Chapter 1

Vincent’s cold, cutting voice carried through the door.

“Ruin her reputation. Let’s see how she dares to cling to the Corleone household after this.”

Leo’s voice faltered for a beat. “I’ll send you the tasteful ones, nothing explicit. Ruining her name is one thing, but if we take this too far and something happens to her, there’s no coming back from it.”

“Oh?” Vincent scoffed. “You this worried about her? Don’t tell me you actually caught feelings.”

Leo denied it quickly, a faint, unmissable panic in his voice. “Are you crazy? Isabella’s coming back to the country soon. I don’t have time to waste on this.”

Isabella Rossi was Leo’s childhood sweetheart, and the only daughter of the Rossi family, one of the Corleones’ oldest allies.

My heart plummeted straight into an icy abyss.

I’d always known Vincent hated me.

He was convinced my mother’s arrival had driven his birth mother to jump off the rooftop.

I had once overheard my mother trying to explain, voice shaking, that things were not what he thought, but Vincent had never given her the chance to finish. From that day on, he turned every ounce of that rage and hatred on me.

After I’d gotten together with Leo, Vincent still spat cruel words at me, but he’d never humiliated me like he used to.

I’d thought he’d finally accepted me as his sister.

Because once, long before all the cruelty began, he had been the one person in that house I trusted most.

It had all been a lie. A far more vicious trap than any he’d set before.

Or maybe not all of it. Maybe that was what made it hurt so much — there had been a time when his kindness to me was real.

He and Leo were brothers in arms, grew up joined at the hip, bound by blood and loyalty. And I’d been naive enough to think Leo had actually loved me.

I’d overestimated myself.

I swallowed back the bitter burn in my throat and ran like my life depended on it, bursting out of the mansion.

A torrential downpour was raging outside, soaking me to the bone in seconds.

The second I got back to my room in the manor, I sent an email to Professor Evans.

“Professor, I accept your offer. I’d like to join your project in Switzerland.”

Professor Evans had been my mentor during the international medical competition I’d won, and one of the most renowned medical experts on the planet.

Once, I’d pushed myself to be exceptional, to achieve things no one my age had, from the family my mother had married into.

But they’d never cared.

The project involved classified core research, with a strict requirement that no one could leave the institute for three full years. That was why I’d turned it down before.

Now, I didn’t hesitate for a second.

I must have caught a chill from the rain. I curled up under the covers, shivering, and didn’t wake until a nightmare jolted me awake.

I’d just pushed myself up to find some fever reducer when the door was kicked open with a violent crash.

Before I could speak, my mother flew at me in a fit of rage, slamming a stack of photos hard into my face. “Elena! What the hell is this? Did you sleep with a man?”

The photos scattered across the floor, all of them side profiles of me asleep, only half my face visible.

Leo had taken these.

I stared at them, unblinking, a bone-deep despair settling over me.

Overnight, these photos had spread like wildfire through New York’s high society.

Only the day before, Leo had held my hand, his voice steady and earnest as he promised, “Elena, I’ll take responsibility for you. We’ll get married when you graduate.”

He’d plied me with wine that night, worn me down with his sweet words and soft pleas until I’d said yes.

I’d been stupid enough to think he’d meant it.

When I said nothing, my mother kept screaming, pressing me for answers. “Say something! Who took these? Are you trying to humiliate the Corleone family on purpose?!”

She’d never cared about how hurt I was, or what I’d been through. She only ever cared about herself, and her place in this house.

But when I told her the photos had been taken by Leo Moretti, she went silent at once.

She frowned, her voice sharp with blame. “How could you get involved with the Moretti boy? We can’t afford to cross… You should have said no to him in the first place. Now he’s got these photos, and there’s nothing we can do about it. This is all your fault for being so loose.”

I snapped my head up to look at her, my eyes wide with disbelief.

She wouldn’t meet my gaze. “I’ll talk to Leo, get him to take the photos down. Give it time, and everyone will forget about this.”

Of course I knew. Leo had money, power, influence. My mother and I were nothing to the Moretti family. We couldn’t touch him.

The second the door clicked shut, I could almost see Vincent’s mocking stare from the hallway.

He’d known exactly how this would play out.

The truth didn’t matter anymore.

A crushing wave of helplessness washed over me, and I crumpled to the floor in the corner, crying violently.