Serena sat before her mother, cradling the velvet box wrapped in green ribbon. Inside was the very dress she had coveted for months, and now it lay in her lap as though fortune itself had descended, as though she had just been handed a manor for free.
Adrian. Adrian Iverson.
A Seraph of old blood, heir to estates scattered across the land. The kind of man who could spend in minutes what her family would not see in years. The kind of man who could, with a single whim, buy her sister a trinket worth double their crumbling home.
At first, Serena had thought Eva was foolish to dally with him. But now... envy gnawed at her. If Adrian truly desired Evangeline, then what mattered how? Even as a mistress, Eva would live in splendor beyond imagination. And if it had been her— if Adrian had turned his eyes on her— she would not have hesitated.
"That Adrian man," Serena murmured, fingers tightening around the box. "Why is he charmed by Eva?"
