Chapter 2I Bought The Ocean Liner

Time did not exist in the hold. There were no portholes, only a single naked bulb swaying overhead, humming a sharp, metallic rhythm with every lurch of the sea.

The iron latch rattled.

Beatrice glided inside, carrying an ornate wooden tray. She was draped in a tailored silk cheongsam, her dark hair pinned in an immaculate chignon. Resting against her delicate wrists was a pair of glowing, imperial-grade emerald bangles.

They were my mother’s. The only heirloom left to me on my wedding day.

"It’s dreadfully damp down here, sister. You must be freezing."

She set the tray on a dust-caked crate and lifted the porcelain lid. A bowl of steaming, rich bird’s nest soup filled the filthy room with the scent of sweet rock sugar.

"Charles said you had no appetite, so I spent two hours over the galley stove preparing this for you." She scooped a spoonful of the broth, blew on it softly, and held it out to my lips, her gaze wide with innocent devotion.

If not for the heirloom glittering on her wrist, she might have passed for an angel of mercy.

I raised my arm and struck the porcelain bowl.

The scalding broth exploded across the front of her embroidered dress, leaving a wide, ugly stain. Beatrice gasped, stumbling back half a step.

She didn't scream. Instead, she drew a silk handkerchief from her sleeve and methodically dabbed at the wet fabric.

"Why so bitter, Camille?" She crouched down, picking up the shattered porcelain shards with slow, deliberate fingers. "All those sleepless nights you spent in France, drinking with foreign bankers, cutting shipping deals in backrooms... you really did bring back a fortune, didn't you?"

She smiled, tilting her head. "Charles used the money you wired home to buy me three brownstones on the Upper East Side. Oh, and these bangles? Charles said my skin was far fairer than yours. He said they looked vulgar on you."

She rotated her wrist, admiring the jade beneath the dim light.

I lunged forward, grabbing her wrist with a guttural gasp. "Give them back to me!"

Beatrice collapsed backward onto the oily floor, letting out a sharp, pitiful shriek. Tears flooded her eyes in an instant. "If my presence offends you, sister, I will leave! Why must you hurt me?"

The door burst open.

Charles swept into the room, sweeping Beatrice off the floor and into his arms. He looked at the broth dripping from her dress, then at the red mark on her wrist, his brow furrowing in disgust.

"Camille, she came down here out of pure kindness, and you attack her?" His voice dripped with profound disappointment. "Have you lost every shred of breeding you ever possessed?"

I leaned against the rusted iron wall, watching them cling to one another. "You gave my mother’s jewelry to your mistress, Charles. And you dare preach to me about breeding?"

Charles shielded Beatrice behind his back. From his breast pocket, he produced a dense legal document and a fountain pen.

"Your illness is worse than I thought. I’ve already secured a suite for you at St. Jude’s Sanitarium upstate. This is a power of attorney agreement. Sign it, Camille. While you rest, I will manage the family estates."

He extended the pen, his tone as soothing as a father coaxing a petulant child. "Sign it, and I promise you will want for nothing during your stay."

Looking at the contract, a ragged laugh tore from my throat. He didn't just want to rob me blind; he wanted to bury me alive behind asylum walls for the rest of my life.

"And if I refuse?"

Charles let out a tired sigh and put the pen back in his pocket. "You always were impossible. Dr. Evans made it clear: when a psychiatric patient refuses intervention, force is necessary."

He gestured toward the open corridor.

Two orderlies in starched white coats stepped in, carrying heavy glass syringes.

"Give her the tranquilizer," Charles said smoothly, turning to guide Beatrice out by the shoulder. "The air down here is foul, darling. Let’s head back to the lounge."

The cold steel of the needle bit into my vein.

In the final second before darkness swallowed me whole, Beatrice glanced over her shoulder and flashed me a chilling, venomous smile.

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