react, Lily had ambushed her with a crushing embrace. Jack’s auburn curls were wild and they tickled Lily’s face. Those curls took on a tinge of gold in the summer, and a tinge of red in the aut
umn. The sight of them was so familiar, tears welled in Lily’s eyes.

  That was good. She’d be expected to cry. Her mother had, after all, just been murdered. “I’m so glad you called,” she said, pulling out of Jack’s embrace. “I’m sorry it took so long for me to answer, but I only have my phone for a couple of minutes each day. Everything’s supervised here.”

  “It’s okay.” Jack’s voice was softer than Lily had ever heard it. She was scared. But Lily was good at soothing people’s fears, and she took Jack’s face in her hands, smiling through the tears.

  “You look good. The same, but…”

  “Different?” Jack suggested, no longer swimming in the long green coat Raven had given her in middle school. Lily caught a hint of a T-shirt and jeans underneath, loose fitting and comfortable. For years Jack had been stuffed into her mother’s flashy hand-me-downs, and she’d always squirmed and tugged at them, never seeming to relax.

  This was better.

  “Thanks,” Jack said, following Lily to the fountain. They sat on the edge as the sun sank below the horizon. “And you look like…”

  “I’ve been eating? Sleeping?” Lily smiled, glancing down at her no-longer-bone-thin frame. She’d come into this place hating her body, but now, three years later, she was comfortable in her own skin.

  Still, she sniffled, because she was supposed to be devastated. She was supposed to feel anguish and grief, and if anyone found out how quiet it was inside her, she might be locked in a scarier place. A place that hurt her instead of helping her heal.

  “Things have been good here,” she admitted, gaze flicking to the great wooden structure at their backs. One side of the roof sloped lower than the other. The windows were all different sizes. The building was nothing short of ugly, and the second Lily had entered its wood-paneled walls, she’d felt perfectly hidden from the outside world. Tucked away. “At least, things were good here, before I got the call about my mother and learned Belle had been arrested.”

  “And why do you think she was arrested?” Jack asked, a shadow crossing her face. “Did it have anything to do with the recipe the detective found on Raven’s kitchen table?”

  “I have no idea how it got there!” Lily’s cheeks flushed with heat, and she fought to keep her voice steady. “I hid it in the orchard years ago. Then Raven went to boarding school, and I never went back for it.”

  “Well, that’s convenient.” Jack shook her head, her jaw tight. “How lucky for you that your name wasn’t on it. Just poppy and belladonna, which means the police could come for me next.”

  “It wouldn’t be the worst idea to go through your things,” Lily admitted, catching Jack’s gaze. “Clear out your computer, in case you and Belle emailed about our plan. They could use that stuff against you, even now.”

  “And you want me to look innocent?”

  “Aren’t you? I know Belle is.”

  “How can you be sure?” Jack pressed, her green eyes narrowed. There was a brightness to them. There had always been a brightness to Jack, as if she’d swallowed the sun and was glowing from the inside.

  For years Lily had wanted to be close with her. She’d wanted to be Raven’s sister. Only one person had stood in her way, and now that person was out of the picture. “I know what you’re thinking,” Lily said. “Belle came up with the plan to murder my mother. But we were scared little middle schoolers then, and we were convinced Raven was going to die. We somehow convinced ourselves we were characters in a fairy tale, taking down a monster.”

  “A wicked stepmother,” Jack murmured.

  “Yes! But we wouldn’t have gone through with it. I know we wouldn’t have, and besides, why wait three years to commit the murder? If someone had done it sooner, Raven could’ve come home, and I could’ve…” Lily trailed off. She didn’t want to remind Jack that Raven wasn’t the only victim of Evelyn’s wickedness. Lily had been her earliest victim. The first and last person to be hurt by her. “Someone else must’ve killed her. Someone with a reason to hate her now.”

  “Someone like you?” Jack asked, cocking her head to the side. Clearly, she hadn’t forgotten any of it. Lily’s veiled hints. Her desperation. “You hated your mother more than anyone, and you kept the Recipe for the Perfect Murder after all this time. If Belle’s not the killer—”

  “I didn’t hate my mother,” Lily corrected. “I was scared of her, but I always thought, once I got out of here…” She broke off, frowning. For a moment, she thought she’d felt something stir in her chest, something like sorrow. Something like loss. “Now that she’s gone, I’ll never get to make peace with her. I’ll never know if it was possible.”

  Jack took her hands. She was warm, and Lily reveled in the feeling of it. She’d been touched so rarely in this place, and only when a certain someone had come to visit. But romantic entanglements were forbidden at the Rose Hollow Wellness Facility, so even then they’d had to steal their kisses. Clasp hands under tables and squeeze for the briefest of seconds. It had been enough, until it hadn’t anymore. Now Lily was desperate to get out of here and truly be with the person she loved.

  But first she needed to tie up some loose ends.

  “The police took my mother’s phone,” she said, as the last of the light disappeared and someone inside the facility waved at her. She wasn’t allowed out here after dark, even now. “They took her laptop, too. But my stepdad told me they haven’t gone down to her office yet, and if we sneak in there tonight, we can search her computer for suspicious emails. Maybe someone sent her a threat—”

  “We?” Jack asked, her brow furrowing. “Are they letting you out?”

  “My stepdad’s on his way to get me. He and Raven had to stop by the mall first, because apparently my mother got rid of Raven’s clothes after he left town. She threw them in the trash or something. Can you believe that?”

  “She… what?” Jack wrapped her jacket around herself, pushing out a laugh. “She really wanted to erase him from that house, didn’t she?”

  “She succeeded,” Lily said, eyeing the blush in Jack’s cheeks. In the weeks before Raven went to boarding school, Jack had started blushing at the sight of him. Or the mention. “But Raven’s back now, and as soon as his wardrobe issues are taken care of, he and his dad are coming to get me so I can help plan this Saturday’s funeral. That gives me six days of freedom.”

  “Do you have to come back here after? If your mom locked you in this place, maybe—”

  “It’s up to the doctors.” Lily pushed to her feet, straightening her loose-fitting sweater. Even now there was a part of her that wanted to stay hidden. Unremarkable. The opposite of pretty. “I just went through a review last week, and they seemed really happy with my progress, so… keep your fingers crossed.”

  Jack nodded, glancing at the back window of the facility. “Maybe I should break into your mother’s office alone. If you get caught, you’ll end up back in this place, no matter how well you’ve been doing. Or you’ll end up at that detention center with Belle.”

  Lily’s breath fluttered at the thought. Her stomach tightened. “Who says we’re breaking in?” she whispered, pulling Jack to her feet. “I know where my mother keeps her key.”

  After that, the two walked into the facility together, where Jack signed out. A boy named Cade was working the front desk. Lily knew him well. He smiled politely as Jack scribbled her check-out time in the visitors’ book, and watched in silence as Lily led her to the door. It wasn’t until Lily returned to him, resting her elbows on the counter, that he spoke.

  “How’d it go?” he asked with a conspiratorial smile. Cade smiled easily. Laughed easily too. Lily had always liked him, and she was going to miss sharing these moments together. He’d been like a brother to her, a stand-in for the family she’d wanted for years.

  “It went perfectly.” She leaned in, clasping his hands. “Thanks for not telling her I checked out last night.”

  “She would’ve had all kinds of questions,” Cade said, his violet hair swe
eping into his eyes. “And I know exactly where you were last night. But you can’t come back here again, pretending you’re still a patient.”

  “I can’t visit you?” Lily teased, poking him in the cheek. Siblings did that, didn’t they? They tickled each other without feeling danger. They slept side by side without fear.

  “You’ve earned your freedom,” Cade said after a minute, pinching her arm. “Don’t waste it on me.”

  Lily nodded, then walked to the doors. She didn’t wait for her stepfather to come pick her up. As the doors whooshed open, bringing with them the scent of flowers, she turned back to the boy at the front desk. “I’m not going to waste a second.”

  5

  Jack Be Nimble, Jack Be Quick

  Jack entered her bedroom through the window. It was less likely to creak than the doors, and her brothers would come running if they heard someone entering the house after dark. Their ears were finely tuned to the near-silent comings and goings of their mother. Bobbi McClain had a tendency to sneak out at odd hours to meet some boyfriend or another, returning days or even weeks later. Once, Jack had come home from a double shift at the local convenience store only to find her youngest brothers lined up in front of the door, their eyes brimming with hope. Then, when they’d realized their sister was creeping into the house at two a.m., they’d tried to mask their disappointment.

  After that, Jack had started entering through her window, determined to let them sleep through the night. This night, however, she had an ulterior motive. She hurried to her closet, flinging open the doors. The smell hit her, soft as a feather trailing across her skin, and her stomach clenched at the thought of destroying the only connection to him she had left. Then, after plucking two pillowcases from the floor, she began yanking clothes from their hangers, stuffing them inside.

  It took about ten minutes. Ten minutes to eliminate all traces of him from her closet. Ten minutes to empty her dresser drawers. Even the floor had been strewn with Raven’s pajamas, and her room looked oddly clean without them. Emptied. Stripping the clothes from her back, Jack stuffed his T-shirt and jeans into the second pillowcase before knotting it closed.