Chapter 1

I was dying of cancer when my destructive ex, Brooks Ferguson, returned to Seattle. The first thing he did was demolish my late father's record store.

But his new fiancée, Grace, delivered the final blow. With a vicious smile, she cornered me and poured my mother's ashes onto the filthy street.

I snapped. I rammed my vintage Mustang into her convertible-twice. I woke up in the hospital, coughing up blood, just in time to see Brooks on the news.

"When I find her," he snarled to the cameras, "I' m going to enjoy breaking every single bone in her body."

He had no idea the cancer, accelerated by his cruelty, was already killing me.

He wanted my body? Fine. I refused all treatment and arranged for the hospital to call him. My final revenge wasn't to fight him. It was to die and make him claim the corpse of the woman he destroyed.

Chapter 1

Dahlia POV:

Brooks Ferguson and I had a ten-year history of mutual destruction, a storm of passion that left us both scarred. We were each other' s greatest love and greatest source of pain. We' d finally called a truce three years ago, a fragile peace I clung to as my world quietly fell apart. Then, he came back to Seattle.

And the first thing he did was set my world on fire.

Figuratively, at first. A notice from the city, cold and official, declaring my record store, "The Groove," a historical hazard slated for demolition. My store. The last gift from my father.

The second thing he did was far more literal. He sent his goons. They didn't just smash the windows; they shattered the display cases, snapped vintage vinyls in half, and kicked over the espresso machine until it hissed its last breath.

I found the man who led the demolition crew, a brute with a smug grin, and I broke his nose with a rusted tire iron I kept behind the counter.

He spat blood on the floor. "He said you'd do something like this."

Brooks arrived minutes later, stepping out of a gleaming Porsche, looking impeccable in a suit that cost more than my entire inventory. He tossed a check at my feet. "For the damages," he said, his voice a low, bored drawl. "And for your trouble."

I didn' t pick it up.

"It's not enough, is it?" he mused, a cruel smile playing on his lips. "You always want more, Dahlia."

I wanted to tell him that what I wanted was peace. A quiet end. But the fire in me, the one he always loved to stoke, wouldn't let me be a passive victim. Not even now.

Not when the doctors had already told me there was no more time.

The fluorescent lights of the hospital hallway flickered, casting a sickly yellow glow on everything. I leaned against the cool wall, the paper cup of water trembling in my hand. Two nurses walked past, their voices low whispers.

"The one in 302. Dahlia Jarvis. Poor thing."

"So young. The aggressive kind, you know. The scans are just... covered. It' s a miracle she's even walking."

Their voices faded, but one last sentence snagged in the air, sharp and clear. "No family listed. Who's going to claim her body?"

Who's going to claim my body?

The question echoed in the sterile silence. It was a practical problem, a final, grim piece of paperwork in a life about to be stamped 'closed'. I looked down at my phone, my thumb hovering over a number I hadn't dialed in three years. A number I knew by heart.

I pressed call.

He answered on the second ring, his voice impatient. "What?"

A bleak, ironic smile touched my lips. "Brooks," I said, my own voice sounding distant and hollow. "I have a request."

"I'm listening."

"When I die," I said, the words tasting like ash, "I need you to claim my body."

The rain fell in relentless sheets, blurring the city lights outside the new, temporary space I' d rented for The Groove. It was smaller, cleaner, and had none of the soul of the old place. I wiped down the counter, the smell of fresh paint and cheap coffee a poor substitute for worn wood and vinyl dust.

The small TV in the corner was on, the volume low. A local news anchor was gushing about Seattle' s returning titan of industry.

"Brooks Ferguson, the private equity magnate, is back in his hometown with a bang, announcing a multi-billion dollar urban renewal project..."

The screen showed him at a press conference, looking every bit the ruthless king he was.

The bell on the door chimed, and a young woman stepped in, shaking a designer umbrella. She was flawless, her trench coat immaculate, her blonde hair styled into effortless waves. She looked like she' d stepped out of an Instagram feed.

"Oh, wow," she said, her bright eyes scanning the rows of records. "This place is amazing. I' m looking for some classic jazz. Coltrane, maybe some Miles Davis."

Before I could answer, the bell chimed again. Carlo Valdez walked in, Brooks's longtime friend and business partner. He looked older, wearier. His eyes met mine for a fraction of a second, a flicker of old familiarity and new tension passing between us.

The young woman didn't notice. "Oh, Carlo, you're here! Brooks said he used to love this kind of music. He told me to pick out something special for tonight." She turned back to me, her smile bright and predatory. "We're having a little celebration."

She gestured around the empty café. "I'd like to book the whole place. Just for a few hours. Brooks is coming, and he loves a good surprise."

A wave of nausea rolled through me, sharp and biting. I gripped the edge of the counter, my knuckles white. The cancer inside me, a quiet, gnawing beast, seemed to stir with agitation. It was getting worse. I could feel it, a constant, dull ache that no amount of pain medication could completely erase. The doctors had confirmed it. The tumors were spreading, defiant and aggressive. Chemotherapy was a battle of attrition I was losing.

The young woman, whose name I now knew was Grace Lawrence from her chattering, was directing Carlo. "Can you help me move this table? I want to set up a little listening station right here. Brooks will love it."

Carlo hesitated, his gaze flicking to me again. He knew the history. He' d seen the screaming matches, the broken dishes, the aftermath of our personal hurricanes.

On the TV, Brooks was still talking. The camera zoomed in on his face. I saw the faint, silvery line of a scar just above his eyebrow.

I remembered putting it there. A thrown whiskey glass during a fight about something I couldn't even recall now. It was one of our last battles, a final, explosive end to a decade of war.

I touched the side of my own ribs, where a faint, puckered scar of my own lay hidden beneath my sweater. A souvenir from him, a shove against a sharp table corner that had required six stitches. We were experts at leaving our marks on each other.

A reporter on the TV asked, "Mr. Ferguson, there are rumors you're back in Seattle not just for business. Is there a personal reason? Are you rekindling an old flame?"

Brooks smiled, a flash of white teeth. "The only flame I'm interested in is a new one." He paused for dramatic effect. "I'm engaged."

Grace, still fussing with the table, let out a little squeal of delight. She looked at Carlo, her eyes shining. "Did you hear that? He's so sweet." She turned her gaze to me, a hint of curiosity in her eyes. "Did you know Brooks long? He never really talks about his past."

My eyes met Carlo' s over her head. His expression was a mixture of apology and exhaustion.

Just then, the bell on the door chimed a third time. Grace gasped and ran to the door, her face lighting up like a Christmas tree. "Brooks!"

He was standing there, holding a large black umbrella over her as she reached up to kiss him. He kissed her back, but I saw it-a fractional hesitation, a slight turn of his head before their lips met.

Our eyes locked through the rain-streaked glass. For a single, charged moment, the city, the rain, and the bubbly blonde fiancée all disappeared. It was just him and me, trapped in the amber of our shared history.

Grace tried to pull him inside, but he held her in place, his hand on her back. He deepened the kiss, his eyes still fixed on mine, a blatant act of defiance, a territorial marking. See? She is mine. You are nothing.

I broke the contact first, turning away, my hands methodically wiping down a counter that was already clean.

Carlo walked over to me, his voice a low murmur. "Dahlia... just... don't. Please. Not for his sake. For yours."

"Don't what, Carlo?" I asked, my voice flat.

"He's not the same. And she's... different," he said, struggling for the right word. "She's polished. Ambitious. She gets what she wants."

"Polished," I repeated, the word tasting strange. I remembered a different kind of girl, one with tangled hair and paint-stained fingers, screaming at him in a thunderstorm. That girl was me. And she was long gone.

The bell chimed again as Brooks and Grace finally stepped inside, bringing a gust of cold, wet air with them.

"Well, well," Brooks's voice cut through the quiet hum of the café, dripping with condescension. "What are we all whispering about? My fiancée, I hope."

His gaze landed on me, sharp and possessive, and I felt the familiar, toxic pull of his gravity. The storm was no longer on the horizon. It was here.

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