Chapter 1

The last thing I saw in my first life was my sister Chloe' s face, twisted with a rage that was uglier than any pain I had ever known. Her hands were around my throat, and her thumbs pressed hard into my windpipe.

"This is your fault," she hissed, her voice a raw, broken thing.

My parents were there, watching. My mother, Sarah, held my arms down, her nails digging into my skin. My father, Richard, just stood by the wrecked car, his face a mask of cold fury, not at Chloe, but at me.

The cross-country road trip had been Chloe' s idea, a stupid, selfish whim. She was eight months pregnant, a high-risk pregnancy, and every doctor had told her to stay put. But Chloe wanted to show off her perfect life and her swelling belly one last time before the baby came. She wanted a road trip, and what Chloe wanted, she always got.

I had warned them. I told them the long hours in the car were dangerous. I told them the stress was too much for her.

"Don' t be so dramatic, Ava," my mother had said, waving a dismissive hand. "You' re just jealous of your sister' s happiness."

"Your sister' s husband, Ethan, is paying for everything," my father added, his eyes gleaming with greed. "It' s the least you can do to be supportive."

So I went. I drove. I catered to Chloe' s every ridiculous demand. And then, inevitably, the disaster I predicted happened. A small fender bender, my fault they said, because I was distracted. Chloe went into premature labor in the middle of nowhere. The baby didn't make it.

And now, they blamed me. It wasn' t the trip, or Chloe' s recklessness, or their own greed. It was me.

Chloe' s grip tightened. My vision started to tunnel, the edges turning dark. My lungs burned for air that wouldn' t come. The last sound I heard was my father' s voice, cold and final.

"She was always a burden."

Then, blackness.

A gasp tore from my throat. My eyes flew open. I wasn' t on the side of a dusty highway. I was in my small, cramped art studio, the smell of turpentine and oil paint filling my nose. Sunlight streamed through the single window, illuminating dust motes dancing in the air.

My hands flew to my neck. It was smooth. No bruises. No pain. I looked at my arms. No crescent-shaped marks from my mother' s nails.

I scrambled off the futon I used as a bed and stumbled to the small, cracked mirror hanging on the wall. My face stared back at me, pale and shocked, but whole. Unharmed.

My phone started to ring, its shrill sound cutting through the impossible silence. I looked at the caller ID.

Mom.

My blood ran cold. I stared at the phone as it vibrated on the cluttered table. This was it. This was the moment it all began. The day they proposed the trip.

I let it ring, my heart hammering against my ribs. I remembered everything. The pain, the betrayal, the chilling finality of their hatred. I remembered the weight of Chloe' s body on mine, the empty look in my parents' eyes as they watched me die.

The phone stopped ringing, then immediately started again. They were persistent. They always were when they wanted something.

A strange calm settled over me. The terror and confusion receded, replaced by something hard and sharp. I had begged them, I had warned them, I had tried to be the voice of reason. I had played the part of the caring daughter, the concerned sister. And for that, they killed me.

This time would be different.

I picked up the phone.

"Hello?" I said, my voice steady.

"Ava? Finally," my mother' s impatient voice came through the speaker. "I was about to give up on you. Listen, dear, we have the most wonderful news."

I could hear Chloe whining in the background, something about needing a special type of pillow for her back.

I closed my eyes, picturing them in their pristine living room, the one paid for by my brother-in-law, Ethan. My parents, so proud of their successful daughter Chloe, so dismissive of their artist daughter Ava, the failure.

For years, I had been their emotional punching bag, their unpaid servant, their scapegoat. They took my money when I had it and my energy when I didn't. They belittled my art, my life, my very existence, while holding Chloe up as a paragon of virtue. Chloe, who had cheated and lied her way through life, securing a rich husband who only wanted her for the heir she carried.

They were parasites, all of them. And I had let them feed on me until I had nothing left to give.

"Chloe has been feeling a bit down," my mother continued, her voice dripping with fake concern. "And we thought, what better way to cheer her up than a little family road trip before the baby comes? A last hurrah!"

I gripped the phone tighter, my knuckles turning white. The words were exactly the same. The stage was set.

My first instinct, the one that got me killed, was to scream 'No' . To list all the medical reasons why it was a suicidal idea. To plead with them to listen to me, just this once.

But the ghost of Chloe' s hands on my throat lingered. The memory of their cold eyes was burned into my mind.

They didn' t want a daughter. They wanted a sacrifice.

A slow, cold smile spread across my face. It felt foreign, like a mask I was trying on for the first time.

"A road trip?" I asked, injecting a note of bright enthusiasm into my voice. "That sounds... amazing."

There was a stunned silence on the other end of the line.

This time, I wouldn't stop them. This time, I would help them. I would give them everything they wanted, and I would watch them choke on it.