My fiancé, Cassian, had prosopagnosia. He was always confusing me with my older sister, Seraphina. When I won the New York Youth Poetry Competition, he handed the bouquet to Seraphina instead. “I knew you had it in you. You’re brilliant.” When Seraphina shattered a six-figure antique wineglass at a Blackwood Foundation gala, he stepped in front of her. “It was Elowen. She’s always been clumsy and ignorant. She has no idea how to behave in decent company.” Countless times, I grabbed his sleeve and forced him to look me in the eyes. “Cassian, look carefully. I’m Elowen.” Eventually, I stopped wearing the red dresses Seraphina loved and gave up the pearls she favored. I replaced everything in my closet with shades of slate blue and forest green. I even styled my hair in ways she hated. But he still mistook me for her. Even on the day we were both getting married, he left with the wrong bride. In my last life, I slit my wrist outside the Vale residence because I was desperate to marry him. I forced my mother to cancel Seraphina’s family-arranged engagement to Adrian Blackwood. In the end, I moved into a house Cassian bought in the suburbs and became the mistress he kept hidden from the world. Then I hemorrhaged during childbirth at a private hospital. Seraphina had been admitted to the same hospital with abdominal pain, and Cassian mistook her for me, directing the emergency team to her room first. By the time a nurse realized the medical chart did not match the patient’s wristband, it was too late to save me. My baby died too. As I lay dying, he stood beside my bed and looked at me without a trace of warmth. “If there is a next life, stay out of my relationship with Seraphina. Then I won’t have to spend years pretending I can’t recognize faces.” When I opened my eyes again, it was my wedding day. Once again, Cassian had driven away with Seraphina. Adrian’s car was already waiting outside, and the Vale household was in chaos. No one dared admit that the bride named in the marriage agreement had disappeared. I opened the door. “I’ll marry him.” … The room fell silent. My mother recovered first. Her shoulders visibly relaxed. “You’ve finally come to your senses. Adrian has a terrible reputation, but the Blackwoods control banks, energy companies, and media outlets, and he alone runs the entire group. Marry him, and you’ll never want for money again.” In my last life, she had said the same thing after we discovered Cassian had taken the wrong bride. Everyone in New York’s business world knew Adrian was ruthless. Partners who betrayed him either went bankrupt or never secured another deal. They could not bear to make the delicate Seraphina marry a man like him, so they let Cassian “mistake” her for me. My mother straightened my veil and regained her composure. “Don’t blame Seraphina. Cassian’s condition acted up, and he took the wrong woman at the wedding. No one wanted this to happen.” “Besides, she has given you an excellent match. You should be grateful to her.” I almost laughed. Only an hour earlier, I had overheard Cassian and Seraphina talking. “Adrian drove a rival to suicide during that Eastern European acquisition. You’re too fragile to handle a man like him.” “The engagement is already public. If the Vales back out now, they’ll go bankrupt. I’ll pretend I mistook you for Elowen and take you to the St. Margaret Hotel. Once we register our marriage, Adrian won’t be able to force you to honor the original agreement.” Seraphina sniffled. “What about Elowen? She won’t actually marry Adrian in my place, will she?” Cassian was quiet for a moment before giving a confident laugh. “She won’t. She said she would never marry anyone but me. Once she realizes I left with you, she’ll probably tear the whole house apart.” “Your mother will stop her too.” “Once her arrangement with Adrian is void, I’ll buy her an apartment. She loves me so much she won’t care that she can never be my legal wife.” In my last life, I had been so excited to marry Cassian that I did not realize his car was missing until the ceremony was about to begin. I already knew the truth, but hearing it again still hurt. What shocked me more was that my mother had known from the beginning. I looked at her. “If you knew Cassian took the wrong woman, why didn’t you stop the car? Why did you wait for me to clean up the mess?” Her head snapped up, panic flashing in her eyes. “What are you talking about?” Then her expression hardened. “This marriage is tied to two billion dollars in financing. If no one marries into the Blackwood family today, Vale Group’s stock will be suspended tomorrow morning. If you make trouble, you’ll only hurt Seraphina, Cassian, and your father.” She had thought of everyone. Everyone except me. In my last life, I had used my life to stop the wedding, and Blackwood Group immediately withdrew its financing. Adrian later called off his retaliation, saving Vale Group from bankruptcy, but my mother locked me away for three months. She confiscated my phone and bank cards and told the public that I was mentally ill. Three months later, Cassian sent an assistant to take me to the house in the suburbs. He did not even show his face. I did not learn until I was dying that his supposed prosopagnosia had been a lie from the beginning. I looked at my mother and nodded calmly. “You don’t need to worry.” “I’m willing to marry Adrian.”
The wedding march began as Adrian and I walked out of the Vale residence together, my veil covering my face. He bent down and lifted me into the bridal car. I could not make out his expression through my veil, but I could hear how fast his heart was beating. The door closed, and the guests raised their glasses in celebration. Everyone was smiling. I alone sat amid the white roses filling the car, my hands and feet ice-cold. In my last life, I had refused the marriage in public, and Blackwood Group withdrew its financing from Vale Group that same day. Adrian later called off the acquisition, saving the Vale family’s company and suppressing the scandal that had swept across the internet. This time, as I sat in his car, I could not tell whether I felt afraid or relieved. But I knew one thing. Whatever lay ahead, I would never return to a home where I was constantly mistaken for someone else and forced to beg for the slightest consideration. I looked down at my wedding dress. Seraphina had rejected it because she disliked the cut at the waist. Even the embroidery on the veil was a pattern she hated. For the past three years, I had tried to make myself her complete opposite. She never wore forest green, so I filled my closet with it. She loved flashy jewelry, so I wore only the simplest silver pieces. Even then, Cassian still claimed he could not tell us apart. I once made him a matching bracelet, only to see Seraphina wearing it later. Even the engagement gifts meant for me had been handed to her by Cassian himself. Before the wedding, I pinned a brooch engraved with my name to my dress and begged him to look at it before I got into the car. Yet on our wedding day, he still left with Seraphina. In my last life, after I moved into his house, I once asked him through my tears, “I wore the wedding dress Seraphina hated most. How did you still mistake her for me?” He pulled me into his arms and kissed away my tears. “I’m sorry, Elowen. There were too many people that day. I was nervous.” “Thank God you still came back to me. If you had really married Adrian, I would have hated myself forever.” Those few words were enough to make me forgive him and forget every indignity I had suffered. Only now did I understand that every kindness he had shown me was an act. Before the car departed, my mother rested a hand on the door and warned me in a low voice, “Once you’re with Adrian, control your temper. Don’t make him angry.” What she truly feared was that I would expose the bride swap and implicate Seraphina and the Vale family. “Don’t worry.” I paused and looked at her through my veil. “You and Father should decide how you plan to explain deliberately switching the brides. I may keep quiet, but that doesn’t mean Adrian won’t find out.” My mother went pale. I shut the door and stopped looking at her. The rain began just as the motorcade pulled away from the Vale residence. Adrian’s black SUV drew alongside the bridal car. He lowered the window and signaled for the driver to slow down. “The rain is too heavy. There’s a private club up ahead. We’ll wait there for a while.” His tone was cool. “All right.” As long as I could leave the Vale family behind, I did not care where we went. When the motorcade arrived at the private club, however, Cassian’s car was already parked outside. I lowered my window and saw him.
Cassian was shielding Seraphina from the rain with his jacket, gazing at her with unmistakable tenderness. He had once looked at me that way. I loved the cherry pie from a bakery in Brooklyn, and he would stand in line for an hour to buy it for me. When I was hospitalized with a fever, he once canceled his meetings and stayed beside my bed all night. In the end, he used his supposed prosopagnosia as an excuse to give Seraphina everything that should have been mine. The night I hemorrhaged during labor, Seraphina was admitted with abdominal pain. Cassian deliberately told the emergency team that she was the pregnant patient. By the time the nurses corrected the chart and the doctors rushed back to my operating room, it was too late. “Elowen, don’t blame me,” he said, his eyes red. “Pretending I couldn’t tell you apart was exhausting. In our next life, stay out of my relationship with Seraphina.” The memory made my fingers turn cold. This time, I would not repeat the same mistake. Cassian visibly froze when he saw Adrian’s motorcade, then hurried over to greet him. Adrian gave him a single indifferent glance before walking to my car and helping me out himself. Cassian kept staring at me, as though trying to identify me. He did not come back to himself until Seraphina tugged on his arm. The club’s lounge was small. I sat by the floor-to-ceiling windows, only a few steps away from them, and heard every word they said. “Cassian, could that really be Elowen in that car?” “Impossible.” He did not hesitate. “She won’t marry him. She told me she would never marry anyone but me. There must be something else going on.” Seraphina readily agreed. “Exactly. If Elowen knew you had taken me, she would have caused a scene by now.” “She probably paid a woman with a similar figure to put on a veil and take her place at the wedding.” Cassian pressed his lips together, as if he had finally found an explanation he could accept. Seraphina studied his expression before asking cautiously, “If Adrian finds out that we switched the brides, will he force me to honor the arrangement? My name is the one on the agreement.” “I’m so scared.” She covered her face and began to cry. Cassian immediately pulled her into his arms. “Don’t be. I won’t let anyone take you away.” “If Elowen really hired a substitute and then tried to blame you, I’ll never forgive her. She can forget about ever coming back to me.” Seraphina leaned against his chest, her voice soft and aggrieved. “But if the truth comes out, the worst Elowen will lose is you. I’ll be forced to marry Adrian. Who knows what he’ll do to me?” Cassian’s expression turned cold. “If it comes to that, we’ll put all the blame on Elowen. It won’t matter whether she admits it.” “Everyone knows I’m face-blind. If anyone investigates, we’ll say it was an accident. No one can prove we switched you deliberately.” I sat only a few steps away and heard every word. It seemed Cassian had been behind those rumors in my last life too—the ones accusing me of marriage fraud and calling me mentally unstable. I clenched my skirt so tightly my fingertips almost went numb. Then Cassian suddenly looked in my direction. His gaze dropped to my wrist, and his expression changed. “Mr. Blackwood.” He spoke abruptly, barely concealing his panic. “The two brides come from the same family. According to a Vale family tradition, they should exchange an accessory before the ceremony as a blessing.” Cassian stared at my wrist. “The silver bracelet on your bride’s wrist is lovely. My wife happens to have an emerald brooch. Why not let them exchange the pieces for good luck?”
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