chapter 11

Serena POV

Pain tore through my left arm like liquid fire, a agonizing, rhythmic throb that pulsed in sync with my racing heart. I grabbed a piece of heavy linen from the floor and wrapped it viciously around the puncture marks, pulling the knot tight with my teeth until the pressure made me gasp.

Black ink-like veins were crawling slowly past my wrist, visible beneath my pale skin.

> [PATHOGEN SPREADING RATE: 4.8% PER MINUTE]

>

The crimson warning text burned in the corner of my mind like a brand, but I forced the agony into a dark, locked corner of my consciousness.

I am not dying here. Not yet.

A cold, sickening realization began to coalesce out of the haze of panic. Marcus was my head of security, vetted personally, paid a fortune, and bound by contracts that guaranteed his family’s comfort for life. A man like that didn't just decide to commit suicide by opening the gates to a horde of the dead on a whim.

He wasn't working alone. Someone had bought him. Someone had orchestrated this exact execution.

I stumbled back into the security control suite, my boots slick with rain and black zombie fluid. My hand was shaking so violently that I could barely input the override codes into the central terminal.

"Show me the East Gate footage," I choked out, leaning heavily against the console as the screen flickered, rewinding the feed by fifteen minutes. "Rewind ten minutes. Show me the perimeter."

The high-definition night-vision footage rewound, the digital timer counting backward until the moment before the breach.

I leaned closer, my breath catching in my throat.

On the screen, standing just outside the shadow of the secondary gate before Marcus unlocked it, was a second figure.

The person was slighter, smaller, swathed in a long, dark rain poncho, her face completely obscured beneath a heavy hood. Rain poured off the hem of her cloak. I watched as she stepped forward, reaching into her coat to pull out a heavy, bulging black leather bag—the distinct shape of thick stacks of cash or high-grade diamond bullion.

She handed the bag through the iron bars to Marcus. He accepted it, gave that chilling salute, and then the hooded woman raised a gloved hand, pointing a single, sharp finger directly toward the main mansion.

Toward me.

Before she turned to vanish into the gathering horde, a violent gust of wind whipped across the frame, catching the edge of her hood and tearing it backward for a fraction of a second.

The camera zoomed in automatically, enhancing the exposed profile.

My lungs completely emptied. The air in the room felt like solid ice.

It was Bianca.

"No..." I whispered, clutching the edge of the control desk so hard the wood groaned beneath my knuckles. "No... that's impossible!"

My mind reeled in absolute, chaotic disbelief. I had left her at the hyper-market parking lot! I had watched her and Damian scrambling in the rain, surrounded by crashing cars and the rising tide of the dead miles away on the other side of the city!

How could she possibly be here?! How had she bypassed the city-wide gridlock, reached my estate before me, and coordinated a high-level security bribe with my own head of guards?!

Why would she open the gates and flood my sanctuary with the dead?

Before my mind could process the impossible logic of the footage, the heavy iron door of the security suite swung open with a harsh, metallic screech.

CLANG.

I spun around instantly, tendency of blue lightning crackling defensively across the fingers of my right hand, ready to vaporize whatever monster had walked through the threshold.

The sparks died in my palm.

Standing in the doorway was my mother.

Her hair was a wild, wet mess plastered across her face, her eyes wide, bloodshot, and burning with an unhinged, manic intensity I had never seen in her before. But it wasn't her expression that stopped my heart.

In her right hand, she was clutching a heavy, serrated eight-inch kitchen knife, the steel gleaming viciously under the harsh fluorescent lights of the control room.

"Give me the key," my mother demanded, her voice low, raspy, and completely stripped of any maternal warmth.

I stared at her in utter, breath-robbing disbelief. "Have you lost your damn mind?!"

"Don't play games with me, Serena!" she screamed, stepping into the room, her hand tightening around the hilt of the blade until her knuckles turned white. "I know you built it! I know you have somewhere safe to hide!"

A cold, heavy rock dropped into the pit of my stomach.

I slowly took a step backward, my back hitting the warm electronic glow of the security monitors. "The key to what?"

"The underground shelter!" she spat, pointing the point of the kitchen knife directly at my chest. "The reinforced bunker! Give me the master keycard right now!"

My mind raced, horror mounting upon horror. The mountain bunker I had purchased was off-grid, a secret I had guarded with my life. The reinforced cellar beneath this mansion was something I had quietly commissioned under a shell company only days ago.

"How do you know about the shelter?" I whispered, my voice trembling with a terrifying realization.

My mother’s eyes flicked past my shoulder toward the bank of security monitors, where the feeds showed the horde breaking through the glass of the eastern conservatory. A strange, twisted smile touched the corner of her lips.

She raised the knife higher. "Give me the key, Serena. Give it to me right now, or so help me God, I will take it from your corpse."

I stared at the woman who had birthed me, the woman whose love I had begged for across two lifetimes, looking at me not as a daughter, but as an obstacle to be butchered.

"You brought Lisa here..." I breathed, the horrific truth dawning on me like a wave of toxic sludge. "You didn't come here because you were scared. You brought her here because you wanted my shelter. You wanted to take my fortress and give it to her, didn't you?!"

My mother said nothing.

The silence in the room stretched out, heavy, suffocating, and terrifyingly definitive. Her silence was her answer.

"You were going to throw me out," I whispered, a hollow, bitter laugh bubbling up in my throat as tears of black rage burned behind my eyes. "Just like you did before. You were going to take everything I built to save myself and hand it to Lisa."

Her eyes narrowed, her knuckles whitening on the hilt of the blade. "Lisa deserves to live! She has suffered enough! You owe her—"

KNOCK. KNOCK. KNOCK.

Three slow, deliberate, rhythmic raps echoed against the heavy steel frame of the open door behind my mother.

The sound was impossibly calm, completely surreal against the backdrop of distant shrieks and roaring gunfire echoing through the mansion.

My mother froze. I stiffened, my gaze darting past her shoulder toward the dark hallway.

A figure stepped out of the shadows, leaning casually against the doorframe.

She was wearing a long, black rain poncho, dripping water onto the floor. She reached up, slowly pulling down the hood to reveal her damp blonde hair and a cold, triumphant smile.

Bianca.

My blood turned to pure ice. The air in my lungs completely froze.

Bianca looked past my mother, her dark eyes locking directly onto mine with a mocking, cruel amusement that cut deeper than any blade.

"Hello, Serena," Bianca purred softly, her voice dripping with venomous satisfaction. She tilted her head, glancing at my mother holding the knife, before turning her gaze back to my pale, shocked face.

"You really have no idea, do you?" Bianca chuckled, a low, melodic sound that sent a wave of horror crashing through my body. "Your dear old mother has a few dirty little secrets she forgot to tell you about Lisa."