01: Congratulations On Your Funeral

→ Agatha ←

‘I only married you because you have Naomi's face.’

The words drifted through the darkness, and I couldn't tell where they were coming from. I couldn't see anything, I couldn't move, I couldn't even open my eyes, but I knew that voice.

I had heard it so many times that it had become part of me, buried somewhere beneath every excuse I had made for the man who had once promised to love me forever.

‘I will never love you.’

My heart ached.

‘No one will ever love you.’

I wanted to cover my ears, but my hands wouldn't budge. The words kept coming, overlapping until I couldn't separate one from another.

‘She is your sister. Can't you sacrifice this one thing for her?’

‘You were the one who chose to become a housewife!’

‘What exactly do you know about running a company?’

‘Know your place, Agatha.’

I shook my head but the darkness seemed to swallow me whole. I wanted to tell them they were wrong. To scream that I had done everything I could.

I had loved my husband. I had sacrificed my career for him. I had stood beside him when the company was struggling. I had defended him even when his temper frightened me.

I had given him everything possible there is to give.

Is it my love? My time? My body? My entire life! I gave it all! And somehow, it had still never been enough.

The sound of shattering glass suddenly tore through the darkness, and I flinched as though it had happened all over again. I felt the sharp sting in my arm, followed by the warmth of blood sliding down my skin.

I could hear my own frightened breathing, but before I could look down, the memory was already changing.

Naomi was standing in front of me.

She is my sister. My other half. The person who had shared my face, my childhood and my blood. She was crying, and I couldn't understand why.

I reached for her, but she stepped backward.

Then I saw Oscar.

His arms were wrapped around someone, and for a moment I couldn't see her face. I tried to look away, but I couldn't.

I backed away from him, but my feet wouldn't move.

Then the smell of smoke filled my lungs. I turned and saw flames rising into the sky.

I could hear screaming from inside, I knew those voices too well to ignore them.

I ran toward the fire, but something held me back. I fought against it, desperate to reach them, desperate to pull them out, but the flames were already consuming everything.

"Please!" My voice broke.

‘Run, Agatha.’

I froze.

The voice came again, louder this time it was almost deafening.

‘Run.’

I woke up with a violent gasp.

For several seconds, I could do nothing but stare at the unfamiliar ceiling above me while my heart pounded so hard against my ribs that I thought it might break through them.

My lungs struggled to draw in air, and the remnants of the nightmare clung to me even as I tried to convince myself that it was over.

Slowly, I pushed myself upright.

Pain immediately spread through my body, forcing a quiet groan from my throat. I looked down at myself and noticed the bandages wrapped around my arms. My fingers trembled as I touched one of them.

What happened to me?

The last thing I remembered was the airport.

I had been on my way to meet the lawyer who had agreed to take my case.

Yes, the airport. The announcement over the speakers about flights taking off, and the determination burning inside me because I had finally found a lawyer willing to stand against the Devereaux family.

Then there was nothing.

I couldn't remember leaving the airport or remember getting into a car.

How am I here? Where is this place? Was I kidnapped or what?

I looked around the room again and everything was unfamiliar, from the dark curtains covering the windows to the expensive furniture arranged with almost unnerving precision. There wasn't a single thing here that belonged to me.

The television facing the bed suddenly turned on and shit, that startled the heck out of me. A news report was playing.

I stared at the screen, barely listening at first, until the words began to make sense.

"...the aircraft crashed shortly after takeoff. Authorities have confirmed that there were no survivors..."

My breathing stopped.

The image of the wreckage filled the screen. Then my photograph appeared alongside a few other civilians.

For a moment, I couldn't understand what I was seeing. My own face stared back at me from the television, beneath a name I had spent my entire life carrying.

AGATHA SINCLAIR.

The reporter continued speaking, but the words became muffled beneath the pounding in my ears.

"...among those believed to have been aboard the aircraft..."

I swung my weak legs over and came down the bed as I took a step closer to the television.

"No. No, that's not possible. I'm not dead! I'm here!"

This can't be happening to me.

"I..." My throat tightened as the realization settled over me. "I was supposed to be on that plane."

My hands began to shake. If the plane had crashed, and there were no survivors, then why was I here?

Who had brought me here? And why was I declared dead with everyone else on that plane?

I turned toward the door and rushed to it, gripping the handle and pulling with all my strength as panic began crawling up my throat. This can't be happening to me! Did they find out about my plans? Did he kidnap me?

"Help! Somebody please help me!!"

That was when I felt it. Someone else was in the room with me. How the hell had I not noticed before? I was so busy freaking out over the TV that I didn’t even check the rest of the place.

I slowly turned my head and my eyes fell across the room. A man stood near the table at the far end, he was dressed in black, his tall figure almost blending into the shadows.

He hadn't made a sound. He simply watched me, remaining completely calm as though my panic was something he had expected.

There was something unsettling about his eyes that stood out well in the darkness he hid in. Those piercing blue eyes looked at me as though he had known me long before I had ever seen him.

I took a cautious step backward pressing my back against the door as he stepped out of the shadows and stepped forward.

One step.

Thud.

Another.

Thud.

He kept coming slow as hell, like he had all the time in the world and I wasn’t going anywhere. I finally got a clearer view of his face, seeing the way he watched me like he already owned me, like he was looking at something he planned to keep and use however the fuck he wanted.

The kind of look that made my skin crawl and my stomach twist at the same time.

Then, in a voice so deep and composed that it made the terror inside me worsen, he said,

"Congratulations on your funeral, Agatha Sinclair."

→

I should have run.

Because the moment Kieran J. Vincenzo congratulated me on my own funeral, Agatha Sinclair ceased to exist.