THE BILLIONAIRE'S PHOENIX

Five Years Ago,

"Daphne!"

The sharp sound of my name cracks through my parents' living room, making me flinch where I stand. A cold trickle of fear creeps up my skin. My husband, Ethan, is marching toward me. He isn't supposed to be here. His face is a thundercloud, his eyebrows drawn together in a dark line. The way he looks at me makes my instincts scream at me to run.

My eyes dart behind him, and my breath catches. His parents are walking in, their faces stern and unyielding. But what shocks me is the sight of the woman trailing behind them. Natasha.

"What the heck do you think you are doing?" Ethan hisses, closing the distance between us in three long strides. His hand shoots out, fingers digging into the soft skin of my upper arm with brutal force. It stings, and a gasp escapes my lips. "Didn't I warn you?" he snarls.

"Let go of me, Ethan," I plead, trying to pull my arm back, but his grip is like iron.

He gives me a vicious, mocking sneer. "Just because you're hiding at your parents' house, did you think you could do whatever you pleased?" With a sudden, cruel shove, he releases me. I stumble backward, my balance lost, and land hard on the cold marble floor. The impact jars my bones, sending a fresh wave of pain through my body.

It hurts. My body, my soul, my heart... everything aches with a deep, weary pain. And in that moment, something inside me snaps. I have had enough.

I hold back the hot tears threatening to spill, pushing myself up onto my elbows. I look him straight in the eye, my voice trembling but clear. "No! I am not going to take it back! I want a divorce, and I don't care what threats you make!"

"Look at you," a cold, disapproving voice cuts in. My mother-in-law, Esther Croft, looks down at me with pure disdain. "How can you speak to your husband like this?"

A bitter, disbelieving scoff escapes me. Is she serious? "It's a problem for you when I raise my voice at your son," I say, my voice growing stronger, "but it's not a problem when he hits me? Huh, Mother? Am I not a human being?"

She simply stares back, her expression bored, as if my pain is a tedious drama she's being forced to watch. The last shred of my naivety shatters. I had truly believed they saw me as a daughter. I was a fool. They never did, and they never will.

Ethan bends down, his face close to mine. His fingers pinch my cheeks, forcing me to look at him. His eyes are filled with venom. "So now you aren't scared if your father's company collapses?" he whispers, his breath hot on my face. "You've got some nerve these past few days, Daphne."

He yanks me roughly to my feet, his grip like a vise on my arm. A terrifying finality settles in his eyes. "It seems," he says, his voice low and deadly, "I'll have to teach you a lesson you won't forget."

Suddenly, the sound of heavy footsteps thunders from the top of the stairs. "Get your hands off my daughter!" my father's voice roars, echoing through the hall.

He rushes down the staircase, his face flushed with anger. My mother follows closely behind him, her usually gentle, round face etched with deep worry. Seeing them, a sliver of safety returns to my heart.

Ethan lets go of my arm with a dismissive shrug, as if he's merely releasing a piece of furniture. I scramble away from him and rush to my father's side, my entire body trembling.

"Who allowed you to enter this property?" Dad thunders, pointing a shaking finger toward the door. "Leave my house right now!"

But the four of them–Ethan, his parents, and Natasha–don't move an inch. They stand there like a wall of cold superiority.

Ethan puts on a mask of calm reason. "Father, I am only here to take my wife home. Whatever stories she has told you are wrong. She hasn't been in the right state of mind lately."

"Stop lying!" I cry out, clinging to my father's arm.

Dad holds me firmly against his side. "My daughter is perfectly fine. It is you who is deranged! She is not going anywhere with you, ever!"

Ethan just laughs, a harsh, ugly sound. His parents, Victor and Esther, smile with proud, smug looks, as if their son has just told a clever joke.

"Well, well," Ethan says, his fake politeness vanishing. "I'll cut the melodrama then, since you aren't going to buy it." He runs his fingers through his hair, sighing dramatically before taking a threatening step toward us. "If you want this divorce so badly, you will have to pay me. Two hundred million. Then she is free."

I gasp in disbelief. How dare he say that to my father?

Dad's eyes bulge. "Two hundred million? We are not responsible for your–"

Ethan cuts him off disrespectfully. "You are responsible for the business deals you failed to honor, which cost my family a fortune! Consider this compensation."

My father releases me, his hands curling into tight fists at his sides. His whole body is rigid with fury. "That is utter nonsense! Those deals fell through because of your own incompetence!"

My father-in-law, Victor Croft, jumps into the argument. "Our records show otherwise. The financial loss is clear. Pay what you owe."

The two fathers go back and forth, their voices rising, their arguments clashing in the air. I have never seen my father argue like this; his face is red, and the veins in his neck are standing out. He looks like a cornered animal, and it terrifies me. Helpless tears stream down my cheeks, leaving wet marks on my skin. My mother wraps a protective arm around me, her own eyes wide with fear.

"Shut up!" Ethan suddenly yells, his patience gone. In a shocking move, he lunges forward and grabs my father by his collar, shaking him. "Stop bullshitting and pay the amount, or your daughter is coming with us right now!"

"We aren't scared of your threats!" I manage to choke out, my voice trembling. My eyes land on the house phone on the side table. "I'll call the cops!"

I break away from my mother and run toward the phone. My hand is just about to pick up the receiver when another hand–a familiar, delicate one with a perfectly manicured nail–slaps down on mine. I look up into the smirking face of Natasha.

"That's not happening, Daph," she says, her voice sweet with poison.

The rage and betrayal I feel toward her is a fire in my chest. I shove her away from me. I know it wasn't that forceful, but she lets out a dramatic gasp, stumbling backward and landing perfectly in Ethan's waiting arms.

Bitch.

Ethan glares at me over her head, his eyes burning with a new, dangerous fury. He gently sets Natasha aside and takes another step toward me, his expression promising pain. "You want to play it that way, Daphne? Fine. We'll play."

Ethan's voice is low and terrifying. He ignores my father's shouts and lunges for me, his fingers digging into my arm like claws. "You're coming with me, now!"

"Let her go!" my father roars, rushing forward. He is older, but fueled by a father's love, he throws himself at Ethan, trying to pry his hands off me.

In a brutal, swift motion, Ethan shoves him away. My father stumbles backward, his legs tangling with the rug. There is a sickening, heavy thud as the back of his head strikes the sharp corner of the marble coffee table.

The world freezes.

A single, choked sound escapes my father's lips before he goes completely still, his eyes open but unseeing.

A scream tears from my throat, raw and guttural. "DAD!"

I break free from Ethan's slackened grip and fall to my father's side, my hands fluttering over him, afraid to touch him. The commotion is deafening-my mother's piercing wails, my own sobs, the Crofts' shocked murmurs.

But Ethan's face shows no remorse. The chaos seems to feed his rage. His eyes, wild and unfocused, scan the room. They land on the ornate fruit bowl on the dining table, and the sharp, silver letter opener beside it.

"See what you made me do?" he snarls, his voice cracking as he snatches the blade. "This is all your fault!"

He isn't talking to me anymore; he is lost in his own fury. My mother, seeing the weapon in his hand, rushes toward her husband's body with a heartbroken cry, "Tim!"

In his enraged state, Ethan sees her movement as an attack. As she passes him, he swings out blindly. The sharp point of the letter opener sinks deep into her side.

She gasps, her hands flying to the wound, a look of pure shock on her face. She crumples to the floor beside my father, her body shuddering.

The world dissolves into a nightmare. I scream again, scrambling toward my mother. But Ethan is still moving, consumed by his violence. He turns back to me, the bloody letter opener raised. I try to push myself away, but I am too slow. A searing, white-hot pain explodes in my abdomen. I look down and see the handle protruding from my stomach.

The strength drains from my legs. I collapse, the cold marble meeting my cheek. My vision begins to tunnel, the sounds fading. The last thing I see is my mother, her hand stretched out toward me, her eyes wide with terror and pain. Then her hand falls, limp, and her chest goes still. The shock and grief are too much for her heart.

The last thing I hear is Natasha's shrill scream, and Ethan's panicked voice, "What have I done...?"

Then, there is only silence, and the overwhelming, coppery smell of blood.

The pain is a distant, throbbing echo. My body feels heavy, anchored to the cold floor. Through blurred vision and the dark haze creeping at the edges of my sight, I see them moving.

Ethan is pacing across the living room, running his hands through his hair, his breath coming in ragged pants. Victor Croft's voice is low as he says, "This is a mess. An unforgivable mess."

"It was an accident!" Ethan snaps, but his voice is thin, frayed with panic.

"Does it matter?" Natasha's voice is sharp, cutting through the men's panic. "They're gone. All of them. Who will know the difference?"

Her words slither into my fading consciousness.

"We need to do something" Ethan tells them, looking back at me and then back to his parents and Natasha. I can't even cry anymore. My body is numb and too weak to speak anything.

I watch, helpless, as Ethan Croft moves with a chilling efficiency. She finds the bottle of expensive cooking sherry my mother kept in the sideboard and begins dousing the heavy velvet curtains. He then pulls out his lighter from his pocket and wait for a minute before lighting the fire. My heart which had been broken before has been shredded now into thousand different pieces.

The first flicker of flame catches the fabric, a small, almost gentle orange tongue. It licks hungrily at the dry material, growing, spreading with a soft whoosh. Smoke, acrid and thick, begins to fill the room, stinging my nostrils.

Ethan looks at my body, at the blood pooling beneath me. For a fleeting second, our eyes meet. He sees the faint gleam of life still in my gaze. I see the final, cold decision in his. There is no mercy left.

He turns away.

"Let's go. Now," Victor commands.

They move toward the door, a parade of monsters leaving their carnage behind. Natasha is the last to leave. She pauses at the threshold, looking back at the growing inferno, at the bodies of the family she once claimed to love. There is no regret on her face. Only a grim satisfaction.

Then, she pulls the front door shut.

The heat intensifies, becoming a physical weight. The smoke is a thick, black fog, filling my lungs, choking my last breaths. The crackle of the fire is the only sound now, a roaring applause for their evil. The flames dance closer, their light the last thing I see, their heat the last thing I feel.

The world dissolves into nothing but fire and smoke.

And then, nothing at all.