Chase called it an "accident" and defended her. He told me Karis was so upset she might have to join him on our honeymoon to St. Barts to feel better. At our rehearsal dinner, when Karis suggested I'd hurt myself for attention, Chase publicly shamed me for upsetting her. His bachelor party turned out to be a private date with her.
I found the prenup he wanted me to sign: if we divorced, I'd get nothing. But the final blow came the night before our wedding. As he slept, he grabbed my arm and whispered her name.
"Karis... don't go."
I realized then I was just a stand-in, a warm body in the dark. My love for him had been a survival strategy in a world he built for me, and I was finally suffocating.
The next morning, on our wedding day, I didn't walk down the aisle. I walked out the door with nothing but my passport and made a call I hadn't made in fifteen years. An hour later, I was on my way to a private jet, leaving my old life to burn behind me.
Chapter 1
Clare Jennings stared at her bandaged hands.
The gauze was thick, clean, and white. Underneath it, her skin screamed. A low, chemical burn that had been humming for two days straight.
Her career wasn't just in that gauze. It was being suffocated by it. A ten-year career as one of New York's top hand models. Ruined.
She heard the front door open and close. Heavy, confident footsteps on the hardwood floor.
Chase Strong walked into the living room, loosening his tie. He was handsome, the kind of handsome that made rooms tilt on their axis. He'd been her entire world since he'd pulled her out of her tiny Midwestern town at eighteen.
He was her savior. Her prince. The man who had promised her a life she couldn't have even dreamed of.
He glanced at her hands, his brow barely furrowing.
"Still hurting?" he asked. His tone was casual, like asking about the weather.
Clare nodded, her throat tight. "The agency called. They're pulling the diamond ad. The client can't wait."
Three hundred thousand dollars. Gone.
Chase sighed, running a hand through his perfect hair. It was a gesture of annoyance, not sympathy. "It's a setback, Clare. Not the end of the world."
"My hands are my world, Chase."
"Don't be dramatic," he said, his voice sharpening. He walked to the bar, pouring himself a scotch. "I spoke to Karis. She feels terrible. It was an accident. A new product, a bad reaction."
Karis.
The name landed like a stone in the pit of her stomach. Karis Manning. His high school sweetheart. The owner of the salon he'd insisted she go to.
"She said it was their top-of-the-line treatment," Clare said, her voice shaking. "She promised it was safe."
"And she made a mistake," Chase snapped, turning to face her. His eyes were cold. "Are you going to ruin her business over an accident? She's been through enough."
The injustice of it burned hotter than the chemical fire on her skin. He was defending the woman who had destroyed her livelihood.
"What about me?" she whispered.
Chase took a long drink of his scotch. He looked at her, his expression unreadable. "You're with me. You'll be fine."
He said it like he was announcing a fact. Like his presence was the cure for everything.
Clare looked down at her bandaged hands again.
For the first time in ten years, the security of his words felt like a cage, not a comfort.
The humming from her skin was no longer just pain.
It was an alarm.
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