Page 140 of The Ashes of Summer

Now I understand exactly what she was.

Not trapped. Employed.

My stomach turns as the memories keep coming. Brenda brushing powder over bruises so they wouldn't show in the photographs. Brenda laying out scraps of lace for terrified girls to put on.

Constance jerks harder on her hair when she starts to fight.

"This bitch tried to shoot me!"

The words carry across the whole warehouse.

Brenda's face is streaked with tears now, mascara run, lipstick smeared. For the first time in all the days I've known her, she looks frightened.

But not for herself.

Her eyes keep going to the bottom of the staircase. To the body lying twisted on the concrete down there.

To him.

Not the women. Not the girls she painted. Him.

"Summer," she gasps.

Hearing my name in her mouth makes my skin crawl. Because how many of them begged her? How many cried while she zipped them into dresses knowing exactly where they were going afterward? How many stood shaking in front of those mirrors while she brushed their hair and made small talk, like it was a salon appointment, like any of it was normal?

My grip tightens around the gun.

Her eyes lock onto mine, and I see something in them that looks almost like hope. Like she genuinely believes I'll help her. Like she thinks the two of us are the same thing.

And that's the worst part of it.

Because six months ago I would have believed her. Six months ago I'd have looked up at that walkway and seen one more woman caught in something too big for her.

Now all I can see are the choices she made. The girls she handed over. The way she screamed Vince's name across a building full of women wearing his bruises.

"Please," she whispers, and the word breaks apart halfway through.

My throat tightens—not because I feel sorry for her, but because I hate that some small part of me still wants to. There's a piece of me that still remembers the woman who brought me food. Who put blankets on the end of the bed. Who spoke softly to me when everyone else in that house was shouting.

Then I make myself look around properly.

At the women pressed together near the exits. At the teenager clutching a stuffed rabbit against her chest with both arms. At the girl whose wrists are still raw from restraints. At all of them crying because they've only just started to believe they might get out of this building alive.

And whatever was left of my sympathy dies right there.

"No."

It comes out quietly. Steadily.

Brenda's face crumples.

I take a step forward. "No. We don't save her."

Constance shrugs. "Works for me."

Brenda screams. The sound tears across the warehouse as Constance shoves her forward, and she hits the railing and claws at it—desperate, grabbing for anything—before she goes over the edge.

The sound she makes when she hits the concrete is one I'm going to hear for the rest of my life.