Chapter 1

The basement door's deadbolt screeched like a banshee.

I huddled in a mildewed corner, losing track of the days. Seven? Ten?

Darkness and silence reigned, save for the suffocating stench of rot and the rhythmic plink of water from the ceiling. A drop hit the back of my hand, ice-cold and biting. It felt like a corpse's finger brushing my skin.

Pain flared in my right leg, a constant, throbbing reminder. Three months back, Michael Shaw had pitched me down the stairs, and the fracture refused to knit. The damp air turned the injury into a festering mess. I could smell the gangrene competing with the mold.

I spent those months marking time by the smallest measures. I counted the drips, the scratching of rats, the erratic thud of my own heart.

Occasionally, a scream ripped from my throat because the void became unbearable. It dragged me back to being ten years old, snatched and shoved into a pitch-black closet for three days—no light, no noise, just raw terror.

That trauma was etched into my marrow. So, when they threw me into this cellar, I lost my mind.

I clawed and gnawed at the concrete with my nails and teeth, desperate for purchase. I just needed to see the sun. My fingernails tore away, leaving my fingertips a shredded, bloody pulp, yet the physical agony never registered.

I only felt the fear—the kind that threatened to swallow me whole.

A man's voice cut through the darkness. "Vivian, get out here."

It was Michael Shaw, my own flesh and blood.

*****

I lunged for my feet, but my right leg was dead weight. I hitched myself along the wall, inching toward the exit. The hallway light pierced my retinas like a needle, and I winced—only for a fist to wind into my hair and haul me into the corridor.

"Stop faking it," Michael Shaw barked, looming over me. "Stella's home. Are you satisfied?"

Stella Shaw. The girl who'd spent eighteen years living my life.

Three months ago, she'd left a staged suicide note claiming my "harassment" broke her, then threw herself off a yacht into the ocean. The Coast Guard spent a week scouring the waves, but they only recovered one of her heels.

During that week, I was buried in the basement. Michael told me he wanted me to taste the terror she felt while she drowned.

The idiot didn't care that I was claustrophobic. After being snatched at ten and crated in a dark room for three days, tight spaces triggered a total meltdown. I'd choke, shriek, and vibrate with a panic I couldn't switch off.

For three months, I lived on the jagged edge of a psychotic break. I'd howled, clawed the drywall, and hammered my skull against the oak door—until my voice died, my nails stripped, and my forehead was a mask of gore.

Nobody checked.

Nobody asked about the agony.

Nobody brought a plate of food.

They only had eyes for Stella.

"She's alive," Michael said, dragging me by the scalp toward the great room. "A trawler hauled her in, but she's got amnesia. The shrink says she can't handle any trauma. You hear me?"

I heard him.

After the hell I'd just crawled out of, I heard him loud and clear.

The great room was a sea of white light. The crystal chandelier burned like a second sun, forcing me to squint at the girl in the white silk dress on the sofa—looking thin, pale, and fragile as a hothouse lily.

Stella Shaw.

She blinked at me, her gaze vacant and skittish. "Who is that?"

"Just a maid," Mom said, rushing to her side to take her hand. "Don't let her bother you. You're exhausted—you need to rest."

A maid.

A jagged, bitter laugh caught in my throat. Three months ago, I was the "prodigal daughter." They'd told me, "Vivian, you've been through so much. We're going to make it up to you."

Now, I was just the help.

"Mom," Stella whispered, her voice trembling, "she looks terrible. Is she okay?"

"She brought it on herself," Dad said, descending the staircase without sparing me a glance. "Stella, honey, did you forget what she put you through?"

Stella blinked, her eyes welling with tears. "I really don't remember. But if I did something to upset her, I'd want to apologize."

"You aren't apologizing for a damn thing," Michael growled, shoving me hard. "She's the one who needs to beg for your forgiveness!"