Alana POV
I arrived at my father's house looking less like a daughter and more like a car crash survivor.
My ribs were bound tight with tape, restricting every breath.
My hand was a throbbing mess.
Although my dress hid the bruises on my torso, my walk was a dead giveaway.
Robert McNeil opened the door.
He looked at me with unmasked disdain.
"Fix your hair," he hissed. "You look like a stray dog. You're embarrassing the Don."
"Nice to see you too, Dad," I muttered, limping past him into the foyer.
The dining room was set with gleaming crystal and china.
Austen sat at the head of the table.
Joyce sat to his right.
My mother's seat.
Diana, Joyce's mother, was fawning over them like a court jester.
"Alana," Joyce smiled, fingering a massive sapphire necklace. "You made it. Did you trip on the way here?"
"Something like that," I said, gripping the locket in my pocket as if it were a lifeline.
I sat down stiffly.
"Show us your little purchase," Joyce said. "The million-dollar tin can."
I didn't move.
"Show us," Austen commanded, his voice cold and detached. "Since you spent my money on it."
Reluctantly, I pulled the locket out.
Joyce snatched it from my hand before I could react.
"Oops," she said.
She let it slip from her fingers.
It hit the floor with a dull clatter.
Before I could move, she smashed her stiletto heel down on it.
The soft silver crumpled.
The hinge snapped.
"Oh no," Joyce giggled, feigning shock. "Clumsy me."
Something inside me snapped.
The tether that held my sanity to the earth finally broke.
I stood up.
I swung my good hand with everything I had left.
Crack.
My palm connected with Joyce's cheek with a force that vibrated up my arm.
It was the sweetest sound I had ever heard.
The room went deadly silent.
Joyce touched her face, eyes wide.
"She hit me!" she shrieked. "Austen! She hit the Savior!"
Austen stood up, his face thunderous.
"Alana!"
Diana shoved me hard.
I stumbled back, tripping over the edge of the rug.
I fell backwards into a glass sculpture on the side table.
It shattered.
Shards sliced into my back through the silk of my dress.
"Get her out of my sight!" Robert roared. "Lock her in the basement until she learns respect!"
Two of my father's guards grabbed me.
They dragged me toward the basement door.
"No," I pleaded, digging my heels in. "Not the basement. Please."
It was where Robert used to lock me whenever I got better grades than Joyce.
It was dark. Damp.
Full of spiders and memories.
They threw me down the stairs.
I tumbled, landing hard on the concrete.
The door slammed shut above me.
The lock clicked.
Darkness swallowed me whole.
My breath came in short, panic-stricken gasps.
The smell of mold triggered it.
Flashback.
Fifteen years ago.
The crawlspace.
The choking smoke.
The boy bleeding next to me.
"Don't let them find me," he had whispered, his voice trembling.
"I won't," I had promised. "I'm your Little Star. I'll shine for you."
I curled into a ball, rocking back and forth on the cold floor.
"I won't let them find you," I whispered to the empty room.
Time dissolved.
I didn't know how long I was down there.
Suddenly, the door at the top of the stairs exploded inward.
Light flooded in.
Austen stormed down the stairs.
He looked frantic.
"Alana!"
He scooped me up into his arms.
He smelled like rain and gunpowder.
"I've got you," he said, his voice rough. "I'm here."
He was playing the hero again.
Saving me from the hell he had allowed to happen.
I was delirious with pain and fear.
I looked up at his face.
The shadows made him look like the boy in the crawlspace.
I reached up and touched his cheek with a trembling hand.
"It's okay," I whispered, my voice slurring. "You're safe now, Stellen."
Austen froze.
He stopped halfway up the stairs.
His body went rigid as stone.
He looked down at me, his eyes wide with shock.
"What did you call me?"
"Stellen," I murmured, closing my eyes. "Your real name. The one you only told the Little Star."
I felt his heart hammer against my chest.
Joyce had never known that name.
Nobody knew that name.
Only the girl in the crawlspace.
The girl he had been torturing for five years.
"Alana?" his voice broke.
But I was already drifting away, leaving him alone with the truth that was about to destroy him.
