Lies Like Poison

by Chelsea Pitcher

  “I sure did.”

  Lily gasped, leaping from her bed. She threw her arms around Belle. When she pulled back, Belle could see that her pale blond hair hung down to her ears. She was wearing a dab of lip gloss, strawberry or cherry, and her limbs didn’t look quite so thin in her sweater and jeans.

  “It took a bit of searching, but I tracked down your birth certificate. Looked up your dad online. And…” Here, Belle blushed, struggling to explain what she’d done next. Three months earlier, she’d wanted nothing more than to retrieve the Recipe for the Perfect Murder. But the closer she’d gotten to finding Lily’s father, the more dangerous the endeavor had felt. What if he was just like Lily’s mom? What if he was worse? “I might have called him and told him about you.”

  “What?” Lily’s mouth dropped open, the blood draining from her face. “How could you—why would you?”

  “I needed to find out what kind of person he was! If you called him up and he told you to get lost…” It would’ve broken your heart, Belle thought, brushing past Lily. She sat down on the edge of the bed. Her purse was clutched to her chest like a child, and she wondered if her parents had ever clung to her that way before giving her up. Had they thought of her once since abandoning her to the foster-care system? Her birth records were sealed, and it was unlikely she’d ever be able to track them down, but if she did… would her parents want to know her at all?

  “I asked your dad if he wanted to see you,” Belle explained, her throat tightening with every breath. “I figured if he said no, I’d lie and tell you I couldn’t find your birth certificate.”

  “But you did find my birth certificate. You’re sitting here telling me you did.”

  “Yes,” Belle agreed.

  “Which means…”

  When Lily broke off, Belle nodded, a smile curving over her face. “He wants to see you. He told me he did leave when you were little, but only because he was a hardcore drug addict and he didn’t want you around that life. After he got clean, he reconnected with your mom, but she was wary of letting him near you.”

  “Because she thought he might bail again?”

  “Yeah, or he’d relapse and put you in danger.” Belle’s chest flashed with heat at the words. The entire time she’d known Lily, the smaller girl had always seemed to be in danger because of something her mother was doing. Something insidious. Something subtle. The idea that Evelyn had protected Lily from her father seemed more than uncharacteristic. It seemed like an outright lie. “According to your dad, your mom demanded that he become one of her clients and agree to random drug testing. He said yes, and for a while it seemed like they were getting along. Maybe even falling back in love. But out of the blue, she started dating Stefan Holloway, and she cut off your dad completely. He was really broken up about it on the phone. He almost started crying.”

  “He did?” Lily’s voice cracked as she sat down next to Belle. “Why are you doing this for me?”

  Belle shrugged, her chest warming again. What was wrong with her? She didn’t get attached to people, except for Raven. And since that had ended so terribly, she knew better than to feel anything for this strange, broken girl. She’d held up her end of the bargain. She needed to get the location of the Recipe for the Perfect Murder and get the hell out of there.

  “I want to help you get away from your mom,” Belle said, touching Lily’s arm. “But I need you to help me get away from her too. If she finds that recipe stashed on her estate, she could have me arrested for plotting—”

  “Oh, wow.” Lily jerked away from Belle’s touch, pushing off the bed. “I was actually starting to think you cared about me, but you only care about that stupid recipe.”

  “What? No, I just want to move on.”

  “You’re lying! I should’ve known. You’re a liar.” Lily shook her head, chuckling grimly. “The last time you agreed to get me away from my mother, you cut me out of the plan, rescuing Raven behind my back. You didn’t care that you’d left me with her. You’ve never cared—”

  “I never cared? I have your birth certificate in my purse. Do you know how much trouble I could get into—” Belle broke off when she realized her mistake.

  “It’s in your purse?” Lily glanced at the empty doorway, then turned back to Belle, a smile slicing across her face. Belle opened her mouth to call for help. But Lily was alarmingly fast for someone who’d ambled through these hallways mere months earlier, and before Belle made a sound, Lily had lurched forward, slapping a hand over her mouth.

  Belle bit her fingers, but Lily didn’t cry out. She didn’t make a sound. Instead, she pulled back her injured hand, glaring daggers at Belle, and then she lunged for the purse. Both girls fell backward on the bed. The two went tumbling, Lily on top of Belle, Belle on top of Lily. After much thrashing and flailing, Belle had her opponent pinned beneath her, just like she had in the orchard so many months ago.

  She held Lily’s arms above her head, leaning down. “You cannot beat me,” she whispered, so the attendants outside the room couldn’t hear her. If anyone walked in on them now, Belle would be banned from the facility. “The best you can hope for is to strike a deal.”

  “This isn’t a game,” Lily snarled. With a burst of unexpected strength, she wriggled her legs free, kicking Belle to the side. Belle went careening off the bed, her purse slipping out of her hands.

  Lily clambered forward, plucking it from the floor. “You have a father who loves you,” she spat, her hair hanging over her eyes. She brushed it aside, revealing a long thin slash where Belle’s fingernails had scratched her. “You have no idea what it’s like to live with—”

  “A monster?” Belle said from the floor, and her voice was hollow. All of her was hollow. Her broken, battered heart had fallen out of her chest that night in the rose garden, and the only thing keeping her alive was her hatred. Her fury. “You don’t know anything about me. You don’t know anything about my dad.”

  “Edwin?” Lily reached into the purse, pulling out a folded birth certificate. She didn’t seem to notice the packet of poppy seeds Belle had bought earlier that day. “Everyone says he’s a saint. When the library burned down at Rose Hollow Elementary, he paid to have it rebuilt, and he donated the children’s wing at the hospital.” A pause, as she handed over the purse. Belle hugged it to her chest, fiercely protective of the seeds that were an important part of her plan. “Plus, he took you in after everyone said you were too old to be adopted.”

  “Lovely,” Belle said, leaning against the bed frame. She felt defeated. Humiliated. She’d lost her leverage, and Lily had no reason to hand over the Recipe for the Perfect Murder.

  She might as well go back to the hospital. Edwin thought she was volunteering until six, and if he found out her shift ended an hour earlier than she’d claimed, things could get really ugly at home. She wished she could stay in this place, even as she knew it was a ridiculous thought. No one chose to sleep on a hard bed in a wellness facility when they could be curled up on a four-poster in an elegant Tudor.

  No one except Belle.

  “What else do people say about Edwin?” she asked, as Lily crouched in front of her. She must’ve sensed that Belle was trying not to cry. And it was funny, because moments earlier, they’d been at each other’s throats, but now Lily’s voice was soft. Tentative. “You lived in six foster homes before Edwin came along and adopted you. He built you a library. Planted you a garden. Everyone says he’s the nicest man in the world.”

  “He is,” Belle said, her gaze drifting to the window. It was after five thirty, and the last of the light was trickling from the sky, cerulean hues darkening to indigo. “Until the sun goes down.”

  11

  Beauty and the Beast

  Belle was eleven years old when she met the man with kind eyes and an easy smile. His hands were wrinkled. His clothes, impeccably pressed. He wore the brown tweed jacket of an English professor, complete with patches on the elbows.

  Belle liked him instantly.

 
It should be noted that, at eleven years old, Belladonna was not prone to liking anyone. She’d been in six foster homes so far, and though no one had thrown her down the stairs or forced her to sleep in the yard like a dog, she had suffered some… unusual situations. There had been the woman who, upon returning from work each night, demanded a two-hour foot rub before Belle could climb into bed. One of her so-called “fathers” had snuck Tabasco into her food whenever she disobeyed him. Her most pleasant experience had been with a kindhearted couple whose only flaw was wanting to help too many children, and she’d been stuffed into a two-bedroom apartment with three brothers and two sisters.

  Edwin was different. He didn’t simply want to foster her for a couple of months and then send her on her way. He wanted to adopt her. Adoption meant forever. Adoption meant a stable home and a loving family, and the first time Belle set foot in his grand Tudor cottage, she felt tears running down her cheeks. This fairy-tale cottage was going to be her house. This four-poster bed was hers for the bouncing. There was a bay window in the kitchen that looked out into the backyard, where willow trees trailed long, elegant branches across green grass.

  Her first night in the house, Edwin gave her a tour of the Tudor, starting at the burgundy front door and ending on the second floor. Her bedroom was on the left side of the hall and his was on the right. There was an attic above them, but it was locked with actual chains. She wasn’t allowed inside.

  Belle didn’t mind. Who cared about a stuffy old attic when you had a canopy bed and three gigantic windows? She could look out over the street, the backyard, and the side of the house, where a little flower garden had been planted. After the grand tour, and an elaborate dinner of roast duck and potatoes, Belle wanted nothing more than to curl up in one of those windowsills and look out at her kingdom. But the darker the house grew, the more agitated Edwin became. Long shadows draped across the dining room, making him jumpy. When a crow flew in through the window, Edwin knocked over his wineglass, spilling it on the white tablecloth.

  Belle frowned, hurrying to mop it up. “I know how to clean,” she said proudly.

  A soft, low chuckle. “I’m sure you do. I’m sure they taught you how to cook, and do laundry, and all sorts of things you’re too young to worry about.” Edwin smiled, pushing back from the table. “But you don’t have to take care of me, Belle. I’m the grown-up, and I’m going to take care of you.”

  He took her hand, leading her toward the stairs. They hadn’t even cleared the table yet! Belle thought that was odd. At eleven years old, she knew there was a certain order to things, and clearing the table happened immediately after dinner. Then, scrubbing the pots and pans. Wiping the countertops. By the time she got to bed most nights, it was after ten, but that night the sun had just slipped below the horizon when Edwin brought her up to her room.

  “The world is filled with monsters,” he said, retrieving a toolbox from under her bed. Belle perched on the purple comforter. “Some will force you to look after them, even though you’re just a little girl. Some will sneak into your bedroom at night and snatch you out from under me. That’s why we have to take precautions.”

  Belle flinched as Edwin pulled a hammer from the toolbox. “What are you going to do?” she asked, heart tolling like a bell in a tower. She pulled the comforter up around her like a shield.

  “What I have to do.” Edwin strolled to the eastern window. The one that looked out into the yard. “I couldn’t do it before, because your social worker would’ve been angry. She wouldn’t have let me take you.” He pulled out a single nail, pressing it into the wood of the window frame. Belle jumped at the first swing of the hammer.

  “I could help,” she said in a light, cheerful voice, as if they were playing a game and she wanted to be included. But deep down, she felt the pressing need to protect herself. “If you have another hammer—”

  “No, no, no,” Edwin said, checking the window to see if it would open. It didn’t. In the briefest span of time, he’d nailed the window to the sill. Now Belle couldn’t slide it open and curl up inside it, letting the breeze tickle her dark hair. She couldn’t fall asleep there, her eyelids growing heavy after watching the stars appear in the sky.

  “You’d hurt yourself.” Edwin hurried to the second window. “If you hurt yourself, I’ve failed.”

  “Failed… what?” Belle asked. There was something she was missing, something important, and her mind trickled to the chains wrapped around the attic handle, locking her out. What was up there? She hadn’t cared before, but she cared in the moment the second window was nailed to the sill.

  Only one window remained.

  “You could leave one,” Belle said when Edwin didn’t answer her question. “I’m on the second floor. Nobody could climb up here.”

  “They can find you anywhere.” Edwin returned to the bed. He crouched down, taking her hands in his. “They have ladders and they have vans. They could pull up beside you when you’re walking home from school, and you wouldn’t be able to fight them off. They’d be too strong and you’d be too small. Especially someone like you. The second I saw you, I knew I had to take you home. You’re too beautiful.”

  “I am?” Belle’s nose wrinkled, the word sounding funny in his mouth. It didn’t sound like a compliment at all. It sounded like an insult, like something a witch would curse you with, making your days fraught with danger and peril. If that’s what beauty was, Belle didn’t want it.

  “We could chop off my hair,” she offered, holding out a strand. She could see her reflection in the mirror on the other side of the room, could see her big dark eyes and olive skin. “Dress me in rags, like a princess before she meets the prince.”

  Edwin smiled then, a bright, genuine grin that made his eyes crinkle. Belle wanted to like him. She wanted to trust him, and as he moved to the final window, she wondered if maybe he was telling the truth. Maybe the world was filled with monsters and he was doing everything he could to keep her out of their clutches.

  As a nail slid into the third window, her heartbeat calmed.

  “We’re not going to cut your hair.” Edwin tossed the words behind him, working steadily. Working with care. “And I’m going to take you shopping for the most beautiful dresses you’ve ever seen, all right? I’m not going to punish you for your beauty. I’m not like them.”

  He’s not like them, she told herself, and her grip on the blankets loosened. She pushed off the bed, scurrying toward him. He was hunched over the window, tugging on it to see if it stayed closed. He heaved and panted, but nothing shifted.

  “You’ll be safe here,” he told her, his muscles relaxing now that the job was finished. “I’ll take you to school every day and pick you up at three on the dot. Sometimes I have engagements in the evening, but we’ll keep you locked up tight in the house. No one will be able to get to you, because you’ll never be alone out there.”

  He gestured to the window, and the world beyond. In houses all over Rose Hollow, little girls were sleeping sweetly in their beds, unsuspecting. Pretty girls. Helpless girls. Was anyone going to help them? Some man could slide open their windows in the middle of the night, and then what would they do? They would scream and they would fight, and it would be of no use. The men would be stronger than them.

  But Belle didn’t have to worry about that. She had a father now, and he was going to protect her. No matter what. All summer Belle slept in a room with nails in the windows and a door that Edwin locked from the outside with a skeleton key. She had her own private bathroom, so she didn’t have to worry about being let out during the night. She slept soundly in her four-poster bed, knowing she was protected from the evil of the world. Unharmed. Untouched.

  When middle school began, and she asked to go to the birthday party of a classmate, Edwin sat her down and explained that bad things happened at parties. Boys became… dangerous. They transformed like werewolves at the slightest flash of skin, and you couldn’t be too careful, so of course he couldn’t let her attend. Instead, he
set to work building a library, so she could read about parties more lavish than her classmates would ever throw. Masquerade balls and dresses the color of glittering jewels. Princes who behaved like gentlemen and monsters who could be defeated. By the time Belle turned twelve, she’d given up on the idea of going to parties in the real world, and she holed up in the library every weekend, reading about other people’s adventures.

  It was better that way, honestly. She was safe.

  But halfway through the sixth grade, Belle started to realize that staying indoors wasn’t solving the problem of a world filled with monsters. Yes, she was safe, but what about all the others? All the girls being snatched from their beds, or attacked at parties, or plucked off the street? One day, she snuck out of school at lunch and bought a packet of belladonna seeds for her garden. She wasn’t planning to poison anyone.

  She just wanted to know that she could, if she needed to protect someone.

  A couple of weeks later, she was crossing the football field when she glimpsed a group of boys huddled under the bleachers, shoving a person back and forth between them. That person had trembling legs. A face so pale, Belle thought all the blood must’ve drained out of it. In spite of her pounding heart, she stalked over to the group.

  “What game is this?” she asked wryly, because one had to be wry with monsters. They didn’t understand sincerity, and begging just made them stronger. So did crying. So did screams. “Can I play?”

  “Sure,” said a boy with golden hair, shoving the person into Belle’s arms. Her body sagged under the weight. But this was not some delicate girl she was holding. It was a delicate boy, with bright eyes and dark curls.

  “Now what?” Belle asked, neither shoving the boy away nor pulling him closer. “Am I supposed to do something with him?”

  A couple of boys snorted, elbowing each other suggestively, but the blond, who was clearly the leader, said, “Yeah. Pass him back.”

  “That’s… it?” Belle frowned, glancing at the boy in her arms. He didn’t look frightened anymore, or even angry. He was watching her curiously, as if he knew this was her game now, and the buffoons surrounding them hadn’t bothered to look up the rules. “Your game seems a bit dull. How about a different one? I’ve been growing belladonna in my garden. Tomorrow at lunch, I’ll slip a petal into one of your sandwiches, and you’ll get to guess whose face will turn purple. Won’t that be fun?”