Chapter 29
God, I was shaking. Not from fear. From fury. My fingers were still bleeding from when I punched the mirror and I didn’t care. I stared at the blood smeared across the glass and thought, good. Let them see it. Let them all see what this woman turned me into. Even in a fucking coma, Therese still had the power to wreck my life.
Jude had been screaming. Asking if daddy really did that to me. I snapped at him, told him to shut the fuck up and go to his room. He cried, but I didn’t care. I couldn’t breathe with the sound of his voice. All I saw was Torren’s hands around my throat and the way he looked at me like I was the problem. Like I ruined everything.
I threw every single thing I could get my hands on in that goddamn glass guest room. Pillows, perfume, a table lamp, my wedding heels. The crash of each one hitting the walls felt like music. And when it was all done, when the chaos had gone quiet, I collapsed in front of the mirror and stared at myself.
Makeup smeared. Lip busted. Blood on my chin. The perfect little Massaro doll cracked
open.
I whispered to my reflection, “No one pities the losing bitch. Only the winner gets applause.”
That’s when I heard her heels. Cold, calm, slow. Eloise fucking Massaro. She opened the door like nothing had happened, her eyes raking the mess on the floor before settling on
- me.
“Quite the tantrum,” she said.
I wiped under my eyes and sniffled, switching to my pretty voice. “Torren choked me. He… he snapped.” My voice broke right on cue.
She didn’t fall for it. She just walked in and sat beside me, crossing her legs neatly. Her eyes, though–they weren’t judging me. They looked tired. Defeated. A crack in the ice
queen.
“I wasn’t thinking. I panicked,” she murmured, barely audible. “Let’s end that whore’s life.”
I blinked at her. My breath caught. Then I leaned closer. “You mean it?”
Eloise nodded slowly. “I underestimated how far Therese would crawl back from the grave. She was always… too stubborn to stay dead.”
And just like that, we bonded. Over hatred. Over desperation. Over losing our grip on Torren and the empire we helped build. We poured wine, sat on the shattered couch like war generals, and talked about everything going to shit.
“She’ll wake up,” I said bitterly. “And when she does, he’ll forgive her. He always forgives her.”
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“Then we make sure she doesn’t wake up,” Eloise replied. Her voice was soft but sharp as
a razor.
I grinned into my wineglass. “It’s not murder. It’s mercy. Just… permanent.”
Within hours, she had her people on it. Phones burned, contacts activated, credentials forged. One call to some freak in Prague, and suddenly I was Dr. Ruby Deveraux, specialist from Zurich, neurologist to the stars. Eloise would play my traveling nurse. Perfect. Elegant. Untraceable.
We rehearsed our script in front of the mirror, practiced our smiles, our concerned faces, the perfect blend of medical professionalism and rich–lady sympathy.
I looked at her once and said, “We’re not killing her.”
She tilted her head. “No?”
I smiled, slow and sharp. “We’re just moving her into our care.”
**
At midnight, the hospital was asleep except for a few guards and one tired nurse at the front desk. She was young, bored, easy to distract. I leaned over the counter, dropped my voice an octave, gave her that smile–the one that always works on men and weak women.
“You’ve got the most gorgeous skin I’ve ever seen. Do you get facials here too?” I said while Eloise pretended to panic about her fake pager buzzing.
The girl flushed and started rambling. We were in.
The espresso trick worked like a charm. We left the pods in the break room, Eloise gave them some bullshit story about complimentary Italian imports. One of the guards even joked, “Hope these taste better than the shit we’ve been drinking.”
I gave him my flirtiest smirk. “You’ll be dreaming of them, I promise.”
Ten minutes later, both guards were out cold. One slumped against the wall. The other one snoring into his phone.
Inside the room, the machines were still beeping soft and steady. And there she was. The queen bitch herself, lying in a coma, looking peaceful. Innocent. Like she didn’t ruin three lives in one lifetime.
I walked to her side, brushed her hair back, and whispered, “Not so untouchable now, are you?”
Eloise was behind me, checking wires, switching tags. We had another woman’s identity ready to go, and the system updated before the nurses even noticed anything wrong.
I leaned closer, lips just near her ear. “Sweet dreams, sleeping beauty. You’re waking up somewhere… less comfortable.”
We moved fast. Pulled the oxygen monitor just long enough to keep the alarms silent.
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Unplugged her ID tag. Hooked her to portable vitals. Got her in the sealed transport pod. Outside, three black SUVS were waiting. Ten mercenaries stood by with earpieces and cold dead eyes. One of them opened the van doors and nodded.
“You got the package?”
“She’s secure,” I answered.
Another guy chuckled. “Looks like a goddamn princess. Too bad this ain’t no fairy tale.”
I stepped in beside him. “It is. Just one with a bloody ending.”
A third merc guy smirked. “Any chance we get to finish her off later? I got skills.”
Eloise didn’t even flinch. “Only if she wakes.”
The tallest one, arms tatted with death symbols, looked at me and said, “You want her dead, boss? We got chemicals for that. Heart attack. Stroke. Brain bleed. You name it.”
I tapped my chin. “Hmm. Tempting. But I want her to suffer. A slow rot. Maybe even silence in a box. Let her scream and no one hears.”
They all laughed.
One leaned over. “You’re colder than most men I’ve worked with.”
I smiled sweetly. “Men are boring. I ruin for sport.”
The door slammed shut. We rolled out. No sirens. No chase. Just dark streets and the hum of the engine.
I held the scalpel in my hand, ran my finger over the edge. It caught my skin just enough to sting, and it thrilled me.
“If she ever wakes up,” I whispered, “I’ll carve her smile into her throat.”
Eloise lit a cigarette, her hands steady now. “Too bad her fairy tale ends here.”
We didn’t speak much after that. I didn’t need to. The silence in the van was thick with victory, and our laughter echoed through it like a curse.
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