Margaret had never been free. Not as a girl. Not as a woman. Not even as a mother.
She didn’t remember her real name—the one she had before him. Before Thomas Whitmore took her, stripped her of everything: her past, her choices, her future. He had remade her into what he wanted—a possession. A slave. A body to own, control, and use to bear his children.

She had never gone to school. Never held a dollar in her own hands. Never made a single decision that wasn’t dictated by his will. She had no identification, no history outside the walls of the house he built to keep her hidden.

And now her daughters—Eleanor, Isabelle, and Grace—were trapped just like she had been.

From birth, they had belonged to him. Their birth certificates had been forged by the same unscrupulous midwife who delivered them in the dingy basement of their home. After that—no doctor visits, no school, no record of their existence outside the world he controlled. They had never known friendship. Never spoken to anyone beyond their father’s reach. They were taught only what he allowed—molded into silent, obedient girls who would never question, never resist.

But they did.

Margaret didn’t know when it started. She had been blind to her daughters’ cleverness—until the Revenge Agent entered their lives.

By sixteen, Eleanor had begun piecing together the cracks in their father’s control. Isabelle, fourteen, had followed her sister’s lead—watching, listening, learning. Grace, just eleven—praised by their father as “worth a pretty penny” for her beauty and budding body—was underestimated. But she was the one he should have feared most.

While he whispered about selling her off instead of keeping her, Grace had already done what none of them had dared: she had made contact.

Late at night, huddled around their father’s discarded tablet—used only after he upgraded—they’d caught glimpses of the outside world. Grace had found someone. Not just anyone, but someone perfect for their situation. They needed more than a smuggler or a fixer. They needed someone who specialized in revenge. Someone who made sure captors paid.

The safe full of cash—discovered by Eleanor behind the map in their father’s office—was more than enough to hire her.

They didn’t know her real name. Only that she called herself Midas. And she came with a reputation. Ruthless. Efficient. A ghost.

Midas didn’t just help victims escape. He hunted their abusers. Ensured they stayed gone. For a price—which the girls could afford—he agreed to do what Margaret had never believed possible.

He came for them.

The night was planned to the second. Their father was drugged—just long enough for Midas to do his work. A tiny surgical cut. A tracker embedded beneath the skin of Thomas Whitmore’s shoulder. He’d never find it. Never remove it.

A warning. A leash.

Then, the girls and their mother took everything—the cash, the car keys, the documents Midas had forged. For the first time, they had real names. Real identities. Real lives.

For the first time, Margaret stepped beyond the walls of her prison.

She was free.

They didn’t look back.

Thomas Whitmore woke alone in an empty house. He would never find them. No matter where he searched, they would always know if he got too close.

And if he did—

They would be ready.