Chapter 1

Tomorrow was supposed to be my wedding day.

I stood outside the bathroom door, a cold feeling spreading through my chest. I could hear sounds from inside, low and rhythmic.

I opened the door without knocking.

Liam Harrison, my fiancé, the man I' d known since we were kids in foster care, was standing there. His back was to me, his hand moving quickly inside his pants.

A name escaped his lips, a breathy, desperate moan.

"Ashley..."

My blood ran cold. Ashley Peterson. The girl who had made our lives a living hell in high school. The one who called him a "freak" and poured scalding coffee all over his cheap shirt because he accidentally bumped into her.

He said her name again, a sound of pure pleasure, and my heart shattered into a million tiny pieces. I felt like I couldn't breathe, like the floor had dropped out from under me.

His phone, sitting on the bathroom counter, suddenly buzzed to life. The screen lit up with the very name he' d just moaned.

Ashley Peterson.

Liam jumped, startled, zipping up his pants with fumbling hands. He grabbed the phone, his back still to me, and answered.

"Ashley?"

Her voice was sharp and loud, even through the phone. "Liam, where' s my birthday cake? You promised."

"I'm on my way to get it now," he said, his voice instantly changing, becoming softer, almost pleading.

"You better be. Don't think for a second that just because you' re marrying that pathetic little charity case, you can forget about me," she spat.

I stood frozen in the doorway, a ghost in my own home. He hadn't even noticed me.

"I won't forget, Ashley. I'll be right there," Liam promised.

He hung up and turned, finally seeing me. His face went pale, then quickly smoothed over into a mask of calm. It was a look I knew well, the one he used to hide things.

"Chloe, honey. I was just... checking a work email."

The lie was so blatant, so insulting, it left me speechless. My throat was tight, and no words would come out.

He walked past me, grabbing his car keys from the bowl by the door. "I have to run a quick errand. For work. I'll be back soon."

I didn't say a word. I just watched him go.

Once his car pulled out of the driveway, I grabbed my own keys. I followed him.

He drove across town, not towards his office, but towards the fancy part of the city, to a bakery that sold cakes for hundreds of dollars.

I parked across the street and watched. My mind drifted back to our past. We were just two scared kids in the system, bounced from one foster home to another. We only had each other. When we got a scholarship to an elite private school, it felt like a dream, but it quickly became a nightmare.

Ashley Peterson and her rich friends made sure of that. They targeted us relentlessly. They called us "gutter rats." They "accidentally" tripped us in the halls. They tore up our homework. Liam, being quieter and more sensitive, got the worst of it.

I was always the one who stood up for him. I took the punches, both verbal and physical. I was the one who cleaned the coffee off his shirt that day, my own hands shaking with rage while he cried silently in the janitor's closet.

"One day, Chloe," he had whispered to me then, his face buried in my shoulder. "One day, I'll make them all pay. Especially her."

And he did. Or so I thought. He became a tech billionaire. His face was on magazine covers. Ashley's family, meanwhile, lost everything in a bad investment. Their empire crumbled.

He hired her as his personal assistant. He told me it was the ultimate revenge, to have her at his beck and call, serving him coffee. I believed him.

But then I found his old journals. Hidden in a box in the back of his closet. I read them one night, my curiosity getting the better of me. The pages weren't filled with plans for revenge. They were filled with Ashley.

Ashley looked at me today. She called me a freak. I hate her. I want her.

She smiled today. Not at me. But I saw it. My heart won't stop pounding.

I want to own her. I want her to look at only me. Even if she's screaming at me.

I felt sick reading it. I realized his obsession wasn't about revenge. It was a dark, twisted desire that had been festering since he was a teenager.

Now, watching him walk out of the bakery with a ridiculously expensive cake, that sickness returned, coiling in my stomach.

He met Ashley in the parking lot. She looked impatient, tapping her foot. He handed her the cake with a hopeful smile.

She didn't even thank him. She just opened the box and looked at the cake.

"It's my birthday tomorrow, Liam," she said, her voice carrying across the quiet lot. "I have a wish."

"Anything," he said instantly.

"Ditch the wedding. Don't marry her. That's my wish."

He stiffened. For a moment, I saw a flicker of conflict on his face. "Ashley, I can't do that."

"Why not?" she whined, stepping closer, placing a hand on his chest. "You don't love her. You love me. You know you do."

He didn't answer. He just stood there, letting her touch him.

"Do it for me, Liam," she purred, her voice dripping with poison. "It's my birthday. You wouldn't want to make me sad on my birthday, would you?"

I watched, my heart turning to ice, as he slowly, almost imperceptibly, nodded.

A single tear rolled down my cheek. Then another. I felt nothing but a vast, hollow emptiness.

I drove away before they could see me. My phone rang. It was the bridal shop, calling to confirm the final fitting for my dress tomorrow morning.

"Cancel it," I said, my voice flat and dead.

"Excuse me, Ms. Miller?" the woman on the other end asked, confused.

"I said, cancel the order. Cancel the wedding. It's over."

I hung up the phone and kept driving, with no destination in mind. I just needed to get away. Away from him. Away from this life that had been built on a foundation of lies.