PAULINE POV
I couldn’t move. Couldn’t speak.
It felt like the air had turned to glass—sharp, fragile, and so heavy it pressed against my chest until I thought I might shatter.
My father—the man who raised me—had just dropped the biggest, darkest truth I never could’ve dreamed up. And I have a pretty wild imagination.
Apparently, not wild enough.
A bloodline of hunters. Torturers. Killers of supernatural beings. Protectors of the human race, they called themselves. What a beautiful euphemism for g******e.
My fingers were ice. My mouth was dry. But my mind? My mind was a forest fire. And the smoke was choking me from the inside out.
Ryers.
Pauline Ryers.
That was my real name. A name dipped in blood, carried on by blades and boots and ignorance disguised as purpose. A name I never a
