Chapter 1 THE SON WHO REFUSED THE THRONE

ADRIEN'S POV

"Your training starts soon, young master."

One of the guards reminded me with the same flat efficiency they always used.

"I'll be there shortly."

I stood, leaving the only room in the entire mansion that ever felt like mine. Everything else belonged to the name, the legacy, the machine my father had built. I had spent years reminding myself who I was supposed to be: the heir to Victor Montrega's empire. The boy who would one day inherit every dirty business and every bloody title. My mother had died because of this world, yet I was still expected to step into it without question. That expectation had been drilled into me since I was twelve, as if it were something natural instead of a sentence.

"You need to improve your aim, young master."

My trainer said. Today was one of the days I hated most 'shooting practice'. Twice a week, without fail. I had never been good at it. Maybe I simply never wanted to be.

I raised the gun again.

Bang.

Missed.

I was already tired of the sound, tired of the failure, tired of the entire ritual.

"That cannot be a shot from the Montrega heir."

I didn't need to turn around. I would have recognized that voice in my sleep the deep and commanding voice, saturated with the same authority that had shaped every corner of my life for twelve years. Victor Montrega.

We never managed to occupy the same space without arguing. I had no energy for another round today.

I turned to leave. Five steps. That was all I managed before his voice followed me.

"Running away again. Just like the coward you are."

The mockery in his tone was deliberate.

I stopped. "Yes. I am. What are you suddenly terrified that your precious heir won't be able to run the business because he can't shoot straight?"

I hadn't wanted the fight. He had started it anyway.

"Is that how you speak to your father?!"

The shout made every person in the room flinch.

I turned fully, dismissed the trainer with a look, and gestured for the guards to clear the space. When the door finally closed behind them, only the two of us remained.

"Where were we?" I said, voice low. "Ah yes your question. "Is that how I speak to my father?" Let's examine which father you mean. The one who handed his fourteen year old son over to military trainers? The one who forces his child into things he never wanted by threatening him? Or the one who"

"Shut up."

I almost smiled. "What? Afraid I'll keep listing the reasons you've been a terrible father to both me and Isabella?"

I knew the words would land. I said them anyway. He had opened the door.

His face darkened. "You are exactly like your mother. Always fighting for some imaginary version of what's right. That isn't how the real world works, Adrien. It only exists in those pathetic songs you write. I did what I did because I refuse to raise a weak heir. Apparently it was all wasted effort. You're useless."

The rage that hit me was sharp enough to steal the air from my lungs. How dare he put her name in his mouth. I had once believed he still held some quiet respect for her. I had been wrong. The only thing he had ever truly cared about was the empire.

"If I'm so useless," I said, voice shaking, then stop wasting time on me. Let me go. You know I never wanted this. She never wanted this for me either. Or have you already forgotten? She wanted me to have a normal life. Let me have it."

Tears burned at the edges of my vision. I doubted he even noticed. He was too busy being angry.

I turned toward the door.

His final words followed me like a chain.

"I will not let you disgrace the name I built with my own hands. You will take over after me, Adrien. That is not negotiable."

The tears finally spilled over as I walked out. What had I expected? Understanding? Empathy? He was blinded by the same hunger for power that had cost my mother her life. We had never found common ground. We never would.

"I wish you could see past your greed", I said quietly, more to myself than to him. "I really wish you could."

The training room was vast, lined with equipment meant for soldiers rather than sons. I had tried to escape this life more times than I could count when I was younger. I never made it farther than the airport or the bus station before someone brought me back. Now the stakes were higher. If I left, Isabella would be forced into the role I was rejecting. My father was capable of many things. Taking his frustration out on her would not even rank among the worst of them.

I climbed the stairs slowly and paused at the top, looking down at the servants moving through the entrance hall like carefully directed pieces.

The mansion was beautiful in the way prisons sometimes were. Pale marble floors stretched beneath a soaring ceiling. A grand staircase curved upward. A heavy crystal chandelier scattered light across. Wide corridors. Tall doors.

It felt like a carefully maintained cell guarded day and night, monitored even when I left for lectures. Every minute of my life belonged to the name Montrega.

That was the truth of it.

And it showed no sign of changing.