Chapter 2

My home was an expansive estate nestled in the gated hills of Bel Air. It was the kind of neighborhood where the annual homeowner association fees alone reached seven figures.

I unlocked the heavy, custom mahogany door with my fingerprint. Almost instantly, a tiny pink ball launched across the foyer and wrapped her arms tightly around my leg.

"Daddy. You are home."

I leaned down and effortlessly scooped up my daughter, Emma Duncan, with one arm, pressing a kiss to her soft, warm cheek.

"Were you a good girl today?" I asked.

"I was the best girl. I even helped Mommy water the hydrangeas," Emma nuzzled into my shoulder, eagerly claiming her credit.

In the open-concept kitchen, a woman with a slender, graceful silhouette turned around. She was wearing a simple, cream-colored sundress, and she offered me the gentlest smile.

"You are back. Go wash your hands. Dinner is almost ready."

This was Grace Sterling. My wife, and Emma's mother.

She was also the only woman in the entire world who could make me willingly wash my hands and step up to a stove.

I walked into the kitchen and wrapped my arms around her waist from behind. I rested my chin on her shoulder, taking a deep breath of the faint, intoxicating scent of jasmine lotion on her skin.

I murmured, "I missed you."

Grace tensed up a bit, and the tips of her ears turned a visible shade of pink. She nudged my ribs lightly with her elbow. "Stop it. Emma is watching."

I let out a low chuckle and pressed a kiss to her flushed earlobe. "So what? We are legally married."

"Mommy and Daddy are being silly." Emma covered her eyes with her hands, but her fingers were spread wide open, clearly enjoying the show.

Grace and I both laughed.

This was my life. I had a beautifully chaotic daughter and an endlessly tender wife. It was absolute perfection.

I made elegant dishes and a rich soup that night, all perfectly tailored to what Grace and Emma loved. As for me, I ate whatever they ate. I was never picky.

Over dinner, I treated my subway encounter with Wyatt as a casual joke and told Grace about it.

Her delicate brows furrowed slightly. "Why is this Ms. Snow still hovering around like a ghost?"

"She is probably just having a rough time lately and suddenly remembered how reliable her old fallback guy used to be." I shrugged, entirely indifferent.

Three years ago, I was just an ordinary corporate drone. On my wedding day, my girlfriend of seven years, Victoria, publicly left me at the altar.

Her reasoning was that she simply couldn't see a future with me.

I got blackout drunk that night. When I woke up, I realized I had transmigrated into the pages of a trashy billionaire romance novel I had casually read, taking over the body of a tragic supporting character who shared my exact name.

In the original book, Isaac was the sole heir to an unimaginable global fortune. He had hidden his identity and lived like a pauper just to win Victoria, the novel's female lead.

When she dumped him at the altar, the original Isaac fell into a severe depression, eventually allowing his family's empire to be swallowed up by Victoria and the novel's true male lead.

When I first woke up in a private hospital suite, staring at a bank account balance with a dizzying number of zeros, I only had one thought.

To hell with the plot. I was going to retire.

I leveraged my spoilers for the future and dumped the business onto a few low-profile hustlers destined for greatness. I had one demand. "Stay out of my hair. Handle your own mess. Only look for me if you're truly stuck."

The result was hilarious. These aggressive executives started competing fiercely with each other for the title of my favorite proxy, working themselves to the bone and doubling Duncan Group's market share in the process.

Meanwhile, I simply collected my massive dividends and embraced my new life of absolute leisure without a shred of guilt.

That was when I met Grace.

She was an heiress from a family with wealth that dwarfed even the Snow family, yet she lived like an ethereal artist who cared nothing for high society. It was love at first sight. We married quickly and had our beautiful Emma.

Victoria knew absolutely none of this. She still believed I was the pathetic loser she had abandoned, struggling to survive at the bottom of the social ladder.

"Daddy, what does rekindling a romance mean?" Emma asked, chewing on the end of her fork with curious eyes.

I tapped her little nose. "It is like eating expired microwave noodles. It just gives you a terrible stomachache."

Grace laughed, shooting me a playful, scolding glare.

Right at that moment, my phone vibrated on the marble island.

It was a FaceTime request from Sean Doyle, my executive assistant.

I answered it. Sean's impeccably groomed, corporate-shark face appeared on the screen.

He pushed his gold-rimmed glasses up the bridge of his nose, keeping his tone entirely respectful. "Good evening, sir. I apologize for interrupting your dinner. I have two minor updates for you."

"Go ahead," I said simply.

"First, we finalized the acquisition of SwiftTech this afternoon. It should boost our profit margin by roughly fifteen percent next quarter. Second..."

Sean paused, his expression turning slightly weird. "The hashtag about you refusing to get out of bed to run the company is trending on Twitter again. It actually caused the stock prices of three of our subsidiaries to hit their daily limits."

I stared at the screen.

These overachieving executives were clearly using my eccentric reputation to manipulate the market and impress me.

"Noted," I said with a deadpan expression. "Is there anything else?"

"No, sir. Please enjoy your evening." Sean prepared to end the call.

A thought suddenly crossed my mind. "Wait."

"Yes, sir."

"Run a background check on Snow Enterprises. Find out what they are up to lately."

Sean blinked, surprised, but recovered instantly. "Understood, sir. You mean the company run by your former classmate, Victoria Snow?"

I replied, "That's right."

He said, "I will have a full report for you in thirty minutes."

I hung up the phone. Grace was looking at me with mild concern in her eyes. "Are you worried she is going to try and hurt you?"

I placed a perfectly seared piece of short rib onto her plate and smiled. "I am not worried about her. I am just worried she is going to crash and burn too quickly. I want to make sure I get to watch the whole show."