Winterborne Home for Vengeance and Valor

by Ally Carter

  The only sound was the roar of the wind and the cold, cruel laughter of Evert Winterborne as he perched on the rooftop, surveying all he’d won.

  The last Winterborne standing.

  34

  Before the Dawn

  Hands. There were hands clawing at April, dragging her away from the balcony’s railing, propelling her down a short flight of stairs and out into the falling rain.

  “Gabriel . . . We have to go help Gabriel,” April said, but she felt numb.

  “Gabriel’s gone,” Tim told her, but that didn’t make any sense.

  “Yeah. That’s why we’ve got to go help him. We have to—”

  She saw Smithers running across the yard, shouting, “Children!”

  “We have to go get Gabriel,” April told him. “And Ms. Nelson. We have to help—”

  “We can’t help them,” Smithers said. “Not here. We have to . . .”

  Smithers trailed off, and April followed his gaze to where Evert still stood on the rooftop, watching. He actually waved, and April remembered how there was one thing he wanted even more than the key. And now he had it.

  Gabriel Winterborne was back.

  And Gabriel Winterborne was gone.

  So Smithers ushered them back to Winterborne House as Evert’s laughter echoed on the wind.

  * * *

  “What happened?” Sadie asked as soon as they stepped through the doors.

  She was sitting at the bottom of the stairs with Violet. “The lightning knocked out the SadieSonic. I think it must have hit a cell tower, because nothing has a signal, and . . .” She looked around, trailing off. “Where’s Ms. Nelson?”

  No one answered, but Sadie kept looking around, as if Ms. Nelson was going to walk through the doors and tell them all to go to bed. “Where is she? Smithers? Where . . .”

  She must have seen the truth in Smithers’s eyes, because when she said, “April?” her voice cracked. April knew that was her cue to hug Sadie and tell her everything was going to be okay. But things weren’t going to be okay. Sadie had already lost a mom and a grandma, and now yet another woman she loved wasn’t coming home.

  And it was all April’s fault.

  “Hello?” There was an old-fashioned phone on the entryway table. April had never paid it any attention before—she’d never even heard the landline ring—but Smithers was holding the receiver to his ear, and his voice got louder and louder with every word. “Hello! I’d like to report a . . . Can you hear me?” The last was part shout, part literal cry for help, but then there was the crack of lightning. Thunder boomed, and the rain fell against the house like a flood.

  Then his arm went limp and the receiver fell from his hand. “It’s dead.” Which was the worst possible word. Violet flew into Tim’s arms, but everyone just stood there, watching the phone swing back and forth.

  “I have to go get help,” Smithers said finally. “I have to tell the police what happened. Not that they’ll believe me. But we’ll need . . . divers.”

  His voice cracked, but he didn’t cry. No one cried.

  “I have to go get help,” Smithers said again. “I have to tell the authorities what happened. I have to make them believe . . . They’re never gonna believe.” Then he looked at the kids as if he’d forgotten for a moment that they even existed.

  “Go,” Tim told him.

  Smithers looked at him. “I shouldn’t leave you—”

  “We’ve been left plenty of times, Smithers,” Tim reminded him. “Besides, who are they gonna believe? The Winterborne family butler or the foster kids who robbed Evert’s house tonight?”

  April could tell by the look in Smithers’s eyes he knew Tim had a point.

  “I won’t be long,” Smithers said, reaching for the keys to the car. “I hope. Stay here. Lock the doors. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

  And then he was gone.

  “Gabriel will be back soon,” Violet said simply. “He’ll know what to do.”

  But Gabriel wasn’t coming back either. And that was April’s fault too.

  * * *

  They ended up in the kitchen even though no one was hungry. But there was something about the smells and the warmth, the comfort of that old wooden table and the clean, shiny pans. Like at any moment Ms. Nelson was going to come in and ask them why they weren’t in bed.

  “I heard a splash.” April reached for the cocoa Colin had made her, but cried, “Ow!” a moment later. She’d forgotten about the broken glass.

  “Let me look at that.” Tim turned April’s hands over to study her bloody palms.

  “I’ll get the first aid kit.” Sadie went to the cabinet where Smithers kept those types of things, but April just sat there, numb.

  She should go take a shower. Tim and Colin needed to put on something dry and warm. They all needed to . . .

  What did they need to do?

  She had no idea. She only knew one thing.

  “When she fell, there was a splash, right? You heard it, didn’t you?” She looked at Tim and Colin, but Colin couldn’t meet her gaze and Tim just shook his head.

  “It happened so fast,” Tim said.

  “Well, there was a splash. So she hit the water. And if she hit the water, then he probably hit the water, and . . .”

  But April didn’t finish.

  “At least we got this.” Colin dropped the key in the center of the table. For ten long years, it had been April’s prize possession, but now she couldn’t even reach for it. She didn’t want to touch it ever again.

  “Throw it in the ocean,” she said.

  “April!” Sadie gasped.

  “Gabriel didn’t want it,” April reminded them. “He said it was stupid. He said it wouldn’t help, and he was right. He was right, and I . . . I got him killed. And Ms. Nelson. It’s my fault. It’s—”

  “Hey,” Colin snapped. “We all knew that window was probably a trap. And we all decided to go. And, well . . . we had to try something, didn’t we?”

  But April couldn’t help thinking that Gabriel had been right. Everything would have been better if she’d never gone looking for him. Everything would have been better if she’d never come to Winterborne House at all.

  Tim started picking glass out of April’s palms with some tweezers, but she didn’t feel the pain.

  She heard the others talking, faint voices that floated through her mind.

  “Maybe a jewelry box . . .”

  “I think we should start in the secret passageways . . .”

  “We should ask Smithers when he—”

  “Treasure,” April blurted out.

  “What?” Sadie turned to April.

  “Evert asked where the treasure was. He thinks I know. He thinks that”—April pointed to the key—“opens it. He thinks there’s a treasure somewhere.”

  “Like it’s not enough he just inherited everything,” Sadie snapped in frustration.

  “Gabriel didn’t even care about it. All he wanted was for the world to know who Evert really is. Gabriel didn’t want that stupid key at all.”

  “Evert wants it,” Colin said.

  But April wasn’t so sure anymore. She huffed. “He told me I could keep it if I just told him where Gabriel was,” she snapped in frustration, but everyone was just . . . staring at her. And it made her snap again, “What?”

  “Okay,” Colin started slowly. “So he wanted Gabriel more than the key, right?”

  “Yes! That’s what I’ve been saying.”

  “But . . . what’s he gonna want now?” The house seemed bigger and darker than ever before as Colin said, “And what do you think he’s gonna do to get it back?”

  The truth settled down around them. Gabriel was gone. So was Ms. Nelson. And who knew how long Smithers would be away? They were on their own.

  “We don’t even know what it opens!” Sadie snapped in frustration.

  Violet was the one who said, “He doesn’t know that.”

  35

  The Spare

 
Everyone knew what happened to Evert Winterborne—that he was a cherished son. An adored little brother. That when his father died, he was perfectly content to live in the smaller house and take the smaller inheritance and play a smaller role in the business. And the town. And the world. And when tragedy struck, he was there, ready and willing to step into his older brother’s shoes and fill his role for as long as needed.

  After all, he had been born a prince and would do anything to help his nephew become king.

  Nobody knew the truth.

  Two hours after his sole remaining relative finally fell to his death, Evert strolled up to his ancestral home. For a moment, he stood in the lightly falling rain, staring up at the tall, imposing doors and the big iron ring with which guests had been knocking for centuries. But Evert wasn’t a guest—not anymore and never again.

  His nephew was dead. The woman was gone. And the only thing standing between Evert Winterborne and what was rightfully his was just on the other side of that door.

  So he reached for the handle. And turned.

  It wasn’t even locked.

  Poor Smithers must have been falling down on the job. He’d have to be let go, of course. And the orphans would have to be disposed of. One way or another. But they wouldn’t ruin this—his return to Winterborne House, so Evert threw open the doors and stepped inside.

  The house was always a bit dreary, and only one dim light burned overhead, but Evert had always felt at home in the darkness. The storm was almost over, and soon the sun would be up. In a few hours he would walk into court and proclaim to the world that Gabriel Winterborne was dead. He wouldn’t even be lying.

  There would be questions, Evert had no doubt. Smithers would try to make trouble. But Evert had a shattered window and a broken nose and the Winterborne name. All Smithers had was twenty years’ worth of rumors and a houseful of children.

  Evert was a Winterborne. No. Evert was the Winterborne. And it was past time for him to take what was his.

  But then he heard the laughter—haunting and faint. It might have been the wind, but it was more like a ghost. Or a memory saying, “Father! Father! Let me try!”

  Evert froze, because he knew that voice, and for a moment he wondered if this was all just a very bad dream. A nightmare saying, “Go away, Ev. You’ll get hurt.”

  “I can do it.”

  “No, you can’t. That’s my sword. That’s the heir’s sword.” His brother laughed. And the taunt that followed had an eerily familiar tune. “I’m the heir, and you’re the spare. I’m the heir, and you’re the—”

  Evert closed his eyes and shook his head as his father snapped, “Boys, enough!”

  Then the voices faded, and the halls echoed with laughter.

  “Gabriel!” a girl cried. “Gabriel! Catch me if you can!”

  He searched the foyer and the hallway. He threw open the doors and rushed into the library, but more laughter rang out.

  “Izzy! Come on!”

  The sound was coming from behind him. He was certain.

  Then he saw the light. It flickered in the foyer, bouncing off the front doors that he had, almost certainly, left open. He was just starting to wonder if there were ghosts when a voice said, “You made a mistake.”

  One more time, Evert spun, but this time it wasn’t a mirage. A girl stood on the stairs. She was younger and smaller than the one who had caused all the trouble. She had black hair instead of red and big brown eyes. She looked unafraid as she stood in the beam of flickering light that sliced through the dark air like a spotlight.

  “You shouldn’t have come here,” she warned while the laughter of the dead echoed all around her.

  “And why’s that?” he asked.

  He expected her to talk of vengeance and justice or maybe even ghosts because that cursed laughter was still ringing through the halls.

  But she just pointed overhead and said, “Because of that.”

  Evert craned back his head to look, just as something flew through the air toward him.

  He tried to duck, but he was too late. He tried to run, but he was too slow. A half dozen copper pots were already zooming straight for his head.

  He stumbled back just as a boy screamed, “Now!” and instantly, Evert was jerked off of his feet. Ropes wrapped around his ankles. A net fell over his head. A complex set of pulleys and wires sent him flying into the air.

  And then there was more laughter. Closer. Louder. And from children decidedly less dead.

  For now.

  36

  Winterborne Home Alone

  “It’s on, mates!” Colin said.

  Violet darted into Tim’s arms, and for a moment, they all froze at the top of the stairs as Evert fought and clawed and clamored against the net and the ropes and the wires. He didn’t seem to notice the label that said SadieMatic Eight. He didn’t even growl. And something about that was scarier. The last Winterborne April had caught had always growled, but he was gone, so April looked at the man who was swinging back and forth, glaring at her and yelling, “You!”

  Instinctively, April’s hand went to the key that was back around her neck, but it didn’t feel at home there anymore. It was no longer an idea for April. Not a symbol. Not a dream or a hope. No. It was a mission, and she couldn’t let herself forget it as Evert stared at it—the key drawing him to her like a magnet.

  “You’re going to tell me where you got that key. And then you’re going to take me to it.”

  “Take you to what?” April asked, defiant.

  “The treasure,” he said, and April wondered, not for the first time, if he really was crazy.

  “What treasure?” Sadie didn’t even try to hide her confusion. “You’re a bazillionaire now. Isn’t that good enough?”

  “No!” he snapped. His eyes were wild. “The Winterborne fortune is one thing—I was always going to get a share of that. But the Winterborne legacy is priceless. They thought I didn’t know about it, but I always heard them talking—whispering. About how it would belong to my brother. I know it’s here. I know they kept it from me. And now it’s going to be mine. Just as soon as you give me that key.”

  “Okay. I’d tell you to come and get it, but you appear to be a little . . . tied up.”

  April started to laugh. But then she saw the knife.

  She watched the SadieMatic Eight fall into pieces. She heard Evert fall—too hard—to the ground.

  She heard Tim yell, “Run!” And then she felt her friends scatter, going in all directions. But April didn’t dare stop or even slow down.

  Not when she saw him slip on the loose runner and fall on the stairs. Not when she heard him trip on the dental floss that they’d stretched across the hall. She didn’t ask questions or demand answers. She just ran as fast as she could, zooming down the hall and away from the chaos, through rooms and down corridors, crisscrossing her way through the giant mansion that had somehow started to feel like home.

  April was home.

  And for some reason, that made her run harder. Faster.

  “Ha!” Evil Uncle Evert was breathless when he appeared before her, bolting out of a passageway.

  “You didn’t think you could outrun me, did you? You didn’t think you could outsmart me? In Winterborne House?” He laughed. “I’ve been wandering these halls far longer than you’ve been alive.”

  The double doors to the balcony were standing open, and April bolted out into a rain that was now nothing more than a heavy mist. The sky was getting lighter in the east. Soon, Smithers would be back, April told herself. Soon, the police would be there. Soon, someone would care.

  “I am Evert Winterborne! This is my house! I earned it!”

  April took a step back. She was starting to shake. Her breath was coming hard, in a way that had nothing to do with her mad dash through the house.

  “Yeah. How did you earn it?” she challenged, sounding far braver than she felt.

  “You think it was easy to blow up my brother’s yacht and have the world think i
t was an accident?” He actually scoffed when he said it, easing closer and closer as April backed up inch by inch.

  “It didn’t work though, did it? Gabriel lived!”

  “He didn’t have the good sense to die when I needed him to, no. And then he had to run away like the sniveling brat he was.”

  “Gabriel Winterborne was a hero!” April shouted, remembering the figure in black who had swooped into a burning building and carried her out the other side.

  “He’s dead,” Evert said, like it was all that mattered. And maybe it was. “Ironic, isn’t it? No matter how many times I tried to kill him, he always lived. He just couldn’t survive my trying to kill you.”

  It hit April harder than she would have liked, the reminder that Gabriel had survived shipwrecks and stabbings and who knew how many other disasters, but knowing her had been enough to doom him.

  “You’re going to give me that key, April.”

  “No,” she snapped.

  “You’re not in a position to bargain,” he told her, so April grabbed the key and jerked, breaking the thin chain, then holding it out over the railing.

  “How about now?” she asked. “Am I in a position now?”

  But Evert just shook his head.

  “This didn’t end too well for you before, April. And he’s not here to die for you a second time.”

  “And now you’re the last of the Winterbornes.”

  “I am indeed.” He smiled like it was the best thing in the world, and something in that moment—in that gesture—made April want to cry. And then it just made her mad.

  “You had a family. You had a brother and sister-in-law and nieces and nephews and . . . You had a family!” she shouted again, heart breaking, voice cracking. “Why’d you do it? You didn’t have to kill them.”

  “Of course I had to kill them! And I’d do it all over again if I had to. They thought they could keep my family’s legacy from me? Well, now it’s mine! Or it will be as soon as I get that key.”

  “Did you get it?” she shouted to the wind.