3
Cassidy broke her leg.
It wasn’t my fault.
But no one believed me.
Not even Lucas Hart.
Three years ago, he used a DNA test to send me back to my biological father in a run–down countryside town.
I don’t even know how I survived those three years.
My father was a gambling addict who owed more money than I could count.
Debt collectors showed up constantly, tearing the house apart and taking anything of value.
The weight of it all fell entirely on me.
Whenever my father drank, he’d beat me senseless and call me a worthless piece of trash.
I had no choice but to work myself to the bone, trying to scrape together enough money to keep us afloat.
One day, the debt collectors came back, this time with a knife pressed to my throat.
They told me I had ten days to pay them back.
If I couldn’t, they’d sell me to a nightclub.
I begged them on my knees, pleading for more time.
Eventually, they gave me a month.
But there was no time to breathe.
The moment they left, my father stormed in with a leather belt in his hand.
The belt lashed across my back, cutting into my skin like a blade.
No matter how much I screamed and begged, he didn’t stop.
“Tomorrow, you’ll sell yourself on the streets and start making money for me!”
I knew if I didn’t escape, my life would be over.
In the dead of night, while my father was passed out drunk, I forced myself to stand.
Shaking, I dialed the number that had been buried in my memory for years.
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I swallowed my pride, abandoned every shred of dignity I had left, and begged him to help me escape.
“This is your home. Where else do you think you can go?”
His cold, detached words hit me like a bucket of ice water poured over my head.
I didn’t dare provoke him further.
He had a hundred ways to make my life miserable, and I no longer had the strength to fight back.
I just wanted to survive. I didn’t dare hope for anything more.
Fragments of memory and reality blurred together in my mind.
I couldn’t tell if I was dreaming or if I was already dead.
I wanted to open my eyes, but my eyelids felt heavy, as though they were weighed down with lead.
Then, I collapsed, my consciousness slipping away.
I had a dream.
In that dream, I was still Nora Miller, the carefree, pampered daughter of the Miller family.
I lived a life of luxury, untouched by pain or hardship.
Cassidy’s accident had never happened.
Lucas Hart didn’t hate me.
If only none of it had ever happened…
A sharp tug yanked me out of my dream and back into the cold reality.
Someone grabbed me roughly, dragging me off the ground.
“Nora, get up! Quit pretending! Who are you trying to fool with this pathetic act? I know exactly what you’re up to!”
I forced my heavy eyelids open and saw Sean Miller’s twisted face glaring down at me.
In my dazed state, I instinctively tried to defend myself.
“I’m not-”
“Let her in!” came my stepmother’s shrill voice from inside the house. “People will think we’re mistreating her otherwise!”
Sean shoved me forward, and the housekeeper, Mrs. Lewis, rushed to catch me.
Her worried expression was the only kindness I’d seen in that house.
“Thank you,” I whispered, my voice weak.
The moment the words left my mouth, my knees buckled, and I nearly stumbled into the door handle.
I don’t even remember how I made it to my room.
The next thing I knew, it was the following evening, and i was burning up with fever.
Mrs. Lewis had secretly given me medicine, but it wasn’t helping.
Sean stood nearby, his face twisted in disgust.
“Quit acting like you’re on death’s door. You caught a little cold–it’s not that serious!”
9:48 AM
