Chapter 1Shattered Hearts And Second Chances

I met Adrian Beaumont when I was thirteen.

I confessed my love to him when I was twenty-one.

But he only sighed, his hands firm yet gentle as he pushed me away.

"Sienna, I’m eight years older than you," he had whispered. "I can’t do that to you."

But later, through the heavy oak of a bedroom door, I heard him. I heard him pressed against my stepsister, their breaths tangled, the sound of a desperate, trembling kiss.

Skylar’s voice was thick with a sweet, shy triumph. "What kind of 'big brother' kisses his sister like that on her eighteenth birthday?"

It wasn't that I was too young. It wasn't that the eight-year gap was a bridge he couldn't cross.

It was simply that he didn't love me. And when there is no love, there is only an excuse.

The first time I saw Adrian, I was barely a teenager.

My mother had passed away when I was five, leaving my father to raise me alone. Or so I thought. By the time I was thirteen, the narrative changed. A woman named Evelyn Reed entered the picture, bringing along her daughter, Skylar.

Our house in the suburbs was small, and suddenly, there were too many people.

"Sienna, you’re a big girl now. You need to help out the family," Evelyn said, smiling as she straightened my collar. Her tone was honey-thick, but her eyes were cold.

Behind her stood my father. He looked apologetic, yet utterly powerless, clutching my suitcase—a small, battered thing that held the entirety of my first thirteen years.

The Beaumonts were a family of old money and immense prestige. Two decades prior, my father had pulled the only son of the Beaumont estate, Adrian, from a wreckage after a horrific car accident. For that, the Beaumonts gave him a blank check of a promise: ask for anything, anytime.

Twenty years later, my father cashed it in.

His request? For the Beaumonts to take me in, to raise me in the city, and to put me through the best schools. The Beaumonts spent millions on charities every year; what was one more girl? They were "gracious" enough to agree.

They even sent a black Town Car to pick me up.

As I left, my father shoved two hundred dollars into my hand, glancing nervously toward the house. "Don't let Evelyn see this," he sniffed, his nose turning a bright, pathetic red. "Take care of yourself, Sienna."

But Dad, why can't you take care of me? I wanted to scream. Mom left plenty of money for me. Why are you throwing me away?

I didn't say a word. I took my suitcase and got into the car.

As we pulled away, I watched them in the rearview mirror. They were laughing. Evelyn had her arm linked through my father’s, and my father was holding Skylar’s hand. A perfect, happy family of three.

I had been the surplus.

The early days at the Beaumont estate were suffocating. I was a ghost in a museum of modern art and velvet. The senior Beaumonts lived abroad most of the year, leaving me alone in the massive house with the staff. I moved through my days in silence—school, homework, dinner—trying to be as invisible as the air.

Then, I found him: a scruffy, golden-furred stray puppy near the school gates. He was a mutt, but he had a peculiar, adorable tuft of white fur right on top of his head, like a poorly dyed mohawk.

I didn't dare bring him back to the estate, so I used my allowance to board him at a local vet clinic. Every day after school, I’d spend thirty minutes with him. He was my only friend, my only family.

"Hey, little guy," I whispered one afternoon, stroking his ears as he whimpered into my palm. "I’m going to call you Sunny. Because you have to be happy every single day, okay?"

I squeezed my eyes shut. "You have to be happier than me."

"Ugh, what a tragic name for a tragic-looking dog."

A mocking voice cut through the air. I looked up to see Roman Knight, the boy from the neighboring estate. He was a year older than me and had made it his personal mission to make my life miserable since the day I arrived.

I ignored him, handed Sunny back to the vet tech, and slung my backpack over my shoulder.

"Hey, Mouse! I'm talking to you!" Roman blocked my path, his chest puffed out with adolescent arrogance.

I wanted to scream at him. I wanted to tell him to go to hell. But I was a guest in this neighborhood—a charity case. If I caused trouble, it would get back to the Beaumonts, and then to my father.

So, I kept my head down and tried to push past him.

"So rude," he sneered, grabbing the strap of my backpack.

I stumbled, the momentum throwing me off balance. I closed my eyes, bracing for the hard sting of the pavement, but instead, I hit something warm and solid. A pair of steady hands caught my shoulders.

"Roman, is this how we treat guests?"

A voice, smooth as aged bourbon and twice as intoxicating, vibrated above me. I looked up.

It was Adrian.

That was the first time I truly saw him, and the first time he saved me.