Chapter 4

Linnea's POV

Two weeks pass in a blur. The whip wounds on my back have scabbed over, but the slightest movement still pulls at them.

For two weeks I've been invisible in that guest room, watching Aurora Marsh run this house like she owns it, watching Damon give her whatever she wants.

That afternoon I go to the greenhouse out back to get the orchid I've been growing. It's the only thing I plan to take to Chicago.

I'm barely out the door when Aurora steps into my path, two of the household staff behind her.

"Linnea, that orchid is gorgeous. Hand it over." She's dressed to the nines today, and she's not trying to hide how much she's enjoying herself.

"Move." I don't even look at her.

The smile slips for just a second. She waves the staff away and drops her voice.

"Drop the act, Linnea Hayes. You're damaged goods nobody wants. Your own husband can't even stand to touch you. Damon's going to divorce you and marry me, so if you know what's good for you, get out of this house."

I stop. I take one look at that face of hers and laugh.

"Aurora, let me make something clear. No matter how far I've fallen, the name on that marriage certificate is still mine. Linnea Hayes. You can drape yourself in whatever jewelry you want and sleep in whatever bed you want. It doesn't change what you actually are: a dead man's widow who'll never belong here. Coming at me like this just makes you look pathetic."

"You—" She goes rigid, shaking with it.

That's when I hear footsteps nearby. Damon and his men, coming around the path.

Something shifts in Aurora's eyes. She snatches the pruning shears from the garden cart, drags the blade hard across her own forearm, shoves the shears into my hand, and throws herself backward onto the gravel path.

"Damon! Help me!"

Damon comes running. He takes one look at Aurora on the ground and the bloody shears in my hand, and his eyes go red.

"Linnea Hayes, what the hell did you do?"

He's across the path in two strides and drives his foot into my stomach.

My body's already wrecked. The kick sends me into the edge of the garden bed. I hit it hard, cough up blood. The orchid shatters on the gravel.

"Damon... don't be mad at Linnea..." Aurora tucks herself against him, crying in that way she does, all soft gasps and trembling. "It's my fault. I said something to upset her..."

"You're out of your mind." Damon hands Aurora off to one of his men and walks straight to me. He gets his hand around my throat and lifts me off the ground, eyes full of something savage. "I warned you not to touch her. You want to play it like this? Fine. Throw her in the flooded cellar. Nobody lets her out without my word. Nobody."

The flooded cellar is the cruelest punishment the Kingsley family has.

They throw me in.

The cold water hits my open wounds all at once and the pain is unlike anything I've felt before.

They chain me in the middle of it. Three days. Three nights.

Fever sets in. The wounds rot. The hunger and cold eat at the edges of my mind until I can barely hold a thought.

Somewhere in the dark, I think back to the day I took that bullet for him. The way he held me. Eyes red. I'll love you for the rest of my life.

A man's promises don't mean a damn thing.

"Damon Kingsley... I hate you..." I close my eyes. Whatever's left of me is slipping away. I'm done.

I'm thinking about dying when something crashes above me. The heavy door gets forced open and light floods in.

"Linnea!"

The Godmother stands at the edge with her cane, a line of her men behind her. She looks down at what's left of me in that water, and something crosses her face. Regret, maybe. Something close to it.

"Get her out of there. Now." Her voice cuts through the room.

They break the chains and pull me up.

"Godmother..." I get my eyes open. Whatever I manage for a smile probably looks worse than crying.

"You've been through enough." She pulls off her coat and wraps it around me, then sighs. "Damon lost his mind over that woman. That's on him. Knox's convoy is already here. I'm sending you out tonight. After this, you and this family are done. For good."

They carry me to the armored SUV.

When the door closes, I look back through the window at the estate one last time. Three years of my life inside those walls.

No grief. No longing. Just a deep, quiet nothing, and something that feels almost like relief.

Goodbye, Damon Kingsley.