Against the wall my back hit, causing the air to explode from lungs.
Something shattered above me.
A heavy family portrait ripped away, smashing to the ground at my feet. Glass exploded outwards, shards running across the stone like memories spilled from a drawer. Smiling, perfect faces peered up at me from the broken frame—what once was entirely whole now divided and shattered beyond repair.
Just like mine.
The ground at my back was ice cold and wet, slippery with condensation, soaking through my clothes as rain pounded the world outside. The storm screamed like it was alive, the wind shrill through unseen gaps as thunder boomed above—bottomless, savage, pounding—shaking the house to its very foundation as if the sky wanted to pry it apart.
Lightning cut through the high windows.
For one beat it threw him in jagged, unrelenting sharpness — his jaw chiseled from rock; his mouth locked into a cruel, grimace curve; eyes as dark as the night consuming me whole. Then the light died away, and left him half-shadow, half-monster: as if even the dark wasn't quite sure it wanted to take him.
He barely kissed my feet as he lifted me, his fingers dug into my flesh like steel clamps. Air vanished. Panic jacked through my chest as I raked at his wrist, nails digging fruitlessly into unyielding muscle.
"You are mine now, little bird," he said softly, his voice a low murmur that somehow cut deeper than a scream. "And that means I can do whatever I want with you."
The storm howled outside, rain pounding on the roof like gunfire, but there was only him inside. Except for the crushing pressure to my neck. My eyes were watering at the edges, black seeping in like ink into water.
He whispered, his breath warm against my ear.
"Let's see what use you can be."
Then suddenly he released me.
I tumbled to the floor in a mess, my lungs streaming sucking up air as if it was the very first breath I had ever taken. My hands tore at my throat as I coughed and choked, tears running down my eyes, body trembling.
I tasted blood.
The room wheeled around me as I sucked in breath after breath, each one jagged and agonizing. The thunder of my own heart pounded in my ear competing with the storm outside.
This wasn't supposed to happen.
I can't believe my parents did this to me.
They sold me.
The idea cut more than he could with his fingers.
How could they?
I'd been invisible to them, all my life.
Liora was the sun and I was only the shadow she cast. The golden child. The spoiled one. The one they could not help but love. My father wanted a doctor in the family, he wanted Liora to be his dreams, but she never even knew herself. Never studied. Never cared.
So I did, in hopes that they would finally notice me.
I studied until my eyes burned and my hands cramped. I aced every exam. Every assignment. Every course. I thought foolishly that if I became perfect enough, they would finally look at me.
But they never did.
Even on the day of my graduation, when my name boomed through the auditorium, their seats were vacant. I looked for them in the crowd till my chest ached.
I was nothing to them.
But still, when they invited me to dinner, hope sprang eternal. Stupid, fragile hope. I just thought, that maybe this time … maybe they really wanted know to make amends from the past, to finally see me as their daughter.
But it wasn't a celebration.
It was a transaction.
My chest clenched with pain as a sob was wrenched from me. The storm outside raged on and now it was pouring down the windows like tears I couldn't stop crying.
A shadow loomed over me.
Strong hands seized me before I could scrabble away. I squealed as a big man scooped me up with ease over his shoulder as though I weighed nothing at all. The earth spun upside down, my hair tumbled across my face as I kicked, battled with fists that pounded uselessly at his concrete back.
"Put me down!" I screamed, my voice breaking. "Put me down!"
He didn't even flinch.
Each step was painful on my bruised body as he brought me outside. Cold, wet slapped against my skin thereafter rain had soaked my clothes the moment it washed me off. There came a flash of lightning, blindingly white; then a great lapping peal of thunder, so loud that it seemed the very world was rending.
Then we stopped.
I could see the fire's reflection in puddles below me, and with my heart hammering I took a deep breath — then fell away from the car.
"Burn the whole place down."
The last line was spoken without a moment's doubt. Without emotion. As if ordering a glass of water.
"No—no, please!" I sobbed, my voice raw. "Please don't! Please!"
Men scrabbled, gasoline splattering, matches scratching and my yells were lost in the crying rain. FIRE blossomed savagely, consuming the house behind us. Heat surged. Smoke twisted its way into the sky while the storm smote on, rain battling fire in a cruel and senseless warfare.
I screamed until my throat felt raw and burning.
But my screams meant nothing.
And I was tossed into the back of a black S.U.V., my body smashing against leather seats. The door closed with a final reverberating thud. A moment later, so did he, sliding in next to me as the car came roaring back to life.
Lightning illuminated his face again.
Kieran.
The devil my parents had handed me to.
He gazed at me with empty cold eyes, as if I was just something to be gauged and scaled.
How could something so beautiful be so scary? I managed at this, and my brain was fraying.
He threw me a malicious grin.
"I hate you," I snarled, calling upon whatever last vestige of defiance remained in me.
He wiped away the spit on his cheek. And then his hand whipped forth and seized my chin, forcing me to look up at him.
"Do that again," he said serenely, "and I'll cut your head off."
"Go to hell," I whispered.
He laughed—soft, dark, amused.
"Darling," he whispered, lowering his head, "I was born in hell."
He snapped his fingers.
"Sedate her."
Panic exploded inside me.
One of Kieran's bodyguards drew a long needle, glinting with metal beneath the now constant flickering lightning.
"No, no…" My voice was weak, quavering. "Please… please don't…"
I struggled to get back, shaking so hard I could hardly talk from fear. The tempest outside blended into streaks of light and shadow. My heart was hammering so loud it hurt.
The needle pierced my skin.
Cold flooded my veins.
"No… please…" I whispered, barely audible now.
The world tilted.
Sounds became distant, muffled, as if I were sinking underwater. The rain softened into a dull hum. Faces blurred. The edges of my vision darkened, closing in.
"Boss," one of the men said, his voice warped and far away. "What are we going to do with her?"
Kieran didn't hesitate.
"We kill her," he replied flatly. "She's of no use to us."
Lightning flashed one last time, illuminating his expressionless face.
"No… please…" I breathed.
Then the darkness swallowed me whole.