They say it was planned. They say she had dropped out of society months earlier so she could plan the perfect crime. The kidnapping and suspected murder of China's favourite son. There were no clues, no evidence. No body. He was just gone. They say her name will never be forgotten. The monster who stole from them their prince, their golden boy. 

No one ever knew the truth.

PROLOGUE


It wasn’t always like this. The loud voices and thuds of fists on flesh. They used to be happy. 

Her father used to be home for dinner and her mother home before her. They were a privileged family, almost always in the tabloids attending one event or another, always avoiding any scandalous articles, of course, there was never anything to scandalise. 

The were seen by the public as the perfect family, the hardworking dad who's always home for dinner, the socialite mother, always ready to share a laugh with anyone but would always put her family first and the pretty daughter who lived life carefree and happy. 

But slowly, everything changed. 

Her father would stay out later and later, sometimes coming back looking weird and staggering through the house. Other times he would walk almost proudly through the house, pockets stuffed with cash and ill concealed red marks dotting his neck. 

Her mother would stumble into the house late at night, never noticing the little girl who sat in the empty dining room, eating her dinner alone while diligently working on her homework. Dot like scars would mark her mothers' arms and she watched as they increased. 


It was that night that things got even worse. She could sense something was wrong. The shouting had stopped and the hitting and cries of pain. The silence that had once comforted her, now terrifying. Something was wrong.

She could hear the murmuring voices before she heard their silenced footsteps outside her door.

“… best way to do it.”

“… dump… body… in the river.”

She held her gasp as she fumbled in the darkness, her tiny fingers wrapping around small flashlight she kept by her bed as she jumped out of her once comforting bed.

She saw the shadows of her parents under the door as she scrambled beneath her bed, fitting easily into the tiny space.

She heard the door as it slowly creeped open, watching as one foot followed by another entered her room. She turned her head to one side, watching as the feet got closer to her bed. 

"Jaerin? Where are you kiddo?" The man asked, his tone so seemingly innocent but even at her young age she knew that was far from the truth. She held her breath, keeping in her gasps for air as her body hyperventilated, clamping her small hands over . 

"Jaerin... Come out before I get angry."

She heard footsteps passing the bed. 

"Look," It was her mothers voice this time "the window's open. Do you think she ran?"

Her father snorted. "It would be better if she had."

She heard the booted feet leave her room followed by the softer pair. She exhaled softly, silent tears tracking down her face, but her relief was short lived. 

Rough hands closed around her ankles and she let out a piercing scream as she was pulled back, scrambling frantically against the hardwood floor. 

"Found you." The man laughed manically, his face a twisted evil version of the man she called her father. 

His meaty hands wrapped around her neck and she felt as her breathing got cut off, the handle of the knife he held digging into her neck. Her limbs kicked and flailed madly, nails digging into the hands around her neck yet even through this, he could see the way her eyes flickered to the knife, barely visible to her.

“Too much mess.” He said casually, as if speaking of mere breadcrumbs scattered across a table rather than blood stained floorboards.

Even at her age she knew about death, the point of no return. And she knew, today was not the day she died. 

She reached her hands up, the distance seemingly impossible but she knew, if she didn't do this, it would be the end. 

Her small fingers touched his face and he smiled, thinking it the final act of a young child. How wrong he was. 

Her fingers dug into his eyes, already bloody nails coated further in more gross stuff. 

Her father cried out, his hands swiftly releasing their grasp on  as the clamped over his bleeding eyes. The knife slicing forth across her face as he sprung away from her, stumbling as he went and whacked his head against the corner of the cabinet. His body convulsed twice before he finally stilled. 

"What's going on here?" The screech came from the doorway as the door was flung open. 

She saw the way her mothers eyes narrowed, taking in the scene before her, the way they showed no remorse for the body that lay on the floor, only rage. 

She scrambled to her desk, grabbing the metal ruler and clutching it close to her as she spun around, just in time to watch her drunken mother charge at her. 

It happened too fast. The wooden floorboard that tripped her so many times tripped its final victim. Her mother, in her high heels and drunken stupor was unable to catch her footing, sending her propelling into the girl huddled against the desk.

The metal ruler dug into the soft flesh of her stomach, impaling her as her weight pushed the metal into the girl below her.


The girls tears tracked down her face, stinging in the gaping wound across her face. The weight of her mothers body crushing her own, though it was probably the only thing that had saved her that night as she  out to the sound of sirens echoing in the distance.


~


She woke to the sound of beeping and low murmurs. Her eyes slid open but no one noticed.

“It would be better this way, you know how many people looked up to them.”

“What about the girl?”

“Ship her out of the country and put her in a foster home, it’s not like there’ll be anyone who misses her.”

The voices stopped and she heard the click of shoes on the hospital floor as the people left.


~


At the age of seven Kim Jaerin is declared a murderer.