I turn instantly.
My aunt’s standing in the hallway. Watching me.
Relief floods through me so quickly it almost makes my knees weak. “Oh my God, you’re okay,” I breathe out, stepping toward her without thinking. “You scared me, I thought—”
I stop. Something about her expression feels…off. Too calm. Not like the frightened woman who called me earlier.
“You came alone?” she asks.
The question makes me pause. “Yes…I came as soon as you called. What happened? You said someone—”
“It’s good that you came alone,” she says, cutting me off.
A cold feeling settles in my chest. “What do you mean?” I ask slowly.
She takes a step closer. Then another. And suddenly, everything clicks. Too late. My heart drops. A sharp, cold realization floods through me as I take an instinctive step back. My breath catches as I really look at her.
The panic I heard earlier is gone. Completely gone. What’s left is something else entirely—something calculated. Something that makes my skin prickle.
“You…you sounded scared,” I say, my voice comes out unsteady despite my effort to keep it level. “You said someone was here.”
“I needed you to come,” she replies simply. And that’s when I understand—the fear in her voice was never real. She used the one thing she knew would bring me running. Me caring about her.
“Why?” I ask, even though I already feel like I know the answer.
She tilts her head, studying me in a way that suddenly feels unfamiliar. As if I’m not looking at the woman who raised me but at someone else wearing her face. “You’ve been hard to reach lately.”
My stomach twists. “I’ve been busy.”
“It doesn’t matter,” she says, her voice colder now. “What matters is that you came.”
Every instinct in me is screaming now.Run.
But my feet feel rooted to the floor, my mind scrambling to catch up. To process what’s happening.
Then my pulse starts to pound. My body finally catches up to the danger my mind’s been trying to deny. I take another step back, my eyes darting toward the door behind me. I calculate the distance, timing, anything that might give me a way out.
She notices. “I wouldn’t do that,” she says calmly.
“Do what?” I ask, stalling.
“Run,” she replies.
My breath catches. Then she moves—faster than I expected, something glinting briefly in her hand. I barely twist away in time, and the knife catches air where I’d been standing. My heart slams against my ribs.
Oh God.This is real. This is actually happening.
“What are you doing?” I gasp, even though the answer is right in front of me.
“What I should have done a long time ago,” she replies, advancing again.
Panic spikes hard, but this time, I don’t freeze. I remember.Feet apart. Stay balanced. She comes at me again, and I step to the side. My hand shooting out instinctively the way Asher showed me, pushing against her arm just enough to throw off her aim.
It works. Barely. “Stay away. I don’t want to hurt you,” I say, my voice shaking but firm enough.
She lets out a short, humorless laugh. “You won’t get the chance.”
She lunges once more, grabbing for me—and I twist, breaking free the way I practiced, clumsy but effective. I back up toward the living room, breathless. But my foot catches the edge of the rug, my balance faltering for just a second too long. Her hand closes around my arm. Tight. Unyielding. She yanks me forward, the knife flashing up—
