Some boys you kiss. Others, you burn for.

I’ve ruined every boy who’s ever touched me.
Not on purpose. Not always. But the trail of heartbreak behind me is long, drunk, and begging for mercy.

They call me a monster in mascara.
They’re not wrong.

I smoke too much, lie like it’s a sport, and ride my Ducati faster than I should—just to feel something. My mom’s passed out by noon, my dad’s a ghost, and I’ve been partying my way out of feeling anything since I was twelve.

Then there’s Atlas Reed.

The golden boy with a gym body and a brain built for equations and quiet revenge.
He reads Nietzsche. Fixes his sister’s bike.
Talks like a whisper.
Looks like a sin.
And wants absolutely nothing to do with me.

So of course I’m obsessed.

But Atlas isn’t like the others. He doesn’t fall. He waits.
Calculates.
And when he finally looks at me like he’s going to ruin me back—

I don’t run.

People say legacy like it's something you inherit.


I watched mine get built from blood, smoke, and courtroom thunder.


I was raised in chaos—but not the messy kind. The beautiful kind. The kind that wears stilettos in court and destroys opponents with one eyebrow raise. The kind that uses logic like a scalpel. The kind that smells like vanilla latte and highlighter ink and sarcasm.


I was raised by the two most feared, most loved, most iconic lawyers in the goddamn country.


My mom was once a wildfire—drunk on pain and rebellion. My dad was the storm that steadied her. Now? They're an empire.


People line up just to breathe the same air in court.


I'm their son. Sixteen. Six-foot-two. Top of every subject. Fastest on the field. Voted "it-boy" of the school three years in a row, which is cringe but not untrue.


Girls like me. Boys do too. Teachers hate how fast I finish exams. I intern at the DA's office after school just for fun. And yeah, I've been called "the heir to a courtroom throne." Whatever that means.


I just don't want to waste the brilliance I was born from.


My dad taught me restraint. Strategy. How silence can make someone spill everything.


My mom taught me how to burn the whole system down if it ever tried to silence someone who deserved to be heard.


They fight over who finished the ice cream. They leave notes on case files like "THIS ARGUMENT IS WEAK, TRY AGAIN" with hearts at the end. They hug too much in public. It's annoying. Gross.


I've seen my mother stare down a corrupt judge. I've seen my father rewrite an entire brief in the middle of the night just because a victim "deserved more precision."


And I've seen them smile like kids when they think no one's looking. Like they've survived everything just to hold each other through it.


But this—this fire that keeps going, passed down like a torch.


With a smirk. With a suit. With a pen sharp enough to change laws.


We leave marks that history can't erase.


Chapter 31 - River’s POV