Rain poured down in sheets as Selena stepped into the center of the family council chamber.

"Mira belongs to the Winslow family, and she betrayed Lucien five years ago, now she's even colluding with outsiders and sneaking into the estate. Leaving her alive for one more day is like planting a ticking bomb in the heart of this family!"

The elders fell silent for a long while.

Someone objected, "If Lucien finds out about this, he'll never agree to it."

Selena curled her lips into a cold smile, "Kill her first, and if Lucien asks, we'll say she jumped into the sea out of guilt."

The order was issued quickly behind Lucien's back.

Selena had Mira seized and taken out to open water.

When Mira stood on the deck once again and felt chains wrap around her ankles, she let out a soft laugh and said, "This time too, was it Lucien's order?"

Selena looked down at her and said, "He said it himself, a traitor like you is better off dead."

Mira said nothing.

She remembered eight years ago, when she had been cornered by a rival gang in an abandoned warehouse during a family operation.

With a blade pressed to her throat, she had been certain she was going to die.

But in the next second, gunfire exploded, and Lucien appeared like a phantom.

Later, when she woke in the hospital, the first person she saw was him waiting at her bedside.

That was when he had said, "From now on, your life belongs to me."

And now, for the second time, Lucien had let others chain her to an anchor and throw her into the sea.

The moment freezing seawater rushed into her nose and mouth, Mira stopped struggling.

Maybe death was better, maybe that would end everything, and everything between her and Lucien could finally be erased with it.

Just as her consciousness was about to fade, a dark figure cut through the water.

It was Lucien.

He dove beneath the surface, pulled her into his arms, tore away the chains, and surfaced with her as fast as he could.

On deck, Selena's face turned deathly ashen as she said, "Lucien, how could you..."

Lucien ignored her, laid Mira flat on the deck, forced open her clenched jaw, and bent down to give her air.

Warm breath rushed into her lungs, and Mira coughed violently before slowly opening her eyes.

The first thing she saw was Lucien's drenched face, his eyes churning with emotions she could not understand: pain, fury, fear, and a trace of something that looked like heartache.

Mira stared blankly ahead and murmured softly, "I don't want to die again... the sea is so dark, I don't want to be thrown in there again..."

Lucien's pupils shrank sharply. What did she mean by die again?

But before he could ask, Mira lost consciousness.

Lucien scooped her into his arms and barked at the guards, "Everyone involved in this tonight will be severely punished."

Back at the estate, Mira lay on the soft bed staring at the ceiling, her body mostly unharmed, but her heart felt as though it had been crushed over and over again.

The next morning, the butler brought in breakfast, hesitated for a moment, and said quietly, "Miss Hawthorne was released last night, Mr. Yates said she has stayed by his side for ten years. So this time he's letting it go."

Mira's hand shook, and the coffee cup slipped to the floor, shattering into pieces.

Letting it go?

Mira lowered her eyes, hiding the storm inside them, and said, "Alright, I understand."

She suddenly remembered one birthday when she had casually mentioned wanting a strawberry cake from Escye, and Lucien had immediately sent a private jet for it, then brought it to her bedside himself at three in the morning.

She had laughed and called him ridiculous, but he had answered with complete seriousness, "If you want it, I'd even bring down the stars for you."

Back then, she had believed him.

But now, when it came to the person who wanted her dead, he let it go.

Liar.

Lucien was a liar.

Mira leaned against the window and cried without a sound. From beginning to end, she had been the only one who ever gave her heart.

The next day, the family convened an emergency council meeting.

Someone still insisted, "Lucien, Mira must die, she's a ticking bomb."

Others quickly agreed, "Selena is right, deal with her now before she causes bigger trouble later."

"Anyone who brings up killing her again," Lucien said, his gaze sweeping across the room, his voice calm yet soaked in bloodshed, "I'll kill them instead."

The entire room erupted in shock.

Standing in the corner, Selena dug her nails into her palm so hard they nearly drew blood.

For the sake of a traitor, Lucien had threatened the entire family.

In that moment, Selena finally understood that no matter what Mira had done—betrayal, escape, any of it—Lucien's heart had never truly left her.

Selena had lost completely, and as she turned away, she sent a message to one of the Yates Group's deadliest rivals.

"I have the security layout of Lucien's private estate, let's make a deal."

Selena handed a flash drive to the leader of the rival gang.

Three hours later, the rival gang stormed the eastern estate, their firepower striking every defensive point with deadly precision.

It was obvious they knew exactly where the defenses were weakest.

Lucien was directing the counterattack from the main house when an urgent report crackled through his earpiece, "Selena and Mira have been spotted in the west garden, they're both surrounded!"

His heart sank.

"Hold the main house!" He grabbed a submachine gun and charged into the night.

In the garden, firelight lit up Mira's pale face as she was forced back against the fountain.

Selena cowered behind her and shrieked, "You sold out the security layout, you traitor!"

Lucien's breath caught, Mira had betrayed him again.

"I didn't!" Mira screamed, "I don't know anything about any security layout!"

Lucien struck from the flank, bullets pouring out as enemies dropped one after another.

At the edge of the garden, Selena was on the inside and Mira was on the outside, and Mira was closer to him.

But Selena suddenly threw herself at him and cried, "Lucien, save me, she's trying to get us killed!"

Lucien instinctively reached out, grabbed Selena by the wrist, and yanked her behind cover.

It was the duty of a leader. Selena was a core member of the family, and if she died, the alliance would collapse.

But the moment he pulled Selena over, a stray bullet struck Mira in the shoulder, and she staggered backward into the rose bushes.

Lucien's pupils contracted sharply, "Mira!"

Mira looked at him, her eyes full of pain, shock, and disbelief, "I never betrayed you, not once!"

It felt like something slammed hard into Lucien's chest.

He tried to rush to her, but Selena clung tightly to his arm and shouted, "Forget her, she's the mole, we have to go!"

"Let go!" Lucien roared as he tried to shake her off and turn back toward Mira.

But then it happened.

A deafening blast erupted all around them, flames shot into the sky, and the shockwave nearly tore the entire garden apart.

Lucien was thrown to the ground by the blast, his ears ringing violently.

He struggled to his feet and looked toward where Mira had been standing, but all that remained was a sea of fire and shattered ruins.

"Mira!" he howled as he charged forward, only to be blocked by fallen beams and burning debris.

The flames devoured everything, and her figure vanished into the thick smoke.

Family reinforcements arrived soon after and drove the enemy back.

Everyone saw the Lucien who had once terrified the entire underworld kneeling in front of the ruins, tearing through the wreckage with his bare hands.

His eyes were bloodshot as he called Mira's name over and over, his voice breaking from hoarse shouts into choked sobs until only shattered whimpers remained.

The last look Mira had given him had been filled with so much pain.

Mira had said, "I never betrayed you."

What did betrayal even matter now? Lucien had never wanted Mira dead, the only thing he had ever wanted was to go back to the way they used to be.

Even if Mira really had been a traitor, he would have knelt beside her before the statue of Jesus and atoned with her until God forgave everything she had done.

Then they could have started over.

Selena staggered over with blood and ash smeared across her face and said tearfully, "Lucien, don't grieve, if a traitor dies, then she dies."

But Lucien could no longer hear anything, and the sheer force of his pain filled his throat with the metallic taste of blood.

A mouthful of blood burst from his lips, and Lucien collapsed into unconsciousness.

Meanwhile, on the north side of the estate.

Julian carried the unconscious Mira away from the inferno, his arm cut open and bleeding from shattered stone, yet he still held her tightly against him.

He said softly, "Hang on, I'm getting you out of here."

Jostled in his arms, Mira weakly opened her eyes, and before her consciousness slipped away again, she looked back one last time toward the estate, where flames towered into the sky like a grand funeral.

Lucien must think she was dead now.

Maybe that was for the best.

That way, the two of them would never have to drag each other through this again.

The fire had gone out.

The east wing of the Silvera estate was reduced to ruins, charred beams jutting crookedly from the debris. Mira had vanished somewhere within the wreckage.

The first thing Lucien did after waking up was return to the ruins and start digging through the rubble with his bare hands.

No one could stop him. They could only watch as his fingers clawed into the still-burning ash, as if he could dig out a shred of her clothing, a strand of her hair, anything that still carried her warmth.

There was nothing.

Only a blackened cufflink lay in his palm. It had been her birthday gift to him three years ago, a line of tiny letters engraved on its silver surface.

"L & M, forever."

Now, the "M" had melted away in the fire, leaving behind only a broken "L."

A hoarse laugh escaped him.

By the time he returned to the main building, dawn was breaking.

The butler hurried over, trembling. "Mr. Yates, the elders are waiting for you… The attackers have been identified. It was the Carlow family. They obtained our defense layout…"

"Get out." Lucien didn't even look at him. He walked straight to the liquor cabinet.

Amber liquid filled the crystal glass, and he downed it in one swallow. The burn traveled from his throat to his stomach, but it did nothing to fill the cold void in his chest.

In the days that followed, Lucien never left his study.

Documents piled up, phones rang endlessly, and the elders berated him for "ruining the family over a traitor." He ignored them all.

He just sat by the window, drinking glass after glass, his gaze fixed on the empty chair across from him. That was where Mira used to sit. She would curl up there with a book, sunlight filtering through the curtains and settling on her lashes like a dusting of gold.

The memories came, unstoppable.

Eight years ago, on a rain-soaked night, he saw her for the first time. She had been cornered in a warehouse, a blade pressed to her throat, yet her eyes burned with defiance.

He should never have saved the daughter of an enemy family. But in that moment, something drove him to pull the trigger.

Because he couldn't look away from those eyes.

From that day on, she became the only light in his dark world.

In the spring of their second year living together in secret, Lucien was shot during a firefight and fell into a coma from excessive blood loss.

Mira hid him in a safe house on the outskirts overnight. For seven full days, she never left his bedside, changing his dressings, feeding him water, and warming his cold hands with her own body heat.

On the night his fever spiked, he murmured about the nightmare of being locked in a cellar by his father as a child. She held him tightly and kept saying, "I'm here, Lucien. I'm here."

The way she looked at him then was quiet and unwavering, like the only lighthouse in a vast, dark sea.

But in the next instant, the memory shifted to that morning five years ago.

One of his men reported, "Mira submitted a hundred-page report to her brother."

He stood before the floor-to-ceiling window, watching her walk out of the apartment, her back resolute.

So all that tenderness had been a lie.

All those promises had been nothing but bait.

He had trusted her so completely. How could she bring herself to betray him?

Lucien had believed she would marry him. He believed in her more than he believed in himself.

But Mira had run. For five whole years, she vanished without a trace, leaving him alone to struggle in hell.

When he saw her again, the hatred was as strong as the joy. He hated her for disappearing for five years, yet he was glad she stood before him again.

Lucien had thought that this time, he would never let her escape again.

But last night, flames had filled the sky.

She had fallen into the rose bushes, blood staining her shoulder. The way she looked at him was filled with shock and pain. "I didn't betray you! Never!"

But he had pulled Selena away first.

In that single second.

The flames swallowed Mira whole.

Lucien hadn't even had the chance to say, "I believe you."

He suddenly hurled the glass at the wall, shards scattering everywhere.

Lucien curled up on the sofa, clutching his head, his knuckles blanching under the strain. A sob was lodged in his throat, but no sound came out.

If he had saved her first…

If he had believed her, just once…

If he hadn't let her leave that morning…

Countless "what ifs" coiled around his heart like venomous snakes.

In the end, the root of his hatred was still love. He would rather have been the one who died.

On the evening of the third day, Selena pushed the door open and walked in.

She was carefully dressed in a black dress, her makeup flawless. "Lucien, stop thinking about it. She was a traitor. It's better that she's gone. The family needs you…"

Lucien slowly raised his head.

There was nothing in his eyes but dead, lifeless ash, yet that gaze sent a chill down Selena's spine.

"Get out." His voice was hoarse. "Say her name again, and you're dead."

Selena's face turned deathly ashen. She finally understood. Even if Mira truly was a traitor, even if she had turned to ashes, Lucien's heart was buried in those ruins forever.

A dead woman was still more worth protecting than she, who was alive.

She stumbled out, her nails digging into her palms.

Selena clenched her fists. "It doesn't matter. Sooner or later, Lucien will forget that woman. And when he does, he'll realize that I'm the only one who's always been by his side."

Inside the room, Lucien curled in on himself, hearing only Mira's final words from the sea of flames the night before. "I didn't betray you…"

His hands trembling, he poured another glass of liquor, but he couldn't bring himself to swallow it. Tears slid down silently, dripping into the glass.

"Mira…" he murmured, his voice shattered. "Come back…"

He collapsed onto the carpet, clutching the charred cufflink tightly in his hand, as if it were the last thing keeping him alive.