By the time I lace up my boots, my fingers are numb—not from the cold, but from how tight I’ve been clenching them. I shove my scarf up over my face, drag my hood low over my forehead, and force myself to breathe.
I wrack my brain, trying to recall if I had told Ben the name of the guesthouse I was staying in. But I must have, because how else could he have found me?
I need to find Sita and warn her not to tell him I’m here. She was wrong. The gods haven’t smiled down on me. I’m fucking cursed.
Moving with slow, deliberate care, I crack my door open and peer outside. The bright glare of snow makes me squint, but the path to the lobby is clear. I slip out, keeping my footsteps light.
But the second I step inside, the air whooshes from my lungs on a startled gasp. Ben is casually sitting in front of the fire, a cup of tea in his hand like he belongs here. Like he’s been waiting for me.
My stomach drops as the world tilts sickeningly sideways. He looks exactly the same.Exactly the fucking same.As if he isn’t the shadow of a life I tore myself free from. But it’s the expression on his face that turns my blood to ice.
A smirk sits on his lips. Smug. Satisfied. Expectant. As if he knew I would come.
I rip my hood back and yank down my scarf, my voice like steel when I spit out his name. “Ben.”
His evil smile widens, slow and condescending. “Hello, Dolly.”
Rage flashes through me, hot and violent. “Don’t call me that.”
He chuckles, shaking his head. “Still so sensitive.” He tsks, then lifts his tea as if in a mock toast. “It’s good to see you, Dahlia. I was starting to think you wouldn’t show.”
I cross my arms over my chest, holding myself back to keep from lunging at him. “What the hell are you doing here?”
He takes a slow sip, as if he has all the time in the world. Then, like he’s enjoying this, he says, “I’ve come to obtain theSilene vitalis.”
A sharp, dizzying rush of panic slams into me. No. No, no, no?—
I school my expression, stalling for time. “Too bad you came all this way then, because I don’t need your help.”
He lets out a humorless chuckle. “I didn’t say I was going to help you. I said I was going toobtainit.”
This is so much worse than I could have ever imagined. I school my voice, remove all traces of emotion, and say, “You don’t even know where it is.”
His smirk doesn’t falter. “Lucky for me, you already found it.” He stands, zipping up his new, top of the line parka, and points to a logo emblazoned on the chest. “And unlike your feeble attempt at a one-woman research expedition, I have the backing of not only the university, but a pharmaceutical company funding mine.”
His eyes gleam with triumph. “Unlimited money. Unlimitedmanpower. You were right about one thing. Turns out that enzyme you stumbled on? Pharma is very interested in it. The drug they’ll develop will be worth millions. Maybe billions.”
It feels like ground has opened beneath me and is swallowing me whole, down into a deep, bottomless pit. He’s taking it. He’s taking everything.
Not just my research. Not just my discovery. But, more importantly, Eryon’s home. His last link to his family, his past, and his grief. His future. An unholy trifecta of exploitation.
“No,” I cry, horrified by the thought of pharma sweeping through Eryon’s caves, destroying his home, his paintings, the heart of the mountain where theSilene vitalisgrows. I bite back my fear for my Yeti, but I can’t help but say, “This area will be ruined. The people, the environment?—”
He cuts me off and says, “You still don’t get it, do you? You could have been something with my backing. Instead you’re nothing but a stupid fucking girl chasing stories instead of science. You should have stuck to plain botany, no one cares about people or culture when there’s money involved.”
Ben turns, brushing past me like I’m nothing. As if he’s already won. He knocks into my shoulder as he passes, spinning me around to look after him. But then he pauses at the door, glancing back with a wicked glint in his eyes.
“I’ve told you before, you really should secure your files better,” he says as if he just can’t help but gloat, and walks out, the door swinging closed behind him.
I can’t breathe. The walls press in, the fire flickering wildly in my peripheral vision as the realization crashes over. My files. He was in myfuckingfiles. This whole time, after being so dismissive of everything I had ever worked on, he had been keeping tabs on my work.
Oh, Dahlia, of course he had,I lecture myself. He had always fallen back on me “helping” him with his, both when he was getting his degrees and as a professor. When in actuality, everything had been my ideas, my research, my hard work and long nights.
All those years, making me feel small. Doubting my research. Calling my passion for ethnobotany a distraction from the true science of botany. He never respected my work, much less me.
But even if he hadn’t respected it, he still used it. Just like he used me. I was always the brains. The talent. The one who did the damn work. And now he’s trying to take everything I have left.
I’m not a “stupid fucking girl.” I was always the woman with the brains in this relationship. And I need to be the brains now.
