chapter one
Zane was only eight, but her eyes had already seen too much.
Fair-skinned, with blue eyes and soft brown waves that fell over her shoulders, she looked like a child untouched by the world.
But she wasn’t.
Night fell, and like every other night, the same routine began.
The door opened.
Her father staggered in, the smell of alcohol filling the house as his voice echoes filling the once quiet house.
Her mother quietly placed his dinner on the table, her hands trembling slightly.
“Why am I eating the same food I ate yesterday?” he barked.
Zane froze.
Her mother stepped back immediately. She already knew what was coming.
Before she could respond, he grabbed the plate and flung it across the room. It shattered on the floor, the sound echoing through the house.
“I-it’s because…” her mother stammered, her voice shaking. “We don’t have enough money… You spend it on drinking, gambling… and women at the club. I haven’t even received my salary yet.”
Silence.
Then—
“Really?” His voice dropped, cold and dangerous. "okay, so now I am the problem?”
Zane’s heart began to race.
“How dare you he said as every syllable reeked menace .”
“Michael!” he shouted.
Zane stiffened as her elder brother appeared. Michael—her father’s exact reflection. Same face. Same cruelty. Same darkness in his eyes.
He never saw anything wrong with what their father did.
“Get my belt,” their father ordered. “Your mother has forgotten her place.”
A slow, wicked smile spread across Michael’s face as he walked away, returning moments later with the whip.And Zane felt something cold settle in her chest.
She didn’t look away this time.
She couldn’t.
Her father grabbed her mother by her hair, dragging her across the table like she weighed nothing as he pulled her skirt up revealing her bare legs that has been tainted purple with bruises. Her mother cried out, but the sound only seemed to make things worse.
The first strike came.
Then another.
“Say it,” he demanded.I-I’m a shameless w***e…” her mother cried. “And I deserve to be punished …”
Zane’s hands trembled violently, her body frozen in place as the sound of pain filled the room.
She wanted to scream.
She wanted to run.
But she stayed.
Because she was used to it.
Zane's POV
Sometimes I wonder if the woman who gave birth to me is the same one who gave birth to him.
Michael.
My brother.
My father’s reflection.
He always smiles when things like this happen… like he enjoys it.
Sometimes I wish I could run away. Leave this house. Leave this life. Leave everything behind.
But I can’t.
Because if my mother isn’t the one taking his anger…
then it’s me.
And she never lets that happen.
She takes it all—every hit, every word—just to protect me.
But my father says I’m becoming like her.
That she’s giving me her bad traits.”
And every time he says it…
I get scared.
