Chapter 2 — The First Promise

Manuel cleaned the wound on her back himself, without calling for the staff.

He asked before he touched the cut, left the door wide open, and promised that no doctor of Emmett’s would ever set foot in the estate again.

Rosalie didn’t fully believe him at first. But it was the first promise in her life that hadn’t felt like a veiled threat.

Over the next weeks, the marriage that had been built as a pure business arrangement began to shift.

Rosalie went through the Pinecrest accounts and found fraudulent charges that were bleeding the estate workers.

Manuel replaced the corrupt administrator the same day, returned the missing wages, and backed her decisions.