Fifteen minutes later her father drove up and Stephanie got in the car, acting stronger than she felt. Her father was mad at her too, but it was an obvious kind of mad, and it was tempered by a relief he couldn’t hide. As they drove she glanced back and saw China’s car in the distance, heading in the opposite direction. Skulduggery had stuck around to make sure she was all right, like she guessed he would.

They got home and Stephanie went to her room and waited for her mother. She sat in her swivel chair, but kept it very still. The door opened, and Stephanie did her best to ignore the fact that the temperature in her bedroom seemed to drop drastically.

“I don’t know what’s wrong with you lately,” her mother said, “I really don’t. You’re gone all day, you don’t get back till late, and all the stories Beryl tells me…”

“Mum, Beryl doesn’t like me.”

Her mother shook her head. “Don’t.”

“It’s true! Ever since I inherited the Estate they’ve been out to cause trouble—”

“It’s the inheritance, isn’t it?”

Stephanie looked up. “What?”

“Your behaviour has been changing ever since you gotthe inheritance. What, do you think you can play by your own rules now?”

“Mum, no, that isn’t it…”

“I think it is. Before this, you barely went out. You barely had any friends. You’d be in your room or you’d be down at the beach, and you’d hardly talk to anyone. We were getting worried about you, actually.

“And now look at you. This Tanith girl, those other people you’re hanging around with, the ones that are keeping you out all day. Who are they? I don’t know who they are. But they’ve definitely had an effect on you.”

“No they haven’t.”

“No? You’re still the same old Steph?”

“Of course I am.”

“The same old Steph wouldn’t do the things you’re doing. You’ve even changed the way you dress, you’re wearing those black clothes all the time. We wanted to see you come out of your shell, we’ve been wanting to see that for a long time, but we didn’t expect that the person that came out of that shell would be… would be you.”

Stephanie didn’t answer. She didn’t like this. She didn’t like being under constant attack, without the means to fight back. But she couldn’t fight back, she couldn’t argue, because she didn’t know what she might say in her anger. She had to sit here and take it.

“You need to think about what you’ve done,” her mother said. “Think about the people you’ve hurt, and the people you are hurting, and then decide if you think it’s worth it.”