Chapter 1 - The Broken Spire (Recap)
On her tenth birthday, my daughter June asked for a castle cake, a fragile memory of a sketch drawn by her late mother, Rebecca. After three sleepless nights spent crafting sugar spires and amber-candy windows on my modest wages as an HVAC technician, the cake was complete. But the celebration shattered the moment my younger brother Blake arrived. In an act of casual cruelty disguised as a joke, Blake shoved June face-first into the dessert. The hardened sugar cut her cheek, her tears smeared the ruined frosting, and when I reacted by shoving Blake back, the room turned on me. My mother fussed over Blake's designer coat. My father slammed his signet ring against the walnut dining table and issued an ultimatum: apologize to the golden child, or forfeit my family and my inheritance forever. I refused. I carried June out into the rain, severed all ties, and vanished into the cold. For five years, I rebuilt our lives from the dirt up, quietly turning sweat, patents, and sleepless nights into an empire they never saw coming. Now, five years later, as their flagship company teeters on the edge of bankruptcy, I have walked back into their executive boardroom just as the clock nears one, dropping a plain yellow folder directly in front of the brother who still believes I am nothing.
