Chapter 1

Because I couldn't let it go, my whole family burned to death.

The boyfriend who had been beside me watching the fireworks one second was ash the next.

Even my best friend, the girl my parents had taken in as their goddaughter, didn't make it out.

Overnight, I had nothing left.

Everyone said it was because I was a lawyer with too many hard edges, that I'd made enemies everywhere.

That I'd brought the slaughter down on us, that every one of those horrible deaths was my fault for dragging them into it.

In the days after, I lived buried in self-blame, until it turned into severe depression.

Another Valentine's Day came around, the very day Mark Stephens had once promised he'd marry me.

I'd already picked out the burial plot for all of us, and I wanted to go to the photo studio for a funeral portrait, so I could spend my death atoning beside them.

But the moment I stepped into the studio, my feet froze where they were.

Behind the glass window, Mark, who was supposed to have died in the fire, stood holding my best friend's hand, posing for their marriage registration photo.

My mind went blank, and I started forward at once to storm in and demand the truth.

A large hand caught my arm. It was Damon Radcliffe, the boy I'd grown up with.

"Bianca Whitman's pregnant. They're happy now."

"If you weren't so vicious, making enemies everywhere, we wouldn't have had to hide from you like this."

My mother hurried out, crying, pleading.

"Lucinda Henson, I'm begging you. They hid for five years just to finally have a peaceful life. Show them some mercy and let them go."

Something dropped away in my chest, and the cold spread out through my arms and legs.

I looked at all those faces standing there, whole and unharmed, and only then did I truly wake up.

So all the pain, all the ways I'd tortured myself, from beginning to end, was nothing but a joke they had deliberately played on me.

……………………

Damon planted himself in front of me, coaxing.

"Lucinda, stop this. Bianca's carrying a child, and the two of them are doing well now. If you force your way in, how are you any different from a mistress?"

My chest clenched hard, and before I could say a word, the phone in my pocket rang.

It was my psychiatrist, Dr. Finch.

I put it on speaker.

"Ms. Henson, your severe depression has worsened lately, and the hallucinations are coming more and more often. I've adjusted your medication plan and increased the dosage. Whatever you do, don't stop taking it on your own."

This Dr. Finch was someone Damon had made a point of "kindly" recommending to me.

At the start I only had mild depression, just couldn't sleep.

But the more I saw the doctor, the worse I got, until the hallucinations came again and again.

Crossing the street after work, in a daze I saw Mark standing on the other side, reaching out to me.

My eyes stung, and I ran toward him without thinking, and a truck came straight at me head-on.

By the time I woke, I was already in the operating room.

The doctors told me my uterus had ruptured, that I'd hemorrhaged badly, and that I'd probably never be able to carry a child again.

Back then I still thought it was my hallucinations acting up, that I'd brought it on myself.

But only now did I see it had never been an accident at all.

I lifted my hand and pulled my shirt up.

The long, jagged surgical scar across my lower belly lay bare in front of everyone.

Mark's gaze slid over it, without a trace of surprise.

"That car crash. I arranged it."

"Only once you couldn't have children could Bianca sleep easy."

He paused, and there was even a hint of charity in his voice.

"You don't need to be afraid, either. The surgeons I hired for you were the best in the field. The stitching was done well. There won't be any lasting damage."

Bianca stepped forward, smiling, and hooked her arm through mine.

"Lucinda, don't blame Mark. It's all my fault. He only lost his head because he was hurting for me."

"I told him long ago he couldn't do this to you, but he wouldn't listen. If you're angry, take it out on me. Don't hold a grudge against Mark, all right?"

I stared at that face of hers, innocent as a little white rabbit, and it suddenly felt like a stranger's.

When I first met her, she was an orphan with no father or mother, and seeing she had nothing to eat, I started bringing her food from home every day.

Afraid she'd be bullied, I looked out for her in everything and invited her to my house to play.

My parents' hearts went out to her, and they took her in as their goddaughter on the spot.

Bianca was so sweet and well-behaved that, somewhere along the way, they came to love her even more than me.

But back then it never occurred to me that from the very beginning, he had gotten close to me only to take everything I had.