Chapter 3
I spent the next five days in the hospital.
Seventeen fractures meant surgeries. Pins in my wrist. A brace around my neck. Pain meds that made me dizzy and sick to my stomach.
My mom never left my side. She slept in the plastic chair, held my hair back when I threw up, read to me when I couldn’t sleep.
My dad showed up on day three.
He’d been out of town on a work trip when the cookout happened. Karen had called him first, of course. Fed him her version of the story.
He walked into my room with his jaw set, his face hard.
“Mia,” he said, not sitting down. “We need to talk.”
My mom stood up. “Tom, don’t—”
“Stay out of this, Sarah,” he snapped. He looked at me. “Karen told me what you did. Framing Lila like that? After everything we’ve done for her?”
I stared at him.
My own dad.
“Dad,” I said, my voice weak. “She pushed me. The doctor said—”
“The doctor doesn’t know Lila like we do,” he said. “She’s a good kid. She’s never hurt anyone in her life. You, on the other hand… you’ve always been competitive. Always had to be the best.”
He shook his head.
“That scholarship went to your head. You couldn’t stand that Lila wanted it too. So you made up this whole story to ruin her.”
Tears burned my eyes.
“I didn’t make up anything,” I said. “Seventeen broken bones, Dad. Did Karen tell you about that? Did she tell you I have two fractured vertebrae? That I might never run again?”
He flinched. But he didn’t back down.
“People do crazy things when they’re desperate,” he said.
He turned to leave.
“I’m bailing Lila out of jail tomorrow,” he said over his shoulder. “She shouldn’t be in there for something she didn’t do. And when this is all over, you’re going to apologize to her. To both of them.”
The door slammed behind him.
I stared at the ceiling. My chest hurt worse than any of my fractures.
My dad had chosen them.
My mom sat down next to me, wrapped her arms around me as best she could without hurting me.
“I’m so sorry, baby,” she whispered. “He’ll come around. He just needs to see the truth.”
I didn’t answer. I wasn’t so sure.
That night, after my mom fell asleep in the chair, the door creaked open.
I looked up.
Lila.
She was alone. No Karen. No police. Just her, standing in the doorway, wearing a pink sweatshirt and jeans like she was just another visitor.
She closed the door behind her. Locked it.
My heart hammered against my ribs.
“What are you doing here?” I whispered. My hand fumbled for the call button.
She laughed. Soft. Cold.
“Relax,” she said. She walked to the bed, leaned against the rail. “I just came to talk.”
She held up my phone again—the one she’d stolen.
“You know,” she said, scrolling through it with her thumb, “you really should password-protect these things. So easy to get into.”
She looked up at me. Her eyes were black, no warmth in them at all.
“I found your scholarship file,” she said. “All those essays. All those recommendation letters. It’s cute how hard you tried.”
“Give it back,” I said.
“Nah,” she said, slipping it into her pocket. “I think I’ll keep it. For now.”
She leaned closer. Her voice dropped to a whisper.
“Here’s what’s going to happen, Mia,” she said. “You’re going to tell the police you lied. That you tripped. That you made up the whole thing because you were jealous of me.”
I stared at her.
“Why would I do that?”
“Because,” she said, smiling, “if you don’t, I’m going to release those fake confession emails to every news station in Chicago. I’m going to post them on Facebook. On TikTok. I’m going to make sure everyone in the world thinks you’re a crazy, lying psycho who tried to put her own cousin in jail.”
She tapped my cast with her finger.
“And let’s be real,” she said. “Who are they going to believe? The quiet, straight-A student with the perfect record? Or the girl with 17 broken bones who’s clearly just bitter she didn’t get the spotlight all to herself?”
My blood ran cold.
She was right.
Lila had always been the golden child of the family. The pretty one. The charming one. The one who could talk her way out of anything.
I was just the nerd who’d gotten lucky with a scholarship.
“You’re insane,” I said.
“Maybe,” she said, pushing off the bed. “But I’m the one who’s going to win. You have until Friday to tell the police you lied. If you don’t… I release the emails. And then your life is over. No scholarship. No med school. No nothing.”
She walked to the door. Unlocked it.
“Oh, and one more thing,” she said, looking back at me. “If you tell anyone I was here? I release them tonight. Got it?”
She slipped out. The door clicked shut behind her.
I lay there, shaking, for what felt like hours.
Lila had planned this. All of it. The shove. The fake emails. Stealing my phone. Showing up at the hospital.
She wasn’t just angry about the scholarship.
She wanted to destroy me.
I thought about Det. Carter’s card on the table. I should call him. Tell him Lila was here. Tell him about her threat.
But if I did… she’d release the emails.
I closed my eyes.
I had to fight back.
But how?
Then I remembered.
My laptop.
It was at home, in my bedroom closet. In a hidden folder, I had all the original scholarship documents. The email confirmations from Northwestern. The receipts for my application fees. The notes I’d taken while writing my essays.
And more importantly…
I had Lila’s old voicemail. The one where she’d threatened me. I’d thought I’d deleted it, but I’d saved a copy to my laptop’s hard drive a week before, just in case.
If I could get my laptop… I could prove the emails were fake. I could prove Lila had threatened me first.
But I couldn’t leave the hospital. I could barely sit up.
I needed help.
I reached for my phone—the one the hospital had given me to replace the one Lila stole. I dialed the only person I knew I could trust.
Mia.
My best friend since third grade. The one who’d helped me study for the SATs. The one who’d been there when I got the scholarship call.
She picked up on the first ring.
“Mia?” she said, her voice frantic. “Oh my God, are you okay? I’ve been trying to call you for days—”
“Mia,” I said, cutting her off. My voice was urgent. “I need you to do something for me. Something big. And you can’t tell anyone. Not my parents. Not the police. No one.”
May you like
I paused.
“Can you break into my house and get my laptop?”
