I seduced the billionaire who ruined my brother’s life. The moment he abandoned his fiancée for me, my revenge was complete. Everyone in Ashworth City had heard their story. Dominic Ashford and Serena Blackwell, the most twisted couple in the city’s elite circle. Dominic Ashford was the sole heir to the Ashford empire, one of the most powerful billionaires in Ashworth City. Serena Blackwell was the crown jewel of the Blackwell dynasty, Ashworth City’s princess. She and Dominic had grown up together, and everyone assumed they’d end up married. But they had a toxic game they liked to play. Every time they fought, Serena would find some unsuspecting, decent man and get engaged to him. She loved the thrill of it — watching those men fall for her. And she loved watching Dominic lose his mind with jealousy. Every time he showed up to wreck the wedding, it proved he was still hers. It was their sick version of a love language. Ninety-nine times. And the ninety-ninth groom was my twin brother, Ethan Mercer. He thought he’d found true love. He’d poured everything he had into planning the wedding — Only to have Dominic Ashford kick down the chapel door on his wedding day, break both his arms, strip him bare, and dump him in the street like garbage. My brother couldn’t survive the humiliation. His mind shattered. On a rainy night, he dragged his broken body up the longest bridge in Ashworth City, one agonizing step at a time. And jumped. I was standing in the morgue, identifying his body, when my phone buzzed. It was Serena’s latest IG story. Wedding crash #99 — success! Dominic really is crazy about me! One more to go and I can finally marry him for real! The photo showed her in a white gown, tucked against Dominic’s chest, smiling like the world was hers. I looked down at my brother’s stiff, frozen body. And I laughed. So this was how they played. Other people’s hearts were disposable toys. Then this time — I’d bet my life to make them lose. I spent three months studying Dominic Ashford. His habits, his weaknesses, his obsession with Serena. I knew which club he went to every Thursday. I knew what kind of woman caught his eye. I carved a scar beside my own eye — ugly and jagged, but enough to mask the resemblance between me and Ethan. Three months later, I walked into the most exclusive private club in Ashworth City and got hired as a hostess. And just like I’d planned, I finally laid eyes on Dominic.

“Strip.” Dominic sat deep in the sofa, spinning a blood-stained Swiss Army knife between his fingers. A handful of trust-fund boys lounged around him with girls draped over their arms, their eyes crawling over me with lazy amusement. I didn’t move. Dominic raised an eyebrow. The knife came down and sank into the table. “You deaf?” “Didn’t you say you needed money? Didn’t you say you’d do anything for the right price?” “Serena’s overseas getting ready for the wedding. Those dead eyes of yours remind me of the look she gets when she’s ignoring me.” Laughter broke out around the room. “She’s a bit rough, boss, but that dead-inside energy? Definitely reminds me of Serena.” “Boss is one wedding away from finishing the bet. While Serena’s gone, this one could pass the time.” I looked at Dominic. The knife was centimeters from my hand. I could even smell the dried blood on it. Then I lowered my head, clutched the hem of my skirt, and let my voice go small, looking every bit the helpless girl. “One million.” Dominic paused. Then he burst out laughing. “One million?” “Bold mouth on you. You know what happened to the last person who tried to set terms with me?” “Though… something about your face looks familiar.” His hand reached up and touched the corner of my eye. Right where I’d carved that scar — ugly, deliberate, just enough to bury any trace of the resemblance I shared with Ethan. He didn’t recognize me. The plan held. The next second, a slap cracked across my face. “I do love the ones who’d sell their soul for a dollar.” “Ten thousand per piece. Whether you walk out with a million depends on whether you last the night.” Eyes circled me from every direction, hungry for a show. “Boss, I think you broke her. If she can’t take it, this won’t be any fun.” “Then again, nobody holds a candle to his girl. That woman’s got real nerve.” Dominic stared at me, already losing interest. He was about to speak — But I pointed at the table full of liquor first. “How about a game instead?” “You lose, you drink. I lose, I cut myself.” “Ten cuts for a million. Deal?” Every man in the room stared at me like I’d lost my mind. “Boss, does she know how you and Serena first met? Is she trying to pull the same move?” “Everyone knows you two hit it off over a drinking table. She’s doing this on purpose while Serena’s away — trying to play stand-in.” Dominic studied me for a long time. Then he smiled. “Interesting.” “That’s real fucking interesting.” I was yanked hard into his lap. The tip of the knife pressed against my cheek. “I’d hate to ruin a pretty face.” “So tell me — besides money, what are you really here for?” I held his gaze steady. “What if I said I’m here for your heart?” Something flickered behind his eyes. He grabbed a fistful of my hair and hauled me upright. “You? A hostess?” “You’re not even close to worthy.” The force of it nearly tore my hair out. He dragged me across the table and bottles went crashing to the floor. Glass bit into my arms and blood seeped through instantly. Dominic’s hand closed around my throat. He slammed me to the ground. “You like games?” “Then let’s give everyone a real show tonight.” That whole night was a blur of pain. They poured liquor down my throat until I choked. Dominic kicked me hard enough to crack my ribs. Cigarette burns dotted my arms, one after another — each one met with laughter or the click of someone’s phone. Nobody told him to stop. When I was barely breathing, Dominic crouched down and asked if it hurt. I didn’t answer. I just lay there with blood on my lips, staring straight at him. Something in Dominic shifted. “Serena…” His voice dropped to a murmur. The violence left his hands, replaced by something almost worse — a shaking, obsessive tenderness, like he was touching someone who wasn’t there. “Why won’t you ever listen to me? Why do you keep running to those worthless men just to get under my skin?” “Am I not enough? I’d give you my goddamn life. Why do you keep doing this to me?” He thought I was Serena. The woman he loved to the point of madness, and hated just as much. The first crack in his armor. I fought through the pain, raised a shaking hand, and gently stroked his hair. “I was wrong. I won’t leave. I’ll do whatever you say from now on.” Those words — Serena Blackwell would never say them. Not in a million years. She was Ashworth City’s princess, a rose made of razor wire. She didn’t apologize. She didn’t yield. She ground Dominic’s dignity under her heel and watched him spiral. That’s why those words cut straight through him. Dominic froze. Every muscle locked. The haze in his eyes shattered in an instant. He shoved me away. “Get out!” “You’re a goddamn hostess. Who gave you permission?” His foot slammed into my stomach. I curled up on the floor, coughing blood. Through the blur I watched him rip off his tie and light a cigarette with unsteady hands. “Boring.” He blew out a cloud of smoke and flicked a check at my face. “Take the money. Get yourself to a hospital.” “Don’t die here. I don’t need that mess.” I clutched the blood-soaked check against my chest. And smiled without a sound.

I spent a week in the hospital. Dominic never showed up once. But he sent over boxes of high-end nutrition kits, along with a message: “Once you can stand, drag yourself to the estate. You wanted money — here’s your chance.” “Once Serena’s hundredth wedding game is done. After that, you’re out of uses. So don’t waste my time.” I stared at those expensive packages and dumped them all into the trash without blinking. These two psychopaths treated crashing weddings like a game and other people’s dignity like a punchline. The ninety-ninth victim had been my brother. What he only got instead was Dominic’s fists and a public humiliation. And Serena? She had stood in her white bridal gown, nestled in Dominic’s arms, laughing. “Ugh, this groom is so boring. Didn’t even put up a fight.” “Dominic, don’t go too hard — don’t kill him. I still need him for my IG story.” That rainy night, my brother had dragged his broken arm up the longest bridge in Ashworth City, one agonizing step at a time. And jumped. I closed my eyes and forced the tears back down. …… When I arrived at Dominic’s private estate, I had changed everything about my appearance. A white cotton dress. Hair down. No makeup. This was what Serena Blackwell had looked like at eighteen. I’d studied every old photo of hers, every habit, every version of her smile. I knew how she used to walk, how she’d tilt her head, how she’d brush hair from her face without thinking. The moment Dominic saw me, the glass in his hand hit the floor. Shards scattered everywhere. A piece sliced across the back of his hand, but he didn’t notice. He stared at me, and his eyes went red in an instant. “Ser… Serena?” I stood in the doorway, fidgeting with the hem of my skirt, looking up at him with wide, timid eyes. “Mr. Ashford, it’s me. Ellie.” Dominic kept me. Not as a punching bag anymore — as a proper stand-in. He stopped letting me wear cheap clothes. He had an entire wardrobe made up for me, every piece styled exactly the way Serena used to dress. He stopped hitting me. He even started putting food on my plate at dinner, clumsy and a little awkward about it. “Serena used to love blueberry pancakes.” “The way she ate — cheeks all puffed out, like a little squirrel. Cutest damn thing.” “But then she changed.” “She started smoking. Drinking. Flirting with every man who looked her way.” “She called it fun. Said it kept things exciting.” “I hated it. I just wanted the old Serena back. The clean, simple version of her.” I swallowed a bite of that sickeningly sweet pancake and nodded like a good girl. “Whatever Mr. Ashford likes, I’ll learn.” Dominic smiled, satisfied, and patted my head. “Good girl.” …… Days passed like that, one after another. I played the perfect gentle girl, chipping away at Dominic’s walls one sliver at a time. Until one day. I was cleaning his study when I bumped the mouse by accident. The screen lit up. An encrypted folder sat in the center of the desktop. My fingers hovered over the keys. On impulse, I typed in Serena’s birthday. Part of me already knew what I’d find. It opened. Ninety-nine videos. Each one starring a different man. Some had been stripped naked and thrown into the street. Some had been forced to drink their own piss. Some had their limbs snapped and were left crawling on the ground like worms. These were Serena’s trophies. Medals she used to prove how far Dominic would go for her. My hands were shaking as I clicked on the latest one.

It was Ethan. In the video, my brother was on his knees with blood streaming down his face, bowing over and over, forehead slamming the concrete. “Please — I’m begging you — let me go. I was wrong. I should never have gone near Miss Blackwell…” Dominic’s foot came down on his face and ground it into the floor. He was laughing. “You think you’re worthy? You think Serena is someone a nobody like you gets to want?” “Since these arms touched someone they shouldn’t have — you don’t need them anymore.” The camera shook hard. Then came my brother’s scream — raw, animal, the kind of sound that doesn’t leave your head. The last thing on the video was Serena’s voice, off-screen. “God, Dominic, that was so hot! Love you! That’s number ninety-nine — next one better top this!” I closed the video. I pulled a bottle of pills from my pocket, shook a handful into my mouth, and chewed them dry. Antidepressants. My doctor had told me that stopping them cold could make things spiral — violent episodes, possible psychotic breaks. I didn’t care anymore. …… The next morning, Dominic was dressed to the nines, ready to go crash Serena’s hundredth wedding. I blocked the doorway with my arms spread wide, eyes red and swollen. Dominic shoved me aside with one hand. I fell — and as I hit the floor, something spilled out from inside my clothes. Dozens of photographs, scattered all over the ground. I’d spent a fortune collecting them before I ever set foot in this city. His foot was already mid-swing toward my ribs. It froze in the air. He stared at the photos like they’d burned him. The photos were all of him. On a basketball court, jersey dark with sweat. Asleep in a library corner, cheek pressed against a bookshelf. At a restaurant, arms thrown around his friends, laughing like he didn’t have a care in the world. A younger Dominic. Bright, alive, full of fire. Not the twisted, hollowed-out thing he’d become — the kind of man who got off on breaking people. Dominic bent down slowly and picked up one of the photos. His eighteenth birthday. Frosting smeared across his face, eyes squeezed shut in a grin. “Where did you get these?” I scrambled to grab them back, tears pouring down. “Give them back! Don’t look at those!” “These are all I have left of you. Don’t you dare take them.” “So you didn’t come to me for money?” Something shifted in his expression — something I couldn’t read. “Dominic, I just had a crush on you, that’s all! Why is it always Serena? Why can’t you ever see me?” “You came because… you’re in love with me?” I didn’t answer. And as it turned out — he didn’t make it to Serena’s wedding that night. Dominic didn’t say a word. He just looked at me like he was seeing someone for the very first time. Then he kissed me. Not rough. Not possessive. I didn’t push him away. His fingers threaded through my hair and slowly tightened. His breath turned hot and uneven, trailing from my ear down the side of my neck. He pressed me into the couch cushions, and his full weight followed. Shirt buttons came apart — the metallic sound cut through the silence like a blade. His mouth burned against my skin — the kind of heat you don’t pull away from. My fingers dug into the edge of the sofa. My body was shaking. I tilted my head back and closed my eyes. Not from desire. From hatred so thick it nearly strangled me. His palm traced up along my waist, heat bleeding through the thin cotton of my dress. He whispered against my throat. Not Serena. Ellie. I opened my eyes and met his bloodshot gaze. Hunger. Greed. Pathetic. The same hands that had crushed my brother into the pavement were trembling on my body now. I wrapped my arms around his neck and buried my face in his shoulder. Later — in bed. Then against the floor-to-ceiling windows. Moonlight poured in, casting our tangled shadows across the glass. He called my name over and over. Ellie. Ellie. Like a man in prayer. And I closed my eyes, silently mouthing my brother’s name. Ethan. I’m here for you.

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My husband was marrying someone else. And his new bride hired me to do her make up. Right before the wedding ceremony began, I received the payment. And the memo read: [Final payment for Miss Tedd’s bridal makeup. Settled by groom Carl Lanion.] Carl Lanion. My husband’s name. I immediately pulled up the client file. Sure enough, his name was also listed under the bride’s emergency contact. Relationship: Husband. I stared at that single word, my fingertips going cold. At that exact moment, Carl sent me a message: [Honey, don’t wear yourself out today. I’m working late at the office.] I replied: [Okay.] Then I took screenshots of every chat, every transfer record, and the entire client contract, saving them all. Half an hour later, the groom arrived to fetch the bride. Carl pushed open the door, beaming, dressed in a crisp white suit. The moment he saw me, his step faltered. But the bride was already clinging to his arm, all sugar and affection. “Sweetie, this is the MUA I told you about.” I lifted my head and extended my hand with a smile. “Mr. Lanion, congratulations on your wedding.” “I received the final payment. And the evidence.” … The color drained from Carl’s face in a single heartbeat. The smug, breezy smile he’d worn just seconds ago now stiffened into something that looked like cheap plaster. Heather Tedd noticed nothing amiss. She even pouted and gave him a playful shove. “Sweetie, what’s gotten into you? She is congratulating you.” Carl swallowed hard, his throat bobbing painfully. He forced himself to take my hand. His palm was slick with cold sweat. “Th… thank you.” I tightened my grip, still smiling. “My pleasure. Mr. Lanion looks dashing today. The suit fits beautifully.” “I just wonder whether the fabric will hold up under closer scrutiny.” Carl yanked his hand back, his eyes flashing with warning and panic. He immediately turned to Heather. “Sweetheart, all the guests are here. Why don’t we let her go? She doesn’t need to stay for the rest of the ceremony.” He was desperate to get me out of that room. Before I could speak, Heather objected. “Absolutely not!” She flung Carl’s hand aside and sat back down at the vanity. “I’m only getting married once in this life. Every single detail has to be perfect.” “This eyeliner she just did—the more I look at it, the more uneven it seems.” Heather shot me a sidelong glance in the mirror, her tone laced with condescending disdain. “You. Come over here and redo it.” I didn’t move. My voice stayed level. “Miss Tedd, you confirmed it was fine just a moment ago.” Heather slammed her palm on the vanity. “So I didn’t look carefully the first time. What of it?” “You’re just the hired help. Shut up and do your job!” “My husband paid double the final fee. He bought your service, and you’d better serve me properly.” Carl was beside himself, sweating bullets. He kept dabbing at his forehead, trying to pull Heather to her feet. “Sweetheart, let it go. The makeup looks great. The ceremony’s about to start—we can’t be late.” Heather shook him off, her face darkening instantly. “Carl, what’s your problem?” “It’s our wedding day and you’re taking some outsider’s side?” “Don’t tell me you’ve got a thing for her because she’s got a pretty face?” Carl flinched and waved his hands frantically, scrambling to prove his loyalty. “How could I, sweetheart! You’re the most beautiful woman in the world to me!” “She’s nothing—just some makeup girl. How could she ever compare to you?” To pacify Heather, he didn’t hesitate to throw me under the bus. I looked at his groveling face and felt my stomach turn. This was the husband I’d been married to for three years. The man who made me breakfast every morning, who swore up and down he’d only ever love me. “Well, since Mr. Lanion says so…” I stepped forward, picked up a makeup brush, my voice utterly devoid of warmth. “Miss Tedd, how would you like it changed?” Heather lifted her chin in triumph, like a rooster crowing over its defeated rival. “Take it all off. Start over.” “I want the look of a rightful wife—something with presence. Got it?” “Not whatever cheap, sneaking-around mistress look you’ve put on me.” She was clearly aiming her words at me, eyes flashing with provocation. I quietly switched on the voice recorder on my phone and set it down on the vanity. “Of course. As you wish.”

Throughout the entire redo, Heather had no intention of making it easy for me. The moment I picked up the powder puff, she jerked her head around. “Gentler! Do you even know how to do makeup? You’re going to rub my skin raw!” I paused and looked at her evenly. “Miss Tedd, you were the one moving.” “You’re talking back to me now?” Heather shrieked. Several bridesmaids swarmed in immediately, all chiming in at once. “You hired help really have no professionalism at all.” “Right? Taking our money and putting on airs—who does she think she is?” “Heather, why don’t you just file a complaint with her studio? Make sure she loses her job.” Heather watched me in the mirror, a mocking smile curling at the corner of her lips. “Forget it. It’s my big day. I can’t be bothered with someone of her class.” She looked me up and down, eyes brimming with contempt. “Judging by your age, you must be pushing thirty?” “Out here baking under the sun day after day doing other people’s makeup, and you can’t even afford a decent piece of jewelry.” “No ring either. Don’t tell me you can’t even land a boyfriend?” I dampened a cotton pad with makeup remover, my tone perfectly flat. “I’m married.” Heather blinked, then burst into exaggerated laughter. “Oh my, married? Then why are you out here doing servant’s work?” “Your husband must be useless—can’t even support his own wife.” Carl stood by the door, his face twisted like he’d just bitten into something rotten. He kept shooting me desperate looks, begging me to shut up. I pretended not to notice. As I wiped her face, I drawled lazily. “He is pretty useless.” “Can’t earn a dime, but loves playing big shot in public.” Heather snorted, drunk on her own superiority. “That’s exactly why I always say—for a woman, marrying well beats working hard.” “Take my Carl. Young, accomplished, runs his own company.” “For this wedding alone, he dropped over a million without blinking.” “That’s what a real man does—shelters his woman from every storm.” My hand paused mid-stroke. A crucial detail had just registered. Over a million? Carl’s salary card had been in my keeping the entire time. His meager monthly paycheck barely covered the mortgage. Where on earth would he get over a million for a wedding? “A million is no small sum,” I prodded carefully. “Mr. Lanion must really dote on you.” Heather assumed I was eaten up with envy. She preened even harder. “Of course. Carl didn’t just cover the whole wedding—he even gave me five million as a gift!” “A washed-up divorcée like you wouldn’t run into a man this good in ten lifetimes.” The bridesmaid beside her covered her mouth, snickering. “Heather, why bother telling her? Her kind has probably never even seen what five million looks like.” “Who knows—maybe she got caught playing mistress and got tossed out without a cent.” Their laughter was shrill and grating. Carl could barely stand. He strode over and grabbed Heather’s arm. “Enough, Heather! We’re really running out of time. Just leave the makeup as is!” Heather shrugged him off, irritated. “What is wrong with you today? Why do you keep taking her side?” Carl was drenched in sweat. He blurted out the first excuse he could think of. “The MC is rushing us. Several VIPs are already here—we can’t keep them waiting!” The mention of VIPs finally got Heather to rein it in. “Fine. Leave it then.” She turned and shot me a vicious glare. “Hurry up and do my hair. If it’s not perfect, I’ll make you cough up double the fee.”

I redid her updo and pinned the veil into place. Ten minutes left until the ceremony. A bridesmaid walked over and handed Heather an exquisite red velvet jewelry box. “Heather, time to put on the necklace.” Heather took the box, her face lighting up with smug anticipation. She deliberately turned toward me, snapping the box open with a flourish right under my nose. “Open your eyes wide. Take a good look at what real jewelry is.” Inside lay a sapphire and diamond necklace, resting on the velvet. The light caught it and threw off a blinding glare. I’d only meant to glance over. But in the next instant, my gaze locked onto that necklace and wouldn’t let go. The rage in my chest detonated like gasoline meeting flame. I knew that necklace. I knew it better than anything. It was the heirloom my grandmother had passed to my mother—the one my mother had fastened around my own neck with her dying hands. Last month, Carl had suddenly remarked that the necklace looked a little dull. He’d offered to take it to his friend’s high-end jeweler for cleaning. At the time, I’d actually been touched by his thoughtfulness. I never imagined he would take my heirloom and pass it off as a gift to his new lover. I fixed my eyes on that necklace, my voice cold as ice. “What a beautiful necklace.” Heather thought she’d stunned me into silence. She laughed scornfully. “Naturally. Carl had someone bid on it for me at an auction in London.” “The starting bid alone was three million.” She lifted the necklace and held it against her throat. “A peasant like you couldn’t afford a single chip off this stone if you worked your whole life.” I whipped my head around to look at Carl. The moment his eyes met mine, he stumbled back half a step and slammed into the door frame. His face was paper-white, his lips trembling. He couldn’t get out a single word. “A London auction?” I advanced on Heather one step at a time, my gaze nailed to that necklace. “Which auction? What’s the name of the auction house?” Heather flinched at my sudden intensity, then exploded with rage. “Are you insane? What business is it of yours where my husband bought it?” She shoved me away. “Who do you think you are, interrogating me?” The bridesmaids closed in around me at once. “What are you doing? Trying to snatch it?” “I noticed her staring earlier—I knew she was up to no good!” Then one of the bridesmaids suddenly screamed. “Heather! Your Cartier diamond ring—the one you set on the table just now—where did it go?” The room erupted. Heather looked down. The table was indeed bare. She spun on me, jabbing a finger viciously at my face. “You thief! No wonder you kept eyeing my jewelry—you were casing it the whole time!” “Hand over my ring!” I watched their performance coldly. “I didn’t take anything of yours.” “Still trying to lie!” A bridesmaid grabbed at my clothes. “There’s no one in this room but us and you. Who else could it have been?” “She was the closest to the table!” Heather’s arrogance hit its peak. She pointed straight at my makeup case. “Search her case! If we find it, I’ll have your hide!” The bridesmaids lunged at my makeup case like a pack of rabid dogs.

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Five years ago, my husband personally put me behind bars. When I got out,his ride request hit my app— and found him tangled up with my best friend who put me there. I’m doing unlicensed rides now.It’s the only work I can get since they stripped me of everything. So when the pickup request comes in from outside Club Nero — one of Dominic’s places — I don’t think twice. I just pull up and kill the engine. Then the door opens. Dominic stares at me like he’s seen a ghost. Maybe he has. “Elena.” His voice drops. “You’re out. Why didn’t you come to me?” Before I can answer, the woman hanging off his arm tips up on her heels and kisses him. Drunk. Sloppy. He fumbles to steady her, and that’s when I see her face. Sienna. My best friend. The woman who drugged me, set me up, and smiled through the glass while I was processed into a cell. I pull my cap lower and hold out my hand for the keys. “Sir, you ready to go? Five stars if the ride’s smooth.” “Elena.” Dominic knocks the keys out of my hand. He grabs my shoulders, eyes glassy. “Come home. My God.Do you know how much I’ve missed you? How much your family has missed you?” I peel his hands off me and turn to get my folding bike from the rack. My prosthetic clips the bumper. The sound is small but it cuts through everything. Dominic goes still. He stares at my leg. Then his eyes go red. I don’t understand what he’s crying about. He’s the one who handcuffed me himself.His own attorney’s badge, his own evidence, his own signature on the filing that put me away. He believed I’d slept with his brother Marco. He didn’t ask a single question. He just buried me. “Elena — your leg. What happened to you in there?” Sienna stirs at the sound of his voice. She blinks at me and her mouth curls. “Well, well. Little Elena.” She slurs it like a taunt. “When’d you get out? You should’ve called, girl. I’d have rolled out the welcome mat.” She leans into Dominic, wrapping both arms around him, pressing herself against his chest. Dominic frowns at her. “Sienna. You’re drunk. Stop.” “I’m not wrong though,” she says, pouting. “She did wrong, she did her time, whatever I always prayed she’d come out a better person.” Then she kicks my folding bike off the curb. Dominic lunges to catch her as she stumbles. “Watch it.” His voice is soft. Careful. Like he used to be with me. Once she’s settled, he looks back at my prosthetic. “Tell me what happened. The whole five years,what did they do to you?” His eyes are wet. I don’t answer. I just right the bike. “Excuse me. You’re in the way.” My pants catch the wind and the metal brace shows — cheap chrome, bulk-ordered. Dominic’s jaw tightens. “Elena, please. Come with me. Let’s talk. Let’s fix this.” He reaches for me. I step aside. “Sir, you canceling the ride or not? Because I can close it out from my end.” I hold up my phone. Professional. Blank. Sienna laughs. “Dominic, why are you even talking to this whore? She went after Marco. Didn’t even flinch.” She breathes liquor and venom in equal measure. “Losing that leg was the least she deserved.” Five years ago, she was the one who poured my drink. She’s the one who got me into that hotel room. When I woke up, Marco was half-dressed beside me,and Dominic was kicking the door in with two of his soldiers behind him. He didn’t let me speak. He slapped me in front of all of them. And then, because Dominic is one of the sharpest legal minds in the New York underworld, he personally represented Marco’s accusation and buried every defense I had. I come back to the present. Sienna has her arm hooked through Dominic’s, his brow creased— but he’s not pushing her away. Sienna opens her mouth to say something. “Sienna, enough.” He looks at me. “Let’s keep the ride going, Elena. You need the money.” He’s not wrong. I get in the car. The drive takes thirty minutes. Sienna whines for him to rub her temples. He does it. I watch the road and keep my foot steady on the gas. We pull up to a gated property in Westchester. Marble columns, iron fence, private security. It used to be our home. “One-eighty,” I say, and hold out my hand. Sienna pulls a thick fold of hundreds from her clutch and throws it at my face. “Keep the change. Buy yourself a decent leg. Stop embarrassing yourself out here.” She walks away on Dominic’s arm without looking back. Dominic stops by the door, staring at the bills scattered across the seat. “She didn’t mean it. She was drunk.” He pulls out his own roll. “Take all of it. And tomorrow come to the firm. I’ll find you something. A real position.” I pick up exactly what the meter said. One hundred eighty dollars. I leave the rest. “I don’t take dirty money, Mr. Ferrano.” “Don’t forget to rate the ride.” Sienna spins around, furious, and lunges . Dominic catches her. I clip my helmet on, unfold the bike, and ride into the dark.

The cold hits my face on the ride back. By the time I get home, the prosthetic socket has rubbed through. I unbuckle the harness and the stump is a mess.Raw, bleeding, ugly. I sit on the edge of the bathtub and press a rag against it. Five years ago, Sienna came to visit me inside. She sat across the glass and smiled the whole time. “You know how good Dominic is in bed, Elena? Every. Single. Night.” She tilted her head, lips curling. “Don’t worry. I’ll keep him very well taken care of. The house, the firm,all of it.” I lost it. I slammed my hands against the glass and screamed until my throat gave out. That same night, three women dragged me into a blind spot.No cameras, no guards. They had an iron rod. They took their time. “Someone paid a lot for this,” one of them said. I was on my back for six months. The infection got bad enough that amputation was the only call left. I hated them for it. But five years inside turns hate into something quieter. Something closer to nothing. The next morning, a hard knock pulls me out of sleep. I figure it’s my landlord again. It’s not. It’s Dominic. Standing in my doorway holding a container of soup. “Bone broth,” he says, like that explains anything. He walks in without being asked. “Don’t take what Sienna said to heart. That’s just how she is.” He sets the soup on my counter and turns around. “I came to talk about your future.” I lean against the doorframe and look at him. “I drive illegal taxi. I don’t have a future.” “Go on back to wherever you came from, Dominic. Don’t get your designer suit dirty.” He sighs. Turns to face me fully. “Elena. Stop.All you have to do is make a public statement admitting your private life was a mess, and sign over whatever shares you have left.I’ll bring you back into the firm.” He pauses like he’s offering me a gift. “Not as an attorney, obviously. But there’s a cleaning position. Five grand a month. That’s enough to live on.” He lifts his chin. Waiting. I actually laugh. “You want me to apologize to the man who lied about me?” Dominic’s face hardens instantly. “You still don’t get it, do you?” His voice rises. “If I hadn’t pushed for leniency,if I hadn’t used every favor I had,you’d have gotten twice the sentence. You should be thanking me.” He steps forward like he’s going to grab my arm and drag me out himself. I push his hand away. “Dominic. Did you ever actually read the case file?” “The hallway camera,why did it go out that exact night?” “And what was in my drink?” He stops. Just for a second, something flickers across his face. Then it’s gone. “Enough.” He cuts me off. “You think Sienna and Marco set you up? You think that’s what happened?” He shakes his head. “I’m here trying to help you. Don’t be stupid about it.” I point at the door. “Get out.” He stares at me like I just spoke another language. “You think you’re still the hotshot attorney you used to be? You’re a convict, Elena. You’re a woman with one leg and a gypsy cab app. That’s what you are now.” He slams the door on his way out. That afternoon I open the app to pick up a few ride requests. A notification hits before I can accept anything. My account has been permanently suspended. Reason cited: a passenger complaint. Inappropriate conduct by the driver. I stare at the screen. Dominic. Of course. He couldn’t even wait a day.

I haven’t even locked the door behind me when the landlord shows up with three heavies at my back. “Elena. Someone just offered me ten times your rent. You’re out. Now.” I don’t get a chance to argue. They throw me and everything I own onto the street. My clothes land in a puddle. The rain is already coming down hard. My prosthetic aches in the wet cold. Then a Maybach rolls up and stops right in front of me. It splashes mud across my legs. Sienna leans out the window, cigarette between her fingers, smoke curling. “Look at you. The big-shot attorney, living like a stray dog.” She exhales slowly. “God, Elena. You’re embarrassing.” Dominic gets out. He opens an umbrella and holds it over my head. “Stop being stubborn. Just apologize to Marco, keep your head down. I’ll sort the job, I’ll sort the housing. Why are you doing this to yourself?” I push myself up off the ground. “Get that umbrella out of my face. And take your girlfriend somewhere else.” Dominic’s jaw tightens. “Sienna was there for me when you were gone. She held things together. I’m standing here trying to help you and you’re acting like I’m the enemy.” He pauses. “Your parents have been asking about you. Don’t shut them out too.” And right on cue，two figures come running through the rain. No umbrella. Moving fast. My parents. I haven’t gone to see them since I got out. I was afraid the rumors had reached them. Afraid they’d been hurt by all of it. My mother reaches me first. She slaps me across the face before she says a word. My father gets the other cheek. “You have the nerve to show your face?” My mother’s voice is pure venom. “You’re not our daughter. You never were.” “Sienna is our family now. She’s the one who deserves that name.” My father’s eyes are cold. “A whore like you should’ve died in that cell.” Five years I spent worrying about them. Five years scared they’d been poisoned by the lies. I never expected them to take Sienna in as their own. Sienna steps out of the Maybach and takes both of them by the arm, guiding them back toward the car. “Mom, Dad. She’s not ready to admit what she did. Don’t waste your energy.” She glances back at me. “We’ve got the firm. You can both retire in peace. Leave her to figure it out.” My parents exchange a look, then turn on me with pure disappointment. “If Sienna hadn’t been running the firm all these years, everything we built would be gone.” My mother’s voice is sharp. “You want to keep playing the victim? Fine. Don’t expect us to catch you when you fall.” The Maybach pulls away. I stand in the rain until the taillights disappear. I limp two blocks to a diner I passed on the way out of my building. I need work. Any work. The manager takes one look at my prosthetic and waves me off before I can speak. “Get out of here. We don’t hire cripples. who’s gonna cover it when you get hurt?” I grab his arm and hold tight. “I work clean and I work fast. Half wages. Just feed me.” The manager huffs, impatient, and moves to shove me off. Then a woman in a cleaning uniform spins around from behind the counter. “Oh my God.” She stares at me. “Miss Elena?” I freeze, studying the woman in front of me. She grabs my arm and pulls me into the corner, eyes darting left and right. Then she reaches into her apron pocket and pulls out a small voice recorder. “Miss Elena, I am so sorry.” Her voice drops to almost nothing. “Five years ago, I was a cleaner at the hotel. Sienna paid me a hundred thousand dollars to kill the camera feed that night. But I recorded her. Her and Marco planning the whole thing. Every word. I kept it because I couldn’t live with myself.” She presses it into my hand. “Please don’t tell anyone it came from me. I just……I needed you to have it.” Five years. A destroyed leg. A prison sentence for something I never did. And the proof was sitting in a cleaning woman’s apron pocket the whole time.

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I leave the window open on purpose, so the Don of the Castellano family hears every sound I make with another man all night long. By sunrise, Damien appears at my door with a face like a thunderstorm, jaw locked, eyes black. “Got room for one more?” he asks, voice low and dangerous. I just lounge between two pretty boys, one arm draped over each, and give him a flat, dead look. “Thought you only had eyes for your precious college girl now.” His eyes go bloodshot red—but he doesn’t take a single step closer. Because I’m the woman who bled beside him for ten years, who helped him carve Harbor City out of other men’s hands. And he’d rather marry some college girl in a sundress than keep the promise he made to me. His soldiers can’t wrap their heads around it. They actually speak up. “Boss Nova fought for every block you own. She’s the sharpest blade you’ve got. You used to be obsessed with her—what the hell changed?” Damien grinds his cigarette out and twists the silver band on his finger—the matching one Lily wears. “Nova Quinn? A woman with blood up to her elbows? Every time I think about touching her, my skin crawls. How could she ever compare to my girl?” “But Boss—Nova’s smart. If she finds out and breaks with you—” Damien scoffs, cold as ice. “All of Harbor City already belongs to me. What’s one woman? You think my territory’s gonna grow legs and walk off?” He has no idea I’m standing right outside the door. Every word. I drop the bruise balm I brought for him into the trash and pull out my phone. I text Kieran Vance—Damien’s worst enemy in the city. [Damien Castellano’s territory. His life. You want them? They’re yours.] … I’m down at the dock arranging a speedboat off the island when Damien finds me. “Big shipment coming in two nights from now. You handle the pickup yourself. And clear out your beach house—I need it.” He gives the order like I’m one of his men. “The house is for her, right?” His brow knits. “Don’t start. I’m not going public with us because the situation’s unstable—Kieran’s watching every move. I can’t let the boys get sloppy over one woman.” “Right now, your job is getting Kieran off my back.” That’s how he’s always handled me. Gaslight, frame it as protection, send me back to bleed for him. For years I bought it. I broke my body for him, twice as hard. Now it just sounds like a punchline. I slide the boat requisition slip across to him. “I’m not pissed. I’m used to it.” Something flickers in his eyes. Annoyance. He signs so hard the pen tears the paper. “Nova—what’s with the attitude? It’s a damn house. Everything on this island is mine. You’re mine. I don’t need permission.” He throws the slip back in my face. “And stop bothering me with errand-runs off the island. I’m busy.” He thinks I want a shopping trip. I don’t correct him. I nod, push through the door, and head for the dock. Looking at that speedboat with my name on it, I actually smile. Ten years. Ten years I helped him build an empire out of broken bones. We were childhood friends. Brothers in arms. Lovers, too—the kind that would die for each other. Now I finally see it. That was just a story I told myself. A lie he wove out of my own devotion. He’s marrying someone else. That night, a small army of mercenaries escorts Lily Monroe onto the island. White dress, soft curls, wide doe eyes—and a smug little smile she can’t quite hide. “Nova,” she chirps, “you’ve worked SO hard for Damien all these years. So loyal.” “I’ll make him give you a promotion. And I’ll send you some pretty boys—a woman your age can’t keep waiting forever, right?” “Not like Damien. He couldn’t wait one more day. Tomorrow we’re married. Can you believe it?” My fingers curl around the grip of the pistol on my hip. It takes every ounce of training I have not to put a bullet through her teeth. “Move,” I say, cold, and step around her. But she grabs my arm. From her purse she pulls out a leather journal, eyes glittering. “These are the love letters Damien wrote to me all these years, when he missed me. The book’s too heavy to carry around—Could you toss it for me?” She glides off, skirt swaying. I stand at the cliff’s edge, salt wind cutting my face, and open the journal with shaking hands. April 12, last year. The night I shielded him from an ambush, blood pouring out of his side. He’d written: Lily, if I make it out alive, I’ll marry you. August 5, two years back. The night Kieran’s sniper put a round near him on a trip, and I walked into enemy territory alone, two blades in my hands, to drag him out. He’d written: Baby, today the air smelled like you. January 24. The night he got picked up by the cops and I took the charge for him. He’d written: If it were you in that cell, I’d never let you suffer like this. Every line carves a piece out of me. How many times did I beg him to marry me? He’d kiss my forehead: Nova. Wait for me. “I have too many enemies. I have to clear the path first. When I own all of Harbor City—then I’ll marry you. Okay?” I waited. Year after year. My phone buzzes. Kieran’s reply. Two words. [Deal. Done.] I tap the screen, and one more question slips out of me before I can stop it: [August 5. The hit on Damien. That was you, right?] His reply is instant. [Swear to God, that wasn’t me. I was framed.] [You chased me down nine blocks with two machetes over something I didn’t even DO.] I laugh. Out loud. At the dark water. So I was a punchline to both of them. A clown with blood on her hands, playing knight for a man who never even loved me. Fine. There’s nothing left for me here.

Nova’s POV I work out the rest of the pickup details with Kieran and head back toward the compound. That’s when I hear Damien talking to his men by the yacht. “Boss, the bride’s gown came in. We picked it up at that royal auction, just like you wanted—a billion-dollar dress.” “But… we’re worried about Nova. If she blows up, exposes the compound, Kieran could wipe us out in one strike—” Damien doesn’t even hesitate. “I love Lily. She’s the only woman I will ever marry. Tomorrow’s wedding goes off without a single scratch. No mistakes.” “Not even from Nova. I’ll keep her quiet.” “And keep your boys’ mouths shut. Anyone leaks a word, I feed them to the sharks.” I made my peace with leaving. I really did. But hearing the man who once swore he’d die for me reduce me to a problem to manage—it still cuts. The pain sits in my chest like broken glass. Back in my room, I start packing. Passports. IDs. Papers. Cash. I look around. Knives. Pistols. A shotgun under the bed. Ammo cases stacked like books. That’s when it hits me: Damien never gave me anything. Not really. Just weapons. To protect him. Once I asked him for a dress. A necklace. Something soft. He laughed. “Nova, even in a dress and jewels, you don’t look like a woman. Don’t waste them.” But Lily Monroe rolled onto this island with a whole truck of designer dresses and diamonds. So why her, and not me? I dig through the back of my closet. There it is—the red dress I bought years ago and never had the guts to wear. I slip it on. Heels. Lipstick. The works. Right then, Lily kicks the door open like she owns the place. “Nova, you read the journal, right? Damien’s truest feelings are—” She stops mid-sentence. Eyes round. Mouth open. Then her face twists. “I figured at least you had some pride. That you’d slink off quietly once you knew Damien doesn’t love you.” “But you actually think you can seduce him back? You shameless bitch—I’ll claw your face off!” She lunges. She’s got zero training, so I could slap her across the mouth easily before she even lands a hand on me. “Nova! You DARE hit me?! Damien’s going to make you regret this!” she shrieks. I cross my arms and watch her stumble. “Thanks for the compliment, princess. I clean up better than you. That’s the problem.” A second later, she drops to her knees and starts slapping her own face. “Nova—please—I’m trash, I shouldn’t have crawled into Damien’s life—just don’t ruin the wedding, beat me to death if you want—” I haven’t even processed what just happened when a boot comes flying at my ribs. “Nova! Are my words a joke to you?! You’re laying hands on Lily now?!” Damien. If that kick lands, I don’t get up again. So tell me—what am I to him? A guard dog? A punching bag he gets to swing at once she’s done her job? I twist out of the way, but the heel catches and my ankle rolls. Pain shoots up my leg. I bite it back and look him dead in the eye. He scoops Lily up, his gaze ice-cold on me— Then he sees the red dress. Sees my face. His pupils blow wide. For half a second, he forgets to breathe. His voice still comes out frozen. “Nova. Dressed up or not, you’ll never come close to her.” Lily clings to his arm, sniffling. “Damien, she forced me to talk, that’s why I gave her the journal—I’m so sorry—” He pulls her against his chest like she’s made of glass. “It’s nothing. No one’s mad at you, baby.” I laugh under my breath. Bitter. One minute ago he was telling his men they’d swim with sharks if they leaked a word. Now that Lily blabbed it straight to my face, it’s nothing. She gets to break every rule. He calls it cute. What does that make me? Just stupid? “So you’re really marrying her.” My voice doesn’t shake. I make sure. I need to hear how he explains this. To me. Part of me—the part still clinging—thinks he’ll flinch. Look guilty. Beg me to let them go. Instead, his brow just twitches. “Yes. Tomorrow. You can come if you want. But you don’t make a scene, Nova. Don’t make me put hands on you.” That’s it. The last sliver of hope I had—gone. I lock my jaw against the tears and shove the word out of my throat. “Out.” But Lily isn’t done. “Damien… I don’t know many people here. I was hoping Nova could be one of my bridesmaids… but I’d hate to offend her—” He melts at the way she asks for it. Turns to me. “Nova, being her bridesmaid is nothing. You won’t make a fuss about that, right?” Something snaps. I grab a steel rod from the corner and start swinging. “GET OUT.” I drive them through the door. Slam it. Slide down against the wood, breath ragged. A single tear cuts down my cheek before I can stop it. Then my phone lights up. A message from Kieran Vance. [Red looks good on you. Beautiful.] [Take the heels off. Ice that ankle.]

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I traded my entire human life to make Ethan the Alpha of this pack, but the day his father died, he dragged a whimpering she-wolf into packhouse and demanded I share his bed with her. “Sera, this was my father’s Mate” he says, one hand pCynthiated protectively on her trembling shoulder. “Pack tradition. I have to take care of her now.” I look at the way he shields her behind his back, and my smile turns ugly on my face. “No.” His face goes cold in a heartbeat. It’s the first time he’s ever gone against me, and he keeps her anyway. Every night after that, the cabin next to ours fills with the same sounds. Heavy thuds. Low growls. A female’s broken little moans. I clamp my palms over my ears and curl up under the fur bCynthiaket, the cramps in my belly twisting like knives. Through the pain, I force myself to count the marks I’ve carved into the stone wall with beast blood. The next Blood Moon is almost here. The cabin door creaks open. A warm body settles on the edge of the bed. I feel his hand drift toward my hair, and I burrow deeper into the furs before he can touch me. “Don’t.” Ethan freezes. His lips press into a thin line. “Sera, you’re sulking again.” His voice is rough, irritated. “”It’s not my fault you can’t give me an heir. Don’t read so much into it. You’re my Luna. You’re the only female with my name”   I clench the fur bCynthiaket and say nothing.· He drags a hand through his hair, frustrated. “When Cynthia whelps in the spring, I’ll send her away. The pack will be satisfied. We’ll raise the pup together. He’ll only ever call you mother. Stop being difficult.” With that, Ethan stands up and walks out the door. He can’t stand facing my cold face, so he goes back to Cynthia. And this same scene has played out every single night since he brought her home. I wipe the dried tears off my cheeks and sit up. The fire is still warm, but my bones feel like ice. I don’t belong in this world. I’ve been in this world three years. It’s brutal. Backwater. Cold in a way that gets inside you and never leaves. If I hadn’t met Ethan, I would never have missed the Blood Moon. I would have gone home. He was the fiercest warrior in the pack, and he gave me the most honest thing he had. I rip the wolf-fang necklace off my throat. My eyes burn. He broke his oath. He broke me. I still remember the night I chose to stay. He pressed this necklace into my palm with both hands. “Sera, thank you. I don’t care that you don’t have a Breeding Totem. In this lifetime, Ethan will only ever have you. Even if we never get a pup of our own, I’m at peace with it.” Three years. That’s all it took for him to drag his dead father’s Mate into our home. There’s a pack law here. The son inherits the father’s Mate. Even though Cynthia shares no blood with him, she became his property the moment the old Alpha stopped breathing. He feeds her. She breeds for him. Clean transaction. I thought he’d broken from those laws for me. I was wrong. I laugh under my breath and toss the necklace into the fire. The bone curls, blackens, crumbles into ash. A tainted vow. I don’t want it anymore. A female’s soft, coy laughter drifts faintly through the wall, on and off. I run my thumb over the bone ring on my finger, then lift my eyes to the corner of the stone wall, where blood-red symbols only I can read are scrawled across the rock. The next Blood Moon is almost here.

I stare at the drowned vegetable sprouts in my field, my whole body trembling with rage. Beside me, Cynthia flinches, the wooden bucket still dangling from her hand. Her eyes brim with tears. “Sera, I didn’t mean to,” she whimpers. “I just wanted to help. I only gave them a little extra water, I swear, I didn’t know they’d all die…” She starts to sob. The mating marks all over her bare skin are impossible to miss. I jerk my gaze away like I’ve been burned. My chest feels sour and hot at the same time. I open my mouth and nothing comes out. What’s the point? The sprouts are already dead. I unclench my fists and step forward to see what can still be saved. But Cynthia’s face goes white with shock. She sways on her feet, then suddenly collapses forward. Before I can even react, a force slams into me and shoves me sideways. My knee cracks against a rock. Cold sweat floods my skin. When I look up, Ethan is there. Still in his hunting leathers, dust and pine needles in his hair. He just got back. His eyes are red and feral. He scoops Cynthia against his chest, and the look he gives me is pure accusation. “Sera. You can’t even tolerate her this much?” My lips tremble. Then I smile at him, tired and sad. “Did you see me do anything to her? Or do your eyes only show you what you’ve already decided to believe?” He freezes. He looks around at the flooded field. He stays quiet for a long second. “They’re just sprouts, Sera. She was only trSerag to help. Don’t take it this far.” Just sprouts. I laugh through my nose. With one sentence, he just erased three years of my work. Before me, this pack survived on raw kills. Sick guts, weak pups, half the litters dSerag before their first winter. I taught them to farm. I taught them to cook the meat right. That’s why his pack thrived. That’s why they made him Alpha. And now he’s calling it “just sprouts” to soothe the female who killed them. “Ethan… my belly hurts,” Cynthia whispers, burSerag her face in his throat. She’s stopped crSerag just enough to look pitiful, clinging to his arm like a vine. His attention snaps to her like a leash pulled tight. His big hand spreads over her stomach, rubbing in slow, careful circles. So gentle. Like he’s afraid of bruising her. Ethan was never a gentle male. He learned all of that, every soft touch, after we mated. Every time I felt unwell, he’d hover at my side and refuse to leave, no matter how I tried to wave him off. And now he’s giving it, stroke for stroke,to another female. My knee throbs. I lower my lashes. My nails bury themselves in the dirt. “Ethan,” I say. My voice cracks. “I hurt too.” He stops. His lips part once, twice. He almost takes a step toward me. I stare him down, my hand pressed over my wound, fingers shaking. The next second, Cynthia’s arms snap up around his neck. “Blood…” she breathes. Red runs down the inside of her thigh. His face drains. He doesn’t look at me again. He just sweeps her up and runs for the Pack Doctor. I watch them disappear, the corner of my mouth twitching up. Whatever was left in me for him, the last thin thread of it, snaps clean.

“She’s… she’s carrSerag!” The Pack Doctor checks her twice, three times, then whirls on Ethan with shining eyes. “Truly the she-wolf with the strongest breeding capability in the entire pack. Just a few nights and she’s already carrSerag a pup!” “Alpha, you can start preparing the nursery!” I stand off to the side, numb from head to toe. I can’t even feel a single emotion left inside me. I just watch Ethan’s face shift from frozen, to stunned, to a wet, broken kind of joy. So this is what he really wanted. A pup. My hand drifts to my own stomach without me telling it to. For three years, I’ve been quietly poisoning my own womb with musk powder. Because I never wanted a pup. In this world, every she-wolf is born with a Breeding Totem. It marks how strong her breeding capability is. The stronger the capability, the darker the Totem. The weaker it is, the fainter the mark. And me, a modern human, of course I don’t have one. So naturally, they treated me like a freak. A cripple. Even after I ended up with Ethan, I never broke the lie. Birthing in this world is already a coin flip with death, and this place is so backward on top of it. I wasn’t going to die for a pup. But back then I was naive enough to think… if it was Ethan… I force down the wave of nausea and press hard on my cramping belly. The truth is, I’m pregnant too.  This pup picked the worst possible moment to come. “Because of the shock, and because Cynthia’s body is fragile, besides plenty of rest, by tradition…” The Pack Doctor hesitates, then lets her eyes drift over to me. I know what she means. Every pup is a treasure to the pack. When one female in the household is carrSerag, the other females are expected to wait on her alongside the male. But the Pack Doctor can’t bring herself to say it out loud. Because I’m not like the other females in this pack. I’ve given everything to this pack. I brought them prosperity. That’s why every member here respects me. I shouldn’t have to lower myself to do something like this. For a moment, no one speaks. Then Ethan speaks. “It’s fine. Sera can do it.” I turn my head so slowly I hear my own neck crack. “This is Sera’s pup too. There’s no reason she’d refuse.” He says it like it’s nothing. Like he’s commenting on the weather. He wants me. To take care of Cynthia. To nurse the female he’s been mounting next door every night. My hands ball up so tight my nails cut my palms. The Pack Doctor flinches and looks away. No one defies the Alpha. Not out loud. I look at the floor. My mouth tastes like blood. “No.” Ethan’s head snaps toward me. His brows pull together, disbelieving. “What did you just—Sera, this is your pup too, how can you—” “It is NOT my pup!” Before Ethan can finish, my voice rises, even cracking at the edge. My voice shakes. “Ethan… is a pup really that important?” “When you begged me to be with you, do you remember what you said…?” His jaw locks. His eyes drop. He doesn’t answer. I take a step back. Then another. The disappointment in my chest is so heavy I can barely stand up under it. I forgot. I let myself forget. Ethan was born in this world. He was raised on the gospel of the bloodline. Of course he was never going to change for me. Of course. I was the fool. Choosing to stay here for him. Choosing this frozen, ugly place over my own world. Cynthia’s lashes flutter. She tugs weakly on his sleeve, biting her lip, doing the wounded-doe routine. “Ethan… it’s alright. Sera has done so much for the pack. And I’m only your father’s leftover Mate. I—I don’t deserve this. I’ll have the pup quickly and move out, I promise—” Cynthia’s words hit Ethan like cold water tossed into a pot of oil. His face goes cold in an instant. It looks like he’s made up his mind. When he raises his eyes again, his face is a stranger’s. “If you don’t want to, then move out.”He says to me.

The whole room goes dead silent. Cynthia’s eyes go wide. For half a second, before she catches herself, I see triumph flash across her face. I smile, bitter and small. My belly cramps. “Then where do you want me to move to?” The Alpha’s cabin is the safest, warmest building in the pack. There isn’t a single spare cabin in the village. He knows that. Is he kicking me out? Ethan doesn’t speak. His breathing has gone fast and shallow. I know he’s hesitating. But what’s there to hesitate over now? You already said it, Ethan. Out loud. In front of the Pack Doctor. There’s no taking it back. Just admit it. The pup matters more than I do. “Where do you want me to go?” I ask again, lighter this time. Almost playful. I’m not even looking at him. I’m staring at the chipped moon outside the window. Ethan is openly hesitating now. “Yes, Alpha,” the Pack Doctor jumps in nervously, “there are no spare cabins. And Sera still tends the fields, where could she possibly—” “I remember… there are a few abandoned cabins up on the Ridge, aren’t there?” Ethan says. The moment those words leave his mouth, the few of us in the cabin react all at once — panic, shock, glee — every eye snapping to Ethan. The Ridge. Where only the ones with no one and nothing left ever go. So Ethan really is throwing me away. I almost laugh out loud. It doesn’t matter. I’m leaving this world soon anyway. “It’s only temporary,” Ethan says stiffly, refusing to look at me. “When Cynthia delivers the pup, I’ll bring you home. But if you’d rather stay—” “I’ll go.” Ethan clearly didn’t expect me to agree so quickly. He freezes for a second, then rushes to speak. “I—I meant, if you’d be willing to stay and help with Cynthia, you don’t have to—” “I’m not staSerag to look after her.” I say it again, level and final. Then I give him a small, broken smile. “Help me move my things tonight.” I turn to leave. He blocks my path with his body. His eyes are shaking. His voice comes out clenched between his teeth. “Sera… why won’t you step back for me. Just once.” I’m so tired. I pCynthiat my palm on his chest and push, gently. “Because I’ve already stepped back too many times, Ethan. This is where I stop.” He doesn’t grab me again. He just stands there, dark-faced, watching me walk away. And then I hear him let out a cold, brittle laugh behind me. “The path down the mountain is rough, Sera. Don’t bother coming back.I’ll bring your rations up to you. Every day. Until Cynthia whelps, and I bring you home.”

Three days since I came up to the Ridge. Ethan only made it up here once. The first day, he brought the rations. He tried to get close to me, and I shut him down cold. He left with a black look on his face and never came back. The grass basket where the food goes has been empty ever since. Maybe he forgot. Maybe Cynthia found some excuse to keep him busy and he never made it out the door. The firewood in the corner is damp. I don’t even have the strength to coax a flame out of it anymore. Cold air that cuts right through the animal hide I’ve wrapped myself in. I curl up tighter, both hands pressed hard against the low, dragging ache in my belly. I lift my eyes to the marks I scratched into the wall the day I arrived. Tonight is the Blood Moon. Another cramp hits, bad enough to wring cold sweat out of me. Then, out of nowhere, I start laughing. I pull myself into a smaller knot and just laugh until there’s no sound left. Because I’ve been secretly taking musk powder this whole time, this pregnancy was already hanging by a thread. And this place runs so much colder than the valley below. This pup was never going to make it. The tears come without warning. Hot and fast. I cry for my own stupidity. I cry because I gave up my whole life, my whole world, for a male who didn’t deserve a single year of it. Then a warm rush moves down the inside of my thigh. I reach down with a trembling hand and turn my palm over. Bright red. I lie back and stare up at the black ceiling. I feel it happening. The small life inside me slipping away, quiet and unhurried, like it was never really mine to keep. In the dark, my mouth curves into something that isn’t quite a smile. It’s alright. Go, little one. Ethan didn’t deserve to be your father anyway. And I’m going home. The bone ring slides off my finger and Cynthiads on the empty hide beside me.

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My husband thinks I’m the broke wife he got stuck with. He has no idea the hacker holding his entire company hostage right now is me.Our four-year-old daughter went missing in his office an hour ago. He’s been comforting his crying secretary ever since.So I locked the doors and started a three-hour countdown. “Three hours. Find my kid, or every nasty little thing you people are hiding goes online. Your bank statements. Your texts. The stuff your wives don’t know about. All of it. Everywhere.” The room loses its mind. Somebody curses. A chair scrapes back hard. Yvonne, my husband’s secretary, is doing that ugly cry thing. The one where she still somehow looks pretty. “Tessa, please. It was me. I lost her. Hate me, scream at me, do whatever you want to me. Just don’t drag everyone else into this. Please.” Ryan pulls her in. Smooths her hair. Murmurs something I can’t hear. Then he turns around and his hand cracks across my face. “Are you out of your mind? You can’t even keep track of your own kid, and now you’re, what, hacking my company? You’re gonna ruin these people’s lives? Tessa, kill the program. Now.” I touch my cheek. It stings. I don’t say anything. I just pull out my phone and start the timer. “Start looking. I want my daughter. I don’t care what shape she’s in when you find her. Just find her.” Kyle, the intern, actually rolls his eyes. “Okay, lady. Chill. Who do you even think you are right now? This is psycho behavior.” His phone buzzes mid-sentence. So does everybody else’s. Heads tilt down. A second of dead silence. Then somebody snickers. It’s a receipt. Kyle has ordered forty boxes of male enhancement pills in the last three days. “Bro. Are you serious right now?” “Kyle, you’re not even thirty, what is going on?” Kyle goes the color of a tomato. Words just fall out of his mouth. “They’re not for me, okay?! Mr. Lucas told me to order them!” Every head in the room snaps toward Ryan. He clears his throat. Doesn’t even blink. “My wife and I have been trying for another baby. Anybody got a problem with that?” I almost laugh out loud. Ryan hasn’t slept at home in six months. Whoever he’s been “trying” with, it sure as hell isn’t me. But after Kyle, nobody else has the guts to open their mouth. He nudges Yvonne in the ribs. “Yvonne. Tell her. Just tell her what happened, maybe she’ll calm down.” Yvonne sniffles. Wipes under her eyes. Lets her voice break right on cue. “I, um, I don’t even, oh my God. Mr. Lucas had this video call this morning, and Lily had nowhere to go, so I said I’d watch her, I wanted to help, and I, I just ran to the bathroom for like one second, I swear, and when I came back she was just, she was…” She covers her face. Shoulders shaking. The whole package. The office swarms her like she’s the one whose kid is missing. “Honey, this isn’t on you.” “You went to the bathroom, that’s all. People have to pee.” “Her own mother couldn’t be bothered to show up. You did way more than you had to.” Ryan tucks her against his chest like she might shatter. “Don’t you dare blame yourself. This is on Tessa. She’s never disciplined that kid for one second. No wonder Lily took off, nobody at home tells her no.” “When that little brat turns up, I’ll whip her myself. She’s getting on her knees and apologizing to you.” Something cold slides down my spine. My four-year-old is missing. And the only person my husband cares about is the woman who lost her. I cut through the noise. My voice is flat. Bored, almost. “Two hours.”

The accountant rubs his forehead, trying to play peacemaker. “Tessa, come on. Locking us in here isn’t gonna magic her back. Maybe she just got bored, snuck out, you know how kids are. Why don’t we just call 911?” Every phone in the room pings at the same time. His face drops. Screens light up with his own paper trail. Cooked books. Fake invoices. Years of skimming, all laid out clean. I tilt my head. “You sure you wanna call 911, Bennett?” He’s already sweating through his shirt. “That’s not, no, I didn’t, that’s not what I meant, Tessa, please.” I send the next file. “Then explain these. All these big numbers, no receipts. Where’d that money go, Bennett?” His eyes flick to Ryan. Mouth opens. Closes. Nothing. I smile, slow. “Fine. I’ll save you the trouble. Two million on a condo for Yvonne. Quarter mil on her car. Twenty grand on a single handbag. Want me to keep going? I have screenshots.” “Enough!” Ryan snaps. “Yvonne’s new in town, okay? She needed a place. End of story. You wanna stand here counting receipts, or you wanna find your kid?” Yvonne bites her lip. Lets out the tiniest, prettiest little sob. “It’s okay. He was just being nice. I’ll give it all back, I swear. I’ll quit today.” Ryan pulls her in. “Stop it. You’re not going anywhere. Tessa’s the one with the problem, not you.” The room turns on me. “Are we looking for this kid or what?” “She doesn’t even care. She just wants to slut-shame some twenty-something.” “No wonder her kid ran off. I wouldn’t wanna be raised by her either.” Something inside my chest splits open. I worked three jobs to put Ryan through his startup. Waitressing, retail, cleaning offices at night. I handed him every dollar I made. He threw me five hundred a month and called it generous. Said the company was bleeding. Said I shouldn’t make it worse. Lily and I lived in a one-bedroom with mold on the ceiling. Day-old bread. Canned soup. Meanwhile he was buying her a condo. Buying her designer bags. Taking her to the kind of restaurants I’d never even heard of. With our money. With my money. I shove it all back down. “My daughter is in this building. Ninety minutes.” Nobody argues this time. “Okay! Okay, we’re going!” The room clears out. I reach into my bag and slide a folder across the table. “Sign it. We’re done.” Ryan’s jaw locks. “Tessa, no. I’m not signing anything. Yvonne and me, there’s nothing there. She’s like a sister to me, I swear to God.” His phone buzzes. He looks down. The blood drains right out of his face. “You’re blackmailing me?” I shrug. “Sign it. Or in three minutes, every single person in this building reads that text.” “Are you out of your mind? You really want Lily growing up without a father?” I look up at him. My eyes sting. A father who’s never been to a single birthday party. A father who couldn’t tell you the name of her preschool. What exactly is she losing? Ryan grabs the pen. Signs so hard he nearly tears the paper. “This isn’t over. We can still tear it up. Eight years, Tessa. Eight years of marriage. You’re really gonna throw that away?” I almost laugh. Eight years ago, I cut off my own family for him. Moved across the country. Believed every word out of his mouth. If my parents hadn’t reached back out to me last year, I wouldn’t even be standing here. I wouldn’t have anything to fight him with. The search team trickles back in. Empty hands. Empty faces. Kyle is red and panting. “She’s not in the building, Tessa! We checked everywhere, twice!” I don’t argue. I just turn on the projector. Every camera. Every angle. The hour before Lily disappeared, on a loop. She never walked out that door. Not once. I tap the timer. “Sixty minutes.”

“From now on, every ten minutes, I drop a new secret.” “Don’t find my kid, and you’re either going to prison or your life is over. Pick one.” The room explodes at me. “What the hell is wrong with you?! We didn’t lose your kid!” “You’re the mom! Why didn’t you watch her?!” “Honestly? You deserve this. Garbage mom, garbage kid. She’s probably hiding somewhere laughing at us right now.” I don’t react. I just turn my head, slow, and look right at Yvonne. “What about you?” She freezes for a second. Then her eyes well up right on schedule. “It’s all my fault. I won’t sleep, I won’t eat, I’ll tear this place apart with my bare hands until we find Lily, I swear.” Ryan strokes her hair like she’s the heartbroken one. “That’s my Yvonne. Some people don’t even love their own kid. Won’t even give her a real family.” Yvonne’s eyes flash. Just for a second. Then back to wounded puppy. “Yvonne.” I cut clean through their little moment. “If you knew Ryan had a video call this morning, why did you tell my mother-in-law to bring Lily to the office?” The room goes dead silent. The same people who were just calling me a monster mom, suddenly nobody’s got anything to say. Ryan stares at her too. His face is doing something weird. I’ve raised Lily on my own from day one. He came in this morning and found a four-year-old in his lobby, and he’s been blaming me for it in his head ever since. Yvonne feels every eye in the room land on her. Her lip wobbles right on cue. “You, you said last week, when you’d been drinking, you said you missed her. I thought you wanted to see her, so I…” Ryan’s face goes blank. But he nods anyway. Of course he does. Then he glares at me. “See? Yvonne thinks about me. Not like you. You couldn’t even bother to come along when my mom brought her over. This is on you, Tessa. All of it.” I drop my eyes. So I was right. His mother hasn’t held our daughter in two years. She wouldn’t have shown up today on her own. Somebody told her to. The ten-minute timer hits zero. I let my eyes drift around the room. Land on Ryan. And smile. He goes pale. “Tessa, I signed it. You can’t use that one against me, we had a deal.” I shake my head. “Oh, honey. You have so many secrets. I’m spoiled for choice.” Every phone in the room pings. It’s a photo. A little boy on Ryan’s shoulders. Both of them grinning like the sun came up just for them. I took that picture myself. Last summer. I was at the park with Lily, picking up empty bottles to cash in for grocery money. He was twenty feet away. Yvonne next to him. That little boy laughing on his shoulders. Looked like a perfect Sunday afternoon family. Lily saw it before I did. Her eyes lit up. And then she looked closer. “Mommy. Is that Daddy?” “Mommy. I want Daddy to pick me up like that. Just one time.” I just held her tighter and swallowed the whole ocean down. Ryan stares at the photo. His face goes stiff, then ugly. “What does any of this have to do with finding her?! I’m done! I’m DONE!” I tip my head back. Push the tears down. My voice comes out flat. “Tell me where my daughter is. Or this little boy disappears. For good.” Yvonne screams. Like an animal. “YOU’RE INSANE!” She catches herself. Coughs. Brings the tears right back up. “Tessa, please, I lost her, take it out on me, kill me if you want, just don’t hurt a baby.” She drops to her knees. Crawls toward me. Wraps her arms around my legs. I don’t even get a chance to kick her off. She goes flying. Shrieks as she hits the floor. Ryan’s face turns black. The next second, his hand cracks across mine.

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Damon Pierce saved my life when I was eighteen. Then he kissed me bloody and told me he’d marry me.Then he asked me to do a hundred favors first — “just to be sure.”Seven years. Thirty-eight bullets. Ninety-eight favors.But tomorrow he’s marrying her. I was eighteen the night Damon dragged me out of a back-alley fight ring with my baby sister bleeding behind me. He looked me over. Saw me drop a guy twice my size. Grinned. “You can fight, kid. Come work for me.” After that, I was his. I climbed The Cage from prelims to main event. Seven years undefeated. The boys called me The Wraith because nobody saw the punches coming. I made him millions. I bled for every dollar. The night they crowned me his number one, his champion, his right hand, he walked into the gym with another woman on his arm. “Jesus, Selene. The hell do you look like.” His eyes flicked over the blood drying on my jaw. “Go wash up. You’re scaring her.” That was the night I lost everything. The boys started calling her Mrs. Pierce. I never got that name. Seven years and I never got that name. He cut my hand wraps off himself. Threw them in the trash. Tied an apron around my waist. The Wraith was dead. I was the help. She didn’t want to eat? I knelt by her chair and fed her. She got a paper cut? He cracked one of my ribs for “not watching her.” I took it. All of it. Because seven years ago, in the back of his car with my hands still shaking, he said: “Wanna pay me back, sweetheart? Do a hundred things for me. Just a hundred. Then you walk.” I look down at the leather notebook in my lap. Three left. Three more, and I’m done with this man. I’m carrying her dinner tray down the hall when his voice stops me. “Selene. Get your sister’s necklace. Chloe wants it.” My stomach drops. Mom’s silver cross. The one she was wearing the night she died. Nina sleeps with it under her pillow. My eyes go red before I can stop them. His face flattens. “Selene Quinn.” He uses my full name when somebody’s about to bleed. Usually me. Three days ago I wouldn’t hand Chloe my water bottle at the gym. He threw me in the sparring ring and let two middleweights take turns on me until I couldn’t stand up. So I turn around. I walk into Nina’s room. I unclasp the cross from her neck while she sleeps and put it around Chloe’s. “Looks good on you.” His mouth curls. He pulls Chloe against his chest. “See, baby? Best-trained dog on my whole roster.” “Selene. You keep her happy, maybe I’ll think about that ring I owe you.” Chloe rips the cross off and slams it on the marble. The chain snaps. “Damon! You promised it was just gonna be me!” The tears come on cue. He breaks. “Baby. Baby, come here.” He shoves past me, scoops her up, and carries her down the hall. I drop to my knees. The broken chain slices my palm open while I’m grabbing at the pieces. Blood everywhere. The boys in the hallway watch me bleed and laugh. Honestly? It’s funny. Last month I went five rounds in a death match for him. Came back with a fractured eye socket and internal bleeding. He walked into the recovery room, looked me over, and said: “Christ, Wraith. You’re slipping.” He shrugged. “Whatever. Chloe’s been needing somebody to do her hair.” I close my fist around the silver. My eyes go redder than my hand. That night Nina sees the broken cross. She sobs until she throws up. I rock her in my lap and lie to her again. “Hold on, baby. We’re almost out. I swear.” The door slams open. Damon. His face is dark. “What the hell is all the screaming? Chloe’s trying to sleep!” “Pack a bag. Both of you. East House. Now.” His boys are already grabbing Nina off the bed. She turns and screams at him. “Damon, you used to be nice to me!” He freezes. Everyone freezes. I clamp my hand over Nina’s mouth. My tears soak into her hair. I learned a long time ago what talking costs in this house. I asked him to come home more. That night he stripped my title in front of the whole roster. Seven years gone in one sentence. I told Chloe to stay out of the training cage. Before I finished the sentence his pistol was between my eyes. He came home with a busted lip last week. I brought him ice. He threw the bag in my face. “Don’t pretend, Selene. Chloe’s gonna think something’s going on.” He’s the one who said I love you first. He’s the one who said he was going to marry me. I let go of Nina. She’s still crying, quieter now. The East House sits on the edge of rival territory. Half the people who sleep there don’t wake up. I make a call. I kick the SUV door open and run for the main house. The second I knock, the noise inside cuts off. A glass shatters against my forehead. I bite the inside of my cheek and bow my head. “Miss Vance. I came to apologize for my sister. She won’t bother you again. I swear.” Damon’s chest is heaving. His eyes catch on the blood running down my face. “Cut it out, Selene. You look like she’s the one beating you up.” I don’t look at him. I drop to my knees. Press my forehead to the floor. Once. Twice. Three times. She finally lifts a soft little hand. “Damon, I’m tired. Just say yes already.” He kisses the top of her head. “Baby, you’re too sweet. People are gonna chew you up.” Then his eyes slide to me. “Since you love your sister so much, walk her there yourself. No driver.” That night the temperature drops to fifteen. Nina spikes a fever of 104. I carry her on my back through a blizzard for six hours. In the ER waiting room, with snow melting off my coat, I open the notebook. I write two words. The cross. Two left.

The East House is hours from the compound. Before the sun even comes up, I have to be back to make Chloe breakfast. I barely make it through the front gate before Damon’s boys grab me. Tie my wrists. Throw me in the back of an SUV. When the bag comes off my head, they dump me on the gym floor. Damon stands over me, arms crossed. He nods at the training cage in the middle of the room. “Get in. Chloe wants to practice.” My head snaps up. “She’s never thrown a punch in her life, Damon. She’ll kill me.” Chloe’s face falls in half a second. She presses both hands to her chest. “Damon, baby, what if she’s right? I’m so clumsy. What if I really hurt her?” “Don’t be silly, baby.” He pulls her against him and slides a pair of pink training gloves onto her tiny hands himself. “You’re a natural. You’re gonna be the best.” His eyes flick to me. The patience is gone. “Get in the cage, Selene. Don’t make me say it twice.” I look at the gloves. Every old break in my body starts throbbing at once. He sees me shaking. He grabs my jaw and squeezes until my teeth grind. “You don’t wanna get in? Fine. I’ll bring Nina down here instead. She owes me a life too, doesn’t she?” Damon doesn’t bluff. One more word out of me, and my ten-year-old sister gets dragged out of her hospital bed and tied to that post. I close my eyes. I force a smile. “She’s a kid. I’ll do it.” “I’m bigger anyway. More fun for her.” He lets go, satisfied. Turns around and starts adjusting Chloe’s stance from behind, his hands wrapped around hers. The boys haul me into the cage. Tie my wrists to the chain-link above my head. My toes barely touch the mat. “Damon, what if I miss? What if I hit her somewhere bad?” He laughs and kisses her temple. “Baby, she’s been eating punches for me for seven years. She’s a punching bag. Hit her wherever you want.” The first hook lands on my ribs. I hear something crack before I feel it. My knees give. The chain catches me by the wrists. Out of the corner of my eye, Chloe is bouncing on her heels, giggling. The man who used to put my hands in ice the second I bled, he just says one word. “Again.” She winds up. Throws another. Right hook. Left shoulder. I feel the joint pop. My head drops. Hot blood fills my mouth. The boys around the cage shift on their feet. Nobody knows what to do. Damon doesn’t even look at them. He just nods at her. “Good, baby. Now the body.” Two more. Left side. Right side. I’m coughing red onto the mat. My white shirt isn’t white anymore. Chloe winds up for one more. Damon catches her wrist mid-swing. “Okay, that’s enough. Get her stitched up.” Chloe stamps her foot. Pouts. “Damon! I was just getting good!” He folds in half a second. He turns to one of his boys. “Bring Nina down.” “No.” The word rips out of me before I can stop it. “No, Damon, please, she’s ten, she’s still sick, she can’t—” He doesn’t even look at me. He boops Chloe on the nose like I’m not screaming six feet away. The last thing I see before everything goes black is two of his boys dragging Nina across the gym floor. Bare feet. Hospital gown. She’s twisting against them. Choking on her own crying. “Selene! Selene, help me!”

I open my eyes in a hospital bed. “Nina. Nina.” I lurch upright and knock a bowl of soup out of Damon’s hands. His face goes dark. But he doesn’t snap. He grabs a tissue and starts wiping the broth off my chest. I grab his wrist hard enough to feel the bones. “Where is she. Tell me.” He looks down. He doesn’t answer. The stitches in my side rip open. I can’t breathe through the pain, but I drag myself off the bed anyway and start for the door. He catches me. Pulls me against his chest. His voice is low, fighting something. “She’s in surgery, Selene. Quit making it worse. The second she wakes up, I’ll bring you to her. Just rest. Please.” For the next two weeks, Damon gives me the best medical team money can buy. Sometimes he sits with me himself. He shows me pictures of Nina on his phone. Tubes everywhere. Tiny chest. Then he tries to spoon-feed me soup. I keep my mouth shut. He doesn’t get mad. He takes a sip himself, leans in, and pushes it past my lips with his own. I wipe my mouth and shove the bowl back at him. He blinks. Doesn’t say a word. He’s been weirdly patient with me lately. Until the day Chloe comes to visit. He bursts through the door and finds her on the floor. Cheeks flushed pink. Palms sliced up on broken glass. His whole body shakes. The look he turns on me has nothing soft left in it. “Selene. Have you lost your mind?” He scoops Chloe up against his chest. His eyes are bloodshot. “Apologize. Now.” The old me would already be on her knees. But Nina is somewhere in this building fighting for her life because of this woman. I can’t bow to her. I won’t. I don’t move. His face turns to stone. “Have I been going easy on you? You think you get to tell me no now?” I ignore him. I turn around and start walking back to the bed. His voice cuts the air behind me. “One more step and I pull Nina’s plug myself.” My foot freezes in midair. My nails dig through the hospital gown into my skin. These last two weeks, I almost let myself believe he felt guilty about Nina. I was an idiot. The Damon who used to carry Nina around on his shoulders, who taught her how to throw her first jab, that man died the day Chloe Vance walked through the door. I turn around. I bow at the waist in front of her. “On your knees.” My legs give out. I drop. I press my forehead to the cold tile. When I look up, Damon has Chloe’s face in his hands and he’s kissing her like I’m not even in the room. I keep saying it. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. By the time my voice cracks, they finally come up for air. He scoffs at me. Scoops Chloe up. Rushes her toward the ER. The second his back disappears down the hallway, the tears come. Hard. Hot. Out of nowhere. I press a hand against my chest. I dig the notebook out of the drawer. I write two words. The cage. A man’s voice behind me. “What are you writing?”

I shove the notebook under the blanket. Too late. He saw it. Dazon scoffs. “Still scribbling that whiny little diary of yours?” He brushes past me, scoops Chloe’s broken bracelet off the floor, and heads for the door. “Oh. Tomorrow. Take Chloe wedding dress shopping. You’ve got experience with that kind of thing. Help her pick something good.” The way he says it, casual, like he’s asking me to grab milk. I almost laugh. Three months ago I told him I wanted to try on dresses. He gave me twelve reasons why we couldn’t. I don’t say anything. I just nod. The boutique is all champagne and giggling girls. Except me. The salesgirls are huddled by the register, whispering. “God, what’s her problem? Looks like somebody died.” “Oh, you didn’t hear? That’s the side piece. Real fiancée’s the blonde.” “Shut up. No way.” “Swear to God.” “Ew. Look at her. He picked that?” I keep my head down and slide hangers along the rack. Same dresses I looked at three months ago. Back when I was the one trying them on. Back when he found a new excuse every weekend not to come with me. Funny how nothing in this store has changed. And everything else has. Chloe tries on dress after dress. Damon doesn’t take his eyes off her. Runs through every adjective in the dictionary praising her. She still pouts. Throws the latest gown on the floor. Looks at me. “Selene, you do it for me. I’m tired.” Before Damon can stop her, I grab a dress and walk into the dressing room. He freezes. I zip up the gown. I pull back the curtain. The look on his face flips from anticipation to disgust in half a second. The dress is strapless. My skin is a roadmap. Bruises layered on top of bruises. Three deep stitched-up gashes on my left shoulder, still seeping pink through the satin. A jagged scar curling from my ribs down to my hip where I caught a knee in a death match last spring. The whole boutique sucks in a breath. Chloe stumbles back. Slaps both hands over her mouth. “Damon, oh my God! What is that? That’s so gross, get it away from me!” His face goes black. “What are you standing there for? Put it back on.” “You’re embarrassing yourself. You’re embarrassing me.” Strangers stare. Salesgirls stare. I peel the dress off in front of all of them. The fabric drags across an open stitch. I bite the inside of my cheek. Every punch I ever ate for this man, every break, every busted joint, it’s all coming back at once. Seven years late. In the end Chloe still can’t pick. Damon waves a hand and buys all of them. I grab a small pink dress off the children’s rack. Something soft. Something a little girl would love. A get-well present. For when Nina wakes up. She must be so scared. A laugh behind me. Mean and high. Chloe rips the dress out of my hands. “Aww. You buying this to bury her in?”

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There were two women in Manhattan who were famous for spending money. One was my mother, Elena Marchetti. The other was my godmother, Sofia Castellano. Whenever they were in a good mood, they might casually give a younger relative a limited-edition sports car—or simply buy an island and disappear there for a change of scenery. No one dared say a single unkind word about either of them. That was because my father, Lorenzo Marchetti, was the head of Manhattan’s Marchetti family and controlled the money flowing through Manhattan’s underworld. My godfather, Dante Castellano, not only controlled several casinos in Las Vegas, but also controlled some of the most lucrative concert, film, and streaming ventures in North America . Outside the home, both men inspired terror. In private, they indulged their wives without limit. “We make the money. They get to be happy.” Then one day, I dragged them both to a concert by Brianna, the hottest pop star in the country. During a backstage meet-and-greet, Brianna immediately noticed the pigeon-blood ruby ring on my mother’s hand. My mother refused politely. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. My husband commissioned this ring when he proposed. It cost thirty million dollars, and there is only one in the world. It isn’t for sale.” Brianna’s expression darkened instantly. “It’s just a red rock.” She snatched up a crystal glass from the table and smashed it against my mother’s forehead. “Who knows whether it’s even real? I’m offering to pay because I’m doing you a favor.” Blood immediately ran down my mother’s brow. I froze in shock. Someone in Manhattan had actually dared to make Don Marchetti’s wife bleed. These idiots had no idea what they had just done. Brianna’s private bodyguards surrounded us. They seized my mother’s wrist and tried to force the ring off her finger. I immediately pressed the emergency pendant hidden beneath the collar of my shirt. It would take only one second for the distress signal to reach my father’s private phone.

“Something’s wrong! Someone is hurting Mom and Aunt Sofia. Hurry—” Before I could finish, Brianna ripped the pendant away from me. “I was so busy dealing with these two ungrateful bitches that I forgot about the little brat. You actually tried to call for help?” She slammed the platinum pendant bearing the Marchetti crest onto the concrete floor. One sharp-eyed staff member stared at it and lowered his voice. “That… that’s the Marchetti family crest. There’s only one like it in all of Manhattan…” Others began whispering. “She pressed it twice. That’s the Marchetti family’s internal emergency code…” “Enough!” Brianna looked my mother and godmother up and down with open contempt. “Look at them. Do they look like women who could have anything to do with the Marchettis? Everyone knows how protective Marchetti is of his wife and daughter. They travel with dozens of bodyguards. Women like you couldn’t get past the Marchettis’ front gate, let alone belong to the family.” A faint silver light flashed across my watch. She destroyed the pendant, but she didn’t know my watch carried a second tracker and recorder. Someone once spoke badly about my mother behind her back. The next day, my father’s men cut out his tongue. Thinking about that made Brianna’s expression almost laughable. Blood was still flowing from the wound on my mother’s forehead. Even so, she bent down and stroked my hair. “Don’t be afraid, baby. Mommy’s here. I won’t let anyone hurt you.” Only then did I get a clear look at the wound. It was raw and bloody. It looked terribly painful. My father had warned me more than once that I was never to let my mother get hurt. “Don’t be afraid, Mom.” I stepped in front of her. “Dad will be here soon!” The contempt in Brianna’s eyes nearly overflowed. “Your father? What is he, a driver? A security guard? Your whole family probably crawled out of some slum, and you still dare brag in front of me?” She turned and shouted at the guards. “What are you standing around for? Take the ring!” The guards rushed forward. My godmother hurried in front of my mother. Before she could speak, one of the guards slapped her across the face and sent her crashing to the floor. When I saw another man grabbing my mother’s hand, I threw myself at him and bit him. “Ah!” The guard cried out in pain and kicked me away. I hit the floor so hard that stars burst across my vision. My mother rushed to me. “Baby, are you all right?” Then she turned on the guards. “Touch any of us again, and I promise you won’t live to see tomorrow.” My mother usually spent her days shopping and enjoying herself. But in that moment, the full authority of Don Marchetti’s wife filled the room. The guards were genuinely intimidated. They stopped. Even Brianna hesitated for a second. “You won’t let us see tomorrow? You really know how to tell a story.” “Do you even know who my husband is? Ray Stone, vice president of Titan Realm Studios. In Manhattan’s entertainment industry, when he speaks, everyone listens.” “He’s a senior associate of the Marchetti family. Once he gets here, we’ll see whether any of this nonsense you’re saying is true.” The name sounded strangely familiar. I blurted out, “Mom, isn’t Ray Stone the man Dad said was worth less than a dog?” Brianna’s smile froze. Her face turned scarlet. “You dare insult my husband? None of you are leaving here alive today!” The backstage door slammed shut. Several staff members took up positions in front of it, blocking every exit.

Brianna pointed to a brown glass bottle in the corner. “Wash out the mouths of that bitch and her daughter. Let’s see if they still dare talk nonsense afterward.” My face went white. It was industrial-grade concentrated sulfuric acid. My mother cared deeply about her beauty. Even a single pimple upset her. Whenever that happened, my father would fly specialists in from Switzerland, order the most expensive skincare products in the world, and arrange the finest cosmetic treatments money could buy. If her face was destroyed, my father’s rage could burn all of Manhattan to the ground. The guards hesitated. “Ms. Veyra, should we wait for Mr. Stone to confirm who these three are before we do anything?” They were clearly afraid of the Marchetti family. But Brianna had already been blinded by rage. “Idiot. Only someone as stupid as you would believe them.” I planted myself in front of my mother, but a guard grabbed me by the back of my collar and lifted me off the floor. “Let go of me!” I struggled desperately, the fabric cutting into my throat until I could barely breathe. My mother was forced to the floor in a humiliating position, yet she still tried to comfort me. “Don’t look, baby! Close your eyes and wait for Daddy!” Brianna slapped her hard across the face. “You’re still pretending when you’re about to die? Do you really think anyone is coming to save you?” “Once I’m done washing out your filthy mouth, that little bitch is next.” Anger burned through me. When Dad arrived, I was going to ask him to have every one of them thrown into the Hudson River for the fish. “What are you waiting for? Pour it!” The moment the cap came off the bottle, the sharp, corrosive smell spread through the room. Brianna leaned against the wall with her arms folded, laughing. “What a touching mother-daughter scene. I should put something like this in my next movie.” The guard lifted the bottle and was about to throw the acid into my mother’s face. My godmother suddenly pushed herself up from the floor and rammed into him with all her strength. He lost his balance. The acid splashed out, and some of it landed on Brianna’s face. “Ah!” She screamed in agony and cursed at my godmother. “You bitch! Do you have any idea how much I spend on this face every year?” My godmother showed no fear. “I’m going to say this one last time.” “My husband is Dante Castellano. Her husband is Lorenzo Marchetti.” “In Manhattan, if you lay one finger on us, your entire family will die with you.” The nearby staff members went pale and instinctively stepped back. My godmother thought Brianna was finally frightened and turned to help my mother. The next second, she screamed and fell to the floor, writhing in agony. Brianna tossed the acid bottle aside and smiled darkly. “Castellano? Marchetti? Look in a mirror. Do you think you’re worthy of saying those names?” “Everyone knows the wives of those two Dons travel with dozens of bodyguards.” “And yet here you are, two women and one little brat, sneaking into a concert without a single escort. You expect me to believe you’re important?” Regret crushed me. Normally, my mother and godmother traveled in convoys of black armored vehicles with teams of suited guards. No stranger could get anywhere near them. I was the one who insisted on seeing Brianna’s concert. I had begged them to sneak out without their bodyguards and had even made sure we avoided their assistants. That was how these people had gotten their chance. It was all my fault. I had done this to my mother and godmother. I screamed with all my strength. “If you touch my mother again, my father will never let you go!” Brianna sneered. “Big bitch, little bitch. Both of you live in a fantasy.” She nodded at the guards. “Cut out the little bitch’s tongue. Let’s see whether she keeps talking.” Two guards approached with scissors. My whole body shook with fear, but I refused to move. I stood firmly in front of my mother. My mother rushed in front of me. “Brianna! Take it out on me. Leave my daughter alone!” Brianna smiled viciously. “Leave her alone?” “Fine.” “My shoes are dirty. Lick them clean, and I’ll spare her.”

The surrounding staff burst into laughter. “Ms. Veyra, be careful. Don’t let her dirty your shoes.” Ever since my mother met my father at eighteen, he had treated her like a princess. She had never suffered the slightest humiliation. My father always said my mother was the most important person in our family, and that he and I had to protect her with everything we had. But now, for my sake, she was being forced to endure this. I watched my mother slowly lower her head toward the toe of Brianna’s shoe. The next second, she drove a knife straight into Brianna’s foot. Brianna screamed in pain and kicked my mother to the floor. “You miserable bitch!” “Break her hand. Let’s see whether she ever tries something like that again.” The guard brought an iron bar down hard on my mother’s hand. Her face twisted in agony. Even as her whole body convulsed from the pain, she lifted her head and forced a smile for me. “Baby… close your eyes… don’t look…” I sobbed until I could barely breathe and twisted desperately, trying to get to her. Brianna threw back her head and laughed. “How touching. Too bad no one is coming to save you today.” At that moment, the sound of synchronized footsteps came from outside. Hope exploded in my chest. “My dad is here! You hurt his wife—you’re all dead You hurt my mother. You’re all dead!” Everyone in the room panicked. The staff exchanged frightened looks, and the guards loosened their grip on me. Brianna’s smile stiffened. The backstage door burst open. A greasy, overweight man walked in. It wasn’t my father. Brianna immediately ran to him, clung to his arm, and burst into tears. “Thank God you’re here, honey! These people are pretending to be Mrs. Marchetti and Mrs. Castellano. They insulted me and even tried to hurt me.” Then she turned toward us, her eyes filled with triumph. “See? My husband is the vice president of Titan Realm Studios. None of you are leaving here alive.” I stared at Ray Stone’s limp and suddenly remembered him. He worked for my father. He had once ruined a money-laundering route connected to one of the casinos. My father had personally broken that leg. Later, Ray had knelt outside our estate for three days and three nights. My mother had taken pity on him and begged my father to spare his life. I shouted, “I’m Isabella Marchetti! That woman is my mother, Elena Marchetti!” Ray Stone froze. His gaze snapped toward my mother, and terror flashed in his eyes. Her face was covered in blood and badly swollen. She was almost unrecognizable. He started toward her, but Brianna grabbed him. “Don’t believe her, honey. They’re impostors.” “Mrs. Marchetti would never leave home without bodyguards.” Ray stared at Elena’s ruined face, unable to recognize her. Then he noticed the lack of security and convinced himself Brianna had to be right. “Everyone in Manhattan knows Don Marchetti and Don Castellano treat their wives like queens.” “If Mrs. Marchetti hadn’t spoken for me back then, I would already be dead.” He roared at the guards. “Break both bitches’ arms and legs. Let everyone see what happens when someone pretends to be Mrs. Marchetti or Mrs. Castellano.” The location marker on my watch showed my father getting closer. I looked at their ugly faces, my chest heaving. Just wait. Not one of you is getting away.

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On our wedding night,Damian Moretti climbed off me. He tossed the used condom into the trash and gave a cold laugh. “Before the wedding,you suddenly asked me to raise the premarital trust to five hundred thousand dollars.I told you the docks were shut down,the family accounts were frozen,and I couldn’t get the cash.” “I was lying.” He opened his phone and pointed to the blue diamond necklace around my friend Lillian’s neck in the photo. “She spent one night in my bed.The next day,I had someone take this photo.Five million dollars.” Pain cramped through my lower belly.I propped myself up with difficulty and stared at him in disbelief. Damian’s voice only grew colder. “Don’t think I don’t know you only wanted to use this to climb into the Moretti family.Spending one more cent on you makes me feel filthy.” After he left,I looked at the death notification from St.Mary’s Hospital on my phone. I cried until I could barely breathe. The white wedding dress beneath me slowly turned red with blood. Damian did not know that the five hundred thousand dollars for the premarital trust was actually the money that could have saved my mother’s life. On the night of my wedding,I lost the four most important people in my life at once. My only family left in the world.My new husband.The friend I had known for more than ten years. And the child in my belly. … By the time I reached the hospital,my mother had already been moved to the chapel of rest,her face as pale as the white sheet covering her body. I held her hand as it slowly went cold,kneeling on the floor while tears kept falling. The wedding dress I was wearing was the one Mom had personally helped me choose two days ago. Her greatest wish was to see me get married with her own eyes,to see me be happy. But she still left me on my wedding night,and I did not even make it in time to see her one last time. All she left me was a phone call from the hospital and a death certificate. A transfer notification suddenly popped up on my phone. The next second,Damian called. “The five hundred thousand dollars has been transferred.” “But Elena,that’s all you’re worth.” His tone was full of mockery. But in the past,he could not even bear to speak one harsh word to me. A month before the wedding,Mom had suddenly been diagnosed with a serious illness. I sold my apartment,but I was still five hundred thousand dollars short for her treatment. That was the first time I ever asked Damian to lend me money. Even now,I still remember how quickly his expression turned cold. “Something happened with the dock business.I don’t have cash either.” “Elena Weiss,if you’re with me for the Moretti family’s money,then get out now.” So I worked three jobs a day,raising money for my mother’s surgery while helping him fill those so-called cash gaps after his accounts were frozen. I was even afraid of adding to his pressure,so I hid how serious Mom’s condition was. But today,he told me it had all been a lie. The docks had not been shut down.He had not truly been forced into a cash-flow crisis. And he had already taken my best friend to his bed. Now,Mom was gone. And I did not want his late five hundred thousand dollars anymore. “No need.I’ll send the money back.” As soon as the transfer went through,I heard Lillian’s coquettish laugh from the other end of the line. “I won!I told you she would definitely return the money.” “A bet’s a bet.That yacht is mine tonight.And you,Don,are mine too.” Soon,the sound of an intimate kiss came through the phone. Then the call was quickly cut off. A violent pain tore through my lower belly again,and cold sweat soon soaked through my clothes. I could not hold myself up and collapsed to the floor. Blood gradually dyed the wedding dress red. Originally,tonight,I had planned to tell Damian the good news that I was pregnant. But before I could say it,he took me roughly. No kisses.No foreplay. At first,I thought it was because the pressure from the family was too much for him. Later,I realized he had only treated me as something to vent on. My vision gradually blurred. I reached weakly toward the direction where Mom lay. But in the end,before I could touch her hand,I lost consciousness completely. When I opened my eyes again,I was already lying on an operating table. With tears streaming down my face,I signed the surgical consent form. After the surgery ended,I was wheeled into a hospital room. In the end,the child could not be saved. Just like my marriage to Damian,it had only been my own expectation. In the end,nothing was left. The anesthesia seemed to have stopped working,and waves of pain surged up from deep in my lower abdomen. Tears soaked into the bedsheet one drop at a time. I thought of how good Damian had once been to me:cooking for me,taking me traveling,smiling countless times as he told me he loved me. In the end,that smiling face twisted into his cold,disgusted one. “Gold digger.” That one sentence ended the three years we had loved each other. I stared blankly out the window and suddenly felt that disappearing from this city right now might not be so bad after all. Just then,two girls’admiring voices suddenly reached my ears. “Look,the Moretti godfather bought an entire yacht just to make his Donna happy.” “That’s not the Donna.I heard the Donna is a gold digger,and he wasn’t even home on his wedding night.It was the woman on the yacht who was his true love.”

I endured the night alone in the hospital. At dawn the next day,I handled Mom’s death certificate and cremation arrangements by myself. By evening,I held Mom’s urn in my arms,called a cab,and returned to the Moretti family estate. The pathetic thing was,aside from Damian’s so-called home,I had nowhere else to go. The money in my pocket was not even enough for one night at a motel. The cab driver was talkative and kept chatting the whole way. “I drove a big shot this morning.Guess who?Don Moretti.” “He and a woman were in the back seat.Their mouths didn’t separate the whole ride.” His tone was casual. But to me,every word grated. The driver glanced at the rearview mirror.Perhaps he saw how terrible I looked and changed the subject. “Miss,you look awful.Break up with your boyfriend?” “If you ask me,you have to find someone who treats you well.Look at Don Moretti and that woman.So happy.” I smiled bitterly. He did not know that the man he was talking about was the husband who had abandoned me on our wedding night. And that woman was the friend I had once trusted most. More than once,Lillian had said she envied me,that I had come from an ordinary background yet could marry Don Moretti. Every time,I explained that I loved Damian for who he was,not for his last name or his money. Back then,I did not understand the jealousy in her eyes.I even thought she was truly happy for me. After she lost her job,I even introduced her to Damian as his personal assistant. I never expected that I was sending her straight into Damian’s bed. The ridiculous part was,Lillian had once told me,”I’ll keep an eye on Damian for you.If he ever dares to betray you,I’ll deal with him for you.” And Damian had also made it clear that he did not like Lillian. He said she was too calculating,too hungry for advantage.Unlike me,who was simple and clean. Until the day I asked him to lend me money. Everything changed. At the time,I still did not understand how someone could change his heart overnight. Only now,far too late,did I realize that he had changed long ago. In that case,then so be it. A husband whose heart had changed,a friend who had betrayed me.I wanted neither of them. I returned to the estate,intending to talk to Damian about divorce. But when I pushed open the door,the first thing I saw was Lillian’s smug face. She was barefoot,stepping on the wedding photo of Damian and me. When she saw me come in,she deliberately stepped on my face in the photo. “Elena,you’re finally back.Damian said he’s taking me to Sicily for our honeymoon.” “Come help me see which dresses I should choose.” My clothes were scattered all over the floor. Among them were several gowns Mom had altered for me herself before she got sick. Holding back my anger,I said,”Those are my clothes.” She laughed,picked up the scissors on the table,and walked toward those gowns. “Damian said everything in this house will be mine from now on.” “As for you?You’re just the maid he bought for me for five hundred thousand dollars.” I hurried forward to stop her. But she shoved me hard to the floor. To protect the urn in my arms,my forehead slammed into the corner of the table. Blood quickly began to flow. Just then,footsteps sounded from the staircase. Damian stood on the steps,his voice edged with urgency. “Elena,you’re pregnant?” In his hand was the pregnancy diagnosis I had planned to give him as a wedding gift.

The blood on my forehead blurred my vision. Damian strode down,grabbed my arm,and pulled me up from the floor. “Why didn’t you tell me you were pregnant?” “What trick are you trying to play now?” I could not read the tension on his face. I had once imagined that maybe Damian would be happy after learning I was pregnant. Maybe our relationship would get better. But now,none of it mattered anymore. “Damian,let’s get divorced.” “Elena,say that again.” His gaze turned cold in an instant. “Divorce?You dare bring up divorce to me?Is this another scheme to cheat me out of money?” “Go on.How much are you trying to get with the child this time?” “Five hundred thousand?Five million?Or fifty million?” He suddenly clamped his hand around my jaw,hurting me so badly I could not get out a complete sentence. “I’m not…before…I asked you for money…because my mother was seriously ill…” “Damian…I never loved…your money…” Tears fell onto the back of his hand. He paused,then abruptly let go. Just then,Lillian suddenly spoke with a soft little laugh. “Why didn’t I ever hear you say Auntie was seriously ill?” “Elena,you wouldn’t be making up stories about your own mother just to win Damian back,would you?” I turned to look at her,unable to believe she could lie like that. Before I knew about her and Damian,I had always treated her as my closest friend. She clearly knew my mother was gravely ill,and she knew I was working three jobs a day for medical expenses. But after Damian heard Lillian’s words,the slight softness in his expression immediately turned to disgust. “I knew it.A bitch like you will never learn honesty!” The man who once said he would always believe me and protect me now decided I was lying because of a few words from another woman. Suddenly,everything felt absurd. I did not want to explain anymore. I hugged the urn tightly and turned around,wanting to go back to the bedroom and pack my things. But as soon as I turned,Lillian grabbed me. “You even prepared a prop?Your acting is so convincing.” Instinctively,I shook off her hand. But the moment I touched her,she screamed and fell backward. “Lillian!” Damian rushed over and shoved me away with the back of his hand. I lost my balance,and the urn slipped from my hands. The porcelain jar crashed onto the floor and shattered. Gray-white ashes spilled everywhere. In that moment,it was as if I saw Mom’s face again. I hurriedly reached out to gather them. The broken porcelain cut my palm,and blood mixed with the ashes. I raised my head and shouted at Damian, “Damian,give me back my mother!” Damian’s steps faltered. But the moment Lillian moaned,he picked her up without looking back. He passed in front of me with a cold face,his leather shoes stepping through Mom’s ashes. “You think I’ll still believe your mouthful of lies?” “You want a divorce?Fine.” “Pay back every dollar I’ve spent on you over the years,and I’ll sign.”

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It was my fifth year after being dumped in Pine Creek. My family finally remembered I existed. When they found me,I was sitting outside the old grocery store,playing bridge with two elderly ladies. My father,Robert Bennett,looked at me with open disgust. “Ava,you really are hopeless now.You’re actually spending your time with two old women from a small town.” “Emily is in trouble.Come back to Boston with us and take responsibility for the car accident for her.” My mother,Caroline Bennett,stood behind him.There was no warmth in the way she looked at me. “As long as you’re willing to help Emily,we’ll let you return to the Bennett family and enjoy your old life again.” My former fiance,Caleb Shaw,came over and took my hand. “Ava,how can you mix with ignorant old women like this?Hurry up and send them away,then come back with us to help Emily.” What a joke. I could send anyone away,but not them. The two elderly ladies in front of me. One was Grace Lin,who had taught me investing. The other was Mrs.Hart,the true power behind the Hart family. She controlled the largest private bank and charitable foundation on the East Coast. And she was also the mother of my current fiance. … I pulled my hand back and kept playing my cards. “Pair of aces.” My father’s face darkened at once. “We sent you here so you could reflect on yourself.” “And look at you,wasting your days playing cards with old women in this miserable place.Do you have any ambition left at all?” My mother spoke too,her voice full of contempt. “Picking up the bad habits of poor small-town people.You have completely embarrassed the Bennett family.” I felt nothing. Because five years ago,I had already heard words a hundred times uglier than these. I slowly looked up and smiled. “So playing cards is an embarrassment.” “Then should Emily get a medal for killing someone while driving drunk?” All three of them fell silent for a moment. My father was so furious that the veins at his temples stood out. Caleb quickly warned them with his eyes not to lose control,then came to my side and said gently, “Ava,don’t be so harsh.” “Emily is in poor health.She can’t survive prison.” “As long as you’re willing to come back and help Emily,I can honor our engagement again and marry you.” I had heard that line too many times. Emily didn’t mean it. Emily is weak,so you have to give way to her. Emily was just too scared. Five years ago,Emily falsely accused me of pushing her down the stairs. Caleb had been standing at the end of the hall. He saw the whole thing with his own eyes. But he did not say a single word for me. Instead,he held Emily in his arms and encouraged my parents to send me to this remote town. In five years,not one of them had come to see me. No money,no emails,not even a single greeting. They left me here to live or die on my own. Thinking of that,I gave a cold laugh. “Five years ago,weren’t you the one who called me vicious,said I wasn’t worthy of you,and broke off our engagement?” “Now that you see I still have some use to Emily,you’ve come running back to talk about marriage?” “Caleb,don’t you think you’re fake?Don’t you think you’re disgusting?” Caleb’s face flushed instantly. “I came here in good faith to discuss this with you,and this is your attitude?” “Spend long enough in the country,and I guess people really do become poor,crude,and unreasonable.” My face went cold. “Are you done?If you are,leave.I’m not going back.” My father was so angry that he stepped forward and suddenly slapped me across the face. He pointed at my nose and cursed, “How can you be so unfilial?You’ve held on to one small thing for five years?” “Your mother and I gave you your life.” “You are part of this family.You should sacrifice for this family.” My mother looked at me as if her heart were breaking. “Emily is in trouble now,and instead of helping your sister,you’re mocking her here.Ava,do you have a conscience at all?” I held my burning cheek and froze for a second. Then I laughed. “When you dumped me here and ignored me,did you ever think I was part of the family?” “Now you remember me?” “Am I your daughter,or am I Emily’s scapegoat?” My father flew into a rage from humiliation and raised his hand to hit me again. But someone caught his wrist in midair. “Enough.”

Mrs.Hart released my father’s hand. “Making your biological daughter take the blame for your adopted daughter.” “The Bennett family’s upbringing is truly eye-opening.” Mrs.Grace laid her cards face down on the table. “Isn’t it?If their brains aren’t being used,they might as well donate them to a hospital.” My father’s neck turned red with anger. “I’m disciplining my own daughter.Since when do two old hags get to interfere?” My mother looked just as disdainful. “The Bennett family has status in Boston.And two small-town old women dare lecture us?You really don’t know your place.” Caleb glared fiercely at the two elderly ladies,then looked at me with disgust. “Ava,look at the low-class people you know now.” “In manners and in perspective,Emily is miles ahead of you.” “It looks like sending you away back then was the right decision.Someone like you should be grateful for the chance to shoulder responsibility for her once.” At those words,the two elderly ladies burst out laughing. Mrs.Hart looked at Caleb,obvious mockery at the corner of her mouth. “You’re the Shaw boy,aren’t you?” Caleb immediately frowned,wary. Mrs.Hart went on. “You were engaged to Ava,yet from beginning to end,you stood on Emily’s side.Back then,you watched Ava get driven out and said nothing.Now Emily has committed a crime,and you’ve come to force Ava into prison for her.” “How cruel and stupid.” Caleb exploded at once. “What nonsense are you saying?” He stepped forward and shoved the two elderly ladies hard. Seeing that they were about to fall,I rushed over and grabbed Caleb’s wrist. “Enough!” “If you want to do something,come at me.Don’t touch them.” Caleb twisted his hand around and clamped down on my arm. “You’re coming back to Boston with me right now and taking responsibility for Emily’s car accident.” With that,he dragged me hard toward the SUV parked by the road. Just then,a familiar voice came from not far away. “Caleb.” Everyone turned around. Emily was standing there. A white cashmere coat,a pale face,tears shining in her eyes. The moment Caleb saw her,he shoved me aside and ran over. I fell straight onto the gravel,and blood seeped from my palm at once. Caleb did not even look back. “Why did you get out of the car?” “The doctor said you need to rest properly.You can’t be out in the wind.” Caleb looked heartbroken as he spoke,taking out a handkerchief to wipe Emily’s sweat. My so-called family did not notice me either. My father and mother hurried to Emily’s side. “Emily,this place is cold and filthy,and it’s full of low-class people.Get back in the car.” My mother’s eyes reddened with worry. My father also coaxed her in a low voice. “Yes.Don’t worry.We’ll make Ava take the blame for you and send her to prison.” Emily shook her head,her voice choked. “Dad,Mom,Caleb,I’m fine.Please don’t fight with Ava.” She looked at me with tears in her eyes,wronged yet strong. “Ava,I was the one who made the mistake.I’ll go to the police station myself.” “Only,if I can’t come back,I hope you’ll take good care of Mom,Dad,and Caleb for me.” After saying that,she turned as if to leave. My mother immediately stopped her. “No,Emily.You can’t go.” My father’s eyes reddened with panic too. “You’re too weak.Your sister grew up outside the family.She can endure hardship.Let her go.” Caleb protected Emily in his arms. “I will never let you go to prison.” “Today,we will take Ava to the victim’s family and make her confess and face the law.” Each of them spoke as if I were the one who had killed someone today. I thought that after so many chilling disappointments,I had long since gone numb. But watching the scene in front of me, my heart still hurt so badly I could hardly breathe.

Mrs.Grace looked at Emily and suddenly smiled. “Beautiful speech.If you truly wanted to go to the police station,you wouldn’t have come here.” “I’ve seen shameless people,but I’ve never seen anyone put on an act as well as you.” Mrs.Hart shook her head. “It is a clever trick.She gets to play the good person and get rid of the thorn in her side.” “Too bad the performance is overdone.Even an old woman like me isn’t fooled.But it can’t stop a pack of fools from being taken in together.” Emily’s face stiffened,and she immediately lowered her head,looking as though she had been wronged. My father shook with anger and turned back to roar, “Drag those two old hags over here and teach them a lesson for spouting nonsense.” Four bodyguards rushed forward at once. “Stop!” I threw myself in front of them. The next second,a heavy punch slammed into my face. Right after that,a kick landed hard in my stomach. Pain folded me over,and my knees struck the ground.Blood dripped from the corner of my mouth and soon gathered into a small red puddle. “You dare defy me?”my father roared.”Beat her until she gets into the car and goes back to take the blame for Emily.” Fists and leather shoes rained down on me. I curled up on the ground,protecting my head with everything I had. My mother not only failed to stop them,she said coldly from the side, “She’s been like this since she was little.She never listens unless she’s beaten.” A flicker of hesitation crossed Caleb’s face,but it vanished quickly. And Emily stood behind him,the corners of her mouth slightly raised,her eyes full of triumph. Mrs.Grace and Mrs.Hart tried to rush over. “Stop!” “She is your biological daughter.” But before they could take two steps,two other bodyguards pinned them to the ground. Mrs.Grace’s face was pressed into the mud. Mrs.Hart’s arms were wrenched behind her back. I heard a dull thud from over there. In panic,I struggled to get up,only to be kicked back down. I forced myself to lift my head and shouted with red eyes, “Let them go!This has nothing to do with them.” Emily walked over and crouched in front of me,her face arranged into a look of difficulty. “Ava,look.They’re being hurt because of you.” She sighed softly. “As long as you apologize to Mom,Dad,and Caleb,I’ll have them released.” I reached for my phone. I was going to call 911. Caleb snatched the phone away and smashed it on the ground. He lifted his leather shoe and stamped hard on the back of my hand. “You still want to call the police?” “Ava,if you dare bring the police here,” he pressed down on the back of my head and forced my face toward the ground, “I could have these two old women beaten to death today,and no one would dare collect their bodies.Do you believe me?”

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