Chapter 2

I used to believe time could dilute everything, seal every charred wound left by the fire. After all, it had been a full decade since I'd last jolted awake at midnight, my ears free from those piercing screams.

Twenty years ago, when I was eight, my world was small—small enough to hold only my loving brother and my mother, who always kept me wrapped tight in her arms.

In that household lacking a father's presence, Mom's embrace and my brother's laughter were the warmth and light of my entire world.

Until that hellish inferno burned it all to ash.

That day, Mom pressed us flat against the floor, shielding us with her body. The acrid smoke nearly exploded our lungs, flames licking at the doorframe with their scorching tongues.

Yet she still trembled as she soothed us: "Don't be scared, Nora. Your dad will burst through that fire to save us. He's the best firefighter on this whole block."

She was right. Dad did break down the door. Only, he wasn't there to take us with him.

I'll never forget what he looked like storming into that room—beneath that heavy firefighting helmet, his eyes were cold and resolute as steel.

Mom clutched at his turnout coat like a drowning woman grabbing a lifeline: "Robert! Please, take the children out first! Nora's running a fever, she can barely breathe..."

"Calm down! I'm a firefighter!" Dad's voice cut through the roaring flames with cruel rationality. "Kayla next door is closer to the exit. Her parents are down. I have to get that kid out first."

"You're my family—I can't give you special treatment! People will say I put my own first!"

Just like that, he shoved Mom's hand away without mercy.

He carried the neighbor's daughter and disappeared into the smoke, never once looking back at his own wife and children.

Twenty years later, I still can't comprehend that twisted, fucked-up logic—

So firefighters' families don't count as lives worth saving?

Because we share his blood, we're supposed to be gloriously sacrificed for his hero complex?

He signed our death warrant with his own hand back then, and now he's running to the media performing his tearful reunion act. What kind of sick game is this?

My phone's frantic buzzing yanked me back to reality.

My assistant's panicked voice exploded through the speaker:

"Evelyn! Check Twitter! You're trending at number one. The entire internet is calling you an ungrateful wretch. Next week's photography exhibition is facing massive boycotts, and several major sponsors are wavering. Christ, we need PR on this now!"

"Don't worry about them yet," I pinched the bridge of my nose, cutting her off coldly. "I need you to dig up information on someone first. I'll email you the details."

I hung up. The screen flooded with headlines—each one glaring and nauseating:

#War Photographer Evelyn Vance Refuses to Acknowledge Hero Father# (EXPLODING)

#Cold-Blooded Socialite: Boycott This Ungrateful Artist#

#War Rose's Persona Crumbles: A Woman Who Could Abandon Her Own Father#

Every vicious comment online appointed itself judge and jury, while all the cheap sympathy was generously bestowed upon my magnificent father.

Kayla, the one rescued that night, even went on camera herself to shed tears.

She expressed gratitude for Robert's greatness while sighing with that insufferable maternal pity about my "extremism and immaturity."

I pulled at the corner of my mouth, feeling only dead, ashen numbness.

This is the brutal social calculus—wear a hero's halo, and you're a saint even if you personally shoved your family into hell. Meanwhile, I, the abandoned sacrifice, get nailed to the moral cross for judgment.

The doorbell rang at that exact moment.

I yanked the door open. Robert stood front and center, with several camera lights blinking red from strategic positions behind him.

Standing shoulder to shoulder with him was a woman about my age, dressed in a demure, pitiful manner.

"Nora, I finally found you." Robert's voice carried practiced exhaustion as he reached for my arm.

I stepped back in disgust, avoiding his touch. "I made myself perfectly clear at the awards ceremony, Captain Bennett. My name is Evelyn Vance, and I have nothing to do with you."

His hand froze mid-air, his expression turning ugly.

The woman beside him smoothly picked up the thread, her eyes brimming with tears:

"Nora, if you need to blame someone, blame me! If I hadn't needed saving... Robert would have had time to come back. But please don't resent him anymore. Blood is thicker than water—surely we can work through this?"

Robert seemed instantly emboldened, nodding earnestly: "Your sister's right, Nora. Come home."

Sister?

My ice-cold gaze locked onto the woman's face—Kayla. The one he'd chosen so resolutely in that fire, later adopted to prop up his "devoted father" image.

So he really did let this outsider naturally occupy the space left by my mother and brother's charred remains.

"For the last time, I have no relationship with you." I bit out each word. "And don't you dare mention blood ties or family in front of me. You don't deserve it."

With that, I raised my hand to slam the door shut.

Kayla suddenly shrieked, jamming her foot into the gap.

Robert seized the opportunity and shoved hard. The door flew open, the violent force sending me stumbling backward until my spine crashed against the entryway wall.

"Get out." I grabbed my phone from the table, staring at them coldly. "Now. Or I'm calling the cops and letting those reporters outside get a good shot of you being cuffed for trespassing."

Kayla ignored the warning entirely, stepping directly into the apartment.

Her gaze swept over the expensive furnishings and hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of photography equipment, jealousy flickering across her face before she lowered her head with practiced pitifulness.

That's when Robert extended a trembling hand, presenting a polished old wooden music box like it was some precious treasure.

His weary eyes brimmed with hope and appeasement: "Nora, I was wrong. I know that now. Look—Kayla and I combed through flea markets all day to find this walnut music box for you."

"After your old one broke, you cried for a replacement, remember? It still plays Swan Lake—your favorite. Open it. Listen."

I lowered my gaze, staring hard at that box.

It looked exactly—damnably exactly—like the one in my memory. That night, before the fire erupted, my brother had smiled just like this while placing the repaired music box on my bedside table.

I let out a soft, cold laugh and slowly extended my hand to take it.

Just as Robert thought I was finally relenting, joy suddenly flooding his eyes, I expressionless twisted my wrist.

And let go.

"CRASH—!"

The heavy wooden box slammed into the trash can. The mechanism shattered on impact, and a sharp, badly distorted rendition of Swan Lake leaked out.

In that dead-silent entryway, the metal reeds screeched and groaned, setting teeth on edge.

"You know what, Mr. Bennett?"

I lifted my eyes, savoring his instantly bloodless face, enunciating each word like a death sentence.

"That night, while Mom and I were nearly suffocating to death in that heat and smoke, the music box that had fallen to the floor kept looping this goddamn tune in my ears!"

I stepped closer, my gaze like a blade: "The thing I find most disgusting now, the thing I can't stand to hear, is this revolting melody! All it does is make me smell burning fat and rotting flesh!"

"So don't ever show up in front of me again with this woman, calling us 'family' like it's some heartwarming reunion. It makes me sick." I locked eyes with him, each word drawing blood.

"And I don't have family anymore. They all burned twenty years ago."