Vengeance
Authors: Kate Brian
VENGEANCE
An imprint of Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing Division 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, New York 10020
www.SimonandSchuster.com
This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2011 by Alloy Entertainment and Kieran Viola All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.
is a trademark of Simon & Schuster, Inc.
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Produced by Alloy Entertainment
151 West 26th Street, New York, NY 10001
Typography by Liz Dresner
The text of this book was set in Filosofia.
Manufactured in the United States of America
2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3 1
Library of Congress Control Number: 2011930749
ISBN 978-1-4169-8473-3
ISBN 978-1-4424-1289-7 (eBook)
To all the fans who have shown me and Reed such love and support over the past few years and sixteen books, this one’s for you
Chapter 1: Imagining The Positive
Chapter 7: Peaceful Perfection
Chapter 10: All About Noelle Day
Chapter 13: Cutting The Ribbon
Chapter 19: Not According to Plan
Chapter 27: Technology is Not Your Friend
Chapter 31: Life’s Little Surprises
Chapter 37: Past, Present, Future
VENGEANCE
The sky that early June day was the kind of blue that goes on forever and makes you believe anything is possible. As I stood at the edge of the new Billings House construction site—my boyfriend, Josh Hollis, holding my hand, and my sister and best friend, Noelle Lange, standing just to my right—I felt like that particular blue had been conjured just for me.
It was all happening. Billings was being rebuilt. A huge, yellow backhoe was clearing the plot, bringing up the dark, wet earth of spring with each drag of its shovel, releasing the sweet scent of new beginnings into the air. Construction workers in hard hats marked off the area, unloaded cement blocks and workbenches, and walked in and out of trailers, letting the doors slam purposefully behind them. It was the fresh start I had always hoped for, and I couldn’t stop smiling. I reached up and touched the gold locket hanging around my neck—the one that had once belonged to my ancestor, Eliza Williams—with
this warm, comforting sense that I was exactly where I was supposed to be, doing exactly what I was supposed to be doing.
“Reed, are you
sure
this is a good idea?” Josh asked, squeezing my hand.
My smile faltered. He squinted his green eyes against the sun as he turned to look at me. His light blue sweater had a few drops of yellow paint on the collar and his always unruly, dark blond hair was pushed up in the back by the breeze. Josh was, hands down, the hottest guy at Easton Academy—the most handsome, adorable, mature, attentive guy I’d ever met—even when he was raining on my parade.
“It just seems so . . . wrong,” Noelle added.
I gaped at her. Her dark hair was back in a low ponytail and she wore a black boatneck dress over black boots. Not very bright-and-bold, spring-fashion runway, but Noelle had never been one for color in her wardrobe. And, of course, she looked perfect anyway.
“Unbelievable.
This
is what you guys finally agree on?” I gestured toward the construction site. The two of them rolled their eyes at each other.
“It’s just . . . when Daddy left you all that money, I don’t think this is what he had in mind.”
Noelle looked down at the ground, nudging a pebble of old-Billings concrete with the pointed toe of her boot. This had been a habit of hers for the past couple of months, ever since her father—
our
father—had been murdered the night of my seventeenth birthday. She looked down whenever she spoke of him. Actually, she looked down a lot more often than she ever had before. I knew how much
she missed him. I missed him too, but in a different way. Noelle had spent every day of her nineteen years knowing him, loving him, calling him “Dad.”
I, however, had never really gotten to know him. I missed what I had never had the chance to have. Sometimes I wasn’t sure which was worse, until I saw the way Noelle’s face fell whenever he came up in conversation. At those moments I knew her loss was far greater than mine. At least the crazy bitch who’d done it, Alyssa Kane—the mother of our now-deceased Billings sister Cheyenne Martin—had been given a speedy trial and sentenced to life in prison after a mere ten-minute deliberation by the jury. Guess that’s what happens when you stab someone right in front of two dozen witnesses, including about ten cops.