Five years ago, my husband personally put me behind bars. When I got out,his ride request hit my app— and found him tangled up with my best friend who put me there. I'm doing unlicensed rides now.It's the only work I can get since they stripped me of everything. So when the pickup request comes in from outside Club Nero — one of Dominic's places — I don't think twice. I just pull up and kill the engine. Then the door opens. Dominic stares at me like he's seen a ghost. Maybe he has. "Elena." His voice drops. "You're out. Why didn't you come to me?" Before I can answer, the woman hanging off his arm tips up on her heels and kisses him. Drunk. Sloppy. He fumbles to steady her, and that's when I see her face. Sienna. My best friend. The woman who drugged me, set me up, and smiled through the glass while I was processed into a cell. I pull my cap lower and hold out my hand for the keys. "Sir, you ready to go? Five stars if the ride's smooth." "Elena." Dominic knocks the keys out of my hand. He grabs my shoulders, eyes glassy. "Come home. My God.Do you know how much I've missed you? How much your family has missed you?" I peel his hands off me and turn to get my folding bike from the rack. My prosthetic clips the bumper. The sound is small but it cuts through everything. Dominic goes still. He stares at my leg. Then his eyes go red. I don't understand what he's crying about. He's the one who handcuffed me himself.His own attorney's badge, his own evidence, his own signature on the filing that put me away. He believed I'd slept with his brother Marco. He didn't ask a single question. He just buried me. "Elena — your leg. What happened to you in there?" Sienna stirs at the sound of his voice. She blinks at me and her mouth curls. "Well, well. Little Elena." She slurs it like a taunt. "When'd you get out? You should've called, girl. I'd have rolled out the welcome mat." She leans into Dominic, wrapping both arms around him, pressing herself against his chest. Dominic frowns at her. "Sienna. You're drunk. Stop." "I'm not wrong though," she says, pouting. "She did wrong, she did her time, whatever I always prayed she'd come out a better person." Then she kicks my folding bike off the curb. Dominic lunges to catch her as she stumbles. "Watch it." His voice is soft. Careful. Like he used to be with me. Once she's settled, he looks back at my prosthetic. "Tell me what happened. The whole five years,what did they do to you?" His eyes are wet. I don't answer. I just right the bike. "Excuse me. You're in the way." My pants catch the wind and the metal brace shows — cheap chrome, bulk-ordered. Dominic's jaw tightens. "Elena, please. Come with me. Let's talk. Let's fix this." He reaches for me. I step aside. "Sir, you canceling the ride or not? Because I can close it out from my end." I hold up my phone. Professional. Blank. Sienna laughs. "Dominic, why are you even talking to this whore? She went after Marco. Didn't even flinch." She breathes liquor and venom in equal measure. "Losing that leg was the least she deserved." Five years ago, she was the one who poured my drink. She's the one who got me into that hotel room. When I woke up, Marco was half-dressed beside me,and Dominic was kicking the door in with two of his soldiers behind him. He didn't let me speak. He slapped me in front of all of them. And then, because Dominic is one of the sharpest legal minds in the New York underworld, he personally represented Marco's accusation and buried every defense I had. I come back to the present. Sienna has her arm hooked through Dominic's, his brow creased— but he's not pushing her away. Sienna opens her mouth to say something. "Sienna, enough." He looks at me. "Let's keep the ride going, Elena. You need the money." He's not wrong. I get in the car. The drive takes thirty minutes. Sienna whines for him to rub her temples. He does it. I watch the road and keep my foot steady on the gas. We pull up to a gated property in Westchester. Marble columns, iron fence, private security. It used to be our home. "One-eighty," I say, and hold out my hand. Sienna pulls a thick fold of hundreds from her clutch and throws it at my face. "Keep the change. Buy yourself a decent leg. Stop embarrassing yourself out here." She walks away on Dominic's arm without looking back. Dominic stops by the door, staring at the bills scattered across the seat. "She didn't mean it. She was drunk." He pulls out his own roll. "Take all of it. And tomorrow come to the firm. I'll find you something. A real position." I pick up exactly what the meter said. One hundred eighty dollars. I leave the rest. "I don't take dirty money, Mr. Ferrano." "Don't forget to rate the ride." Sienna spins around, furious, and lunges . Dominic catches her. I clip my helmet on, unfold the bike, and ride into the dark.
The cold hits my face on the ride back. By the time I get home, the prosthetic socket has rubbed through. I unbuckle the harness and the stump is a mess.Raw, bleeding, ugly. I sit on the edge of the bathtub and press a rag against it. Five years ago, Sienna came to visit me inside. She sat across the glass and smiled the whole time. "You know how good Dominic is in bed, Elena? Every. Single. Night." She tilted her head, lips curling. "Don't worry. I'll keep him very well taken care of. The house, the firm,all of it." I lost it. I slammed my hands against the glass and screamed until my throat gave out. That same night, three women dragged me into a blind spot.No cameras, no guards. They had an iron rod. They took their time. "Someone paid a lot for this," one of them said. I was on my back for six months. The infection got bad enough that amputation was the only call left. I hated them for it. But five years inside turns hate into something quieter. Something closer to nothing. The next morning, a hard knock pulls me out of sleep. I figure it's my landlord again. It's not. It's Dominic. Standing in my doorway holding a container of soup. "Bone broth," he says, like that explains anything. He walks in without being asked. "Don't take what Sienna said to heart. That's just how she is." He sets the soup on my counter and turns around. "I came to talk about your future." I lean against the doorframe and look at him. "I drive illegal taxi. I don't have a future." "Go on back to wherever you came from, Dominic. Don't get your designer suit dirty." He sighs. Turns to face me fully. "Elena. Stop.All you have to do is make a public statement admitting your private life was a mess, and sign over whatever shares you have left.I'll bring you back into the firm." He pauses like he's offering me a gift. "Not as an attorney, obviously. But there's a cleaning position. Five grand a month. That's enough to live on." He lifts his chin. Waiting. I actually laugh. "You want me to apologize to the man who lied about me?" Dominic's face hardens instantly. "You still don't get it, do you?" His voice rises. "If I hadn't pushed for leniency,if I hadn't used every favor I had,you'd have gotten twice the sentence. You should be thanking me." He steps forward like he's going to grab my arm and drag me out himself. I push his hand away. "Dominic. Did you ever actually read the case file?" "The hallway camera,why did it go out that exact night?" "And what was in my drink?" He stops. Just for a second, something flickers across his face. Then it's gone. "Enough." He cuts me off. "You think Sienna and Marco set you up? You think that's what happened?" He shakes his head. "I'm here trying to help you. Don't be stupid about it." I point at the door. "Get out." He stares at me like I just spoke another language. "You think you're still the hotshot attorney you used to be? You're a convict, Elena. You're a woman with one leg and a gypsy cab app. That's what you are now." He slams the door on his way out. That afternoon I open the app to pick up a few ride requests. A notification hits before I can accept anything. My account has been permanently suspended. Reason cited: a passenger complaint. Inappropriate conduct by the driver. I stare at the screen. Dominic. Of course. He couldn't even wait a day.
I haven't even locked the door behind me when the landlord shows up with three heavies at my back. "Elena. Someone just offered me ten times your rent. You're out. Now." I don't get a chance to argue. They throw me and everything I own onto the street. My clothes land in a puddle. The rain is already coming down hard. My prosthetic aches in the wet cold. Then a Maybach rolls up and stops right in front of me. It splashes mud across my legs. Sienna leans out the window, cigarette between her fingers, smoke curling. "Look at you. The big-shot attorney, living like a stray dog." She exhales slowly. "God, Elena. You're embarrassing." Dominic gets out. He opens an umbrella and holds it over my head. "Stop being stubborn. Just apologize to Marco, keep your head down. I'll sort the job, I'll sort the housing. Why are you doing this to yourself?" I push myself up off the ground. "Get that umbrella out of my face. And take your girlfriend somewhere else." Dominic's jaw tightens. "Sienna was there for me when you were gone. She held things together. I'm standing here trying to help you and you're acting like I'm the enemy." He pauses. "Your parents have been asking about you. Don't shut them out too." And right on cue，two figures come running through the rain. No umbrella. Moving fast. My parents. I haven't gone to see them since I got out. I was afraid the rumors had reached them. Afraid they'd been hurt by all of it. My mother reaches me first. She slaps me across the face before she says a word. My father gets the other cheek. "You have the nerve to show your face?" My mother's voice is pure venom. "You're not our daughter. You never were." "Sienna is our family now. She's the one who deserves that name." My father's eyes are cold. "A whore like you should've died in that cell." Five years I spent worrying about them. Five years scared they'd been poisoned by the lies. I never expected them to take Sienna in as their own. Sienna steps out of the Maybach and takes both of them by the arm, guiding them back toward the car. "Mom, Dad. She's not ready to admit what she did. Don't waste your energy." She glances back at me. "We've got the firm. You can both retire in peace. Leave her to figure it out." My parents exchange a look, then turn on me with pure disappointment. "If Sienna hadn't been running the firm all these years, everything we built would be gone." My mother's voice is sharp. "You want to keep playing the victim? Fine. Don't expect us to catch you when you fall." The Maybach pulls away. I stand in the rain until the taillights disappear. I limp two blocks to a diner I passed on the way out of my building. I need work. Any work. The manager takes one look at my prosthetic and waves me off before I can speak. "Get out of here. We don't hire cripples. who's gonna cover it when you get hurt?" I grab his arm and hold tight. "I work clean and I work fast. Half wages. Just feed me." The manager huffs, impatient, and moves to shove me off. Then a woman in a cleaning uniform spins around from behind the counter. "Oh my God." She stares at me. "Miss Elena?" I freeze, studying the woman in front of me. She grabs my arm and pulls me into the corner, eyes darting left and right. Then she reaches into her apron pocket and pulls out a small voice recorder. "Miss Elena, I am so sorry." Her voice drops to almost nothing. "Five years ago, I was a cleaner at the hotel. Sienna paid me a hundred thousand dollars to kill the camera feed that night. But I recorded her. Her and Marco planning the whole thing. Every word. I kept it because I couldn't live with myself." She presses it into my hand. "Please don't tell anyone it came from me. I just……I needed you to have it." Five years. A destroyed leg. A prison sentence for something I never did. And the proof was sitting in a cleaning woman's apron pocket the whole time.
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