Chapter 2

"Since when have men and women played by the same rules? Stop making trouble over nothing."

I had nothing left to say.

I turned to leave, but Adriel reached out to stop me.

Before he could touch me, Adam Aldridge slammed his palm against the table.

"Let her go!"

His voice thundered through the room.

"A woman who's lived under my son's protection all these years suddenly thinks she has pride? Fine. Walk out that door. Just don't come crawling back when you realize no other Family wants you."

This time, Adriel listened.

He didn't follow me.

The cold night wind struck my face as I stepped outside the Aldridge estate, sharp enough to remind me of the winter when I first met him.

Back then, Adriel Aldridge was nothing more than the son of a declining Family.

The Aldridges still had their name, but little else.

My closest friend had warned me about him.

"Adriel? The Aldridge boy who spends all his time trying to rebuild what his father lost?"

"Half the daughters from the smaller Families have tried to get his attention. He doesn't even look at them. He says he doesn't have time for women when he's trying to keep his Family alive."

"If you're planning to chase him, good luck."

But I liked him anyway.

So I hid the truth about who I was.

Instead of telling him I was the Ashbourne heir, I introduced myself as a distant relative from an insignificant branch of the Family.

Then I found every excuse I could to stay close to him.

Behind his back, I quietly paid off some of the Aldridge Family's debts. I used my father's connections to introduce Adriel to powerful capos, secured invitations to private gatherings he never would have entered on his own, and made sure doors opened whenever he needed them to.

I rejected every marriage alliance my father arranged for me and poured ten years of my life into Adriel.

Eventually, believing I came from a background not much different from his own, Adriel accepted me.

After we became engaged, my father's influence helped him gain a place inside the Ashbourne organization.

I could have lived at one of the Ashbourne estates, surrounded by guards and servants.

Instead, I chose a small villa near Aldridge territory because Adriel said he wanted to build his own future without relying on anyone.

For a while, we were genuinely happy.

On mornings when I refused to get out of bed, Adriel would pull me into his arms and laugh while trying to wake me.

At night, we would buy groceries from the little Italian market a few blocks away and cook dinner together.

Sometimes we spent hours on the couch, my head against his shoulder while he fed me slices of fruit from his plate.

I once believed that was what the rest of my life would look like.

Then Amara came back to the city.

Everything changed.

She became the center of Adriel's attention.

The first car he bought after finally earning his own money had barely been in our garage for a week before the passenger seat became Amara's.

Whenever I reached for the door, Adriel would stop me.

"Amara gets carsick in the back. Our villa isn't far anyway. Walking will do you good."

So I walked.

Then one night, after leaving a Family-owned club alone, I realized a man had been following me for three blocks.

I called Adriel with trembling hands.

"Someone's following me. Come get me."

There was a brief silence before he answered.

"I can't."

"Amara isn't feeling well. I'm heading to her place."

My grip tightened around the phone.

"Adriel, I'm telling you someone is following me."

"And I'm telling you Amara needs me."

His voice turned impatient.

"Can you stop turning everything into a competition with her?"

The call ended.

Minutes later, the man came at me.

I fought him in a dark alley, terrified and desperate.

When his hand closed around my throat, I grabbed a loose brick from beside a dumpster and swung with everything I had.

Blood splattered across my face.

By the time Ashbourne men arrived, I was sitting against the wall with shaking hands, staring at the blood on my dress.

Adriel never came.

The next morning, after I finished giving my statement to the Family's attorney, I saw Amara's latest Instagram Story.

Two first-class tickets lay beside a glass of champagne.

The destination was the Maldives.

Her caption read:

[Was feeling awful, so my favorite brother decided I needed a vacation. Best brother in the world.]

I stared at the photo for a long time.

The Maldives.

The place I had asked Adriel to take me countless times.

Every time, he gave me the same answer.

"We're getting married soon, Azalea. We should be saving money, not wasting it on vacations."

Apparently, saving money only mattered when it came to me.

For Amara, there were always exceptions.

I closed my eyes and slowly wiped away the tears gathering at the corners.

Then I remembered all those years of visiting the Aldridge estate.

I had helped Adelina prepare dinners, chosen gifts for Adam, and done everything I could to make his Family accept me.

Yet every time Amara visited, Adelina would take the old Aldridge sapphire bracelet from the safe and slip it onto her wrist.

Then she would sigh.

"If only you and Adriel had ended up together. You would have made such a perfect match."

I had heard it more times than I could count.

And every time, I told myself it didn't matter.

As long as Adriel loved me, I could endure it.

One insult.

One humiliation.

One disappointment after another.

I thought loving someone meant learning how to compromise.

But I couldn't do it anymore.

If the Aldridges had never considered me one of their own, then there was no reason for me to keep sacrificing myself to become one.

I had spent ten years choosing Adriel.

From now on, I would choose myself.

I returned to the villa we shared, intending to pack my belongings and leave that night.

But when I entered the security code, the lock flashed red.

Wrong code.

I tried again.

Still wrong.

I frowned and entered the numbers a third time.

Access denied.

Just as I pulled out my phone to call Adriel, I heard footsteps on the other side.

A second later, the lock clicked.

The door opened from inside.