I was born with a built-in fortune system. Whenever I'm happy, everyone around me makes money.

To keep me in a good mood, my billionaire father takes me out on adventures every single day, showering me with limited-edition sneakers, private yacht charters, and one-of-a-kind luxury items.

It all comes down to one thing: the Connolly Group's luck is tied directly to my emotional state.

As long as I'm laughing hard enough to snort, the stock price climbs and the money pours in.

The moment my mood tanks, the losses start. At worst, the whole thing goes bankrupt.

Take last month. One of the cleaning staff accidentally tossed out half a macaron I'd left sitting on the counter, and I was mildly annoyed for about a second.

The next day, the Connolly Group's West Coast division posted a hundred-million-dollar loss.

Dad spent the entire night buying up ten gourmet bakeries and terminating the cleaning company's contract just to smooth things over.

After that, nobody in Manhattan's upper-crust social scene dared so much as look at me sideways.

That was, until Dad flew out to Los Angeles on business, and Isabella, the long-lost biological daughter who'd just been found, walked into my room.

"You've been leeching off this family for years," she said, looking down at me with pure contempt. "Did you actually think draining the Connolly name dry made you the real heiress? I'm the one with Connolly blood. Now that I'm back, it's time for you to crawl out of my house."

I didn't react.

She picked up the black coffee sitting nearby and poured it straight onto my keyboard. I watched the screen go dark, and something hollow opened up in my chest.

"Get on your knees and clean it up."

I wiped the coffee off my face. The air had gone cold. The Connolly Group was about to implode, and I found myself wondering whether Dad, thousands of miles away in LA, was already reaching for his heart medication as he watched billions evaporate off the ticker.

I looked up at Isabella, wearing the smuggest grin I had ever seen.

I pulled out a tissue and took my time wiping the coffee off my hand.

The smile on Isabella's face froze.

She clearly hadn't expected that.

In her head, I was supposed to be on the floor sobbing, or launching myself at her like some kind of feral animal. But that kind of move was amateur hour for anyone who'd grown up in Manhattan's elite circles.

"Did you hear me?" Isabella's voice shot up three notches. "I said get on your knees and clean it up!"

I dropped the used tissue into the trash and finally looked up at her.

"You've been back from the sticks for all of five minutes and you're already throwing tantrums? Twenty years of the Connolly name in this city, and this is what crawled out of it? You're an embarrassment."

Isabella's face went crimson.

"Who are you calling a hick?! You're the one who—"

She didn't finish.

Rapid heels clicked in the hallway outside, and Isabella's eyes went red, tears spilling down her face on cue.

Margaret, my adoptive mother, pushed the door open.

"Mom!" Isabella flung herself into Margaret's arms, crying so hard she could barely breathe. "I just came to see her, to talk, and she said I was some country girl who didn't belong here. She told me to go back where I came from. Mom, maybe she's right. Maybe I shouldn't have come back. I'll just go home. I don't want to cause trouble for anyone."

I watched the performance. My stomach turned.

Margaret wrapped both arms around Isabella, eyes already going red, then turned to look at me.

"Ivy! Are you even human?!"

She jabbed a finger at my face, practically close enough to touch. "You ate our food, wore our clothes, slept under our roof. We raised you like our own daughter for twenty years, and this is how you repay us?"

"Mom—"

"Don't you dare call me that." Margaret cut me off, sharp as a blade. "You have no right. Isabella is my flesh and blood. She spent twenty years suffering out there, and the moment she comes home, you do this to her?"

I opened my mouth to explain, but Margaret didn't give me a second.

"I gave you twenty years and you've been ungrateful every single day." Her voice was loud enough to carry through the whole floor. "Without me, you would've died on the street. Now get up and bow to Isabella. Ninety degrees. Now."

I didn't move. A chill crawled up from my feet to the top of my skull.

Isabella peeked at me from Margaret's arms, mouth curving just barely, then smoothed her expression away.

"Mom, it's okay. She didn't mean it." She tugged Margaret's sleeve with a sweet, helpless look. "As long as we're all getting along, I can handle a little hurt. I don't mind."

Then her eyes drifted to my desk.

Sitting on top of it was the Connolly Group's black titanium unlimited card, the only one in the world, with no spending cap. Dad had pressed it into my hands just last night.

Greed flashed in Isabella's eyes for just a fraction of a second. Then it was gone, replaced by the most pitiful expression she could manage.

"Ivy, I'm not asking you to apologize anymore. Just let me have that card. Call it a little compensation for the twenty years I spent struggling out there. Is that too much to ask?"

Margaret nodded. "Hand it over. Consider it an apology to your sister. You only ended up here because I felt sorry for you, and your father handed you a card. Don't go getting ideas above your station."

I stared at her. This face had smiled at me a thousand times over twenty years, had cooked for me, had sat by my bed through entire nights when I was sick. Now it was twisted into something I didn't recognize.

"You forgot what Dad made perfectly clear?" My voice came out cold. "If I'm unhappy, the Connolly empire crumbles."

Margaret let out a dismissive snort. "Go ahead, hide behind Raymond Connolly. I'm done letting you get away with that attitude. The whole company bends over backwards to keep you smiling while I've spent forty years as his wife and ranked below some girl with a questionable origin story. Let me tell you something: you're nothing but a tool the Connollys paid to keep the bad luck away. Real gold doesn't need polishing. Fakes belong in the trash."

She grabbed the black card off the desk and shoved it into Isabella's hands. I watched Isabella turn it over between her fingers, savoring it, while Margaret looked like she'd just won something.

"Fine."

The word left my mouth almost lightly, and there was even the ghost of a smile on my lips.

The next second, my phone went insane.

Connolly Group Overseas Project 3: breach of contract triggered.

Core fund liquidity chain collapsed. Connolly Group: emergency circuit breaker on hundred-billion valuation.

Isabella was still laughing with the card in her hand, drifting closer to dangle it in my face.

"Thanks, sis. I'll make sure to enjoy being a Connolly heiress on your behalf."

Laugh while you can. I didn't even bother to look up, just kept watching the stock price fall.

Isabella hooked her arm through Margaret's and turned, a sudden flush spreading across her cheeks, eyes full of barely-contained excitement.

"Mom, I came back today to see you and Dad, but I also have the most incredible news."

She glanced toward the bedroom door. The half-open door swung wide from outside, and Corey Harrison walked in with his arms full of red roses.

He was my fiancé. We'd been together for three years, and our wedding was two months away.

The moment I saw him, something in me unclenched. He was here to help.

I took a step forward without thinking.

He walked straight past me and pressed the roses into Isabella's arms. Ninety-nine of them, the exact same count he'd used when he confessed to me three years ago.

My feet stopped.

Corey slipped his arm around Isabella's waist and glanced back at me with an expression I'd never seen before.

"The Harrisons don't marry imposters. Ivy, our engagement is over as of today."

Margaret didn't say a word in my defense. She stepped forward beaming and clasped Corey's hands. "Corey, you always knew what was right. Only Isabella, real Connolly blood, is worthy of the Harrison name. That fake could never measure up."

The words hit me like a fist to the chest.

Isabella leaned into Corey's side, tilting her head in my direction, then slowly pulled back the collar of her blouse. Below her collarbone was a pattern of red marks, plain as day.

"Don't be mad I didn't warn you ahead of time." Her voice was honeyed. "Last night at the Harrison estate, Corey and I, well... you know how it goes, right?"

She raised her wrist and slowly turned it for me to see.

An emerald ring caught the light, throwing green flickers across the room. I knew that ring. It was the Harrison family heirloom, passed down as a betrothal gift through generations.

On Christmas Eve last year, Corey had gone down on one knee in the snow-covered garden and slipped it onto my finger himself. He said he'd only ever give it to one person.

Now it was on Isabella's hand, and it felt like a slap across my face.

"What's wrong? Does it hurt to look?" Isabella pushed her wrist closer. "Can't help it. Turns out being the real deal has its perks. Corey knows quality when he sees it."

Corey pulled Isabella back against him, chin resting on her shoulder, looking at me like he was inspecting something he'd already discarded.

"Ivy, you took twenty years that belonged to Isabella. Time to give it back." He tipped his chin up. "Get on your knees and bow to her. Call it penance. And when you're done, use the back door. Don't dirty the front entrance on your way out."

I stared at the two of them, back and forth, and bit down hard enough that I tasted blood, metallic and sharp, spreading across my tongue.

My phone buzzed again. I glanced down.

Breaking News: Connolly Group's core real estate portfolio in full collapse. Losses exceed two billion dollars. Federal regulators have launched an investigation.

I locked the screen and looked up. I was done talking.

Corey didn't have long to enjoy himself. His phone rang, and he picked up. The arrogance on his face collapsed in under three seconds.

"What? The Connolly real estate projects all tanked? The eighty million we put in—"

His voice was shaking.

Isabella pulled away from him immediately, pointing at me. "It's her fault. It has to be. She's always been bad luck; she drags down everything around her."

I looked at her. I wanted to slap her, but that would only make me angrier. "I told you," I said quietly. "Don't make me unhappy."

Margaret jumped in: "Still throwing a tantrum at this point? You've been a liability in this house since day one. Should've been sent away years ago."

Isabella clapped her hands. "Don't worry. Today I'm giving you back what's yours."

She crossed to the front door and pulled it open. Two strangers stood in the hallway, a man and a woman. The man was gaunt, his eyes darting immediately to anything in the room that looked valuable. The woman was chewing something, her jaw working rhythmically.

Margaret pressed a handkerchief to her nose and stepped back three paces.

"Ivy, take a good look. These are your biological parents. They came all the way from the country today to take you home, back to the life that was always meant to be yours."

I stared at those two completely unfamiliar faces. No blood recognition, no warmth, just instinctive revulsion.

My biological father lit up and shuffled over, wringing his hands. "Kid! I finally get to see you!" His eyes weren't on me. They were fixed on the Tiffany jade earrings on my ears.

"Dad's got some good news for you." He dropped his voice but didn't bother controlling the volume. "The Crawford fellow one county over, fifty-three with a bad knee but decent enough. He put up thirty thousand dollars and he's waiting for you to come back and marry him."

Thirty thousand dollars. The shoes on my feet were worth more.

My biological mother reached into her pocket and pulled out a crumpled scrap of red fabric, grinning with a mouthful of uneven teeth. "Don't you worry, baby. That Crawford man, well, his last wife left because he had a temper, but if you're good and give him a son, I'm sure he won't lay a hand on you."

Nausea surged from my stomach straight to the back of my throat.

I looked left at the manipulative schemer and the spineless traitor. I looked right at the pair of biological strangers who'd sold me for a better offer. Then I looked at Margaret, standing three feet back with her arms crossed, watching it all like she was enjoying a show.

I kicked the solid oak coffee table in front of me clean over.

"Thirty thousand dollars?" My voice was quiet, but every word came out shaking. "The shoes I'm wearing could buy your whole family. You touch one hair on my head, and the first thing Raymond Connolly does when he lands is bury every last one of you."

My biological father stumbled back two steps, but Isabella's voice rose from behind me.

"That's hilarious." She tilted her chin up. "You're still hiding behind Raymond Connolly? He's my father. You think he's going to punish his own flesh and blood, his daughter who spent twenty years lost, for your sake? Wake up, Ivy."

"Somebody grab her. Take her home."

At Margaret's signal, the household staff surged in. Corey moved fast, eager to impress Isabella, and locked both arms around me from behind.

I turned my head and sank my teeth into his wrist.

"God—!" Corey screamed, yanking his hand back, then whipped a slap across my face.

I spat the blood out of my mouth and looked at him. "A dog who sold out for scraps. Doesn't it make sense that someone bit back?"

Corey's forehead was beaded with sweat, his humiliation curdling into fury. He turned and barked at my biological father: "What are you standing there for? Tie her up!"

My biological father fished a coil of rough rope from his pants pocket. Two men grabbed my shoulders and wrenched my arms behind my back. The rope's fibers ground into my wrists, shredding a layer of skin instantly, and blood seeped up.

I fought, driving my heel hard into Corey's shin. But two grown men were more than I could overpower.

Margaret stood exactly three feet away and watched every second of it. She didn't lift a finger. Instead she walked to the kitchen and came back with a grimy stovetop rag, pried my mouth open without a word, and shoved it inside.

Every sound I could make was gone.

I tilted my head back and looked at her. She looked satisfied. She'd been waiting to do this for a long time, and now she'd finally gotten rid of me, with no one left to challenge her claim on the Connolly estate.

They dragged me down the stairs. The rope cut into my wrists with every step, and my heels slammed into each stair. The pain was nearly blinding.

But I didn't cry once. Through the rag I let out a single muffled laugh, and the sound made my biological mother flinch.

As the car door slammed shut, a bright red warning blazed across my mind.

FORTUNE SYSTEM — CRITICAL ALERT: Host emotional index has reached minimum threshold. Connolly Group market cap... ZERO. Bankruptcy effective immediately.