I returned to the Moretti estate to collect what still belonged to me.

Verona House sat above the Hudson like a fortress dressed up as a mansion. Black gates, armed guards, marble steps, cameras hidden behind ivy. In my last life, I had mistaken all that steel and money for safety.

Now I knew better.

I stepped inside and found Lucien in the foyer with Isabella in his arms. She was tucked against his chest, one hand gripping his lapel, her voice soft and trembling.

"I ruined your signing, didn't I? Grace must hate me. I should leave. I don't want to cause trouble."

Lucien stroked her hair. "Stop that. You are not trouble. Your safety comes first. Grace will understand."

I cleared my throat.

Lucien released her a little too fast. Isabella lowered her eyes, but not before I saw the small, satisfied curve of her mouth.

"Grace," Lucien said. "I was just checking on her. She had a rough morning."

My gaze moved to Isabella's throat. The Moretti ruby rested there, dark red against her skin. It was the family necklace reserved for the bride, the one Lucien had once promised to fasten around my neck himself.

In my last life, I never wore it.

Isabella touched the ruby as if she had only just remembered it. "Oh, this. I thought it was beautiful and wanted to try it on. I'll take it off if you mind."

Her fingers moved slowly toward the clasp. Her eyes were on Lucien, not me.

"Grace," Lucien said, already tired of the conversation. "Don't make a scene over a necklace. Isabella likes pretty things."

"She should keep it," I said.

Both of them looked at me.

I smiled. "It suits her."

Isabella blinked. "You don't mind?"

"Why would I?"

Lucien's mouth tightened. He had expected tears, an argument, some proof that I still cared enough to fight. My calmness did not comfort him. It made him uneasy.

"Grace," he said quietly, "do not play games with me."

"I'm not."

He watched me for another second, then reached for a long white box on the hall table. "I had this brought in for you. The dress from Paris. The one you wanted."

The lid lifted to reveal ivory silk and antique lace. In my last life, I had cried when I saw it. I had thought it meant he had been listening.

This time, I only saw fabric.

"Let Isabella try it," I said. "We're close enough in size."

Lucien's expression hardened. "I ordered this for you."

"Then consider it a gift from me."

Isabella's eyes brightened before she remembered to look guilty. "Grace, I couldn't possibly. I mean... wouldn't I look like the bride?"

"Maybe you should," I said.

Silence fell hard.

Lucien let out a short laugh, the kind he used when he was angry but did not want to show it. "Fine. If this is the mood you're in, Isabella can have it."

"Thank you," I said, and walked past them.

I did not go upstairs to cry. I went to my room and locked the door. Then I opened my suitcase and began packing.

In the bottom drawer of my desk, under a stack of old Vance family letters, I kept the only thing that mattered now: clearance papers for the Raven Wharf auction.

Raven Wharf was where old families sold secrets without admitting they were broke. Land deeds, offshore accounts, black ledgers, stolen art, favors written in blood. One vault there held documents my father had hidden before the Vance family fell. If I could get them, I could rebuild without Lucien Moretti's name.

The auction opened in seven days.

Seven days, and I would be out.

Someone knocked.

"Grace," Lucien said through the door. "We need to talk."

I slid the papers beneath a scarf. "Come in."

He entered without waiting, his eyes moving over the half-open suitcase. "Going somewhere?"

"Sorting things."

"You were strange today."

"Was I?"

"You gave Isabella the ruby. You gave her your dress. You are either furious or trying very hard to look like you aren't."

I folded a blouse and placed it in the suitcase. "Isn't this what you wanted? A woman who doesn't argue with you about Isabella?"

For once, he had no clean answer.

After a moment, he said, "I came to ask you for something."

Of course he did.

"What?"

"The Vance signet."

My fingers stopped. The signet ring was the last real heirloom my family owned. It opened our old vaults, verified our accounts, and proved that the Vance name still had weight in certain rooms.

"Why?"

Lucien's jaw flexed. "Isabella's name is still tied to the convoy shooting. I need leverage with a judge who owes your family. The signet will get him to listen."

In my last life, I would have handed it over just to hear him call me generous. I would have told myself love meant helping him protect the woman he kept choosing over me.

This life, I looked him in the eye. "You can have it."

Suspicion flickered across his face. "Just like that?"

"No. I want a signed release removing every Vance holding from Moretti custody, and a sponsor letter for Raven Wharf under my own name. No Moretti escort. No Moretti oversight."

His stare went cold. "That is a lot of paperwork for one ring."

"Then don't pay it."

Something changed in his expression. The anger faded, replaced by a slow, almost arrogant smile. "So that is what this is. You want to prove you can walk away. You want me to stop you."

"Call it whatever helps you sleep."

He stepped closer. "You still care. If you didn't, you wouldn't be making such a show of independence."

I let him believe it. A man like Lucien trusted his own ego more than the truth, and right now, his ego was useful.

"Do we have a deal?" I asked.

"We do." He looked too pleased with himself. "You can have your little release. And you will come with me to the Ravencrest gala tomorrow night. The families expect to see my future wife."

Before I could answer, the door opened.

Isabella stood there in the Paris dress. The ivory silk hugged her perfectly, and the Moretti ruby burned at her throat.

"Lucien," she said, turning once with a shy smile. "How do I look?"

His eyes softened before he could stop them. "Beautiful."

Isabella glanced at me as if she had won something. "I heard you mention the gala. Grace, you're going? I just don't want people to think I pushed you out."

The trap was obvious. If I refused, I was bitter. If I went, I watched them perform.

I closed my suitcase. "I'll be there."

The Ravencrest gala was built for people who smiled with knives behind their backs.

Every major family in New York was there: Moretti, DeLuca, Santoro, Hale. Women glittered in diamonds. Men traded threats over champagne. By midnight, three alliances had been hinted at, two insults had been swallowed, and at least one man had probably ordered another man's death in the bathroom.

I stood near the windows in a navy silk dress and watched Lucien move through the room with Isabella on his arm.

She wore silver. He kept a hand at her waist. Every few minutes, she leaned in to whisper something, and he bent his head as if the rest of the world could wait.

"Poor Grace Vance," a woman behind me murmured. "Not even married yet, and already replaced."

"Moretti men like useful wives and fragile mistresses," another said. "She should learn the difference."

I sipped my champagne and said nothing.

A man from one of the smaller families drifted toward me with a smile too sharp to be friendly. "Miss Vance. Brave of you to come alone."

"I'm not alone. I'm bored. There's a difference."

His smile thinned. "Must be hard, watching your fiance play house with another woman."

Before I could answer, Lucien appeared beside me.

"Careful," he said softly. "The last man who spoke about my fiancee like that lost more than his invitation."

The man went pale and backed away.

I looked at Lucien. There it was again, the part of him that wanted me under his name even when he was giving everything else to Isabella. In my last life, that possessiveness had confused me. I had mistaken it for love.

Now it only felt like ownership.

"You don't have to perform," I said. "No one is watching anymore."

"I am always watching you." Then Lucien lowered his voice. "There is one more thing. Isabella is staying in the bridal suite at Verona House. Her nightmares are worse in unfamiliar rooms. I need you to wait before moving in."

I looked across the room at Isabella, who was pretending not to stare.

"Fine."

Lucien blinked. "Fine?"

"She can keep the suite."

Relief crossed his face, but it did not last. My easy surrender unsettled him more than a fight would have.

"Grace, look at me."

Before I could, glass shattered above us.

The first shot hit the chandelier. Crystals rained down as screams tore through the ballroom. The second shot came from the balcony, aimed straight at Isabella.

Lucien moved on instinct.

He shoved her behind him and covered her with his body.

People ran. Tables overturned. Someone slammed into my shoulder, and I stumbled hard against the wall. I heard another shot, felt the punch of it before I understood the sound, then saw red spreading across my dress.

I had been hit.

Pain ripped through me so cleanly that my knees gave out. I pressed a hand to my side and looked through the chaos.

Lucien was on the floor with Isabella in his arms.

"I've got you," he kept saying. "Bella, look at me. You're safe."

He did not see me.

Not until a DeLuca guard shouted, "Miss Vance is down!"

Lucien's head snapped up.

For one second, our eyes met across the ruined ballroom.

Then the floor tilted, and everything went black.