Chapter 3

My mother, Brenda, settled into her role as Mrs. Hayes with breathtaking speed. She draped herself in silks and jewels, hosted lavish parties, and cultivated the air of someone who had been born to wealth. The tired, bitter woman from our tiny apartment was gone, replaced by a polished, smiling stranger who looked right through me.

While she floated through her new life, I was still stuck in the old one, just with a prettier backdrop. I was less a stepdaughter and more an unpaid servant. I did chores the maids were too busy to do. I ran errands. I was a ghost in my own home.

The other staff, seeing how the family treated me, took their cues. They ordered me around, gave me the worst tasks. The head cook, a large, sour woman named Mrs. Gable, seemed to take special pleasure in making me scrub the enormous kitchen floors on my hands and knees.

I endured it all for one reason: my education. It was the one thing they couldn' t take from me. My mother, in a rare moment of wanting to show off, had enrolled me in the best private school in the city. Every day, I put on my uniform and escaped the mansion. School was my sanctuary. It was my secret weapon.

I had a timeline in my head. A countdown. I would get a scholarship. I would go to college, far away from here. I would get a good job. By the time I was eighteen, I would be free. The thought was a small, warm light I kept burning inside me, no matter how dark things got.

The countdown was shattered one rainy Tuesday afternoon. I was in my room, trying to study, when I heard shouting from downstairs. It was Mr. Hayes. I had never heard him raise his voice before. It was a deep, guttural roar of fury. Then, I heard the sound of something smashing, followed by my mother' s high-pitched shriek.

I crept to the top of the stairs. Mr. Hayes was standing in the foyer, his face purple with rage. He was holding a stack of photographs. My mother was on the floor, her dress torn, a trickle of blood running from her lip. She had been having an affair. The scandal was out.

"You filthy whore!" Mr. Hayes bellowed, throwing the photos at her. They scattered across the marble floor. Images of my mother, tangled in bed with another man.

My mother scrambled on the floor, trying to gather them, but it was too late. She looked up, her face a mask of desperation and defiance. "It' s not my fault! It was you! You were never here!"

From the landing above, a figure emerged from the shadows. Alex. He wasn' t looking at my mother or his father. He was looking straight at me. His expression was one of chilling, triumphant calm. He gave me a slow, deliberate nod, as if to say, It' s starting.

I understood then. This wasn' t just a family drama. This was the beginning of his real revenge. He had been waiting for this, planning for this. My mother' s downfall was just the opening move in a much larger, more terrible game. And I was the main prize.