Chapter 2 2

Waking up was not like in the movies. There was no slow flutter of eyelashes. There was just a sudden, violent return to consciousness, accompanied by a throbbing pain behind her eyes.

Dahlia gasped. She tried to open her eyes, but they wouldn't open. There was weight. heavy, coarse gauze wrapped tight around her head.

Panic, sharp and primal, spiked in her chest. She sat up too fast. Her hand flailed out, seeking an anchor.

Crash.

Her fingers swept a glass off the bedside table. The sound of shattering glass echoed in the small room. It sounded like an explosion.

She froze. She waited for the yelling. In the foster homes before Gertie, breaking something meant shouting. It meant no dinner.

But there was only silence.

Hello? she rasped. Her throat was dry, like she had swallowed sand.

No one answered.

She pulled her hand back, curling her knees to her chest. She was blind. She was alone. And she had made a mess.

Slowly, the memories reassembled themselves. The surgery. The cab. The lie to her mother.

She sat there in the dark, breathing through the pain. Her mind, untethered by visual input, drifted backward. It landed on the day the Douglas family found her.

She had been twenty-two. Waitressing at a diner in Jersey.

They brought her to the estate. The carpets were Persian. Thick enough to drown in. Don Douglas, her biological father, had handed her a cup of tea. He looked at her not like a long-lost daughter, but like an accountant looking at a tax write-off.

Annabella, the sister she never knew she had, floated down the stairs. She was perfect. Blonde, polished, radiant. She hugged Dahlia, and the smell of Chanel No. 5 was suffocating.

You're so... rustic, Annabella had whispered in her ear.

Dahlia shook her head, trying to dislodge the memory. The movement made the pain in her eyes flare.

The door to her hospital room opened. Rubber soles on linoleum.

Oh, look at this mess, a voice said. It wasn't unkind, just tired. A nurse.

I'm sorry, Dahlia said. I didn't know where the table was.

The nurse sighed. I'll get a broom. Stay in the bed.

Stay in the bed. Just like the contract.

Dahlia remembered the day she signed it. The conference room in Midtown. A table made of mahogany that was longer than her entire apartment.

Clive Harrington sat at the head. The sun was behind him, turning him into a silhouette. He didn't speak to her. He spoke to his lawyers.

Page 45, paragraph 3. No claim to assets acquired prior to the union. Page 80, paragraph 12. No cohabitation requirement.

Then, he had looked at her. It was the only time.

Sign it, and your foster mother gets the best oncologists in the state. Sloan Kettering. Private care.

He said it like a transaction. Because it was.

Dahlia had picked up the pen. She didn't read the rest. She just signed. At that moment, she respected Clive more than she respected her own parents. He was honest about his coldness. He didn't pretend it was love.

Back in the hospital bed, Dahlia fumbled for the call button cord. She found it and pressed it against her palm.

She needed water. She needed to take the painkillers.

Her phone buzzed again. She located it by sound, sliding her finger across the screen.

Voice message. Gia. Her only friend.

Dahlia, tell me you aren't actually at that stupid charity gala tonight. I swear, if I see one more picture of your mother wearing that hideous emerald necklace... anyway, call me. How are the eyes?

Dahlia smiled weakly. She tapped the voice memo button.

Hey, Gia. I'm good. Surgery went fine. Just... dark. I'm pretending I'm in a sensory deprivation tank at a spa. Very chic.

She sent it. A lie. But a kind one.

She needed to use the bathroom. The nurse hadn't come back yet.

Dahlia swung her legs over the side of the bed. Her feet touched the cold floor. She reached out, her hands swimming in the empty air.

She stood up. The dizziness hit her like a wave. She swayed.

She took a step. Then another.

Her shin connected hard with something metal. A chair leg.

Ah!

She bit her lip to stifle the cry. Tears pricked behind the bandages, stinging the fresh incisions. She rubbed her shin.

She felt pathetic.

She thought about Clive. He was probably in London. Or Tokyo. Moving millions of dollars with a phone call. He walked through the world with absolute certainty. He never bumped into furniture in the dark.

She found the wall. The cool plaster was grounding. She traced it until she felt the doorframe of the bathroom.

Success.

Later, back in bed, she lay listening to the sounds of the hospital. The squeak of carts. The distant chime of the elevator.

Outside in the hallway, two nurses were talking.

Did you see who just came up to the VIP floor?

Yeah. Looked like a Harrington. The suit alone cost more than my car.

Dahlia's heart skipped a beat.

Harrington?

No. Impossible.

Clive was in London. The Financial Times said so. He was closing the deal on the lithium mines.

It must be a cousin. Or maybe she was hallucinating from the anesthesia.

She rolled over, burying her face in the pillow.

Just sleep, Dahlia. He isn't coming. He doesn't even know you're here.

And that was exactly how she wanted it.