Page 100 of Claiming Pretty

Then she said with a whisper that felt like thunder, “I saw the name of their clinic.”

AVA

“How the fuck did this happen?” a gruffy older man’s voice said. “I thought she was given the implant.”

That voice. It was… familiar. But I couldn’t place it.

“I’m sorry,a Thiarna Ard.”High Lord.“I did not want to mar her lovely skin.”

I recognized this second voice as… the professor.

He continued. “I used a contraceptive mixture that I—”

“You and your little concoctions,” the first voice spat with disdain.

More harsh clattering of metal. Cold hands propped my bare feet up in strange braces, causing my nightgown to slip down my legs.

I wanted to cover myself up, but I couldn’t move. I couldn’t even cry out.

“You make sure she never remembers this, do you hear me?”

Someone leaned over me. A doctor wearing a surgical mask, the lights turning their features into a silhouette.

And then they were gone and I could hear whispers.

A loud crash made me jolt, like someone had thrown something across the room.

“You dare second-guess my command? You are my fucking heir. You will do as I say. Now… take care ofit.”

I stood between Ty and Ciaran, like matching stone sentinels, staring up at the charred remains of Ashcradle House,the hospital from my darkest memory.

Ashcradle House had once been located in one of the old Darkmoor campus buildings, supposedly abandoned during the Spanish flu. I remembered telling Lisa about it last term when we’d just found out that Liath had gone missing, but standing here now, it felt less like history and more like a nightmare come to life.

The collapsed outer wall exposed skeletal remnants of modern medical equipment. Hospital beds, their metal frames warped by fire, lay scattered amid the debris like corpses on a battlefield. The smell of smoke and ash lingered faintly in the cold night air, mixing with the damp scent of decay.

“They’re always a step ahead,” I whispered, anger and frustration tangling in my voice. “We’re chasing our fucking tails.”

The wind rustled through the towering bloodred oaks surrounding us, hissing like snakes in a pit. The trees swayed ominously against a starless sky, their twisted branches clawing at the void.

Ciaran reached for my hand as we stepped through the rubble, the crunch of charred wood and shattered glass beneath our boots the only sound breaking the heavy silence.

I frowned as I studied the hospital beds more closely.Strange half-melted metal lumps were welded onto the frames—two near the waist, two at the foot.

Realization slammed into me like a freight train.Clamps.For wrists and ankles.

A memory tore through my mind with visceral clarity. Cold, unyielding metal snapping shut around my ankles. My legs forced apart. The sterile bite of disinfectant in the air, masking the scent of fear and blood.

My stomach turned violently. I stumbled back, tripping over the charcoaled remains of what used to be a chair.

Before I could hit the ground, Ciaran’s arms were around me, pulling me flush against him.

“I’m sorry, Ava,” he whispered, his voice thick with pain.

I looked at the surrounding ruin, the horror of what it had once been. Perhaps it was a blessing this place no longer stood, that it couldn’t continue to exist as a factory for pain and violation.

But the knowledge of what had happened here—of what had happened tome—would never burn away with the ash.

“I can’t take this anymore,” I said, my voice breaking under the weight of my own anguish. Tears threatened to spill, but the scream clawing at my throat felt far more powerful. “How could human beings be so fuckingevil?”

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