Betrayed Before the Apocalypse, Reborn as a Queen

I woke up screaming.

My fingers clawed at the bedsheets like I was trying to hold onto something that wasn't there anymore. My lungs burned, my throat was raw, and my whole body was drenched in sweat. For a few seconds I just sat there in the dark, gasping, shaking, trying to remember how to breathe.

I was alive.

That couldn't be right. I remembered dying. I remembered the fall, the wind tearing through my hair, the monsters waiting below with their jaws wide open. I remembered every single second of it.

I threw the blanket off and stumbled toward the light switch. My fingers trembled so bad it took me three tries to flip it on. When the light flooded the room, I froze completely.

A wedding portrait hung on the wall across from the bed. Me in a white gown, smiling like I meant it. And next to me, tall and cold even in a photograph, stood Alejandro Montero.

"No," I whispered, pressing my hand over my mouth. "No, no, no..."

My legs carried me to the window before my brain could catch up. I shoved the glass open and the night air of Coral Ridge hit my face, warm and familiar. The skyline was intact. The buildings were standing. No fires. No rubble. No monsters roaming the streets, tearing people apart like paper dolls.

Tears rolled down my cheeks and I didn't bother wiping them. I gripped the windowsill and let out a sob that came from somewhere so deep inside me I didn't even know it existed. I was back. Somehow, impossibly, I had been sent back to the time before the apocalypse destroyed everything.

I turned around slowly and looked at that wedding portrait again. Alejandro's face stared back at me, handsome and distant, and every ounce of relief in my body turned into something harder. Something colder.

Because I remembered exactly how I died. And I remembered who killed me.

The memories hit me like a wall of water, pulling me under.

They had dragged me into that room with my wrists bound behind my back. The abandoned building on the east side of the city, forty floors up, with nothing below but concrete and creatures. The whole family was there, standing in a half circle like judges at a trial they'd already decided.

Camila had been the first to speak. My sister. My only family in the world.

"She did it on purpose!" Camila had screamed, clutching her stomach with tears streaming down her face. "She poisoned me! She killed my baby, the last heir of the Delgado bloodline! How could you do this to me, Mia? How could you murder my child?"

Her voice cracked on every word. Her body shook with sobs that looked so real, so raw, that everyone in the room believed her without question. I had stared at her with my mouth hanging open, too stunned to form a single word.

"That's not true!" I had finally choked out. "Camila, I would never hurt you! I would never touch your baby, you know that! Please, you have to believe me!"

But nobody was listening. Rodrigo stepped forward next, his jaw tight, his eyes full of a hatred I had never seen before.

"She also leaked our location to the Severance group," Rodrigo announced, his voice flat and final like he was reading a death sentence. "Because of her, we lost the bunker. We lost our food supply. Dozens of people are dead because of this woman."

"That's a lie!" I had screamed until my throat burned. "I never spoke to anyone from Severance! Rodrigo, please, you have to listen to me!"

I looked at Alejandro then. My husband. The man I had loved with every foolish, desperate piece of my heart. He was standing at the back of the group with his arms crossed over his chest, watching me the way you watch a stranger. No warmth. No doubt. Nothing.

"Alejandro," I had begged, my voice breaking into pieces. "You know me. You know I would never do any of this. Please just look at me. Please."

He didn't move. He didn't blink. He just stared at me with those dark brown eyes that used to make my heart race and spoke three words that ended my world.

"Traitors belong to the monsters." His voice was quiet, almost bored, like he was talking about the weather.

Two men grabbed my arms and dragged me toward the railing. I could hear the creatures below, growling and snapping, hungry and waiting. I kicked and screamed and begged until my voice gave out, but their grip only tightened.

Then Camila raised her hand. "Wait. Let me talk to her alone first. Just give us a moment."

The men looked at each other, then at Alejandro, who gave a slight nod. They released me and stepped back.

The second they were out of earshot, Camila's face changed completely. The tears vanished. The trembling stopped. Her mouth curved into a slow, venomous smile that I had never seen on her face before, and my blood went cold.

"You really are the stupidest woman alive," Camila murmured, tilting her head to the side with a look of pure satisfaction. "You actually believed I loved you, didn't you? That I ever saw you as a real sister?"

"Camila, what are you talking about?" My voice was barely a whisper.

"I killed my own baby, Mia." She said it casually, the way someone talks about throwing out leftovers. "I hated that family. I hated carrying their heir. So I got rid of it and told everyone you did it."

My knees buckled. The world tilted sideways. "You... you killed your own child?"

"And the Severance leak?" She leaned closer, her breath hot against my ear. "That was me too. Every single piece of information, every bunker location, every supply route. I gave them all of it."

"Why?" The word came out broken, shattered. "Why would you do this?"

"Because I wanted your life." Her smile widened, and there was nothing human left in her eyes. "I wanted your husband. I wanted your name. And now I'm going to have all of it."

Before I could say another word, before I could even scream, Camila pressed both hands flat against my chest and shoved.

The railing hit my back and then there was nothing beneath me. I was falling, the wind swallowing my screams, the ground rushing up to meet me. My last sight before the darkness swallowed me whole was Alejandro pulling Camila into his arms, pressing her face against his chest while she sobbed her perfect, practiced tears.

Then the monsters caught me.

I pressed my forehead against the cold glass of the bedroom window and let the memory drain out of me like poison. The street lamps of Coral Ridge glowed warm and golden below, casting long shadows across the sidewalks where people were still walking their dogs, still holding hands, still living their normal little lives. They had no idea what was coming. None of them did.

My reflection stared back at me in the glass, pale and hollow eyed, but there was something different in my face now. Something that hadn't been there before. A hardness in my jaw. A stillness in my eyes that looked nothing like the girl in that wedding portrait.

I turned around slowly and looked at that portrait one more time. Alejandro's handsome, indifferent face. My own stupid, hopeful smile. The white dress I had been so proud of. The flowers I had picked out myself because he couldn't be bothered to care about the details.

What a fool I had been. What a blind, pathetic, trusting fool.

I walked to the portrait and lifted it off the wall. The frame was heavy in my hands. I stared at it for a long moment, then set it face down on the dresser without breaking it. Not yet. There would be time for breaking things later.

Never again.

I would never let them use me again. I would never trust their lies, never fall for their tears, never beg for love from people who wanted me dead. This time, I was going to be the one they feared. This time, I was going to be the one standing at the top of that building, looking down.

This time, I would burn them all before they ever got the chance to touch me.