Chapter 1

Ava Chenault' s eyes opened.

The sunlight hit her face. It felt too warm, too real.

This was wrong.

Her bedroom. Her family' s Malibu estate.

The scent of salt and roses from the gardens below.

Today.

Her 21st birthday.

The gala.

A cold dread, sharp and familiar, settled in her stomach.

She remembered.

The Starlight gown, custom-designed, a symbol of her future. Gone.

Brooke Ashley, her childhood friend, wearing it. Smirking.

Ava' s quiet words, "Brooke, that' s my dress."

Then the explosion.

Brooke' s tears. Ethan, her fiancé, calling Ava a spoiled brat. Harrison, her older brother, his face contorted with rage, accusing Ava of jealousy, of ruining everything.

Her father, Lawrence Chenault, was sick then, gravely ill. He couldn't protect her.

Harrison, so easily twisted by Brooke' s lies and Ethan' s ambition, had orchestrated it all.

Public disgrace.

Stripped of her inheritance.

Exiled.

To a forgotten family vineyard in some desolate, sun-baked canyon. The staff there, cruel. Their eyes, cold.

Isolated. Slandered. No one to call. No one listened.

She had faded there, a slow, agonizing death from neglect, from a heart that couldn't take any more.

Just before the end, a bitter nurse had sneered, "This is payback. For embarrassing Miss Ashley."

Ava sat up in bed. Her heart hammered against her ribs.

Not a dream. A memory.

A life lived and lost.

She was back.

The morning of her 21st birthday gala.

Her hand went to her closet, the one that held her gowns.

The Starlight gown. It would be missing.

She opened the doors.

The custom hanger, the one labeled "Starlight," was empty.

A small, cold smile touched Ava' s lips.

Predictable. Utterly predictable, Brooke.

Last time, she had panicked. Cried. Given them the opening they needed.

Not this time.

This time, she remembered something else.

Her father, Lawrence. A few weeks ago, in her first life, he' d been beaming, a secretive glint in his eye. "Ava, I have another surprise for you. Something truly special. Just in case."

He had never shown it to her in that life. He'd fallen ill too quickly.

But now...

Ava walked to the secure vault adjoining her dressing room. Her father had given her the code.

She entered it.

Inside, nestled in a climate-controlled case, was a gown.

It wasn't the Starlight.

It was moonlight. It was midnight. It was a thousand crushed diamonds. A creation so breathtaking, it made the Starlight seem like a child' s drawing.

An exclusive, one-of-a-kind masterpiece from a designer so reclusive, he only created for royalty. Her father' s secret commission.

Ava touched the fabric. Cool. Silken. Powerful.

"Thank you, Father," she whispered.

This time, the stage would be hers.

And Brooke Ashley would learn the true meaning of payback.