Clara Beaumont POV:
"Dudley," I whispered, my voice cracking perfectly. "I'm dizzy. Can you... can you help me sit up?"
His eyes, full of impatience and a poorly concealed greed, flickered. He wanted this over with. He wanted his prize.
"Of course, Clara." He set the bowl down on the nightstand with a soft clink, the sound echoing in the silent room like a countdown timer.
He reached for me, his hands rough against the delicate skin of my arms. I flinched, a genuine reaction this time. The memory of his touch, of what he did to me, sent a tremor of revulsion through my body.
I used it.
I let my body go limp, leaning heavily against him as he pulled me into a sitting position. My head lolled to the side, my hair falling across my face, hiding the cold, hard focus in my eyes.
My weight shifted, guiding my torso toward the edge of the bed, closer to the ornate mahogany nightstand.
My arm, seemingly too weak to support itself, slid from his grasp. It dangled for a moment, then my fingers brushed against the cool, polished wood.
"Hurry up and drink it," Dudley urged, his voice losing its gentle facade. "It will get cold, and the effect will be gone."
The effect. The irony was so thick I could have choked on it.
My fingers, hidden from his view, fumbled along the underside of the nightstand's top drawer. My nails scraped against the wood until they found it.
A small, almost invisible latch.
A cold smile touched my heart, but my face remained a mask of pathetic weakness. My grandfather had this secret compartment installed for me years ago. "A lady must always have a place for her secrets," he'd said with a wink.
In my past life, I'd kept love letters and silly trinkets in it.
In this life, it held my salvation.
My fingertip pressed the latch. A faint click, softer than a breath, and a small panel sprang open on the lower side of the nightstand, hidden in the decorative scrollwork.
Inside, nestled on a bed of velvet, was a cold, metallic weight.
A small, silver-plated pistol. My twenty-first birthday present from Grandfather Alistair. A beautiful, deadly thing I had never once fired.
What a fool I had been. Believing in the goodness of the world, in the loyalty of those around me. This pack, this family, was a pit of vipers, and I had been dancing among them, utterly defenseless.
"I... I have no strength," I murmured, leaning my full weight against Dudley, forcing him to adjust his position. "You'll have to feed me."
A flicker of triumph crossed his face. He thought my final resistance had crumbled. He was so sure he had won.
He reached for the bowl again, his back partially turned to me as he scooped up the dark liquid.
It was all the time I needed.
My fingers closed around the cool, heavy grip of the pistol. The weight of it was grounding, a solid piece of reality in a world that had fractured and reformed. I drew it from the compartment, concealing it in the folds of my silk nightgown.
My gaze flicked to the door. I could imagine it already — my stepmother Candis's footsteps hurrying up the stairs, then her voice calling Grandfather and Jenson. Soon she would bring them bursting in to witness my "shame."
I had to act before then.
Dudley turned back, the spoon held aloft like a victor's trophy. The bitter, earthy smell of the drug assaulted my senses, a phantom taste of despair on my tongue.
He brought the spoon to my lips.
I jerked my head to the side.
The spoon clattered against my teeth. A drop of the vile liquid splashed onto my chin, burning cold.
Dudley's patience finally snapped. His face, once a mask of fake sympathy, twisted into an ugly snarl. "Clara, don't be a bitch!"
He dropped the spoon into the bowl and reached for me, his fingers crooking into a claw, aiming to pry my jaw open. "You'll drink this one way or another!"
His hand shot toward my face.
But he never reached it.
In that split second, a strength I didn't know I possessed surged through me. It was the strength of a lifetime of agony, of a soul screaming for retribution.
I shoved him, hard.
He stumbled backward, surprised by my sudden force.
I used the momentum to roll across the wide bed, away from him, my body a blur of white silk. The pistol, now free from the folds of my gown, felt like an extension of my own arm.
I landed on my knees on the far side of the bed, the mattress dipping under my weight.
And I raised the gun.
The silver weapon gleamed in the dim lamplight, its dark, hollow eye staring directly at Dudley Nixon.
He froze, his hand still outstretched, his face a comical picture of shock and disbelief.
The hunter had just become the hunted.
