Prodigy by Theft

Everyone called my sister Alessia a prodigy.

I was the only one who knew she was a thief.

From the day I moved back into the brownstone, she started taking from me. Quietly. Carefully.

My designs. My sketches. My drafts.

Everything I created would appear under her name before I even had time to finish it.

The family stood behind her. Always.

My father, Salvatore Lucchese, head of the family, his word law itself, said he believed Alessia.

So I became the liar. The plagiarist. The disgrace.

They threw me out of the outfit's front shop. Blacklisted me from the industry. Erased my name.

Then one of her loyal admirers ran me down in the street.

That was the end.

Or it should have been.

When I opened my eyes again, it was the day before the national jewelry competition.

This time, I didn't draw a single line.

Let's see what my darling sister delivers… when the well has run dry.

...

"Viviana, you ready for this thing? Confidence level?"

I blinked. The fluorescent lights above my workstation felt too bright, too real. My coffee cup sat exactly where I always placed it—two inches from the keyboard, ceramic edge aligned with the desk corner. The familiarity of the detail made my stomach turn.

Because I'd lived this day before.

"Viviana's got more design awards than anyone on this floor," Elena said, bumping my shoulder with hers. "She doesn't need confidence. She needs someone to hold her trophy."

I opened my mouth, but nothing useful came out. What was I supposed to say? That in a few hours, I'd submit designs I'd bled over for weeks, and the judging panel would call my name and the word "plagiarist" in the same sentence? That my own sister would stand in front of a room full of people and ask, with tears perfectly calibrated for maximum damage, why I'd stolen from her?

The organizers had displayed both submissions. Identical. Every curve of the setting, every line of filigree—matched stroke for stroke. But hers had arrived first.

And the designer who'd submitted it was my sister. Alessia Lucchese.

She'd held the microphone like she'd rehearsed the moment. Red-rimmed eyes, trembling lower lip, voice breaking at all the right places.

"Viviana... why would you do this? If you were struggling, I could have helped. We could have found inspiration together. But to copy my work? My own sister?"

I'd grabbed for a microphone. Tried to speak. But the crowd had already decided. Plagiarist wasn't a word they shouted—it was a verdict they'd delivered before I'd opened my mouth.

My parents had photographs ready. Alessia at her drafting table, supposedly working until dawn, proof of her dedication and my theft. Then my father's voice, cold and final: We regret ever bringing you back into this house. You're no daughter of ours.

Security escorted me out. My phone became a weapon in strangers' hands—every notification another stranger calling me a fraud. I'd checked my computer afterward. No malware. No remote access. My physical drafts had never left my possession.

But Alessia's designs had been identical to mine. Every single one.

And I couldn't explain it.

"Viviana?" Elena was still waiting for an answer. "Your sister's competing too, right? Any bets on which Lucchese takes first place?"

Alessia had joined the firm shortly after I did. Convenient timing, I'd thought at the time. Now the coincidence felt like a threat I should have recognized.

I forced my fingers to uncurl from the fist they'd formed against my palm. The crescents my nails had pressed into the skin would bruise by evening.

"I need to check something," I said.