Page 55 of The Knight

"Thank you," I tell him. "For everything."

I mean it.

* * *

It takes me hours to get up the courage to open the files.

My room is empty, Holly galavanting across Paris, her social media feed full of photos of her with her family. I envy her the life that she has, not for the money and privilege—though that's part of it—but because of how easy and simple her family life seems to be.

She's not getting messages from her murdered brother, all the way from beyond the grave.

The word document is a letter. I read each word over and over, wishing it was longer, wiping tears out of my eyes periodically.

Brenna, if you're reading this, then the worst has happened. Well, two possible terrible things have happened: either I'm gone, in which case you better not eat all my chocolate oranges, or you've somehow become a hacker. That second thing seems unlikely, knowing you, but stranger things have happened.

I'm sorry you have to find out this way, but there are things you need to know. The first of which is: I haven't told you the whole truth. I wanted to, but I was afraid you'd look at me differently. I always told you that I'd take you out of Wayborne. What I didn't tell you is that I was willing to do anything to make sure it happened. Even break the law.

I fell in with a bad crowd. How it happens doesn't really matter, but I should admit: that summer camp I went to was a lie, and so were a good half of the times I told you and Mom and our shithead of a dad that I was going to a game out of town with Wally. The truth is that I was meeting with my new bosses. I was getting assignments. And making money. More than you can imagine. Almost enough to go to New York and send you to NYU. Almost.

I thought I could look the other way long enough to dig us all out together. That changed, though. I saw things. Things I couldn't just ignore. More than just drugs or fraud. People were hurt. Lives were taken. I realized that I had to do something, and I knew it was dangerous. So I started gathering evidence. And then one day, I realized that what I was doing had become so dangerous that the only way out might be the end of me. I've been planning on writing this letter for a long time. Today is the day I do it.

I'm sorry, Brenna. Sorry I wasn't a better brother. Sorry that I left you (because we both know you didn't hack this computer.) Most of all, I'm sorry that I didn't get to see you do all the things I know you're going to do: figure yourself out, graduate and go places, get married to someone who'll have no idea what they're in for. Brothers are supposed to be there for their sister.

If you want to, you can pick up where I left off and take down the people who I'm sure are behind my sudden "disappearance." But I understand if you want nothing to do with any of it. God knows I would go back and have nothing to do with it too if I could.

I love you. Goodbye.

Tearing up, I read the letter two more times, then click the video and press play. It's very short, maybe fifteen seconds at the most. In it Silas sits in front of his computer—this computer—and speaks directly into the camera.

"This is the last living will and testament of Silas Edwin Wilder. I leave all I have, what little there is of it, to my sister Brenna Caroline Wilder. That includes my bank account and all its content, ending in the numerals 1534. That is all."

Blinking, I stare at the video. All around me the campus of Coleridge is quiet, a late spring chill settled into the air, the trees spending all their effort on making new leaves. A cloud passes over the sun, and I can see the laptop screen more clearly without the glare of light overhead.

My brother had a bank account.

One with money in it.

Money that got him killed.

Feeling sick, I close the laptop, and vow that I won't touch a single cent unless necessary. I can't even imagine what I'd do with it, but I know that I would give all the money in the world up just to have one more second with him.

Without even knowing it, I got tangled in the same forces he faced off with, the ones that ultimately killed him. I just hope I don't wind up in the same place as him.

Iwilltake up his mission, and use the evidence he risked his life collecting.

Even though I wish he had told me what he was doing when he was still alive, so we could've faced the Syndicate together—or gone down together, like the mirror images of each other we were.

Chapter 23

The knock on the door rouses me from a late afternoon nap. I'm not expecting anyone, especially because spring break isn't quite over yet, so I call out, "Holly isn't here right now. Her flight doesn't land for another hour."

"It's me, and I'm here for you." Lukas's accent slips through the doorway, and I find myself getting out of bed quickly, squinting at my reflection in the bathroom mirror and trying to make the most of what I see. "I can come back later, if you're busy or... something. I just thought since it's the last day of spring break it'd be nice to do something fun. Even though we can't really leave campus. But maybe it was a silly idea."

"Just a second!" He sounds like he's considering turning around and leaving, so I add, "I'll go with you. I just need to get dressed."

A low chuckle from the other side of the door. "Having a lay in, are we? I'll wait. Just don't forget to take your jacket—it might be cold where we're going."

That gets my attention. The only places we can go are on campus, after all, and I've been to and from Carthage Library and the dining hall plenty of times. So much so, in fact, that I'm getting pretty sick of the old books that stretch floor to ceiling like something out of a fairytale.

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