The Betrayed Rose Rises Anew

He called me his wild rose, the foster kid he rescued from the streets. He built me a gilded cage and told me it was love.

Then I saw the text: my best friend, Karis, showing off the engagement ring he' d just given her.

I rushed to his office, only to overhear the truth. I was just a "placeholder," a "stray he picked up," a useful toy to keep his family happy while he planned his real future with her.

He laughed about how easily he could control me.

"A little gaslighting, a few well-placed gifts, and she'll be back where she belongs. Under my thumb."

His final act of love? Drugging me and handing me over to a monster, sacrificing me as a "body double" to protect his precious Karis.

He thought I was just a broken foster kid with nowhere to go. He thought he could erase me.

He was wrong. As the private jet he put me on exploded over the ocean, I was already gone-saved by the powerful family I never knew I had. Now, I'm coming back, and they will pay for every single lie.

Chapter 1

Fae Ware POV:

The chill of the night air clung to me, a familiar companion from my days bouncing between foster homes. That was before Glenn Christensen. He found me, a lost girl, caught in the undertow of a life I didn't choose. He pulled me out, offered me a hand, then an entire world. I thought it was love. I thought it was forever. I was wrong.

He called me his wild rose. He said I was beautiful, untamed, something he needed to protect. I believed him. He didn't know about Juilliard. He didn't know about the music that lived inside me, the only thing truly mine. He wouldn' t have understood. He liked to own things. He liked to own me.

I remember the first time I truly felt like I belonged to him. It was a stupid street fight, some lowlife trying to mug him in a back alley. He was rich, but not street smart. I was both. I didn't think twice. My fists flew, my nails tore, my knees connected with flesh. I was a tornado of fury, protecting the man who had given me a home. He looked at me afterward, bruised and bleeding, but with a look in his eyes I' d never seen before. A mix of awe and possessiveness.

He bandaged my knuckles himself that night, his touch surprisingly gentle.

"Fae," he whispered, tracing the line of my jaw. "You're mine."

I leaned into his touch. "Always, Glenn."

He sealed it with a kiss, a promise etched in the warmth of his lips. He bought us a house the next day, a sprawling mansion overlooking the city. He filled it with everything I could ever want. Clothes, jewelry, endless possibilities. He told me it was all ours. Our future. Our life. I had never had anything of my