POV: Selene Hart
The problem with revenge was that it didn't prepare you for the taste of your own blood.
I'd thought I'd learned to stomach anything—humiliation, loss, the gnawing hunger for justice—but the grainy video on my laptop screen was different. Damon Blackwood's body moved with deliberate sin, his hand gripping the waist of the woman beneath him as though she were the only thing keeping him alive. And that woman…
Lila.
My best friend. My only friend. The one who used to share takeout with me on rainy nights, who held my hand at my father's funeral, who vanished without a word the night the feds dragged me away.
The date stamp in the corner of the footage was missing. There was no context, no explanation. Just the sound of Damon's low voice, clear even through the static:
"She's just a cute baddie. Hart means nothing to me."
My name in his mouth felt like a blade between my ribs.
I didn't remember moving from my chair, only the slam of my apartment door behind me. My heels hit the pavement with surgical precision, each step fueled by the kind of fury that had kept me alive for the past two years.
Damon wasn't going to explain this over the phone. No, I wanted to see his eyes when I threw this betrayal in his face.
By the time I reached Blackwood Tower, the doorman didn't even bother stopping me. My reflection in the mirrored elevator doors looked nothing like the woman Damon had met two years ago—no soft edges, no polite smiles.
When the doors slid open to his penthouse, I stepped into glass and steel and the faint scent of his cologne. But I wasn't alone.
Victor Langston stood by the floor-to-ceiling windows, his expensive suit catching the city lights. Damon was across from him, one hand shoved in his pocket, the other holding a tumbler of something dark.
"Selena," Victor said smoothly, as though my arrival was expected. "Or should I say Elena? You've been busy."
"Get out of my way," I snapped.
Victor's smile didn't falter. "Hart is playing a dangerous game, Damon. You'd be wise to—"
"I said out," Damon cut in, his voice low but sharp enough to slice through the room.
Victor's eyes flicked between us, measuring something, then he brushed past me on his way to the elevator. "Careful, Hart," he murmured as he passed. "You don't even know which side you're on."
"And who told you am like you. You're nothing but a desperate and selfish dog looking for the nearest carcass of bone to have all to himself." I said, my voice low barely above a whisper.
The doors closed behind him. Silence stretched between Damon and me, thick enough to choke on.
"You're haven't been answering my calls?" Damon said finally, setting his glass down.
"Ohh…" I chuckled, "No remorse. Now asking me if I did pick your calls or not. What stupid calls are you talking about?" I snapped with the little pieces of heart that remained.
"Remorse for what?" he asked as though confusion took the identity of his face.
Without a word, I pulled my phone from my coat pocket, opened the video, and thrust it toward him. "Care to explain this?"
His gaze flicked to the screen. No denial. No shock. Just a slow exhale, as if the sight of it was inevitable.
"You think you know what you saw," he said, his tone almost bored, "but you don't know what I lost that night."
I laughed, sharp and humorless. "You lost? Damon, that's my best friend. The one who disappeared the same night I was arrested. And there you are, screwing her like—"
"Careful," he warned.
"No," I stepped forward, closing the gap between us until I could feel the heat radiating off his body. "You don't get to warn me. You don't get to stand there and pretend that this doesn't matter. You—"
His hand shot out, gripping my wrist. Not hard enough to hurt, but enough to still me. His eyes were darker than I'd ever seen them, dangerous in a way that made my pulse betray me.
"You have no idea what that night was," he said, voice low. "My parents were testing me. Forcing me to choose between love and the empire they wanted me to inherit. That," he nodded toward the phone, "was part of their game."
I swallowed, my voice catching. "So it's fake?"
His jaw tightened. "I didn't say that."
God, I wanted to hit him. I wanted to kiss him. I wanted to drag the truth out of him with my bare hands. Instead, I yanked my wrist free.
"You're a coward," I said, my voice shaking more than I wanted it to.
"And you're still playing checkers in a chess game," he shot back. "You think Lila was some innocent friend who betrayed you. You think I'm the only one who could've orchestrated your fall. But the real enemy? You haven't even looked him in the eye yet."
Something in his tone—something almost pitying—made me step back. I hated that he could make me doubt my own convictions.
"All instincts in me say you're the one, and there is nothing that can change that conviction."
He gave a small grin, "Well done with your convictions. If I was in all of this dark deeds, I would have killed you ever since you returned back to New York."
I turned toward the elevator, avoiding to cause any bad scene. "I'm done here."
"Selena—"
"Don't." My voice was final. "Don't even call me."
Just minutes passed, my phone buzzed.
A new message. No sender ID. No subject line.
The text was short:
The man you hate didn't destroy you. It is the man who you trust that did.
My heart slammed against my ribs as the attachment loaded. A single photograph filled the screen.
Ethan Graves. My Ethan.
Shaking hands with Victor Langston.
The timestamp in the corner was clear.
Two weeks before the night I was arrested.