Where Shadows Hide

Prologue

The only sound was the rain drumming against the smashed windscreen. Slow and steady, the storm took its time, almost as though it were mocking her.

She opened her eyes. The pain hit her long before the memory of the crash did. A sharp breath caught in her throat, sending a ripple of agony through her ribs. Her head throbbed with a heavy, rhythmic pulse. Warm blood trickled down the side of her face, mixing with the cold rain that leaked through the shattered glass above.

The dashboard was completely crushed. Shards of glass glittered across her lap like tiny, cruel diamonds. Then, the overwhelming smell of petrol and hot rubber filled the cabin, and the memory finally returned. The shouting. The reckless speeding. The blinding anger in his eyes. She remembered the desperate way she had reached for the steering wheel, fighting him, trying to keep the car on the road.

Then the tree. It had all happened so fast.

"Oh God..." she whispered, her voice cracking into nothing.

She forced her head to turn. Adrian stirred. Rain slid down the cracked window beside him, distorting his features into something unreal. His forehead rested heavily against the steering wheel. One hand still gripped the leather rim, while the other hung completely limp by his side.

"Adrian?" she called softly.

A low, pathetic groan escaped him. Her stomach lurched. This wasn't one of his games. He wasn't pretending. He wasn't waiting for her to panic just so he could lift his head with that smug smile and tell her she was overreacting. He wasn't about to tell her this was somehow her fault. For the first time in years, Adrian looked entirely powerless.

She stared at him, barely able to breathe. A sob caught in her throat—not because she loved him, but because the sudden absence of his control was terrifying. She didn't know what came next.

Then the car groaned. A sharp, violent hiss came from somewhere beneath her feet. Scarlett froze. Petrol was actively leaking into the footwell. Her pulse exploded in her ears. She fumbled blindly for the seatbelt, but her trembling fingers refused to grip the plastic.

"Come on..." she cried, yanking at the tangled fabric. Nothing. She tried again, breaking her fingernail against the metal. Still nothing. "Please..."

Tears blurred her vision as panic tightened like a vice around her chest. Then... Click. The buckle released.

She slammed her weight against the passenger door. It didn't move. She pushed harder, her boots bracing against the crumpled dashboard. Still nothing. Her breathing became fast and shallow as the fumes grew thicker, stinging her eyes. With every second that ticked by, she imagined the spark that would swallow the wreck in flames. Using every single ounce of strength she had left, she slammed her bruised shoulder against the metal panel. With a deafening screech of tearing metal, the door finally gave way just enough for her to squeeze through.

She stumbled out into the dark. The icy rain hit her face like needles, shocking her system. She barely made it two steps before her knees buckled completely. She slammed into the wet asphalt, the rough road grazing her palms. For a long, agonizing moment she stayed there, hands and knees in the dirt, breathing hard while the storm washed streaks of copper blood from her skin. The world around her felt impossibly still.

She looked up and down the road. No headlights. No passing cars. No distant voices. Nothing. Just endless, suffocating darkness stretching deep into the forest.

With shaking legs, she forced herself to stand. She turned back toward the wreck.

The eerie blue glow of the dashboard lights still flickered inside the crushed cabin, casting long shadows across Adrian's face. He hadn't moved. She took one hesitant step toward the door. Then another.

If she left him... he could die out here. She looked at the twisted metal, the smoke rising from the radiator.

But if she stayed... The petrol smell was becoming unbearable. What if the car exploded? Worse, what if he woke up right now? What if he survived this, looked at her, and blamed her? What if he came after her? His voice echoed inside her mind, as loud and clear as if he were standing right beside her in the rain.

“You’ll never survive without me.”

Scarlett squeezed her eyes shut, pressing her hands to her ears.

“Nobody else will ever love you.”

She took another shaky step backward, away from the car.

“Everything that goes wrong is because of you.”

"No..." she whispered, though she wasn't sure whether she was speaking to the memory or to the man in the car.

Another tear escaped down her cheek, hot against the freezing rain. "I'm sorry." She wasn't even sure who she was apologizing to anymore: Adrian, herself, or the woman she had spent years becoming.

She looked at the car one final time. Then she turned away.

She ran.

The trees swallowed her within seconds, plunging her into total darkness. Thick branches clawed at her soaked clothes, scratching her bare arms as though trying to drag her back to him. Deep mud s*ck*d at her shoes with every desperate stride, threatening to pull her under. Her lungs burned, every breath sharp and agonizing, but she didn't stop. She couldn't.

Every shadow looked like his silhouette following her. Every crack of a branch made her heart leap into her throat. She didn't know where she was going. She only knew she had to get as far away from that car as humanly possible.

Away from Adrian. Away from the invisible cage she had been trapped in for years.

Behind her, back toward the road, a muffled, ragged cough echoed through the storm.

Scarlett froze for only a single heartbeat. Then, she ran faster.

Chapter One The Perfect Morning

One Week Earlier............

Scarlett woke before the alarm, she always did and for a few seconds she lay perfectly still, just listening, the apartment was silent, no footsteps, no one calling her, just the soft hum of the refrigerator from the kitchen. She closed her eyes again, letting herself pretend, just for a minute, that this was an ordinary morning and her life was different, Scarlett rolled onto her side and winced.

A dull ache spread through her side, along her shoulder and down her arm, she pulled up her pyjama top, the bruises had darkened overnight. She stared at it for only a second before pulling her top back down. "It would fade", she sighed, they always did, she noticed the other side of the bed was empty, a tight knot loosened in her chest before she remembered he'd slept in the spare room, she had no idea whether he'd been awake for five m