The Life: Sacrifice (The Life 3)

Things are coming along well back home. I’d called the jailhouse pretending to be Jimmy to mess with Becky minutes before we left to come here. When she answered, I just hung up as soon as I heard her voice knowing that that would terrorize her even more. It may seem childish but psychological warfare is just as effective as the physical.

I’ve mapped out everything in my head to get the best result for Gianna. So far, I have someone working on building a case against Becky for her mother’s murder, something I haven’t told her as yet in case it doesn’t pan out. Greta’s words may not be enough to have her arrested, but if we handle it right, we just might luck out there.

There’s no statute of limitation on murder, but I don’t expect Becky to own up to what she’d done, so it’s her word against the housekeeper. So, I’m trying to find a way to get her to confess, which isn’t going to be easy unless she’s brain dead. That’s why I’ve been trying to push Victoria over the edge because I’m almost certain she knows some if not all of what her mother has done.

Young as she was back then, there’s no way that over the years, she hasn’t known what her mother is. I’m banking on the fact that she won’t want to go down with that ship. Felix had been dumb enough to adopt her, or so he thinks, so she’d use that in her favor, or at least I’m hoping that’s the way it goes.

It’s the reason why I’ve ostracized her from her friends and separated her from her mother, this way, she has time to think, to imagine what her life will be like if she loses everything. As far removed as she is now, being kicked out of school, then having to spy on the lavish party from a distance, I know she won’t want to be even farther away, which will happen if she gets kicked out with her mother, so she’d want to hang on to what little bit she has, which she can only do by staying in Felix’s good graces.

It’s diabolical, I know, using the daughter against her mother, but those two are one and the same as far as I’m concerned. I’ve overheard plenty since bugging the Fontane home, but nothing yet about the murder, only enough to make him see them in a different light when I finally expose them. If all I wanted was for him to be disappointed in them and himself, I would’ve outed them already, but that’s small potatoes compared to what I’m after—total and complete annihilation.

* * *

“Have the girls been posting about their vacation online?” I pulled Anna aside after breakfast the next day while the others got ready for a day on the yacht. It was our last day here, and I was ready to get back home and put my plans into action. There were only a few weeks left until Paris, and I wanted this thing with Fontane out of the way long before then.

Gianna seems to think that once she exposes the truth to her dad through Greta that that will be the end of it, but I know it’s going to hit her hard, and I am preparing for it.

She’ll be busy with all the debutant bullshit, which should help, but I know she’s going to break at some point no matter how brave she’s pretending to be now. At least once a day, when we’re alone, I bring up her mom and the way she feels about what had happened to her as a way to get her to face it and not bury her head in the sand like she’s been doing; this way, she too will be ready for the fallout.

She hates it, which is only normal, but the more she talks about her feelings, the easier it’s becoming for her to swallow the reality that her mother had been murdered. Now it was almost time to head back home, so there was no more putting it off.

“Of course, with minute detail just like you asked.”

“Cool, thanks. Don’t forget, no pictures of Gianna, just talk up how much fun she’s having.” She rolled her eyes and grinned.

“I know; you’ve told us a thousand times already.” Yes, I have, but they have no idea why I’m making them do it, or maybe they do. They’re my sisters, so I’m sure they must have some idea of what I’m up to.

I know it’s eating away at Victoria that she’s not here, and Gianna is. I’m using her irrational jealousy and envy against her to send her into a tailspin. By the time we get back home for the final confrontation, she’d be ready to sell her mother down the river, which is what I’m banking on.