Chapter 1

My name was Gina.

I had been married for eight years and haven’t worked a single day since the wedding.

I rarely went out and my husband, Michael, was my only real connection to the outside world.

But my life was far from boring as Michael had a knack for keeping things exciting.

Before his latest business trip, he meticulously planned a date night and bought me a gift.

I peeked inside the gift box and rolled my eyes.

"Another one of your creepy pranks? Aren’t you a little too old for this?"

He chuckled, leaning in to plant a kiss on my lips. "Never too old. Deal with it."

I didn't pull away, letting him draw me into his embrace.

One thing led to another and before we knew it, we had tumbled from the living room couch straight into the bedroom.

After all these years, the fact that we were still practically inseparable was largely thanks to his playful streak.

If he ever stopped being childish, I would probably think something was seriously wrong.

Just as Michael pulled off his shirt, my eyes caught a sharp red line on his arm.

The scratch was fresh, the crimson beads of blood looking like they had just been left by a fingernail.

I grabbed his arm immediately.

"What happened here? Are you seeing someone else?"

He glanced down, casually wiping the blood away before wrapping his arms around me to soothe my sudden panic.

"It’s just a scratch from work. Instead of worrying about me, you're throwing wild accusations."

With a playful whine, he buried his face in my chest, acting like a coddled child.

I laughed and called him a rascal but my fingers couldn't help brushing against the wound again.

The moment my fingertips touched the torn skin, a wave of unease washed over me.

It felt off.

But Michael didn't give me any more time to think.

He pressed his body against mine, drowning out my doubts.

By the time I opened my eyes, daylight was streaming through the windows.

A sticky note was pasted onto the nightstand.

“Off on my business trip. Be good, babe. I'll be back in a couple of days.”

Groggy, I gathered his clothes scattered across the floor and threw them into the washing machine.

As I emptied his pockets, something hard grazed my fingers.

It was a button.

A delicate, pearlescent one, clearly from a woman's blouse.

I smiled and dismissed it.

Michael had a habit of pocketing loose buttons from my shirts, claiming he was hoarding them so he could sew them back on later.

Only to completely forget about them.

This was probably just an old one that he had forgotten to clear out.

For the next few days, I had the house to myself.

My routine became incredibly lazy.

Within a week, the place was an absolute disaster.

Michael usually handled all the chores while I barely lifted a finger, but with him gone, I couldn't just let the mess pile up forever.

With a heavy sigh, I finally began to clean.

The moment I opened the door to the storage closet, a pungent, nauseating odor blasted into my face.

It was far worse than the musty smell of a damp wardrobe on a rainy day.

Frowning, I stepped back and aggressively sprayed air freshener throughout the hallway.

But when the artificial floral scent mingled with the stench, it only made it weirder.

The combination of the two smells made my stomach churn and I dry-heaved twice.

Holding my nose, I stepped inside, determined to find the source of the rot.

Two steps in, my foot suddenly slipped.

I looked down and saw a puddle of dark, brownish liquid oozing from a corner.

It was coming from the box Michael had brought home.

My first thought was that it was a prop from one of his pranks, fake blood leaking out.

Shaking my head in exasperation, I reached down and picked it up.

The next second, my entire body froze.

It wasn't a toy.

It was a human hand, cleanly severed at the wrist.

The flesh around the cut had turned a sickening shade of black and purple and a foul tissue fluid was still sluggishly weeping from the edges.