inside as if she were a piece of luggage. She landed hard on the polished hardwood floor, the impact jarring through her already

wasn't her old room. This was a cage. The windows were boarded over with thick planks of wood, plunging t

al her mother, Genevieve, with Chloe hovering behind her. The faint ligh

r once been made to feel like an outsider. She was laughing at something Genevieve had said on the way up the stairs, her head tilted toward her s

ng on the outside of that painting, pressing h

t shifted from Chloe to the daughter on the floor. The warmth

he impatient sigh of a woman who had been inconvenienced once too oft

s still resting on Chloe's arm, at the way their shoulders touched. They stood together like a fortress. A fortress w

rn, you've been difficult. Chloe has been more of a daughter to me in a single afternoon than you have been in your entire life." She reached

f pure, venomous triumph. She didn't need to say a word. The image said

ce shifting to something colder, more businesslike. "We have a liquidity crisis

ered, her voice shaking. "His wives... all f

int, dear. All Sinclair Industries needs is his capital injection fr

he looked at her mother, at the woman who had carried her and birthed her and

girl who still, despite everything, wanted her mother to choose her. "Mom, please. I'm begging you. Don'

ed. Something passed through her eyes. It might have been memory. I

softly, her voice dripping with filial concern, "don't let her manipulate you. You know how she gets.

every way that mattered, and the warmth returned to her eyes. She s

three days. You will attend. You will smile. You will sign whatever they put in front of yo

anding over her like judges pronouncing a sentence. She had spent her entire life trying to earn a place between them. She had been quiet. She had been

e?" Genevieve repeat

he couldn't. Her throat h

learner, but she gets there eventually." She tugged gently on Genevieve's arm. "Come. Let's leave her to think about

toward each other in quiet conversation. The door closed behin

to the dusty floorboards. She could still hear them through the door. The fading echo of their footsteps on the stairs. The distant lilt of Chloe's laughter. The low, warm mu

the thing she had been fighting not to do since the moment th

her. The way they had trembled, just for a moment, when she touched his bare chest. His voice, low and

believed him with every broken piece of her heart. She had lo

he had wok

ords dissolved into the silence, unanswered. "You said

of her mother's betrayal, a tiny, stubborn ember refused to die. He had saved her once. He had held her through the fire and whispered pr

ught like a lifeline.