Chapter 3

After leaving the bridal salon,

I went straight to the law firm.

I submitted the documents dissolving the engagement and reclaiming the painting authorization.

After reviewing the materials, the lawyer signed the confirmation.

"Claire, the agreement is in effect."

"Formal notice will be delivered to Adrian's company and your father's estate before ten tomorrow morning."

"Thank you."

After leaving the firm, I went to my studio.

This studio was rented with the inheritance my grandmother left me.

Inside were all the original works I'd created over the past three years.

I called a moving company.

I packed up my paints and brushes and sent them to the airport freight station.

Three days ago, a professor from an art academy in Florence had sent me a full scholarship invitation.

They were inviting me to join their old oil painting restoration team

for a five-year closed program.

My flight was at ten tomorrow morning.

Exactly when Ava and Adrian's engagement banquet was set to begin.

I was packing when the studio door was suddenly kicked open.

My brother Lucas stormed in with two bodyguards.

His face was terrifyingly dark.

"Claire, you've really grown some nerve!"

Lucas walked up to me in a few strides.

He kicked over the wooden box of brushes by my feet.

Brushes scattered across the floor.

"How dare you pull a knife and ruin Ava's dress in public at the bridal shop."

"And give Mom attitude!"

"Do you think no one in this family can control you anymore?!"

I looked at the broken brush handles on the floor.

They were a gift from my grandmother on my eighteenth birthday.

I bent down and picked them up one by one.

Seeing that I didn't speak, Lucas thought I was scared.

He snorted coldly.

He pulled a black card from his suit pocket and slapped it onto the easel beside him.

"Alright, stop putting on that poor victim act for everyone."

"Mom came home with a headache from anger."

"I'm here to teach you a lesson for her."

"The PIN is six eights. There's three million dollars on it."

"Go buy yourself some decent clothes."

"Show up at the engagement banquet tomorrow like you're supposed to."

"In front of the media, raise a glass to Ava and Adrian."

"Wish them a happy marriage."

He looked down at me crouching on the floor.

His tone dripping with condescending charity:

"Don't feel wronged."

"I've already bought you a three-story private gallery downtown."

"The renovation is almost done."

"As long as you cooperate tomorrow and finish this play properly."

"Let Ava have her grand engagement."

"I'll give you the keys the day after."

He straightened his chest as he said this.

As if he were some noble brother bearing humiliation for the family.

He had no idea.

When he kicked over the brush box,

the can of turpentine on the table, used for cleaning oil paintings, was knocked over.

The liquid dripped along the table edge.

Drop by drop, it fell onto the still-wet oil painting by his feet.

It was the Family Portrait he'd pestered me into painting last month,

making me stay up for half a month.

At the time, he said he wanted to hang it in his private study at the estate.

The painting had my parents, him, and Ava.

And in the most inconspicuous corner of the canvas,

I had painted myself as a white dove perched on the windowsill.

Now the turpentine was eating through that white dove, along with all the colors of the painting,

in one devastating mess.

"Did you hear me?"

Lucas urged impatiently.

"Put the card away."

"Eight tomorrow morning, I'll send a car for you."

I stood up and put the broken brushes I'd picked up into my bag.

I didn't even glance at the black card.

"No need for the car."

"Keep the gallery for yourself."

"I won't be painting in this city anymore."

Lucas sneered.

"Not painting here? Don't tell me you're going abroad?"

"Claire, without the Lin family's money and Adrian's support,"

"you can't even afford paint."

"Stop talking big!"

Before he finished, his phone rang.

It was Adrian.

Lucas answered and put it on speaker.

"Adrian, I've already taught her a lesson."

"She took my card too. She'll definitely show up tomorrow—"

"What? The dress is ruined and Ava's throwing another fit?"

Adrian's tired, irritable voice came through the phone.

"Yeah, Ava keeps saying the dress Claire cut is bad luck."

"Now she's crying and refusing to eat."

"Is Claire there? Put her on."

Lucas held the phone up in front of me.

Adrian's voice came through.

With that familiar tone of command:

"Claire, I know you're upset today."

"But since you caused this, you have to fix it."

"Don't you know how to embroider?"

"Take a cab to the estate now."

"Fix the damaged part of the dress overnight."

"By tomorrow morning, I want to see a flawless dress on Ava."

"As compensation, after the engagement banquet tomorrow, I'll take you to Iceland to see the northern lights."

"I've already had my secretary look into flights."

I looked at the phone screen and suddenly smiled.

The aftereffects of my wrist fracture from three years ago

meant that on rainy days, or if I held a needle for more than half an hour, my wrist would spasm violently.

Adrian knew this better than anyone.

But to make Ava happy,

he could casually ask me to repair a dress all night.

And then placate me with a flight he hadn't even booked.

"Adrian," I said into the phone, word by word.

"My hand hurts. I can't embroider."

Adrian paused, then his tone dropped.

"Claire, I already promised to take you to see the northern lights."

"How long are you going to keep this up?"

"I'll give you half an hour."

"If you don't show up at the estate,"

"then at tomorrow's engagement banquet, I'll make it real. I'll actually marry Ava."

"Do you believe me?!"

That was his favorite threat these past three years.

Every time he threatened to "make it real,"

I would immediately apologize and give in.

"Okay," I said.

"Then I wish you both a long and happy life together."

After saying that, I reached over and ended the call on Lucas's phone.

Under Lucas's stunned and furious stare,

I took out the estate access card from my bag.

And the plain ring Adrian had given me three years ago.

I set them down next to the black card.

Then I picked up my suitcase and walked past him out the door.

"Claire! You dare take one step!"

"If you don't show up tomorrow, don't even think about setting foot in this house again for the rest of your life!"

Lucas raged behind me.

But when he looked down to grab his phone,

out of the corner of his eye he caught the ring I'd returned on the table.

And the Family Portrait on the floor, destroyed by turpentine.

An inexplicable panic suddenly seized his heart.