Chapter 02

Estelle's POV

"Estelle! Wait! Sorry I'm late!"

I stopped walking.

I knew that voice. I would know it anywhere.

A red sports car pulled up beside me on the dusty road. The window rolled down, and a young man with messy brown hair and a bright smile leaned out.

"Happy freedom day, Estelle," he said.

Tristan Hale.

We grew up in the same small village. Our houses were only three doors apart. When I had no shoes, he gave me his. When the other kids threw stones at me and called me "the girl nobody wants," he stood in front of me and took the stones himself.

He was my best friend. The one person in the world I trusted more than anyone.

---

*Six years ago...*

"Estelle, don't cry."

Tristan sat beside me under the big mango tree behind the village church. My knees were bleeding from where the bigger boys had pushed me.

He tore a piece of his own shirt and tied it around my knee.

"I promise you something," he said, very seriously. "Wherever you go, I'll go too. If you go to a big school in the city, I'll study hard and go to the same one. I'll always protect you. Like a knight protecting a princess."

I laughed through my tears. "You're not a knight, Tristan. You're just a skinny boy with no shoes."

"Then I'll be a skinny knight with no shoes," he said, and grinned.

---

*Present...*

That boy was gone.

Because when I needed him the most, Tristan was the one who pushed me into hell with his own two hands.

---

*Three years ago...*

The night Lilith fell, there was only one person who could have saved me. Tristan was standing right there beside the drinks table. He saw Delilah pour the juice. He saw her hand the glass to me.

I grabbed his arm with shaking hands.

"Tristan, tell them. Please. You saw it. Tell them it was Delilah."

He wouldn't look at me.

Later that night, I heard him in the garden, talking to Delilah in a low voice.

"She's too soft," Delilah whispered. "I would never survive a place like that convent. But Estelle grew up poor. She's used to suffering. Just tell them you saw her do it, Tristan. Please. For me."

The next morning, Tristan stood in front of my father and the police.

"I saw Estelle put something in the glass," he said.

That was all it took.

And after I was gone, Delilah kept her promise to him. With the Silverthorn name behind him, Tristan got a full scholarship to the best music school in the country. Now he plays the piano on television. Girls scream his name. Magazines call him "the golden boy."

He built his whole shining life on top of my ruined one.

---

*Present...*

Tristan climbed out of the car holding a big bunch of white roses. He pushed them toward me.

"Look, I got you flowers. Your favorite, remember?"

I didn't take them.

"No, thank you, Tristan."

His smile froze a little. "Estelle, come on. I know things were bad. But I'm here now. Let me take you somewhere. We can talk."

I stared at the roses. They were beautiful. Perfect. Just like his lies.

If there was one thing Holy Rose Convent taught me, it was this.

---

*One year ago...*

"On your knees, village girl."

Three older girls stood around me in the dark laundry room. Sister Agatha stood at the door with her arms crossed, watching. She did nothing. She never did anything.

One of the girls threw my bread on the dirty floor and stepped on it.

"You want to eat? Then crawl like a dog and eat it from the floor. Bark first."

I didn't want to. My whole body shook with shame.

But I was so hungry. I hadn't eaten in two days.

So I barked.

They laughed and laughed. One of them pushed my face down into the bread and rubbed it in my hair. "Good girl," she said. "Good little dog."

That night I lay on my thin mat and made myself a promise. Never let anyone see what you want. Never trust anyone. Make yourself small. Make yourself quiet. Because when no one is on your side, that is the only way to stay alive.

---

*Present...*

I looked up at Tristan's warm, kind face.

The Silverthorns hated me. But at least they said it to my face. My father told me he wished I was never born. My brother called me a liar. They never pretended.

Tristan smiled at me while he stabbed me in the back.

I would rather walk into a house where I know who my enemies are, than walk beside a "friend" who could pull the ground from under my feet again.

I turned around.

Cassius was still standing beside the black car down the road, arms crossed, looking annoyed.

I walked back to him.

"I changed my mind," I said. "Let's go home."

Cassius raised an eyebrow, but he opened the door without a word.

As I got in, I heard Tristan shout behind me.

"Estelle! Estelle, wait!"

I shut the door. The car drove away. In the side mirror, I watched him standing alone on the road, holding his white roses.

I didn't feel anything at all.