Lightning split the sky, illuminating the greenhouse in a harsh, strobe-like flash.

Clarine's fingers closed around the cold, heavy steel of a pair of gardening shears left on the soil bench. She gripped the handles until her knuckles turned white. Her eyes locked onto the dark figure stepping around the palm tree.

Suddenly, the estate's backup generator kicked in. Blinding overhead lights flooded the greenhouse.

The two intruders froze, exposed in the glaring light.

"Drop it!"

Three estate security guards burst through the main doors, weapons drawn. They tackled the blinded men to the wet floor, pinning them down.

An hour later, Clarine sat on the living room sofa. She had a thick blanket pulled tightly around her shoulders. Her body was still shivering, but her face was entirely blank.

A police sergeant stood across from her, flipping his notepad shut. "Where is your husband, Mrs. Lynch?"

"He is with another woman," Clarine said. Her voice was flat, devoid of any emotion.

The officers exchanged uncomfortable, pitying glances.

Just before dawn, the screech of tires echoed outside. Evert's Maybach stopped at the front steps. He strode through the front doors, his tie loosened, annoyance radiating off him in waves.

He stopped when he saw the mud, the broken glass on the rug, and the police officers. A flicker of shock crossed his eyes, but he quickly masked it with a hard scowl.

"Mr. Lynch," the sergeant stepped forward, his tone clipped. "Your wife was nearly killed tonight. You should have been here."

Evert's jaw tightened. He walked the police to the door, his posture rigid. As soon as the door shut, he spun around to face Clarine.

He didn't check if she was hurt. He didn't ask if she was okay.

"You brought the police to my house?" Evert's voice was a harsh whip. "Do you have any idea what this will do to the Lynch family stock if it leaks?"

Clarine slowly lifted her head. She looked at the man she had loved for three years. The final, desperate ember of hope in her chest hissed and died.

That evening, the annual Lynch and Gill family charity gala took place at The Apex Club in Manhattan.

Clarine stood in the grand ballroom. Evert's styling team had forced her into a conservative, high-necked white gown. She felt like a porcelain doll on display.

Her stepmother, Marta, glided over with a crystal champagne flute in hand.

"Look at you," Marta sneered, her eyes raking over Clarine. "I heard you made a fool of yourself crying to the cops last night."

Gemma, Clarine's half-sister, smirked beside her. "Everyone knows Evert spent the whole night at Cherie's apartment. You're pathetic."

A group of wealthy socialites nearby turned their heads, whispering behind manicured hands.

Clarine straightened her spine. Her hands curled into tight fists at her sides. She looked Marta dead in the eye, her voice trembling with a dark, reckless edge. "Keep talking, Marta. But do you really want to see what a woman with absolutely nothing left to lose will say? Push me, and I'll spill every dirty secret keeping the Gill family from bankruptcy. See what happens then."

Marta's smug smile vanished. Her face twisted into an ugly scowl. She shot Gemma a dark, venomous look.

A moment later, the ballroom doors opened. Cherie walked in, wearing a plunging, blood-red dress. She commanded the room as if she were the real Mrs. Lynch.

Cherie sauntered straight to Clarine. She held out a glass of pink champagne. "Clarine! I'm so sorry about the misunderstanding last night. Let's drink and make peace."

Clarine stared at the glass. She opened her mouth to refuse.

From across the room, Evert's gaze locked onto hers. He adjusted his cufflink-his signature warning. His eyes demanded she take the drink and avoid a public scene.

Clarine's chest tightened. She took the glass from Cherie and took a small sip.

Five minutes later, the room tilted.

A violent wave of dizziness hit Clarine's brain. The chandelier lights blurred into long, blinding streaks. Her stomach rolled.

She turned toward the hallway leading to the restrooms, intending to force herself to throw up. Her legs felt like lead. She stumbled.

Gemma was instantly at her side, gripping her arm like a vice. "Oh, my sister had too much to drink!" Gemma announced loudly to the staring guests. A nearby waiter stepped forward, looking concerned, but Gemma quickly waved him off with a tight smile. "She's having a severe panic attack. Evert asked me to take her up to his private suite immediately to avoid a scene." The waiter nodded and stepped back. "I'll take her upstairs to rest."

"Let go of me," Clarine slurred. Her tongue felt thick and useless.

She tried to shove Gemma away, but her muscles wouldn't obey. Gemma dragged her toward the private elevators.

As the elevator doors slid shut, Clarine's drooping eyes caught a glimpse of Marta. Her stepmother was raising a glass to Jax Kade, a notorious, sleazy Hollywood producer.

The elevator dinged at the top floor. Gemma hauled Clarine's limp body down the silent, thickly carpeted hallway.

They reached the suite at the end. Gemma fumbled with a keycard.

Clarine bit down hard on her own tongue. The sharp, metallic taste of blood filled her mouth. The sudden spike of intense pain sent a jolt of adrenaline through her sluggish veins.

With a desperate burst of strength, Clarine violently shoved Gemma's chest.

Gemma shrieked as her high heels twisted. She crashed hard onto the floor. "You bitch!"

Clarine didn't look back. She ran. Her legs wobbled, but she threw her weight forward. She saw a heavy mahogany door slightly ajar-the Presidential Suite.

She threw herself inside, slammed the door shut, and hit the deadbolt just as Gemma's fists pounded against the wood outside.

The Presidential Suite was pitch black. Heavy blackout curtains sealed off the neon glow of Manhattan.

Clarine leaned against the locked door, gasping for air. The strange heat in her blood ignited. It spread like wildfire from her stomach to her fingertips. Her skin felt too tight, burning from the inside out.

She pushed off the door, blindly reaching for a light switch on the wall. Her hand struck something hard. A heavy ceramic vase tipped over and shattered against the marble entryway.

From the deep shadows of the bedroom, a low, ragged breath cut through the silence.

A massive silhouette moved toward her. The air shifted, thick with a predatory, aggressive heat.

Evert was burning alive. He had been drugged during a vicious corporate negotiation an hour ago and barely made it back to his long-term private suite. His mind was fractured, his vision completely gone.

Through the haze of the drug, a faint, unfamiliar sweetness-something soft and intoxicatingly clean-hit his senses.

He lunged forward. His large hands grabbed Clarine's shoulders, slamming her back against the wall.

The scorching heat of his body burned through her thin white dress. Clarine let out a sharp, trembling gasp.

She tried to scream, to fight him off, but the drug turned her panic into a soft, helpless whimper. Her brain short-circuited.

The sound of her voice snapped the last thread of Evert's control. He swept her off her feet, carrying her into the dark bedroom and dropping her onto the massive king bed.

In the absolute darkness, fueled by the hallucinogenic drugs, neither recognized the other. They were just two bodies burning in the dark.

Outside, a violent thunderstorm rolled over the city, drowning out the muffled sounds inside the suite.

At four in the morning, the biological shock of exhaustion jolted Clarine awake.

Her body ached. Every muscle felt bruised and torn. She blinked into the darkness. A faint flash of lightning slipped through a crack in the curtains.

It illuminated the broad, muscular back of a man sleeping next to her.

The memories of the night crashed into her skull. The pink champagne. Gemma dragging her. Marta toasting with Jax Kade.

A wave of pure, suffocating terror crushed her chest. She thought she had escaped Jax. She thought she was safe. Who is this?

Bile rose in her throat. She clamped a hand over her mouth to stop a sob. Ignoring the tearing pain between her thighs, she slid off the edge of the bed.

She found her torn white dress on the floor and pulled it over her head. She didn't bother looking for her shoes. She unlocked the door and fled the suite, running down the hallway like a hunted animal.

Ten minutes after Clarine disappeared into the elevator, another set of doors opened.

Cherie stepped onto the top floor, her heels clicking softly. She had come to find Evert, hoping to play the devoted caretaker.

She noticed the door to the Presidential Suite was slightly open.

Cherie pushed it wide. The heavy scent of sex and sweat hit her instantly. She tiptoed into the bedroom and saw Evert's sleeping form tangled in the sheets.

A wicked, triumphant smile stretched across Cherie's face. She quickly unzipped her red dress, letting it fall to the floor, and slipped under the covers next to him.

Clarine moved like a ghost through the halls of the Long Island estate. She bypassed the staff and locked herself inside the master bathroom.

She turned the shower dial all the way to hot. She stood under the scalding water, scrubbing her skin with a loofah until it turned raw and red. She scrubbed until her arms shook, trying to wash away the phantom touches of the stranger.

She stepped out and wiped the steam from the mirror.

Her reflection made her sick. Her pale neck and collarbones were covered in dark, angry purple bruises.

Clarine slid down the bathroom wall, pulling her knees to her chest. The tears finally broke. She cried until her throat was raw, the sound drowned out by the running water.

When the tears stopped, her eyes changed. The vulnerability vanished, replaced by a cold, dead emptiness.

She dried off and pulled on a thick, black turtleneck sweater, hiding every inch of her skin. She needed to know exactly who ruined her.

Clarine walked out of the bedroom and headed toward the stairs to get a glass of water. As she reached the landing, a voice drifted up from the living room.

She stopped and pressed herself against the wall, hiding in the shadows.

Marta was sitting on the sofa, a phone pressed to her ear.

"Yes, it went perfectly," Marta laughed, her voice dripping with venom. "Gemma lost her in the hallway, but Jax caught up to her in the penthouse. That little stand-in is completely ruined now."

Clarine's fingernails bit so deeply into her palms that the skin nearly broke. A violent, white-hot rage erupted in her chest.

She didn't run down the stairs to scream at Marta. Instead, she pulled her phone from her pocket, hit record, and captured every vile word her stepmother said.

Marta hung up and walked toward the kitchen.

Clarine spun around and hurried back to the master bedroom. She pulled her encrypted laptop from her bag. Before she was Mrs. Lynch, she was someone who paid attention to the details Evert ignored. Her fingers flew across the keyboard. She navigated to the Apex Club's VIP client portal and typed in the universal backend override password-a string of numbers she had once seen Evert's assistant use. She prayed they hadn't bothered to update it. Within minutes, she was into the security server.

She pulled up the top-floor hallway cameras. The footage from 11:00 PM to 11:15 PM was a wall of static. Someone had wiped it.

Clarine's eyes narrowed. She switched to the exterior street cameras. At 2:00 AM, the footage showed Jax Kade storming out of the lobby, kicking a trash can in frustration. He was alone.

Clarine slammed the laptop shut. If Jax left angry at 2:00 AM, he wasn't the man in the bed. She had slept with a total stranger.

The weight of the betrayal and the violation pressed down on her lungs. She glanced at the calendar on her phone. Her blood ran cold. She was ovulating.

Clarine grabbed her keys, threw on a trench coat, and put on a pair of dark sunglasses and a medical mask.

She drove to a rundown, 24-hour pharmacy on the edge of Manhattan. She kept her head down, handed the cashier a twenty-dollar bill, and walked out with a box of Plan B.

Sitting in the driver's seat of her car, she ripped the foil open. She swallowed the pill dry. It scraped down her throat, leaving a bitter, chalky aftertaste.

She crumpled the empty box and the receipt into a tight ball, shoved it into her coat pocket, and drove back to the estate.

When Clarine walked into the bedroom, the adrenaline crash hit her. The room spun. She tossed her coat onto the armchair.

As the coat hit the cushion, the crumpled receipt slipped out of the shallow pocket and fell silently onto the thick carpet, landing just inches away from the metal wastebasket.

Clarine was too exhausted to notice. She collapsed onto the bed in her clothes and fell into a dark, dreamless sleep.

At 3:00 PM, the screech of tires tore through the driveway.

Evert kicked the front doors open. He was vibrating with a dark, explosive energy. When he woke up in the hotel and saw Cherie next to him, a wave of intense physical repulsion had hit him. He didn't understand why, but he had thrown a blank check at her and left immediately.

He took the stairs two at a time and shoved the bedroom door open.

Clarine was asleep on the bed. Evert walked toward her, intending to demand why she left the gala early.

As he stood over her, his eyes caught the edge of her black turtleneck. The fabric was slightly bunched, revealing an inch of pale skin on her collarbone.

And a dark, violent hickey.

Evert's pupils dilated. A deafening roar filled his ears. The rational part of his brain snapped in half.

He reached down and violently yanked the collar of her sweater down.

Her neck and chest were covered in fresh, aggressive bite marks and bruises.

"Wake up!" Evert roared, grabbing her arm and hauling her up from the mattress.

Clarine gasped, her eyes flying open in terror. She thrashed against his grip, her brain still foggy from sleep.

"Whose marks are these?" Evert's voice was a demonic growl. His fingers dug into her biceps. "Which bastard did you spread your legs for?"

Clarine's mouth opened, but no words came out. She couldn't tell him she didn't know.

Evert shoved her back onto the bed. As he stepped back, his expensive leather shoe caught the edge of the wastebasket, kicking it aside in his blind fury.

He looked down. The crumpled receipt lay exposed on the carpet.

He snatched it up and smoothed out the paper. The bold black letters screamed at him: PLAN B - EMERGENCY CONTRACEPTIVE.

Evert let out a chilling, hollow laugh. He threw the receipt directly at her face. It fluttered onto her lap like a dead leaf.

"You cheap whore," Evert spat, his chest heaving. "You break the loyalty clause of our contract, and you try to hide the evidence in my own house?"

"Evert, listen to me-" Clarine started, her voice shaking.

"Shut up!" he bellowed. He pulled his phone from his pocket and dialed his legal team. His eyes never left hers, burning with absolute hatred.

"Draft the divorce papers. Now," Evert ordered into the phone. "Invoke the infidelity clause. She gets nothing. Strip her naked and throw her on the street."