The Wild Daughter from Deadwater Strikes Back

The day the butler of Sterling family came to claim me, the folks back in my dusty hometown lined the streets with tears in their eyes, waving goodbye like I was headed somewhere better.

The moment I stepped into that mansion, armed guards pinned me down in the first-floor medical suite, demanding I donate bone marrow to their precious adopted daughter, Celeste.

I responded by ripping out Celeste's dialysis machine.

My biological parents, Richard and Eleanor, went ballistic. They locked me in the attic storage room to "reflect on my behavior."

That night, while the house slept, I crept down to the basement and twisted open the main gas line valve.

I was halfway through rigging a candle delay fuse when the thermal imaging system caught me. Armed security tackled me before I could finish the job.

They'd had enough. They blindfolded me, tossed me onto a private jet like garbage, and flew me overnight to the most notorious hellhole in America—Deadwater, Texas.

The car had barely stopped in front of the bullet-riddled town sign when Richard leaned in with a cold warning:

"Listen to me. These people don't show mercy. An ungrateful brat like you? Three days, tops, before they pick your bones clean."

Eleanor stood beside him, dripping with fake concern:

"Willa, just agree to donate your marrow to Celeste, and you'll still be a Sterling. Stay here in this godforsaken wasteland, and you're dead."

I spat blood at her shoes. Eleanor's mask shattered. She ripped off my hood and shoved me hard into the dust.

I pushed myself up slightly, staring coldly at the yellow sand beneath my hands, and shook my head.

I squinted up at the familiar landscape—the rusted water tower, the butcher shop with skinned hogs hanging in the window, the faint smell of gunpowder in the air.

Funny. Nobody ever told me that the place I'd spent twenty years calling home was what rich people called "Deadwater."

Well. Since I'm here anyway.

Nobody's leaving this town alive today.

I lifted my head and spotted Arthur on a nearby porch, smoking a cigar on the steps. My eyes lit up.

I tried to call out, but my throat produced no sound. My face felt numb and swollen.

Eleanor leaned against the car door, smirking.

"Don't bother. Sterling Corp's latest neural inhibitor. Should keep a wild little thing like you quiet for a while."

Richard stepped closer, looming over me. "Sign the papers, or things get worse."

I lay in the dirt, laughing silently to myself.

All that righteous talk, and they still couldn't force me. Back in New York, every time they tried drugging me or restraining me, I'd find a scalpel and open somebody's carotid artery.

They were respectable people. They cared about appearances. I didn't. Touch me and I'll snap your neck.

When I remained silent, Richard lost it. He yanked out an iPad and shoved it in my face, gripping my jaw hard to force me to watch.

"Look at this. Keep refusing, and you'll end up just like them."

The screen showed a stinking pig farm. Naked men wallowing in manure pits, forced to swallow rotten fish guts.

I rolled my eyes. Idiot.

In this Texas wasteland, Arthur was the last person I'd ever fear.

Though when did this former military assassin develop a taste for treating people like livestock? Usually, Grandma Martha dissolved human traffickers in hydrofluoric acid, or Crazy Billy chopped them up for the dogs.

When I first arrived here, I thought I'd been kidnapped. I prayed every night that my real parents would swoop in with helicopters and take me home.

But then I realized the town's "monsters" treated me surprisingly well. The assassin taught me hand-to-hand combat. The poisoner taught me toxicology. The most wanted outlaw bought me pretty dresses.

Eventually, I stopped hoping.

But when the Sterlings showed up with a DNA test, my heart still skipped a beat.

Blood relatives. My actual parents. Surely they'd know how to love better than a bunch of outlaws, right?

Holding onto that sliver of hope, I climbed into that black sedan bound for New York.

Turns out, parents like these? Better off dead.

I bit my lip, headbutted Richard's iPad out of his hands, and stumbled to my feet, lurching toward Arthur.

That move set Richard off completely. He grabbed my hair and yanked me back, slapping me across the face. Hard. Repeatedly.

"You really don't know when to quit!"

The blows left me seeing stars. I collapsed, blood dripping from my nose onto his leather shoes.

Disgust flashed in Richard's eyes. He immediately released me and pulled out a handkerchief to wipe the blood from his hands.

Eleanor checked her watch and tugged Richard's sleeve.

"Celeste needs her medication. If we're not there, she'll throw a tantrum."

Richard's expression darkened. "Celeste can't stand the smell of blood. This freak did it on purpose. If we didn't need her marrow, I'd blow her brains out and leave her to rot here."

Watching their eyes fill with worry and tenderness when they mentioned Celeste, I suddenly understood what the parents in my childhood fantasies looked like—

Treasuring their daughter. Worrying about her health. Anxious when she didn't take her medicine on time.

Too bad that kind of love was never for me.

Eleanor stared at the tears welling in my eyes, her face twisting with revulsion.

"Disgusting. Even with the DNA test, I doubt I could've produced something with such inferior genes. Honey, deal with her. I can't stand another second in this dump."

Richard nodded and pulled a chrome tire iron from the trunk.

He dragged me toward the porch, then dumped me in a roadside sand pit like trash. Gripping the tire iron with both hands, he aimed for my right kneecap and brought it down without hesitation.

Crack.

Just as he raised it for a second strike—

I bit back a scream and dragged my shattered leg through the dirt toward Arthur, collapsing at his dusty combat boots.

I looked up hopefully—only to meet a gaze so cold it chilled me to the bone.

Right. My face was swollen, caked with blood and dirt. Of course he didn't recognize me.

"This the one you want me to break in?" Arthur's voice was rough as sandpaper, devoid of emotion.

"Fine. Put your toy away. I'll handle it from here."

Richard paused, then grabbed a heavy black duffel bag from the car and dropped it at Arthur's feet with a thud. Bundles of cash spilled out.

He glanced coldly at me and his lips curved into a vicious smile:

"No. The rules changed. This time, we're staying. We want to watch her get broken. Bone by bone."