Lucian had suspected Julian from the beginning.

Even the prospect of finding me hadn’t distracted him from the details.

Hayes’s expression cooled.

“If there’s evidence against him, I’ll arrest him.”

He stepped closer and lowered his voice.

“I know you’re using your enemy’s disappearance to go after her family. Stop interfering with my investigation.”

He didn’t believe Julian was guilty.

Why would he?

Julian was the perfect gentleman. A charity ambassador. One of the city’s ten most outstanding young business leaders.

Lucian was arrogant, ruthless, and rumored to have ties to people the police would very much like to arrest. He had openly targeted the Whitmores since I disappeared.

I understood why Hayes distrusted him.

That didn’t make it any less bitter.

Lucian waited until the police had gone, put out his cigarette, and headed toward the main house.

Adrian followed, his joking expression gone.

“Our people have checked the dumps and every likely disposal site. No body. It’s strange. Even if she’s dead, there should be something.”

Lucian’s network had dozens of informants. In some places, they moved faster than the police.

But there was nothing left to find.

That was why.

Adrian adjusted his glasses and attempted a joke.

“Unless she was so unlucky there isn’t even a body left?”

Lucian stopped.

One look from him wiped the smile from Adrian’s face.

“Lucian…”

“I pay you an eight-figure annual retainer to listen to this?”

“I’m sorry.”

“Keep looking. If she’s alive, find her. If she’s dead, find her body.”

I watched him in silence.

Even my enemy hadn’t given up on me.

Perhaps I should have been kinder to him when I was alive.

Without Julian and the Whitmores between us, we might even have been friends.

Lucian took the elevator from the living room to the third floor.

I had been to Rosehaven once before.

I was nineteen then.

It was the first time we truly faced each other.

The Whitmore Group had expanded into property and finance, but pharmaceuticals had built the family fortune.

We had spent a fortune recruiting researchers and developing a drug designed to strengthen immune-cell function.

Then our laboratory director, Brandon Ellis, lost the formula in a bet.

Brandon was Vivian’s nephew. Spoiled, reckless, and fond of gambling with the friends he’d made abroad.

The family was furious. Vivian nearly fainted.

Julian looked at me with worry in his eyes.

“What are we going to do, Stella? This could ruin the family.”

I couldn’t bear to see him unhappy.

So I put on a cap and mask and went to find Brandon. I intended to get the casino’s details and win the formula back.

Instead, I saw him leave with a gun.

I hid in the trunk of his car.

He drove straight to Rosehaven Estate.

He hadn’t lost the formula to a casino.

He had lost it to Lucian Blackwood.

I knew enough about Lucian to understand how dangerous this was. The Whitmores couldn’t afford to antagonize the Blackwoods.

Brandon understood nothing.

He stormed into the living room with his gun and demanded the formula back, apparently unaware that cameras had picked him up more than a mile before he reached the house.

Lucian had let him in.

He lounged on the sofa, long legs stretched out, watching Brandon as though someone had brought a performing monkey into his home.

“Are you threatening me?”

Those gray-blue eyes went dark.

Before Brandon could answer, I crept up behind him and hit him with a heavy stick.

He dropped unconscious.

I took the gun, unloaded it, and threw it into the fish tank.

For once, Lucian looked surprised.

I removed my cap and mask.

“Play me. If I win, you give me the formula.”

He rested a hand against his forehead, looking amused.

“And if you lose?”

I took off my coat.

“My life is yours.”

His gaze changed.

“What’s your name?”

“Stella Whitmore.”

“Stella Whitmore.”

He repeated it slowly.

Such an ordinary name should not have sounded like that in his mouth.

I was nineteen. I had never been looked at the way he looked at me then, as though he wanted to tear me apart and consume every piece.

He rose and came toward me.

The pressure of his presence made me want to retreat. I forced myself to stand still, concealing my fear and meeting his eyes.

A smile touched his mouth.

“Remember. You started this.”

That was how it began.

I had gambled the only thing that belonged to me.

My life.

And now I had lost it.