Life was never kind to you.

Born into poverty in a nameless village, you grew up counting stars and chasing dreams you couldn’t afford. New York—bright, ruthless, alive—was the dream. The kind of dream you’d read about in crumpled magazines passed around at the diner where you worked evenings as a waitress. Every tip, every coin, every aching shift brought you closer. You had a goal: a penthouse, a skyline, a name that meant something.

Then came Aziel Lynch.

He was seventeen. Blonde hair, a smile that could melt the moon, ocean-blue eyes, and those goddamn dimples. You were fifteen and hopelessly naive. You saw a boy; he saw an opportunity.

He made you laugh. Made promises under starlight while you sat on the hill behind the diner, knees touching. He spoke of the city like it was already his. "We'll make it there together," he said, hand over your heart. “I’ll take care of you.”

You believed him.

He was your first kiss. Your first everything.

And when he said he needed money to buy the train tickets, to start the life you both dreamed of, you gave it to him. Every single penny you had scraped together over three years. You packed your bag. Wore your best dress. Met him at the station with stars still in your eyes.

He kissed your forehead and told you to wait in the carriage. Said he had “unfinished business” to take care of.

You never saw him again.

You screamed for the conductor to stop the train. Cried. Pleaded. But it didn’t matter. Aziel was gone. With your savings. With your trust.

You returned home, broke and broken. Your parents—ashamed, furious—disowned you. You had shamed them by running away. You were fifteen, alone, and homeless.

Still, you survived.

You made it to New York. Begged. Slept in shelters. Ate out of trash cans and prayed for sleep that wasn’t haunted. You scrubbed dishes, cleaned toilets, served tables, sold the last pieces of your dignity to keep breathing.

And then one cold afternoon, sitting on a bench in Central Park with a burrito you’d begged enough quarters for, you unwrapped it from a greasy newspaper. And there he was.

Aziel Lynch.

A full-page profile. Billionaire. Founder of Lynch Securities. The prodigy of Wall Street. Seven years later, and he was everything you had ever wanted. Everything he’d stolen from you.

That day, something inside you shattered—and something else was born in its place.

You didn’t weep. You didn’t scream. You planned.

You found a lonely billionaire—a much older man who craved youth and attention more than he cared for love. You played the role. Sweet, soft-spoken. Submissive. You married him. He died a year later. Cardiac arrest. The will was ironclad.

You inherited everything.

From there, it was a carefully orchestrated climb. You bought a failing security firm, reinvented it from the ground up, and rose—ruthless, brilliant, untouchable. You didn’t just succeed. You built an empire.

And now, at twenty-two, you sit across a long boardroom table in a Manhattan skyscraper—your skyscraper—awaiting a meeting with a new business rival.

The door opens.

Aziel walks in.

The color drains from his face.

He falters.

You smile slowly, like a blade unsheathing.

“Hello, Mr. Lynch,” you say, voice silk over steel. “It’s been a while.”

Seven years.

Seven years since he stole everything.

Now you have more than he ever dreamed of—and something far sweeter.

The power to destroy him.

And oh, how you plan to.