Chapter 44

Olivia Martins

I couldn’t stop shaking.

Karen’s blood soaked into the floorboards, sticky and metallic, thick in the air. I sobbed uncontrollably, the sounds raw and animalistic, my wrists burning where the binds had rubbed them raw. Her body had gone still. Limp. Cold. Dead.

“No…” I whispered, as if I could take it back. As if that one word could rewind time. “No, no, no—”

The scent was overwhelming, iron and death. My stomach turned and I doubled over, vomiting onto the floor, gagging on the stench, on the grief, on the horror.

Bridget was whining about something to the witch, pacing like a child denied her toy. I could barely hear her over the pounding in my ears.

“This wasn’t how it was supposed to happen,” she snapped.

The witch waved a dismissive hand, unbothered. “All in good time.”

“Why did you?” I screamed, lifting my head. My throat was raw, tears and bile on my chin. “You monster! How could you!”

Bridget didn’t