Chapter 1

The air in the Miller family living room was thick and heavy. It felt hard to breathe. I stood in the center of the room, a defendant in a trial I didn't know was happening. The plush, cream-colored carpet felt like quicksand under my worn-out sneakers.

Across from me, on a massive white sofa, sat my adoptive parents, Richard and Eleanor Miller. Their faces were cold, carved from expensive stone. They didn't look at me, they looked through me, their eyes fixed on a point somewhere over my shoulder.

Beside them, my adoptive brother, Brandon, looked genuinely distressed. His handsome face was a perfect mask of concern and disappointment. He was the golden child, the one they had chosen, the one who fit perfectly into their world of galas and board meetings.

"Alex, how could you?" Brandon' s voice was soft, laced with a pain that was so well-acted it was almost believable. "I trusted you. We all trusted you."

He gestured to a stack of papers on the polished mahogany coffee table. They were printouts of emails and data logs, all expertly forged to show that I, Alex Miller, had sold company secrets from MillerTech to a competitor.

"This is a mistake," I said, my voice hoarse. It was the first thing I' d said in ten minutes. "I didn' t do this."

"A mistake?" my adoptive father, Richard, finally spoke. His voice was a low growl, the kind he used to terminate multi-million dollar deals. "This isn' t a mistake, Alex. This is betrayal. This is corporate espionage."

My former fiancée, Sarah Jenkins, stood near the fireplace. She looked beautiful in a dress that probably cost more than my rent for a year. She wouldn't meet my eyes.

"I can' t believe I was going to marry you," she said, her voice dripping with disgust. "A traitor. A common thief."

She took off the engagement ring I' d saved for two years to buy and placed it on the mantelpiece as if it were contaminated.

Then came the final blow. My adoptive sister, Chloe, held up her phone, its screen glowing. She was already live-streaming.

"Hey everyone," she said to her millions of followers, a sad little pout on her face. "So, something awful has happened. My brother, Alex... well, it turns out he' s not who we thought he was."

Humiliation washed over me, hot and suffocating. It was a perfectly orchestrated execution, and I was the guest of honor.

Brandon stood up and walked over to me. He placed a hand on my shoulder, his grip surprisingly strong.

"I' m sorry, Alex," he whispered, for my ears only. "But you were always in the way."

Then he shoved me. Hard. I stumbled backward, tripping over an ottoman and crashing onto the floor. A sharp pain shot through my wrist as I tried to break my fall. The collective gasp in the room was performative.

My mother, Eleanor, finally looked at me, her expression one of pure revulsion. "Get him out of here, Richard. I can' t stand to look at him."

Richard nodded grimly. "It' s been decided, Alex. You' ve brought shame on this family for the last time. You' re disowned. Your shares in the company are forfeited."

I pushed myself up, my wrist screaming in protest. I looked at their faces, one by one. The cold father, the disgusted mother, the triumphant brother, the scornful ex-fiancée, the influencer sister using my downfall for content. There was no family here. Not for me.

"We' ve also made arrangements," Richard continued, his tone final. "We can' t have you on the streets, tarnishing the Miller name. A friend of ours, a Dr. Reed, runs a private wellness retreat. A place for... difficult individuals. You' ll be sent there. Indefinitely."

He said it like a death sentence. A lifetime of isolation. A punishment designed to break me.

The room was silent, waiting for my reaction. They expected me to beg, to cry, to protest. They wanted to see me broken.

A strange feeling bubbled up inside me. It wasn' t despair. It wasn' t anger. It was relief.

A slow smile spread across my face. It must have looked insane.

"A wellness retreat?" I asked, my voice surprisingly steady. "Away from all of this? No work? No family obligations?"

I looked Richard straight in the eye.

"Thank you," I said, my smile widening. "Honestly. Thank you."

The silence in the room was no longer thick, it was sharp. Brandon' s perfect mask of sorrow twitched, a crack in the facade. Sarah' s mouth was slightly agape. Chloe lowered her phone, her brow furrowed in confusion.

My father stared at me, his eyes narrowed. He had expected a plea for mercy, not gratitude. He had sentenced me to exile, and I was acting like he' d just handed me a winning lottery ticket.

"This isn' t a vacation, Alex," he snapped, his composure slipping.

"I know," I said, still smiling. "It' s better. It' s freedom."

I looked around the ridiculously expensive room, at the people who had made my life a quiet hell of never being good enough. They had tried to cage me, but in their arrogance, they had just handed me the key. They thought they were sending me to a prison. I knew they were sending me on a paid vacation. A long, long vacation from them. And I couldn't wait for it to start.

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