Chapter 2

Mortimer tossed a jar of frostbite ointment down in front of me.

I knew this product. It was the flagship item Barnes Group had just developed, the one that could heal even old, stubborn frostbite.

Which meant the price was absurd.

I had no idea why Mortimer, who had always taken pleasure in tormenting and humiliating me, would suddenly turn kind, and I looked up at him before I could stop myself.

Something uneasy crossed his face.

"Don't get the wrong idea. I just don't want you limping around and botching Tilda's memorial service and making her a laughingstock."

The hope that had risen in me sank back down.

Of course. Mortimer hated me to the core, wished I would hurry up and die. Why would he ever care that I'd gotten frostbite?

I handed the ointment back to him. "Don't worry. My life is cheap. I won't die that easily."

Those were the words Mortimer had said when I first came to the Barnes house, after his first punishment left me feverish and unconscious and the servants suggested taking me to a hospital.

That was when I first understood how much deeper his hatred ran than I'd ever imagined.

Sure enough, hearing that, Mortimer cursed at me.

"You don't know what's good for you!"

"Fine. Then stay here and wait until they amputate your legs!"

"But don't think I'll soften. Even crippled, you'll crawl to Tilda's grave and beg her forgiveness!"

He slammed the door on his way out.

I dragged myself down off the bed and went to find the family physician.

Once I'd put on the frostbite ointment he mixed, the numbness in my legs eased quite a bit.

I asked him for a sleeping pill. Dr. Kim, who apart from fetching and applying medicine for me had never once had anything to say to me, spoke up this time.

"Miss Sullivan, this is the third month running that you've come to me for sleeping pills. Is something wrong with your health?"

"Should I tell Mr. Barnes—"

"No need." I refused fast.

"It's just the same old thing. There's no reason to trouble him."

But before I left, he still called after me.

"Miss Sullivan, you don't have to hold it together like this."

"Mr. Barnes... he cares about you far more than you think."

I smiled.

It was true.

After all, I had a face that was seventy percent my sister's.

And after all these years of Mortimer forcing me to mimic everything about her, even my own parents sometimes couldn't tell us apart, and in a daze they'd call me Tilly.

I remembered clearly that it was Thanksgiving, a day that was supposed to be for family, and Mortimer had flown into a rage.

He'd flipped the table, then shut himself alone in the wedding suite he and my sister were meant to share, drinking.

The servants, afraid of being caught in it, sent me in with hangover soup.

I never expected the drunk Mortimer to mistake me for my sister, and consummate the marriage.

Afterward he plunged himself into disinfectant, scrubbing over and over until his skin broke.

And he gripped my chin and poured a whole bowl of abortion drug down my throat.

The drug wrecked my body. It didn't just leave me unable to ever have children, it took the little life not yet formed inside me away from me too.

My hand drifted to my stomach without meaning to. It was strangely cold there, a place where even having a normal woman's period had become something I couldn't have.

Still, it was almost over.

I already had ninety-four sleeping pills.

Six more, and I'd have a hundred.

Just enough to leave, quietly, in my sleep.