Lucian's POV:
She was the exact replica of my mother's murderer.
A living echo of everything that ruined me.
I can't look at her without seeing the image of my mother—the woman who took her own life because of the affair. The first time I saw her walk into the academy, all I could see was that face — the same angle of jaw, the same slope of neck, the same mouth that belonged to the woman who'd cut my life open and left me bleeding. The woman who forced my mother to end her life. Raven Blackwood didn't look like an accident. She looked like a verdict.
Raven didn't know it, but she was just a product after that act—the result of the betrayal that shattered everything. I hated her for it. She is the proof. The proof that the world tolerates the unforgivable. The proof that some people get to live happy with the consequences of their choices while others die for them.
