Page 79 of Conflicted Lies

My aunty reaches into her purse and pulls out her phone. She swipes at the screen a few times as she walks over to me, her heels clicking on the floor, and then she turns her phone around and shows it to me. It’s a man with a green mohawk; he’s dead. I try my best not to give her any reaction because I know she’s watching my every move. My clever aunty is always assessing everything.

“It’s a dead man,” I say and meet her eyes.

“I always wondered about you. I assumed you’d end up more like your mother than your father. But it seems, for the first time in my life, I’m actually wrong. And you’re a combination of deadly as well as beautiful.”

“Hope,” Dad says nothing but my name, and everything feels like it’s going in slow motion.Fuck. They know.

They know.

They know.

They see me!The dark little voice in my head speaks with glee.

“You never wanted to share this with me?” he says.

Everything stops. My heart. The airflow in the room. My existence. Everything I’ve built on lies comes crashing around me, and a twisted sense of relief and freedom comes with it. My shackles feel like they’ve finally been removed.

Somehow, someway, they’ve discovered my dirtiest little secret. It could’ve been someone worse that caught me, I guess. I turn and walk to my closet, which houses a safe. I bend down and enter the code to unlock it. I grab out a knife, then I turn around and show it to them.

My father once owned this knife, and I stole it from his collection when I was thirteen but never used it until I was sixteen.

“Amazing, really,” my aunty says, clapping her hands excitedly.

“You should have told me,” Dad says in warning.

“I didn’t know I’d like it so much,” I confess. I’ve kept this secret for so long that when I finally chose to act on it, I wasn’t sure if I could ever share it with anyone close to me. Yes, my family are killers. But they usually kill because someone is threatening the family or their businesses. I kill for the absolute adrenaline rush it gives me. I like it. I like it about as much as I like art. Or when Braxton fucks me. The way he fucked me the other night is probably top-tier with how it feels when I take a life.

It might’ve started with a knife, but I’ve experimented since then, exploring all the ways a soul can leave the shell of a body.

“It’s perfect, really. No one would suspect you.” Anya takes the knife from me. “But this?” She waves the knife in front of me. “Holding on to things that could easily get you caught when you have a detective in your space is very fucking stupid. I want you to think better. I want you to never keep anything from any kill. Do you understand me?”

“Yes,” I say quietly, still in shock that they know my secret.

“How did you know it was me who killed the guy with the mohawk?” I ask, still trying to figure it out. Was I betrayed?

Anya clicks her tongue. “Well, having Ivy cover for you and tamper with the videos was an impressive feat; however, she still has much to learn if she’s to surpass her father. Will was able to recall the videos. You’re lucky it was at Lucy’s where Eli could get rid of the body.”

Ah. I hadn’t expected Ivy to see it. I’d kept it a secret for so long, and she was the first to stumble across my dirty secret. She was shocked but quick to offer a contingency plan, and her involvement definitely helped the aftermath to try and hide it from my family when I begged her not to tell anyone, so she one upped and decided to tamper with the remaining evidence. I didn’t think she’d accept this part of me so easily, and I was grateful because I couldn’t handle that kind of disgust from one of my best friends.

I don’t really know what I was thinking. Sometimes I go into a daze. My targets have always been men who have hurt women, but lately, my reasoning seems miscued. It’s felt like an avalanche, and my brain hurts from all the impulses to take more victims I’ve had to fight off.

“You’re the one who’s been leaving the bodies around the city for the past nine months, aren’t you?” Dad asks.

My mouth opens and then closes. At first, I was messy. I didn’t know how to hide a body. But then I realized I didn’t want to. I wanted them to be found. I wanted to be seen, as risky as that was. I wanted my art to be discovered. I nod, except for the two men. I don’t know who took them out, but I’m certainly not strong enough to physically overpower them, and it insults me that the media have placed them into my serial killer count.

My father sighs, looking at the ceiling. “I don’t know how I didn’t notice.”

“It isn’t your fault that I’m like this.”

“This?” My aunt quickly grabs both of my shoulders. “No, no. We don’t look at this like it is something ugly. You embrace this part of yourself, Hope Ivanov. Do you hear me? This thing inside you?” She places her hand on my heart, and my breath shudders, as if her every word is something I’ve been waiting to hear my entire life. “This thing inside you is powerful. Deadly.Beautiful.We do not forsake the parts of us that come naturally. Have you ever judged us for killing?”

“No,” I whisper. Because the truth is, I haven’t. “But Mom…”

I wanted to be perfect for her. She tried so hard to keep me away from all of this. She’d be disappointed in me, maybe even hate me, for becoming this sick, twisted little thing.

“Don’t worry about your mother,” Dad reassures me as he pulls me in for a hug. I’m surprised at the action but wrap my arms around him, not knowing how badly I needed this… acceptance. “Your mother learned to love me even with my misdeeds. She’ll just have to adapt.”

“Gah.” Anya throws her hands in the air. “There are no misdeeds in this. We take what we want when we want. That is what it is to have Ivanov blood. We just need to sharpen your fangs, little one. And no more leaving around trophies for others to see. If you’re proud of your kill, send a photo to me or something if it’s praise you need.”

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