With a Vengeance

by Riley Sager

While a flash of righteous violence would feel glorious in the moment, it wouldn’t satisfy, it wouldn’t linger. What she needs is something longer. Something drawn out to a torturous degree. What Anna wants is for each of them to lose the will to live—and then be forced to keep on living. Only then will she be satisfied. Revenge is fleeting. Vengeance lasts a lifetime.

But now that her intentions have been revealed, uttered aloud and therefore unable to be taken back, Anna feels not euphoria or relief but exhaustion. The fire inside her is now a faint flicker, allowing sadness to creep in at the edges.