His Damnation

CHAPTER 1

ELENA

The moans hit me first.

Soft, breathy at first, then louder. A woman’s voice, high and sweet. A man’s groan following close behind.

I froze at the bottom of the staircase, my blood turning to ice. No. Impossible.

I blinked, my fingers tightening around the bottle of wine I’d been carrying up. Maybe it was the TV. Maybe one of them left N*****x on.

But the sounds kept coming, raw and rhythmic, echoing down the hall I knew too well.

“Adrian…” The moan was too clear, too close. Too damn real.

My throat closed. My fiancé’s name on someone else’s lips, wrapped in pleasure.

I climbed the stairs slowly, each step a punch to my gut. My heart raced, my skin clammy. I wanted to stop. I should’ve stopped. But my feet moved anyway. Because deep down, a sick part of me already knew.

The bedroom door was half-open. Golden lamplight spilled through the crack.

And there they were.

Adrian. My Adrian. Naked. Moving inside the last person I ever thought I’d see him with.

“Aria.” His voice was a groan, rough and desperate.

My twin sister tilted her head back, her glossy black hair spilling across my pillow, her body arched like she was born for sin. Her laugh—my laugh, only sharper, meaner—filled the room as Adrian drove into her.

I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t scream. All I could do was watch, my whole world tilting until I didn’t know which way was up anymore.

Finally, my voice tore free.

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”

They froze. Aria didn’t look guilty. Didn’t look surprised. She only turned her head toward me, her lips curling into a satisfied smile.

“Elena,” she purred, like she’d been waiting for this. “You’re home early.”

Adrian’s face went pale. “Shit.” He pulled out of her like he could erase what I’d just seen, but it was too late. The image was carved into my skull forever.

I dropped the wine bottle. It shattered against the floor, shards flying. My hands shook, but my voice—oh, my voice came out steady. Too steady.

“My fiancé,” I said. “My twin sister. Of course.”

Aria sat up, not even bothering to cover herself. Perfect skin, slim waist, long legs. She looked like a cruel mirror of me, but thinner, sharper, more “social media ready.”

“You should’ve known, Lena.” Her tone was mocking, almost pitying. “Adrian never wanted you. You were just… the weaker option. The easy one to manipulate.”

The weaker twin.

Her words sliced through me like a blade.

I turned to Adrian, desperate for denial. For something. For anything.

But his mouth only twisted into a grimace. “She’s not wrong.”

My stomach dropped. “Excuse me?”

Adrian sighed, like I was exhausting him. Like I was the problem. “I tried, okay? But you’re not my type. You’re too… much.” His gaze flicked over my body—my curves, my breasts, the shape of me I’d once been proud of—and he shrugged. “Too curvy. Aria’s more my style. Sleek. Elegant.”

My ears rang.

Too curvy.

Too much.

I’d been called voluptuous. Jessica Rabbit curves. The kind of body men turned their heads for on the street. But the man I’d promised forever looked at me like I was a joke.

“Elegant?” I spat the word. “She’s a snake in heels.”

Aria smirked, not bothering to disagree. “And you? You’re soft. Always have been. It’s pathetic, really. You thought he wanted you? Wake up, Elena. You were a placeholder. Nothing more.”

My chest cracked open.

All the late nights Adrian said he was “working.” All the times Aria mysteriously disappeared at the same time. All the excuses I swallowed down.

The truth was here, naked, sweating on my sheets.

“You both…” My voice broke, but I forced it steady. “You’re disgusting.”

Adrian rolled his eyes. “Don’t be dramatic.”

“Dramatic?” I laughed. The sound was brittle, sharp. “I just walked in on my fiancé screwing my sister, and I’m the dramatic one?”

Aria stretched like a cat, lounging in my bed as though she owned it. “At least now you know, Lena. Consider it a blessing. You never stood a chance next to me.”

My hands trembled. Rage burned hot in my veins, tangling with humiliation. My sister, my own blood, smirking at me from my bed. My fiancé, looking at me like I was a mistake he regretted making.

I wanted to claw their eyes out. To scream until the walls collapsed.

Instead, I laughed again, sharp and cutting. “Congratulations. You deserve each other. Rot in hell together.”

Adrian opened his mouth, but I didn’t wait.

I turned on my heel, stormed out, glass crunching beneath my shoes. Each step hurt, but I kept moving. If I didn’t, I’d collapse.

By the time I hit the front door, my vision blurred with tears. My chest heaved, but I swallowed it all down. I wouldn’t give them the satisfaction of seeing me break.

Outside, the night air slapped my skin, sharp and cold.

I walked fast, no destination in mind, my heels clicking against the pavement.

I kept hearing their voices.

You’re too much.

You were a placeholder.

She’s more my style.

I wanted to rip my skin off.

I stumbled into the first bar I found. Neon lights, heavy bass, the stench of alcohol and sweat. Perfect.

I slammed myself onto a stool, ignoring the stares, and ordered the strongest thing they had.

The glass hit my hand, and I downed it in one go. Fire scorched my throat, but it wasn’t enough. Nothing would ever be enough.

The bartender hesitated. “You okay, miss?”

I barked a laugh. “Do I look okay?”

He wisely shut up.

I ordered another. And another.

Every swallow was supposed to numb me. Supposed to erase Aria’s smirk and Adrian’s disdain. But it didn’t. It only sharpened the pain, made it brighter, louder.

Too curvy.

I stared at my reflection in the mirror behind the bar. Full breasts. Narrow waist. Hips that made dresses impossible to zip without a tailor. I looked like a woman. A real one. Not a rail-thin shadow like Aria.

But in Adrian’s eyes, I was wrong.

Maybe in everyone’s.

The bitterness rose, thick and suffocating. I tilted back my head and laughed again, loud enough for people to stare.

“Fuck them,” I muttered, lifting my glass in a mock toast to the shadows. “Fuck Adrian. Fuck Aria. And fuck me for ever believing either of them.”

I was drunk already, my thoughts blurring. But one thing cut clear through the haze.

I wasn’t going to crawl into a corner and cry. I wasn’t going to give them what they wanted.

If Adrian and Aria thought I was weak, if they thought I was too much… then fine.

I’d show them exactly how much I could be.