Chapter 1

The closing night curtain fell to thunderous applause, but my world was already silent.

I knelt on one knee, the velvet box open in my hand, the diamond inside catching the last of the stage lights. Before I could even speak the words, she shook her head.

"Ethan, no."

Her voice, usually so sweet, was cold. She was Matthew Blakely' s niece, the rising star I' d fallen for, and I had just made the biggest mistake of my life in front of our entire cast, crew, and a sold-out off-Broadway house.

She didn' t just say no. She twisted the knife.

"I' m in love with someone else," she announced, her voice carrying across the suddenly quiet theater. "His name is Mark, and he' s a producer. Uncle Matthew' s rival."

The humiliation was a physical force, pressing down on me, stealing the air from my lungs. The audience murmured. My castmates stared, frozen in a tableau of shock and pity.

Then, a new voice cut through the haze.

"I' ll take him if you don' t want him."

Nicole Johns, the niece' s aunt, stepped out from the wings. She was elegant, poised, a woman I' d only met in passing. She walked directly to me, ignoring her niece completely.

"I' ve had a crush on you for years, Ethan," she said, her voice a soothing balm. "Let me help you. I have connections. I have money. I can make you a star."

She helped me to my feet, took the ring, and slid it onto her own finger.

That night, she saved me. We were married within a month.

Five years later, I woke up to the smell of antiseptic and the searing, constant pain of my own burning skin.

The on-stage pyrotechnics "accident" had been anything but. It left me with third-degree burns over forty percent of my body.

I was floating in a fog of morphine, but I could hear voices through the haze. Nicole' s voice, sharp and clinical, and a doctor' s deeper tone.

"The only viable skin is on his thigh," the doctor was saying. "We can use it for the primary grafts on his face and hands."

"No," Nicole said, her voice devoid of any emotion. "You' ll take that skin for Mr. Blakely."

I struggled to process the words. Matthew Blakely? The Broadway producer?

"Matthew has a minor cosmetic procedure scheduled," Nicole continued, her tone casual, as if discussing the weather. "He needs a small graft. Any scar on his thigh would be detrimental to his public image. He golfs, you know."

"But Mrs. Clark," the doctor protested, "your husband' s burns are life-threatening. Mr. Blakely' s procedure is elective."

"And my husband won' t be on stage anymore, will he?" Nicole' s words were ice. "For Ethan, use the synthetic skin. The experimental one. It' s cheaper."

The world swam, the sterile white of the hospital room turning a sickening gray. My heart, a muscle I thought had been shattered five years ago on that stage, broke all over again.

With a hand that trembled, I reached for the call button. But I didn't press it. Instead, I fumbled for the cheap, prepaid phone I kept hidden in my bedside drawer.

My fingers, clumsy and wrapped in gauze, slowly typed a number I hadn't dialed in five years.

The number for my family' s ranch in Texas.