My sister walked into my wedding wearing a white bridal dress

The blast of wind and rain tore through the shattered transom, scattering glittering diamonds of glass across the entryway. Owen threw his body over mine, driving me to the floor as a heavy iron grappling hook caught the interior door frame with a sickening crunch.

"Down! Both of you, into the library!" Owen roared.

Arthur grabbed Celeste under her arms, hauling her dead weight across the threshold of the double doors. I scrambled backward on my hands and knees, grabbing the brass key and the water-stained photograph from the runner before lunging into the shelter of the library. Owen slammed the heavy mahogany doors, sliding the brass bolt home just as the exterior doorknob rattled with violent, calculated fury.

Heavy boots pounded against the exterior wood. A muffled voice called out through the tempest, low and commanding.

"Celeste Vance! Open the door, and the Sterlings live until sunrise! Give us the ledger key, and this ends tonight!"

My blood turned to ice. *Celeste Vance.* Not Sterling. They had raised her under Victoria's own surname, grooming her within the very viper’s nest that had poisoned my family for a quarter of a century.

"They're not street thugs," Owen whispered, his breathing controlled despite the adrenaline pumping through his veins. He swept over to the gun cabinet concealed behind the row of antique encyclopedias, punching four digits into the keypad. The metal panel popped open to reveal a pair of semi-automatic pistols and spare magazines. "They’re private contractors. The same tier of mercenaries Victoria employed to orchestrate Mia’s arrival at our wedding."

"Owen, we're trapped," I said, crouching beside Celeste as Arthur applied antiseptic to her wound. "The cell signal is dead. The gates at the foot of the hill are locked from the inside, but if they brought heavy equipment, they'll breach the back terrace within minutes."

Celeste shifted against the leather armchair where Arthur had propped her up. A sharp, ragged cough rattled her ribs. When she looked up at me, the confusion was gone, replaced by a cold, calculating fire that looked eerily like Mia at her most dangerous.

"They won't breach the terrace," Celeste said, her voice a reedy rasp. "They're waiting for the fire."

"What fire?" Owen demanded, chambering a round into the slide with a crisp metallic snap.

"Victoria had an insurance policy," Celeste said, resting her head against the mahogany paneling. "She knew that if the state ever held her for longer than forty-eight hours, her silent partners on the Vance board would eliminate her to keep their offshore accounts hidden. Her death in that jail cell wasn't an execution—it was a signal fire. The hit squads were given twenty-four hours to scrub every living trace of Nicholas Sterling’s heirs. Mia in her high-security psych facility, Lila in this estate, and me wherever they hunted me down."

"Mia," I gasped, the room tilting around me. "They're going after Mia?"

"She’s in protective custody under Judge Vance's jurisdiction," Arthur pointed out grimly. "Which means she is sitting in the mouth of the wolf."

"No," Celeste murmured, a faint, bitter smile touching her bloody lips. "Mia isn't there anymore. She broke out of Saint Jude's psychiatric wing three hours ago. Who do you think stabbed me, Lila?"

The air was sucked entirely from my lungs. I stared at Celeste, unable to process the words spilling from her lips. "Mia did this to you?"

"Mia found out about me three days before the wedding," Celeste whispered, closing her eyes against the wave of pain. "Victoria kept us apart for twenty-six years, feeding us different lies. Mia believed I was the favorite child, living in luxury while she rotted in boarding schools. And I believed Mia was the monster who destroyed our parents' marriage. When Mia escaped tonight, she didn't come to you for forgiveness. She came to the safehouse to kill me before I could bring you the truth."

Outside, the smell of acrid smoke drifted through the shattered transom of the foyer. A flick of orange light reflected against the rain-streaked library windows.

They weren't coming through the doors. They had doused the porch in accelerant.