Page 7

A tear slides down my temple. I wipe it away at once and turn on my side. My hand lifts, and I hold it above the candle. How valuable would I be if I let my skin bubble and melt off the bone? How much pain would it take to make me into someone new? After my skin blistered and peeled until I was a different person.

I lower my hand closer until the heat begins to bite. But I keep it over the glass, forcing myself to endure it, to take the punishment I’m owed until the flame extinguishes. When I pull back, I hold my hand steady, staring at the reddened skin in the soft spill of moonlight. A sinuous curl of smoke drifts up and vanishes.

When did I start to crave the correction? The pain is proof that I can be shaped into something better. Good enough has never been an option.

Light tapping comes from the air vent next to the bookcase on the other side of the room. My heart leaps, and I scramble to get down from the bed. On the floor, I crawl across the carpet until my face is right against the metal grate.

“Asher?”

He lies on his back on the other side of the vent, his face golden from the lamp behind him. His hair is longer than it was at Christmas, but not like it was in high school. It’s still weird to see the shift from the grungy teen I idolized to this full-blown adult in the real world. Every time he visits, something new has changed.

But I know that look. It’s the same one he had when I was seven and told him a boy pushed me down on the playground. Whatever hurt me had become his problem to solve.

“I’m okay,” I tell him.

“You always say that.”

“Sometimes I even mean it.” I try to look convincing, but when he gives me the side eye, I let it go.

Years ago, this vent carried every secret I had into his room after our parents went to sleep. Now there are things I don’t know how to tell him.

“I’m sorry, Zaiya.” He exhales as if the weight of a thousand secrets presses on his shoulders. “I knew they were overprotective, but…fuck.”

Black iron swirls around to decoratively cover the hole pumping cold air into our rooms. A fancy version of prison bars, just big enough to see each other’s faces.

“It’s okay.” I force a smile, though it trembles. “It was just a bad night.”

He turns on his side and studies me, as if he’s trying to piece everything together.

“How long has this been going on?”

I shrug, but he can’t see much of me through the small gaps in the metal.

“Not long.”

How long is a few years over a lifetime?

I was the accident baby, born seven years after our parents thought they were complete with one son. I grew up an afterthought. Mother never liked the idea of a daughter who could rival her. She’s looked at me like a stain on her favorite dress ever since.

After high school, they decided I needed to be useful. My father had his political ambitions and learned that an untouched daughter could open doors for him. Pure girls make good currency.

At twenty-one, my father says I’m ripe for the picking.

They keep me here for my own good. I swallow every complaint, keeping it all to myself. When the time comes to give me away, I will go, because that’s what I’m meant to do.

I only hope the next option is kinder than Toby Alcott.

“You can come back to Chicago with me,” Asher says. “We’ll go tomorrow.”

The offer hurts in a way I can’t explain. It sounds straight out of a story I’ve read too many times. A rescue. A happy ending. But that doesn’t happen in real life. Having that kind of hope is a dangerous thing.

“Do you like it there?” I ask instead. “Or are you too busy to enjoy it?”

“Not much time off, but I’ll help you get set up.”

I pull my bottom lip through my teeth, uncertainty curling in my mind. I wouldn’t last a week on my own.

“I mean it, Zaiya.”