My fingers hovered over his name on my phone. Mom’s hand closed around my wrist before I could type.
“Under no circumstances,” she said, voice low but fierce, “can you text about what you saw. To no one. Not even Luke. Especially Luke. He can’t know why you’re leaving. Or even that you are.”
Tears stung my eyes, blurring her face into something soft and unfamiliar. “Mom?—”
“Promise me, Mila.”
My chest ached. The words scraped out, raw and splintered. The future we’d planned and dreamed of shattered around me. But Mom had always looked out for me. And in this, I had to believe she still was. “I promise.”
I thought I was protecting him. Turns out, I was setting the fuse.
CHAPTER ONE
MILA
Present Day
Iclenched my fists as Mom pulled into the driveway of our new rental—a squat, forgotten house slouched behind overgrown hedges and broken dreams. The porch sagged under the weight of peeling paint and rust-bitten railings. Weeds clawed through the concrete like the place was trying to swallow itself whole. It looked temporary. Like us.
Blackwood. The name hit with the force of a punch to the ribs. The town I swore I’d never set foot in again. And yet, here I was.
Mom threw the car into park as if she hadn’t just driven us headfirst into a land mine. Her exhale was light, as though she hadn’t ripped the scab off a wound I’d spent a year trying to forget. Another town. Another house. Another mask to wear. But this wasn’t just another pit stop on our escape route. This was the origin story of every broken piece inside me.
Luke King. The name pressed against my skull, relentlessly. I forced it down. The next time I see him, he wouldn’t be theguy I remembered. The one who kissed me as if I was air and he couldn’t breathe without me. I didn’t need to see him again to know that boy was gone, no doubt replaced by someone colder. Crueler. The kind of dangerous that didn’t need weapons because of who he was and who he was connected to. Someone I’d helped create by leaving the way I had. As if I’d taken his trust and thrown it back in his face.
I’d left him without a goodbye. Just one message on a phone I wasn’t supposed to have.I’m leaving. I’m sorry.
He’d called. Texted. Begged. Then raged. Until I went dark. Changed my number. Disappeared. But now, we were back. Walking willingly into the heart of the storm.
“Mila, help me with these boxes.”Mom broke my mental spiral as she popped open the door, stretching as though this was a yoga retreat instead of a return to hell.
I grabbed the nearest box, shoulders stiff. Arguing with her wouldn’t change anything. It never did. Our life was built on burned bridges and fabricated names. She called them reinventions. I called them what they were—lies dressed in fresh coats of paint.
This move wasn’t about reinvention. It was a resurrection.
Supposedly, someone had offered her a job too good to pass up—financial consulting, high-dollar, low-transparency. She swore it was clean. That it had nothing to do with the past, with how she’d worked for King Enterprises back then, or what’d happened. No one had come after us; she said we were good. Said her new job was with King’s competition. But in Blackwood, every job came with strings. And I’d learned the hard way that those strings were often nooses.
The stairs creaked as if they knew we didn’t belong. I walked down the hall and entered my room that was more storage unit than sanctuary—yellowed blinds, warped wood floor, air thickwith dust and a ghost of something sour. Probably mildew. Possibly regret.
I dropped my box by the bed and turned to the window—and froze.
Beyond the rusting fence, past cookie-cutter houses trying too hard to be charming, loomedBlackwood Academy.All glass and stone. Cold and perfect. A castle built to keep people like me out. And just past it, the glint of metal and glass caught the light—Blackwood’s prized rink. Luke’s domain.
I knew before we got here that he still ruled it. His name was legend. His scowl immortalized in championship photos and whispered hallway threats. His family’s empire was intact, at least on paper. But the cracks had started a year ago. And now, here I was, a sledgehammer with a fake smile.
Stay invisible. Graduate high school. Get out.
The plan was simple. And impossible.
The scent of cardboard and old pine cleaner filled the hallway as I ventured out of my room. Mom was already unpacking as if this place was a home instead of a strategic hideout. I found her in the kitchen, stacking chipped plates.
Her voice floated in, light and familiar.“We just got here. Thanks for checking in.”
I stepped in as she leaned against the counter, casual and composed. Her eyes flicked to mine—intense and unreadable, too calm for a woman who just reentered enemy territory. She hung up the call.
I scowled, irritated on principle by everything. “Who was that?”
“Just someone from the company. Checking in.”
