Fawn’s POV

Air ripped into my lungs like I’d swallowed knives.

I jerked upright, hands flying to my chest, half-expecting water to gush out of my mouth as I gulped in air. For one panicked, blinding second, I was back in the bath, drowning. No, not drowning… being murdered as I fought to stay alive. But I hadn’t fought them off; they had been stronger. I could still smell lavender oil for a second before it was gone. Like a snap.

Now everything smelled like bleach and plastic and something harsh that stung my nose. I wiggled my nose to stop myself from sneezing as I focused my eyes, or tried to.

The light above me was too bright. Everything around me was white, sterile, and clean. Not my bathroom. Not home. Not even anywhere I recognized. There was a plastic rail at my side. A beeping that was fast and frantic. It was damn annoying.

I became aware my throat hurt, and I needed a drink of water, and I was dizzy.

“Easy—easy!” Someone’s hand hovered near my shoulder, not quite touching.

I blinked, vision clearing.

A man stood at the foot of the bed. I had been looking in his direction.

He didn’t fit… Not Richard.

No. This man was taller, broader, in a shirt with the sleeves rolled up and a loosened tie. His jaw was sharp and dark with stubble, his mouth a hard line, his eyes a steel gray that made my stomach twist because I knew that face. Which didn’t make sense. I blinked once.

Blake Huntington.

My husband’s rival. The man Richard ranted about after too many whiskeys. The “arrogant prick,” the “smug bastard,” the name he spit whenever a deal didn’t go his way. Or when Mr. Huntington had won a project he wanted. Both Richard and Blake had businesses in construction, and they often placed bids for the same jobs.

So why the hell was he in my hospital room?

Then it hit me, I was alive. They hadn’t killed me after all. I must have passed out, and they thought I was dead. It didn’t explain the out-of-body experience. But how had I gotten here? Had they called the police to say I had drowned, but instead of the police finding me dead, I had been very much alive?

The room wobbled a little, then snapped into focus in jerks. Blake wasn’t the only one in the room with me. Two men in white coats… I would take a guess they were doctors; both stared at me like I’d just crawled out of my own grave. Maybe I had, after Richard and Gemma tried to kill me. Also, a nurse stood pressed against the wall, one hand over her mouth, eyes huge. I almost felt the urge to check myself and make sure I still had a head, but my eyes were working, so my head had to be on my shoulders, right?

The older doctor recovered first. “Cassandra,” he said slowly, like he was testing it. “Can you hear me?”

Cassandra? My ears were working, but that wasn’t my name.

I frowned. The effort made my head throb. “That’s… not my name,” I tried to say, but the words barely made it past my dry lips. Had they mixed up my files with another patient’s? Well, that was embarrassing. For them, not me. “I’m… That is… I’m…”

My voice wasn’t right; it stopped me from going on because I was so shocked by the sound. It was deeper, huskier, like I’d smoked a pack a day for ten years, and there was this weird… accent? No, not an accent. Just not mine. The voice was a New Yorker’s voice, but it was sexy, and my voice wasn’t sexy. Was it a side effect from the almost drowning. Well, I hoped it stayed.

Blake Huntington took a step closer to the bed; those grey eyes locked on me as if he could somehow pin me in place with his stare alone.

“Cassie?” he said, and his voice was rough. “You… you weren’t supposed to—”

Die? I thought, and a hysterical little laugh bubbled up that I swallowed down. Too soon for that joke yet, I was guessing.

“I… I don’t…” My throat still felt like sandpaper. Not surprising when I had swallowed a bath full of water. “Water.”

The nurse jolted into action, grabbing a cup, pouring some water into it, then fitting a straw and guiding it to my lips. I sucked greedily, the cool liquid tasting like heaven, not like the bathwater I had swallowed.

As she took it away too fast for my liking, my hands dropped to the sheet, to the hospital gown hanging off my shoulders. The fabric was thin and scratchy. I had hospital tape on the back of my hand where it looked like an IV would go. My fingers looked… different and, well… wrong.

The fingers were longer. The nails were neater, longer. I couldn’t keep my nails that long; they chipped and broke all the time. My wrists were different as well…slimmer.

Okay. Weird. I’d lost weight. Or maybe almost dying was a great detox plan.

Had I been in a coma? Was that why I had lost weight? How long had I been here for? I had so many questions.

My gaze darted past Blake, catching a glimpse of myself in the reflective surface of a dark TV screen on the wall.

And my brain just… stopped. Frozen as I stared.

The woman staring back at me was gorgeous in a way I had never been. Not cute. Not “you have a nice smile” pretty. No. This was the kind of gorgeous that made people stop mid-sentence. And what was that saying… stop traffic. Yes, the woman staring at me would definitely stop traffic.

Long black hair spilled over her shoulders in a glossy mass, almost blue in the fluorescent light. Her skin was pale, with high cheekbones and a full mouth that could’ve sold lipstick in a magazine ad. Her eyes—I couldn’t tell, because the TV screen didn’t show that sort of detail well enough.

I stared. She stared back. I blinked. So did she.

“Okay,” I thought, grasping for logic while my heart hammered against my ribs. “So either I’m dreaming, or I hit my head without knowing it, or I’m in some kind of post-drowning coma hell where I have to live as a supermodel.”

The monitor beside me beeped faster, betraying me. No, my eyes must be playing tricks on me. I would not panic… panicking had been in that bath. I had lived through that.

“This shouldn’t be happening; she was… was brain-dead,” the younger doctor whispered to the older one. “She… was unresponsive. She shouldn’t—”

That snapped me out of whatever shock my brain had gone into.

“I can hear you,” I croaked. I hate it when doctors talk over your head, don’t you?

All three of them… two doctors, one nurse flinched like I’d slapped them. Well, what did they expect? They had been rude.

Blake didn’t move. He just kept staring at me with an expression I couldn’t read. Shock, yes. But under that, something else. Wariness. Guilt. Like he’d been about to do something unforgivable, and I’d caught him right in the act. Why would he care? He hadn’t… hadn’t tried to kill me. That was something I did know.

My last clear memory before waking up in the hospital slammed into me.

My bath. The scent of my lavender oil. Gemma’s nails biting into my arms. Richard’s hands on my shoulders, pushing but not bruising. The water in my lungs. The burning pain in my chest as my lungs were starved of oxygen. How would they explain Gemma’s nail marks as an accident? Richard had been careful not to bruise my skin, but Gemma hadn’t. Now I was alive; there was no way I would let them get away with trying to kill me. I would not be silenced.

Then the promise I’d made as the darkness had taken over. The way my soul had peeled away from my body like smoke. But I was back and alive.

I would make them pay… but I would make it hurt and hit them where it hurt.

My stomach churned.

“I… almost drowned,” I whispered, more to myself than anyone. “He… my husband tried to kill me with his mistress. They tried to kill me.”

Fawn’s POV

I watched three pairs of eyes turn on Blake. What they didn’t think—

“Mrs. Huntington,” the older doctor said carefully, drawing my attention back to him. “You were in a car accident six months ago. You’ve been in a coma. Do you… remember anything? Anything at all?”

Everything inside me went still.

Mrs. Huntington?

“Mrs. Huntington? Car accident?” I repeated.

“Well, that’s one way to describe being murdered in a bathtub,” my brain supplied. My tongue stayed wisely silent. Was that how they’d covered up what they’d done? Put me in a car before crushing it… thinking I was dead.

My heart pounded harder, like it was trying to break out of this too-perfect chest. Six months? Coma? No. I’d been in a bath. Flashes like freeze-frames from a movie flickered through my mind like some black-and-white Hitchcock film. Lavender to help my headache. Gemma grinning at me. Richard’s calm, cruel voice. My lungs burning as I struggled to breathe while more water rushed into my mouth. The panic was still very real.

It hadn’t been a dream… I was here, in a hospital, after all, wasn’t I? Everything was so confusing…

No. I wasn’t. Not really.

After seeing that person in the reflection on the TV, I knew I was no longer Fawn Jones. I didn’t know what was going on… but I would.

I tried to sit up straighter. My body responded, muscles engaging in ways I didn’t recognize—but they worked. Definitely not coma-soft. My… breasts felt different. Higher. Fuller, in a way that didn’t match the rest of the slim, toned frame. Great. Either reincarnation came with an upgrade package, or this body had expensive taste in surgeons. I had the urge to reach up and touch them, to see if they were real—but I’d wait until everyone left.

Then the room tilted.

A wave of dizziness crashed over me. The monitors shrieked again.

“Lie back,” the younger doctor said quickly, hands up like he was soothing a wild animal. “Please. Your body’s been inactive for a long time. We need to assess—”

“Inactive?” I snapped, then winced as my throat protested. “Yeah, sure, that explains why I feel like I could run a damn marathon.” I lay back as he asked. I felt weird. Off.

Blake’s mouth twitched, just for a second, like he wasn’t sure if he was allowed to find that funny.

He stepped closer to the bed, ignoring the doctors’ subtle attempts to shift between us. To keep him back. I had just said my husband had murdered me.

“Cassie,” he said quietly. His voice dropped lower, almost intimate. “Do you know who I am?”

My gaze flicked to him. “Blake,” I said before I could stop myself. “Blake Huntington.”

Something flashed in his eyes. “So you remember me.”

I swallowed. Did I? I remembered him from the cover of GQ and Richard’s bitter rants, from interviews on business channels when I’d been bored enough to watch. I’d seen him at one charity gala, across the room, laughing with someone important while Richard muttered about sharks and vultures and huge egos. Blake Huntington had never spoken to me, though.

And I had never stood this close to him. Never had those grey eyes focused on me like that… sharp and intense—but not in a loving way.

“I… know of you,” I managed.

The older doctor glanced between us, frowning. “Mr. Huntington, we’ll need to run a full neurological workup—”

“Do whatever you need,” Blake said, not taking his eyes off me. “Just tell me how this was possible… how you didn’t pick up this was even a possibility. You told me she wouldn’t be waking up.”

That stung, and I didn’t know why. I didn’t know him… knew of him, yes, like I’d said. But he didn’t want me here. That was clear from his tone.

“I’m right here,” I muttered. “Please stop talking like I’m not. It’s rude.”

The older doctor cleared his throat. “Can you tell us your full name?” he asked gently.

That should’ve been easy.

I opened my mouth.

“I’m F—”

The word stuck in my throat, caught on something jagged and invisible. A sharp, stabbing pain shot through my skull, like someone had shoved a needle behind my eyes and twisted. With the thought came a mental image. Yuck. That only made it worse.

My vision whited out for a second. The heart monitor spiked, shrill and panicked as my pulse jumped.

“F…” I gasped. “Err…” I squeezed my eyes shut, fingers clawing into the sheet, riding out the flash of agony.

The pain eased as soon as I stopped trying to force the name out. I exhaled shakily, sweat prickling at my hairline.

When I opened my eyes, the room felt… wrong. No. It wasn’t the room. It was me.

I wasn’t the same. I already knew that. Everything sort of went fuzzy again.

I stopped trying to talk. If I wasn’t the same woman, they know who I was? I didn’t know what was going on, and until I did, maybe I should play dumb. They hadn’t called me Fawn… what had they called me? My brain hurt so much, it took me a moment to even focus on the people in the room. I felt like I was going in slow motion but everything around me was at normal speed.

“Why don’t you tell me who I am first?” I said instead.

They had called her Cassandra or Mrs Huntington. But who was she? The nurse had gone completely pale. The younger doctor looked like someone had just told him ghosts were real. The older one recovered first, his face smoothing into that professional blankness I was starting to really hate. They must think I’d lost my mind… and maybe I had. Tick that box… being murdered probably did things to a person.

“I think we’re dealing with some confusion,” he said in that calm, patronizing tone doctors use when you say something they don’t like. “Your name is Cassandra Huntington. Cassie. You’re twenty-five. You were in a car accident six months ago. Before that, you lived here. In this city. You’re married to—”

“Ex. Soon-to-be ex,” Blake cut in automatically. His gaze flicked to the older doctor, jaw tight. “We were in the process of divorcing.”

Wait. What?

They thought I was Blake’s wife.

The older doctor nodded once. “Separated, then.” He turned back to me.

The room seemed to drop a few inches, like the floor had tilted. I swallowed hard, forcing air into my lungs.

After a moment, I said before I could stop myself, “Well. Tell all of that to the part of me that watched my husband and his mistress hold me under bathwater.”

Silence crashed down.

Blake’s head snapped toward me so fast I was surprised he didn’t give himself whiplash.

“What are you saying?” he demanded.

The doctors exchanged looks. The younger one scribbled something on a chart like that would fix any of this.

“I think,” the older doctor began carefully, “that we may be dealing with some… delusional memories. It’s not uncommon after traumatic brain injury. We’ll schedule an MRI and—”

“I don’t have brain damage,” I snapped, then gave a humourless little laugh because, okay, I could practically hear the universe going sure. “Or if I do, it’s the least of my problems.”

I dropped my gaze to my hands again, flexing my fingers. The muscles responded beautifully. This wasn’t what a body should feel like after six months in bed. This wasn’t what my body had ever felt like.

Somewhere deep inside, that same tug I’d felt when I was ripped out of my own body stirred again. Less violent now. More… anchored. Like something had clicked into place.

'If not in this life… then in the next. I will make sure they pay.'

My own words echoed at the back of my mind—the vow I’d made while dying. I’d assumed that meant heaven or hell or nothingness. Not waking up in some stranger’s hospital gown with my husband’s enemy staring at me like I’d crawled out of the grave just to spite him.

Maybe I had.

Blake stepped closer again, ignoring the doctor’s attempt to move between us.

“Cassie,” he said, voice low. “What’s the last thing you remember before… this?”

“I told you, my name’s—” I started, then stopped. Pain flickered behind my eyes again. Less intense, but a clear warning.

Fine. I won’t say my name then.

It was like something was holding me back.

“Bath,” I said instead. “Lavender oil. Headache. Richard being… overly polite. Gemma hovering like the rat she is. Then hands pushing me under, holding me there. And a pull. Then… nothing.”

Blake’s eyes darkened. “Richard?” he asked slowly. “Who the fuck is Richard?”

My husband. Past tense. The word curled bitter on my tongue, and I couldn’t help saying it. “Husband.”

Blake went very still. “You know who I am, and my name isn’t Richard,” he said quietly. “So unless you married a second time without me knowing… why do you remember being murdered in a bath but not the car accident that put you here?”

“Are you seriously arguing with the murdered woman about the details?” I shot back, because apparently near-death didn’t kill my sarcasm.

The nurse made a strangled sound that might’ve been a laugh if she weren’t clearly freaking out.

The older doctor sighed, rubbing his forehead. “We’re moving you to ICU for monitoring,” he said firmly, slipping back into full authority mode. “Mr. Huntington, we’ll need you to step out while we run tests.”

For a second, Blake looked like he might refuse. His gaze stayed on my face, searching for something. Recognition. Maybe proof I was insane.

Well, I was fresh out of sanity. After being murdered, no one would be surprised.

Whatever he saw, it wasn’t enough.

But he nodded.

“Fine,” he said, straightening, pulling his shoulders back, sliding the mask of the controlled, untouchable billionaire back into place. “But I’ll be back.”

The way he said it sent a shiver through me that had nothing to do with the cold hospital air.

He turned to leave, grabbing his suit jacket, then paused at the door. When he looked back at me, his expression was unreadable.

His gaze took everything in.

“Don’t think this changes anything.” His jaw tightened. “We are still over.”

The doctors ushered him out. The nurse busied herself with wires and lines and things I didn’t want to think too hard about.

I sank back against the pillows as the adrenaline ebbed, leaving me shaky and cold.

I should’ve been dead. I had been dead. I remembered floating above my body, lifeless in the water.

Instead, I was here. Alive. Breathing. In someone else’s flawless, expensive body with great hooters. In a room belonging to a woman everyone apparently believed was Blake Huntington’s brain-dead wife.

I knew that look in his eyes. I’d seen it in the mirror when I thought of Richard. I’d hated Richard long before the end.

And somewhere out there, my husband and his mistress thought they’d gotten away with murdering me.

I stared up at the ceiling, letting the beeps and hums settle into a rhythm around me.

“Okay,” I whispered to the universe, to whatever had yanked me through darkness and dropped me here. “You wanted me to come back?”

A slow, dangerous calm slid over me, coiling with the fire I’d found at the bottom of that bath.

“Fine. I’ll come back.”

I curled my fingers into the thin blanket, feeling unfamiliar muscles tighten, a stranger’s heart thudding hard in my chest.

“But this time, it will be different,” I promised. “I’m not going to be the weak one.”

And somewhere deep inside, that vow settled like a seed.

Awakening. Not for redemption.

For sin. For revenge.

I might really go to hell by the time I’m done.

Fawn’s POV

I waited until the room cleared, until the last nurse checked my vitals and promised to be right back, before carefully swinging my legs over the side of the bed. My muscles responded with surprising strength. Yeah, I was a little shaky, but nothing like what six months of bed rest should have done to them. I knew it was going to take time to build my strength up.

The IV tugged uncomfortably against my skin as I moved. I hesitated only a moment before carefully peeling back the tape and sliding the needle out with a slight wince. A tiny bead of blood formed at the puncture site, which I dabbed away with my fingertip. The bleeding stopped soon enough.

My balance wavered, then steadied. I took one step, then another, my bare feet silent on the cold floor. The hospital gown gaped open at the back, but I didn’t care. I needed to see.

The bathroom was small, institutional, with harsh fluorescent lighting and a mirror above a basic sink. I didn’t expect more, this was a hospital, not a five-star hotel. I braced myself against the counter, finally raising my eyes to the reflection.

A stranger stared back.

So, it wasn’t an illusion or a dream. I really was a supermodel.

I pressed my palm to the mirror, touching my reflection. No—not my own. Cassandra’s. Icy blue eyes, not brown. High cheekbones, not the rounded ones I’d grown up hating. Full, plump lips. Whoever had been taking care of Cassie hadn’t let her beauty diminish. Her lips were a little dry, but her skin and hair were clean and in good condition.

“Who were you?” I whispered. “Why does Blake want to divorce you? Why does he hate you?”

The woman in the mirror didn’t answer. She just looked scared, those light blue eyes wide with disbelief.

I traced my new face, feeling the unfamiliar angles. This body was taller than my old one, the limbs longer, the waist more defined. My fingers moved down my neck, across a collarbone that jutted more sharply than mine ever had, to the curve of a breast that was definitely bigger.

A laugh bubbled up, edging into hysteria. “Did you pay for these?” I cupped them, feeling their weight. “Christ, what else did you upgrade?” After having a good feel, I snorted. “Shit. They’re real. You lucky bitch.”

I turned, examining my profile in the mirror. Then I reached back and tugged the gown open, letting it fall from my shoulders to pool at my feet.

“Holy shit,” I breathed.

I knew I should be freaking out… I mean, I was in another woman’s body. But I wasn’t dead. That had to be better than being dead, right?

And what a body. It was perfect—the kind that graced magazine covers and made women hate themselves. Smooth skin with defined shape, just enough softness to be feminine. The breasts were full and high, natural despite what I’d initially thought. No scars. No imperfections except a small birthmark on my left hip shaped like a love heart.

I ran my hands down my sides, over my stomach, my thighs. Everything felt foreign. Like wearing a costume made of flesh.

The door clicked open behind me.

I spun, about to grab for the gown, but it was too late.

Blake stood frozen in the doorway, his grey eyes locked on my naked body for one long, charged second before he slammed them shut and turned his back.

“Jesus Christ,” he muttered. “I knocked.”

He acted like he’d never seen me naked before.

“Well, I didn’t hear you,” I shot back, heat flooding my cheeks as I yanked the gown back on. My fingers fumbled with the ties. “What the hell are you doing in here?”

“I left my phone.” He kept his back to me, one hand braced against the doorframe, rubbing the other over his face. “The nurse said you were most likely sleeping. When I didn’t find you in the bed…”

“Does it look like I’m sleeping?”

“No.”

For a man who didn’t want this body, he sure had looked. But then again, I really wasn’t surprised Cassie had been smoking hot and sexy. I finished tying the gown, then crossed my arms over my chest. “You can turn around now.”

He did, slowly, his expression neutral. But something flickered in his eyes, something that made my stomach flip in a way that had nothing to do with fear.

“You shouldn’t be out of bed,” he said.

“Yeah, well, I needed to see.” I gestured to the mirror. “Needed to know if I was losing my mind or if this was real.”

Blake’s gaze swept over my face, searching. “And?”

I shrugged. “Still deciding.”

He stepped into the small bathroom, making the space feel even smaller. There was just something about him that filled a room.

He smelled like expensive cologne and something darker, richer. It had to be his own scent. Nothing like Richard’s overpowering aftershave that always made my nose itch. Richard bathed in the stuff. Maybe I should have drowned him in it.

“The doctors want to start running the tests,” Blake said. “A lot of them. Brain scans, neurological assessments, psychiatric evaluations. Are you up for it?”

“Psychiatric?” I barked out a laugh. “Oh, let me guess. Because I’m claiming to be someone who drowned?”

“Because you woke up from a six-month coma spouting details about being murdered in a bathtub.” His voice stayed level, but his jaw tightened. “Can you honestly blame them?”

I met his gaze in the mirror. “Can you blame me for telling the truth?”

“The truth.” He said it like he was testing the word. “Your truth is that you were murdered by your husband… namely me?”

“Yes. No. Not you.” I rolled my eyes. “But that is what happened.”

He stared at me for a moment before his features reset. “Can you hear yourself? You sound crazy. If your accident wasn’t well documented, I think the hospital would’ve called the police by now. What game are you playing, Cassie? Is this some sort of payback because I wanted a divorce?”

“I drowned.” I kept my voice flat, let the words land. “I remember putting lavender oil in the water. Gemma’s bracelet clinking against the bath while she held my arms down. His voice, so calm, as he pushed my shoulders into the water.”

The muscle in his jaw jumped.

“Cassie, listen to me.” His tone hardened. “You were in a crash. Driving too fast on a wet road, you went through a guardrail. You wrapped your car around a tree. You had a broken ankle and some bruising; the worst damage was to your head. You had a lot of swelling on the brain.”

A chill slid under my skin. This body’s skin.

“I wasn’t driving,” slipped out before I caught it.

His gaze sharpened. “No?”

“I mean…” I licked my lips; his eyes flicked down and watched the movement, before moving away just as quickly. “I don’t remember the car. I remember water. Not—” I pulled in a slow breath. “You really think I’d confuse a bath with a wet road?”

I could see in that moment I couldn’t tell him, or anyone, who I really was. I was still too confused myself.

“Brains do weird shit, Cassandra.” His tone cooled. “Six months with no input? They start filling gaps with whatever they can reach. Old fears. Half-remembered stories.” His eyes narrowed slightly. “Nurses talking about another patient.”

“You think I heard about another patient and… what? Stole her murder?” My laugh scraped my throat. “You think I want all this?” I spread my arms wide.

But I did. I wanted another chance. It was my last vow as Fawn… to come back for revenge. To make Richard and Gemma pay.

He watched me too closely. “I think you sound like someone the psych team will be very interested in.”

The words hit like ice water down my spine.

Psych team.

Frigging great. He wanted to lock me up.

White rooms. Padded edges. Soft voices with sharp drugs in tiny cups, dulling my mind. I’d never set foot in one, but I’d seen enough daytime TV to fill in the blanks. That was not the place for me.

“I’m not crazy,” I said, quieter than I liked.

“No,” he agreed, and that surprised me enough to look straight at him instead of the mirror. “You’re not. That’s the problem. What are you after with this charade, Cassie?”

My fingers tightened around the edge of the sink. “Explain to me why you think this is a charade.”

“Because you’re coherent. Lucid. You know who I am.” His eyes held mine, unblinking and cold. “A rant from someone who can’t string a sentence together is one thing. When it comes out of your mouth like this? It’s a game. What are you up to, Cassie? What do you think you can gain from the act?”

The look he fixed on me made the bathroom suddenly feel airless.

I turned back to the mirror. My new reflection stared at me—too pretty, too tall, not mine. But it was the life I’d been given.

I swallowed against the tightness in my chest. “So what, I’m supposed to shut up? Pretend I didn’t get murdered? Because you think I’m playing some sort of game.”

Maybe I needed to be Cassie Huntington for a while.

The thought slid in, quiet and brutal.

Play along. Nod for the doctors. Answer to Cassie. Learn this body, this life, this man who looked at me like I was a problem he couldn’t solve.

Use it. Use her. Use him.

I didn’t feel great about that one.

But I needed to get my revenge

Footsteps were heard in her room, the squeak of rubber shoes on laminate floors. A nurse’s voice floated closer, talking about scans and transfers and adding, “Your private room is ready.”

Blake glanced toward the door, then back at me. “You should get back into bed,” he said. “So they can transfer you. You only just came back. You need rest.”

Came back.

He wasn’t wrong.

I squared my shoulders, lifted my chin, and gave my reflection one last look. Fawn Jones was dead. The universe had made that very clear.

Cassandra Huntington, though? She was apparently alive—and I was wearing her skin. I heard the Twilight Zone theme play in my head.

And if I had to wear her face to get revenge on Richard and Gemma, so be it.

I slipped past Blake, brushing his arm as I went. The shock sent a jolt up my arm as I headed back to bed.

“Maybe you’re right,” I said, climbing under the sheet, letting the good-patient mask slide into place. “Maybe the smart move is to stop talking.”

“That would be a first,” he muttered, but his gaze lingered on my face like he was trying to memorise this version of me.

The orderly came in moments later to move me into a private room.

Let them call me Cassandra.

I might be Cassie on paper.

But underneath?

I was the girl they drowned in that bath.

And I was done being the weak one.

I would bring them down piece by piece.