Chapter 4

The heavy oak door creaked open, revealing the terrified face of Maria, our housekeeper. Her eyes darted to the floor where I lay curled in a fetal position, my bruised cheek pressed against the carpet where my mother’s life had been stolen.

I didn't cry as I pushed myself off the floor. I had absolutely no tears left to shed.

I stepped out of the tomb and into the sunlit hallway.

The bright morning light filtering through the massive floor-to-ceiling windows felt offensive, a cruel, glaring mockery of the darkness consuming me.

I dragged my heavy feet toward the grand living room.

There, lounging on the leather sofa, was Ethan.

He looked so perfectly normal, a picture-perfect child enjoying a lazy weekend morning. But as I stared at the boy I had raised since he was a colicky, abandoned infant, a boy I had loved so fiercely I would have taken a bullet for him, I saw nothing but a monster.

Hearing my footsteps brush against the hardwood, Ethan paused his game and turned his head.

"Finally," Ethan huffed, tossing the controller onto the plush cushions. "I'm starving. Hurry up and make me my favorite pancakes. The ones with the chocolate chips and the strawberry syrup."

I stood completely frozen.

"Are you deaf?" he snapped. "Mom is still sleeping, and Dad is in the shower. You need to make me food. You're supposed to serve us, that's what Dad said. So go to the kitchen right now."

I looked at his demanding, entitled face. For seven years, I had wiped his tears, nursed his fevers, and held him close when he had nightmares.

In that single, crystalline moment, the maternal love I once harbored for him rotted away completely, turning into pure, unadulterated hatred.

"No," I said.

Ethan’s jaw dropped in genuine shock. "What did you say?"

"I said no," I repeated, turning my back on him. I began to walk away, intending to go to my bedroom, pack whatever I could carry, and walk out the front door forever.

"You can't say no to me!" Ethan shrieked, his voice pitching into a hysterical whine.

The sound of his bare feet slapping rapidly against the hardwood floor was the only warning I got before he launched himself at my back.

He grabbed the fabric of my wrinkled blouse, yanking it hard enough to tear the delicate seam at my shoulder.

"Make me breakfast!" he screamed. He began kicking my shins with his sharp heels, his small fists pummeling my thighs relentlessly. "You have to do what I say! You're not my real mom! You're just a maid! Elara is my real mom!"

I tried to step back, to pry his clawing fingers off my clothes, but he clung to me like a vicious little parasite.

"Let go of me, Ethan," I warned, my voice trembling with suppressed, dangerous rage.

"No! I'll tell Dad!" he threatened. "I'll tell him you were mean to me, and he'll lock you in the dead grandma room again! I'll make him lock you in there forever!"

The dead grandma room.

The sheer, psychopathic cruelty of those words snapped the very last fragile thread of my restraint.

I shoved him away.

It wasn't a violent strike, just a desperate, forceful push to get his hands off me. But Ethan was small, and he was completely off-balance from his kicking fit.

He stumbled backward, his arms flailing wildly in the air. His heel caught the thick edge of the rug. He fell hard, and a sickening crack echoed through the massive room as the side of his head collided with the sharp, beveled edge of the glass coffee table.

For a split second, there was absolute, horrifying silence.

Ethan lay on the floor, his eyes wide with shock.

Then, a sharp, ear-piercing cry tore from his throat.

"Ethan!"

The frantic scream came from the top of the sweeping staircase.

I looked up to see Elara sprinting down the steps with Matthew right on her heels.

In an instant, Matthew’s handsome face contorted into a mask of pure, murderous rage.

He lunged across the room with terrifying speed. Before I could even take a breath to defend myself, his large hands clamped around my throat.

The sheer force of his momentum lifted me entirely off my feet, and he slammed my back against the hard plaster wall with bone-crushing force.

The air was instantly cut off from my lungs. I clawed desperately at his wrists, my vision exploding with bright white stars as panic set in.

Matthew leaned in, his face mere inches from mine, his breath hot and reeking of mint and malice.

"You psychotic bitch!" he roared, his spit hitting my cheek as his grip tightened like a steel vise. "If he dies, I'll kill you!"