Page 1 of Nothing Left

PROLOGUE

Her head was pounding. The room was tilting around her like a ship at sea. Each movement intensified the nausea that wasn't just in her stomach but roiling through her entire body.

"Heather Andrew," she chastised herself, in a croaky voice, with a throat that felt like sandpaper and a mouth that tasted vile. "Never again. Never, ever again will you drink that much."

This was the biggest mistake of her twenty-two years. That was for sure.

Ugh. Where was she? Not in bed. She was on a hard, cold floor. Tiles slipped under her fingers as she eased her eyes open just a slit to let in some of the harsh, cruel daylight.

"Ouch!" she whispered. Her hands were trembling. How was it possible to feel so close to death's door?

Fragments of the previous night flashed through her mind. The neon lights of the club, the thumping music, and the sharp taste of tequila on her tongue. Salt, lemon, they'd done the whole routine, not once but many times. In the club, and then back home to their shared Barcelona apartment where she was studying for a year. Together with another bottle. Not tequila, but something just as potent. Man, the Spanish knew how to party, and things had intensified back home. She remembered smashing glasses; someone else had tried to make coffee and broken the pot.

Other things, too. Those tablets that the guy at the club had sold them. They had been like the best, most fun, most energizing experience. But now, the headache. It was literally as if her skull was splitting.

She opened her eyes wider. She had a feeling she was on the bathroom floor and that she was there because she'd thrown up. A lot. Yup, she remembered hugging the toilet bowl like it was her best friend. She’d had a long conversation with it.

Talking of which, where was her bestie? Samantha had been partying with her. Although she hadn't drunk quite as much, from Heather's vague memory. She'd been more restrained. Had she gone to bed? There was a big memory gap after getting home. After the coffee machine debacle. Hopefully, Samantha had made it to bed. But most likely, she was still feeling vile.

Heather raised her head. Opened her eyes fully. Ugh, something slippery and stinky was on the floor. Puke, probably.

Not puke. Blood.

Dark red curdles and streaks of blood were on the bathroom floor.

And a knife. A knife with a sharp blade was lying on the floor near her hand. She'd last seen that knife in the wooden block in the kitchen. What on earth was going on?

Was the blood from her? Her breath caught in her chest at the thought. But she didn't seem to be hurt.

She picked it up, staring in total confusion at that bloodied blade.

Now that she was looking at it, there seemed to be a trail of droplets leading from that knife to the shower stall.

As she realized that, her stomach twisted in a clench of pure terror. She dropped the knife. What the hell had she even been thinking about picking it up? Something very, very bad was happening here.

She got up, staggering, nearly slipping in the blood, her head spinning more violently than ever. Clumsily, she navigated around the splashes and stumbled to the shower stall's door.

There was something inside; she could see that through the frosted glass. But what it was, she had no idea.

She needed to find out, though.

Her battered brain offered up a weird, vague memory of a monster at the shower door with zigzag teeth. Where had that come from? It must have been a drunken dream. There wasn't a monster here, surely? But there was... something.

She grasped the shower door and hesitated, a wave of nausea overwhelming her, retching even though she'd thrown up everything there was to throw up earlier.

Heather had hoped that standing there, thinking about it, would make her feel less afraid, but her terror was building, becoming overwhelming.

Suddenly, there was no time to do anything. Not to think about it some more, not to hesitate, not to track down her phone and talk to her friends about it.

She grasped the door with cold, shaking hands. She got her fingers in the ridge, the feel of it familiar to her, but everything else was out of kilter and scary and so very wrong.

Pulling the door open, she stared down.

Pooled in blood, eyes staring wide, face drained and white, Samantha stared back.

CHAPTER ONE

Paulette Bouchard. Until a fortnight ago, FBI agent Juliette Hart hadn't known the name, or the woman, existed. Now, she was having dreams about the woman she'd never met - or more like nightmares, given the scenario.

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