Chapter 1

My sister Chloe was blind with love. She sat on a plane for thirty straight hours just to celebrate the birthday of the boyfriend she'd kept overseas for three years.

She looked at me, a martyr's glow in her eyes.

"Elena, you don't understand. Every year, the one who gets to spend his birthday with him is never me."

"This time, I want to stand beside him myself."

I sighed and let it go.

When my fiancé, Don Julian, heard, he gave a cold little snort on the other end of the line.

"She flew halfway around the world just to throw a man a birthday party? Has she lost her mind?"

"A woman who throws herself at a man like that—let her do whatever she wants."

The night Chloe landed at Sheremetyevo International, I stumbled onto her post on Twitter.

A photograph of a man from behind, with a caption of nothing but a curt *Happy Birthday*.

But my breath froze in that instant.

The ring on the man's ring finger was the Ashford family ring, set with black diamonds.

The perfect match to my engagement ring.

That was when I understood. The boyfriend Chloe had been dating for three years.

Was my fiancé.

...

I sat with that photograph all night.

Two days earlier, when I'd told him I wanted to fly to the Moscow estate to celebrate with him, he'd answered in that steady, unruffled voice of his:

"There's no need, Elena. When I'm back in New York, we'll do it privately, just the two of us."

But it wasn't that he wasn't celebrating. It was that he already had someone to celebrate with.

And that someone was my own sister.

I didn't fall apart. I took a screenshot and sent it to Julian.

Ten minutes passed. My phone lit up—but the message was from Chloe, cheerful as a bell.

*Elena! We met up—finally! But I didn't have time to get him a gift. Do you think if I tied a bow around my wrist and let him unwrap me, it would be too forward?*

She'd attached a photo.

A three-tier dark chocolate cake beside a champagne tower. A man's right hand rested casually on the edge of the table.

The black-diamond ring on his ring finger was now unmistakable.

Three years ago, when Julian decided to expand into the Russian market, he'd promised in front of every elder that the moment he returned to New York, we would marry, and I would become the Donna of the Ashford family.

But now, it seemed there was no need for that wedding at all.

I didn't reply to Chloe.

What was I supposed to ask her? Why did you climb into your sister's fiancé's bed?

I'd always known Chloe was carrying someone in her heart. Through college, she was forever off traveling in Russia, saying she was "making up for the regrets of her youth."

Whenever Julian and I made small talk about it, his face would twist with disgust. "Only a fool like her would chase all the way to Russia. Serves her right if the traffickers get her."

He had never shown Chloe a shred of patience, never a decent expression. Precisely because of that, it had never once crossed my mind that Chloe's every trip led to the very Russia where Julian was doing his market research; never once did it strike me as strange that they shared a birthday.

I had never once imagined that they'd been together for three years, right under my nose.

The screen lit up again. Julian.

*What's the meaning of this?*

He was denying it.

I leaned against the rosewood desk for support, my fingers cold as I typed out a few words:

*The one celebrating that birthday with her—isn't that you?*

A long silence, long enough for me to believe he'd thrown his phone into the Volga.

Then the call came through.

I picked up. His heavy breathing came through the receiver.

"Elena. When I'm back in New York, I'll explain it to you myself."

A confession, dressed up as something else.

My eyes fell on the leather calendar on the desk. The 26th was circled thickly in red pen, the Ashford family seal stamped beside it.

The day of his return. The day after tomorrow.

Julian let out a heavy sigh. "Don't make a scene in front of Chloe. Promise me."

His tone was thick with undisguised favor and protection.

My eyes stung suddenly. My throat was so dry it felt full of grit. "Why, Julian?"

"Elena, wait until I've landed."

Before the words had fully left his mouth, a soft, delicate voice drifted through.

"...Was that Elena on the phone?"

Julian's voice dropped instantly to something so gentle I'd almost never heard it from him.

"No."

"Just one of my subordinates."