Chapter 3

The lawyer's office was stark, professional. It matched the new coldness inside me.

As I signed papers, memories flickered.

Eighteen, my parents gone in a car crash. Ethan, a near stranger then, appearing with a faded story of a childhood promise between our families. He'd marry me, take care of me and my parents' company.

I'd been so grateful, so quickly in love.

He said he was giving up a quiet life, a near-monastic existence he craved, to honor that promise.

I believed him.

I merged my family's business with his ambitions, shielded him from skeptical board members.

Ten years, I respected his "need for solitude," his separate wing of the house, his long meditative retreats.

Then his father demanded an heir.

I suggested IVF, endured the injections, the bloating, the hope and fear, all for Sophia.

I thought his distance was a spiritual man's aversion to worldly taints.

Sophia's death ripped away that illusion. A model boat, a symbol of Chloe, outweighed my daughter's life.

The fight for my financial independence from Ethan became my focus. It was all that was left.

A week later, I drove back to the house for the last of Sophia's things.

A strange, sweet smell hit me as I opened the front door. Incense?

Then I saw it.

Sophia's bedroom door was open. It was empty. Stripped bare.

My gaze followed a trail of smoke to the backyard.

Chloe Jennings stood before a roaring fire in the outdoor fireplace. Ethan was beside her, watching.

She threw a small, ballerina-themed music box – Sophia's favorite – into the flames.

"This energy conversion will help Leo, Ethan, I know it," Chloe said, her voice earnest. "His immune system needs all the pure energy it can get."

She then tossed in a tiny pair of bronzed baby shoes. My daughter's first shoes.

Ethan nodded, a gentle expression on his face. "You found this ancient ritual, Chloe. It will work. Leo will be strong."

He looked at the fire. "Sophia was a sweet girl. She'd want to help her... cousin."

My baby's precious mementos, her toys, her first drawings, all fuel for a lunatic ritual.

To cure a sickness I now suspected Chloe invented.

Rage, black and blinding, surged through me.

I ran towards the fire, shoving past Ethan.

I reached into the licking flames, grabbing for a half-burnt teddy bear.

"What are you doing?!" I screamed, my hands stinging.

Chloe shrieked. She grabbed the heavy iron fire poker.

She swung it.

Pain exploded in my head. The world went dark.