Chapter One

“Hattie Snow Ellignton, come down now!! The taxi is already waiting!”

My mother’s voice echoed up the stairs, sharp enough to cut through the heavy silence of my empty bedroom.

“I am coming, Mother!!” I screamed back, throwing the last of my books into my backpack and zipping it shut with a harsh pull.

I leaned against my desk and let out a long, exhausted sigh. Honestly, I was as supposed to be used to this by now. This wasn’t the first time I had to pack my entire life into a few cardboard boxes, and it certainly wasn’t the first time my mom was getting married.

It was a cycle. Every single time she met a new man, she claimed he was her “soulmate.” And every single time the marriage failed, she found a brand-new excuse to leave. I had completely lost count of all my failed step-siblings over the years. Most of them were just little kids and Mom happened to never give birth in any of the marriage, so it was easy to ignore, easy to forget once we packed up and moved to a new city.

But this time, it was different. This was my first time getting an older stepbrother. And this time, we were moving into serious wealth.

I still didn’t know how she managed it, but my mom had somehow landed one of the richest men in New York City. The guy was loaded, but the whole situation felt wrong. His wife had passed away just two months ago according to my mother. My mother didn’t even wait for the poor man to heal from his grief before rushing down the aisle. Just another excuse to add to her list.

Still, I couldn’t complain too much. The only good thing about this entire mess was that her new husband had already paid my tuition for the most expensive, prestigious college in New York. For a quiet, in experienced girl who usually hid behind good grades and perfect behavior, it was a perfect dream come true.

I grabbed the handle of my suitcase and dragged it towards the door, the wheels scraping loud in the floor.

At the top of the stairs, I paused. I hauled the suitcase up and began the slow, tedious trek down, each step making a dull thud that echoed through the empty house.

When I finally reached the bottom, I dropped my bags by the front door and took a slow look around. The living room was completely stripped. The walls naked, showing faint clean squares where our old framed picture used to hang. Every furniture in the house was gone.

This place had never truly been a home—just another temporary pit stop between my mother’s chaotic romances—but a small part of me still felt a sting. Every time we left a place, I left a little piece of myself behind, forced to start over and adapt to whatever new life she had engineered for us.

“Hattie! Move it!!” My mother snapped, already standing by the open front door, her heels clicking impatiently on the porch. She didn’t look back at the house once. She was already living in her glossy, New York future.

I took one last deep breath of the stale, empty air, letting the dust settle in my lungs. I didn’t know what kind of life was waiting for us in that massive New York Mansion, or what kind of person my new step family would be. But as I turned and walked towards the taxi, I knew there was no turning back.

My old life was officially over.