At Old Mr. Sinclair's eightieth birthday gala, my husband's first love sobbed that my brother had forced himself on her. The elite guests murmured amongst themselves, tongues sharp enough to draw blood. "Clara Hayes was hand-picked by Old Mr. Sinclair as a potential bride for his grandson. The Carver boy has gone too far!" Out of respect for the two families' long-standing ties, Old Mr. Sinclair chose not to pursue legal action. Instead, he decreed that my brother marry Clara, using the union to atone for the alleged offense. But my husband Sebastian stepped forward in front of everyone and personally shattered both of my brother's legs. Afterward, he took my hand with a helpless expression. "The Sinclairs have reach on both sides of the law. If we don't let them have this, the whole Carver family could pay for it later." Seven and a half months later, Clara gave birth to a healthy baby boy. Ethan sat in his wheelchair and screamed until his voice broke. "I told you — I never laid a single finger on her!" He had said it a hundred times that night. Not one person had believed him. They mocked him instead and called him a coward who couldn't own what he'd done. He scooped the newborn out of the bassinet and moved to take the story to the press. Sebastian came up behind him and brought something down hard against the back of his skull. Ethan dropped to the floor. I lunged forward to scream — and Sebastian's hand closed around my throat. "If you two blow this open, what kind of life do Clara and the child have left?" His eyes were cold and without mercy. He squeezed until everything went dark. When I opened my eyes again, I had been reborn — back to the evening of the gala. This time, I zip-tied Ethan's wrists myself and locked him in the supply closet. Three deadbolts. But Clara still walked into that ballroom claiming someone had violated her. ... Clara had nothing on but Sebastian's suit jacket draped over her bare shoulders, angry red marks trailing down her skin. She covered her face with both hands, her sobs wretched and practiced. "I've shamed myself in front of Mr. Sinclair. I can't face anyone." She twisted toward the nearest marble pillar. "Sebastian, don't stop me — just let me die!" Several society wives lunged forward to pull her back. Their eyes, when they turned to me, were full of contempt. "Ethan Carver thinks he can come back from abroad and act like an animal?" "His family scraped together their reputation off military service, and now he puts his hands on the woman Old Mr. Sinclair himself chose? He clearly has no respect for this family." "Clara was supposed to marry the Sinclair heir next month. That's finished now." I glanced at Sebastian, Clara sheltered behind his broad back like something precious, and swallowed the sneer threatening to curl my mouth. I pushed through the crowd and walked straight to Clara's side. "Miss Hayes." My voice came out even. "Look carefully. Is the man who attacked you actually my brother?" Clara flinched. Fresh tears spilled down her face. "Miss Carver, I understand you want to protect Ethan. But who would lie about something like this?" Her voice cracked. "I don't want to live anymore." She threw herself toward the pillar again. The society wives caught her in a flurry of silk and pearls. Sebastian crossed the room in three strides and yanked me aside, fingers biting into my wrist hard enough to leave bruises. His face was a thundercloud. "Lena. Your brother commits something unforgivable, and instead of making him apologize, you come here and bully Clara?" "Your father spent his whole life building something decent. You and Ethan just burned it to the ground." His grip was iron. My wrist throbbed. But inside, I was laughing. Thirty minutes ago, I had tied Ethan up myself and padlocked him in the supply closet. Three locks. Unless someone physically broke him out, there was no way he'd touched Clara Hayes. I met Sebastian's eyes without flinching. "Are you certain, Sebastian? Certain the man you saw was my brother?" His brow creased. He bit out his answer through clenched teeth. "I watched him put his hands on her with my own eyes. I knocked him out myself to pull her free. You think I can't recognize my own brother-in-law?"
My stomach dropped. The certainty in Sebastian's voice made something cold crawl up my spine. Had Ethan somehow gotten out? "Mrs. Holt." An older socialite cut across the room toward me, voice shrill with indignation. "How much longer do you intend to make a scene?" "You're the wife of the Holt Group's heir. Instead of protecting this family's name, you're shielding a criminal from your own bloodline. You have no business calling yourself the mistress of the Holt household." "What — should Sebastian turn a blind eye while your thug of a brother destroys Clara and drives her to her grave?" Sebastian shot me a withering look. "Lena. Stop embarrassing yourself." I let out a short, cold laugh and swept my gaze across the room — all these people so certain of their righteousness, so eager to follow whoever was loudest. "It seems no matter what actually happened tonight, the blame was always going to land on my brother." "How dare you—" Clara recoiled as though I'd slapped her, fresh tears streaking her cheeks, her expression the perfect portrait of wounded innocence. She bit her trembling lip. "I have never tried to attach myself to anyone. I have never wanted anything I didn't earn." "And now I'm being called shameless. Desperate." Her voice splintered. "Fine. If the Carver family won't believe me, I'd rather die than have any part of this." She spun and threw herself toward the floor-to-ceiling window. Three society wives caught her in a shrieking tangle of arms. "Miss Hayes, don't!" "It's that Carver boy's fault — every bit of it!" "You can't let him win by doing something like this!" They comforted Clara with one breath and spat venom at me with the next. "Clara was going to be the Sinclair heir's wife. The Carvers are what — a mid-tier business family? You think a woman with her future would risk her reputation to frame you?" Sebastian stepped in close, his tone softening into something that might have looked like concern. "Lena. It's over. Let Ethan marry Clara, issue a public apology, make the financial settlement." "If this goes to court, a sexual assault charge alone puts him away for ten years. The Carver Group's stock collapses overnight. How do you explain that to the board?" In my last life, I had believed every word of this. I'd convinced myself Ethan had done it — drunk, reckless, out of control — and I'd spent years drowning in guilt. I handed over Carver Group's most valuable contracts to the Hayes family. I treated Clara like royalty. And seven and a half months later, she delivered another man's child and took everything we had built. Nausea rolled through me in a slow, vicious wave. I pulled my arm free from Sebastian's grip. "Letting Clara Hayes walk into my family without the truth coming out first?" I said. "Not a chance in hell." The last trace of warmth vanished from Sebastian's face. His eyes went flat and mean. Before he could speak, Mr. Hayes stormed through the doors, his face the color of iron. He crossed to Clara without a word and struck her across the face — clean, sharp, loud enough to echo. Clara staggered and hit the floor, blood welling at the corner of her mouth. "You embarrass me in front of these people?" he snarled. "Get out. Buy a plane ticket. Die abroad if you have to — just don't come back and drag the Hayes name any further through the dirt." Two bodyguards moved in to drag her out. "Don't touch me." Clara snatched a fruit knife off the nearest table and drew it across her wrist without hesitation. The room erupted. Someone screamed. Others rushed to stop her. Hands grabbed at my sleeve. "Mrs. Holt — you're just going to stand there?" "If Ethan hadn't done what he did, she wouldn't be doing this!" "Can the Carver family even live with themselves?" I watched the performance in silence. A flash of something vicious crossed Clara's eyes. Her grip on the knife tightened. The blade parted skin. Blood came fast and bright. The society wives shrieked in unison. "The Carver family has blood on their hands!"
Sebastian's face went white. He crossed the room and wrenched the knife from Clara's hand. "Get the house physician — now!" He stripped off his tie and wound it tight around her bleeding wrist. Clara let herself be surrounded, blinking weakly up at the crowd. Her eyes slid to me for just a moment — no despair in them, no death wish. Only the bright, quiet gleam of someone who thought she was winning. Once Clara had been carefully arranged on a chaise in the rest area, Sebastian turned and came straight for me. "Lena." The slap landed before I could move — open-handed, full force, ringing off the walls of the ballroom. I staggered into the edge of a marble table. The corner caught my forehead. Blood ran into my eyebrow. My left cheek burned, my ear rang, and the room tilted sideways. Sebastian stood over me, pointing down like I was something he'd scraped off his shoe. "You wanted her dead, right? You didn't stop until you pushed her there?" "I don't need such a wife. I want a divorce. Tonight." The room erupted in agreement. Someone actually smiled. "He's right to do it. A wife like that is a curse." "The brother's a predator and she's no better — God knows how she landed Sebastian in the first place." "The Holt family and Clara Hayes are the real victims here. These two Carver siblings are a plague." The words came in waves, each one uglier than the last. They looked at me like I was something that needed to be put down. I swallowed the blood pooling at the back of my throat. I pressed a hand to the floor and pushed myself up, slowly, until I was standing straight. "Proof." My voice didn't shake. "Show me one person in this room who actually witnessed my brother attack Clara Hayes." Silence. Faces exchanged glances. Sebastian's smile was brittle. "You never learn, do you?" He turned and walked to the far corner of the ballroom, where two bodyguards stood flanking a large black duffel bag. He crouched, unknotted the drawstring, and reached inside. When he straightened, he was holding a custom lapel pin between two fingers — small, expensive, engraved with a single letter: C. He raised it above his head so the whole room could see. "This pin was commissioned for Ethan Carver's twenty-first birthday. Custom design, one of a kind. No duplicate exists anywhere in the world." He turned and threw it at my chest. "Still want to tell me your brother wasn't there?" The floor shifted under me. Cold sweat broke across my back. That pin. I recognized it instantly. Ethan had been wearing it tonight. Had someone gone to the supply closet and let him out? But I had left a guard posted. I had given specific instructions. Something wasn't adding up. Mr. Hayes spat on the ground at my feet. "The evidence is right in front of you. What exactly is left to argue?" I held Sebastian's gaze and let the smile come slowly. "Funny thing, isn't it?" "Ethan and I haven't been back long. We don't run in these circles often, but we've never caused trouble. We know how to conduct ourselves." "So why is it that on the one night I specifically asked my brother to stay close to Sebastian and keep his head down — this happens?" I let the question sit. "Someone set Ethan up. Someone who wanted my family to take the fall." "That is a lie—" The composure cracked. Just for a second — but I saw it. Sebastian's eyes flickered with something he couldn't quite bury. The men closest to him grabbed his arms, quietly, firmly — keeping him from doing something he couldn't walk back. The room turned on me instead. "Lena, have you lost your mind? You're accusing your own husband to cover for your brother?" "You want to take the Holt family down with you?" "The Holts have suffered enough bringing you into this family!" Several older women rushed over to pull me aside. "Lena, apologize to Sebastian. There's still time to fix this." I shook them off. "I have nothing to apologize for." Someone murmured nearby. "Sebastian and Clara grew up together. If something was really going on between them, they'd have married years ago. Why would she need to bother with any of this?" It was a small thing — barely above a whisper. But in a room full of people who'd been so certain a moment ago, it landed like a stone in still water. Eyes shifted. Expressions changed. The crowd that had been pointing at me began, almost imperceptibly, to point somewhere else.
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