Dark Sins (Dark Intentions #3) - Charlotte Byrd Page 0,2

family, just to be part of something. Sometimes, they're confused. Sometimes, they actually think that they saw this missing person; they just want to be part of a bigger picture."

"But Michael isn't missing," Dante says.

"Yes, I know that. He's been killed. I saw the accident. I saw the car and how messed up it was. He died in that car."

"I think your mom is just trying to hold on to hope."

"Of course she knows that he's dead. We all know that, we have the confirmation from the medical examiner, but I can't believe that she thinks I don't want to investigate."

"She's just very hurt. She’s going through a lot right now. It's her son," Dante says.

I glare at him.

"I'm not trying to take her side," he adds.

"Look, I know perfectly well where she's coming from. She wants to have some explanation for why it happened. Right now, it's like he just died for no reason. I mean, it was snowy and icy and the road conditions were terrible, but there’re hundreds of thousands of deaths like that in America every winter; it's just bad luck. You run into something. You are in the wrong place at the wrong time. It happens all the time."

"What do you think deep in your heart? What do you think happened?" Dante asks as he pulls up to a red light.

I stare into the light and notice how it gets a little less red in the middle, more of a pinkish color. "I don't know, but I also have no idea whether that letter is something that we can believe."

"You seem so resistant to it though," Dante adds when the light turns green. "I mean, don't you want to find out?"

"Of course I do. I'm just really angry that someone would do this. Someone would just make this up, but I have to know who.

Who would want to hurt us so much?"

He stares at me and then turns his eyes back to the road. I realize, of course, that I sound like someone who knows that it's an accident and someone unwilling to believe anything else about his death.

It's not that I'm not; of course he could have been murdered, but what is the likelihood of that?

Why would someone murder my brother?

He had a normal job, went to work every day, didn't have any major problems with anyone.

Of course, I don't know everything about him.

He could have had secrets, God knows I've kept enough. From the outside, no one would believe that I am the type of girl who went to a club like The Redemption and no one would think that Dante and I could have met there and actually had a real connection.

Appearances are deceiving, we all know that.

But I'm so certain that I know who my brother was and I have no idea why someone would murder him.

"You know, this could have been an accident," Dante says.

We get to Long Island before I realize that he's driving us back to his house in the Hamptons. We haven't talked about this, but I don't fight it. I don't really want to go back and see my mom today.

"Yeah, I know it could've been an accident, that's what I'm trying to say," I add.

"No, I don't mean it like that. It could have been an accident that he was killed."

I stare at him, not fully comprehending.

"I'm not sure exactly if I'm reading too much into the letter," Dante says, "but what if someone hit him with their car, but it was an accident? What if they left the scene? It doesn't have to be this planned first degree murder charge kind of situation, but it would still be murder. It would still be not just him alone getting into this situation, but there's no way to know unless you find out who wrote the letter."

I swallow hard and nod slightly.

I hadn't considered that.

Of course! What if this person told someone that he ran into someone and killed him?

If someone had told me that, I'd probably feel incredibly guilty. And maybe even be forced to write a letter like this to alleviate some of the guilt.

I don't say any of this out loud, but in my own mind, I continue to spin further and further out of control.

There are so many possibilities now. As much as I don’t want the letter to be true, or to even go further into uncovering it, now I feel like I almost have to.

Mom is right, I do have