Chapter 1: The Name She Forgot
The room fell into a suffocating silence.
The man stood frozen just inside the grand doorway, his sharp eyes locked onto the girl crumpled on the marble floor. Dirt smeared her cheeks, blood dried at the corner of her lip—but beneath the pain, beneath the years of neglect… he saw her.
“...Lina?” His voice cracked, barely above a whisper.
The girl flinched.
No one had called her by a name in years.
The mistress let out a brittle laugh. “Sir, you must be mistaken. That’s just a servant. She’s—”
“Silence.”
The single word hit like thunder.
The mistress’s smile vanished.
The man crossed the room in long, urgent strides and dropped to his knees beside the trembling girl. His hands—hands that commanded empires—shook as he gently lifted her chin.
“It’s me,” he said, softer now. “Adrian.”
Her breathing hitched.
A memory flickered—warm sunlight, laughter, a boy promising he’d come back for her.
But that was a lifetime ago.
“You… didn’t come,” she whispered, her voice hollow.
Pain sliced across his face. “I was taken away. I searched for you everywhere.”
Behind them, the mistress took a slow step back.
Something was very, very wrong.
Adrian rose slowly, his expression transforming into something cold, something terrifying.
“Do you know,” he said quietly, “who she is?”
The mistress swallowed. “She’s nothing—”
“She is the heir to the Virelli Foundation.”
The world seemed to tilt.
“And you,” Adrian continued, turning his gaze toward her, “have spent years abusing her.”
May you like
Guards flooded into the mansion before the mistress could react.
Her empire collapsed in a heartbeat.
