Reborn Heiress: Taming The Ruthless Tycoon

A searing white light stabbed into her eyes, burning like hot needles. A deafening crash of a live symphony orchestra slammed into her ears, a wall of sound so violent her teeth rattled.

Gemma sucked in a violent, desperate breath. Her chest heaved as if she’d just broken the surface of freezing water after drowning forever.

Her hands flew to her abdomen, trembling fingers clawing at the silk, expecting the warm, sticky pool of her own blood. She expected the tearing, white-hot agony of the bullet wound that had just ended her life.

Instead, her fingertips met cool, smooth silk. No blood. No torn flesh.

Her heart pounded so hard it hurt, each beat a sharp ache blooming through her chest.

She gripped the edge of the mahogany vanity and forced herself upright. Her legs felt like lead. The room spun violently before snapping still.

She stared into the massive gold-leafed mirror.

The face staring back was flawless. The skin was tight, glowing with youth, completely bare of the jagged, puckered scar that had sat on her left cheek for five years. The scar carved by shattered glass during the explosion. The scar she had traced every single night before bed.

Her breath caught and locked in her throat.

Impossible.

A sharp, frantic knock slammed against the heavy dressing room door. The sound shook through the ornate wood.

“Gemma! Open up, hurry!”

Katelyn’s voice. Hushed, urgent, dripping with that familiar, sickening sweetness—honey laced with cyanide.

That voice cut like a poisoned blade, ripping open every memory from her previous life. The fake friendship. The orchestrated betrayal. The ruined face. And then the cold barrel of a gun against her forehead, Katelyn’s glossed lips curving into a smile as she pulled the trigger.

Hate surged up from her stomach, hot and thick, burning her throat. It swallowed the haze of rebirth and left behind nothing but cold, clear murderous intent. Her fingers fisted into the silk of her dress, knuckles going bone-white. The expensive fabric strained under her grip.

She snatched the phone off the vanity. The screen lit, cold blue light falling across her face.

The date in stark white numbers confirmed the impossible.

Exactly ten years ago. The day of her engagement party.

The door handle rattled violently, the brass fixture jerking back and forth. Katelyn found it locked.

“Gemma, Jair is waiting in the rain! If you don’t leave now, you’ll be trapped!” Katelyn hissed through the wood, voice pitched low and frantic.

Gemma forced down the acid burning up her throat, the bitter taste coating her tongue. She made the muscles in her face go slack, burying the hatred deep in her gut where it could fester and chill.

She crossed the plush carpet in bare feet, silent, and yanked the door open.

Her eyes landed on the woman in the hallway. Flat. Cold. Nothing living in them.

Katelyn physically recoiled, taking a half-step back. Her designer heels clicked sharply on the hardwood. The rehearsed words died