Standing at the altar in front of four hundred guests, Jonathan Duncan squeezed my fingers until the wedding rings bit into my flesh and leaned in to whisper that from that second forward I belonged to him and I’d better learn my place fast—so I smiled right back and told him he’d asked for a wife, and now he was about to meet my witness.

I lunged across the desk.

My fingers closed around the edge of the leather cover an inch before it touched the fire.

I wrenched it out of her hand.

The heat seared my palm, but I didn’t let go. I stumbled back, clutching the ledger to my chest, my skin throbbing.

Rosalind snarled.

She slammed her hand down on the desk, sending the burning trash can tipping sideways. Flames spilled across the mahogany, catching on a stack of files, spreading fast.

“You little thief,” she spat. “Everything I built—everything!—you think you can just take it from me?”

Cole ran past me, grabbing a fire extinguisher from the wall by the door. He sprayed the desk, the white foam hissing, dousing the flames before they could spread to the velvet curtains.

Maya grabbed Rosalind’s arm, but Rosalind wrenched free.

She was still in the navy blue dress she’d worn to the wedding, her pearls askew, her hair falling out of its neat chignon. She looked less like the polished society matron everyone knew and more like what she really was: a cornered animal, teeth bared, ready to tear anything apart to survive.

“You think you’re so smart,” she said, her voice shaking with rage. Her eyes were fixed on me, black as oil. “You think because you found a few old files and dug up a ghost, you’ve won? Let me tell you something, Elena. I was playing this game when you were still in diapers. I have friends in every police station in this state. Every courthouse. Every newspaper. You think a few bruises and a crazy woman’s journal are enough to put me away?”

She laughed.

It was a harsh, barking sound.

“By next week,” she said, “the only story anyone will remember is how you, a bitter, gold-digging little accountant, seduced my son, manipulated a vulnerable amnesiac, and planted evidence to steal a fortune you never earned. Jonathan will be exonerated. Clara will be back in the psych ward where she belongs. And you? You’ll be lucky if you only get twenty years.”

Clara stepped forward.

She was leaning on the doorframe, her face pale, but her voice was steady.

“You’re the one who put me there, Rosalind,” she said. “You told the doctors I was suicidal. That I’d tried to kill myself and crashed the car on purpose. You paid them to keep me drugged for three years before Jonathan moved me to the cabin. I have the medical records. The bank transfers to the hospital administrator. Elena found them last month.”

Rosalind’s face flickered.

Just for a second.

But I saw it.

The crack in her armor.

She didn’t know we had those records.

“That’s not possible,” she said. “I had them destroyed.”

“You paid a clerk to shred the official copies,” I said. I opened the ledger, flipping to the page I’d memorized. “But you forgot the hospital’s backup server. It’s stored offsite. I pulled the files three weeks ago. They show every time you authorized a higher dose of sedatives. Every time you told the doctors to increase my restraints—sorry, Clara’s restraints. Every single payment you made to keep her quiet.”

I closed the ledger.

“You’re right about one thing, Rosalind,” I said. “You do have friends in high places. But friends cost money. And you just moved fifty million of it into an offshore account. The IRS is already flagging that transfer. By the end of the day, every account you’ve ever touched will be frozen. Your friends don’t stay friends when there’s no money left to pay them.”

The color drained from her face.

She took a step back, her legs hitting the edge of the desk.

For the first time, she looked scared.

“Where is Jonathan?” she said, her voice smaller than I’d ever heard it. “What did you do with my son?”

“Your son is in a holding cell,” Cole said, stepping forward. His hand was resting on the gun at his hip. “And he’s going to stay there until he stands trial. Unless he decides to make a deal. Testify against you in exchange for a lighter sentence.”

Rosalind’s head snapped toward him.

“Jonathan would never,” she said. But there was no confidence in her voice anymore. Just doubt.

“Wouldn’t he?” I said. I thought about the way Jonathan had looked at the altar when he saw Clara. The pure, unadulterated terror. “He’s spent his whole life doing exactly what you told him to. He stole a company for you. He kidnapped a woman for you. He forged millions in loans for you. And what did you give him in return? A pat on the head when he was good. A slap in the face when he wasn’t. Now he’s facing thirty years in prison. How long do you think he’ll stay loyal when he realizes you’re going to let him burn for all of it?”

Rosalind screamed.

She lunged for me this time, her nails out like claws.

Maya and Clara grabbed her before she could reach me, holding her arms behind her back. She fought them, kicking, spitting, screaming curses that would have made a sailor blush.

The sound of sirens wailed in the distance, getting closer every second.

Backup had arrived.

Two uniformed officers ran into the study, taking Rosalind from Maya and Clara. They cuffed her, reading her her rights again, but she didn’t seem to hear them.

She was staring at me.

Her eyes were wild.

“You don’t know what this family is capable of,” she shouted as the officers led her out of the room. “You think you’ve won? I’ll make you pay for this, Elena. I’ll take everything you love. Every single thing. You’ll regret the day you ever crossed me!”

Her voice faded down the hallway.

I stood there, clutching the ledger to my chest, my burned palm throbbing.

The study was a mess.

Foam dripped from the desk. Half the files in the trash can were charred at the edges. The air smelled like smoke and chemicals and fear.

Clara came over to me.

She gently pried the ledger out of my hands.

She looked at my palm.

The skin was bright red, already blistering.

“Come on,” she said, putting her arm around my shoulders. “Let’s get you to a doctor.”

As we walked out of the study, I passed the wall of family portraits.

There was Rosalind, young and beautiful, standing next to her husband—Jonathan’s father—who’d died of a “sudden heart attack” when Jonathan was sixteen.

There was Jonathan, twelve years old, grinning with a missing front tooth, his arm around his mother’s waist.

And there was Clara, thirty years old, standing in front of the Duncan Apex building, holding a pair of oversized scissors at the grand opening.

I stopped.

I stared at the portrait of Jonathan’s father.

Something about his face was familiar.

I’d seen it before.

Not in the Duncan house.

Somewhere else.

A long time ago.

“Clara,” I said, pointing. “Who is that man?”

Clara looked.

“That’s Arthur Duncan,” she said. “Rosalind’s husband. Jonathan’s father. Why?”

My blood ran cold.

I knew that face.

I’d seen it a hundred times when I was a kid.

On the business cards my dad used to leave on the kitchen table.

On the check he’d brought home the day his construction company won the bid to build the new Duncan Apex headquarters.

On the death certificate the police had given us twelve years ago, when they said he’d driven his car off a bridge and killed himself because his company was going bankrupt.