Jean Vice

Britton Walsh has never had a home. After a lifetime in the care system, she doesn't expect she’ll ever find one. But beginning her senior year with new foster parents, in a new city, means starting over - yet again. Tom and Cate Cahill seem okay. The hitch? Their daughter, Avery. Beautiful, popular, and cool, Avery is everything Britton is not. She’s all Britton could ever ask for in a sister, or even a friend - but having survived without either for so long, Britton knows the way her heart races whenever Avery enters the room can only mean one thing.

The day that the iron doors of the old mill in Westover, Massachusetts, closed forever is a day that still haunts the sleepy town’s residents. On that fateful day 100 years ago, 11 people died in a fearsome fire, and since then, no one has dared to revisit the mill or the dark secrets locked inside it. Now, a member of the once-powerful Sturgess family has aspirations to reopen the mill. Little does Philip Sturgess know that by unlocking the padlock he is also unlocking horrible secrets from the past. There are forces at work that will do their best to see the mill doors stay tightly closed.

They call it the Academy: a secluded, cliff-top mansion overlooking the rugged Pacific coast. It's a school for children gifted - or cursed - with extraordinary minds, children soon to come under the influence of an intelligence even more brilliant than their own - and unspeakably evil.