The biting chill of early morning seeped through Riley's threadbare shirt, a familiar companion to the gnawing ache in her stomach. She moved with practiced silence, her small hands deftly preparing coffee for the monster masquerading as her father. Bruises, a roadmap of last night's brutality, bloomed beneath her clothes, a grim reminder of a home that offered no solace.

Her escape was a tiptoed dance through the silence of the house, a breathless dash into the liberating chill of the dawn. College, her fragile sanctuary, was the only place she could dream, where the fleeting thought of Brad, the campus idol, sparked a tiny, hopeful flame within her.

But the campus, too, would betray her. As she approached Brad, her heart a frantic drum against her ribs, the mocking laughter of a crowd, cameras flashing, would shatter her already fractured world. His words, sharp as glass, would slice deeper than any physical blow: "This pathetic shit here likes me. You're a pathetic poor shit. Even my whores are of a high standard."

Humiliated, broken, Riley would flee, her tears a hot, blurring stream. Not home, never home. The park offered a brief, cold refuge, but even there, peace was fleeting. A deeper horror awaited in the suffocating darkness of the forest, a place where a giant, terrifying black wolf with golden, swirling eyes would emerge from the shadows, an omen of a fate far more extraordinary—and dangerous—than she could ever imagine.