I wake up gasping, tangled in sheets that smell like mildew and cheap detergent. The ceiling above me is water-stained. Cracked plaster. A single bulb hanging from a wire. I know this ceiling. My studio apartment. The one on Seventh Street, above the Thai restaurant. The one I lived in before Dominic found me. Before the money. Before the mansion. Before Margot's hands on my back and the long fall from the balcony. Before I died. My phone is charging on the floor beside the mattress. I grab it with shaking hands. March 15th. Three years ago. I died on March 18th. Three years from now. I remember the date because it was Dominic's birthday, and Celeste had insisted on throwing him a party even though he hated celebrations. I remember standing on the balcony with a glass of champagne I hadn't wanted, watching the city lights blur through tears because I'd finally understood that my brother would never see me as family. I remember Margot's voice behind me. "You don't belong here." I remember falling. Now I'm sitting on a mattress that smells like failure, holding a phone that says I have seventy-two hours before Dominic's assistant calls to schedule our first meeting. The meeting where he'll offer me five hundred thousand dollars and a downtown condo in exchange for staying out of his life. The meeting where I'll be so desperate for connection that I'll refuse the money and beg him to let me be part of the family instead. That decision killed me. I stood in his office and tore up his check like some kind of romantic fool, thinking he'd be impressed by my integrity. Thinking he'd see me as a sister instead of a problem to be solved. He let me move into the mansion. Let Celeste and Margot circle me like sharks. Let me believe I was finally home. Three years later, I was dead. I set the phone down carefully. This time, I'm not begging for anything. This time, I'm taking what's mine. I shower in the cramped bathroom where the tiles are loose and the hot water only lasts four minutes. I put on the nicest clothes I own—a black dress I bought for job interviews, heels that pinch. I pull my hair back and look at myself in the mirror. Twenty-three years old. Vivian Clarke. Bastard daughter of Richard Ashford, the man who built an empire and never acknowledged my existence. But Dominic knows. He's known for months. He hired investigators the moment his father died, tracking down every secret Richard left behind. I'm the biggest one. I walk to the Ashford Industries headquarters because I can't afford a cab and won't waste money on the subway. It takes forty minutes. My feet are bleeding by the time I reach the glass tower. The receptionist tries to stop me. I walk past her to the elevator. "Ma'am, you can't—" "Tell Dominic Ashford that Vivian Clarke is on her way up." The elevator doors close on her stunned face. Fiftieth floor. Corner office. I've been here before, in another timeline. I know exactly where I'm going. The doors open. Dominic is standing by the window, waiting.