Above the Law

Chapter Four

Every day after Eden came home from school, her first stop was the library. Lily would wander around, checking out romance novels and blushing as she read. Eden, however, was using one of the libraries' computers to print articles about the man in the mask. There were a lot, and she printed every single one. She'd stared a timeline on her wall, obsessively tacking all the information she found on him in order. She'd even researched the victims and plotted them under the day they were killed. And as far as she could tell, the man in the mask was being truthful; each man so far had been a registered sex offender.

Eden picked up the stack of newly printed papers and walked over to where Lily sat absorbed in a paperback. "Lil? You ready to go home?"

She looked up, a deep blush spreading over her cheeks. "Yeah, on sec..." Eden watched as she finished the last few pages of the chapter. Eden tilted her head and read the description on the back of the book and her heart sunk. Lily had always been drawn to sappy, pretentious romantic novels. But that wasn't how life worked. Life was cruel and unfair. Happy ending were for children. Life wasn't a Disney movie, love didn't triumph the villains. And Lily was going to be constantly disappointed that her life wasn't like her favorite characters; that she didn't get the happy ending. "Okay..." Lily said distractedly as she slipped the bookmark in between the pages, her eyes still moving over the last few words. She shut the book, sighed, and looked up with doe eyes.

"Ready?"

Lily nodded and stood. She eyed the papers clutched tightly in her sister's hands. "Why are you still obsessing over that killer?"

"I just—"

"He's a murderer!" Lily said in disgust. "You watched him kill three innocent men! Isn't that what that detective said? So why are you acting like he's some sort of hero? But he's not. He's a murder."

"What if they did deserve it?"

Lily looked like Eden had slapped her. "Two wrongs don't make a right, Ed. Those people died." She gazed at her small hands. "You don't think that, do you?" Lily seemed, for the first time in a long time, disappointed in her sister. Like she couldn't believe they were related. "Nobody deserves to die, Eden," she said quietly.

Of course nobody deserved to die, not in Lily's world, at least. Not in Lily's mind where two strangers fall in love at first sight. People falling in love and people being killed couldn't be in the same world, they just couldn't.

Eden and Lily walked home quietly. Eden wished she hadn't said anything, she wished she'd just gone to the library on her own like she'd planned. As soon as they walked inside, Lily went straight to her room, Eden practically on her heels. "Lil—"

Lily's door shut in Eden's face and she stood in front of her sisters' door, wanting nothing more than to take back the words she'd said. Eden knew she shouldn't have said anything to Lily, but what was it going to take to make Lily see that there were bad people out there? Didn't Lily notice that her big sister always locked herself in her room each night? Didn't Lily feel the kitchen knife under Eden's pillow when she slept in there? Didn't she question why?

"Why the long face, Princess?"

Eden shook the glazed look off her face and turned with a scowl towards Drew. He smirked and brought a beer bottle to his thin lips.

"Come on, have a drink with me."

A vivid scene played out in Eden's head of her and Drew sitting down on the vomit stained couch, each holding beers. Of herself breaking the bottle over his head and the couch suddenly being stained with red too...