Chapter 2

The art studio was my sanctuary and my cell. It was the one place in the mansion that felt like mine, filled with canvases I never painted and sculptures I never finished. For ten years, my creativity had withered under Vanessa's shadow. The room smelled of turpentine and despair.

I sat on a stool in the dark, the door locked behind me. I didn't bother turning on the lights. I just sat there, replaying the night's humiliation over and over in my head. The laughter. The spilled champagne. The cold floor against my knees. The sound of my own voice, broken and pathetic.

I was lost in that miserable loop when my phone buzzed in my pocket. I almost ignored it. It was probably one of Vanessa's assistants with another demeaning task. But it buzzed again, insistent.

I pulled it out. The screen lit up with the name of the long-term care facility where my father lived. My heart instantly seized with a cold dread. They never called this late.

I swiped to answer, my hand trembling. "Hello?"

"Mr. Miller?" a frantic nurse' s voice said on the other end. "It's about your father. There's been an incident. His vitals are crashing. The doctor says you need to get here immediately."

The floor dropped out from under me. "What happened? Is he...?"

"He's still with us, but it's critical. You need to come now."

The line went dead.

Panic, raw and absolute, tore through me. I scrambled to the studio door and pounded on it with my fists.

"Vanessa! Let me out!" I yelled, my voice cracking. "It's my father! There's an emergency!"

Silence.

"Vanessa, please! I have to go to the hospital! He's dying!"

I rattled the doorknob, but it was solid. I kept shouting, my throat growing raw, until I heard footsteps approaching.

Vanessa's voice came through the thick wood, laced with sleepy annoyance. "What is all this noise, Ethan? Are you trying to wake the entire house?"

"My father!" I gasped, pressing my face against the door. "The hospital called. He's dying. You have to let me out!"

There was a pause. Then, a soft, cynical laugh.

"Oh, please," she said, her voice dripping with scorn. "Another trick? This is a new low, even for you. Making up stories about your dying father just to get out of your punishment? It's pathetic."

"It's not a trick!" I screamed, desperation making my voice high and thin. "I swear, Vanessa, they called! Please, I'm begging you!"

"Go to sleep, Ethan," she said, her tone final. "We'll talk about your little performance in the morning."

I heard her footsteps retreating down the hall.

"No! VANESSA!"

She was gone. He was dying, and she had left me here to rot.

A wild, primal rage I had never felt before surged through me. It wasn't despair anymore. It was fury. I looked around the darkened studio, my eyes searching for a way out. The windows. They were large, old-fashioned sash windows, looking out over a stone patio three floors down. It was insane. It was impossible.

I didn't care.

I grabbed the heaviest thing I could find-a solid bronze bust I had started years ago and abandoned. It was heavy, awkward. I hoisted it in my arms and staggered towards the window. With a guttural roar, I swung it with all my might.

The glass didn't just break; it exploded outwards in a shower of glittering shards. The sound was deafening. The cool night air, wet with a light drizzle, rushed in.

I didn't hesitate. I used the bust to smash out the remaining pieces of glass from the frame, cutting my hands in the process. Blood dripped onto the floor, but I barely felt it. I ripped thick canvas tarps from a stack in the corner and started tearing them into strips, my mind working with a frantic, singular focus. I tied them together, knot after knot, my fingers clumsy and slick with blood.

I secured one end to the leg of a heavy iron sculpting table and threw the other end out the window. It didn't reach the ground. It dangled a good ten feet above the patio.

It would have to do.

Without a second thought, I swung my legs over the sill. The jagged glass in the frame tore at my clothes and my skin. I gripped the canvas rope and started to lower myself, hand over hand. The rough fabric burned my palms. My muscles screamed in protest.

I was halfway down when I heard shouting from inside the house. They knew.

I let myself slide faster, the friction searing my hands. The end of the rope rushed up to meet me. For a terrifying second, I was just hanging there, swinging in the dark. Then I let go.

I hit the stone patio hard. A sharp, white-hot pain shot up my left ankle. I cried out, collapsing onto the wet stone. I tried to stand, but my ankle buckled immediately. Broken. It had to be broken.

I didn't have time for this. I could hear the mansion's security alarms starting to blare.

I started to crawl. I dragged myself across the patio, my broken ankle leaving a smear of mud and blood behind me. I scrambled through the manicured hedges, thorns and branches scratching my face and arms, and pushed myself through the back gate.

I was out. I was on the street.

The rain was coming down harder now, cold and steady. I was soaked, bleeding, and in agony, wearing nothing but a ruined suit. I tried to flag down a car, but they just swerved around the pathetic, desperate man in the road.

I had to keep moving. I started to hop and drag my way down the long, private road, every movement an explosion of pain. Each hop felt like a hammer blow to my ankle.

I was about to collapse when a pair of headlights washed over me. A sleek black sedan slowed to a stop beside me. The back window glided down silently.

Inside, a woman looked at me. I couldn't see her face clearly in the dark, just the silhouette of her head and the glint of her eyes.

"You look like you're in trouble," she said. Her voice was calm, steady.

"I... I need to get to the hospital," I stammered, leaning against the car for support. "My father..."

"Get in," she said, without a trace of hesitation.

She pushed the door open from the inside. I practically fell into the plush leather seat, gasping with pain and relief. The interior of the car was warm and smelled faintly of leather and something clean, like rain.

"Westwood General," I managed to say.

The driver, a stoic man in a suit, didn't need to be told. The car pulled away from the curb, accelerating smoothly into the night.

The woman in the back seat with me didn't ask any questions. She simply opened a compartment and handed me a clean, dry handkerchief.

"For your hands," she said.

I looked down and saw they were a bloody mess. I numbly wiped them clean.

The rest of the ride was a blur of pain and flashing city lights. When we pulled up to the emergency room entrance, I turned to thank her.

"I don't know how..."

"Don't worry about it," she said. She pressed a small, stiff card into my hand. "If you find you need more help than just a ride, call this number."

Before I could say another word, she had helped me out of the car, and the sedan was pulling away, disappearing into the rain. I looked down at the card in my hand. It was black, with a simple, elegant silver logo and a name: Sarah Jenkins.

I hobbled into the emergency room, the card clutched in my fist. The triage nurse took one look at me and immediately got a wheelchair. As they were wheeling me down a hallway, I passed two nurses talking in low voices at their station.

"...such a shame," one was saying. "That poor Mr. Miller in room 304. Just passed a few minutes ago. Never even woke up."

The words hit me like a physical blow.

No.

It couldn't be.

I was too late.

They wheeled me into a small cubicle to look at my ankle, but my mind was a million miles away. My father was gone. After ten years of being a ghost, a justification for my imprisonment, he was finally, truly gone.

And a strange, terrible thought surfaced through the grief.

A part of me was relieved.

The chain was broken.

I sat there on the gurney, my ankle throbbing, my hands stinging, my suit ruined, and I felt the first, faint tremor of freedom. It was a terrifying, exhilarating feeling.

After they put a temporary cast on my ankle, I limped my way to the hospital's non-denominational chapel. It was small and empty. In a small, locked cabinet, I knew they kept the urns of unclaimed patients. A few years ago, I had arranged for my mother's ashes to be kept here, unable to bear the thought of bringing her into Vanessa's house.

I stared at the cabinet. My father was gone. My mother was in there, a box of dust and bone. I was utterly alone. And for the first time in a decade, I was free to make my own choices.

The weight of that freedom was crushing. The fatigue hit me all at once, a wave that threatened to pull me under. I was exhausted. Exhausted from the years of abuse, from the night's escape, from the grief and the guilt and the terrifying, uncertain future.

I was so, so tired of fighting.

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