More lights flashed on overhead, illuminating the shadowed corners of the basement in fluorescent brightness. I noticed instantly from the new light that there were more kids in the room than I initially realised. There were about ten other children, of all varying ages and genders. There was one girl who looked at maximum eight years old and a few teenage boys including the ones that attacked me.

When Lisa looked up at me her features were tormented and filled with misery. My mouth was gaping open in disbelief at what was occurring. She wasn't spiteful or vengeful, she was filled with regret for kidnapping Blake and that just made me angrier.

"I never wanted you to find out about this," Lisa explained solemnly, wrapping her hands around her waist as if she was the one needing comfort.

The boys that I had incapacitated earlier were slowly rising groaning from the ground and stood just behind Lisa, almost protectively. I watched Billy with narrowed eyes as he rose from the ground, wiping his bloody lip and rearranging his glasses that had fallen from his eyes. He ran his elbow over his face and stood at his full height beside Lisa.

"What the hell is going on?" I barked at her, acrimony fuelled heat rising within me and twitching a vein in my neck.

"I never wanted to hurt you." She reached a hand out towards me but I flinched violently away from her. "Or Blake." Her soulful eyes moved to Blake who was still restrained to his chair, his hands raw and red from the blood that had dripped from the cuts he had made from yanking his hands against the rope that restrained him so desperately. Lisa's eyes hardened as she looked back to me, shining with certainty.

"But I have responsibilities," she declared, falling into another seat in defeat.

"What are you talking about?" I stomped my foot against the ground in frustration at not being able to move and punch her in the face like I wanted too. My eyes flashed towards the kids at the back of the room as the young girl, with long blonde hair walked up to Lisa lifting her up off the chair and hugged Lisa around the waist.

"These kids," she revealed curtly, gesturing her head to the children standing behind her. They were all standing there just watching our interaction in silence. A young boy with long ginger hair, so long it looked like he hadn't had a hair cut in years sat down on the floor. He could only be no older than ten years old, his eyes were fixated on the chains holding me and Blake down. A young child shouldn't be seeing something like this.

"Why are they even here Lisa?" I snapped; I didn't understand what was going on. She had never told me anything about these kids before.

"I never did tell you. But when I started at this school, I lied to everyone about my parents because I was ashamed. I just wanted to be normal for once," Lisa explained sombrely, her lips turning down at the corners. I couldn't help the rising anger that clenched my jaw together but also betrayal, I had known Lisa for four years and she never told me this at all. Our whole friendship was a lie.

"But I was from this orphanage, I didn't have parents that sent me to this school from overseas, I lived here. When I was fourteen, my only living relative that I didn't know I had died and I inherited his money. I had always dreamed of going to this school, but because I was an orphan I never could. But with the money I was able to afford boarding at the school." My hands were fists at my side, barely containing my bitterness at her deceit. But not just that, I was hurt that she couldn't trust me with this secret of hers, I thought we were best friends.

"And it was wonderful, I made so many friends. But the orphanage kids would always be my true family, I came back to see them all every night." Lisa stroked the hair of the young girl that was still hanging off her, she was hugging Lisa like she was her mother. She was looking up at Lisa with complete adoration on her face, she wouldn't know the evil that Lisa has done.

"But a year ago when the orphanage shut down, I knew I couldn't stand by and watch my family be torn apart." Lisa softly unwound the girl's hands from around her waist and nudged the girl back towards the kids at the back of the room with a soft smile. When Lisa looked back at me her eyes were red and rimmed with tears as if letting go of the little girl was the hardest thing she could do.

"So instead of being sent to separate foster homes, those of us old enough to look after ourselves stayed here. And some of the younger ones who were sent to horrible homes ran away to live with us when we set up this place as home. We looked after ourselves, cooked, cleaned, bought our own clothes. The young ones go to the public school under false identities I forged," she recounted, her tone was fatigued as if this was the hardest time of her life. Things started to make sense, Lisa had become distant in the last year, she would never ask to see me outside of school hours and say that she was busy when I wanted to hang out after school.

"But there was only so long before we needed money to do all those things," she stated mournfully and her eyes became haunted. Of course, this was about money. I couldn't help the way my mind reeled; how much trouble had she got into that she couldn't even let Blake leave this room?

"What have you done Lisa? What could have been so bad that you needed to kidnap Blake and chain me up?" I growled, yanking my hands in the air so that the chains flew upwards and then banged against the concrete floor. The children flinched away from me, and the young girl yelped as if I was the bad guy. Lisa turned around to smile at them reassuringly.

"That was when I started hacking into private company's bank accounts, stealing money for us to live off. After that we could afford for a few of us to board at the school, that was our ultimate goal as we knew the orphanage will be knocked down eventually. We needed enough money so we could all board at the school, that is why I have been desperately saving up money, stealing more and more." I could see the toll this had taken on her, she had black circles under her eyes and her hair was knotted as it curled down her back, unbrushed.

I just thought she was stressed from exams but turns out it was because she was constantly on the lookout for the police at her door. Who is this person and where is my best friend?

"But your sister found out about it, how I was stealing," she announced, her eyes were downturned and she dug her toe into the ground. "She disagreed with what I was doing." A shock banged through my chest at her declaration, like a punch to my stomach. My mouth fell open.

"What? Ellie knew? She didn't say anything," I perplexed, my eyebrows pinched together in distress. Nothing was making any sense, there were so many lies.

"But I just couldn't watch my family be torn apart. Your sister tried to stop me, she wanted to help me. She hacked into the old orphanage database trying to find information on me, on my real family so maybe I could return to my real family," Lisa disclosed, running her hands through her dark curly hair. She kept moving from one foot to the other anxiously. It was really pissing me off, along with the fact that my sister didn't tell me any of this. Next time I saw her she was in for a grilling and a serious cold shoulder.

"But that was when she found out the truth, she found her name in the files. Your mother never told you but your sister was adopted. They adopted her from this orphanage when she was a baby," she revealed. I choked on my own breath, coughing and spluttering up noises of outrage. How dare she make up such nonsense?

"You are lying," I accused in denial, my eyes narrowing into a sneer at her nerve. Lisa gave me a flat, pitying look and my hands balled into fists inside the confounds of my handcuffs.

"Due to your fathers' cancer he was unable to conceive, so they adopted your sister. But you were the miracle child from IVF," Lisa continued explaining. Her tone was matter of fact, holding no emotion that she was tearing my world apart with her lies.

"Why would my parents not tell me this?" I spluttered, disbelieving, my forehead puckered. I rattled the chains holding my arms together in denial, it couldn't be true. Lisa's eyes were heavy as if she held a secret that was weighing them down.

"Because your sister wasn't just some orphan, she found out her real parents were bikies that sold drugs, they had many enemies. Both of her parents were killed when she was a baby and their enemies tried to kill your sister, but the police saved her in time. She was sent into the witness protection program, given a new name, and the authorities made her old identity technically dead in the records. If anyone found out about her true heritage your family would be hunted down as she had an inheritance of drug money." Lisa grimaced and dropped her gaze shamefully and I had a feeling that Lisa had stolen that money too. Nothing was making any sense; it was all too much to take in. But in the back of my mind I was piecing all the clues together.

"The blood sample Blake found on the motorcycle, he said that it came up as a baby who died years ago," I commented closing my eyes tightly for a moment, still not believing her words but bewildered as to how it was all fitting together.

I glanced over to Blake, he had been so quiet this whole time I had forgotten he was even there. His features were as pale as mine and he was watching me intently, concern radiating from his eyes and frustration from being unable to come over to me. But I saw his features light up as if the mystery he has been trying to decipher has been solved.

"Yes, the records of your sister would have come up as her old identity," she confirmed, her eyes flickering to Billy's and they shared a dark look. Just from that look blocks started to click into place. My realisation hit me like a punch to the stomach and all the air left my lungs in a gasp.

"So, what are you trying to say is my sisters' blood was on that motorcycle?" I surmised with trepidation lacing my tone, voicing my fears. Lisa's features dropped along with her eyes but not before I saw the guilt there. Pressure started building up in my chest making it hard for me to breathe.

"That night of the fire at the school, your sister was at the orphanage that night. She had come back to town from college to surprise your family but she went to the orphanage first waiting for your mum to get home from work. She went to see everyone at the orphanage first, she had become close with all the kids." Lisa was fidgeting as she explained, her feet stepping from side to side and she wasn't looking me in the eye.

Bile rose up in my throat, forming a lump in the back of my throat and I raised my bound hands to my throat rubbing it soothingly. My breathing accelerated just from the mention of that night, the night that haunted my dreams with terrible nightmares. Of course, Lisa had something to do with that night, I knew deep in my bones that whatever she was going to say next was not good.

"It was you that night wasn't it? You threatened me? You hurt someone in the woods?" Lisa winced and her features became filled with guilt, but her eyes were absolutely harrowing.

"Yes. Ellie saw all of us break in because she was out in the orphanage gardens, she followed me when I left the group. While everyone else went to the pool, I went to the lockers and started breaking into the lockers, stealing money, goods whatever I could. It was her last straw with me, she didn't realise my stealing had got so out of hand. She was going to go to the police, tell them everything about the orphanage." I blinked, overcome with all this new information.

I glanced up to the ceiling breathing heavily trying to process that Ellie knew everything and she didn't tell me this whole time. I didn't understand how she could have let me stay friends with Lisa when she knew what a psycho she was.

"I panicked and dropping everything I had gathered from a locker and ran after her. I didn't see that I dropped a lighter from someone's locker. The fire started but I was too worried about stopping your sister that I didn't have time to put it out," she distressed, biting her nails as she recalled her evident panic. "I caught her just as she ran into the orphanage gardens. I tried to reason with her, I threatened her with my knife, I was never going to hurt her. But she wasn't listening to me, she knew I would never hurt her. She was going to tear all of us apart."

"No," I objected, I knew where this was going. It was in the orphanage gardens that I saw someone get hurt and the figure threatened me not to tell anyone about it. My sister couldn't have been involved in something this sinister, I refused to believe it.

"She turned to leave but I was so scared I tried to stop her and we fought. She knew self-defence and disarmed me of my knife, it fell to the floor. And I retaliated and I pushed her over as she walked away. Just so I could reason with her, talk to her. But when she fell over, she fell onto the knife, and she didn't get up." Lisa raked her hands through her dark front fringe so it splayed out over her face messily and her eyes were wild, flickering crazily around the room.

I was watching her numb, my eyes beginning to haze over as I hadn't realised that my breathing had stopped. I swayed on my feet, my vision slipping and I staggered a step to the side barely keeping my footing.

"Rose," Blake worried. I could only see him through the blurriness, his blue eyes were completely radiating worry for me. He yanked his hands against the ropes bounding him trying to get to me, blood was dripping down his hands and soaking into the rope.

"And then I saw you in the bushes and I realised that you had witnessed everything. I panicked, and I went after you first and threatened you not to tell anyone. If I went to prison then I wouldn't be able to look after my family." Lisa started sobbing, and the young blonde haired girl walked up to Lisa again and took her hand.

Rage surged through my blood, heat rising up my neck and clenching my jaw. Lisa did this, it was her. All these months I have been spending time with her, caring about her, when she was the one that caused my nightmares. She was the villain in the hoodie. Finally, the demon from my nightmares had a face and it was the one person in the world outside my family that I trusted with all my heart.

"I couldn't face what I had done alone, I didn't want to see if I had hurt her. So, after I threatened you, I ran to Jason, he was still in the pool with everyone. I told him everything. I loved him and he loved me but we couldn't be together because I had too many responsibilities. He had been helping me steal money for the kids, helping me take care of them. I had asked him earlier to come with me, help me steal things in the lockers. He blamed himself for not coming with me, if he had then maybe he could have been there to stop me from pushing Ellie over," she agonised, crying through sobs that wracked her body as she explained. Jason the boy who Blake bullied and killed himself because of this secret, it was all coming together, he helped Lisa.

Lisa's expression was filled with so much pain, such raw real pain and I couldn't understand how this story could be true, but her pain was so real. I gasped in a breath but it was all the air I could take in as I was struggling to breathe. A weight that was slowly compounding on my chest was now impossible to inhale through.

"Stop," I barked, raising my chained hands up in front of me. I couldn't hear this, I refused to listen to her lies. But there was a part of me, a part deep down that was listening because I knew there was something not right about Ellie's absence in our lives the last year. She was so apprehensive to leave mum and I for college, we were planning her first trip back to see us long before she had even left for college. But she had made excuses saying that she was taking extra courses through the breaks and joining clubs and she hardly ever called me these days. It was like I didn't even have a sister anymore.

It was that thought that broke me, that made me see that maybe Lisa's words had some realism to them. I staggered a step backwards, my back banging onto the wall which held me up for support and I started hyperventilating.

Lisa's face broke then, revealing the tormented soul inside, haunted from what she had done. Tears spilled down her cheeks and she let go of the girl's hand to bury her head in her hands.

"I returned to Ellie with Jason, but there was nothing we could do, her chest was covered in blood." Lisa looked up at me from her hands, her eyes red and she placed her hand over her mouth as she sobbed. My own heart broke in response, my features falling apart, my face scrunching up in pain as a cry left my lips.

"She was dead, I killed her," Lisa declared.

***

A new chapter YAY!! I hope I answered your questions in this chapter everyone, there was a lot of reveals.

What did everyone think? I loved hearing all your ideas on the last chapter on what you guys thought would happen in this chapter :)

I came up with the ideas for this chapter years ago!! I knew Rose's sister was the person who died in the prologue since I started writing this book, I am a bit crazy like that haha

Until next update, much love, Elaine Xx