Prologue
8Years Ago
“Klarissa, you have to wake up.”
Klarissa moaned.Was that her mother?
“Klarissa!Wake up!Wake up baby, and run!”
Klarissa’s head throbbed like a drumbeat of pain, each pulse behind her eyes sharp enough to make her nauseated.The scent of antiseptic clogged her nose, mixing with the sterile chill of recycled air.When she tried to lift her hand to shield her face from the harsh fluorescent light above, leather straps cut into her wrists.Another set at her ankles.Panic roared through her chest.She twisted against the restraints, ribs screaming in protest, and the heart monitor at her side spiked frantically in response.
“Mom?”Her voice cracked, thin and desperate.
The hydraulic hiss of a door opening made her freeze.A tall man strode in, his presence filling the room like smoke.His hair was a dignified salt-and-pepper, his suit dark and tailored, the cut screaming wealth.But it was his eyes—hard, cold, and calculating—that froze her where she lay.
He stared at her for a long, uncomfortable moment, his gaze unblinking, making her skin crawl.Klarissa’s voice wavered.“Who ...who are you?”
The man’s lips curved into something that wasn’t quite a smile.“Do you not recognize your own father?”His accent was thick Italian, his tone a blend of arrogance and disdain.
Klarissa’s stomach plummeted.Father.The word rang hollow.The man she had only ever known through her mother’s warnings, a looming shadow that haunted bedtime stories and whispered fears—Vincent Caruso.
She rasped, “Where is she?Where’s my mom?”
Caruso’s sneer carved lines into his face.“Your mother is alive ...for now.Whether she stays that way depends entirely on you.”
Her memory cracked open like a broken dam—her mother’s laughter while driving her to dinner to celebrate her recent graduation, the radio blaring, headlights blinding, then the spin of metal, the taste of blood, and nothingness.Until now.
When Klarissa’s defiance snapped, she shouted, “Tell me where she is!What have you done to her?”
Caruso’s hand lashed out, the sting of the slap exploding across her cheek.She gasped in shock, her head snapping to the side, pain and nausea slamming through her in equal quantities.He leaned closely, the smell of expensive cologne suffocating.
“You will not raise your voice to me,” he growled.
Klarissa glared back, tears welling but her jaw tight.It took everything she had to not bite back.She was injured, she had no idea where her mom was, she would have to play this asshole’s game.
His lips peeled back in a cold smile.“Respect me, or you and your mother both die.You understand me?As far as you are concerned, I am God.”
Her breath hitched, and a sob broke loose despite her effort to choke it down.He had her mother.“Please ...just don’t hurt her.”
Her agreement was little more than a whispered sob.She lay still, trembling, until she thought she heard something faint—her mother’s voice, calling her name, urging her to wake.The sound pierced through her panic, reminding her that she wasn’t completely alone.That was what gave her the strength to focus her gaze back on the man looming over her.
Caruso leaned closer, his expression softening into something more dangerous than rage.Calculation.
“You’re a genius, Klarissa.That mind, that IQ—that comes from me.And I will not let it go to waste.”
She blinked in confusion, her lips parting.“What are you talking about?”
“You know about your mother’s illness,” he explained, almost conversationally.“I know you have been searching for the cure.But this disease that has been rotting her from the inside, exacerbated by the animal she carries within her.She is a shifter who cannot shift, and that latent beast is slowly killing her.”He crouched lower, voice silk wrapped around steel.“If you can separate the animal from the woman, strip it from her DNA, then the human part of her might live.”
Her chest tightened, tears springing to her eyes.“You want me to experiment on her?”
“I want you to study, to learn, to create.You will research everything you need to in order to heal her, but every piece of that research will also be shared with me.Do you understand?This is bigger than one woman’s survival.It is about control, about power.”
Klarissa’s mind reeled.Her mother’s life hung in the balance, and the key to saving her lay in tearing apart the very thing that made them who they were.She would endure, not for him—but for her mother.
****
Six Years Ago
