"You can't, can you?" Ashlynn shook her head. "Because you don't know. You don't know why you're here. You don't know what you want. You're just drifting, child. Drifting from one man to the next, letting them take pieces of you until there's nothing left."
"That's not true."
"Then prove it. Leave. Walk out that door and never look back."
I stared at her. The laundry room was quiet, the only sound the hum of the dryer and the distant murmur of the house. I could see the driveway from the window—the gate, the trees, the road that led to the city.
Freedom.
It was right there.
But I couldn't take it.
"I can't," I said.
"Can't, or won't?"
"Does it matter?"
She sighed. It was a long, tired sound, the sound of someone who had been fighting a losing battle for far too long.
"I'll have fresh towels brought to your room," she said. "And I'll pray for you, Miss Monika. Whether you want it or not."
She turned back to her folding, dismissing me. I stood in the doorway for a long moment, watching her work, and I thought about what she'd said.
Predators don't get fixed.
I thought about Aleksander. About the way he'd held me, the way he'd said he loved me. I thought about Gabriel. About the way he'd promised to wait, to love me no matter what. I thought about Nathan. About the way he'd looked at me like I was something to be consumed.
They were predators. All of them.
But maybe that was what I needed.
Maybe I was a predator too.
I walked back to my room in a daze.
The hallways were empty, the servants busy with their morning tasks. I passed the library, the ballroom, the greenhouse where Gabriel had kissed me for the first time.Everything looked different now—the light harsher, the shadows deeper.
I stopped outside the nursery. The door was closed, the lock engaged, but I could hear something inside. A voice. Low and soft, almost like a lullaby.
I pressed my ear to the door.
"My mother used to rock me in this chair," the voice said. "She'd sing to me. I don't remember the songs, but I remember the sound of her voice. Low. Soft. Like she was telling me secrets."
Nathan.
I pulled back from the door. My heart was pounding, my breath coming faster. He was in there. In the nursery. Talking to himself, or to the ghosts of the past.
I should have walked away.
I didn't.
I pushed open the door.
He was sitting in the rocking chair, his back to me, his head bowed. He didn't turn around when I entered. He just kept rocking, back and forth, the rhythm slow and hypnotic.
"Monika," he said. "I was wondering when you'd find me."
