The room was freezing.

It was a chill that had nothing to do with the snow outside; this freeze radiated from the marrow out, a hollow, rattling cold that settled deep in my bones.

I lay on the gurney, shivering uncontrollably.

Dr. Evans didn't bother with the gentle bedside manner he usually reserved for the Made Men.

He tied the tourniquet around my arm, pulling it tight enough to bite into the skin.

Then he slapped the inside of my elbow, searching for a vein.

"Make a fist," he muttered, his voice devoid of sympathy.

I looked past him to Floyd.

He was standing on the other side of the sterile room, holding Jaylah's hand. She was crying softly, her forehead resting against his shoulder.

He was stroking her hair, his lips moving near her ear.

It's going to be okay. I've got this. I'll save her.

He was offering her the very comfort he had denied me while he watched his men beat me into submission.

The needle pierced my skin.

It was a thick gauge, designed for rapid flow. I flinched, a small, ragged gasp escaping my lips as the steel invaded my vein.

Floyd didn't even turn around.

I watched the clear tube turn dark crimson.

My blood.

My life.

It flowed out of me, cycled through the machine, and pumped directly into the arm of the woman lying on the adjacent table.

I felt the drain almost immediately.

I was already weak from the cold and days of starvation. The sudden loss of volume hit me like a physical blow.

The room began to spin.

The harsh fluorescent lights overhead seemed to stretch and blur, creating halos that hurt my eyes.

"Doctor," I mumbled, the word feeling thick on my tongue. "I feel dizzy."

"Keep squeezing your hand," Floyd commanded from across the room. His voice was sharp, cutting through the haze. "Don't stop."

He wasn't worried about me fainting. He was only worried the flow would slow down.

I squeezed.

My fingers felt like lead, disconnected from my body.

A wave of nausea rolled over me, heavy and suffocating.

My vision started to tunnel. The edges of the room turned to black smoke, encroaching on the center.

Through the narrowing aperture of my sight, I saw Floyd lean down and kiss Jaylah on the forehead.

He looked so strong. So vibrant. So alive.

And he was feeding off me.

He was draining me dry to keep his new life breathing.

"She's stabilizing," Dr. Evans announced, his eyes fixed on the Matriarch's monitor.

"Good," Floyd said, his tone flat. "Take another pint to be safe."

"Boss," Evans hesitated, glancing back at me. "The girl's pressure is dropping fast. She's barely ninety pounds soaking wet. Another pint might..."

"Did I ask for a medical opinion?" Floyd cut him off, ice in his voice. "Take it."

I wanted to scream.

I wanted to rip the needle out of my arm and run until my lungs burned.

But I couldn't move.

My limbs felt like they belonged to a corpse. The cold was spreading up my arm, seeping into my chest, freezing my lungs.

My heart fluttered.

It was a terrifying sensation, like a bird trapped in a cage that had suddenly become too small.

Thump... thump... thump...

Slower.

Weaker.

I closed my eyes.

A single tear leaked out, sliding hot against my cooling skin and into my ear.

I realized then that I was dying.

Not dramatically. Not with a bang.

I was just fading away in a basement, being consumed by the people who were supposed to be my family.

The darkness rushed in, absolute and final.

The last thing I heard was the steady, strong beep of the Matriarch's heart monitor-powered by my stolen blood-while my own faded into silence.

I woke up to the sharp, chemical tang of fresh blueprints and ammonia.

I wasn't in a hospital bed.

I was sitting at the drafting table in the estate's library, slumped over the wood.

My head was pounding so hard I thought my skull had fractured along the sutures. My arm throbbed where the needle had been, the puncture site wrapped in a crude bandage stippled with dried blood.

"Finally," a voice said.

I lifted my heavy head, fighting the gravity that tried to pull me back down.

Floyd was leaning against the heavy oak desk, a silhouette of casual cruelty.

He held a rolled-up set of plans in his hand, tapping them rhythmically against his thigh.

"You've been out for three hours. Wasting time."

He threw the plans onto my table. They unrolled with a snap, revealing the complex layout of a new casino complex on the waterfront.

"The structural supports for the underground vault are wrong," he said, his tone bored. "The city inspector is coming tomorrow. If this isn't fixed to hide the laundering room, they shut us down."

I blinked, trying to focus. The lines on the paper were swimming, refusing to stay still.

"Floyd... I can't," I whispered, my voice cracking. "My hands... I can't feel my hands."

He sighed.

It was a sound of suffering patience, as if I were the one being unreasonable.

He reached under the desk and pulled something up.

It was a crate.

Inside was Sunny.

My golden retriever. The dog I had raised since she was a puppy. The only living thing in this house that looked at me with love instead of calculation.

Floyd pulled a gun from his waistband.

He didn't point it at me.

He pointed it at the crate.

"Sunny has been barking all morning," he said casually. "It's giving me a headache."

My heart stopped in my chest.

"No," I gasped. I tried to stand, but my knees buckled, useless as water. "Floyd, don't. Please."

"Fix the plans, Elizebeth," he said. He clicked the safety off-a dry, mechanical sound that echoed in the silence. "Every mistake you make is a reason for me to pull this trigger."

I grabbed a pencil.

My fingers were stiff claws, uncooperative and alien. I gripped the wood so hard it snapped in two.

I grabbed another one.

I started to draw.

I drew through the tears blurring my vision. I drew through the violent shaking of my body.

I corrected the load-bearing walls. I hid the vault behind the ventilation shafts, my mind operating on pure adrenaline and terror.

I worked for two hours, terrified to look up, terrified to hear the deafening bang.

"Done," I sobbed, dropping the pencil. "It's done."

Floyd stepped forward and checked the plans.

He nodded.

"See? You just needed motivation."

He holstered the gun.

"Tea is being served on the terrace. Bring the plans. Jaylah wants to see where her new office will be."

I followed him like a ghost.

My legs dragged, heavy as lead.

We went out to the terrace. The heaters were blasting, glowing orange against the winter grey, fighting a losing battle against the biting wind.

Jaylah and her recovering mother were sitting at the iron table.

A silver tea service was laid out, gleaming in the dull light.

There was a brazier of hot coals nearby, keeping the area warm.

I placed the plans on the table.

"Here," I said.

Jaylah looked at me. She smiled, but her eyes were dead-two chips of ice.

She stood up, pretending to reach for the sugar.

As she moved, her foot lashed out.

She kicked my shin, hard.

I stumbled forward, my balance already compromised.

My hip hit the table with a jarring thud.

The teapot wobbled and tipped over.

Scalding hot Earl Grey splashed onto the Matriarch's lap.

The woman screamed.

"You little bitch!" Jaylah shrieked.

She turned to Floyd, her face twisted in fake horror.

"She attacked her! She tried to burn my mother!"

Floyd's face went dark.

He looked at the Matriarch, who was wailing, and then at me.

"I didn't..." I started, panic rising in my throat. "She kicked me..."

"Enough!" Floyd roared.

He grabbed me by the throat.

He lifted me off my feet, slamming me back against the stone railing. The impact knocked the wind out of me.

"I take your blood to save her, and you try to burn her?" he yelled, spittle flying from his lips. "You are a snake, Elizebeth. A poisonous, ungrateful snake."

"Floyd, look at me!" I choked out, clawing at his hand. "It's a lie!"

He didn't see me.

He only saw the insult to his power.

"You like fire?" he asked, his voice dropping to a terrifying whisper. "You want to burn things?"

He dragged me toward the brazier.

The coals were glowing red hot. The heat radiating from them scorched my face, drying the tears on my cheeks instantly.

"Jaylah says you don't deserve hands that create art if you use them to hurt family," Floyd said.

He forced me toward the coals.

"Admit you did it on purpose," he demanded. "Admit it, or I bring your mother here and I put her hands in this fire instead."

My blood ran cold.

My mother. She was in a nursing home paid for by the Meyers trust. He could get to her in ten minutes.

I looked at the coals.

I looked at my hands. The hands that drew. The hands that built. The hands that were my only ticket out of this hell.

"Leave her out of this," I whispered.

"Admit it!"

"I did it!" I screamed, my voice raw. "I did it! I wanted to burn her!"

Floyd released my neck.

"Punishment," Jaylah said softly from behind him, her voice silky with satisfaction. "An eye for an eye."

Floyd looked at me.

"Do it," he said.

He pointed to the coals.

"Put them in. Or I call the boys to pick up your mother."

I looked at him one last time.

I engraved his face into my memory. Not to love him. But to remember the face of the devil so I would never forget who to hate.

I took a deep breath.

And I plunged my hands into the fire.

Elizebeth Rice POV

The air in the warehouse tasted of rust and stale gasoline.

It was a violent shift from the lavender tea I had spilled only an hour ago.

My knees were raw, grinding against the unforgiving concrete floor.

Two of Floyd's soldiers pinned my shoulders.

These were men I had once made sandwiches for during long stakeouts. Men whose coffees I had poured.

Now, they held me like livestock waiting for the slaughter.

Floyd stood before me.

The brazier of coals from the terrace had been dragged in here.

It glowed in the dim light, a menacing, unblinking orange eye staring me down.

The heat radiating from it was already drying the tears on my face.

"You have a choice," Floyd said.

He sounded bored.

He sounded like he was ordering dinner, not orchestrating the mutilation of the woman he had promised to marry.

Jaylah stood behind him, checking her reflection in the dark screen of her phone.

"She doesn't deserve a choice, Floyd," she said, not bothering to look up. "She tried to burn my mother. She should lose the hands that did it."

Floyd looked at me, his expression unreadable.

"Jaylah is right. But I am a fair man."

He crouched down.

His eyes were empty. The man I knew was gone, completely hollowed out and replaced by this cold kingpin.

"Confess," he commanded softly. "Tell me you did it on purpose to sabotage the alliance. Tell me you are a rat working for the Russians."

"I'm not," I sobbed, my voice trembling. "It was an accident. She kicked me!"

Floyd sighed, a sound of pure disappointment.

He pulled his phone out.

He dialed a number and set it to speaker.

"Hello? This is Green-Wood Nursing Home."

Ice flooded my veins, stopping my heart.

"This is Mr. Meyers," Floyd said, his eyes locking onto mine with predatory focus. "I'd like to arrange a transfer for Mrs. Rice. To the street."

"No!" I screamed.

I lunged forward, surging against the grip of the soldiers, but they yanked me back effortlessly.

"Floyd, please! She's sick! She'll die without the machines!"

"Then confess," he said, his voice terrifyingly calm. "Or she dies tonight."

I looked at the phone.

I looked at the glowing coals.

I looked at my hands.

My fingers were long and slender.

They were calloused from holding pencils, from the friction of drafting rulers.

They were the hands that had designed the library Floyd claimed to love so much.

They were the only thing I had left that was truly, undeniably mine.

"I did it," I whispered.

The lie tasted like ash in my mouth.

"Louder," Jaylah demanded.

"I did it!" I screamed, my voice cracking under the strain. "I tried to burn her! I hate you! I hate all of you!"

Floyd nodded to the person on the phone. "Cancel the transfer."

He hung up.

Then, his gaze shifted to the brazier.

"The debt for the attempt must still be paid," he stated. "An eye for an eye. A burn for a burn."

He gestured to the coals.

"Do it yourself, or my men will hold you down and keep you there until the bone shows."

I stood up.

My legs were shaking so violently I could barely maintain my balance.

I approached the fire.

The heat was intense, instantly singeing the fine hair on my arms.

I looked at Floyd one last time.

I was searching for a flinch. A hesitation. A flicker of humanity.

He just checked his watch.

I closed my eyes.

I thought of my mother, safe and warm in her bed.

I thought of the sketches I would never draw again.

I thrust my hands into the orange heart of the fire.

The sound came first.

A wet, searing hiss.

Then the smell.

Sweet, cloying, and sickening-like pork left too long on a grill.

Then the pain.

It wasn't a sensation. It was a white noise that swallowed the entire world.

I didn't scream.

My brain couldn't process the signal to scream.

I just opened my mouth and let out a silent, broken gasp as my future turned to ash.