Chapter one
477 Words
The Montgomery family wasn't always rich. Thomas Montgomery grew up in a small apartment in Brooklyn with his mother, a seamstress who worked sixteen hour days just to keep the lights on. His father had left when Thomas was seven, and from that moment, Thomas promised himself he'd never be poor again. He studied harder than anyone else in his school, won scholarships, worked three jobs through college, and barely slept. By the time he was thirty, he'd started his own investment firm with money he'd saved and borrowed from anyone who believed in him. Five years later, he was a millionaire. Ten years after that, he was worth more than he'd ever dreamed possible.
He met Caroline at a charity gala in Manhattan. She was different from the other women there, quieter, more thoughtful. She came from old money, the kind of family that had been wealthy for generations, but she didn't wear it like armor the way others did. She worked as a curator at an art museum, and when Thomas approached her that night, she was standing alone, staring at a painting instead of mingling with the crowd. He asked her what she saw in it, and she told him it reminded her of loneliness. That answer surprised him. Most people at these events only talked about money or connections or who they knew. Caroline talked about feelings.
They started seeing each other quietly at first. Thomas was still building his empire, working eighteen hour days, taking meetings at midnight, flying to different cities without notice. But Caroline never complained. She understood ambition because she'd grown up around it, even if her family's wealth had come easier. After two years, Thomas proposed to her on the rooftop of his office building at sunrise. He told her he didn't have much time to give her, but whatever time he had was hers. She said yes without hesitation.
They married three months later in a small ceremony. Caroline's family didn't approve at first. They thought Thomas was too rough around the edges, too hungry, too new to wealth. But Caroline didn't care. She loved him for his drive, for the fire in him that refused to go out. And Thomas loved her for her calmness, for the way she made him feel like he didn't have to fight every second of every day.
A year after their wedding, Caroline got pregnant. Thomas was terrified. He didn't know how to be a father. He'd barely had one himself. But Caroline held his hand through every doctor's appointment, every ultrasound, every moment of panic. When their daughter was born on a cold February morning, Thomas held her in his arms and cried for the first time in twenty years. They named her Victoria, after Caroline's grandmother. From the moment she came into the world, Victoria Montgomery had everything
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