I never intended to fall in love. Love, commitment, all of it—those were ideas I kept safely stored on a shelf, the kind of things that might come later, after I’d lived a little more. Or maybe never. After all, when you’re raised in a world where power comes before passion, and marriages are as much about image as emotion, it’s easy to become cynical about romance. So no, love was never the plan. What was the plan? Spite.

Rebellion, if you want to dress it up.I was born into the kind of wealth that smooths every edge of life. The kind of family that doesn’t just own a country club membership—but the land the country club is built on. Summer homes. Private tutors. Cars for every mood. That was my reality.

And I was the heir. The only son of a self-made billionaire, groomed to take the reins of an empire. Except, I had one fatal flaw: I liked to live. Parties that started on a Thursday and ended two cities away. Weekends in Monaco because I felt like it. No apologies, no regrets. It made my parents insane. My father, a man who clawed his way out of poverty and built a legacy brick by brick, didn’t understand my carefree attitude.

My mother, raised to value appearances over emotions, didn’t hide her disappointment either. Still, they tolerated me. They expected that, eventually, I’d grow up. Become serious. Respectable. 2Then came the dinner that changed everything.