Chapter 1

The crystal chandeliers of the Houston Museum of Fine Arts glittered, but all I saw was the reflection of my own failure in a hundred thousand fractured pieces.

Gabby Chadwick, my fiancée, stood on the gala stage, her hand not in mine, but clasped in Tony Johns' s.

Tony. The star quarterback our family foundation had plucked from obscurity and put through Texas University.

"I can' t live a lie," Gabby' s voice, amplified by the microphone, echoed through the stunned silence of Houston' s elite. "My heart belongs to Tony. He' s real. He' s passionate. Ryan... Ryan and I are over."

A camera flash went off, searing the image into my brain: Gabby, beautiful and defiant; Tony, smug and triumphant. And me, Ryan Fowler, son of an oil tycoon, left standing alone in a sea of whispers and pitying looks.

The drive home was silent. The air in the Bentley was thick enough to choke on.

My father, a man who measured life in barrels of crude and political favors, stared straight ahead. My mother, the architect of our family' s social standing, had a single, perfect tear tracing a path down her cheek.

We didn' t speak until we were in my father' s study, the scent of leather and old money a familiar comfort that now felt like a cage.

"This is a disaster," my father' s voice was low, dangerous. "The Chadwick merger was about more than just their failing manufacturing assets. It was about consolidating power."

"Forget the merger, Charles," my mother said, her voice sharp. "Our son has been publicly castrated. We' re a laughingstock."

She turned to me, her eyes no longer soft, but hard as diamonds. "The boy you were, the dependable, respectable heir... that boy is dead. He died on that stage tonight."

My father nodded slowly, a general planning his next campaign. "She' s right. You can' t stay here, Ryan. Not now. You need to disappear."

He walked to his globe, spinning it until his finger landed on the North Sea. "Go to the rigs. Learn the business from the bottom up. Get your hands dirty. Then, London. Learn the market. Learn how money really moves."

He looked at me, his eyes boring into mine. "Don' t just inherit power, son. Build your own. Build something so massive, so ruthless, that when you return, you can crush them without a second thought."

I looked from my father' s cold strategy to my mother' s social blueprint.

"I will," I said, the words tasting like ash in my mouth. "I' ll come back. And I will dismantle everything the Chadwicks have ever built. I will make her regret the day she ever knew my name."