Chapter 1We Grew Up Side By Side

Michael’s girlfriend was chronically online. She loved testing out every new TikTok trend she scrolled past, and tonight was no exception.

"Michael, you're a year older than me. Why didn't you visit me in the hospital the day I was born? Do you even love me at all?"

Michael let out a helpless laugh, entirely used to her antics. He played along with the joke, but then his eyes caught his famously stoic, buttoned-up uncle sitting nearby. A mischievous glint crossed Michael's face.

"Uncle Declan, what about you? How would you answer that?"

The man, who rarely cracked a smile, swirled the amber liquid in his glass. "I did visit."

He took a slow sip. "Not only did I visit, but I held her when she was just a baby."

As the words left his mouth, his dark, heavy gaze drifted across the room, landing squarely on me.

* * *

Michael Prescott and I grew up together. For the first twenty years of my life, we were inseparable.

It wasn't just me who thought we were endgame. Our parents, our entire social circle, everyone practically had our wedding invitations drafted in their heads. We were the quintessential high-society match, perfectly suited in background and temperament.

When I turned eighteen, my parents officially brought up the idea of a merger between the Astor and Prescott families through marriage. They asked how I felt about it.

Honestly, I adored Michael. If our families joined, it would be a beautiful story. But we were still young, so the engagement talks were gently shelved, and we headed off to the same Ivy League university instead.

For the next two years, we lingered in that agonizingly sweet gray area. More than friends, not quite lovers. Everyone around us treated it as an inevitability. Swept up in the expectations, I let myself fall a little deeper for him with every passing day.

Then came the winter of our sophomore year. Michael found me, his eyes bright with an excitement I had never seen before. "Sharon, I met someone. I think I'm really falling for her!"

It wasn't me.

Seeing him so ecstatic was a brutal wake-up call. The last two decades of our lives had never sparked real romantic love in him. The lingering hugs, the intertwined hands, to Michael, they were just the perks of having a best friend.

You cannot force a heart to feel something it doesn't. And I refused to humiliate myself by begging.

So, I gathered up my feelings and locked them away.

To the absolute shock of our social circle, Michael started dating a girl from a very ordinary, middle-class suburb. She was undeniably pretty, with a spoiled, slightly demanding streak that proved she was her parents' pampered princess.

He paraded her around, introducing her to every single person in our elite bubble.

My presence suddenly became a very awkward elephant in the room.

Our mutual friends didn't buy it. They placed bets on when the novelty would wear off, convinced that once Michael got bored of playing tourist in a normal life, he would realize I was the one he belonged with.

"Don't stress it, Sharon," a friend whispered to me over martinis. "He's just fascinated by the naive, girl-next-door routine. Give it a few months. He'll get sick of it."

He didn't.

Michael stayed with her for two solid years. He flashed his new relationship all over town, making sure everyone knew, including my parents and his.

My father was furious enough to march over to the Prescott estate and give them a piece of his mind.

My mother had to physically block the door. "If they don't want the match, we walk away gracefully. Why make a scene? Do you honestly think our daughter is going to lack suitors?"

"That is not the point!" my father thundered.

When the families had first discussed the marriage, Michael wasn't a child. He knew about it. He had, at the very least, offered silent consent. Even if we hadn't made it official, we were a hair's breadth away from an engagement. It was only because my mother thought we were too young that she gave us time to date properly.

By flaunting this new girl, he wasn't just breaking my heart. He was publicly slapping the Astor family in the face.

Still, on the surface, Michael and I remained friends. Our families had hundreds of millions tied up in joint ventures. We had to keep up appearances.

But friends were all we would ever be.

Which brings us to tonight. Michael booked a massive VIP lounge at an exclusive club downtown for his birthday, inviting half the city's young elite.

I was on the guest list.

And naturally, so was his girlfriend, Sophie.