me one last time before ta

s head now bandaged, dragged me out onto the patio. T

umbling passage that ran from the cellar to the woods beyond the estate walls. One of the maids, a quiet woman from the mountains who recogni

ured it. As my father lectured me about my sins, a car pulled up th

tion was al

c maid, Maria, appeared at the edge of the pool. She wasn't looking at me,

at. And the l

were still talking, their backs to me. I grabbed the b

n to the cellar. The lock was broken from my earlier fight. The entran

it me was damp and smelled of earth and freedom. I didn't look back. I

led me out into the woods at the edge

ty clothes in tatters, my feet bleeding. I ate the last of Fang's meat, not as a victi

e familiar territory of the Ap

tions. They saw the look in my eyes, the fur coat I clutched like a child, and t

looking the valley where Fang and I used to run. I mourned him wit

deception. He found her medical records. Her degenerative disease wasn't as severe as she'd claimed. S

een a monster. H

ed him. He used his family's immense resources. He

ong to trace my path