“Oh, really?” I called out, just to keep him crowing.
I stalked from one side of the mausoleum to the other, hoping to find another exit, a trapdoor, or something, anything, that would help me. But there was nothing, and I wound up standing next to Vaughn’s tomb, staring down at the words carved into the bottom of it: Gone Too Soon.
Because of me. And just like me, in another minute, two tops, if Sebastian had his way.
“Yes, really.”
I crept back up to the entrance and peered out. “Is that why you like to slap your sister around? Because teenage girls are so useful to your grand schemes?”
For once, I managed to wipe the smug grin off Sebastian’s face.
“Charlotte needs to learn her place,” he snarled. “I was the firstborn. I was the one my parents loved the most—at least, until she came along.”
My eyebrows shot up. Looked like Finn and I weren’t the only ones who had some sibling rivalry going on—if that’s what you could even call Sebastian’s twisted jealousy of his baby sister.
“Charlotte’s weak, just like our father was,” Sebastian continued. “Always whining, always crying, always whimpering about every little thing. She should be grateful that I’m here to look out for her, to teach her how to toughen up and be as strong as I am.”
I snorted. The only thing Sebastian wanted to teach anyone about was pain.
“Keep telling yourself that, sugar.” I mocked him with the same endearment that he’d said to me earlier in bed. “Instead of just the fact that you’re a sick, sadistic son of a bitch who gets his kicks beating up kids. A real prince, you are. A real king of industry and empire.”
I made my voice as mocking and disdainful as possible, hoping that I would enrage Sebastian enough to get him to rush into the mausoleum to try to kill me himself. For a moment, I thought that it might actually work. Sebastian’s cheeks reddened with fury, the hot emotion mottling his tan skin, and his hands clenched into tight fists. He even went so far as to take a few steps forward before he thought better of it and stopped. I had to admire his self-restraint.
Even if it was going to be the death of me.
“You know what, Gin?” Sebastian said. “You’re as weak and pitiful as Charlotte is. More so, really. So starved for affection, so hungry for attention, so desperate for some-one to love you that you leaped at the opportunity to cozy up to the son of the man you murdered. What kind of sick, sadistic, twisted bitch does that make you? Were you ever going to tell me what you did to my father? Or were you under the impression that it wouldn’t matter? That we would just live happily ever after? Are you really that delusional?”
This time, the angry blush stained my cheeks, making them burn even in the cool dark of the mausoleum. But like Sebastian, I didn’t give in to my anger, and I didn’t respond to him. Instead, I glanced over my shoulder at Porter, but the giant stood in the same position as before, ready to shoot me the second I stepped out of the mausoleum.
When he realized that I wasn’t going to answer, Sebastian shrugged. “No matter. I don’t really care, anyway. I never did care, you know, especially not about you.”
Despite everything that I’d learned about him in the last hour, his words still hurt me, cutting me to the core and then eating away at everything there like a chain saw slicing through a tough cord of wood. But it was my own fault, for not listening to Finn, for not putting more faith in Fletcher’s feeling that something was wrong about the job, but most of all, for being an easy, stupid mark, just like Sebastian had said.
Oh, yes. Arrogance will get you, every single time. I had no one to blame but myself, especially for what was about to happen next.
“Oh, come on, now, Gin,” Sebastian said. “Don’t be a sore loser. I was always going to win, you know. There was never any doubt about that. You just made it a bit easier than I expected.”
Once again, I didn’t respond.
“Fine.” He pouted. “If you don’t want to play anymore, then neither do I. In fact, I think that it’s rather fitting that you’re cowering in there, right beside my dead father, since you were the one who killed him. It’s so terribly, tragically ironic. And it will make this all the easier and sweeter.”
Sebastian raised his hands, and the amber flecks in his dark eyes, the ones that I’d thought were so beautiful, began to brighten as he reached for his Stone magic. All around me, the marble of the mausoleum took on even sharper, harsher mutters. It knew what Sebastian was going to do with it—and so did I.
He kept gathering and gathering his magic, until his eyes burned like two topaz torches set into his handsome face, and his skin took on a hard sheen, as though it was made of the same marble that he had so much control over. Sebastian was like me in that his magic was completely self-contained. He’d never used it around me, which was why I hadn’t sensed it before. But now that he was actively reaching for his magic, I could feel exactly how powerful he was.
He was strong—much, much stronger than his father had been, stronger even than I was. Jo-Jo had always told me that I was a powerful elemental, but Sebastian far surpassed me. No wonder he’d been able to crumble that restaurant balcony. With the amount of magic he was wielding right now, it would have been child’s play to him, as easy as knocking over a stack of wooden blocks.
Sebastian grinned, and his eyes locked with mine, despite the shadows that lay between us. Then he brought his hands down and unleashed his magic, driving the invisible waves of it into the ground at his feet and then into the mausoleum.
His magic made the ground ripple, like a whip that was rising up and getting ready to crack down—right on top of my head. His Stone power raced through all of the rocks in the ground, leapfrogging from one to another, until it reached the foundation of the mausoleum. And I finally realized what Sebastian was going to do. He didn’t dare come in here and fight me himself, so he was going to do the next best thing.
The bastard was going to bury me alive.
Oh, no, the irony didn’t escape me. Me, a Stone elemental, about to be smashed to death by the very thing that I felt such kinship with, that I had such control over.
Sebastian’s magic raced up through the foundation and then raged outward. The slick floor bucked and heaved under my feet, while chunks of stone broke off the columns that held up the domed roof. Without those supports, it wouldn’t be long before the entire structure collapsed in on itself and on me.