Chapter 4

Ellie POV

My apartment resembled a war zone, a chaotic landscape of cardboard boxes.

I was purging.

Every gift Marcus had ever given me was going. The silk scarf from Hermès. The pearl earrings for my sixteenth birthday. The leather-bound journal.

I threw them all into a box addressed to the Thorne Estate in Arizona. I didn't want them. They were heavy with memories I couldn't afford to carry anymore.

"Hey, Ellie?"

My roommate, a bubbly Italian girl named Sofia, hovered in the doorframe. "Are you okay? You've been packing for hours."

"I'm fine," I said, sealing the box shut with aggressive rips of the dispenser. "Just cleaning house."

"Did you hear?" she asked, leaning further into the room. "Someone said Marcus Thorne is expanding his business to Europe. Chloe gave an interview saying they might honeymoon in Paris."

"Good for them," I said. My voice was flat, devoid of emotion.

"He really took care of you, didn't he?" Sofia said, her tone dangerously innocent. "Paying for all this."

"He was paying for his conscience," I snapped.

She flinched at my tone. "Sorry."

"No, I'm sorry," I sighed, rubbing my temples. "I'm just... tired."

I turned back to my desk. There was one photo left. It was hidden under my textbooks. Me and Marcus, three years ago, watching the sunset in the desert. The light was golden, and he was looking at me with something that resembled pride.

I picked it up.

It hurt. It physically hurt, like a knife twisting in my gut.

I remembered that day. He had told me I was smart. He had told me I had a good eye for beauty.

Lies. All of it.

If he thought I was beautiful, he wouldn't have shipped me off like expired goods.

I took the photo in both hands and ripped it down the middle. I tore it again and again until his face was just shreds of paper in my trash can.

A knock at the door shattered the silence. It was a courier.

"Package for Ms. Ellie."

I signed for it. It was a box from Arizona. From him.

My heart hammered against my ribs. Had he sent a letter? An apology?

I opened it with trembling fingers.

Inside, wrapped carelessly in old newspaper, was my "Desert Flower" sculpture. It was a clumsy clay piece I had made when I was twelve. It was the only thing I had left of my childhood artistic dreams. I had left it on the mantle in the library.

He had sent it back.

He hadn't even used bubble wrap. One of the petals was chipped.

He was scrubbing me out of his house. He didn't want a single trace of me left in his sanctuary.

I looked at the chipped clay. It looked pathetic. Just like me.

He didn't know me. He thought this was just some trinket. He didn't know that I made this the day after my parents' funeral because I needed to create something that wouldn't die.

"You know nothing, Marcus," I whispered to the empty room.

I threw the newspaper on the floor.

My phone buzzed on the desk. An email from his assistant.

Mr. Thorne suggests you take business electives. He expects you to be useful to the company when you return.

Useful.

He wanted a secretary. A subordinate.

I laughed. It was a dry, harsh sound.

"No," I said.

I walked to the calendar on the wall. I circled the date of my graduation with bold, angry strokes.

I clenched my fists until my nails dug into my palms. The pain grounded me.

I wasn't going back to be his assistant. I wasn't going back to be his ward.

I was going back to settle the debt. I would pay him back every cent he spent on me. And then I would walk away forever.

I grabbed the chipped sculpture and placed it deliberately on my desk. It wasn't a keepsake anymore.

It was a reminder.