Page 135 of Fragile Sanctuary

I turned it off—everything inside me that made me human again. Everything Rho had brought back to life. I didn’t have any other choice.

I tested the front door. Unlocked.Fuck.The moment it swung open, Biscuit ran at me, barking his head off. I grabbed his collar, quickly hooking a leash to it. “Easy, boy. Easy.”

But I didn’t feel the words. Nothing about me was easy, and Biscuit knew it. He went unnaturally quiet at my side.

Everything about the place was silent. Too still. There was no music or humming, no sounds of laughter or chatter. It didn’t feel like Rho’s place.

I found no sign of her in the bedroom or bathroom, but nothing was out of place either. I headed back down the hall. I stilled when Biscuit and I reached the living room and kitchen. Nothing was out of place, not exactly, but something wasoff. Something that had triggered my sixth sense.

I walked deeper into the living space, coming up short as I reached one of the bookcases. The entire world dropped away.

A note was held to the shelf by a photo of Rho and her family. Scrawled across the paper was blocky lettering, familiar in a way that had dread sinking deep.

YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO SUFFER. HOW QUICKLY YOU FORGET. YOUR SISTER MUST’VE MEANT NOTHING TO YOU AT ALL. BUT RHO DOES. AND I’LL MAKE SURE YOUR TORTURE AND HERS LASTS FOREVER THIS TIME. SHE WAS ALWAYS SUPPOSED TO BE MINE ANYWAY.

LET THE GAMES BEGIN.

-THE HANGMAN

45

RHODES

It wasn’ta sound that woke me, it was a feeling. A thumping inside my skull like my pulse lived there and only there.

I tried to open my eyes but couldn’t quite get them to obey. It was as if they were glued in place. Confusion swept through me. That shouldn’t be possible.

Trying harder, I finally got them to flutter. I was blinking so fast, the images filling my vision looked like they were bathed in strobe lights.

Nausea swept through me, whether from my weird vision or the fact that I had some sort of migraine; I wasn’t sure.

I tried to slow my breathing, inhaling through my nose and out through my mouth. I tried opening my eyes again, slower this time. As my surroundings came into clearer view, I stopped breathing altogether.

I was lying on charred flooring surrounded by the remnants of what looked like some sort of burned-out cabin. The only thing left of it were pieces of framing. Everything else had been burned away.Even pieces of the floor revealed a drop-off into nothing but the darkness of a basement below.

None of it was familiar. Not the structure itself or the forests beyond it. That simple fact had my heart rate speeding up as I struggled to sit.

The moment I pushed up, a wave of dizziness swept over me, bringing nausea flaring back to life. I lifted my fingers to my head and winced as I connected with a lump. Pulling my hand back, I saw flecks of dried blood there.

Crap. What the hell happened?

I searched my memory. Flashes of the day came back to me. Forcing Anson out the door to go to work. Getting ready for lunch with Fallon. Walking out to meet her?—

My spine jerked straight as I remembered. Deputy Rolston. All the blood. My stomach pitched as I swallowed back bile. But the memories kept coming. That voice, something about it so achingly familiar but not exact. Then the pain. The falling.

I clambered to my feet, the world swaying around me.

Shit, shit, shit.

I reached out, grabbing for something to hold, anything. My palm hit rough wood, and I gripped it hard. Splinters pierced my palm, but I didn’t give a damn. I needed to stay upright. There was no way I could sustain another hit to the head without passing out.

Slowly, the dizziness faded, and the world came back into focus around me. But I had to blink to make sure that what I was seeing was real. It shouldn’t have been. It was a photo of me that looked to be from high school or college given the haircut. I was working at the nursery but caught in a moment of laughter, my head tipped back and hair tumbling around me.

I swallowed hard and began scanning the space with new eyes. It wasn’t the only photo. There were countless images. My stomach hollowed out.

This wasn’t happening. Maybe if I believed that deeply enough, I could alter my reality and transport myself to early this morning so I could redo everything.

I picked my way through the rubble of the house to the next photo, careful to avoid the places where the floor had fallen away. This shot was more recent. I was working in the garden at the guest cottage, my hands deep in the dirt. I could tell from the grainy quality that all of them had been taken with some sort of zoom lens—one that enabled whoever it was to invade my privacy with the press of a button.

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