Chapter One: The Funeral

The wind moved through Wren Hollow like a whisper from the grave—dry, persistent, and full of secrets. It stirred the dust along the path to the cemetery, lifted the edges of black skirts, and rustled the cottonwoods that lined the ridge like sentinels. Gabrielle Moreau sat astride her horse, Raven, watching the mourners gather below. Her posture was straight, her face unreadable. But her eyes—dark, sharp, and unyielding—missed nothing.

They came in twos and threes. Ranch hands with smoke-stained collars. Women with sun-worn faces. Children clinging to hems, confused by the weight of silence. Gabrielle recognized nearly every face. Her father had helped most of them—patched roofs, lent tools, delivered calves in the dead of night. He had been the kind of man people relied on without asking why.

Now he lay in a pine box, built by Gabrielle and old Mr. Talbot with hands that trembled more from grief than age. No warning. No telegram. No final words. Just the sound of a body falling in the kitchen and the silence that followed. Gabrielle had found him herself, slumped beside the stove, a half-carved saddle horn still clutched in his hand.

She hadn’t cried. Not when she washed his face and buttoned his Sunday shirt. Not when she hammered the lid shut. But now, as the preacher’s voice cracked over the grave, something inside her shifted. Not tears. Something older. Heavier. A fracture.

Aunt Eugenia stood beside her, dressed in violet silk that shimmered unnaturally in the morning light. Her gloves were spotless. Her perfume sharp and foreign. She hadn’t set foot in Wren Hollow in over a decade, and now she stood like she’d never left.

“You’ll come with me to the city,” she said, voice low but firm. “It’s what your father wanted.”

Gabrielle didn’t turn her head. Her gaze remained fixed on the grave. “He wanted me free.”

Eugenia’s lips tightened. “Freedom is a romantic notion. But it doesn’t feed you. It doesn’t protect you.”

“I don’t need protecting.”

“You’re seventeen.”

“I’m capable.”

“You’re alone.”

Gabrielle finally looked at her. “I’ve been alone since my mother died. He taught me how to live with it.”

Eugenia’s expression softened for a moment, then hardened again. “You’ll come. I’ve made arrangements.”

Mr. Talbot approached, hat in hand. “He was proud of you,” he said quietly. “Said you had more grit than any man he’d ever met.”

Gabrielle nodded. “He taught me everything I know.”

“He taught you well. But grit won’t keep the wolves from the door.”

She looked past him, toward the hills. “I’m not afraid of wolves.”

That night, the house felt hollow. Gabrielle moved through the rooms like a ghost, touching the things her father had left behind—a pair of worn gloves, a book of poetry with the spine cracked, a tin cup still warm from the last fire. Beneath the floorboard, she found his pocket watch. It ticked steadily, defiantly, as if time itself refused to mourn.

She sat in the barn until the moon rose, Raven shifting quietly in his stall. The horses were restless, sensing the change. Gabrielle leaned against a bale of hay, the watch in her hand, and stared at the rafters.

She didn’t sleep.

The train station was a blur of steam and shouting porters. Gabrielle stood on the platform, her trunk at her feet, Raven already loaded into the livestock car. She wore a gray traveling dress and a hat with a veil—Eugenia’s choice. Her boots were polished, her hair pinned. She looked like someone else.

Eugenia arrived with two valets in matching coats. She surveyed Gabrielle with a critical eye.

“You’ll find the city invigorating,” she said. “It’s time you learned to live properly.”

Gabrielle didn’t respond. She boarded the train and settled into the parlor car, surrounded by velvet seats and polished brass. The countryside blurred past the window—fields, fences, rivers—all fading into memory.

The city was loud and fast and full of strangers. Buildings rose like stone giants. Carriages clattered over cobbled streets. People moved with purpose. Eugenia’s townhouse stood on a quiet street lined with gas lamps and iron fences. Inside, everything gleamed—marble floors, crystal chandeliers, silk wallpaper.

Gabrielle’s room was large and cold. A maid named Clara helped her unpack, folding clothes with practiced hands.

“Is there anything else you need, miss?” Clara asked.

Gabrielle shook her head. “Just quiet.”

Clara hesitated. “It’s never quiet here.”

That evening, Eugenia hosted a dinner party. Gabrielle was expected to attend. She wore a burgundy satin gown, corseted so tightly she could barely breathe. Her hair was pinned, her boots replaced with delicate slippers. She looked in the mirror and saw a stranger.

The guests were polished and perfect. They spoke of opera and imported tea, of politics and fashion. Gabrielle sat beside a banker’s wife who smiled without warmth.

“You’re not from here, are you?” the woman asked.

“No,” Gabrielle replied. “I’m from where people say what they mean.”

“How direct,” the woman said, and turned away.

Across the room, a man in a dark frock coat watched her. He was tall, sharp-featured, and didn’t smile. His eyes were unreadable, but they lingered.

“Who is that?” Gabrielle asked.

Eugenia’s face tightened. “Dante Virelli. Heir to the Virelli syndicate. Dangerous. Uncivilized. Stay away.”

Gabrielle raised an eyebrow. “Sounds familiar.”

A few days later, Gabrielle wandered into the stables behind the townhouse. She needed air. She needed horses. She needed something real.

She found a stable boy—barely fifteen—being shoved by two men in tailored coats. They accused him of theft, their voices low and cruel.

Gabrielle stepped forward. “Leave him alone.”

One of the men turned. “This doesn’t concern you.”

“It does now.”

A third man stepped out of the shadows. Dante Virelli. He wore a charcoal coat, a silver pocket watch chain glinting against his vest. His boots were polished, his gloves spotless. But his eyes were wild.

“You have a habit of interrupting,” he said.

Gabrielle met his gaze. “I have a habit of doing what’s right.”

Dante studied her. “You’re not like the others.”

“No,” she said. “I’m not.”

He nodded to his men. “Let the boy go.”

They obeyed.

Gabrielle turned to leave, but Dante’s voice stopped her. “Your name?”

She hesitated. “Gabrielle Moreau.”

His smile was slow, dangerous. “I’ll remember that.”

 

That night, Gabrielle sat by her window, watching the city lights flicker like trapped stars. She held her father’s pocket watch in her hand, its ticking steady and defiant.

She didn’t know what Dante Virelli wanted. She didn’t know what secrets the city held. But she knew this—she would not be tamed.

And somewhere in the shadows, Dante poured a glass of bourbon, thinking about the girl with dust on her boots and fire in her eyes.

Then he opened a drawer and pulled out a letter—yellowed, creased, and signed by a name Gabrielle had never seen.

Julian Virelli.