(Author notes: Mmm. I'm back. Again. Hopefully, this time it won't be as crazy of an LOA, but I write when the inspiration hits me, which - yeah. This has hit me pretty hard. Leave a review? I'll give you a cookie. Anyhow carrying on...)

From the diaries of Hailey Beckford -

I've never been one to let a grudge go lightly - perhaps the Irish temperment that boils in my veins, perhaps it's the stories I've heard of the betrayal that my father had to deal with. I'm aware of the fact that I'm Daddy's Little Princess, and nothing will ever change his thougths on that matter...

Even if he would never approve of me going to do what I see necessary.

Daddy shouldn't be in a wheelchair.

See, this was when I was younger, when we still lived in Conneticut, before what Mom only referred to as 'the accident' happened, and we'd moved to Virginia to be closer to the family - all the easier to take care of Daddy.

I've thought about this for a long time. For it to finally happen....

-*-

It's the hissing of the brakes that startle me from my writing, and as the Greyhound bus lurches to a stop, I stuff the small notebook into the hidden pocket of my jacket, the plans I'd constructed kept close to my heart, the boiling point of years of seeing only the aftermath of something that had happened when I was too young to even realize what betrayal was. Far too young to realize that righting this wrong would be something that would consume me.

Blonde hair, a tiny bit matted from sleeping on the long trip, dangles in front of dual colored eyes, one reflecting the blue of the heavens, the other a murky hazel, perhaps the color of a moss overgrown pond. Red track pants and a black tank top cling to a curvy frame, one that is apparently thought to be attractive by the opposite sex.

It's what I'm banking on, after all. Loveliness can always lure her way into the heart of evil, if only to destroy it from the inside out.

After all, that's what I intend to do - walk blindly into the lions' den, play their little games...

Bring them to their knees. Make them hurt like I have, like my family has.

It'll be easy, I'm sure. Power brings corruption. Corruption heightens lust for more of everything. Lust - for more power.

And what kind of threat is a pretty young blonde thing, anyway?