Chapter 1
My sister Claire Sterling had been stealing my stuff since we were kids, always with that same innocent look on her face.
Pencils, backpacks, birthday presents, and even my friends—nothing was ever safe.
The spoiled princess already had everything, but she just couldn't resist taking what was mine.
Now here she was, in bed with my fiancé, still playing the wide-eyed innocent.
"Helena," she said with those fake tearful eyes, "Justin and I are really in love. Can't you just be happy for us?"
Mom immediately wrapped her arms around Claire like always. "You've got everything already," she scolded me. "Why can't you let your sister have this one thing?"
Fine. They could have each other. I'd walk away.
But I didn't say I'd forgive. Hoped they were ready for what happened next.
*****
My sister Claire and my fiancé, Justin, were caught in bed together by paparazzi—red-handed, no excuses.
The photos of their tangled, naked bodies hit me like a slap to the face.
Just an hour before those pictures landed in my hands, I'd been finalizing the schedule for our engagement ceremony.
After a moment, I stood there in silence, feeding every last page of the meticulously planned event into the shredder.
My assistant Zachary York didn't say a word. The only sound was the machine's mechanical grind, chewing through my trust along with the paper.
It was only after every last sheet had been shredded into pieces that I finally regained my composure.
There was no room for anger or self-pity now.
I had too much to deal with.
Who had tipped off the paparazzi? Should I bury the story? How would this affect the Sterling-Keaton alliance?
Questions raced through my mind as I shifted into damage-control mode.
I ordered Zachary to contain the fallout and, above all, keep this from my grandfather, Arthur Sterling.
His health was fragile, and the last thing he needed was stress.
Luckily, Arthur had already handed full control of the family business to me while he enjoyed his retirement.
He was busy gardening and birdwatching. Keeping him in the dark wouldn't be hard.
But whether I should cover it up depended on the truth.
Before making any moves, I needed answers from Claire right now.
Was it an accident? Was she forced?
Or was this just another one of her so-called "innocent" attempts to take what belonged to me?
When I walked through the front door, Claire was crying.
Dad paced the living room, cigarette smoke trailing behind him, while Mom held Claire in her arms, looking worried and urgent to know what had happened.
"Claire, talk to me," Mom pleaded, stroking her hair. "You're scaring me. Did Justin force you?"
Seeing me, my mom just shot me a perfunctory look and went right back to fussing over her precious princess.
She seemed to forget that Justin was my fiancé up until today.
She didn't care at all whether I was hurting or not.
Claire kept whimpering, looking like she was the most pitiful victim in the world, but she refused to actually speak up.
When she heard me come in, she lifted her head, those big, teary eyes gazing at me with that innocent look of hers.
I held her gaze, my face emotionless, my voice flat.
I asked, "Claire, just calm down and tell me exactly what happened last night.
"If he forced you, we'll deal with it and sue him right away."
Instead of answering, she let out another theatrical wail.
Mom immediately rounded on me.
She shouted, "Helena, can you at least try to be nicer to your sister?
"That attitude of yours is why you can't hold onto a man in the first place."
And there it was—the classic Mom pivot. Suddenly, I was the problem. Justin was a monster, sure, but only because I'd dragged him into our lives.
She ranted until she ran out of breath, and then, like magic, Claire's tears dried up.
Claire finally spoke up, her voice all pitiful and whiny.
And her first words were a masterpiece for me.
"Helena..." she sniffled, all fragile innocence. "I'm so sorry. But Justin and I... We're in love. Grandpa forced him to propose to someone he didn't even like. So we drank last night, and then... it happened."
She paused just long enough to give me a pointed look.
She continued, "Helena, please... Why not just let us be happy?"