Chapter 170

[Third-Person’s POV]

Isabella often knew how to get herself out of troubling situations. It had become one of her many hidden talents over the years. Even during the desperate times, she always had a fallback plan.

However, this time around, the woman seriously found herself trapped in a rather precarious situation.

She, Fiona, and Samantha had escaped the Silverwood Estate with just seconds to spare before getting caught by Alexander’s men. Thankfully, in her case, she knew where the secret passageways led that were able to aid their getaway.

Isabella had every reason to believe that her plan to dispose of Evelyn had succeeded. Why wouldn’t it have?

She trusted Fiona’s skills as a doctor to know exactly where to make the grueling lacerations that would gradually become fatal the more time passed. With Evelyn, undoubtedly, out of the way, things were finally due to go her way.

Isabella had no reason to suspect that her plan to get rid of her annoying Stepdaughter would have been faulted. Considering the amount of blood that had been drawn, only a miracle would have been possible to save her.

Now, as far as it came to her getting caught—she wasn’t too concerned about that either. Even if an investigation was run and they ended up finding her fingerprints around the scene of the crime, there was no telling if the prints were new or old.

The fact that it all occurred within the walls of her home, it was a natural thing to stumble upon her own fingerprints. When it came to the blade, she’d never touched it and promptly made sure that Fiona was the only one to handle it.

Granted she didn’t know Fiona well, she wanted to think that the woman was wise enough to keep track of the blade to prevent any potential complications. But worse came to worse, and the blade was recovered, it wouldn’t be traced back to either her or Samantha.

It had been quick thinking on her part to decide to lay low for a little while at Liam and Samantha’s. Liam was none the wiser as to why she had insisted on staying. After all, it was by sheer coincidence that Leonard was out of town away on business which happened to give her the perfect cover for not wanting to linger in that house.

She even went out of her way to help Liam organize some of the pack’s affairs as a means of keeping him unsuspecting. Samantha, on the other hand, only had a handful of moments where she nearly blew their cover.

“What if Alexander tries to retaliate?”

“What if Evelyn ends up surviving?”

“What if we left behind too much evidence and it traces back to us?”

“What if Fiona rats us out?”

Isabella was moments away from throttling her daughter’s throat with her own bare hands. Of course, her questions were validated. But Isabella had ensured that there was just no chance of any of Samantha’s worries coming to light.

“Soon this whole issue will blow over and it will be as though Evelyn never existed,” she claimed. “What you ought to be thinking about is what you’re going to wear when Alexander makes the rightful decision to reach out to you.”

Indeed, she still believed that Alexander was going to ‘come to his senses’ and inquire about taking Samantha as a replacement for Evelyn. And sure enough, she was right.

When the invitation came in, Samantha was utterly booming with excitement. Clearly, Evelyn had taken a turn for the worse. There hadn’t been any public announcement of her untimely death or even so much as her present physical state. Isabella had thought nothing of it.

Oh well, she thought carelessly.

Poor Liam had no idea what to think as he snatched the letter from Samantha’s hands and briskly read through it.

He scoffed. “You seriously think that he’s going to want to take you on as a Luna?”

“Well, I’d surely be better appreciated there than I am here,” she hissed back.

Isabella had the highest hopes in the world for her daughter when she and Liam left for Kingston Hall. Things were finally going her way...

That was until the couple had returned within the hour that Isabella realized something had gone terribly wrong. Liam looked sickly pale and Samantha had been nursing a bloody broken nose.

Her heart slammed in her chest as she approached the two of them. “What the hell happened?!”

Liam walked right past her, ignoring her excessive questions and shrilling voice. He went straight for the liquor cabinet and poured himself a large glass of whiskey.

“Were you never going to say anything regarding the fact that you and your demented daughter tried to kill Evelyn?” he asked viciously.

Isabella’s entire body went still. A nervous chill raced down her spine. “What are you talk—”

“Save it, Isabella!” he shouted back angrily. “ I know everything. Everything that you did to her. You and Samantha are lucky that she’s alive.”

Her eyes widened. “What?”

“It’s true, mother,” Samantha groaned through the pain. “Evelyn is alive and let’s just say that she’s determined to seek her revenge.”

No. It wasn’t possible. Her plan had been flawless. How on earth had Evelyn managed to survive?

That feeling of safety and security had dissolved into nothing within seconds.

“Is she the one that did this?” she asked, gesturing to Samantha’s blood-soaked hands.

Her daughter nodded her head with glossy tears in her eyes. “Evelyn broke my nose!”

Liam glanced at the two women and sneered. “You’re lucky that was all she did,” he spat. Isabella glared at her son-in-law. “You purposely allowed Fiona to disfigure her and then left her there to bleed out! Evelyn was so angry she broke a picture frame and threatened to tear up Samantha’s face in return.”

Isabella gasped.

Liam downed the rest of his drink and made his way to stand in front of his wife. “Just so you know, I’m not paying to have your nose fixed. So, I hope for your sake, it doesn’t heal poorly.”

As soon as Liam left the room, Isabella demanded that she be told the whole story from the very beginning. She helped Samantha clean away most of the blood and pressed a warm compress to her nose.

Samantha went into fine detail about what had happened. She even went on to explain how Alexander placed them and the entirety of Liam’s pack on house arrest until the investigation was through.

Isabella did not like the idea of essentially being trapped there. Not one bit.

“You know, seeing Evelyn alive actually wasn’t the most shocking thing.”

“What do you mean?”

“Would you believe me if I told you that Alexander wasn’t actually paralyzed and that he’d been faking his injuries this entire time?”

Isabella felt a surge of anger rush to the surface. “I fucking knew it!” She practically sprung out of her chair and raced for her phone. “I knew that bastard wasn’t paralyzed. Everyone thought I was crazy, but I knew it.”

“What are you doing? Shouldn’t we be thinking about how the hell we’re going to get out of this mess?”

Isabella shook her head. “There still might be a chance that things could work in our favor.”

“How?”

She pulled up Caroline’s number.

“How do you think the Alpha King is going to react to finding out that Alexander has been essentially faking his injuries?”