Chapter 1

The day of my SATs, a day that was supposed to be my first step toward freedom, started with a slap.

A thunderstorm had turned the dirt roads of our Texas ranch into a river of mud. The testing center was twenty miles away, an impossible distance to walk.

"Dad, I need fifty dollars for an Uber," I said, my voice barely a whisper. "Please."

My father, Matthew Jones, the self-made oil tycoon who preached about pulling yourself up by your own bootstraps, didn' t even look up from his newspaper.

"Fifty dollars? Do you think money grows on trees, Gabrielle?"

"It' s the SATs. I can' t miss it."

That' s when he stood up. The slap was hard and fast, the sound of it echoing in the cavernous living room. My cheek stung, a hot, shameful brand.

"Lazy and entitled," he spat. "When I was your age, I walked five miles to school in the snow, uphill both ways. You want a ride? Use your legs."

He snatched the worn leather wallet from my hand, the one that held the seventeen dollars I had painstakingly saved over six months. He emptied it onto the marble-topped table and pocketed the cash.

"Now get out. And don' t come back until you' ve learned the value of a dollar."

My older brother, Andrew, the one who used to braid my hair when I was a little girl, stood by the fireplace, his arms crossed. He watched the whole thing happen, his face a mask of cold indifference. He was Molly' s protector now, not mine.

My mother, Jennifer, was upstairs, probably admiring the new diamond bracelet Matthew had bought her. She wouldn' t have cared anyway. My return ten years after my kidnapping had only ever been a painful reminder of a trauma she wanted to forget.

I walked out into the storm without another word. The rain soaked through my thin jacket in seconds, cold and miserable. As I trudged toward the main road, my boots sinking into the mud, I passed the giant electronic billboard at the edge of our property.

It was usually reserved for oil price tickers. Today, it was a news report.

A live feed from a local TV station showed my parents and Andrew, smiling, standing on a stage at the city' s art museum. The headline scrolled across the bottom of the screen: "Jones Family Donates One Million Dollars to Arts Program."

The reporter' s voice, tinny through the rain, explained the reason for their generosity.

"The donation was made in honor of their daughter, Molly Smith, to celebrate her recent achievement in her high school art class."

I stopped, the rain plastering my hair to my face, and stared at the screen.

A C+.

They donated a million dollars because my adopted sister, the girl who had replaced me in their hearts, got a C+ in art.

And they had just slapped me and kicked me out for asking for a fifty-dollar ride to the most important exam of my life.

I stood there for a long time, letting the cold seep into my bones, until the image of their smiling faces burned itself into my mind. The rain washed away the tears I didn' t even realize I was crying.

Defeated, I finally reached the testing center. The heavy glass doors were locked. A sign taped to the inside read: "Testing in Progress. No Late Admittance."

I looked down at the soggy admission ticket clutched in my hand. For years, this piece of paper had been my everything. It was my ticket out, my escape from this family that treated me like a stray they had reluctantly taken in.

Slowly, deliberately, I tore the ticket into tiny pieces and let the rain carry them away.

In that moment, something inside me broke. Or maybe, it finally healed.

I pulled out my cheap, cracked phone, the one I' d had to beg for, and dialed the only number that had ever offered me a real lifeline.

"Dr. Fuller?"

My high school physics teacher' s voice was warm and concerned. "Gabrielle? Are you okay? You sound..."

"I' m fine," I said, my own voice surprisingly calm and clear. "Dr. Fuller, about that early admission scholarship to MIT you told me about... is the offer still on the table?"

"Of course, it is! They' d be crazy to let you go. But I thought your family wanted you to stay in Texas?"

I looked back in the direction of the ranch, at the life I was leaving behind.

"I' ll accept it," I said. "I' m ready to leave."