Free The Conspiracy of Us by Maggie Hall Page B

Elisa downstairs to wrap the silver one. I watched it go. I couldn’t believe that, just like that, it was going to be mine.
    I stood in front of the mirror for a few more minutes, watching the gold sequins twinkle. This was the only time I’d ever get to do anything like this. I wanted to make it last as long as I could.
    I was about to step out of the gold dress when I heard footsteps coming up the stairs. “Elisa?” I said. “Aimee?” There was no answer.
    In case it was one of the men come to escort me downstairs, I zipped the dress up.
    The girls were nowhere in sight, but the man who had let us in stood at the top of the staircase.
    â€œSorry, I’m not ready yet,” I said. I smiled at him, and he reached into his jacket pocket.
    He pulled out something that, for a moment, didn’t register. It was too discordant with the marble floors, the dresses, the Bach chiming from the speakers. He stepped toward me, and the overhead light glinted off the object.
    Then I knew, but I still didn’t understand.
    It was a knife.

CHAPTER 12
    I stood frozen, half in and half out of the dressing room. The man moved slow and steady toward me, the dagger—shorter than Stellan’s, but thicker and more menacing—gleaming in his hand. My reflection glittered in his wire-rimmed glasses.
    I stumbled back into the dressing room and slammed the door. I snapped the lock shut with shaking fingers, and my heartbeat thundered in my ears.
    The store was almost empty, plus it was late afternoon—the perfect time for a robbery. I just hoped he wouldn’t come after the gowns that were in here with me. There were only a few, and they couldn’t be as valuable as the cash register, or the jewelry, or the merchandise out on the floor.
    I held my breath.
    The doorknob jiggled hard.
    Silence.
    Then a crash.
    I jumped away. One more crash—a shoulder or a foot slamming into the door. The thin wood splintered down the middle.
    I tried to scream, but nothing came out.
    He wouldn’t be going to that much trouble for these dresses. He must not want to leave any witnesses.
    And I was trapped.
    â€œAimee! Elisa!” I forced out. My voice sounded tiny in the emptiness, and there was no answer. Besides the jagged rhythm of my own breath and the tinkle of the music, the shop was deathly silent. Oh God. He might have gotten to them already.
    The whimper that came out of my mouth didn’t even sound like me.
    One more thud and the man’s foot cracked through the center of the door.
    I whipped around, frantic, the adrenaline shooting through me bringing the dressing room into focus. The gleaming mirror, the pink velvet armchair. The smattering of crimson feathers from the red dress that had fluttered to the carpet and fanned out like bloodstains. My own reflection, a small girl with dark hair falling over her shoulders in waves, whose wide, panic-stricken eyes didn’t match her exquisite dress.
    Someone was trying to kill me while I was wearing a ball gown. This didn’t happen in real life. But I was pretty sure I wasn’t dreaming, and this wasn’t an action movie. The door cracked further, and bile rose in my throat.
    If this was a movie, I would at least try to defend myself.
    A tall vase of lilies sat on a table next to the armchair. I ducked behind the chair and grabbed it, the dreamy scent of the flowers surrounding me as I dumped them on the floor, drops of water splattering my bare feet. I held the vase like a baseball bat.
    The man yanked away a cracked section of the door, making a hole large enough to reach through to the lock. The door swung open.
    He didn’t run at me, didn’t yell, didn’t glance down the stairs to see if anyone had heard my screams. The cold calculation in his eyes was more frightening than rage would have been. Like the eyes of a hunter. Whatever this was, it wasn’t just a robbery.
    The heavy vase trembled in my hands.