No sagging cardigan. No unbrushed hair. No slump to her shoulders or brittle looking hands. Her gray hair is swept back into a sleek twist at the n ape of her neck, not a strand outof place. Her clothes are tailored, expensive—dark slacks and a fitted coat that costs more than everything I’ve ever owned combined.
Her posture is immaculate.
Her eyes, my mother’s eyes, are sharp and calculating as they take me in.
The woman who is biologically my grandmother.
She steps closer, heels echoing, and stops out of reach. Her gaze flicks to the blood soaking my sleeve, then back to my face.
“Nasty business, having to cut into that flawless skin of yours,” she says coolly. “But the drug I developed is most effective on those who are…worn down, so to speak.”
The words land like another cut.
Laurel Masterson eyes me like I’m nothing more than garbage beneath her shoes.
“You look so much like Sadie,” she admits, a cruel twist to her mouth. “It was almost like seeing a ghost when you walked onto the ranch.”
“You…did this?” I whisper in disbelief.
She sighs, like I’ve exhausted her already. “Henry is a blunt instrument. But sometimes blunt instruments are useful.”
My stomach churns. “Why?”
She studies me for a moment longer, her expression unreadable. “Because you were never supposed to come here. Henry didn’t do his job right the first time. Managed to kill that worthless daughter of mine but messed it all up. Fumbled the ball because he couldn’t keep his dick out of her.”
The truth settles heavy and suffocating in my chest.
“You had your own daughter killed?”
“After she failed to do as instructed, of course,” Laurel scoffs as if I offended her. “My husband may have been content eating from the hand of Hudson Shaw and taking the scraps he gave us, but I wasn’t. He promised me the world and all I got was an oldcattle ranch and a husband who worshipped the ground other walked on. It was sickening.”
“You should have left then,” I spit bitterly, my head still swimming.
She laughs, cold and mockingly. “You really don’t know who your family is, do you?”
My jaw tightens, the pain causing me to wince, but I don’t take my offs of the woman in front of me as I remain silent.
“How utterly stupid of them to keep you in the dark,” she muses, light dancing behind her eyes. “Foolish, honestly.”
“Why don’t you tell me what I’m missing then,” I breathe, the pain in my arm growing worse. “You seem to find it funny they left me in the dark.”
The fog in my head thickens, but fury burns hot beneath it, keeping me awake. Attentive.
“You poor sweet girl,” she mocks. “Why should I tell you anything? I’m not the one with drugs working their way through my body. I am going to be the one asking the questions here.”
“You’ve already ascertained I know nothing about my family,” I remind her bitterly. “Not much for me to tell you that you don’t already know yourself.”
“Henry might be wanting that kind of information, but not me,” she tells me, leaning forward so that she’s perfectly in my view. “No, I want to know something different. More personal.”
Her gaze softens a fraction as she looks at me. Not with kindness but with assessment.
“What did your mother tell you?”
Confusion seeps through my addled brain.
“About what?”
She sighs impatiently. “About where my money is, you stupid girl,” she snarls, her darkness coming full circle. “It’s why I sent Henry after her all those years ago. To get the money she stole from me. Millions of dollars my families money that went intothat fucking cattle ranch. Your disgraceful mother up and took it when she ran from town to become a fucking druggie ass bitch.”
