Chapter 9

Clara’s reaction to that line was to throw her pen at Caiden. He disappeared before it could hit him and she was left glaring at empty space. 

She sighed and picked her pen off the floor. Sometimes he was very annoying, but most of the time he was oddly kind for a demon. She still didn’t quite know what to make of the demon she was bonded to. 

She looked down at her notes again. Revenge didn’t seem as easy now that she knew she would have to somehow get hold of all the evidence needed to prove Beryl’s wrongdoing. 

How was she going to do that by herself?  

To obtain James’ financial records she would either have to ask him, ask his financial advisor or somehow steal them herself. She sighed and closed her notebook. There was no chance any of them were possible. James might love his granddaughter, but he was never going to disclose very personal financial information to her and neither would his financial advisor. 

She needed to ask Caiden for more advice. He would know a way to get hold of evidence. Clara pushed aside the notebook and turned her attention to the computer. She switched it on and waited for it to load. There were a few things she wanted to check. 

When the computer was ready, she typed in the password from Clarissa’s memories and opened up the internet browser. It was time to look up her death as Clara Kennedy. She typed in her name and death before closing her eyes. She wasn’t under any allusions that she would like what she found. 

Clara counted to three and opened her eyes. The first result on the page was an article from the Trinity Academy website. Clara clenched her jaw and clicked on the link. 

The article detailed that the star scholarship student at the academy had sadly passed away and her death was suspected to be suicide. 

“Clara had always been a welcome part of the school as our first scholarship student. Her presence is greatly missed by students and staff,” she read aloud with a scoff. 

There was nothing about her relentless bullying or how the school had been complicit by doing nothing about it. Clara wanted to tear her hair out. 

“We offer our condolences to her family and anyone affected by the loss,” she continued and snorted loudly. 

She closed down the article with a huff and continued down the list of results. There were some news articles about her death that were brief and only identified her as a student of Trinity Academy who lived with a foster family.  

Clara was itching to find out what actual students of Trinity Academy were saying, but she would need to be friends with them on social media to find out. It was tempting to log into her social media accounts to find out, but she knew she couldn’t do that.  

Clara Kennedy was dead and it would look odd if she was logged into her social media accounts. She was Clarissa St. Clair now.

Clara closed down the browser and resolved to never look herself up again. Everything she had seen had enraged her.

She distracted herself by finding Clarissa’s phone and putting it on charge. It was a very expensive phone and was a far cry from the basic cheap phone she had as Clara Kennedy. Whilst she was waiting for the dead phone to charge, she pulled out Clarissa’s schoolwork. 

It would help to acquaint herself with the schoolwork in advance. The art part didn’t look like it was going to be a problem. She would have to be careful about showing a sudden improvement in art though. The teacher would jump to the likely conclusion that she was getting someone else to do her homework for her if she handed in work that was on a completely different skill level. 

Business looked a little harder. She hadn’t worked on anything like it before. It was lucky that Clarissa had been good at it, she could use her memories.  

Schooling was very different in the UK compared to the US. Clarissa was studying for an International Baccalaureate and went to a fee-paying high school. 

Clara saw a uniform in Clarissa’s school memories and opened the closet to take a look. There were lots of closets in Clarissa’s room and each one had a different theme. The one she opened was the school themed one. Inside were rows of white blouses, school jackets and black pants. 

Clara pulled out a complete set to evaluate the uniform when compared to Trinity Academy. Both uniforms were from fee paying schools that had prestigious images. 

The school jacket was black with the school logo on one side. It was nice and plain and looked like it would be the perfect fit. She liked the idea of wearing black pants more than the Trinity Academy plaid skirt. She also had lots of bad memories associated with the Trinity Academy uniform. 

For now, Clarissa’s school uniform was infinitely better than the one she had worn before. She put the clothes back in the closet and reminded herself to call it a wardrobe if she was speaking aloud. Closet was the American word for a wardrobe and she was British now. There were a lot of things to remember so she could pass as British 18-year-old.  

Clara spent the rest of the afternoon exploring Clarissa’s expansive bedroom. There were lots of things to look at so by the time a maid came to collect her for dinner, she still had a lot to explore. 

Dinner was Clarissa’s favourite, Chicken Masala Curry. Clara hadn’t tried anything like that before so she was intrigued when she sat down at the table and smelled the spices. It smelled good at least. She tried her best to ignore Beryl who was also sitting at the table. 

“It’s this curry again?” Beryl griped. “It’s too spicy, I always have to drink lots of water after.” 

Clara went through Clarissa’s memories to see if she could find anything to say in response. 

“This curry is considered to be not spicy by normal standards,” she replied. “I was thinking I would like to try something spicier in the future. I’ll talk to Maria about it.” 

Beryl gave her a nasty look and Clara knew she had successfully annoyed her. There was no way she was going to shy away from Beryl now that she knew exactly what she had done. Her body was nervous, but her mind knew she was planning revenge. 

“That’s an idea,” James agreed. “I think we should have a variety of cuisines for our evening meals. It’s good to try different things. It certainly makes you look more esteemed when having lunch or dinner meetings with clients.” 

Clara risked a glance at Beryl. The redhead was glaring at her. If looks could kill, Clara would have already burst into flames. She smiled at Beryl who glared even harder.  

She took a bite of chicken and found that it was delicious. It might also be her favourite thing to eat as well. The curry itself was comfortably spiced and creamy. It was so nice that she almost forgot Beryl was sitting next to her. 

“Clarissa, are you going to have permanent scarring from your cuts?” Beryl asked a moment later. 

Clara tried not to show that she was uncomfortable with the question. She should have known it wasn’t a good idea to annoy Beryl. 

“I have to see a doctor in a few days, I’ll ask then,” she replied, doing her best to sound like she wasn’t concerned. 

“I can shop around to see if I can find a plastic surgeon who can help with the scarring,” Beryl said sweetly. “I don’t want you to have permanent scars from self-harm for life. You’re a girl and you need something more than your money to make you attractive.” 

Clara tried her best to ignore Beryl's insult about Clarissa's suicide attempt. She looked over at James to see if he had noticed that Beryl was insulting her in an indirect way.  

“She can cover up the scars with make-up if they bother her,” James commented. “Beryl, you’re finding solutions for problems Clarissa doesn’t yet have.” 

Clara appreciated that James had noticed that Beryl had gone too far, but he hadn’t exactly reined her in either. It was no wonder that Beryl had been able to get so far in her kill Clarissa plan. 

“Problem solving is why my business is going so well,” Beryl said with a laugh. 

Clara’s ears pricked up, but she tried her best to not show her interest. Clarissa didn’t normally pay much attention to Beryl’s company so it would be odd if she was suddenly attentive when Beryl mentioned her company. She continued eating like Beryl hadn’t spoken. 

“What is your revenue like this quarter?” James asked. “I like that you haven’t asked me for any help with your company, it shows your independence from me.” 

Clara knew that was very far from the truth. Beryl had stolen his money instead of asking for his help. 

“We’re smashing our targets,” Beryl said triumphantly. “I’m confident things will be the same next quarter.” 

“Are you sure you don’t want me to visit and take a look at everything to see if there’s anything I can suggest?” James offered. 

Clara glanced at the woman next to her who most definitely didn’t want James coming to take a closer look at her company. Beryl didn’t show any signs of being bothered by the request.  

“Darling,” she giggled. “I want to be an independent business woman; I can’t be if you poke your nose in.” 

"Fine, I won’t,” James said with a smile. 

Clara wanted to vomit. Beryl had missed her true calling as an actress. She had averted the situation so well. Clara knew how she had managed to get this far in life by lying, Beryl was the right type of person to pull scams off flawlessly without her victims noticing anything amiss. 

*** 

After dinner Clara turned down an invitation to play cards with James and Beryl and returned to her bedroom. She felt more energetic after eating and wanted to get back to working on her revenge plan. 

Caiden hadn’t turned up since his disappearance in the afternoon so she could only assume he was gathering information for her or was avoiding her. 

Clara added some more notes in her revenge notebook about Beryl being a good actress and tried to think of other ideas to bust her lies. Beryl didn’t want James to look closely at her company. Perhaps she could find some way to get James to Beryl’s company office to look over their financial records. 

She wrote that down with a frown. James did seem determined to let his girlfriend be independent from him businesswise so that idea was unlikely to succeed. None of her ideas looked like they were going to work so far. 

Perhaps she could learn how to hack so she could get access to Beryl's financial records herself.

Clara tried to look up how to hack on a search engine and ended up with a headache. It was all too complicated for her. She put her head on her desk and sighed heavily. 

“I don’t know what to do...” 

“I’ve already come up with a plan,” Caiden said from behind her. 

Clara didn’t bother to turn around. It felt Caiden had been waiting for the right moment to reappear. 

“What’s your plan?” 

Caiden came to stand by her chair. 

“There’s a hacker in your classes at school, he can help you.” 

Clara looked at him skeptically. 

“How do I convince a hacker to help me out?” 

Caiden grinned at her.  

"The hacker just happens to have a crush on Clarissa. You’re going need to flirt a little. It will hurt me to see you flirt with another man, but I’ll allow it.”