Chapter 2

Sitting at my desk, my phone screen still glowed with the message that had popped up yesterday on the shopping app, back when I'd wanted nothing but to die.

"This world isn't perfect, but someone is always watching over you."

Since coming back to this so-called home, I felt like I'd been eaten away bit by bit, my mind fixed on one thing only—how to make my parents happy.

They wanted me sweet and well-behaved, so I buried the fierce temper I'd grown up with in the countryside.

They wanted me to excel, so I took first place in the city and made my name shine.

They even wanted me to look after Dorothy Fox, so I treated her like my own sister.

But what I got in return wasn't their genuine love. It was more demands, each one greedier than the last.

At first it was just giving up a glass of milk. Then it was giving up a room. And then, even my SAT scores were supposed to go to Dorothy.

I thought about yesterday, when Wanda cradled my SAT scores and spoke to me in that heavy, earnest voice.

"Dorothy doesn't have long left, and all she wants is to go to a good school. Give her your scores and let her go to college in your place. We have money—you can just take the test again next year!"

In that instant I studied the woman in front of me, over and over, unable to imagine those were words a mother could say.

It was her words, too, that had driven me to want to end my thin little life.

But now, I didn't want to do that anymore.

From the moment nineteen years ago that they let me be handed off to traffickers by mistake, my life had had nothing to do with them.

I opened the college application portal.

Today was the last day to apply. As long as I kept my eyes locked on the screen until the final moment, no one could steal my life from me.

With that thought, I fixed my full attention on the application page.

There were no other schools listed on it, only one—an Ivy League law program.

Maybe the law couldn't pass judgment on all good and evil, but before the law everyone was equal, and no one got special privilege.

That was my life's pursuit—to set everything back on its rightful track, to return every stolen life to the person it belonged to.

At six that evening, the application page finally flashed: Registration period closed. Your application is complete.

The moment I saw those words, the fear I'd been holding up inside me finally let go. It was done. Everything was settled at last.

Right then, at the worst possible moment, a knock came at my door.

"Crystal, you've finished applying, haven't you? Come out and eat, we've got your favorite barbecue ribs tonight."

I frowned, half wondering if I'd heard wrong.

Wanda was actually... trying to win me over?

I stepped out of the room carefully, and Wanda linked her arm through mine.

"Crystal, I've been thinking, and you're right."

"I've neglected you for too long, I never took proper care of how you felt. So from today on, whatever you want, you just tell Mom, and Mom will give it to you!"

Dorothy blinked up at me too, and slid her arm through my other one.

"That's right, sis. I've been so selfish lately. From now on I won't ever fight you for anything again. We're the closest sisters."

Even Norman, for once, dropped his cold expression and gave a nod.

"From now on, we live as one family, and live well."

Live well? Those words, out of the mouths of three animals?

The warmer they got, the more my nerves prickled.

Nobody suddenly turns good, unless there's something on me that they want.

But... the application was already closed. What could they still be after?