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The nurse’s hand was gentle, but it still made me flinch when she tucked the blanket up to my shoulders. “We patched you up, Starla. You were in bad shape. A fractured rib, stitches here and there. You also…lost a lot of blood.”

She hesitated. Something cold wormed through my guts. I knew, even before she said it.

“You were pregnant,” the nurse said, quiet. “But with the blood loss…the trauma…there was a miscarriage.” She paused. “I’m sorry.”

My whole body spasmed. I thought I might vomit, but there was nothing to bring up. I just dry-heaved air. I pressed my hand to my belly, palm flat. Empty. Gone.

For a moment, I didn’t feel anything. Only a blank, drifting feeling. Like being dropped through a hole and not ever hitting the ground.

My eyes burned. I tried not to cry.

“Do you remember what happened?” she asked. “Police took a statement, but it was all from your boyfriend. He said there was a robbery. He said you might be in shock.”

I couldn’t answer.

“When you feel up for it, we’ll call him. If you need food, water, anything, just ask at the desk. You’re safe here, okay?”

Safe. That word meant nothing.

She left. The door clicked in its frame, echoing.

I tried to sit up. Couldn’t. My body ached everywhere, every joint bruised. My hands were wrecked, fingers swollen and red. There were bandages on my ribs, my legs, across my eyebrow.

I stared at the pale blanket, traced the stains on the edge.

Why did he bring me here? Why not just let me bleed out on the filthy carpet? Wasn’t that what he wanted? To see me ruined? To watch me die for being stupid and careless and broken?

But that was it. He didn’t want me dead. He just didn’t want the mess. A dead body was trouble. The cops. An investigation. He’d done enough to be the villain, but not enough to be the killer. He wanted me alive enough to serve as a lesson. A warning. Some toy to break again next time.

So he dragged me here, made up some neat lie, let the system patch me up.

He didn’t do it for me. Never for me. He did it for himself.

I wanted to scream, but my voice was too thin. The horror wasn’t that I’d lost everything. The horror was that I’d never had anything to begin with.

All I’d ever been was something to be used, tossed away, repaired, and wrecked again. My body. My mind. Even the insides of me I tried to protect. There was never any safe place. There was never any hope.

And now? My sweet baby would never see the light of day, because a man who was devoid of light made sure of that.

Chapter 41

Blacked Out

Malakar

My bluebird didn’t know this, but I installed cameras in their house. Tiny ones and hidden well enough so that nobody would find them. I had to keep an eye on her and keep her safe until I found the right time to take her away.

I didn’t want to yet, I wanted to drag it out. I wanted to play with my little bluebird and fuck with the man who took what belonged to me.

But now? I had to take action. I saw on the camera what he did. All that blood. All the bruises. I followed him to the hospital where he took her. I made sure she was alive. But in doing so, I discovered information that wrecked me. She was pregnant, but not anymore. She was beat so bad to the point of miscarriage.

My vision went fucking red. Then black.

He killed my baby.

I knew it was mine. There was no doubt about that. The timeline was in perfect sync from when she was with me. He took that away, and I would make fucking sure he got what he deserved. I hopped in the stolen car and sped to their house. I’d get there before him, and when he got back, I’d let hell rain down.

I might be a murderer, but I wasn’t fucking heartless. That was our child and he ripped it away from us. I screamed and slammed my fist on the wheel. Again and again and again.