The rain eased by afternoon, leaving the house wrapped in a humid stillness that clung to the air like a whisper that refused to die. The Smith estate looked almost peaceful from the outside columns polished, the garden trimmed, every window gleaming. But Emily knew better. Peace in that house was only a costume.
She sat on the edge of her bed, scrolling through the new camera feeds she had hijacked. Six lenses. Six new sets of eyes, all trained on her. The stepmother was learning fast. Emily smiled faintly, her fingers moving with slow precision as she traced each signal back to its source. A few lines of code later, she owned them.
The walls of her room no longer watched her; they reported to her.
She muted the tablet and leaned back, listening to the soft murmur of conversation downstairs. From here, voices were thin, distorted, but she could tell who they belonged to her father, calm and hesitant, and the smooth, clipped tone of her stepmother, Patricia.
"I don't understand why you agreed so easily," Patricia was saying. "You know Timothy Grant's reputation. He doesn't forgive mistakes. What if he"
"He's powerful," her father interrupted, voice low. "And power protects us. You saw the company's losses. The merger with Grant Industries will fix everything."
"So you'd sell her off like a token?" Patricia's tone sharpened.
"She agreed, didn't she?"
A brittle silence followed. Emily's lips twitched.
She could picture Patricia's face thin smile, cold eyes calculating their next move. They weren't worried about her safety. They were worried about their leverage. The shares. Her mother's legacy.
Emily reached for her notebook. On the first page she wrote: Control the board before they move the pieces.
Every breath she took since waking in this body had been part of a single plan test the walls, learn their shape, then tear them apart from the inside.
The tablet flickered. Stephanie's voice filled the speakers next, light and petulant.
"Mother, do you think she'll really marry him? What if she changes her mind?"
"She won't," Patricia replied. "Not if she values what little she has left. Keep an eye on her, just in case."
"I already am," Stephanie said. "I put the maid in charge of her meals. She'll report everything."
Emily's fingers paused over the screen. The maid. So that's how they planned to monitor her next.
She closed the laptop gently, stood, and crossed to the window. The garden glistened under the weak sun, its wet hedges reflecting slivers of light. Somewhere down there, the staff moved quietly through the paths obedient, unnoticed.
It was a perfect place for secrets to hide.
When dinner came, she didn't eat. Instead, she sat by her desk, dissecting the maid's background on her phone. Within minutes, she knew everything bank accounts, family, debts. She understood the leash Patricia had placed around the woman's neck.
Emily could cut that leash at any moment. She didn't yet. Fear was a more useful ally than loyalty.
Hours slipped past. The house settled into night, creaking softly like an old thing remembering its weight. From the hall, she heard her father's study door close, then Stephanie's laughter echo faintly before fading into silence.
She turned off the lights, letting the glow from her monitors spill over the room. On one of the hacked feeds, she caught a glimpse of Patricia entering the study again, whispering urgently to her husband.
"Tomorrow," Patricia said. "We'll visit the Grants and finalize the terms. Once the contract is signed, she can't back out."
Her father sighed. "Emily's not a child anymore."
"Exactly why she's dangerous," Patricia murmured.
Emily leaned back, the faintest smirk curving her lips. Dangerous. They were finally seeing the truth, even if they didn't understand it yet.
She wrote one final note before shutting everything down:
They think I'm the pawn. I'll make them forget the board belongs to me.
Outside, a gust of wind rattled the glass, scattering rainwater down the pane. Emily didn't move. The storm had passed, but inside her, something colder was taking shape a quiet, deliberate fury, waiting for its time.