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I kiss their heads before I close the panel. Then I step back into the cabin, knowing I can’t fit in there with them while wondering what to do. Suddenly I find myself alone. So I wait. Because I don’t know who’s coming through that door next—Igor… or Leone. And I need to be ready for either.

I glance around wildly, searching for a weapon, an escape route, anything.

The kitchen knives are gone. The back door is warped shut in its frame.

My eyes land on the worn floorboards near the kitchen table—the ones that always creaked when I would sneak out of the closet for snacks.

I drop to my knees, fingers finding the edge of a warped plank.

It lifts easier than it should; years of rot and neglect are finally working in my favor.

The space below is black, the musty smell of damp earth rising to meet me.

I don’t have time to think about what might be living down there.

The headlights grow brighter, cutting through the cabin’s dusty windows in harsh white slashes.

I ease myself into the crawlspace, my body barely fitting through the narrow opening.

I pull the floorboards down over me just as car doors slam outside.

Darkness swallows me whole. I curl into myself, trying to make my body smaller, trying not to think about the spiders that are surely crawling across my skin right now. The dirt beneath me is cold and damp, soaking through my clothes.

I hold my breath as boots crunch on the porch steps. The door crashes open—my chair defense tossed aside like it’s nothing. Flashlight beams dance across the floorboards above my head, sending thin rays of light through the cracks. Dust rains down on my face.

“Find her,” a voice growls, and my blood turns to ice. Mikhail. Not Leone. Not Igor. Worse. So much worse.

Boots stomp across the floor directly above me. I press myself deeper into the dirt, praying the boards don’t give way. They kick over furniture, rip open cabinets, and shatter what little remains whole in this broken place.

“Check the bedrooms,” someone barks. More footsteps. More banging.

I shift slightly, trying to ease the pressure on my shoulder where a nail juts down from the floorboards.

My hand sinks into the dirt—and touches something hard.

Something smooth. Not a rock. I run my fingers along it, feeling the curve, the hollow spaces.

Recognition hits me like a punch to the gut.

Bones. I stifle a gasp, jerking my hand away, but morbid curiosity pulls it back. I trace the shape in the darkness—a forearm. Ribs. And then, unmistakably, a skull, half-buried in dirt and torn fabric.

I clamp a hand over my mouth, bile rising in my throat.

It clicks into place. No funeral. No answers.

Just silence from my father whenever I asked where Grandma went.

She didn’t leave. She was buried right here, rotting beneath the kitchen all these years.

It explains why we never went to her funeral, why we never heard Dad speak of her again or why he never took us to visit her.

Most of all it explains why he never sold this place, the land would have had to have been worth something, yet he said no one ever showed interest; maybe this is why, he couldn’t sell it knowing his mother was beneath a house that would have been knocked down if he had.

“Nothing in the bedrooms,” a man reports, his voice muffled through the floorboards.

“Check under the house,” Mikhail orders, and my heart stops. “Tear this place apart if you have to.”

I need to move. Now. I crawl silently away from my grandmother’s remains, inching toward where I remember the foundation vent to be. It was beneath the porch steps, a small opening barely big enough for a child to squeeze through.

The space grows tighter as I near the edge of the house, the floor lower, pressing down on my back until I’m flat on my stomach, pulling myself forward with my elbows like I’m in some hellish military training exercise.

I reach the vent—rusted metal slats that give me a narrow view of the yard beyond.

Just as someone drops to their knees on the porch above, flashlight beam cutting through the darkness beneath. I freeze, not daring to breathe as the light sweeps inches from my feet.

“Nothing under here,” the man calls after a cursory check. “Just dirt and spiders.”

Thank god for lazy thugs. A door slams. An engine revs. They’re leaving? That can’t be right. Mikhail doesn’t give up that easily.

Then I hear it—a scream. My mother. I inch toward the broken foundation vent beneath the porch steps, blinking through the slats as movement catches my eye. He’s dragging her. Mikhail has her by the hair, yanking her toward the clearing like she weighs nothing.

“Where are they!” he bellows, his voice carrying across the silent forest.

She says nothing. Her face is already bloody, one eye swollen shut. She spits in his face.

He backhands her so hard I hear the crack of his hand against her cheekbone. She crumples to her knees.

“Tell me, or I’ll gut you open and dump your insides across this fucking yard!” he screams, kicking her in the ribs.

She curls into herself, coughing blood, and still, she doesn’t speak. I bite down on my fist to keep from screaming.

“Come out, Fallon!” he yells, voice echoing across the trees. “Come out now, or I’ll beat your mother until she stops breathing.”

I freeze. He knows. He knows I’m her daughter. How?

The porch rattles. His men crash inside again, roaring orders and splintering furniture. Glass shatters. Cupboards slam. I hear footsteps right above me, dust raining down into my eyes.

“She’s not here!” one of them shouts.

More footsteps. Curses. Then…

“Burn it,” Mikhail says.

No.

“No, no, no,” I whisper, already scrambling back toward the crawlspace entrance that is beneath the kitchen. The girls. I have to get to the girls.

The first flames lick the edge of the porch. Smoke drifts under the boards, stinging my eyes and throat. I crawl fast, heart slamming and blood rushing in my ears. I can’t let them burn alive.

My shoulder hits something hard. I glance down—my hand landing on a skeletal forearm. I should be horrified. I should be screaming. Yet all I feel is a cold, creeping certainty that I’ll end up just like her if I don’t move faster.

I shake it off. No time. I reach the trapdoor and slam my fists against the pantry floor.

It’s hot. Burning. I grit my teeth and push.

The floor creaks open just enough. I throw myself upward, coughing violently as smoke rolls around me only to glance down to see I was right about it being her, I recognize the old frayed dress, the necklace around her skeletal neck, it’s my grandmother.

Not having time to process that information, I rush for the girls.

“Anya! Mila!” I choke crawling to the closet wall. I claw it apart. I rip through the nailed-up slats and insulation. Their wide eyes blink back at me. “Come on! Now!”

They don’t question. Just crawl out. Their faces are streaked with tears and soot, eyes wide with terror as flames lick up the walls around us.

I grab each of them by the arms and pull them through the thick smoke, coughing, stumbling toward the back entrance.

The heat presses against us like a living thing, hungry and vicious.

My lungs scream for clean air. My eyes burn. I don’t let go.

“Stay low!” I tell them. We crouch, moving as fast as we can through the burning cabin. The smoke hangs thick above our heads, a deadly black cloud waiting to suffocate us if we stand too tall.

A beam cracks overhead, showering us with burning splinters.

Anya screams, brushing embers from her hair.

I yank her forward, my grip so tight I’ll probably leave bruises.

Better bruised than burned alive as I clamp a hand over her mouth to shut her scream off.

I pat her down and press a finger to my lips and they nod.

The back door is just ahead, warped in its frame yet our only chance. I throw my shoulder against it, once, twice, the impact jarring through my bones. On the third try, it gives with a groan of protesting wood. We spill out into the night air, gulping it down like we’ve been drowning.

We make it out the back door, just as the roof begins to cave in. The sound is deafening, a thunderous collapse as memories turn to ash. I don’t look back. Can’t afford to.

I clutch Mila’s hand tight, dragging her through the thicket behind the cabin. Anya is right behind me, wheezing from the smoke, her thin shoulders heaving with each cough. The heat from the house still burns the back of my neck. We just have to make it a little farther.

The forest is a maze. Every tree looks the same, every path twists back on itself.

But I remember these woods, even after all these years.

Remember the way the creek bends to the north, the way the old hunting trail cuts through the densest part of the underbrush.

If we can just reach the road beyond—And then I hear her voice.

“Daddy?”

I freeze. My heart skips a beat. No. No, please, no.

Mikhail stops, too. Across the clearing toward the old barn. He was heading for the barn, barking orders at his men as they fanned out across the property. Now he turns slowly, his head whipping toward the sound like a predator that’s just scented blood.

I spin toward Mila, clapping my hand over her mouth. It’s too late. She’s already waving, her small arm raised above the underbrush. His eyes lock onto her. Onto us. A smile spreads across his face, slow and terrible as spilled blood.

“Over there,” he calls to his men when his voice turns soft with false tenderness. “Mila where are you, baby, come to Daddy, little one.”

“No,” I whisper fiercely in Mila’s ear as I drag her further back.

Her eyes widen in confusion, darting between me and Mikhail. She doesn’t understand. How could she? She’s just a child caught in a war she didn’t start.

“Run!” I scream. “Run, Mila!”

She stands frozen, her lips parted, confused. Mikhail is already moving toward us, his long legs eating up the distance between us. His men fall in behind him, their guns drawn.

“Mila, now!” I snap, grabbing her arm as I yank her through the trees. “Anya, come on—move!”

I grab Anya’s hand too, nearly lifting her off the ground as I take off toward the trees. She fights me, twisting, sobbing.

“We can’t leave Mommy!” she cries, her voice breaking on the word.

“We have to! She’s right behind us!” I lie. The truth is too much to bear, that her mother is still back there, at their father’s mercy. That we might be the only reason she’s still alive at all.

I clamp a hand over Anya’s mouth as branches scratch our faces and the world turns to noise—boots thudding, men yelling, dogs barking in the distance. We tear through the forest, my lungs burning, legs giving out beneath me. Every breath is fire. Every step is agony.

Gunshots crack behind us. I flinch, instinctively pulling the girls closer, using my body as a shield. The bullets aren’t meant for us. Not yet. They’re warning shots, meant to herd us like frightened animals. And it’s working.

My foot catches on a root, and I go down hard, my knee smashing against a rock. Pain explodes up my leg. I bite back a scream, tasting blood. The girls tumble with me, a tangle of limbs and terrified breathing.

“Get up,” I hiss, more to myself than to them. “Get up, get up, get up.”

My knee throbs as I force myself back to my feet. More shouts behind us. Closer now. They’re gaining on us. Of course they are. They’re grown men with guns and flashlights. I’m an injured woman with two exhausted children.

Think, Fallon. Think.

My gaze scans the darkness frantically. There… a massive fallen oak, its roots torn from the earth to create a cavernous space beneath.

I drop to my knees, ignoring the stab of pain, and peer inside. It’s dark, but dry. Big enough for the girls, at least.

“In here,” I whisper, pushing them toward the hollow. “Quick.”

They hesitate, only for a moment. They scramble inside, pressing themselves as far back as they can go.

“Wait here. You understand?” I whisper. “Don’t move. Don’t make a sound. Not until I come back.”

Anya stares at me with tear-streaked cheeks and a trembling chin. “You’re coming back, right?”

“I am,” I whisper, brushing her tangled hair off her face. “But I have to help your mom. I have to try.”

She nods, barely. Then I go. One thing I do have some reassurance of is that Mikahil is unlikely to kill his own daughters; me, he won’t hesitate.

I slip through the shadows, keeping low as I crawl to the edge of the clearing.

Then I see them. Mikhail. My mother. He has her on her knees, blood running down her face and coating her hands, her blouse torn.

She’s thrashing, still trying to push him off, spitting curses even as he hits her again and again.

“Call the girls to come out,” he demands, his voice carrying across the still night air.

“Go to hell,” she spits, blood and saliva splattering his expensive shoes.

He grabs her by the throat, lifting her slightly off the ground. “I’ll find them with or without you. I’ll make this quick if you tell me where they went.”

My mother laughs—a ragged, broken sound. “Then do it, you fucking coward.”

He drops her, disgust twisting his features. He nods to one of his men, Igor. The hulking Russian steps forward, drawing his gun from its holster.

And then Mikhail shoves her to the ground in front of Igor who lifts his gun, aiming directly at her.

“No…” I whisper, taking a step forward. I need to do something. Anything. I can’t just watch this happen.

Bang.

The sound echoes through the trees and seems to stop time itself. She slumps forward. Dead. Just like that. One moment alive, and the next… nothing.

A scream claws its way up my throat, and I slam my hands over my mouth, shaking violently as I sink to my knees. No sound escapes. My mother. She bought us time. She fought. And he?—

Pain explodes at the back of my head. Everything goes black.

Pain throbs at the base of my skull, each pulse like a hammer striking an anvil.

I blink awake to darkness and the taste of dirt in my mouth.

For a moment, I can’t remember where I am or why I’m face-down in forest debris.

Then it comes back in flashes—the cabin, the fire, my mother’s body on the grass.

I bite back a sob. No time for grief. Not if I want to keep the girls alive.

I push myself up on trembling arms, the world tilting and spinning around me.

Blood matts my hair, warm and sticky against my scalp.

“Where are my daughters?” Mikhail screams, grabbing my hair.

I don’t even feel it, no pain, nothing, just a horrifying numbness as I stare at my mother’s body lying limp.