CHAPTER 33 — THE SECRETS THAT REFUSE TO SLEEP
Elena woke with a sharp gasp, the kind that rips through the lungs as if the body is trying to remember how to breathe.
Her heart pounded violently beneath her ribs, her throat dry, her skin cold despite the warm sheets tangled around her legs.
Another nightmare.
Except this time, the nightmare wasn't blurry.
It wasn't distant.
It wasn't made of shadows or old memories.
This one was vivid.
She'd been standing in the Kane estate… but it wasn't the present. It was the past — blurred, shifting, but real. She heard screams she once tried to forget, saw faces she had buried deep inside her mind, and at the center of it all was Lydia's broken voice echoing:
"You promised… you promised you wouldn't let them win…"
Elena pressed her palms to her temples, breathing shakily.
The promise.
The vow she made before ever stepping into the Kane mansion.
The vow that brought her here.
The vow that kept her alive.
But last night…
