I don’t want Leander anymore.
Not after I discovered him with her—with Dahlia—entwined and breathless on my sheets, in my room, in the bed where I used to dream of the life we might have had. The man who once traced the scars on my back and kissed them like sacred vows now lay tangled in the arms of the girl who poisons everything she touches.
He was never just a bodyguard to me. He was mine—in secret, in stolen hours, in the quiet corners of a world that wouldn’t allow us to exist. For a year, we lived like whispers carried between wars. He knew the real sound of my laugh, not the one sharpened into a weapon. He knew my coffee order. He knew how to hold me when my father’s cruelty carved me open. And I let him see all of me—the vicious, the broken, the raw.
I loved him in a way that made me feel whole. Alive. Safe.
Then Dahlia returned from Europe.
She swept into the estate with her designer luggage, tanned skin, and that infuriating smirk that always meant devastation. From that moment, everything tilted. Leander withdrew, became distant. Guarded. He started volunteering for shifts that planted him close to her. And I—I kept inventing excuses. For him. For her. For the silence spreading like rot between us.
Until the day I came home too early.
Until I pushed open my bedroom door and found them.
There is no scream for that kind of betrayal. It cuts too neatly. It carves too deep. I stood frozen at the threshold, eyes locked on the tangle of bodies, on his back bent toward her like instinct. I didn’t cry until later—when they were gone, and the air still reeked of them.
That night, I shattered. Not like a girl. Like a weapon dropped too hard on stone.
I screamed into the pillows, cried until my lungs threatened to collapse. Because I hadn’t just lost him. I had lost the only good thing I believed was mine. The only man who ever looked at me like I wasn’t just another pawn in my father’s endless war.
But the numbness crept in. Slowly. Like frost crawling under a door. And when it settled, it clarified everything.
Dahlia always stole what was mine. Always.
Friends. Clothes. Teachers’ praise. Father’s affection. Even the last fragile string of sanity that held my mother together. She watched our mother sink into despair in her own home and never once looked ashamed. She was the golden girl, the beloved, the darling everyone adored because she knew how to smile softly while I burned too brightly.
And now, Leander.
Even he wasn’t strong enough to resist her pull.
---
Two weeks before I was destined to be handed over as a bride to a stranger, I struck a deal to wed a man who was barely alive.
Not out of affection. Not out of pity.
But because Dahlia—and Leander, the man who was supposed to guard me, the man I secretly loved—were sharing a bed behind mine. And I’ve never been one for forgiveness. I’ve always believed only in calculation.
Dahlia, my father’s illegitimate child paraded around like she was a prized jewel, was originally chosen to marry Caius Martino, heir to one of the most dangerous dynasties. It was supposed to be her crown, her alliance, her kingdom. Until the car crash. Until he slipped into a coma—and she fled like a rat from fire. She announced she wouldn’t “shackle herself to a corpse.”
She discarded the empire like it was a handbag out of season. And my father, weak and trembling behind the shadow of his legacy, fell to his knees, begging me to step into her role. I laughed in his face. Said no. Tilted my glass and spilled red wine across his desk like venom, again and again.
Until it hit me—
If I wanted vengeance, I needed leverage.
If I wanted to destroy them, I had to claim the fire.
And the Martinos? They were bleeding.
So I accepted.
I would marry the breathing shell she left behind. I’d slip into her gown. I’d seize her throne. And when my empire was strong enough, I’d tear her apart.
Let Dahlia watch me carry the crown she threw away—and choke on every jewel in its frame.
---
“I’ve made up my mind,” I announced. “I’ll marry the unconscious Martino heir.”
My father froze. His cigar slipped from his lips and tumbled like a man thrown overboard.
“You’ll what?” he whispered, his tone quiet—quiet like the last moment before the trapdoor opens beneath the gallows.
“You heard me.” I walked further into the study, my heels cracking against the marble like shots fired. “The Martino boy. The one whose heart still beats but whose mind is gone. The one lying in a hospital bed while his family claws to hold their empire together. That one.”
His gaze sharpened, suspicion flickering—then, to my shock, his mouth twisted into the ghost of a proud smile.
“Raven, darling, this is… unexpected. The Martinos have been scavenging for an edge, and the ceremony is only two weeks away. I’ll have Madison fly in designers from Milan. Black, yes? Something bold, dramatic?”
“That’s it?” I cocked my head. “I’m throwing myself to marry a man who doesn’t even know I exist—a man who was Dahlia’s fiancé first. She should’ve been the one walking down that aisle. But the moment the storm came, that greedy little coward bolted. Now here I am, rescuing your crumbling empire. And I don’t even get a thank-you? Not even a crown for my trouble?”
His jaw locked tight. The atmosphere thickened, heavy with unsaid threats and ancient, festering truths.
“Watch your tongue,” he snapped. “She’s your sister.”
“No.” My voice lashed out like ice in the bloodstream. “A sister is born of the same mother. That girl is nothing but the shadow that stained Mom’s coffin.”
For just a second, his face faltered—an involuntary twitch of guilt, gone as quickly as it appeared.
We never truly spoke of it. But we both carried the truth like a scar. My mother didn’t wither from sickness. She wasted away from heartbreak—forced to watch the man she loved parade his mistress through our halls, forced to live under the same roof as the bastard child she never asked for.
Dahlia.
The daughter he adored above me. The one who earned the smiles, the forgiveness, the warmth. While I was forged into steel, trained like a soldier, starved of gentleness.
I was born with fire in my chest. She was born with his arm slung around her shoulders.
And yet, I was the one left bleeding to hold this family together.
“What do you want?” he asked at last.
“One hundred million transferred into my account the moment the marriage is sealed. And Leander reassigned—to her.”
His eyes blinked once. Twice. “Leander? Your own bodyguard?”
I gave a careless shrug. “People change. I don’t want him anymore.”
He didn’t entirely believe me—I saw it. But he didn’t dig. He only nodded after a long pause. “Fine. The money comes once the papers are signed. Leander goes with Dahlia. Consider it done.”
I turned toward the door, but his voice hooked into me like a knife.
“Raven…” he said softly, almost human for once. “Leander was the only man you ever let close. Are you truly certain about this?”
My hand curled over the brass handle. My chest tightened for a single heartbeat. Then I forced the ache out with one breath and locked the steel back in place.
“He made his decision,” I answered coldly. “Now I’m making mine.”
