Chapter 1

Half an hour later, my brother, Callum Lovelace, pushed open the door to the wine cellar and walked in with a cup of coffee.

The light from the hallway illuminated my body, which was curled up beside the door.

"Caroline Lovelace, are you done putting on a show?" He lowered his gaze and kicked my stiff calf with his dress shoe. "You got tired of banging on the door, so now you're playing dead?"

My corpse swayed slightly with his movement and fell still again. I lay facedown on the ice-cold floor, completely devoid of life.

I hovered in midair and watched him quietly. I was the Lovelaces' biological daughter—the one they had brought home from the countryside—yet he protected only his adopted sister, Cecilia Lovelace.

Cecilia followed him in, fanning away the musty air in disgust before adopting a worried expression. "Caroline has been lying on the floor for almost half an hour, Callum. Is she asleep?"

"Asleep? She's giving me the silent treatment to make a point." Callum slammed his coffee mug onto the wooden barrel beside him, his expression dark with anger.

"Does she think if she plays dead, I'll feel guilty and admit I'm wrong? That rotten streak she picked up from that run-down shack in the countryside is really ingrained in her bones!"

Callum strode over, grabbed me by the back of my collar, and yanked me upward. My upper body was forcibly lifted off the ground.

Having lost all muscle control, my head fell back limply. My long hair cascaded down, covering my ashen, ghastly white face.

Callum clearly sensed that something was wrong, but he assumed I was deliberately going limp to resist him. He tightened his grip on my collar, the veins on the back of his hand bulging.

"Caroline, are you really going to fight me on this? You stole it, yet you still have the nerve to defy me? I'm going to break that stubborn streak of yours today!"

Yanking me by the collar, he strode out of the wine cellar. My legs dragged limply across the floor, the tips of my shoes scraping against the rough tiles, making a dull sound.

Cecilia shrank back toward the door, frightened. "Callum, why isn't Caroline struggling at all?"

"She's addicted to playing dead!" he gritted out before quickening his pace. "Since you like to lie on the floor so much, I'll let you lie there to your heart's content!"

When they reached the marble steps, Callum abruptly released his grip. "Get on your knees and apologize to Cecilia!"

Deprived of all support, my corpse toppled forward like a discarded rag.

With a dull thud, my forehead slammed hard against the sharp edge of the step. The impact was so loud that Cecilia yelped.

My body tumbled down two steps before finally coming to a stop on the landing.

A dark red streak of blood slowly trickled from my temple, dripping onto the pristine white carpet.

I floated above them, watching the blood gradually soak into the white carpet.

Surprisingly, I felt an overwhelming sense of relief. At long last, I didn't have to desperately prove my innocence to him anymore.

Callum stood at the top of the steps, looking down at my bloodied and battered head. His chest heaved violently, and the disgust in his eyes was almost palpable.

"Didn't you crack your skull open in the hospital last month? Are you doing it again?" He snickered. "Get up and clean the blood off the carpet yourself! If you don't, I'll lock you in the wine cellar again tonight!"