Ashes to Ashes (Burn for Burn 3)

Shrieking, Danner peels off her fur coat, lays it down on the fire, and stamps the flames out. Then she picks her smoking coat up off the floor, and I finally let her open the door. She runs like mad down the walkway.

They might want this house, but they’re not going to get it. Not while I’m still here.

*  *  *

Suddenly I’m standing in front of a beautiful old building. There’s a bronze plaque next to the door.

JAR ISLAND PRESERVATION SOCIETY

I wonder if I’ve appeared here because I’m supposed to get back at these ladies. At Danner. I am here for a reason. I just need to find out what the reason is.

The office is closed up; there aren’t any lights on inside. I guess the whole staff was over scoping out my house. I pass through the locked door and look around inside. Every detail is beautifully restored. The place must have been an old bank or some kind of store. The ceilings are high, and the place glows with the pink setting sun.

I feel myself pulled down the hallway, and I go with the current. Hanging along the walls are black-and-white photographs of Jar Island from long ago. It’s like a museum. I stop at one photo, of a group of elected officials seated at a table covered in documents. Five men and one woman. She has to be my great-aunt, the first female alderman of Middlebury. She fought for the rights of the migrant workers on the island, to see that they were paid fairly and treated well by their employers. My family did such great things. I could have done great things too, if I hadn’t . . .

No. Wait. I am doing great things.

I am avenging the lost, the downtrodden. I am punishing those who deserve it.

I pass by an open office door and see a picture of my house up on an easel. On the desk there are contractor plans, beautiful plans, no doubt, but it’s not their right. The Preservation Society must have preyed on my mother, knowing she was so vulnerable.

They stole my house.

I snoop around on the desk. There’s a seating chart from last year’s fund-raiser. There’s an X over the date, and someone’s changed it to this year’s date. I scan the table assignments. I see Alex, his parents. Lillia and her parents at the same table with the Linds. I remember Lillia once telling me how much fun she and Alex had together at the fund-raiser. But someone has put a Post-it next to Lillia’s seat. It says available.

Well, that shouldn’t be. If Reeve is so intimidated by Alex Lind, if he’s so worried that Alex is going to steal Lillia away from him, then Lillia should definitely be at the benefit with Alex. I use my hand to lift that Post-it note off, and then I peel off the very top ticket in the pile.

Okay. Time to go make mischief.

But when I try to go, I can’t. I’m still in the office.

There must be something else I need to find.

It takes some searching, but I finally spot a creamy white envelope in the outbox. I can see through it to the letter inside, like the envelope is glass.

To Whom It May Concern:

I am writing to highly recommend acceptance of Katherine DeBrassio to Oberlin College. I have worked with Katherine for the last several months on a preservation project here on the island and am so impressed with the character . . .

It goes on and on, full of praise, glowing praise, detailing what a hard and motivated worker Katherine DeBrassio is. How she’d be an asset to any college.

Ah. Yes. I get it.

It makes me extra mad, knowing that she’s helped the place that basically stole our family house.

I pick the letter up between two fingers, blink, and the thing goes up in flames.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

LILLIA

EVENTUALLY EVERYONE COMES BACK TO one lunch table but Alex. I don’t know where he eats. I tried to ask PJ about it once, but he just gave me a vague nonanswer, and I gave up. Ash isn’t exactly warm to me, but she isn’t outright ignoring me anymore either. I’ll take what I can get. Alex is the one I can’t stop thinking about. He’s the one I have to make things right with. And Kat’s right. Letting more and more time go by is only going to make a hard conversation even harder.

Friday night I don’t get home until dinnertime because my riding lesson at the barn goes long. I run straight upstairs and hop into the shower because Reeve’s going to be here soon to pick me up for a party—some junior girl PJ is talking to is throwing it, and Reeve thinks we should go and be social. I think it’s because he knows Alex won’t be there; he’ll be at the Preservation Society gala with his parents. Alex’s parents buy a table every year, and my parents always go. That’s where they are tonight.

Last year Alex and I went. We sat with our parents, and we rolled our eyes and laughed at them on the dance floor. We snuck a glass of champagne behind the staircase, and we took turns gulping it down. I kept thinking he would ask me to dance, but he never did.

When I get out of the shower, I sit down at my vanity to comb my hair, and that’s when I see the gala ticket, tucked in between my perfume bottles. I pick it up, hold it in my hands. My mom must have left it for me this morning. When my mom first mentioned the gala, it was right after Valentine’s Day, when things between me and Alex were super weird. I told her I probably wasn’t going, but I’m glad she didn’t listen.

There’s no way Alex will be able to ignore me in front of our parents! He’ll have to talk to me. I leap into action, doing my makeup, putting my hair in a slicked-back bun. I don’t have time to curl it or do anything special. I’m zipping myself into the only long dress I own, a slinky black strapless dress my mom gave me because it was “too youthful” for her, when I remember I’m supposed to go to that party with Reeve.

Shoot.

Before I really think it through, I text him that I’m not feeling well and I’m going to skip out on the party and rest. Reeve immediately texts back a concerned Are you okay???, which makes me feel horrible. But there’s no going back now.

*  *  *

Dinner is being served when I arrive. I hurry over to the table, and Alex’s mother, Celeste, jumps up as soon as she sees me. “Lillia! You look stunning!”

We hug, and then I slide into the empty seat next to Alex. His jaw is hanging halfway to the floor, and then he remembers he’s mad at me and erases the surprise from his face and goes back to indifference. He looks very grown-up in his tuxedo.

My mom turns to me and says, “Lilli! How did you know there was an extra seat at the table?”

“Because you left me a ticket,” I remind her.

“I did?”