Chapter 2

Three weeks later. Vermont.

The clinic was worse than I remembered. Peeling paint, a roof that leaked in four places, and a waiting room that smelled like mildew and old grief.

My mother had run this place for twenty years, treating farmers, loggers, anyone who couldn't afford the hospital forty miles south. She'd died here, in the back office, a heart attack at fifty-three. Alone. Because I'd been in Manhattan, playing wife to Alexander Steele, too busy performing perfection to come home.

I scrubbed the floors on my hands and knees the first day. It felt right. Penance.

The pregnancy test sat on the bathroom sink upstairs, two pink lines screaming at me.

I hadn't told anyone. I wouldn't.

If Alexander knew, he'd come for the child. Not for me — never for me — but for the Steele heir. And he'd bring Vivienne, and the lawyers, and the full crushing weight of a family whose fortune was built on taking what they wanted.

My phone rang. Unknown number.

"Sera Voss?" A woman's voice, crisp, professional.

"Who's asking?"

"My name is Dr. Lena Park. I'm a geologist with NovaCorp Energy. I've been trying to reach the owner of the Voss property in Hartfield, Vermont, for six months."

"You've reached her."

A pause. "Ms. Voss, are you aware of what's beneath your land?"

"Rocks, presumably."

A short laugh. "Lithium, Ms. Voss. A substantial deposit. Possibly the largest undeveloped reserve on the Eastern Seaboard. We'd like to discuss a partnership."

The number she quoted made my knees buckle.

I sat on the clinic floor, phone pressed to my ear, and for the first time in weeks, I laughed. A real laugh, raw and slightly hysterical.

Alexander had called this place worthless. He'd tossed it to me like a bone to a stray dog.

And it was worth billions.

The universe, it seemed, had a vicious sense of humor.

"I'll think about it," I told Dr. Park, and hung up.

That night, I sat on the clinic's sagging porch, a cup of tea growing cold in my hands, and stared at the dark hills.

My phone buzzed. A text from a number I'd blocked but that kept finding new ways through.

Vivienne.

Alex proposed tonight! Can you believe it? I said YES obviously. The wedding will be in June. At the Steele estate. In the garden where you two got married. Hope that's not weird lol. Love you sis! 💍

Attached: a photo of Vivienne, radiant, holding up her hand. On her finger, the five-generation Steele emerald.

I stared at the photo until my tea went cold.

June. The garden. My garden. My ring.

I deleted the text. Then I undeleted it. Then I screenshotted it and saved it to a folder labeled "Reasons."

The baby fluttered. Too early for real movement, the books said. But I felt it. A tiny defiance.

"It's just us now," I whispered, my hand on my stomach. "And we're going to be just fine."

The next morning, I called Dr. Park back.

"I don't want a partnership," I said. "I want full ownership of the extraction rights, with NovaCorp as a contracted operator. Non-negotiable."

A stunned silence. "Ms. Voss, that's... highly unusual."

"So is finding out you're a billionaire in a gas station bathroom," I said. "Do we have a deal?"

We had a deal.

I hired a lawyer. Not a Manhattan shark — a quiet, brilliant woman from Burlington named Margot Chen, who specialized in resource rights and had a personal vendetta against corporate overreach.

"Keep my name out of everything," I told her. "Shell company. Offshore holding. I don't exist."

Margot raised an eyebrow. "Running from someone?"

"Building a fortress," I corrected. "There's a difference."

Over the following weeks, I rebuilt. The clinic first — new roof, new equipment, a proper staff. Then the land deal, structured with layers of legal protection so thick even Alexander's army of lawyers couldn't penetrate.

I was three months pregnant, growing visibly, when a black sedan pulled up to the clinic.

My blood turned to ice.

But it wasn't Alexander.

A man stepped out, tall, dark-haired, with the kind of face that looked like it had been designed to make women forget their own names. He moved with a slight limp, leaning on a sleek black cane, and when he looked up at the clinic, his expression was one of quiet, almost painful nostalgia.

"Is this the Voss clinic?" he asked, his voice low, carrying an accent I couldn't quite place. British, maybe, roughened by something else.

"It is. Can I help you?"

He looked at me, and something shifted in his dark eyes. Recognition? No. Something deeper.

"My name is Dominic Ashford," he said. "I believe your mother saved my life here, twenty years ago."