“Cool.” The word fell flat between us.
She let the silence hang before she asked, “Did you plan on checking out any sorority houses for next semester?”
“Uh, no. Perks of living nearby. Besides, I like the dorms.” The words came out strangled, my fatigue slowly winning the war within me.
She nodded as if understanding. “Ah, that’s right. I forgot, you’re a local.” She gifted me with a bright smile. I recalled our first meeting, when she mentioned she had lived abroad her whole life, and someone in her family chose this school for her business degree.
I’d pitied her then, for being in someone else’s control.
I shoved my dark hair back and said, “It’s fine. I didn’t expect you to remember.”Just like I didn’t remember your name when we first met.
Alice busied herself at her desk, and I caught sight of her name embroidered on her bookbag. Classy and somehow alarming, she would proudly display it for others to see. There was a small part of me that wanted to make the effort to befriend Alice, to suggest we grab coffee, toswap stories about professors, to care about whatever boy she inevitably had a crush on.
But a larger part of me was too tired, too apathetic, and overflowing with a lifetime of trauma that held me back. That same part had learned that caring about people just gave them leverage over you.
I rose from my bed and sat at my own desk, suddenly remembering the mess I’d left there like an idiot.I hope she didn’t notice them.Pages and pages of my handwriting comparing my two lives, trying to make sense of the impossible. Names, dates, and places, all circled and connected like some detective’s murder board.
Which, in a way, it kind of was.
One name dominated the chaos, circled in red so many times the paper had torn: Edward Fitzgerald—buyer, owner, murderer.
He didn’t know me in this life. He’d never seen my face, never heard my name. In this life, I’d grown up safe in my parents' home, riding horses and winning both archery competitions and Brazilian jiu jitsu tournaments.
But I knew where to find him. Men like Edward were creatures of habit, and his habits had been branded into my memory with the kind of clarity trauma provides. Every Saturday, he went to the posh and invitation-only nightclub named Oubliette.
I’d been there hundreds of times in my first life. Dragged along as decoration, forced to wait in velvet-draped rooms while he conducted ‘business’ behind doors that muffled sound but not enough to hide the screaming. Made to dance for his colleagues while he ventured below into the belly of Oubliette. I stripped for their amusement, pretended to be grateful for the privilege of being owned by someone so powerful. Even now, I remembered the perfumed air thick with sin, and the bright-eyed woman I had come to admire.
Vengeance would give me the justice and moral code I needed for it to feel right. With vengeance, I could weave a web of lies, focusing on retribution towards a corrupt society that sold and killed women, but deep down I knew. . . revenge would fuel me.
A pitch-black darkness began to devour me from beneath my ribs and wrap its red-hot thorns like a second heartbeat. I could not ignore the calling, nor withdraw myself from a life simmering with grief and hatred.
“Violet?” Alice’s voice pulled me back. “Are you okay? You look pale.”
I realized I’d been gripping the edge of my desk hard enough to leave crescents in the wood. “Just tired. Haven’t been sleeping well.”
“The health center has counselors,” she offered carefully, “if you need to talk to someone.”
What would I tell a counselor? That I remembered being murdered? That I’d woken up in my younger body with all my trauma intact like some cosmic joke? That the man who’d killed me was out there living his life and still buying other girls? That I was going to hunt him down, string him up, and bleed him dry the same way he’d bled me?
“Thanks,” I said instead. “I appreciate your concern. I just need some more time to adjust, I think.”
“Of course.” And she went about busying herself on her side of the room, switching to her studies as I turned back to my notes. The red circles around Edward’s name looked like bloody targets.
I’d need my money first, so I could start buying supplies and information. Then I’d need to find a way to get invited into Oubliette, despite having no connections to that world or their clientele in this life. I prayed that the Oubliette I knew was the same one Edward had taken me to.
I glanced at my phone, wondering if Rowan listened to me for once as the new piercings throbbed against my shirt, little points of pain that reminded me I was here, this was real, and I was in control. Both versions of me agreed on that much.
I put my notes away and lay back on my bed, staring at that butterfly-shaped water stain as I contemplated my next steps. The gods might have given me this second chance by accident, but I’d take their mistake and forge it into something sharp enough to cut.
And then I’d carve Edward’s heart out.
Chapter 2
Rowan
Iheard Violet’s voice waver through Levi’s phone, clipped and angry, right before she told me to go fuck myself. The line went dead, but her words still echoed in my ears.
There was a hint of. . .somethingin her voice that was not normally there. She had been clearly bewildered when I had answered, and then she struggled when I poked at her. It had been so much easier than normal to get under her skin.
