Dusk Snow Hides All Return (Rowan and Adrienne) novel Chapter 2

The Operating Room light flicked on. Rowan sat outside, slowly closing his eyes.

But behind his eyelids, scenes from five years ago played out, sharp and clear.

Back then, he was still Rowan Langley, living in a rundown walk-up in the North End Tenements.

His mother worked as a housekeeper, grinding away for scraps. His father was a drunk and a gambler who beat people when he was wasted, came home demanding money when he lost, and smashed things when he didn't get it.

His life was gray, no end in sight. The only bright spot was studying his ass off, dreaming he'd escape that suffocating house someday.

Then one day, a group of men in suits showed up at his door. They told him he'd been switched at birth with the son of the wealthy Ashford Family. He was the true heir.

The day he was brought back to the Ashford Family, he carried a faded canvas bag on his back, his canvas sneakers caked with mud.

He stood in the lavish living room, stiff and out of place, the muddy footprints on the carpet drawing smothered laughter from the household staff.

Just when he wanted to crawl into a hole and disappear, a girl—painfully beautiful—walked over.

She crouched down, wiped the mud off his shoes with a wet wipe, then pulled a brand-new pair of soft-soled slippers from the shoe cabinet and set them by his feet.

"Welcome home." She looked up and smiled at him. "Rowan Ashford."

In that moment, she was like the prince saving Cinderella in a fairy tale, giving him a scrap of dignity and warmth when he was at his lowest.

Later he learned she was Adrienne Merritt, heiress to the Merritt Family—the dream girl every rich kid chased.

The Ashford and Merritt families had an engagement contract. So technically, she was his fiancée.

The days that followed, Adrienne slowly helped him fit into this strange world of old money.

She taught him manners, took him to galas, and quietly covered for him when other heirs threw shade his way.

He fell for her. Hard. He latched onto her like she was a beam of light breaking through the dark—his only salvation.

Everything changed on the day Desmond was supposed to be sent away, when Adrienne came to find him, her tone lacking its usual polite warmth and instead laced with urgency and pleading.

"Rowan, Desmond... he was spoiled his whole life. He's never had it rough. If he returns to his biological parents, he won't survive it. For my sake, can you let him stay? Just... think of him as another brother."

That's when it all clicked for Rowan.

Every kindness. Every soft smile. Every ounce of patience she'd shown him—maybe it had all been for this moment. It was all so her precious Desmond could stay in the Ashford Family and stay close to her.

He refused flat out.

He couldn't accept it. The son of the woman who'd stolen his life was supposed to keep taking everything that was his? Share his parents? And now... share the fiancée he'd just started falling for?

No. He wasn't that generous.

So Desmond got sent away in the end.

VERIFYCAPTCHA_LABELVerify