Chapter 1 1

The DNA report slid across the polished mahogany surface, the friction of paper against wood the only sound in the cavernous study. It stopped exactly three inches from Aria's hand. She didn't look at the paper. She looked at the man who had thrown it.

Richard Carlisle stood by the fireplace, his silhouette cutting a sharp, unforgiving line against the roaring flames. He wasn't looking at her. He was looking at the girl sobbing softly on the velvet settee.

Vanessa.

She was wearing a Chanel suit that was a size too small, the tweed straining against her shoulders, her face buried in her hands. The sobbing was rhythmic, practiced. A performance designed for an audience of two.

"I didn't mean to," Vanessa choked out, her voice thick with manufactured guilt. "I didn't want to ruin everything. I can leave. I should leave."

Richard turned then, his eyes cold and hard, like flint.

"Stop it, Vanessa. You aren't going anywhere. You belong here."

He turned that flinty gaze onto Aria.

"But you," he said, the words dropping like stones into deep water. "You need to leave. Tonight. Before the press gets wind of this. Before the stock prices dip."

Aria sat perfectly still. Her heart didn't race. Her palms didn't sweat. This was a reaction she had trained out of herself years ago, a survival mechanism honed in the shark tank of the Carlisle estate. She felt a strange, hollow sensation in her chest, not of loss, but of release. Like a corset being unlaced after seventeen years of suffocation.

She stood up. The legs of her chair scraped against the hardwood floor, a harsh, screeching sound that made Eleanor Carlisle flinch. Eleanor was sitting next to Vanessa, staring out the window at the manicured gardens, refusing to acknowledge the girl she had called daughter for nearly two decades.

"I'll pack," Aria said. Her voice was steady. Flat.

Ten minutes later, she descended the grand staircase.

She wasn't dragging the Louis Vuitton trunk Richard had doubtless expected. She wasn't carrying the limited-edition Birkin bags or the jewelry boxes filled with diamonds bought to buy her silence after bruised ribs or broken promises.

She carried a single, black tactical backpack. It was deceptively heavy, reinforced at the bottom to hold the weight of a high-density server laptop and compressed survival gear. The fabric was worn at the seams, the zippers scuffed. It looked like something pulled from a dumpster behind an army surplus store.

Richard frowned, his lip curling in distaste.

"Is this a joke?" he asked, gesturing to the bag. "Are you playing the martyr? Trying to squeeze a settlement out of us by looking pathetic?"

Aria walked past him. She stopped at the entryway, where a crystal bowl sat on a marble pedestal, usually reserved for keys and outgoing mail.

She reached into the pocket of her jeans. Her fingers brushed against the cool, sleek metal of the Centurion Card. The black card. The symbol of unlimited access, of power, of the Carlisle name.

She pulled it out.

Vanessa peeked through her fingers, her eyes widening. She expected a scene. She expected begging.

Aria held the card between her index and middle finger. With a flick of her wrist, she sent it spinning through the air.

It landed in the crystal bowl with a sharp, resonant clatter. The sound echoed off the high ceilings, louder than a gunshot in the silence of the foyer.

"The pin is the date you first bought me a dress, Mother," Aria said, her voice barely above a whisper, yet carrying to every corner of the room. "August 12th. Ten years ago. Though I doubt any of you remember the year."

Eleanor's shoulders stiffened, but she didn't turn around.

Aria pushed open the heavy oak doors. The wind from the East River hit her face, biting and cold, carrying the scent of impending winter and exhaust fumes. It smelled like freedom.

She stepped over the threshold. The door clicked shut behind her, severing the connection with a finality that vibrated through the soles of her boots.

Outside the iron gates, there was no limousine waiting. No driver. Just a pile of dead leaves swirling on the asphalt.

Aria pulled her phone from her pocket. Her thumb hovered over Sebastian's contact. She pressed block. Then Julian's. Block.

She unwrapped a cheap peppermint candy, the wrapper crinkling loudly in the quiet street, and popped it into her mouth. She bit down, the sharp crunch satisfying against her molars.

Down the street, a sleek black sedan flashed its headlights once. Nate.

Aria shook her head imperceptibly. Not yet. She couldn't show her hand.

Footsteps crunched on the gravel behind her. It was Alfred, the butler, holding a large black umbrella. His face was crumpled with worry.

"Miss Aria," he stammered, holding it out. "It's going to rain. Please."

Aria looked at the umbrella. It had the Carlisle crest on the handle.

"Keep it, Alfred," she said. "I don't want anything that belongs to them."

She turned her back on him and walked toward the streetlamp flickering at the corner.

She walked two blocks down, away from the immediate security perimeter of the estate. A car was idling nervously near a fire hydrant. It wasn't a Mercedes or a Bentley. It was a rusted Ford Taurus, its muffler hanging low, emitting a thin cloud of dark smoke.

The driver was gripping the wheel, his eyes darting to the private security patrol car passing on the adjacent street. He looked terrified of being asked to move.

Frank Miller. Her biological father.