Chapter 3

I woke up to the biting cold.

I was in a desolate cemetery. Next to me was a freshly dug, gaping hole in the earth. The dirt was piled messily beside it. Not far away, the old man who attacked me lay motionless on the ground, covered in soil.

A scream tore from my throat.

That was the man who kidnapped me.

Then my eyes fell on the tombstone in front of the empty grave. It bore the name of the person who erected it: Olivia Miller.

This was Olivia's father? But he wasn't dead. He couldn't be here.

My body went rigid with terror. Before I could process the insanity of the situation, a piercing wail split the air behind me.

"Dad! Dad!"

Tires screeched. Car doors slammed. Liam and Olivia were sprinting toward me.

"Nina, you monster! My father believed in a peaceful rest! I buried him here in our family plot, and you dug up his grave? How could you be so evil?" Olivia shrieked, pointing a trembling finger at me.

She was sobbing, her face flushed, playing the part of the grieving daughter to perfection.

I stared at the "corpse." The old man was lying still, but I could see the faint rise and fall of his chest. His skin had color. He looked nothing like a man who had been buried for days.

"You liar," I started, "Your father is clearly..."

Smack!

With a sharp crack, Liam slapped me hard across the face.

My head whipped to the side, my ear ringing. My cheek burned as if on fire.

Before I could recover, Liam grabbed the front of my shirt and hurled me to the ground.

The drug was still in my system, so my limbs were heavy and unresponsive. I was helpless to stop him.

"Still lying!" he roared. "I knew you were petty, Nina, but I never imagined you were this twisted!

"I was just going through the motions to give a dying man peace, and you desecrate his grave? What kind of demon have you become?"

He stared at me with such pure hatred that I thought his eyes might actually set me on fire.

So this was the trap.

It all clicked into place.

Looking at Olivia's theatrical sobs and Liam's blinding rage, I felt the agony ripping through my heart.

"Idiot," I spat, a trickle of blood from my cut lip staining the dirt. "You think a man who's been dead for days looks like that? Open your eyes and look at him before you start accusing me."

For a flicker of a second, confusion crossed Liam's face. His grip on me loosened.

But in that instant, Olivia grabbed a nearby shovel and charged at me, tears streaming down her face.

"I hate you! I hate you!" she screamed. "You dug up my father and slandered him? I'll kill you!"

The shovel swung towards my head. I flinched, but then Liam's expression changed. He let go of me and lunged, catching Olivia's arm just in time.

She looked at him, stunned, her eyes wide with tear-filled disbelief.

"Liam, she dug up my father's grave! She left his body out in the open! And you're still protecting her?"

I had to admit, her acting was flawless. She could win an Oscar.

Any bystander would believe I was the villain.

But I never expected Liam to stop her.

I watched, surprised, as he silently took the shovel from her hands.

"I'm the one who was wrong about her," he said. "I'm the one who caused you this pain. Don't look. Let me handle this."

He turned her around, shielding her from the sight of me, and turned back with the heavy shovel held loosely in his hand. He loomed over me.

I had never seen him look this mad. My body trembled when I saw his livid face.

I knew, with a terrifying certainty, that he was capable of killing me. The drug was still weighing me down. I couldn't run.

"Liam! Think! Just use your brain!" I screamed. "If I wanted to dig up a grave, do you really think I'd do it myself? Can't you just check if he's actually dead?"

I was pleading, trying to find a shred of the man I once knew.

My words were cut short by a wave of excruciating pain.

Liam had swung the shovel down onto my outstretched arm.

In that horrifying moment, I heard the sickening snap of my forearm breaking.

I screamed.

The scream was primal. My vision tunneled, the world dissolving into a haze of white-hot agony.

Liam froze, gripping the shovel. His face was a mask of shock.

"Why didn't you move?" he muttered. "You just let me hit you?"

He should have realized when he slapped me that I was too weak to even run.

How could I possibly have dodged a shovel?

"I get it," he said. "You feel guilty. You know you deserved this."

His eyes hardened as he glanced toward Olivia. Just then, a group of young men appeared out of nowhere, rushing to the "body," lifting it, and carrying it off into the trees.

"They're from my village," Olivia murmured, leaning into Liam's chest. "After this, we'll have to find a new plot."

"Call 911..." I gasped. "Please... I'm begging you..."

I was drenched in a cold sweat, on the verge of passing out.

But I never heard him make the call.

I heard Olivia urging him to leave. I heard their footsteps crunching on the gravel path. I heard a car door slam and an engine fade into the distance. They left me there.

I didn't know how long I lay there, drifting in and out of consciousness, before the piercing wail of a police siren dragged me back from the edge.

It was Lisa.

And with her was another man, one I hadn't seen in a very long time.