Ficorpio
Chapter 1
Chapter 1
Adrian Vaughn and I were one of Arden City’s most talked-about celebrity power couples.
He was the handsome, filthy-rich new CEO of Vaughn Holdings. I was an A-list young actress with both a face the cameras loved and the talent to justify the attention. We’d been married for three years and still looked as sweet as newlyweds. I brought him homemade lunches. He showed up on my film sets with flowers in his arms.
To everyone watching from the outside, we were perfect together.
I had honestly believed I could stay that happy forever.
Until my former best friend, Vanessa Cole, appeared at my wrap party.
“Happy birthday.”
Adrian stepped onto the set holding a bouquet of roses—my favorite kind. Today was my last day of filming, and tonight was both the wrap party and my birthday celebration.
We’d just finished shooting the final scene, a wedding between the lead characters. I was still wearing the wedding dress, hadn’t even had time to change, and I gathered up the skirt as I ran over to him and took the bouquet.
“Aren’t you supposed to be out of town on business? What are you doing here?”
He smiled and reached out to ruffle my hair, indulgent as ever. “How could I miss my princess’s birthday?”
“Oh my God, that is disgustingly sweet,” Cherry blurted out, clutching her chest in fake agony. “Real married couples really do hit different.”
People around us were already pulling out their phones, laughing and cheering.
“Hug her!”
“Come on, hug!”
I could practically see tomorrow’s entertainment headlines writing themselves.
Adrian opened his arms, about to pull me in, but then he stopped.
I followed his gaze and turned.
A woman in a long white dress stood in the corner of the crowd, looking straight at Adrian.
The second I saw her, I knew.
I was going to lose him.
“Vanessa. Long time no see.” I reacted first and slipped my hand around Adrian’s arm, steering him toward her.
I knew exactly how good the paparazzi were at twisting half a glance into a full-blown scandal. Before anyone could start inventing stories, I needed a flawless explanation on the table.
Adrian had already steadied himself by then. “When did you get back?” he asked. “You didn’t even tell us.”
To everyone else, we looked like old friends reconnecting after years apart.
And, in a way, that was true.
I’d known Adrian and his younger sister, Sienna Vaughn, since we were kids. Our families had been close for years, and we had business ties too, so naturally we all ended up at the same elite private academy.
Chapter 2
Chapter 2
The first time I met Vanessa, she was surrounded by a group of girls.
One of them was yelling at her to pay for a pair of shoes. Vanessa stood there facing all of them without the slightest sign of panic, saying in a calm, measured voice, “I’ll pay for them. I just don’t have that much money on me right now. Give me a little time.”
The girl let out a cold laugh. “With what? Those washed-out jeans of yours? Or those sneakers that are practically falling apart?”
That school was full of rich kids and legacy families. If you were there, you were either wealthy or powerful—or both. Someone from an ordinary background like Vanessa was bound to stand out.
“I’ll cover it for her.”
Sienna and I stepped in front of Vanessa at the same time.
“Oh, it’s you,” Sienna said with a mocking smile, clearly recognizing the girl. “Since when did you start bullying people?”
The girl shot Vanessa a vicious glare, then turned and left with her little entourage.
“You know her?” I asked Sienna afterward.
Sienna nodded. “Yeah. She’s the daughter of a regional manager at one of our family’s subsidiary companies. I met her once at the annual corporate gala last year.”
Vanessa explained that she’d accidentally stepped on the girl’s shoes, and paying for them was only fair.
“Pay her for what?” Sienna rolled her eyes. “Those were knockoffs. They cost, what, thirty bucks?”
That was how we met Vanessa.
If I was a rose—bright, bold, impossible to ignore—then Vanessa was a lily hidden in a valley, elegant and hard to read.
We were all in the arts track. Sienna and I studied dance. Vanessa studied painting.
Because of who he was, Adrian had never lacked female attention. Girls liked him openly, relentlessly, shamelessly. But there was something about Vanessa’s cold pride, that distance she kept between herself and everyone else, that drew him in for reasons I didn’t understand then.
Introducing Vanessa to Adrian was the greatest mistake I ever made.
I’d liked Adrian for as long as I could remember. Ever since I was old enough to understand what that feeling meant. I just never had the courage to say it out loud. I was too afraid he’d reject me, and I couldn’t bear the thought of ruining what we already had.
And what we had felt special.
Other than Sienna, I was the girl closest to him. He remembered what made me angry. He remembered what I liked. He knew my favorite animated character. He even remembered my period better than I did sometimes.
So I thought… surely I mattered to him in a different way.
Surely I was an exception.
Chapter 3
Chapter 3
It wasn’t until I saw the way he looked at Vanessa that I realized how wrong I’d been.
What Adrian felt for me had never been romantic.
The affection he had for me was the same kind he had for Sienna.
But the way he looked at Vanessa—
That was different.
His eyes were burning and careful all at once, as if he were looking at something unbearably precious. Something rare enough that even wanting it felt dangerous.
“How have you been these past few years?” Adrian asked first.
I sat beside him, slowly stirring a cup of coffee I hadn’t touched. I didn’t actually like bitter things, but for some reason, that was what I’d ordered today.
“I’ve been good.” Vanessa smiled. “What about you and Selena?”
“We’re good.” Adrian’s voice came out rough around the edges. I knew that tone. It was what happened when he was nervous.
Vanessa had been Adrian’s first love. What was the phrase for it again? Right—the one that got away.
Back in our junior year of college, Vanessa had accepted Adrian’s pursuit, and from that day on, Sienna hated her.
Sienna thought the gap between their families was too wide. Vanessa’s father had died in an accident, and she’d come to school on the compensation money left behind after his death.
The truth was, all of us knew that academy had some of the best educational resources in the country. Vanessa had gone there because she was talented, and because her father wouldn’t have wanted her to waste that talent.
But Sienna still couldn’t accept that her brother was dating a girl from such an ordinary background—poor, if she was being brutally honest. And Sienna also knew I’d liked Adrian all along. In her mind, Vanessa was the outsider who came later.
The matter eventually blew up in front of Adrian’s parents. They had always wanted Adrian to end up with me. A marriage between our families would have made sense—socially, financially, strategically. The kind of match powerful families liked to call well suited.
And if not me, then at least someone from a similar background.
For the first time in his life, Adrian openly defied his parents. He even moved out of the Vaughn family home and squeezed into a tiny place with Vanessa, the kind where eating and sleeping happened in the same room.
His parents asked me to talk sense into him. I agreed out loud, but I never went.
Once I knew they were together, I knew I had no right to interfere. I’d hidden my feelings for Adrian for years. I could keep hiding them.
By the time we graduated from college, I had started to gain some traction as an actress. I was already landing supporting roles, the third female lead in a few dramas, and I gradually drifted farther from Adrian and Vanessa.
Life on set was busy. I only kept in touch with Sienna now and then, and to her credit, she never brought up Adrian or Vanessa.