Chapter 1 Confession 1 #3
Of course, we were caught more than once.
A cuff to the ear, an extra round of scrubbing, sometimes worse.
But even punishment felt different with Leah at my side; her wide smile and whispered “worth it” made every bruise into a badge, every aching muscle into a reminder that I was alive, not just Viktor’s Doll.
It was livable. Leah made life livable.
My fifteenth year flew by thanks to her.
I always dreaded nine p.m., but the rest of my day was mine to own.
Sixteen didn’t feel that much different.
I did notice that Leah lost a little bit of luster, her smile never quite reaching her eyes, but I didn’t think much of it.
No one’s smile was bright in Viktor’s estate.
She wasn’t waning; she was fitting. I knew that intimately, and our relationship became more balanced.
Leah couldn’t do all the heavy lifting. I had a part to play in the ways of hope, and that meant showing Leah that I took her words to heart.
When I wasn’t Viktor’s Doll, I was Arden, the best I could be.
For Leah. I left my hair unbraided until eight-fifteen p.m., wearing it long and in thick messy, brown curls.
I stopped wearing makeup until the same time, letting myself look as ragged and tired as I wanted.
I slouched when I ate my ration of soup, and I stole books from Viktor’s library so Leah could teach me how to read.
That was when she began to tell me pieces of herself.
The more open I became, so was she. It presented me with a different reflection.
Not the soulless, dark eyes of Rafe Creed, but the pretty blue, sparking eyes of Leah Hollis.
Leah was the sun; Rafe was the night. I couldn’t help but compare them, because everyone else at the estate faded into the background when they were around.
Even when Rafe was sold for another year—“They tripled their bid this time, my Doll. Imagine the jewels I can dress you in”—his presence loomed over the boys of the house.
They all aimed to claim the space Rafe Creed claimed, because they didn’t know he was saving them from a hell far worse than death.
So while everyone looked to Rafe, I looked to Leah.
She’d grown up with oil on her fingers and wrenches heavier than her wrists.
Her parents, she told me, had worked on cars, real cars, not the kind Viktor kept under tarps like trophies, but the kind people actually drove until the engines coughed and died.
She said the sound of a socket wrench clicking still made her think of home.
I couldn’t picture her as a little girl in grease-stained overalls, hair tied back with a rag, but I wanted to.
I wanted to imagine Leah somewhere else, laughing in daylight, climbing under a hood and making something come alive again.
One night, after the estate had quieted and Viktor’s footsteps had faded down the hall, she tugged me out of bed with a dangerous gleam in her eyes. “Come on,” she whispered. “If you’re going to live, Arden, really live, then you have to see this.”
We slipped down staircases and past locked doors until the air changed, cooler, tinged with gasoline and leather polish.
Viktor’s garage was another world entirely.
There were rows of gleaming cars. Metal and glass, chrome that caught the dim bulbs overhead, wheels so spotless they might never have touched a road. My breath caught.
Leah crouched beside a black coupe, pulling a hairpin from her braid with a flourish.
“Watch closely, Arden. One day, this could be a weapon to get us out of here,” she said, and then she showed me.
How to strip the column on the driver’s side bare and twist the right wires together.
How to listen for the low hum, the spark that meant you’d stolen life itself back from the machine.
I watched her hands work with a reverence, and when the engine rumbled awake, low and growling, I pressed my palm to the leather wheel and felt a thrill rise through me so sharp it hurt.
“Your turn,” Leah grinned, sliding out of the seat.
And though my fingers trembled and the wires blurred in my vision, she guided me, patient, whispering, “That one, now pull. Good. Again. Hear it?” until the car growled for me, too.
We both slapped our hands over our mouths to muffle our laughter, our eyes wide in the dim garage light, hearts pounding.
Quickly, Leah made the car quiet again, and for thirty minutes, because that’s all we could really risk, we sat there.
Leah in the passenger seat. Me in the driver’s.
I curled my fingers around the wheel, pressed my foot down on the gas as far as it’d let me with the car off, imagined throwing the car into reverse and breaking through the garage door.
I imagined what it would feel like to ride through the night, the wind in my hair, and I closed my eyes as tears welled.
“Happy seventeenth birthday, Arden,” Leah said softly. “What do you want this year?”
I turned my cheek into the cool leather of the seat, peering through tear-blurred lashes at my friend’s freckled face and blue eyes, her orange hair catching red against the dim light.
I didn’t know how to answer. I’d never been allowed to want for anything.
But I stared at her a little longer, her expression tired, and my heart warmed with desire.
“I want to see you smile again,” I whispered. “Really smile. Like you used to.”
Her eyes turned to glass, her lips wobbling, and I reached a thumb out, brushing a stray tear from her cheek. “It’s truly a wonder, Arden, how good your soul is after being molded by such an evil man.”
But good, I knew, had its limits—especially surrounded by evil.