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He didn’t wake up. His breathing was easier. The machines

whirred and beeped. It was just them, and not just them.

Coralyn felt so truly alone.

Giana Thompson had done this.

It’s not her fault. Dad getting sick wasn’t her fault. But if

she’d just said yes, then I would have been out of her office

and I would have been here, even without the necklace. I

would have been here when it mattered. When he needed me.

She knew she wasn’t thinking clearly, but she was beyond

reason or logic. She was letting her anger get away from her.

She knew that the rage eating her up was a lying, slithering

beast that was out of control, but all she could see was Giana’s

face, that cruelness and indifference. The way she shook her

head and told Coralyn to leave. She was the villain in all of

this. She wasn’t a good person. She was wicked and evil, and

Coralyn had cursed her and now she was going to embody that

curse.

She’d said no and she’d stolen Coralyn away from here

when she could have been here with her dad. Giana had taken

the last chance Coralyn might have had to say goodbye and

she was going to pay. Coralyn was consumed with the need to

make it happen. To make Giana pay for her pain. She’d never

felt anything like it in her life. It scared her, but she’d rather

feel that fear than feel the helplessness that twisted her up

when she looked at her dad’s unconscious form. At least

revenge was doing something.

Giana Thompson thought they were engaged? Coralyn

would give her that. She’d return the necklace and she’d play

her part and she’d make Giana fall in love with her, then she’d

break her. She’d break her heart, shatter her the way she was