Chapter 1 - The Cost of a Beauty
The sterile scent of antiseptic replaced the smell of my own blood, but the ringing in my ears persisted, a constant, high-pitched reminder of that sickening crack. I lay in the hospital bed, my head swaddled in thick gauze, the left side of my face feeling like a crater of pulverized bone and raw nerves.
Wyatt sat in the plastic chair beside me, his knuckles bruised and swollen from the fight in the rose bushes. His eyes, usually vibrant with warmth, were now haunted. He hadn't left my side for a second.
"The police are taking statements, Sadie," he whispered, his voice cracking. "The electrician who stopped—his name is Marcus. He was the first of six. Two neighbors across the street and a delivery driver also saw the whole thing from their windows."
"They don't care," I managed to rasp through swollen lips. "They think they own me, Wyatt. They think they can rewrite the rules of my life like they rewrite family history."
"They're wrong," he said, his jaw tightening. "I’m not leaving you. I don't care what they do or who they think I should marry. They’re going to prison for this."
"It's not just about the assault," I said, my mind racing through the hazy memories of my childhood—of the hidden lockboxes in my father's study and the way my mother would whisper to Melanie about 'the legacy.' "Did you see him? The man behind the curtain?"
Wyatt looked puzzled. "What man?"
"Behind the window. My father's study window. He looked… terrified. He looked like he was trapped."
Before Wyatt could answer, a soft knock came at the door. It wasn't the police or a nurse. It was an elderly man in a sharp, albeit dated, three-piece suit. He moved with a fragile, labored gait. His eyes, deep-set and watery, locked onto mine.
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"I am Arthur Sterling," he said, his voice like dry parchment. "I was your grandfather’s attorney. And I am the one who drafted the Will that Gregory Davis has been desperate to destroy for thirty years."
He pulled a thick, weathered envelope from his briefcase. "You think this was about your sister’s obsession with your fiancé, Sadie? No. This was about timing. Your father knew he had to break you before your twenty-fifth birthday—today—because that is when the trust activates. A trust he has been stealing from for decades."
