Damon Pierce saved my life when I was eighteen. Then he kissed me bloody and told me he'd marry me.Then he asked me to do a hundred favors first — "just to be sure."Seven years. Thirty-eight bullets. Ninety-eight favors.But tomorrow he's marrying her. I was eighteen the night Damon dragged me out of a back-alley fight ring with my baby sister bleeding behind me. He looked me over. Saw me drop a guy twice my size. Grinned. "You can fight, kid. Come work for me." After that, I was his. I climbed The Cage from prelims to main event. Seven years undefeated. The boys called me The Wraith because nobody saw the punches coming. I made him millions. I bled for every dollar. The night they crowned me his number one, his champion, his right hand, he walked into the gym with another woman on his arm. "Jesus, Selene. The hell do you look like." His eyes flicked over the blood drying on my jaw. "Go wash up. You're scaring her." That was the night I lost everything. The boys started calling her Mrs. Pierce. I never got that name. Seven years and I never got that name. He cut my hand wraps off himself. Threw them in the trash. Tied an apron around my waist. The Wraith was dead. I was the help. She didn't want to eat? I knelt by her chair and fed her. She got a paper cut? He cracked one of my ribs for "not watching her." I took it. All of it. Because seven years ago, in the back of his car with my hands still shaking, he said: "Wanna pay me back, sweetheart? Do a hundred things for me. Just a hundred. Then you walk." I look down at the leather notebook in my lap. Three left. Three more, and I'm done with this man. I'm carrying her dinner tray down the hall when his voice stops me. "Selene. Get your sister's necklace. Chloe wants it." My stomach drops. Mom's silver cross. The one she was wearing the night she died. Nina sleeps with it under her pillow. My eyes go red before I can stop them. His face flattens. "Selene Quinn." He uses my full name when somebody's about to bleed. Usually me. Three days ago I wouldn't hand Chloe my water bottle at the gym. He threw me in the sparring ring and let two middleweights take turns on me until I couldn't stand up. So I turn around. I walk into Nina's room. I unclasp the cross from her neck while she sleeps and put it around Chloe's. "Looks good on you." His mouth curls. He pulls Chloe against his chest. "See, baby? Best-trained dog on my whole roster." "Selene. You keep her happy, maybe I'll think about that ring I owe you." Chloe rips the cross off and slams it on the marble. The chain snaps. "Damon! You promised it was just gonna be me!" The tears come on cue. He breaks. "Baby. Baby, come here." He shoves past me, scoops her up, and carries her down the hall. I drop to my knees. The broken chain slices my palm open while I'm grabbing at the pieces. Blood everywhere. The boys in the hallway watch me bleed and laugh. Honestly? It's funny. Last month I went five rounds in a death match for him. Came back with a fractured eye socket and internal bleeding. He walked into the recovery room, looked me over, and said: "Christ, Wraith. You're slipping." He shrugged. "Whatever. Chloe's been needing somebody to do her hair." I close my fist around the silver. My eyes go redder than my hand. That night Nina sees the broken cross. She sobs until she throws up. I rock her in my lap and lie to her again. "Hold on, baby. We're almost out. I swear." The door slams open. Damon. His face is dark. "What the hell is all the screaming? Chloe's trying to sleep!" "Pack a bag. Both of you. East House. Now." His boys are already grabbing Nina off the bed. She turns and screams at him. "Damon, you used to be nice to me!" He freezes. Everyone freezes. I clamp my hand over Nina's mouth. My tears soak into her hair. I learned a long time ago what talking costs in this house. I asked him to come home more. That night he stripped my title in front of the whole roster. Seven years gone in one sentence. I told Chloe to stay out of the training cage. Before I finished the sentence his pistol was between my eyes. He came home with a busted lip last week. I brought him ice. He threw the bag in my face. "Don't pretend, Selene. Chloe's gonna think something's going on." He's the one who said I love you first. He's the one who said he was going to marry me. I let go of Nina. She's still crying, quieter now. The East House sits on the edge of rival territory. Half the people who sleep there don't wake up. I make a call. I kick the SUV door open and run for the main house. The second I knock, the noise inside cuts off. A glass shatters against my forehead. I bite the inside of my cheek and bow my head. "Miss Vance. I came to apologize for my sister. She won't bother you again. I swear." Damon's chest is heaving. His eyes catch on the blood running down my face. "Cut it out, Selene. You look like she's the one beating you up." I don't look at him. I drop to my knees. Press my forehead to the floor. Once. Twice. Three times. She finally lifts a soft little hand. "Damon, I'm tired. Just say yes already." He kisses the top of her head. "Baby, you're too sweet. People are gonna chew you up." Then his eyes slide to me. "Since you love your sister so much, walk her there yourself. No driver." That night the temperature drops to fifteen. Nina spikes a fever of 104. I carry her on my back through a blizzard for six hours. In the ER waiting room, with snow melting off my coat, I open the notebook. I write two words. The cross. Two left.
The East House is hours from the compound. Before the sun even comes up, I have to be back to make Chloe breakfast. I barely make it through the front gate before Damon's boys grab me. Tie my wrists. Throw me in the back of an SUV. When the bag comes off my head, they dump me on the gym floor. Damon stands over me, arms crossed. He nods at the training cage in the middle of the room. "Get in. Chloe wants to practice." My head snaps up. "She's never thrown a punch in her life, Damon. She'll kill me." Chloe's face falls in half a second. She presses both hands to her chest. "Damon, baby, what if she's right? I'm so clumsy. What if I really hurt her?" "Don't be silly, baby." He pulls her against him and slides a pair of pink training gloves onto her tiny hands himself. "You're a natural. You're gonna be the best." His eyes flick to me. The patience is gone. "Get in the cage, Selene. Don't make me say it twice." I look at the gloves. Every old break in my body starts throbbing at once. He sees me shaking. He grabs my jaw and squeezes until my teeth grind. "You don't wanna get in? Fine. I'll bring Nina down here instead. She owes me a life too, doesn't she?" Damon doesn't bluff. One more word out of me, and my ten-year-old sister gets dragged out of her hospital bed and tied to that post. I close my eyes. I force a smile. "She's a kid. I'll do it." "I'm bigger anyway. More fun for her." He lets go, satisfied. Turns around and starts adjusting Chloe's stance from behind, his hands wrapped around hers. The boys haul me into the cage. Tie my wrists to the chain-link above my head. My toes barely touch the mat. "Damon, what if I miss? What if I hit her somewhere bad?" He laughs and kisses her temple. "Baby, she's been eating punches for me for seven years. She's a punching bag. Hit her wherever you want." The first hook lands on my ribs. I hear something crack before I feel it. My knees give. The chain catches me by the wrists. Out of the corner of my eye, Chloe is bouncing on her heels, giggling. The man who used to put my hands in ice the second I bled, he just says one word. "Again." She winds up. Throws another. Right hook. Left shoulder. I feel the joint pop. My head drops. Hot blood fills my mouth. The boys around the cage shift on their feet. Nobody knows what to do. Damon doesn't even look at them. He just nods at her. "Good, baby. Now the body." Two more. Left side. Right side. I'm coughing red onto the mat. My white shirt isn't white anymore. Chloe winds up for one more. Damon catches her wrist mid-swing. "Okay, that's enough. Get her stitched up." Chloe stamps her foot. Pouts. "Damon! I was just getting good!" He folds in half a second. He turns to one of his boys. "Bring Nina down." "No." The word rips out of me before I can stop it. "No, Damon, please, she's ten, she's still sick, she can't—" He doesn't even look at me. He boops Chloe on the nose like I'm not screaming six feet away. The last thing I see before everything goes black is two of his boys dragging Nina across the gym floor. Bare feet. Hospital gown. She's twisting against them. Choking on her own crying. "Selene! Selene, help me!"
I open my eyes in a hospital bed. "Nina. Nina." I lurch upright and knock a bowl of soup out of Damon's hands. His face goes dark. But he doesn't snap. He grabs a tissue and starts wiping the broth off my chest. I grab his wrist hard enough to feel the bones. "Where is she. Tell me." He looks down. He doesn't answer. The stitches in my side rip open. I can't breathe through the pain, but I drag myself off the bed anyway and start for the door. He catches me. Pulls me against his chest. His voice is low, fighting something. "She's in surgery, Selene. Quit making it worse. The second she wakes up, I'll bring you to her. Just rest. Please." For the next two weeks, Damon gives me the best medical team money can buy. Sometimes he sits with me himself. He shows me pictures of Nina on his phone. Tubes everywhere. Tiny chest. Then he tries to spoon-feed me soup. I keep my mouth shut. He doesn't get mad. He takes a sip himself, leans in, and pushes it past my lips with his own. I wipe my mouth and shove the bowl back at him. He blinks. Doesn't say a word. He's been weirdly patient with me lately. Until the day Chloe comes to visit. He bursts through the door and finds her on the floor. Cheeks flushed pink. Palms sliced up on broken glass. His whole body shakes. The look he turns on me has nothing soft left in it. "Selene. Have you lost your mind?" He scoops Chloe up against his chest. His eyes are bloodshot. "Apologize. Now." The old me would already be on her knees. But Nina is somewhere in this building fighting for her life because of this woman. I can't bow to her. I won't. I don't move. His face turns to stone. "Have I been going easy on you? You think you get to tell me no now?" I ignore him. I turn around and start walking back to the bed. His voice cuts the air behind me. "One more step and I pull Nina's plug myself." My foot freezes in midair. My nails dig through the hospital gown into my skin. These last two weeks, I almost let myself believe he felt guilty about Nina. I was an idiot. The Damon who used to carry Nina around on his shoulders, who taught her how to throw her first jab, that man died the day Chloe Vance walked through the door. I turn around. I bow at the waist in front of her. "On your knees." My legs give out. I drop. I press my forehead to the cold tile. When I look up, Damon has Chloe's face in his hands and he's kissing her like I'm not even in the room. I keep saying it. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. By the time my voice cracks, they finally come up for air. He scoffs at me. Scoops Chloe up. Rushes her toward the ER. The second his back disappears down the hallway, the tears come. Hard. Hot. Out of nowhere. I press a hand against my chest. I dig the notebook out of the drawer. I write two words. The cage. A man's voice behind me. "What are you writing?"
I shove the notebook under the blanket. Too late. He saw it. Dazon scoffs. "Still scribbling that whiny little diary of yours?" He brushes past me, scoops Chloe's broken bracelet off the floor, and heads for the door. "Oh. Tomorrow. Take Chloe wedding dress shopping. You've got experience with that kind of thing. Help her pick something good." The way he says it, casual, like he's asking me to grab milk. I almost laugh. Three months ago I told him I wanted to try on dresses. He gave me twelve reasons why we couldn't. I don't say anything. I just nod. The boutique is all champagne and giggling girls. Except me. The salesgirls are huddled by the register, whispering. "God, what's her problem? Looks like somebody died." "Oh, you didn't hear? That's the side piece. Real fiancée's the blonde." "Shut up. No way." "Swear to God." "Ew. Look at her. He picked that?" I keep my head down and slide hangers along the rack. Same dresses I looked at three months ago. Back when I was the one trying them on. Back when he found a new excuse every weekend not to come with me. Funny how nothing in this store has changed. And everything else has. Chloe tries on dress after dress. Damon doesn't take his eyes off her. Runs through every adjective in the dictionary praising her. She still pouts. Throws the latest gown on the floor. Looks at me. "Selene, you do it for me. I'm tired." Before Damon can stop her, I grab a dress and walk into the dressing room. He freezes. I zip up the gown. I pull back the curtain. The look on his face flips from anticipation to disgust in half a second. The dress is strapless. My skin is a roadmap. Bruises layered on top of bruises. Three deep stitched-up gashes on my left shoulder, still seeping pink through the satin. A jagged scar curling from my ribs down to my hip where I caught a knee in a death match last spring. The whole boutique sucks in a breath. Chloe stumbles back. Slaps both hands over her mouth. "Damon, oh my God! What is that? That's so gross, get it away from me!" His face goes black. "What are you standing there for? Put it back on." "You're embarrassing yourself. You're embarrassing me." Strangers stare. Salesgirls stare. I peel the dress off in front of all of them. The fabric drags across an open stitch. I bite the inside of my cheek. Every punch I ever ate for this man, every break, every busted joint, it's all coming back at once. Seven years late. In the end Chloe still can't pick. Damon waves a hand and buys all of them. I grab a small pink dress off the children's rack. Something soft. Something a little girl would love. A get-well present. For when Nina wakes up. She must be so scared. A laugh behind me. Mean and high. Chloe rips the dress out of my hands. "Aww. You buying this to bury her in?"
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