Prologue
Dark eyes looked at the list on the desk. So it had come to this. After everything she had gone through, this was the only way to make amends with herself. She bit her lip anxiously, an old habit, before remembering that wasn't who she was anymore. That habit was from a time when she'd been weak, powerless to stand up for herself or anyone else. But things had changed. She had changed.
She twirled a strand of midnight black hair around her finger. In a way, she'd had to change. It wasn't only herself that she'd had to protect. There were so many things, so many people that had needed her. As she had needed them.
But that had changed as well. Needing people was something she'd left behind her when she'd changed. She almost regretted it, but she knew that for what she needed to do she could only depend on herself. And it was because of her need for others that she was doing this, even if she wouldn't admit it.
She'd become what she'd always despised, a cold-hearted, arrogant, manipulating bitch. But as they say, you had to know your enemy to defeat him. And what better way to know the enemy, then to become like them yourself?
