I Changed My Name and My Fate Chapter 01

I Changed My Name and My Fate Chapter 01

The day I cut myself loose from the Thornes, I chopped off my hair, disconnected my phone number, and skipped town. I went back to being a Vance.

I found a flower shop on a quiet corner at the edge of town and made it mine.

The Thornes were probably sure I was dead by now. The biological daughter they never wanted had crawled off and starved to death in some gutter.

Years passed before anyone found me. He walked in wearing a suit that cost more than my monthly rent.

He was carrying a pot of bellflowers, brown and curling at the edges. Asked if I could save them.

I looked up, and recognition hit us both at the same time. Julian Thorne — the same Julian who used to look right through me — stood frozen in my doorway.

“Eleanor? You’ve been here this whole time? We all thought you were—”

His hands were shaking. I didn’t look at them.

My eyes went to the bellflowers instead — the ones I’d given him, once upon a time — and when I spoke, there was nothing in my voice at all.

“I’m sorry, sir, but nothing comes back from the dead. Not flowers. Not anything else.”

***

His gaze dropped to the pot, then snapped back to me. “You don’t mean that.”

I picked up my scissors and clipped the last dead stem from the plant. One flick of the wrist, and it landed in the trash.

“The flower’s gone, sir. There’s no saving it. Some things work the same way.”

Julian grabbed for my wrist. I set the scissors down flat on the counter, blades angled toward him.

He stopped. His hand hung in the air for a second, then fell back to his side.

“Where’ve you been? All these years, Eleanor.”

“Not a single word? Do you have any idea how long Mom and Dad have been searching for you?”

That got a laugh out of me. “Looking for me?”

Julian swallowed hard. “The whole family thought something had happened to you.”

I tipped the pot and let the soil spill out. The roots were black all the way through.

“Mr. Thorne, wasn’t it your family that had a lawyer draw up papers to disown me? Didn’t you throw my things out of the house yourself?”

What little color Julian had left drained from his face. I could see it — he was back there too. That night. The rain.

Chloe Thorne had tumbled down the stairs, screaming, arms wrapped around her stomach. “My baby — my baby!” And I’d been standing ten feet away. I hadn’t even been close enough to touch her.

But Chloe’s mom slapped me across the face. “How could you do this, Eleanor? What is wrong with you?”

My ears were still ringing from the chaos when Chloe’s dad shoved me to the floor beside her hospital bed.

“Beg for her forgiveness.”

“I didn’t do it,” I whispered.

Julian came storming in. He grabbed the wooden figure I’d spent days carving for him and hurled it at the floor. “You don’t deserve to be a Thorne.”

They threw me out that night. I stayed slumped by the front door until morning.

Rain ran down my face and into my mouth, and I couldn’t even cry. I knocked and knocked and begged someone to let me in.

Through the window, I watched Chloe’s mom glance at me once, then turn around and go back to fussing over Chloe’s blankets.

That was when I understood. Sharing blood didn’t mean a thing. The only daughter they ever wanted was Chloe.

Julian’s hands hadn’t stopped shaking. “We didn’t know the truth back then, Eleanor.”

“You gave me these bellflowers. I’ve been keeping them alive all these years.”

The flowers with roots rotted clean through. Right. I gave him those.

When I first arrived at the Thorne house, I thought I’d finally found a real brother. I looked up what bellflowers meant — fumbled my way through it, honestly. Gratitude and gentle love.

I gave them to Julian, and he stuck them in a corner of the balcony without a second look. Then Chloe complained the pollen was triggering her allergies.

So Julian had the housekeeper haul them off to a storage closet. Did it right in front of me.

And now here he was, cradling that same dead plant, talking like family suddenly mattered.

What a joke. “So who killed it, Julian?”

Something flickered in his eyes. “It was already dead. It started dying the day you walked away.”

His mouth worked around the words. “Eleanor Thorne—”

“Don’t call me that.” I met his eyes.

“My name is Vance. Eleanor Vance.”

The wind chime over the door jingled. Harper Quinn, my assistant, shouldered her way in with a bag of takeout.

Her eyes went from Julian standing at the counter to the scissors resting on the wood, and she stiffened. “You okay? Want me to call the cops?”

Julian flinched like she’d hit him. His hand closed around the pot, then dropped away as he backed toward the door.

“I’ll come back,” he said. I nudged the trash can toward his feet.

“Don’t bring dead things into my shop next time.”

He stood there for a beat, then turned and walked out. He nearly tripped over the threshold in his haste.

Harper leaned over to watch him go.

“Who was that?” Harper asked as I wiped the scissors clean and dropped them back in the toolkit.

“Someone who can’t afford new flowers.”

Harper snorted and set the food down. “Wow. Cheap much?”

A real laugh slipped out of me before I could stop it.

My phone buzzed on the counter. Video call.

I picked up, and a round little face filled the whole screen. “Mommy!”