Chapter 1

The black Escalade rolled to a stop just outside the massive iron gates of the Hughes family ranch in Texas.

I could see the paparazzi swarm, their cameras flashing like a thousand angry fireflies. TMZ was already live-streaming, their logo a bright red parasite in the corner of my vision.

This was the moment. In my last life, this was where it all began to unravel.

My phone buzzed. It was my agent, panicked. "Stella, what are you doing? Get back in the car. We handle this through lawyers, not by showing up at their front door!"

I ignored him. I was Stella Johns, Nashville's rising star, the "girl-next-door" with a guitar and a sad song. That was the brand. But I was also the long-lost daughter of the late Howard Hughes, the reclusive oil tycoon, a fact his family had just confirmed.

And I was reborn. The woman who was shamed, manipulated, and driven to suicide by these people was dead. I was here to burn their world to the ground.

Nicole Lester, the family's adopted daughter, stepped out of the main house and marched toward the gate. She was a wannabe socialite, all fake tan and designer clothes, her face a mask of practiced contempt. She stopped just inside the gate, a smug queen in her tiny kingdom.

"Stella Johns," she announced, her voice dripping with condescension for the cameras. "Before you even think about setting foot on this property, you need to change. We have a family dress code."

She gestured at my outfit-black leather pants and a fitted top, my standard stage attire. "That... is scandalous. It's exactly the kind of trashy look from that music video you did. The Hughes family has standards."

In my past life, her words had cut me. I was desperate for their approval. I had actually let them take me to a side room and dress me in a plain, ill-fitting dress. The humiliation was the first step in breaking me.

Not this time.

I stepped out of the Escalade, leaving the door open. The cameras went wild. I walked right up to the gate, my heels clicking on the asphalt.

"A dress code?" I said, my voice clear and carrying over the media buzz. "That's funny, Nicole. I've seen your Instagram. The 'dress code' didn't seem to apply to that yacht party in Dubai, did it? Or was that bikini considered formal wear?"

Her face froze. The reporters started shouting questions.

I wasn't finished. "And my music video? The one that won three awards and has fifty million views? You mean the art you're too simple to understand? Let's be clear. You're living in a house my father paid for, trying to lecture me on standards. You have no standards. You just have his money."

The air crackled. Nicole's jaw worked, but no sound came out. She was used to a timid, broken girl. She wasn't prepared for me.