Chapter 1
Lyia
I shoved my textbooks into my worn-out backpack, the zipper catching on the frayed fabric as I forced it closed.
The lecture hall at Cornell University was emptying out, and I had no intention of lingering.
The corridors were always a nightmare after class—crowds of elite students laughing, gossiping, and tossing their hair like they owned the place.
Which, in a way, they did. I just wanted to slip through the chaos unnoticed, head down, steps quick.
Stay low, Lyia. Don’t draw attention. That was the mantra I repeated to myself every day.
I was here for one reason: to earn my degree, to claw my way out of the wreckage of my past. Nothing else mattered.
Not the whispers, not the stares, not the weight of my last name—Clare.
Ten years ago, my family’s company, Clare Enterprises, collapsed in a spectacular blaze of scandal.
My father was arrested, convicted, and sent to prison.
I was sixteen then, too young to fully grasp the legal details but old enough to feel the world shift beneath my feet.
Overnight, I went from being Lyia Clare, daughter of a respected businessman, to Lyia Clare, the disgraced orphan of a criminal.
Life became a marathon after that—exhausting, solitary, and relentless.
I couldn’t stop running, because stopping meant facing the truth: I had nothing left.
No family, no home, no safety net. Just me, my determination, and the faint hope that a degree from Cornell could rewrite my story.
Sometimes, I think about that high fever that took away all my memories before the age of six.
The doctors called it a rare illness, one that burned away my earliest years like they never existed.
Maybe it was a mercy. If I couldn’t remember the warmth of my mother’s arms or the safety of our old life, I couldn’t miss it.
But the absence still ached, a hollow space in my chest that no amount of studying or working could fill.
“Lyia! Hey, wait up!”
Jack’s voice cut through the hum of the hallway, pulling me out of my thoughts.
I glanced over my shoulder to see him jogging toward me, his sandy hair bouncing with each step.
He flashed that easy, disarming smile that always seemed to put people at ease.
Jack was one of the few genuinely kind people I’d met since arriving at Cornell on a scholarship.
He was handsome in an unassuming way, with warm brown eyes and a knack for making everyone feel seen.
I knew he liked me—more than I was comfortable admitting.
But letting him get closer was a risk I couldn’t take.
For me—a Clare, attachments were dangerous.
They gave people leverage, and I’d learned the hard way that leverage could be weaponized.
“You’re too fast,” he said, catching his breath as he fell into step beside me. “I thought I’d have to sprint across campus to catch you.”
“Sorry,” I mumbled, adjusting my backpack. “I just—”
My words were cut off by a sudden, brutal force slamming into my side. I stumbled forward, my notebook flying from my hands and skidding across the polished floor. Sharp laughter erupted around me, slicing through the air like shards of glass. I didn’t need to look up to know who it was.
“Whoops, my bad. I didn’t see you there.”
Avery. Of course it was Avery.
Her voice was unmistakable—high-pitched, dripping with mockery, and laced with the kind of confidence only wealth and privilege could buy.
Avery Norton, daughter of a university trustee, was Cornell’s reigning queen bee and the architect of my daily torment.
I forced myself to meet her gaze. She stood there, flawless as always: golden hair cascading in perfect waves, designer clothes tailored to her frame, and a delicate bracelet on her wrist that probably cost more than my rent for the entire semester.
Her blue eyes scanned me like I was a piece of furniture she’d decided wasn’t worth keeping.
Behind her, her entourage of equally polished girls smirked, their expressions a mix of amusement and disdain.
Avery’s gaze flickered to Jack, and her lips curved into a predatory smile.
“Jack, darling, I’ve been looking for you,” she purred, looping her arm through his as if I didn’t exist. Then she turned back to me, her eyes narrowing. “Oh, you’re still here.”
I clenched my jaw, forcing myself to stay calm as I scrambled to my feet.
My notebook lay a few feet away, its pages splayed open like a wounded bird.
I started toward it, but Brenda—one of Avery’s loyal minions, with sleek brown hair and a politician’s daughter swagger—swooped in and snatched it up.
She handed it to Avery with a flourish, like she was presenting a trophy.
“Look at this,” Avery said, her voice dripping with mock fascination as she flipped through the pages. “Lyia Clare’s precious little notebook. Let’s see what our former heiress is up to these days.”
My stomach dropped. That notebook wasn’t just a planner—it was my lifeline. It held my class schedule, my work shifts, my carefully calculated budget, and, worst of all, personal notes I’d scribbled in moments of weakness. Things I never wanted anyone to see, especially not Avery.
“Give it back,” I said, my voice low but firm. I took a step toward her, but she held it out of reach, her manicured nails grazing the pages.
“Oh, let’s see what we have here,” Avery said, raising her voice so the growing crowd of onlookers could hear.
She flipped to a page and cleared her throat theatrically.
“Nine-thirty: Calculus. Eleven: Literature seminar. Three p.m.: Visit Dad.” She paused, her eyes locking onto mine with cruel delight. “Oh, right. Your dad… in prison.”
She lingered on the word prison, letting it hang in the air like a guillotine. The crowd erupted in laughter, the sound crashing over me like a wave. My face burned, and I could feel the heat creeping up my neck, my ears. I wanted to disappear, to melt into the floor and never resurface.
“Clare Enterprises was a total scam!” someone called out.
“Ten years in, and her dad’s still behind bars. Think he’ll ever get out?”
“Lyia Clare should teach a class on how not to run a company.”
Clare, Clare, always that damn name. It followed me like a shadow, a reminder of everything I’d lost and everything I could never escape.
I could still see that freezing winter morning, the memory as vivid as if it had happened yesterday.
Debt collectors stormed our house like a pack of wolves, their eyes glinting with greed.
They shoved my father to the ground, binding his wrists with coarse rope that bit into his skin until it turned purple.
I stood frozen, a terrified girl watching as they tore through our home, seizing anything of value.
They flipped mattresses, rifled through drawers, and even took the framed photos from the walls.
Then one of them—a hulking man with a scar across his cheek—picked up the delicate vase from the living room mantel.
“Doesn’t look like much,” he sneered, tossing it in his hand like it was trash.
“No!” my father cried, his voice breaking as he crawled forward, blood seeping from where the ropes had cut into his wrists. “That’s my wife’s… my daughter’s mother… please…”
It was my mother’s vase, her only remaining keepsake.
I watched it spin through the air, the sunlight catching its colored glaze, and then—crash.
It shattered on the floor, the sound echoing like a gunshot.
That was the moment my childhood ended. I wasn’t Lyia anymore.
I was Clare’s daughter, the orphan, the burden passed from one reluctant relative to another.
Old friends stopped calling. Invitations to birthday parties dried up.
I became a ghost in their world, invisible unless they needed someone to mock.
Even at Cornell, where I’d earned my place through sheer grit and a scholarship, the stigma clung to me. I was still the punchline, the outcast, the girl who didn’t belong.
“Give me my notebook,” I said again, my voice steady despite the storm raging inside me. I couldn’t let Avery see how much this hurt.
She tilted her head, her perfect features twisting with contempt. “Are you giving me orders, Clare?” She tossed the notebook to Tara, a redhead whose father was a city councilman. Tara caught it with a smirk.
“Looks like we’ve got ourselves a new game,” Tara said, waving the notebook like a flag. I lunged for it, but she tossed it to Christy, the daughter of a sports icon, who flipped it open and started reading aloud.
“Wow, she’s got her coffee shop shifts written down. And bar hours. How… quaint,” Christy said, her voice thick with condescension. The crowd laughed again, louder this time.
“Her handwriting’s atrocious,” Jennifer, a green-eyed heiress, chimed in as she caught the notebook next. “Guess poverty kills your penmanship too.”
The notebook passed from hand to hand, a cruel game of keep-away. I was trapped in the center, reaching desperately as they tossed it just out of my grasp. Each laugh, each taunt, was a blade carving into me. I felt like a mouse in a circle of cats, helpless and humiliated.
Jack tried to intervene, his face flushed with frustration. “Avery, stop it. This isn’t funny.”
Avery turned to him, her smile sugary but cold. “Oh, Jack, you’re always such a gentleman. It’s why I adore you.”
The notebook slipped from Jennifer’s hand and landed on the floor, inches from my feet. Relief flooded me as I bent to grab it—until a glossy red stiletto heel slammed down on the pages. The sharp heel tore through the paper, the sound like a scream in my ears.
“Did I say you could have it?” Avery’s voice was as cold as the marble floor beneath us.