I'm lying on an old bed in the guest room, staring at the ceiling with its familiar water stain, when Kaia appears in my doorway. She doesn't knock, just slips in like she owns every room in this house.
Which, I suppose, she does.
She sits on the edge of my bed, careful and tentative. Her eyes are red-rimmed, tear-stained, and for a moment she looks like the little sister I used to protect from our father's rages.
Then I see the calculation behind the tears.
"Esther, please," she whimpers, twisting her hands in her lap. "Father told me what that... that monster did."
Her voice cracks on the word monster. "He killed my baby."
She reaches for my hand, her fingers cold. "He destroyed my life. Everything's falling apart."
I don't pull away yet, just watch her perform.
"Aaron... Aaron hasn't been the same since." A single tear rolls down her cheek, perfectly timed. "He blames me for everything. He's so cold now, so distant."
She squeezes my hand, leaning closer. "I know you're hurting too. I know he threw you away like you meant nothing."
Her eyes search mine, looking for common ground. "We have to make him pay, Esther. We're sisters. We have to stand together."
"Please," she whispers, her grip tightening. "Tell Father what he needs to know. About Cassian's operations, his weaknesses, anything that can help us."
She wipes at her eyes with her free hand. "Do it for me. For what he took from us."
I feel nothing. No pity, no sisterly solidarity, not even anger.
Just a cold, crystalline clarity.
I yank my hand back. "You want my pity?"
Kaia blinks, her mask slipping.
"You're upset that the man you stole from me is treating you badly?" My voice is level, almost conversational. "You're crying because the life you built on my betrayal isn't a fairy tale?"
"Esther, I—"
"Maybe," I continue, standing up so I'm looking down at her, "if you hadn't spread your legs for my fiancé, none of this would have happened."
Her face flushes red, tears forgotten.
"You got exactly what you wanted, Kaia. Aaron, the baby, the rushed wedding, all of it." I move toward the door, opening it wide. "Now live with it."
She scrambles off the bed, her expression twisting into something ugly. "You selfish bitch. After everything Father's done for you…"
"Get out."
She runs from the room, and I can hear her sobbing dramatically in the hallway. Calling for Father, for Patricia, for anyone who'll listen to her victim narrative.
It takes less than two minutes.
Father storms into my room, Patricia and Kaia trailing behind him like henchmen. His face is red, a vein pulsing in his temple.
"What is wrong with you?" He doesn't close the door, lets his voice carry through the house. "Your sister is in agony, and you attack her?"
I cross my arms, lean against the dresser. "She came in here asking me to betray my husband. What did you expect?"
"After everything I've done to bring you home, to offer you protection?" Father moves closer, using his height to intimidate. "This is how you repay me?"
"Protection?" I laugh, harsh and bitter. "You call this protection?"
Patricia makes a disapproving sound in her throat, but I ignore her.
"You're using me," I say, meeting Father's eyes. "You want a weapon to aim at Cassian, and you're pissed that your bait isn't working."
"That's not…"
"Don't lie to me." My voice rises. "You don't care about protecting me. You care about destroying him."
Father's expression hardens into something I recognize. The mob boss, not the concerned father.
"You will choose, Esther." He speaks slowly, deliberately. "Us, your blood. Or him, the man who murdered your sister's child and threw you away like garbage."
They all move closer—Father with his cold rage, Kaia with her selfish tears, Patricia with her bored indifference. A pack of vipers circling their prey.
"Choose," Father demands.
I look at each of their faces, seeing them clearly for the first time in my life. My father who sold me. My sister who betrayed me. My stepmother who never gave a damn.
"I choose neither."
Father's hand twitches, like he wants to hit me. "What?"
"You are not my family." I push past him toward the door. "You're just a cabal of hypocrites."
"Esther…" Father grabs my arm but I wrench free.
"Don't touch me."
I storm down the hallway to my room—the guest room they've put me in, since Kaia took over my old space years ago. I slam the door hard enough to rattle the frame, twist the lock.
My heart hammers against my ribs. I lean against the wood, listening to them argue in hushed voices outside.
They'll use me. Drain me of every piece of information I have about Cassian's operations, his vulnerabilities, his routines. And then what? Marry me off to someone else? Lock me away like an embarrassment?
I think of Cassian in his office, bourbon in hand, paranoia eating him alive. He's a monster. Paranoid and violent and broken by his father's legacy.
But he was my monster.
He gave me choices when he didn't have to. Trained me to be strong instead of keeping me weak. Protected me, saw me, loved me in his own twisted way.
Until his fear consumed him. Until Ivy's poison finally worked.
He was lost, not malicious. Scared, not cruel.
My family? This is malice. Cold, calculated self-interest dressed up as concern.
And they're going to kill him, using me as their excuse and their weapon.
The choice crystallizes, sharp and clear. Cassian built me up. They tore me down.
I have to warn him.
I move to the window, looking out at the trellis I used to climb as a teenager. Sneaking out to meet Aaron, back when I thought he was my Prince Charming instead of just another man who'd betray me.
The house settles into evening quiet, tense and watchful. I hear Patricia's voice downstairs, Father's study door closing, Kaia's footsteps in the hallway.
Waiting for me to come crawling back, apologetic and useful.
I give it an hour. Let them think I'm sulking, processing, breaking down.
Then I ease open my window, testing the trellis with my weight. It holds, same as it did when I was seventeen and stupid.
I'm not that girl anymore. I'm not running away from my life this time.
I'm running toward it.
I swing my leg over the sill, grip the wooden slats, and start climbing down. The night air is cold against my skin, but I barely feel it.
My mind is already racing ahead—how to get back to the estate, how to get past his guards, what I'll say when I see him.
If he'll even listen.
My foot finds the ground, and I freeze. A security light sweeps across the garden, and I press myself against the wall, holding my breath.
The light passes. I run.