Chapter 1

IVY'S POV

‘Ms. Laurent?’

The voice in my ear was trembling. It was not mine. It was hers. A woman over the phone. Or it was a man. I couldn’t tell through the pounding in my head. I felt so sleepy. It was 2am in the morning for God's sake. 

‘Yes,’ I rasped, my voice dry and scratchy. ‘What happened? What…who are you?’ 

‘Your sister’s been in an accident.’

The world thinned. My vision blurred. I scrambled up from the bed, but my knees buckled and I pressed my palm to the wall to keep myself from hitting the floor.

‘No. No, no, no—’

‘She’s alive,’ the woman rushed to say, her words clipped and breathless, like she had been running around, ‘But her condition is critical. We need you at the hospital now. I’m so sorry, Ms. Laurent, but—’

‘Where?’ I cut her off, already shoving my feet into the sneakers I had kicked under the couch.One second I was sleeping in bed with my heart pounding violently in my chest, and the next I was shoving my legs into jeans, grabbing my wallet and keys with shaking hands. My apartment was dark and cold, but I didn’t notice. I didn’t even care. My ears were roaring, my thoughts kept coming back to the one word that kept ringing in me. Emily. Emily. Emily. 

 ‘Which hospital?’

‘Saint Augustine’s Medical Center. Emergency wing.’

I didn’t remember ending the call. I didn’t remember grabbing my coat. I ran outside, the cold air of the night hitting my skin, but it wasn’t enough to hit me from the nightmare I had just found myself in. My body was moving on its own, my feet hitting g on the wet pavement as I stood on the deserted road, waving frantically at the few cabs that passed. 

God, Emily. 

My Emily. My little sister who still called me at one in the morning to complain about her classes, who would steal most of my clothes and wink at me, telling me that stealing older sisters’ clothes was the trend these days and she would dart away with my clothes on despite my warnings and yells. It was still the same Emily who still laughed like a child when she found something really, really funny. She couldn’t be—

I pressed the thought down somewhere in my stomach. After all, stomachs were there to stomach things. 

The cab ride felt like the longest car drive of my life, ever. My fingers kept twisting into my coat sleeve until the fabric frayed. The driver didn’t speak. Thank God. If he’d said a single thing I would have cried. Or totally ignored him and seemed rude. 

Soon, the white brick hospital came into view. I didn’t even wait for the car to stop. I threw the money at the driver and ran, my shoes squeaking on the polished floor as I burst into the emergency ward.

‘Emily Laurent!’ My voice was too loud, bouncing off sterile white walls and steel fixtures. ‘Where is she?’

A nurse looked up from behind the desk. Her eyes softened in that way people’s do when they’re about to tell you your whole life has just been split open. ‘Are you family?’

‘I’m her sister. Ivy. Where is she?’

‘Right this way.’

Her steps were brisk and calm. Mine were ragged, every one of them shoving more fear into me. I was a mess. My walking steps were a mess. I couldn’t find it in myself to calm down. We passed many rooms with curtains and I couldn’t stop hearing the beeping of monitors. The sharp scent of antiseptic burned at the back of my throat. 

When we reached the room, my heart dropped into my stomach.

Emily lay on the bed like a broken doll, tubes snaking into her arms, bruises blooming ugly purples and blacks along her cheek and collarbone. Her hair was thick and golden like mine. But right now, it was matted to her forehead with blood. 

‘She was in a hit-and-run,’ the nurse said quietly. ‘They said it was an SUV with no plate numbers. The witnesses around at that time say it came out of nowhere.’

‘Is she going to…?’ My voice cracked in half.

‘She’s stable for now, but there’s swelling in the brain. We’ll need to operate soon to relieve the pressure, and her spine—’ She stopped herself. ‘The surgery is complex. And expensive.’

My throat tightened. ‘How expensive?’

The nurse hesitated, glancing away. ‘Two million, give or take. Without insurance…’

My knees felt like jelly. ‘Two million?’

She gave me the kind of look that wasn’t cruel but might as well be called rude. ‘Without it, I’m afraid we can only keep her comfortable, and not for long.’

The words hit me harder than anything else. Only keep her comfortable.

‘No.’ My voice came out sharp, feral. ‘You’re going to fix her.’

‘We want to, Ms. Laurent. But without payment—’

I didn’t wait to hear the rest. I just wanted to get out of there. I slowly went out of the room. My hands shook so hard that I could not hold onto the wall. My head was buzzing, my vision tunneling. Today was one of the worst days of my life. I stood there, trying to think of how this had happened and why to find my sister.’

And then I saw something. Or someone, rather. A tall, dark figure leaning against the far end of the corridor like he owned the damn hospital. He wore a dark suit that seemed to be tailor made, just for him. He wore black shirt with no tie. His hair, dark. His eyes… I took a deep breath. His eyes were like steel. Dark and reflecting absolutely nothing. And his eyes. They were fixed on me. 

I was disoriented. I was confused. I was sad, angry that someone had hit my sister and refused to take responsibility for it and then I was mad at myself for not being there for her. I should've been there. I didn’t know why my legs carried me. I walked towards him. He didn’t move when I stopped in front of him. He just looked at me, gaze dragging slowly from my face to the trembling fists at my sides.

‘Ms. Laurent,’ he said, and his voice was low, smooth, deliberate. The kind of voice that didn’t need to raise itself to be heard.

I swallowed hard. ‘Do I know you?’

‘Not yet.’ His mouth tipped into something that wasn’t quite a smile. ‘But I know you. And I know your sister.’

My pulse spiked. ‘What the hell does that mean?’

He pushed off the wall, closing the distance between us in slow, measured steps. The air around him shifted as if he carried gravity in his pocket.

‘It means,’ he said, ‘that I can save her.’

For a second, I couldn’t breathe.

‘How?’

‘My name is Sebastian Wolfe.’

I blinked. The name was familiar in a way. He seemed like he was the kind of man whose face was printed on financial magazines beside words like Empire and Ruthless. CEO of Wolfe International. Billionaire. Untouchable.

‘Why would you—’

‘Because I want something.’

The words were like ice water down my spine.

‘I don’t have anything you could possibly want.’

He studied me like I was a chess piece and he’d already decided my move. ‘You’d be surprised.’

‘I can’t—’

‘Two million dollars,’ he interrupted. ‘will be paid in full today. She would get a private room and also the best surgeons in the country. Emily will live.’

I stared at him, every cell in my body screaming that there was no such thing as a free miracle. ‘And in return?’

‘One year.’

My stomach twisted. ‘One year of what?’

His smile was slow, deliberate, and dangerous. ‘As my wife.’