“I never cared? I have your birth certificate in my purse. Do you know how much trouble I could get into—” Belle broke off when she realized her mistake.

“It’s in your purse?” Lily glanced at the empty doorway, then turned back to Belle, a smile slicing across her face. Belle opened her mouth to call for help. But Lily was alarmingly fast for someone who’d ambled through these hallways mere months earlier, and before Belle made a sound, Lily had lurched forward, slapping a hand over her mouth.

Belle bit her fingers, but Lily didn’t cry out. She didn’t make a sound. Instead, she pulled back her injured hand, glaring daggers at Belle, and then she lunged for the purse. Both girls fell backward on the bed. The two went tumbling, Lily on top of Belle, Belle on top of Lily. After much thrashing and flailing, Belle had her opponent pinned beneath her, just like she had in the orchard so many months ago.

She held Lily’s arms above her head, leaning down. “You cannot beat me,” she whispered, so the attendants outside the room couldn’t hear her. If anyone walked in on them now, Belle would be banned from the facility. “The best you can hope for is to strike a deal.”

“This isn’t a game,” Lily snarled. With a burst of unexpected strength, she wriggled her legs free, kicking Belle to the side. Belle went careening off the bed, her purse slipping out of her hands.

Lily clambered forward, plucking it from the floor. “You have a father who loves you,” she spat, her hair hanging over her eyes. She brushed it aside, revealing a long thin slash where Belle’s fingernails had scratched her. “You have no idea what it’s like to live with—”

“A monster?” Belle said from the floor, and her voice was hollow. All of her was hollow. Her broken, battered heart had fallen out of her chest that night in the rose garden, and the only thing keeping her alive was her hatred. Her fury. “You don’t know anything about me. You don’t know anything about my dad.”

“Edwin?” Lily reached into the purse, pulling out a folded birth certificate. She didn’t seem to notice the packet of poppy seeds Belle had bought earlier that day. “Everyone says he’s a saint. When the library burned down at Rose Hollow Elementary, he paid to have it rebuilt, and he donated the children’s wing at the hospital.” A pause, as she handed over the purse. Belle hugged it to her chest, fiercely protective of the seeds that were an important part of her plan. “Plus, he took you in after everyone said you were too old to be adopted.”

“Lovely,” Belle said, leaning against the bed frame. She felt defeated. Humiliated. She’d lost her leverage, and Lily had no reason to hand over the Recipe for the Perfect Murder.