Chapter 1

"Enough, Serafina! The thing rigged to the parasail is just a mannequin. It's not your mother! Cut the damn act!"

I watched helplessly as my mother plummeted from hundreds of feet in the air, smashing into the ocean.

My husband was holding my stepsister, a doting smile playing on his lips.

My own biological son clapped his hands in glee—because he was the one who had pushed the release button.

They all said I was faking it. They said I was vicious, toxic, and jealous.

It wasn't until I erased every last trace of my existence and vanished entirely from their lives that they dug through the wreckage of our past like madmen, desperate to find me.

......

"Declan, I'm begging you! My mom just had a heart bypass! She can't take this! Bring her down, please, I'm begging you!"

I clung to Declan's pant leg.

But when I looked into his eyes—the same eyes that used to soften the moment they met mine—I found nothing but raw, unflinching disgust.

He kicked me away without a second thought. The sheer force of it sent me skidding across the slick deck, my body slamming hard against the metal railing.

"Shut up, Serafina. Your little pity act is pathetic." Declan sneered. He turned and pulled Blair into his arms, holding her as gently as if she were made of spun glass. "When you smashed the necklace her late mother left her, did you ever stop to think how much it would hurt her?"

"I didn't smash it! Blair broke it herself!" I screamed until my voice cracked, a thick, metallic taste of blood rising in my throat.

Standing behind Declan, Blair flinched, her eyes instantly welling with tears. "Sera... I know you've always hated me, but that necklace was the last thing I had left of my mom..."

"You're too kind, Blair. That's exactly why this venomous woman bullies you." Declan patted her shoulder gently. When he turned back to me, his gaze turned to absolute ice. "Serafina, I'm giving you one last chance. Get on your knees, grovel, and apologize to Blair right now. Then I'll bring your fake-sick mother down."

I trembled from head to toe, my insides twisting as if crushed by an invisible fist.

I looked up at the tiny, weakening silhouette suspended high in the harsh wind. My mother's head was already slumping lifelessly against her chest.

"I'll kneel... I'll kneel!" I abandoned every last ounce of my dignity, my knees crashing heavily onto the unforgiving deck.

Facing Blair, I slammed my forehead against the deck boards. After just a few brutal strikes, warm blood trailed down my brow, stinging my eyes and turning my vision into a desperate, blurry crimson.

"I'm sorry, Blair. I broke it. It's all my fault. Please, just ask Declan to let my mom down. Please!"

I slammed my head down again and again. Blood ran down the bridge of my nose and seeped into my mouth—coppery and bitter.

"Declan, look... she knows she was wrong..." Blair murmured, her voice sickeningly fragile, while an undetectable smirk of triumph played at the corner of her lips.

Declan scoffed dismissively. He was just lifting his hand to signal the bodyguards to lower the parasail when a pair of small, sneaker-clad feet stepped into my line of sight. It was my five-year-old biological son, Orion.

His face was flushed with childish thrill as he pointed at the sky. "Daddy! That person is flying so high! Like a giant kite! I wanna see her fly even higher!"

"Orion! That's your grandma! She's sick!" I reached out desperately, pawing at my son's shorts. "Tell them to bring Grandma down!"

Orion took a disgusted step back, dodging my bloodstained hands as if I were a piece of filthy trash. "No way! Auntie Blair said you're a bad woman. You bullied her, so Grandma is a bad person too! Bad guys should be hung up in the sky to be punished!"

A bomb went off in my brain, leaving behind a ringing, paralyzing emptiness.

This was the flesh and blood I had carried for nine months. The child I had nearly bled to death on the delivery table to bring into the world.

And right now, in the most innocent, cheerful tone imaginable, he was signing my mother's death warrant.

"Orion, do you want to see the kite fly perfectly free?" Blair crouched down suddenly, a sickeningly sweet smile on her face as she pointed at a bright red button on the control console. "If you push that, the kite will fly right into the clouds."

"Blair! Don't you dare!" I shrieked, my eyes wide with sheer terror.

But it was too late.

Orion let out a joyful cheer, trotting over and slamming his little hand squarely onto the red button without a second thought.

The steel cable on the winch snapped instantly. I watched, paralyzed, as the lifeline holding my mother whiplashed violently in the air and severed.

Stripped of its tension, the massive parasail collapsed like a bird with broken wings. Dragging my fading, breathless mother along with it, it caught the furious wind and plummeted rapidly toward the violently churning depths of the ocean.

"MOM—!!!"

My bloodcurdling scream tore through the sea breeze. Without a second thought, I vaulted over the railing and threw myself headfirst into the agonizingly freezing water.

From the deck of the yacht fading above me, Declan's cold voice echoed faintly down.

"Leave her. Let the water snap her out of it. Does she really think these cheap tricks can fool me?"