Pampered by the Ruthless Boss: A Deceptive Sweetness

Pampered by the Ruthless Boss: A Deceptive Sweetness

Gavin

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My last memory was the smell of ancient celluloid in a 21st-century archive, then a sharp chest pain. I woke up to the stench of gin and stale perfume, trapped in a stranger's body, in 1920s Chicago. My own mother, a faded vaudeville dancer, sold me to a notorious gang boss, Artie Gallo, for a sapphire cloche hat. I found a flicker of connection with Leo, the kind projectionist, and risked everything to steal medicine for the starving poor. But when Artie discovered our secret, Leo, the only person I' d dared to trust, pointed a trembling finger at me. "She made me do it." The betrayal was a physical blow, worse than the whip that lashed my back in Artie's cursed cellar. They threw me back in my room, broken and left to fester. The film, my last connection to my old life, gone with him. My body healed, but my soul was twisted into something cold and hard. How could he? How could the one pure thing I found in this nightmare turn out to be the cruelest blade? When I finally emerged, adorned in garish makeup and a deceptively sweet smile, the old Clara was gone. I would become the woman Artie wanted, the woman this brutal world demanded. And I would make sure everyone who ever wronged me paid the price, even if it meant burying every last piece of my humanity.

Introduction

My last memory was the smell of ancient celluloid in a 21st-century archive, then a sharp chest pain. I woke up to the stench of gin and stale perfume, trapped in a stranger's body, in 1920s Chicago. My own mother, a faded vaudeville dancer, sold me to a notorious gang boss, Artie Gallo, for a sapphire cloche hat.

I found a flicker of connection with Leo, the kind projectionist, and risked everything to steal medicine for the starving poor. But when Artie discovered our secret, Leo, the only person I' d dared to trust, pointed a trembling finger at me. "She made me do it." The betrayal was a physical blow, worse than the whip that lashed my back in Artie's cursed cellar.

They threw me back in my room, broken and left to fester. The film, my last connection to my old life, gone with him. My body healed, but my soul was twisted into something cold and hard. How could he? How could the one pure thing I found in this nightmare turn out to be the cruelest blade?

When I finally emerged, adorned in garish makeup and a deceptively sweet smile, the old Clara was gone. I would become the woman Artie wanted, the woman this brutal world demanded. And I would make sure everyone who ever wronged me paid the price, even if it meant burying every last piece of my humanity.

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My world revolved around Jax Harding, my older brother's captivating rockstar friend. From sixteen, I adored him; at eighteen, I clung to his casual promise: "When you're 22, maybe I'll settle down." That offhand comment became my life's beacon, guiding every choice, meticulously planning my twenty-second birthday as our destiny. But on that pivotal day in a Lower East Side bar, clutching my gift, my dream exploded. I overheard Jax' s cold voice: "Can't believe Savvy's showing up. She' s still hung up on that stupid thing I said." Then the crushing plot: "We' re gonna tell Savvy I' m engaged to Chloe, maybe even hint she' s pregnant. That should scare her off." My gift, my future, slipped from my numb fingers. I fled into the cold New York rain, devastated by betrayal. Later, Jax introduced Chloe as his "fiancée" while his bandmates mocked my "adorable crush"-he did nothing. As an art installation fell, he saved Chloe, abandoning me to severe injury. In the hospital, he came for "damage control," then shockingly shoved me into a fountain, leaving me to bleed, calling me a "jealous psycho." How could the man I loved, who once saved me, become this cruel and publicly humiliate me? Why was my devotion seen as an annoyance to be brutally extinguished with lies and assault? Was I just a problem, my loyalty met with hatred? I would not be his victim. Injured and betrayed, I made an unshakeable vow: I was done. I blocked his number and everyone connected to him, severing ties. This was not an escape; this was my rebirth. Florence awaited, a new life on my terms, unburdened by broken promises.

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