Chapter 1

When the husband I had loved for five years smiled and slipped a lethal dose into my coffee, my stepsister's foot was wrapped tightly around his calf under the table.

"Drink it, sweetheart. You need to calm down."

Harrison wore a perfectly tailored Tom Ford suit as he lifted the expensive cup of black Gesha coffee and gently held it to my lips.

Morning light streamed through the floor-to-ceiling windows and fell across his handsome face.

His captivating blue eyes were filled with a tenderness that made me sick.

"You had another nightmare last night. You woke up screaming. I'm really worried about your mental state, Eleanor," he murmured, soothing me as if I were a fragile porcelain doll.

If grief had not kept me awake the night before, forcing me to pretend I was asleep while I watched him coldly crush several powerful white antipsychotic pills into the coffee grounds under the moonlight...

I might have drunk the poison with gratitude.

For the past three months, and ever since my father died in a cliffside car crash last week, Harrison had been "taking care" of me with this same suffocating devotion.

Everyone said I was the luckiest woman in Napa Valley, married to the perfect man, the kind who would shield me even if the sky came crashing down.

But now, cold seeped through my entire body, and my stomach twisted with nausea.

I made my hands shake violently as I accepted the delicate bone-china cup.

"Harrison, could you get me a sugar cube? My mouth tastes so bitter." I looked up weakly, keeping my eyes unfocused.

The moment he turned toward the bar, I tilted my wrist and emptied every drop of the drugged coffee into the dying monstera on the windowsill.

The dark brown liquid soaked into the soil without leaving a trace.

"Thank you, Harrison. I feel better after drinking it, but my head is still so confused..."

I collapsed against the enormous leather sofa and rubbed my temples in pain, giving them the perfect picture of a helpless, fragile "madwoman."

"That's the medication taking effect. You need to rest."

A cold, commanding voice came from the other end of the sofa.

My father-in-law, Arthur Bell.

He sat rigidly in my luxurious living room, holding a forged psychiatric evaluation in one hand.

His eyes moved over me as if I were a broken tool waiting to be thrown away.

"Face reality, Eleanor." Arthur pushed a thick stack of papers across the crystal coffee table.

"Your father drove off a cliff while drunk just last week. In your current mental condition, you are in no state to run Silverleaf Winery, the largest winery in Napa Valley."

Printed across the cover were the words: GENERAL POWER OF ATTORNEY.

"Sign it," Arthur ordered, leaving no room for argument.

"Harrison will take control of the winery on your behalf. As your legal spouse, he also has the right to place you in the best private psychiatric facility in Switzerland so you can recover."

A psychiatric facility?

It would be a grave I would never walk out of.

The moment I signed and stepped through those doors, I would end up like my mother, who had battled depression for years—dead in a carefully arranged "accident."

But the woman sitting beside Harrison made me even sicker.

My stepsister, Chloe.

She wore a skin-tight red dress, and the Cartier diamond necklace around her neck was the one my father had left to me.

A few minutes earlier, I had dropped my napkin and bent down to pick it up. I had seen everything happening beneath the tablecloth.

Chloe's black high heel had been sliding shamelessly up Harrison's calf, rubbing him through the fabric of his suit pants.

So that was it.

My husband. My stepsister. My father-in-law.

Like a pack of hyenas that had scented blood, they had built a perfect trap. They would have me declared insane, get rid of me, and divide the empire worth hundreds of millions that my father had left behind.

My heart slammed against my ribs while ice seemed to flow through my veins.

But I lowered my eyes and used every ounce of strength I had to hide the hatred raging inside me.

"Okay..."

My voice trembled in surrender as my weak fingers played with the solid-gold pen.

"But I'm too tired today. I can barely hold the pen. Tomorrow... I'll sign it tomorrow, after the gala."

A flash of impatient triumph lit Harrison's eyes.

He hurried over and kissed my forehead. The damp, cold touch of his lying lips made goose bumps rise across my skin.

"Don't be afraid, Eleanor. I'll take care of everything," he whispered with fake tenderness.

Yes, you will take care of everything, Harrison.

Outside his line of sight, I slowly clenched my fist.

But I swore that tomorrow night would not end the way any of them expected.