When She Rose From the Ashes (Natalie and Jensen) novel Chapter 120

Chapter 120 The Forgotten Memory

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Her reflection still looked like herself, yet not quite. Most of her features remained, but her contours had been subtly refined. At first glance, she was still Natalic. Look longer, and she had become something else entirely.

Before, Natalie’s beauty had been soft, like a lily–delicate and pure. Now, she was a blazing red rose, sharp–edged, dangerous, breathtaking with a kind of defiant allure.

“Is this really me?”

She raised a trembling hand, fingers brushing her new skin.

Baron’s smile deepened. “It’s you. At sixteen, you were already this dazzling, this untamed.”

Sixteen?

Natalie blinked. She wanted to argue–when had she ever been so bold? But then, unbidden, a memory she had long buried broke the surface.

That year, she had gone abroad for a dance competition. For once, away from home, she dared to try a striking makeup look–fierce, smoldering. The effect was stunning. Too stunning. Strangers stared, whispered, followed. What should have been triumph ended in fear.

She remembered the leers, the mocking laughter, and the accusation that her beauty was an invitation. She had cried, ashamed. In that moment she learned–sometimes, beauty itself was treated as a sin.

After that, she swore off heavy makeup. She wore simplicity like armor, and over time, even the memory blurred.

The Summers couple had never known about it. She had believed it was hers alone to carry. And yet here was Baron, recalling it so easily.

Her breath caught. Hadn’t he once said they had met before?

Could it have been then–during that very competition?

Her mind raced, searching the fragments of that night. And suddenly–she saw it.

She had been fleeing down a back alley, heels clattering against stone, her heart pounding after the harassment. She ducked behind a row of trash bins, praying to get back to the hotel

unseen.

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Chapter 120 The Forgotten Memory

And then–she stumbled.

A body.

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A man sprawled on the ground, blood soaking his chest. His face was smeared, indistinct in the dark, but when she tried to retreat, a hand clamped around her ankle.

“Help me,” he rasped–in the local tongue.

Natalie nearly screamed. She had never seen so much blood, never been this close to death. Her instincts shrieked at her to run, but his grip was iron.

Panicked, she pulled free what little she had–her wallet, her phone–and dropped them beside him.

“I’m just a student. I don’t want trouble. Here–take this. Call someone. We never saw each other, all right?”

She tugged at her leg, desperate.

The man groaned, rolling back against the filthy bricks. Only then did she see the knife, buried deep in his chest.

Her stomach lurched at the copper stench, the sight of so much red.

“Just pull it out,” he whispered. “Bandage me, and whether I live or die–I’ll swear we never met.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me!” she hissed, horrified.

He was blackmailing her?

“I gave you everything! Call an ambulance, damn it!”

“If I could go to a hospital, do you think I’d be lying here?” His voice shook with weakness, but his gaze was unyielding.

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