Page 115 of Damsel in Disguise

He starts the engine, one hand on the wheel, his gaze flickering up to the rearview mirror every few seconds.

They’re watching me for any signs of resistance. Or maybe just an imperceptible crack in my composure.

I give them neither.

I lean back against the seat, forcing my shoulders to loosen and my breathing to even out. My cuffed hands rest on my lap, but my pulse refuses to settle completely.

That’s when it falls into place.

This isn’t a mistake.

They didn’t stumble onto me by accident. They didn’t dig through old records by chance, didn’t piece together fragments of a past that was meant to stay buried.

This is planned specifically for me.

Something cold and electric slides down my spine, settling low in my stomach.

If someone went through this much effort—if they reached into Keinston’s sealed history, intercepted me this cleanly right after I found out about Triarch Dominion—then this isn’t law enforcement acting on its own.

My lips part slightly, a quiet breath slipping out as the realization settles in.

It has to be them—the Triarch Dominion.

37. PSYCHO

ariella

FOUR YEARS AGO—AGE 16

My three besties—Athena, Sadie, and Refayla—hang from the ceiling over a pool filled with three hundred piranhas, my temporary starving pets for vengeance.

Their limp bodies are whipped bloody before I suspended them above the water.

I step back, momentarily struck by the art I’ve carved into their skin.

Bloody strokes. Open flesh. Trembling bodies matching perfectly with the bass of Dolls by Bella Porch blasting through the speakers.

The girls pant in ragged bursts, still not fully recovered from the cocktail of adrenaline I kept injecting into their veins.

I needed them to be fully aware. I wanted every second of this etched into their corrupted souls.

I tied them up and whipped them every day since I dragged them here—little breaks, nothing generous. One lash for every tear they ever made me shed.

I whipped them and cried. I was losing the only three people I ever called best friends. Then I whipped them more, for the tears they were making me shed.

Seven thousand and twenty-nine.

That’s how much each of them earned.

The fun part? I made them count. One mistake meant five extra lashes. That’s how we reached this extraordinary number.

It was supposed to be much less, but my besties seemed to love making mistakes—no wonder they tried to mess with the Keinston.

And now here they are… stripped of every scrap of fabric, just like how they tried to strip me bare.

“You wanted to test my character?” I chirp, tossing my hands out dramatically. “Here you go. A psychopath!”

“You’re a monster,” Athena spits.