Author: Momo Chan

For twenty-five years, I was in love with a boy from the wrong side of the tracks. We tumbled through life together, a chaotic whirlwind of shared struggles and scraped-together dreams. My sister, Rory, had a different kind of love story. Her boyfriend treated her like a princess, enshrined in gold and jade. When someone made a pass at her once, the man’s hands and feet were broken, and he was thrown into the sea for the sharks by the next morning. The day a rival of Ash’s couldn’t find him and took out their anger on me instead, smashing the fish stall that was my entire livelihood, I cried until I couldn’t breathe. That same night, my sister’s boyfriend forgot to give her a goodnight kiss, so he had fireworks set off across the entire city for three days and three nights just to apologize. Her legendary romance went viral. A legion of followers waited with bated breath for every update. I was one of them. The day Ash was supposed to propose to me, he vanished. At the same time, I was scrolling through my phone when I saw Rory’s latest post. “This time, I’ll let you have your happiness with her.” The accompanying photo showed her locked in a fierce kiss, the corner of her lip bitten red. The man’s face was pixelated, a mosaic of blurred color. But the scar on the back of his hand, a pale, jagged mark from a burn… it was identical to Ash’s. … 1 “Oh my god, my favorite love blogger just updated!” “Damn, her boyfriend has so much tension. Even his scars are sexy.” Hearing the chatter from the customers at my stall, my focus slipped. The blade in my hand slid, slicing deep into my finger. “Are you blind?” a man barked, pointing at the fish on the cutting board. “You cut the gallbladder. How are we supposed to eat that now?” “I’m so sorry, so sorry,” I stammered, bowing my head, my words tumbling out in a frantic apology. “I’ll give you another one, on the house.” Thankfully, a regular customer nearby stepped in to smooth things over, and the man didn’t escalate. “But Anya,” the regular said kindly after he’d left, “that dress really isn’t practical for cleaning fish.” I looked down at the fabric clinging to my body, a bitter taste filling my mouth. I hated this dress. It was tight, impractical, and stained easily. But today was the day Ash was supposed to propose. I just wanted to look beautiful for him. Finally, after the last customer of the rush was gone, Ash came running up, his breath coming in ragged pants as he wrapped his arms around me. “Did some bastard give you trouble just now? I’ll go kill him.” Any other time, I would have grabbed his arm, pleaded with him not to cause a scene. But as I watched him clench his fist, my eyes fixed on the familiar scar on his hand. I took an involuntary step back. I refused to let myself entertain the possibility. Just then, my phone rang. It was Rory. “Congratulations, big sis! Did he pop the question?” “I have good news, too! I got the scholarship, and my boyfriend bought me a huge condo!” I forced my lips into a smile. “That’s amazing, Rory. Congratulations.” “Anya? What’s wrong?” she asked, her voice sharp, sensing the tremor in mine. “It’s nothing. I just cut my hand while cleaning a fish,” I said softly. “No way. Put me on speaker!” The moment I did, her voice, sharp and furious, blasted from the phone. “Ash, you son of a bitch! Aren’t you supposed to be proposing to my sister? Why is she still gutting fish?” Ash shot back without missing a beat, “You don’t know shit. Mind your own business.” He scowled. “Proposal or not, she’s my wife.” He hung up, his brow furrowed. I watched him, his eyes red-rimmed with what looked like concern as he rummaged for a Band-Aid, and I pushed down the strange, sick feeling coiling in my stomach. Not long after, Rory herself burst onto the scene, a full-blown paramedic’s first-aid kit in her arms. “I’m really fine, Rory. You’re making a mountain out of a molehill,” I said, feigning annoyance. She pouted, her expression petulant. “When it comes to my sister, nothing is ever too much!” She looked around my cramped, damp stall. “You should move into the condo my boyfriend gave me.” “How could I possibly do that?” “Your boyfriend is so good to you. Maybe he’s planning for it to be your marital home?” A faint blush crept up Rory’s cheeks. Ash, who had been leaning against the counter, glanced over at her, the corner of his mouth twitching into a slight, almost imperceptible smile. Then Rory’s tone shifted, a sharp edge returning to her voice. “Unlike some people, who can’t even take care of their own wife properly,” she said, directing a pointed look at Ash. “Still needs me, the family servant, to come running.” With that, she took a roll of gauze and began wrapping my finger with practiced ease. At her last words, Ash’s brow twitched again, a flicker of something I couldn’t name. A strange impulse took hold of me. I looked at him. “Ash,” I said, my voice steady. “Let’s just get married.” I turned to my sister. “Rory isn’t married yet. She can be our maid of honor.” Rory froze. The half-wrapped roll of gauze slipped from her fingers and fell to the wet floor. “I’m not planning on getting married,” she said, her head bowed so low I couldn’t see her face. “I’m just playing around.” Ash’s body went rigid at her words. “How can you say that? You have to take relationships seriously!” I said, reaching out to touch the top of her head. She flinched away, a subtle but definite movement. “It’s impossible for us,” she murmured. Then she lifted her head, a bright, brittle smile plastered on her face. “You have to be happy, Anya. Promise me.” “I still want to beat the hell out of that guy,” Ash grumbled, his voice laced with frustration, breaking the strange tension. “Who the hell does he think he is, making you bow and scrape like that?” “Ash!” I grabbed his arm, stopping him. “You promised me you wouldn’t get into any more trouble. We’re just ordinary people. We can’t afford to cross someone with money and power.” He stopped, his body still, and a strange expression crossed his face. Rory let out an ill-timed laugh. I looked at her, confused. Realizing her slip, she quickly linked her arm through mine, her touch intimate. “It’s just… this is the first time I’ve ever seen him back down. It’s kind of funny.” For a split second, I thought I saw a look of pure indulgence in Ash’s eyes as he looked at her. I shook my head, clearing it. These two were the most important people in my life. Ash could be impulsive, but he was devoted to me in every other way. Besides, he was a street brawler and I was a fishmonger. Where would he get the kind of money to turn someone into a princess? When Rory left, she clung to me, her face a mask of reluctance. But my eyes caught a glimpse of her phone screen. Her pinned chat at the top of her messaging app was with someone named “Mr. Won’t Say Yes.” I remembered her joking back in high school. “One day, I’m going to call myself ‘Miss Courageous,’” she’d declared. “And I’ll go after anyone I want.” “What are you staring at?” Ash’s voice broke through my thoughts as he wrapped his arms around me from behind. “Are you mad that I missed the proposal today?” He lifted me effortlessly, settling me onto his lap. “I ran into someone I have a history with. An old enemy.” He held me tight. “I was afraid he’d find out about you, threaten you. So I led him away.” He kissed my temple. “We’ll have another proposal ceremony, I promise.” I remained still, my fingers tracing the scar on his hand. “I saw one just like this today…” He immediately pulled his sleeve down, covering the mark, and changed the subject. “You’re on your period. You shouldn’t be getting your hands in cold water. I’ll wash your underwear for you.” I leaned back on the sofa, my heart a hollow drum, and mindlessly scrolled through short videos on my phone. Suddenly, I landed on the campus confession page for my sister’s university. I tapped on it out of curiosity. I saw that the page was obsessed with a specific couple, secretly documenting their moments. I chuckled at the blogger’s sneaky devotion to her ‘ship.’ Then I saw a video where the girl was wearing a dress identical to Rory’s. It was a designer piece I had bought for her birthday, a gift that had cost me nearly a year’s savings. She had told me she adored it, that no one else at school would have anything like it. I stared at the screen, my finger hovering over the video, trembling slightly. I scrolled down. The blog had started shipping this couple three years ago. Three years ago? That was when Rory had just started college here. A chill spread through my entire body. I clicked on the very first video. Rory’s back was to the camera. She was calling out to a man, her voice sweet as honey. “Brother…” The camera angle shifted. The man’s face wasn’t visible, but the hand that reached out to cup her cheek was identical to Ash’s. Even the scar—its position, its size—was exactly the same. In the next few videos, the girl’s face was never shown. But the moment I heard her voice, a roar filled my ears, and my breath caught in my throat. The comment section was a frenzy of excitement. “OMG, you can just tell from her voice she’s gorgeous!” “I’m so jealous of the OP, getting to see this up close every day!” The account owner replied: “She’s my roommate! They’re so in love, but the guy is trapped by some other woman who he’s indebted to for saving his life. She’s demanding he marry her.” “I’ve had to wipe her tears so many times. I swear, I want to kill that bitch myself!” Tears blurred my vision completely. I swiped to the next video. The date stamp was the day of my fifth anniversary with Ash. Rory was passed out drunk at a karaoke bar. A moment later, a man burst into the frame, his movements frantic as he gathered her into his arms. After checking that she was okay, he pressed her down onto the sofa, his anger melting into a series of desperate, punishing kisses. Finally, he lifted her into his arms, his breath ragged. Before he left, he shot a warning glare at the camera, and the screen went black. Staring at the final, familiar half-profile of his face, I felt a profound and bottomless despair. The caption read: “Risking my life for this content. Guess if my OTP finally went all the way tonight!” The comments flooded in: “I’ll bet you a bag of chips they did!” “Isn’t it obvious?!” The last video was the one with the highest view count. It was a video of the two of them kissing on the Concord Bridge. The date was today. The day Ash was supposed to propose to me. The Concord Bridge was the highest bridge in the city, the most popular spot for couples. I had asked Ash so many times to go there with me. I’d told him we didn’t even have to go onto the bridge itself, knowing he was afraid of heights. Every single time, without exception, he had refused. The reason was always the same: it was for my own good, for my safety. It turned out he had already done it. With another woman—my own sister. It wasn’t that he wouldn’t go. It was that he wouldn’t go with me. I collapsed onto the floor. My heart felt like it was being slowly, methodically flayed by a dull knife, the pain so intense it made me tremble. Just then, a street sweeper passed by outside. I was too close to the roll-up door and didn’t have time to move. A spray of filthy water drenched me. Looking at the grime staining my clothes, my stomach churned violently. I scrambled to the bathroom and threw up until I was dizzy and empty.

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The epiphany hit me when I was still slinging drinks at The Junction, a dive bar that smelled perpetually of stale beer and regret. It was too early in the story. The heroine, my coworker, was still wiping down sticky tables, years away from the meet-cute that would define her life. And I was right there beside her, still just a girl in a cheap apron, a lifetime away from meeting the millionaire who was supposedly my father. 1 After six months of hauling trays and fending off drunks, I suddenly woke up. I wasn’t just a bartender. I was a character in a romance novel—and not just any character. I was the bitchy, doomed antagonist. The script said that tomorrow, my long-lost biological father, a titan of industry, would find me. I’d be swept into a world of wealth, only to be promptly married off to a man who felt nothing for me. A man who, the script dictated, would eventually use his fists to communicate. Meanwhile, the heroine—Lily—would meet the hero, Ethan. She’d be swept into the loving embrace of his family and adored beyond measure. And, according to the plot, she would spend every waking moment rubbing her perfect life in my face, detailing every romantic gesture, every sweet nothing. The constant reminders of my own miserable existence were supposed to curdle my soul, turning me into a venomous schemer obsessed with destroying her happiness. My grand finale? A prison cell. Hers? A pair of cherubic twins and a happily ever after. Jesus Christ, I thought, wiping down the bar. What kind of hack author wrote this garbage? To have money, a husband, and all the free time in the world, and to throw it all away obsessing over someone else’s love life? That wasn’t a character flaw; it was just plain stupid. 2 Just as the story foretold, my father found me. And just as it was written, I was promptly engaged to the emotionally unavailable Adrian Cole. But that’s where I threw the book in the fire. I chose the path of non-stupidity. I chose to enjoy the damn ride. The first test came when Adrian informed me he was going to see his old flame. The one that got away. “You should probably bring flowers,” I suggested, pulling a dress from my new, ridiculously large closet. “Sophia always loved white roses. Don’t get the wrong ones.” Adrian froze, his hand on the doorknob. “What?” His confusion was understandable. According to my character notes, I was supposed to be throwing a jealous fit right now, maybe blocking the door, tears streaming down my face. Under my old moral code, the one from before I “woke up,” marriage was a sacred vow. No cheating, no emotional affairs, no looking back. But that was then. Now, my only sacred vow was to my bank account. “Look,” I said, turning to face him. “For the sake of a peaceful coexistence, how about we make a deal?” “What kind of deal?” he asked, his eyes narrowed with suspicion. “You do your thing, I keep my mouth shut. All it costs you is a recurring fee for my silence and discretion.” Adrian just stared at me. I blinked, genuinely confused by his shock. “Isn’t this how it works in your world? I thought this was standard procedure for you people.” Marriage as a merger, a strategic alliance for mutual benefit. Love was a separate ledger entirely, full of names and past indiscretions. He was silent for a few seconds, processing. “Arrangements where both parties… see other people aren’t uncommon,” he finally said, his voice carefully neutral. “But a wife who demands hush money from her husband? That’s a new one.” I shrugged, a gesture that felt more genuine than any I’d made in years. “A man can leave. Money is reliable.” Adrian had no response to that. 3 The moment Adrian’s car pulled out of the driveway, my phone buzzed. It was Lily. Right on schedule. By now, she and her hero, Ethan, were officially an item. The script said she’d call to tell me how wonderful he was, how he showered her with affection, and then, as an afterthought, she’d ask how I was doing. Given that my new husband was off visiting the love of his life, the original plot had me spiraling into despair. And Lily, whether out of cluelessness or a subtle sadistic streak, never seemed to notice my pain. Her concern was fleeting, but the gushing about her perfect relationship was endless. A Sinclair heiress, miserable and outdone by a bartender. The injustice was supposed to be my villain origin story. But now? Honestly, I didn’t give a damn. When she asked me how I was, I smiled into the phone. “Busy packing, actually.” “Oh my god, what happened?” she gasped, her voice full of drama. “Did you and Adrian have a fight?” “A fight? Who has time for that? I’m going on a trip.” “A honeymoon?” “Nope. Just me.” There was a stunned silence on her end. “Thea… you guys are newlyweds. This is supposed to be the sweet phase. Aren’t you, you know, trying for a baby?” I almost choked. A baby? With Adrian? We barely had enough chemistry to start a fire with gasoline and a blowtorch. I mumbled a few excuses and got off the phone as quickly as I could. The moment the wire transfer from Adrian—my first hush money payment—hit my account, I was out the door, suitcase in tow. Later that night, my phone rang again. It was Adrian. He sounded genuinely shocked. “The house is pitch black. Where are you?” I took a sip of my cocktail, the warm breeze ruffling my hair. “In the Maldives, watching the sunset.” Adrian was silent, the sound of his bewilderment traveling thousands of miles across the ocean. 4 On my second day in paradise, Lily and Ethan showed up. She claimed she missed me so much that she just had to have Ethan fly her out for a visit. But the way she said it, draped all over him, felt less like friendship and more like a victory lap. Worse, for someone who supposedly came all this way to see me, she spent every waking moment attached to Ethan’s hip. I became their personal assistant, fetching drinks, grabbing towels, taking their pictures. Any onlooker would have assumed I was their very well-dressed cabana girl. That was it. I decided to pack my bags and hop over to another island. Lily was aghast. “You spend money like this all the time? Doesn’t your husband say anything?” “It’s a commercial arrangement, Lily, not an allowance,” I said flatly. The word “allowance” must have struck a nerve, reminding her of her own financial dependence on Ethan. The smile vanished from her face. She gave me a long, hard look before muttering, “Well. Have fun.” Oh, I would. The only thing I asked of the universe was that she and her perfect boyfriend would stop following me around to flaunt their perfect love story. The script might have cast me as the villain, but I refused to be anyone’s supporting actress. You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t force it to be miserable. 5 After nearly three weeks of island-hopping, Adrian finally called again. This time, it was for a gala. A command performance, requiring us to appear as a united front. Without missing a beat, I suggested, “Why don’t you take Sophia? You just need a date, and she’s a woman. It works.” A long, suffering sigh came through the phone. He patiently explained that this particular event was critical. Both of our families would be there, watching. It had to be me. “I see. Well, in that case… could you just tell them I’m sick?” I was still enjoying my freedom and had zero desire to go back. His patience finally snapped. “I have never met a woman who pushes her husband away like you do,” he sneered. “Thea, you’re really something else.” Am I? I thought. Or are you guys just masochists? In the original script, my constant jealousy and meltdowns over Sophia drove him away for months at a time. I’d tracked her down, we’d gotten into a physical fight, and he’d hit me in a fit of rage. It ended with our families feuding and becoming the laughingstock of our social circle. Is that what he wanted? A return to that train wreck? “Fine,” I said, cutting through his tirade. “I’ll come back and play the part. But I have one condition.” “What is it?” “My friend’s birthday is in a few days. You’re coming with me, and you’re going to be on your best behavior.” Lily’s birthday was coming up. It was guaranteed to be another nauseating festival of her and Ethan’s love. I’d planned on skipping it, but I owed her. Back in our days at The Junction, she’d stepped in front of a violent drunk for me. This was me paying back that debt. As long as she didn’t push it, I was willing to keep the peace. 6 Adrian agreed to my terms. I was on a flight home the next day. A flight delay left him waiting at the airport for three hours. The moment I walked through the arrivals gate, I was met with his thunderous expression. “What’s with the face?” I chirped. “Not happy to see me? I can turn right around and go back.” His jaw tightened. He practically shoved me into the back of his car, then tossed a garment bag at me. “Change. We’re late.” “In the car?” He pressed a button, and a privacy divider slid up, sealing us off from the driver. “There. No one can see you.” I looked at him pointedly. “And you’re not a person?” He whipped his head around to stare out the window, his jaw clenched so hard I thought it might crack. “The reflection in the glass, Adrian,” I sang softly. “You might want to close your eyes.” He took a deep, shaky breath, but it wasn’t enough to keep his composure. He spun back around, his eyes blazing. “Thea, we have a marriage license. It is perfectly legal for me to see every inch of you.” “Oh. Okay, then. Look away,” I said, and with a theatrical shrug, I started to unbutton my shirt. Just as I’d predicted, his bravado crumbled. A dark flush crept up his neck, and he quickly averted his eyes. Amateur, I thought with a smirk. You’re playing checkers while I’m playing chess. I had the whole script memorized. Adrian Cole was the kind of man who met force with overwhelming force. But show a little vulnerability, a little playful defiance, and he short-circuited. With him staring determinedly at his shoes, his face still beet red, I calmly changed into the evening gown. 7 The moment we stepped out of the car at the gala, I looped my arm through his. “Nice acting,” he muttered under his breath. “Glad you think so,” I whispered back. “A million-dollar bonus for my performance would be lovely, Mr. Cole.” He didn’t reply, but I felt the muscle in his arm twitch. Throughout the evening, I was the perfect corporate wife. I smiled, I made small talk, I remembered names and business connections. There was no trace of the lost girl dragged out of a dive bar. I watched Adrian’s expression shift from surprise to something else… something warmer. Was that… appreciation? Wait. No. Not appreciation. It was… tenderness. An alarm bell went off in my head. The second we were back in the car, I pulled my arm away. “Just so we’re clear, this was a transaction. I helped you tonight so you’ll help me at the birthday party. This is purely reciprocal, so don’t get any weird ideas.” Adrian seemed to have had a bit too much to drink. He leaned his head back against the leather, his eyes hazy. He loosened his tie, the picture of a devastatingly handsome CEO unraveling. “You didn’t just marry me for the money, did you?” “What else would it be for?” I asked with unflinching honesty. “Your sparkling personality?” My sincerity seemed to wound him more than any insult could have. He lurched forward, grabbing my chin and forcing me to look at him. “You don’t like this?” he demanded, gesturing to his face. “If a guy like me doesn’t do it for you, then who does?” I decided to throw a grenade. “Someone like Ethan, I guess.” “Ethan? Your friend’s boyfriend?” “So? They say you should keep your friends close and your enemies closer. I’m just the kind of friend who’d steal a girl’s boyfriend,” I said, my voice dripping with fake malice. He stared at me, utterly speechless, as if my moral compass had just spun off its axis and flown out the window. It took him a long moment to find his voice. “Thea,” he said through gritted teeth. “Your husband is sitting right in front of you.” “So?” 8 That did it. Adrian snapped. He ripped off his tie and tossed it onto the empty seat. Then he grabbed my hand and pressed it flat against his chest, sliding it down over the hard ridges of his abdomen. The muscles were like steel cables under his shirt. Damn it. The bastard was using his good looks against me. “What—what are you doing?” I stammered, trying to pull my hand back. He wouldn’t let go. A slow, dangerous smile spread across his face as he leaned in, trapping me between the car door and the solid wall of his chest. “Telling me you want another man while you’re with me,” he murmured, his voice a low growl. “Thea, are you trying to get yourself into trouble?” The pose, the look in his eyes, the words themselves—it was all intoxicatingly intimate. For a split second, a dangerous, ridiculous thought flashed through my mind: What if he’s actually falling for me? Then his phone buzzed, shattering the illusion. The screen lit up with a single name: Sophia. So intimate. He glanced at it, his jaw tightening, and silenced the call. But I was wide awake now. The fog had lifted. I smirked at him. “Doesn’t the great Mr. Cole have feelings for another woman, too?” My question hit him like a physical blow. He froze. I seized the opportunity, pushing him away and smoothing down my dress. “Don’t forget, Adrian,” I said, my voice cool and steady. “We’re a business arrangement.” In the original script, he used that line to shut me down time and time again. Tonight, I was deploying it first. The consequence, however, was that Adrian spent the next several days treating me with a glacial coldness. The silence in our massive house was deafening. Finally, the day of Lily’s birthday arrived. “Are you still coming with me?” I asked him. He shot back, his voice dripping with ice, “If I don’t, are you going alone?” “Nope. I’ll find someone else.” “A man or a woman?” I just gave him a look. One that said, What do you think? Sometimes, silence is the most eloquent answer. He exploded. “You wouldn’t dare take another man! I swear to God, I’ll have him arrested!” I just stared at him. He had to be kidding. Calling the cops in that situation? The only person who’d be humiliated is him. But his outburst told me what I needed to know: he was still coming. Since the objective was achieved, I saw no need to prolong the conflict. I broke into a bright smile and took his hand. “Then let’s go.” Adrian stumbled, caught off guard by the sudden shift. As we walked toward the door, I saw him glance down at our intertwined fingers. And then, just for a second, the corner of his mouth tilted up in a ghost of a smile.

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I was eight months pregnant when my parents, who had always favored my sister, invited me over for dinner. It was the first time in years I had felt a glimmer of their warmth. That was the night of the fire. When the smoke detectors shrieked and the flames began to lick at the doorframes, their instincts were instantaneous. They shoved me aside, my swollen belly a clumsy obstacle, and grabbed my sister, Chloe—the one with leukemia, the one who had always been the sun in their universe. They carried her out into the night, leaving me behind in the suffocating heat. I was sure I was going to die. But then my husband, Ethan, burst through the wall of smoke. He swept me into his arms without a moment’s hesitation, his body shielding mine as he carried me to safety. The burns blistering his own skin didn’t seem to register. His eyes, full of a desperate tenderness I’d craved my whole life, were only for me. “Ava, you’re pregnant,” he’d whispered, his voice hoarse from the smoke as paramedics worked on us. “If anything happened to the baby… to you… I don’t know what I’d do.” In that moment, I believed I had finally found the one person who would choose me. Who truly loved me. That belief shattered when I saw the text exchange between him and Chloe on his unlocked phone. Chloe: I can’t wait much longer, E. Ethan: Just hold on, my love. A little more time. Once she has the baby and we get the cord blood, I can finally save you. My world tilted on its axis. The air left my lungs. Without a second thought, I pulled out my own phone, my fingers numb as I dialed the number for the women’s clinic. “Hello,” I said, my voice a dead, hollow thing. “I need to schedule an abortion.” 1 I had just tucked the clinic’s appointment confirmation slip into my purse when I saw them. Ethan was walking down the hospital corridor toward me, his arm wrapped protectively around my sister, Chloe, guiding her toward the oncology wing for a check-up. He stopped short when he saw me. “Ava? Honey, what are you doing here? I thought your next prenatal wasn’t until next week.” Ethan’s gaze dropped instantly to my stomach, his face a mask of anxiety. I used to mistake that frantic energy for love, for a fierce, protective instinct. Now I saw it for what it was: a man checking on his investment. “I just felt a little off,” I lied smoothly. “Decided to come get it checked out.” His panic sharpened. “Off how? What’s wrong? What did the doctor say? Is the baby okay? Did you get the results yet?” He rushed to my side, his hand hovering over my belly, his eyes wide with a carefully crafted concern. Chloe, however, couldn’t be bothered with the performance. She shot me a glare filled with pure contempt. “Can’t you do one thing right? Honestly, what’s the point of you if you can’t even carry a baby properly? If anything happens to what’s in there, I swear to God, Ava, I’ll make you pay.” I ignored her, pulling the ultrasound printout from my bag and handing it to Ethan. “Everything’s fine. The baby is perfectly healthy.” The relief that washed over his face was profound. He finally exhaled. “Oh, thank God. Okay, good. You should go home and rest, then. Chloe still has a few more tests, so I’ll stay with her and be back later.” His other hand, the one not reaching for me, had never once left Chloe’s arm. I used to explain away his constant, hovering attention on my sister as a kind of misguided brotherly affection, an extension of his love for me. Love the house, love the mouse. How naive I’d been. I never imagined their plan was this monstrous. As they walked away, a cold impulse took over. I followed them. I watched them disappear into the office of the Head of Hematology—an office that belonged to my father. “We can’t wait any longer,” Ethan’s voice was tight with urgency, even muffled through the door. “Chloe’s getting worse.” “Just a little more time,” my father’s voice rumbled. “Two months at most. Once Ava gives birth, we’ll have the cord blood, and Chloe will be saved.” “She might not have a month! We have to do the surgery now.” “Then we induce her now,” a new voice said, sharp and decisive. A figure stepped out from a corner of the office, and my blood ran cold. It was my mother, an OB/GYN at this very hospital. A thousand tiny blades seemed to plunge into my chest, stealing my breath. They were all in on it. All of them. And I had foolishly, desperately believed that my pregnancy had finally earned me a place in my parents’ hearts. “But the baby’s only at eight months,” Ethan said, a flicker of something—hesitation? concern?—in his voice. “If we take it out now, will it be… okay?” My mother’s face, visible through the crack in the door, was a granite slab of impatience. “Chloe’s life is the only thing that matters right now. Everything else is secondary.” I stared at the woman who had carried me for nine months, and my heart felt like it was being torn in two. Chloe leaned into Ethan’s embrace, her voice a sickly sweet murmur. “Ethan, honey, you seem so worried about her baby. You’re not getting attached to her, are you?” He immediately pulled her tighter, his voice dropping to a fierce whisper I could still just barely hear. “Never. Don’t ever think that. I only married her to get you this cure. To use her body to grow the medicine you need. The second that baby is out of her, she’s worthless to me.” Tears streamed down my face, hot and silent. My hand was clenched so tightly around the small packet of pills the clinic had given me that my knuckles were white. I lifted my head, my resolve hardening into something cold and sharp. Without another thought, I tossed the pill into my mouth and swallowed it dry. Back home, I took out the divorce papers Ethan had signed as a “show of faith” before our wedding—a document I’d never intended to use. I signed my name, dated it, and locked it in the safe. I had just started to pack a bag when the front door flew open with such force it slammed against the wall. I flinched, my heart seizing in my chest. Ethan strode in, his face grim. He grabbed my arm, his grip like a vise. “Ava. The doctor just called me. They reviewed your chart again. The baby’s in distress. We have to go back to the hospital. Now.” I tried to pull my arm away, but his fingers dug in, bruising the bone. My wrist was already turning red. “No. The doctor told me, to my face, that the baby was fine. And why would they call you instead of me?” His eyes were bloodshot, a wild desperation lurking in their depths. “It was a last-minute consult! Your mother called me herself. You don’t trust me, fine. But you trust your own mother, don’t you?” On cue, my parents walked through the open door. My mother’s face was a cold mask of disapproval. “This is your own fault for not being careful enough. You’ve upset the baby’s balance. We’re going to the hospital.” My father chimed in, his voice oozing false reason. “Your mother is a respected obstetrician, Ava. Are you really going to question her medical opinion?” My free hand shot out, gripping the bedroom doorknob like a lifeline. “I’m not going. It’s late. We can go tomorrow. I feel fine. Nothing is wrong.” My mother’s face twisted in fury. She marched over and began prying my fingers from the knob, one by one. “You’ll do as you’re told! Why must you be so difficult? I’m your mother! Do you think I would ever hurt you?” Yes, I screamed in my head. You have my whole life. They had shipped me off to live with my grandparents in the countryside as a baby, only deigning to bring me into their home after my grandparents passed away and the village council forced their hand. I’d spent my entire life wondering what was so wrong with me that my own parents couldn’t love me. I held on with every ounce of strength I had. My mother couldn’t break my grip. CRACK. The sound of her palm connecting with my cheek echoed in the room. “You are going to the hospital right now,” she hissed, her face inches from mine. “If you delay this and Chloe doesn’t make it, I will never, ever forgive you.” Half of my face was numb, the other half blazing with pain. A bitter laugh escaped my lips. “There it is. The truth finally comes out.” She didn’t even flinch. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I only know that your body is no longer a viable environment for this pregnancy. It’s a happy coincidence that your sister needs the cord blood right now.” My father, seeing I still wouldn’t budge, joined the effort. “Ava, you were always the sensible one. Your sister needs you. Please, just do this for us. For your mother and me.” He was trying to play the family card. I turned my head and spat on the floor by his feet. “Stop pretending. Her life is a life, but mine isn’t? Forcing a C-section at eight months is dangerous. I could die.” Seeing his emotional appeal fail, my father’s face contorted with rage. He slapped my other cheek, just as hard. “You ungrateful brat! That’s your sister! Sacrificing one baby to save her is a noble thing to do. It’s not like you can’t have another one.” Ethan dropped all pretense. He lunged forward, his hand clamping around my throat. “Enough of this. Chloe collapsed this afternoon. She’s waiting for this cord blood to save her life. You’re going to that hospital, one way or another.” “Ethan, it’s your baby!” I choked out, clawing at his hand. His eyes were chips of ice. “If my offspring can save Chloe, then that is its honor. Its sole purpose for existing. Otherwise, a woman like you would never have been worthy of carrying my child in the first place.” Staring into his cold, dead eyes was like falling into an abyss. “Dad, Mom, let’s stop wasting time,” Ethan said, his voice flat. “Chloe can’t wait. Let’s just tie her up and take her.” He found a length of rope in a utility closet. With my parents holding me down, he bound my hands tightly behind my back. “Move,” my mother snarled, shoving me toward the door. I dug my heels in, hooking my foot around the doorframe. Ethan let out a roar of frustration and kicked my leg, hard. “If we’re too late because of you, Ava, I will personally see to it that you pay with your life.” The force of the kick sent me sprawling to my knees. A searing pain shot up my leg, and a vicious cramp seized my abdomen. I cried out, tears of pain blurring my vision. “Be careful!” my mother snapped at Ethan. “Watch the belly! Hit her face, I don’t care, but you can’t damage the merchandise.” Ethan nodded grimly. He and my father hauled me to my feet like a sack of grain and began dragging me toward the elevator. The elevator doors slid open. A tall, well-built man was stepping out. I knew him. Officer Miller, from next door. He’d helped me once when my car was broken into. Hope, bright and blinding, flared in my chest. “Help—” Before I could get the word out, my mother’s hand clamped over my mouth. “Oh, sweetie, feeling nauseous again? Don’t worry, Mommy’s taking you to the hospital right now.” Officer Miller looked at the scene, his brow furrowed in confusion. “Is everything alright here?” “My wife,” Ethan said, his voice impossibly calm. “She’s not feeling well. We think she might be going into labor, so we’re rushing her to the hospital.” My hands were bound behind me, Ethan’s grip a crushing pressure on my wrist to keep me still. I could do nothing but stare at Officer Miller, pouring every ounce of my desperation into my eyes. “I’m an OB/GYN,” my mother added, pulling her hospital ID from her purse with a practiced motion. “It’s my daughter. She’s about to give birth. We can’t waste a single second.” “Oh, of course,” he said, stepping back immediately. “Don’t let me keep you. Go, go.” He held the door for them. Ethan breathed a sigh of relief. They bundled me into the elevator. As the doors slid shut, I watched Officer Miller’s back recede down the hallway, and the fragile hope in my heart turned to ash. The moment the doors closed, my mother dug her nails into my arm. “You little bitch. You almost blew it with that cop. Do you have any idea what you’re doing? You’re trying to murder your own sister. How can you be so evil?” The pain was excruciating, and fresh tears streamed down my face. Just then, my father’s phone rang. “Dr. Sterling? It’s the hospital. Your daughter Chloe has a sudden high fever and isn’t responding to treatment. You need to come back immediately.” He hung up, his face grim as he stared at my stomach. “We’re out of time. The second we get to the hospital, we’re taking her straight to the OR.” The elevator doors opened. Ethan and my father started to drag me out. “Hold it.” A voice. Footsteps, quick and urgent. I twisted my head and saw Officer Miller standing right behind us, his expression serious. That extinguished ember of hope sparked back to life. “You dropped this,” he said, jogging up to us. He handed my mother my ID card, which must have fallen from her purse. “Oh, thank you so much, Officer,” she gushed. I strained against my bonds, trying to make a sound, anything. “Offi—” As Miller turned to leave again, I gasped out the word, but Ethan’s hand immediately clamped over my mouth, muffling the sound. “Just breathe, honey, we’re almost there,” he said loudly, for the officer’s benefit. Then he was dragging me toward the car. The second I was thrown into the back seat, my mother’s hand was on me again, pinching and twisting the flesh of my arm. “You try one more thing, I swear to God, you will regret it.” Ethan drove like a madman, blowing through three red lights to get to the hospital. They didn’t even bother with admitting. I was dragged through back corridors directly into an operating room. The sterile chill of the room, the gleam of cold steel, sent a fresh wave of terror through me. I tried to scramble away, to run, but my mother was already there, plunging a syringe into my arm. A sedative. “We’re just taking a baby out, Ava,” she said, her voice laced with a chillingly casual cruelty. “I don’t understand why you’re making such a scene. We’re family. And you’re saving your sister.” The drug began to work, a strange lightness spreading through my limbs, but she must have used a low dose, afraid of harming the baby. My mind remained terrifyingly clear. “Strap her to the table,” she commanded. “I’ll perform the surgery myself.” Ethan and my father hoisted me onto the operating table. “This is illegal!” I screamed, my voice echoing in the cold, tiled room. “You can’t do this!” My mother just scoffed. “You’re my daughter. What’s illegal about me operating on you? I gave you your life, I can do with it as I please.” My father glared at me. “You’re a monster. We raised you, and now, when we ask you to do one small thing to save your sister, you talk to us about the law?” Ethan tightened the strap on my wrist, cinching it so hard I felt the buckle dig into my flesh. “Hurry up and sign the consent form, Ethan,” my mother said, thrusting a clipboard at him. “I need to begin.” He scribbled his name without even glancing at the page. I looked at the faces of the people I had once called my family, and my heart felt like it had been frozen solid. “Ethan, you might want to step outside,” my mother said, picking up a scalpel. “This could get messy.” He shook his head, his eyes fixed on my stomach. “No. I need to be here. I need to see the medicine for Chloe come out with my own eyes.” His words were needles, piercing my heart one by one. To him, my child and I were not human. We were a pharmaceutical. There was no anesthesiologist. It was a rogue, illegal surgery. My mother pressed the blade against my skin and cut. It was a pain beyond anything I could have imagined, a white-hot agony that felt like my bones were being shattered from the inside out. I could feel every layer of my body being sliced open, peeled back. My screams tore through the room, raw and unending, but no one wiped the sweat from my brow. No one flinched. No one even looked at my face. “You will all pay for this,” I hissed through clenched teeth. Ethan started to retort, but was cut off by a triumphant shout from my mother. “I’ve got it! The baby is out!” But her joy lasted only a second, replaced by a sound of pure horror. “The baby… why isn’t it breathing? It’s not breathing.”

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The text message arrived twelve hours into a marathon artificial heart transplant with Dr. Evan Maxwell. It was from his fiancée, Isabelle Croft, and it was the start of a storm. “Dr. Reed, Evan hasn’t answered me in ten minutes. I miss him so much.” “You two are together, aren’t you? Can you send me a picture of him?” I glanced at the sterile instrument tray, everything laid out and ready. I spared one-ten-thousandth of my focus to reply. “Ms. Croft, Dr. Maxwell is in his final pre-op consultation. All phones have been secured.” A few minutes later, a voice message. “I knew it. You’re together. The only reason you won’t send a picture is because you have something to hide.” I hadn’t even finished pulling on my last pair of sterile gloves. I ignored it and prepared to enter the OR. The next second, my phone rang. I declined the call. A text immediately followed. “You little bitch. I knew you were seducing him. How many times have you two slept together?” “No wonder Evan won’t touch me anymore. He’s already had his fill with you.” The surgical suite doors hissed open. My patience, already worn thin, finally snapped. “Ms. Croft,” I said, my voice low and clipped, “Dr. Maxwell and I are colleagues. Nothing more. I have zero interest in him.” I sealed my phone in my locker, figuring that would be the end of it. I was wrong. Just as the surgery reached its most critical phase, Isabelle Croft, flanked by two imposing bodyguards, smashed the glass of the operating room’s observation window. She was screaming, a wild, frantic sound from the other side of the broken pane. 1 “Anna Reed, you shameless bitch! Get the hell out here!” Evan’s hand jerked. The micro-suture needle, stitching the artificial heart to the aorta, came perilously close to piercing the arterial wall. A single millimeter further and the patient would have died instantly on the table. “Security! Get her out of here. Now.” I didn’t have time to look at him, and I certainly didn’t have time to look at the lunatic shattering hospital property. My world narrowed to the heart on the table, waiting for its final, life-giving sutures. “Evan, I’ll do it.” Before he could answer, I reached out and took the needle holder from his trembling fingers. My hands moved with a speed that was a full thirty percent faster than Evan’s on his best day. We had practiced this procedure hundreds of times; every motion was etched into my muscle memory. Beyond the sterile field, the chaos was a boiling pot of noise—Isabelle’s curses, security guards shouting. And here I was, in the eye of the storm, stitching a new beginning onto a dying heart. When the final suture was clipped, the data on the monitor was as steady as a mountain range. The surgery was a success. I set down my instruments, and my legs gave out. I nearly collapsed. Evan caught me. The OR doors slid open. Outside, Isabelle was pinned between two massive security guards, but her fury hadn’t dimmed. Seeing Evan holding me up, the venom in her eyes intensified. “Spit.” A glob of saliva flew through the air. I twisted my head aside, and it hit the wall behind me. “Anna Reed. You slept your way to the top, you piece of trash. You’re seducing him right in front of me.” Evan stepped between us, his voice heavy with exhaustion. “Isabelle, that’s enough. Anna is my colleague. We’ve done nothing wrong.” “Nothing wrong?” she shrieked. “Evan, you’re yelling at me for her? If you’ve done nothing wrong, then why did you spend the entire night with her two days ago?” Her gaze, filled with pure hatred, locked onto me. “Tell me, Anna. How many condoms did you two use that night? Did you wear him out so much he couldn’t even bother to come home?” I was too tired to even lift my eyelids. “Ms. Croft, I have no interest in your fiancé,” I said, my voice flat. “The only reason we were together was to run the final simulations for this procedure.” “As for how many condoms we used,” I paused, finally meeting her gaze. “I suggest you book a consultation with a plastic surgeon. After all, a woman who can’t even keep her own fiancé interested should probably be more concerned with her own face and body than having a meltdown in a hospital hallway. Don’t you think?” Isabelle’s face turned a shade of mottled purple. She screamed and tried to lunge, but the guards held her fast. It was at that precise moment my boyfriend, Mark, arrived to pick me up. And it was at that precise moment Isabelle dropped to the floor, grabbing Mark’s pant leg with the desperation of a drowning woman. “Sir! Help me! Please, save my love!” she sobbed. “This woman… she’s trying to steal my husband! She’s put a spell on him with her scalpel! Please, make her stop! Make her leave us alone!” Mark was completely stunned. He took a half-step back, trying to shake her off. The look he gave me was suddenly complex and utterly foreign. Evan, his face a grim mask, rushed forward to pull Isabelle away. She slapped him across the face. “You’re still protecting her!” Watching the absurd, theatrical scene unfold, I grabbed Mark’s hand and walked away. On the drive home, I told him everything. The harassing calls, the vile accusations. He listened in silence. When we parked in front of our building, he killed the engine and pulled me into a tight embrace. “I’m sorry, Anna,” he whispered into my hair. “I’m so sorry I was late. You shouldn’t have had to go through that alone.” Tucked safely in his arms, the exhaustion of the last twenty-four hours finally broke through, and I cried. Back home, I had just finished my shower when my phone buzzed. It was a picture from Isabelle. It was a photo of her in a wedding gown, photoshopped over an image of Evan and me at the operating table. My face was obscured by a giant, crudely drawn red X. Beneath it, a single line of text. “I’m the bride.” “You’re just a sacrifice at my wedding.” I looked at the pathetic, vicious image and typed back two words. “Get help.” Then I blocked her number and deleted the conversation. The next day, I arrived at the hospital on time, ready for work. But my name was gone from the surgical schedule. Not only that, I’d been removed from the cardiothoracic department’s core surgical team entirely. A new assignment notification popped up on my computer: administrative duty. I was to organize and archive old medical files. For a surgeon, it was the ultimate insult. The department head called me into his office. His expression was grim as he pushed a letter across his desk. “Anna, the hospital received a formal, signed complaint against you.” I picked it up. The complainant, identifying as a patient’s family member, accused me of having a terrible attitude during pre-op consultations and demanding cash bribes. Even more absurd, the letter claimed I had leaked Dr. Maxwell’s private schedule to the paparazzi, leading to his being harassed. At the end of the letter were several screenshots of faked chat logs. Every word was meticulously crafted to paint me as a manipulative, unethical gold digger. I knew instantly it was Isabelle’s handiwork. The so-called “patient’s family member” didn’t exist. Evan found out soon enough. He stormed into the dean’s office, arguing passionately on my behalf. But he had no proof. His defense was meaningless against their manufactured evidence. The hospital’s final decision: I was suspended, pending a full investigation. My ID and access card were confiscated on the spot. As I walked out of the office, I instinctively reached for my phone to call Mark. The screen lit up with a new message before I could dial. It was a video from him. Someone had edited together clips of the surgery. Every glance Evan and I shared, every time our hands brushed while passing an instrument, was now in slow motion. It was set to the most saccharine, suggestive music imaginable, with lines of lewd text scrolling across the screen. A life-or-death race against the clock had been twisted into a cheap, dirty movie. Before I could even process it, a second message came through. “Anna, what do you have to say for yourself?” “We’ve been together for ten years. I gave up a fellowship abroad for you. Is this how you repay me?” The cold accusation felt like a knife in my chest. My hands trembled as I tried to type a reply. “I’m being framed, Mark. You have to believe me…” But before I could hit send, a bright red exclamation point appeared next to his name. One final message flashed on the screen. “We’re done.” Then, he blocked me. A bitter laugh escaped my lips. Ten years of my life, and I wasn’t even worth a single conversation. As I stood on the sidewalk, lost and hollowed out, a red Porsche pulled up to the curb. Isabelle rolled down the window, a triumphant smirk on her face. “Did you like my little film, Anna? Your boyfriend was even easier to convince than I expected.” “You know, all it took was one video from a burner account and a few suggestive messages, and he completely folded,” she purred. “He said you’ve been so cold to him lately. He knew you must have found someone else.” “The star of your own dirty movie, Anna Reed. See how beautiful I made you look? Every pore just screaming with desire.”

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For three years, Arthur Finch has never publicly acknowledged our marriage. He was in the middle of a panel interview when the moderator asked. “Professor Finch, a question from our online audience. Are you drawn to the steady, quiet type, or someone with a little more… fire?” Arthur, a man who has made a career of precision and discipline, answered with a straight face. “Neither. I’m drawn to a person.” The moderator blinked, then recovered with a practiced smile. “Of course. And what kind of person might that be? Is she here with us today?” He turned his head, his gaze sweeping over the audience until it found me. His voice was flat, devoid of emotion. “No.” I clutched the lab report in my pocket, the paper crinkling under the pressure. A familiar, hollow smile touched my lips. In the periphery, I saw his expression flicker with something like surprise as I slowly stood up and walked out, leaving the auditorium behind. 1 “Is it Lily Monroe?” Someone from the audience shouted the question, their voice sharp in the sudden quiet. My steps faltered at the door. Lily Monroe. Arthur’s brilliant protégée, his current research partner. Their names were always linked, on publications, at academic conferences. The rumors were relentless. The air in the auditorium seemed to solidify. My nails dug into my palms. I held my breath, waiting for Arthur’s denial. A drowning woman grasping for a phantom hand. After a few seconds of silence, he simply offered a mild, academic smile. “I’d appreciate it if we could keep the focus on our field of study. Let’s stick to professional questions, please.” He didn’t deny it. He never did. The hope I’d been holding, a fragile bubble in my chest, finally burst. The fall left an aching void. 2 Distracted, I wasn’t watching where I was going and bumped right into someone in the lobby. “I’m so sorry,” I mumbled automatically. “It’s alright, Mrs. Finch.” I looked up at the sound of the voice and met a pair of bright, clear eyes in a face that radiated an almost ethereal innocence. She smiled, her eyes curving into gentle crescents. “The panel isn’t over yet. Aren’t you going to wait for Professor Finch?” It was Lily Monroe. I’d seen her a few times when I’d visited Arthur’s lab. She was one of the very few people who knew about our marriage. Before I could answer, my eyes caught on the tailored wool coat draped over her arm. It was identical to the one I’d picked out for Arthur. But he was obsessively clean, a man who recoiled from anyone touching his personal things, especially his clothes. It must be a coincidence, I told myself. But then, following my gaze, Lily let out a soft, musical laugh. “Oh, this? Professor Finch lent it to me during that rainstorm last week,” she said. “I just had it dry-cleaned and was bringing it back to him. We’re heading to the lab together after this.” She then lifted the thermos in her other hand. “He’s been a little under the weather, so I brewed him some herbal tea.” I said nothing. She watched me, her head tilted. “You don’t mind, do you, Mrs. Finch?” Beneath the flawless, harmless facade, the challenge was unmistakable. My gaze flickered to the cheerful pink flowers painted on the thermos, a stark contrast to everything I knew about my husband’s minimalist tastes. I managed a faint smile. “Thank you for taking care of him. I have to go, I have another engagement.” I turned, but her voice followed me, sharper this time. “Don’t you see it? Arthur doesn’t love you at all. He won’t even tell the world you exist. What’s the point of clinging to a marriage like this?” I stopped. I turned back and looked at her, my expression calm. I opened my mouth to say something, but the words wouldn’t come. Instead, I walked out into the crisp afternoon air. Under the weak sun, I unfolded the crumpled lab report and stared at the clinical, damning words, lost in thought. 3 Later, sitting in a sterile examination room, my phone rang. It was Arthur. His voice was clipped, laced with an unfamiliar thread of anger. “Where are you?” I gripped the phone, my knuckles white, and stared out the window at the inky black sky. The interview would have been over for hours. The man who treated his laboratory like his true home should have been on his way there by now. “I’m at home,” I lied. The silence on the other end stretched, punctuated only by the faint sound of his breathing, slightly heavier than usual. “Arthur?” I prompted, my voice tentative. “Are you still there?” “…So am I.” His voice was a low growl, charged with an emotion I couldn’t decipher. My stomach dropped. Caught in a lie. The embarrassment was a hot flush on my cheeks. I collected myself, forcing a casual tone. “Just kidding. I’m working late at the office.” He was quiet for a moment, then let out a short, cold laugh. “Working late? You have a talent for composure, I’ll give you that.” I curved my lips into a smile he couldn’t see. “I’ll take that as a compliment.” Another long pause. This was his way. I braced myself and pushed forward. “Well, if there’s nothing else, I should get back to…” “Why did you leave early?” The question was hard, edged with something that sounded almost like hurt. My fingers tensed around the phone. It was true. In the past, no matter what he said or did in public, I would always stay until the very end. I would find him in a quiet corner, slip my arm through his, and plead, “Can you come home tonight?” And every single time, without fail, he would coldly refuse. The memory faded. I laughed softly into the phone. “Isn’t this better? I’m not bothering you anymore.” A beat of silence, then a scornful chuckle. “…Then you’d better keep it that way.” 4 The screen went dark, and for a moment, I felt completely adrift. The man across from me said something, but the words didn’t register. Not until he waved a hand in front of my face. “Ava?” I blinked, pulling myself back to the present. “Sorry, Liam. What did you say?” He sighed, a look of deep concern in his eyes. He repeated his question. “Are you really not going to tell him about the diagnosis? He’s your husband, Ava. He has a right to know.” I forced a light, airy laugh. “It’s just a tumor. It’s not like it’s a death sentence.” The words hung in the air between us, heavy and false. We both fell silent. As my oldest friend, Liam knew my family history. He knew about my grandmother, and my mother. He knew this disease was a dark inheritance passed down the women in my family. And he knew the mortality rate was not insignificant. 5 Liam drove me home. As I got out of the car, my leg gave out, a sudden numbness spreading through it, and I nearly crumpled to the pavement. He shot out, grabbing my arm to steady me. “You okay?” I gave him a grateful look and a small shake of my head. As he was about to leave, he hesitated. “Surgery always has risks, Ava. You should really talk to Arthur…” I cut him off with a bitter smile. “He hates me enough already, Liam. I don’t want him thinking I’m trying to win his sympathy.” He sighed, but didn’t push it. The taillights of his car disappeared into the night. I turned toward my front door and froze. Arthur was standing there, under the dim porch light. He must have been there for a while. Half of his face was lost in shadow, but the chill emanating from him was palpable. I composed myself. “What are you doing here?” I asked quietly. His eyes, cold and hard, fixed on me. He sneered. “The office? Working late? Or were you with him?” It took me a second to process. I looked at him, really looked at him—at the way his hair was slightly disheveled, his tie loosened. “You… you went to my office to look for me?” The words came out in a breath of disbelief. In all our years together, he had never shown the slightest interest in my work, in my life outside of him. He didn’t answer, but his intense, dark stare was confirmation enough. My fists clenched. “I was actually at…” “Enough.” The word was a blade. “I don’t want to hear it.” He brushed past me into the house, his face a mask of fury. He went straight to the bedroom, pulled a duffel bag from the closet, and began throwing clothes into it. As he walked back through the living room, he didn’t even glance in my direction. “Arthur.” I called his name. He didn’t stop, didn’t even slow down, as if he hadn’t heard me. A knot of panic tightened in my chest. I pushed myself off the sofa, ran to him, and grabbed his hand. His skin was warm. His whole body went rigid at my touch. He turned his head slowly, his eyes deep, dark pools. For a second, I thought he was waiting for me to say something more. But then a flicker of impatience crossed his face. I let go of his hand, my own suddenly feeling clammy. “Can we… can we talk?” I asked softly. He stared down at me, his gaze glacial. “Talk about what? About how you cheat and lie? Or how you walk out on me whenever you feel like it?” I wanted to defend myself, to explain, but the words died in my throat. I lowered my eyes and they landed on his forearm. The sleeve of his shirt was rolled up, revealing a pale, jagged scar against his skin. 6 As his expression darkened, I felt my own hand moving, as if of its own accord. I reached out and gently touched the scar. The reaction was instantaneous. His body tensed like he’d been hit with an electric shock. He grabbed my wrist, his grip like iron. His black eyes were churning with a storm of emotions. “What are you doing?” His fingers tightened, but I barely felt the pain. I was lost, staring at that mark on his skin. The memories flooded back. Five years ago. The screech of tires, the crunch of metal. Arthur throwing his body over mine an instant before the impact. He’d almost died to save me. He survived, but his dominant hand was shattered, the nerves shredded. I remembered standing in his hospital room, my face a cold mask, telling him it was over. He’d pulled at his pale lips in a weak attempt at a smile, his uninjured hand reaching for mine. “Don’t do this, Ava. Don’t joke like that.” I pulled my hand away. I pointed at the thick bandages covering his arm. “Arthur, I don’t want a boyfriend with a crippled hand. I don’t want people staring at us, pitying us. Please,” I begged, “just let me go.” For a man as proud as Arthur, my words were a deliberate, cruel demolition of his dignity. I will never forget the look in his eyes. It was like watching a fire die, leaving behind nothing but gray ash and a burning, profound hatred. In the present, his grip on my wrist tightened until his knuckles were white, veins standing out in stark relief. Then, just as slowly, his fingers uncurled, one by one. He looked away, his voice so raw it was barely a whisper. “Fine.” Pulled from the memory, my eyes stung with unshed tears. “Does it still hurt?” I murmured. Arthur looked startled, then his brow furrowed in a deep scowl. “Is this performance amusing to you?” he bit out. “You got what you wanted. Do your part. Anything else is a privilege you haven’t earned.” He turned and strode toward the front door. I took a deep breath, the air burning my lungs. “If it weren’t for me,” I said to his back, “you would be with Lily Monroe, wouldn’t you?” He stopped dead in his tracks. He whipped around, his eyes shot with red, and roared, his voice raw with a fury I’d never seen. “Ava, what the hell is wrong with you?” My heart seized. The man who prided himself on his composure, on his intellect, was cursing at me. I clenched the fabric of my sleeve, lowered my gaze, and whispered to the floor. “Yes. I am.” He must not have heard me. He just stood there, staring, his chest heaving. The sound of the door slamming shut rattled the walls and echoed in my ears long after he was gone. 7 I sat on the living room sofa, hugging my knees to my chest, and surveyed the room. Every surface, every shadow, seemed to radiate a cold emptiness. My gaze landed on our wedding photo on the mantelpiece—a picture of two strangers, their smiles polite and distant. My vision blurred, and the past rushed in again. After I broke up with him, I thought I’d never see Arthur again. But then his father, the chairman of Finch Enterprises, offered me an internship. My mother was sick, my own father had remarried and moved on, and it was Chairman Finch who had paid for my college education. He took me under his wing, mentored me personally, taught me everything. The day I closed my first major deal on my own, I ran to his office, the signed contract in my hand, eager to share the news. But I found something else on his desk by accident. A medical report. The words “Stage Four Stomach Cancer” burned themselves into my memory. Later that day, he called me into his office. “The company, and Arthur,” he’d said, his voice heavy. “I worry about them both. Arthur is consumed by his research. He has no interest in marriage, and even less in the business.” He paused, his eyes pleading. “Ava, I’ve watched you grow up. Could you possibly…” I knew Chairman Finch like a father. I understood what he couldn’t bring himself to ask. And so, two years after I had destroyed him, I went to find Arthur. I asked him if he would marry me. He took a long, slow drag from his cigarette, then crushed it out in an ashtray. Through the haze of smoke, he stared at me, his eyes filled with cold, mocking amusement. “Why?” “I want to take over Finch Enterprises,” I said. “Your father told me that whoever marries his son gets control of the company. And as far as I know, you’re his only son.” He told me to show him how much I wanted it. To prove my sincerity. But as I stood on my toes, my lips just inches from his, he recoiled as if burned. He laughed, a sound full of contempt. “Marry you? In your dreams.” I was figuring out how to break the news to his dying father when Arthur reappeared. “Go home. Get your passport. We’re going to the courthouse.” He didn’t say another word. … A full week passed, and Arthur never came home. I was drowning in work, consumed by a competitive bid for a massive new project. This deal could elevate Finch Enterprises to a new level. We’d worked ourselves to the bone for a month, running endless models and analyses. And at the bidding conference, we lost. By a margin so slim it was statistically impossible. It was a figure our competitor, based on all my research, should never have submitted. My assistant was running through the post-mortem analysis as we walked out. I stopped her. “Hold the report,” I said. “Just tell me. What’s your personal take on what just happened?” As she hesitated, my gaze drifted past her, across the lobby. And my body went rigid. 8 I never expected to see Arthur here. He despised the corporate world. Then I saw Lily Monroe standing beside him. And standing in front of them, smiling, was the very man whose company had just beaten ours by an impossibly narrow margin. Lily was calling the man “cousin.” And I heard her, clear as day, introduce Arthur as her boyfriend. Just then, she spotted me. Her smile widened. She looped her arm through Arthur’s, stood on her toes, and leaned in to kiss him. Arthur turned his head away, a frown creasing his brow, and he started to say something. But then his eyes met mine. His pupils contracted. A flash of pure panic crossed his face before he could hide it. I looked away. “Get the car,” I told my assistant, my voice clipped. “We’ll debrief back at the office.” But at the elevators, Lily caught up to me, alone. Her voice was laced with derision. “I heard Mrs. Finch lost out to my cousin—and everyone knows he’s all charm and no brains.” “What do you want, Lily?” I asked coldly. “Aren’t you curious? How did our bid come in just under yours? Such a coincidence.” She leaned in closer, her voice a conspiratorial whisper only I could hear. “You have Arthur to thank for that. He despises you, you know. So much that he’d rather give away his own family’s project than see you succeed.” A tremor went through me. I turned slowly to face her. “What… did you say?” Seeing my reaction, she tilted her chin up, her eyes gleaming with triumph. The victor, surveying the vanquished. “I said, you’ve lost, Ava. The project, and the man. You’ve lost him to me, completely and utterly.” Before I could think, my hand was moving. The sharp crack of the slap, followed by a second one, echoed in the vast, empty space. “You…” she stammered, her hand flying to her cheek. She stared at me, her face contorted in disbelief and rage, momentarily speechless. My voice was low and steady. “You do not get to slander Arthur.” “What are you doing?” A familiar, sharp voice cut through the air from behind me. I froze. Arthur strode past me, his eyes fixed on Lily. He took in her reddened, swelling cheek, and his face hardened into a cold fury. He moved her behind him, shielding her, and then his gaze, sharp as a shard of glass, landed on me. He repeated the question, his voice dangerously low. “Ava, what are you doing?” I pushed down the acid wave of bitterness in my throat and calmly rubbed my stinging palm. “You didn’t see? Should I demonstrate again?” I raised my hand, but this time, he caught my wrist in a vice-like grip. “Enough,” he snarled. 9 Seeing her protector had arrived, Lily immediately reverted to her innocent, helpless persona. Tears welled in her eyes, spilling down her cheeks in perfect, glistening trails. “I just saw that you lost the bid… I was only coming over to offer Professor Finch’s condolences,” she sobbed. “I didn’t think you’d take your anger out on me just because my cousin won…” She punctuated the lie with a pathetic, heart-wrenching sniffle. I didn’t bother to argue. I just looked at Arthur. “Do you believe her?” He once promised me that no matter what happened, he would always be on my side. Because I trust you, he had said. A fog seemed to roll over his eyes, obscuring whatever was there. I couldn’t read him. After a long, suffocating silence, he stared at me, his words slow and deliberate. “Ava, are you really that sore of a loser?”

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I had a best friend who married into a world of unimaginable wealth—a girl from my small town who played the part of an heiress. She was the one who stole the project proposal from my desk, then told her husband I was just a new hire, eager to learn. She was the one who wired ten million dollars from his account, claiming it was to buy me a starter home, a place to finally be secure. She was the one who sold the luxury car he’d given her as a wedding gift, saying it was just to get me a reliable ride. And when she was caught transferring company assets while sleeping with her husband’s assistant, she told him I was the mastermind who had manipulated her. In the end, her husband, Ethan, had me sent to prison. And in prison, her lover made sure I was silenced for good. But then I opened my eyes. And I was back on the day it all began to unravel, the day of her husband’s first real accusation. 1 Every time Stella needed to meet her lover, she used me as her alibi. A girls’ day out. Shopping. A long lunch. So when her husband, Ethan Blackwood, sent me yet another text demanding to know when I was letting his wife come home, I didn’t feel surprised. Just tired. My thumb hovered over the screen, a ghost of a memory—of blind loyalty, of the countless lies I’d told for her—flashing through me. This time, I didn’t hesitate. I swiped and deleted the entire thread. I had just smoothed a cool sheet mask over my face when my phone blared to life. My hand, still slick with serum from the packet, fumbled and accidentally hit the answer button. His voice, tight with fury, crackled through the speaker. “Anna. When are you planning on allowing my wife to return to her family?” “Her son has been crying for three hours straight. Have you forgotten she’s a mother? How selfish can you possibly be? I let it slide before, but she has a child now, for God’s sake.” “Let’s get something straight. I’m her husband. The card you’re swiping belongs to me. The car you’re riding in is mine. So what the hell is this new habit of having her block my number every time you two go out?” “I’ve been patient with you, Anna. But I’m done. Don’t you think you’re a little… superfluous in this picture?” Each question landed heavier than the last, his patience fraying into raw steel. But the anger simmering in my own gut was hotter. If it weren’t for his perfect, darling wife, I wouldn’t have ended up dead on a cold prison floor. Just because I was the only friend she’d brought with her from our dusty hometown, I became her living, breathing excuse. The cover for all her dirty secrets. Back then, I never knew what she was really doing. The truth is, once she got married, our connection started to fade. But the calls from Ethan never stopped. They’d come in, laced with confusion and anger, and I—like a fool—would cover for her. I remember one night, he called long after midnight, his voice a furious whisper. “What the hell are you two still doing out? It’s the middle of the night. How long does it take to get your hair done?” Dazed with sleep, I almost told him I had no idea what he was talking about. But then a text from Stella lit up my screen. 【Just say we were at the salon! The one next to the spa. Tell him we decided to get massages too. Sister-special package. I already sent him a pic of the sign. Thx babe! U owe me one ;)】 And just like that, in Ethan Blackwood’s eyes, I became the villain. The toxic best friend single-handedly destroying his marriage. The next day, he sent me a warning text, and after that, I started pulling away from Stella. But it wasn’t enough. In the end, she still threw me to the wolves to save herself. And Ethan, already primed to hate me, probably felt a sense of righteous victory as he watched me get locked away. Not this time. I would not be her stepping stone again. His voice snapped me back to the present. “Is Stella with you or not? Put her on the phone. Her son needs his mother.” A cold, sharp smile touched my lips. I held the phone up, turning my head as if looking around my small apartment. “Stella? Honey? It’s Ethan for you.” Silence, of course. “Oh, shoot,” I said, my voice dripping with fake sympathy. “Sorry, Mr. Blackwood. She’s getting a blowout. The dryers are so loud, you know how it is. We’re at that new place on the corner? The one we went to last time?” “She’ll call you when she’s done, I’m sure!” The moment I finished the sentence, my face went slack, the smile vanishing. I jabbed the end-call button with my thumb. Five minutes later, just as I was peeling the sticky mask from my skin, a violent pounding rattled my front door. I pulled it open, and the force from the other side almost sent me sprawling. It was Ethan. And he’d brought a team of grim-faced men in dark suits. Bodyguards. Before I could speak, two of them had me by the arms. I could only watch, helpless, as Ethan stormed into my apartment, his face a mask of rage. He tore through the tiny space, ripping open my closet, checking behind the shower curtain, kicking aside a pile of laundry. Every corner of my life, violated. When he found nothing, he stalked back to me, his jaw tight. “Where is she, Anna? The lights were on. I’ve been watching the building for the last hour. You never left. So enough with the shopping excuse.” Seeing the raw, unhinged fury on his face, a bitter, satisfying pleasure bloomed in my chest. Let him burn. Let him feel a fraction of the helplessness I felt. Stella was off with her lover, and I was, as always, the designated scapegoat. In his mind, thanks to years of Stella’s subtle poisoning, I was already guilty. My words meant nothing. He saw the silence on my face and shot a look at his men. Their grip tightened. He stepped forward, his hand clamping around my jaw, forcing my head up. His eyes were chips of ice, sharp and cold. “I’m going to give you one last chance,” he gritted out. “Where. Is. My. Wife?” 2 A laugh, sharp and mocking, escaped my throat. “She’s a grown woman, Ethan. A mother, as you so helpfully pointed out. Her own mom couldn’t control her. What makes you think I can?” His hand fell away from my jaw, but only for a second. It swung back, fast and hard, and the crack of it hitting my cheek echoed in the small room. My head snapped to the side, my eyes stinging, a coppery taste filling my mouth. The more desperate he became, the more pathetic he seemed. He bent down and snatched my phone from where I’d dropped it. He pried my fingers open, using my own thumb to unlock the screen. Then he started tapping it against my bruised cheek, a threatening rhythm. “You think staying silent is going to work for you?” he sneered. “I got you the job at my subsidiary. I can make sure you’re out on the street by tomorrow.” His gaze was murderous. He found my boss’s contact in my phone and hit the call button. But before it could connect, an idea seemed to strike him. He hung up and hit the video call icon instead. The screen flickered to life, showing my boss, Mark, still at his desk, buried in paperwork. He frowned at the unfamiliar face on his screen, then his eyes widened in recognition. “M-Mr. Blackwood?” he stammered. “That’s right,” Ethan said coldly. “You know this woman?” He flipped the camera around to my face. Mark nodded frantically. “Yes, yes, Anna. Is… is everything alright?” “Does your company have a policy on plagiarism? On employees who steal their work? Or did you just not bother to ask how she was completing her assignments?” As he spoke, he shot me a look, mouthing the words: Last. Chance. I kept my lips sealed. My defiance lit the final fuse on his temper. “Every single proposal Anna has submitted was stolen directly from one of my company’s internal servers!” he roared into the phone. “You will fire her, tonight. If you don’t, my legal team will be in touch with yours by morning.” He paused. “In fact, I brought a lawyer with me. I see you’re still in the office.” He crossed his arms, leaning against my wall. The message was clear: Your move. Any thought Mark might have had of defending me evaporated. You don’t cross the Blackwood empire. A bitter laugh escaped me. “You can’t do this, Ethan. You have no proof. I could sue you for slander.” He let out a short, ugly laugh. “This is bothering you? Oh, we’re just getting started. I’ll ask you one more time. Tell me where Stella is.” He leaned in closer, his voice dropping to a venomous whisper. “You took ten million dollars. You sold my car. And now you’ve taken my wife. I have given you far too much grace, Anna.” The bodyguards tightened their hold, making it hard to breathe. After getting Mark’s stammered confirmation that I was fired, Ethan smiled grimly and went back to scrolling through my contacts. A knot of dread tightened in my stomach. “This is breaking and entering,” I choked out. “You can’t just barge in here. I’ll call the police.” He didn’t even look up from my phone. “The police?” he said, as if it were the funniest thing he’d ever heard. “Please, be my guest. Should I dial 911 for you? Let’s see… who do you think they’ll arrest? The woman who orchestrated the disappearance of my wife and the mother of my child? Or me?” He finally looked up, his eyes glittering. “The last text I have from Stella says she was spending the night with you.” His eyes lit up. “Ah. Found it.” I watched in horror as he dialed the number for my landlord. A plan, desperate and risky, began to form in my mind. 3 With me standing right there, Ethan told my landlord I was breaking my lease and would be out by morning. When I tried to shout, to explain, one of the bodyguards clamped a hand over my mouth, muffling my protests. Hot, frustrated tears streamed down my face. He was a fool. An absolute fool. If Stella had really given me the money for a house, why would I still be living in this rundown one-bedroom apartment? He ended the call, his eyes burning with a rage that hadn’t cooled in the slightest. “Still not talking?” The hand was removed from my mouth. I took a ragged breath. “Why don’t you ask your assistant?” I said, my voice cold and steady. “Maybe he knows where she is.” For the first time, a flicker of uncertainty crossed Ethan’s face. He hesitated, then pulled out his own phone and dialed his assistant, Leo. The moment the call connected, I heard a faint shuffling sound on the other end before it stopped abruptly. “Mr. Blackwood? Is everything alright?” Leo’s voice was smooth. “Find Stella’s location for me. Now. It’s an emergency.” There was a calculated pause. “Sir, the last few times I drove Mrs. Blackwood to meet her friend, she would jump out of the car and the other woman—Anna—would just pull her away. She never gave me a chance to even say anything.” Leo’s voice took on a note of feigned helplessness. “I tried to follow once, but Anna yelled at me, told me to mind my own business. I didn’t want to overstep. I honestly have no idea where they’d go.” I almost had to laugh. He was good. Just as good at shifting blame as Stella was. Ethan hung up, his face a thundercloud. Before he could speak again, his phone rang. It was the nanny. The baby wouldn’t stop crying. He was inconsolable. That was the last straw. Ethan’s face hardened into a mask of cold resolve. He gestured to his men. “Get her in the car.” They dragged me out of my apartment and shoved me into the back of a black SUV. “If you won’t talk,” he said, sliding in beside me, “we’ll do this the hard way. We’re going to check every single salon on this street.” We pulled up to a strip of upscale boutiques and spas. He yanked me out of the car by my collar, forcing me onto the sidewalk. His bodyguards formed a tight circle around us, a clear show of force that immediately drew the attention of passersby. Within minutes, a crowd had gathered, phones held up, whispering. Ethan, playing to the audience, announced that his wife had been led astray by her malicious best friend. It was all the crowd needed to hear. “You can’t trust anyone these days,” a woman muttered loudly. “My cousin’s husband ran off with her best friend. Left her with three kids and a mountain of debt.” “And look at the news! All those girls who get trafficked overseas, who’s the one who tricks them? It’s always a friend!” “She doesn’t even look like she has any money. You’d think if she was that evil, she’d at least dress better.” “That’s how they get you! They look all innocent and poor so you trust them! It’s always the ones you least expect.” The murmurs grew into a chorus of condemnation. Ethan’s face was dark with grim satisfaction. He ordered his men to drag me into the first salon. The chicly dressed owner took one look at me and shook her head. She’d never seen me before in her life. Of course she hadn’t. But this was the very salon Stella had sent Ethan a picture of countless times. His control finally snapped. He grabbed a fistful of my hair, yanking my head back. “You’ve been playing me from the very beginning, Anna!” His men hauled me back out onto the street. “Call the police,” Ethan commanded. “And call the press. We’re going to search every business on this block. If I have to tear this city apart to find her, I will.” A dark glint entered my eye. “The police?” I whispered, just loud enough for him to hear. “Why not call a few reporters while you’re at it? Make a real spectacle. Nail me to the cross for the whole world to see.” He narrowed his eyes, then gave a curt nod to one of his men. “You heard her. Give her what she wants.” A triumphant smile played on my lips. Yes, I thought. Make it big. Make it loud. Make it so public that Stella can never, ever crawl out from under the rubble. 4 The bodyguards dragged me from one boutique to the next, a humiliating parade of rejection. The answer was always the same. No one knew me. This world of five-hundred-dollar haircuts and diamond-dust facials was not my world. I couldn’t have been more out of place. When we circled back, Ethan was on a video call with his son. Hearing the report from his men, he nearly crushed the phone in his hand. Through gritted teeth, he told his crying child goodbye, then ended the call and hurled the phone directly at my head. The expensive device was fine. My forehead, however, immediately began to swell. The crowd had grown, their sympathy for the heartbroken father palpable. They had heard the child’s desperate cries for “Mama,” and their glares turned to daggers aimed straight at me. “What kind of monster does that? Tearing a mother away from her child. It’s just cruel.” “Look at the expression on her face! No remorse at all. You’d think he was the one who wronged her.” Just then, sirens wailed in the distance. The police arrived, followed closely by a pack of reporters, cameras already flashing. And behind them… behind them were two people I never expected to see. My parents. Ethan had brought them here. He had flown my parents in from our small town, feeding them the story of how I’d corrupted and kidnapped his wife. Their faces were etched with panic and exhaustion. As they pushed through the crowd, Ethan gestured for the bodyguards to release me. The memory of my mother’s face in the prison visiting room—a mask of shattered disappointment—flashed before my eyes. Tears welled up, and I reached for her. My arm was met with a stinging slap. I clutched my hand to my chest, staring at her in disbelief. Her eyes were red-rimmed, her voice shaking with a mix of fury and shame. “We thought you were here working hard, making a life for yourself. What is this, Anna? What have you done?” She was so overwrought she swayed on her feet. I reached for her again, but she recoiled as if burned. “Mom—!” My father caught her, steadying her, then turned his wrath on me. “Don’t you call her that! We don’t have a daughter. Not one who does… this! We could have been sold in our sleep by you and never known it!” After everything that happened in my last life, my only plan had been to clear my name and go home to them. And now here they were, brought here by my executioner to serve as the final, public nail in my coffin. I looked past them, searching for Ethan. He was standing off to the side, speaking in low tones to a police officer. Before I could call out to him, a sharp, searing pain exploded in my ear. My mother had grabbed it, twisting hard. Tears of pain and betrayal streamed down her face. “You tell Mr. Blackwood where you took Stella! You tell him right now! If you don’t, you can forget you ever had parents. We are done with you!” The crowd’s murmurs turned to outright shouts of disgust. I tried to cover my ear, which felt like it was splitting open. A warm trickle of blood ran down my neck. But before I could, my father reappeared, holding a thick wooden stick he must have broken off a nearby display. He swung it hard against the back of my knees. A scream tore from my throat as my legs buckled, sending me crashing to the pavement. The sudden movement made my mother lose her grip, but not before tearing my earlobe. Blood now flowed freely, staining the shoulder of my shirt. Ethan walked over slowly, standing over me. He calmly informed my parents about the ten million dollars and the sold car. The color drained from their faces. They looked at me as if I were a monster. “Our fault…” my father choked out, his voice cracking. “This is our failure as parents…” Just then, a police officer approached Ethan and whispered something in his ear. Ethan’s expression hardened, his eyes turning to flint. He looked down at me, then at his men. “Take her. We’re going to the property listed in her name.” I knew where we were going. It was the place Stella had set up as the final piece of evidence to frame me. It was her and her lover’s secret paradise. It’s almost over, I thought, a strange sense of calm washing over me. It’s finally ending.

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The day my life ended began at my son’s preschool. I was there to pick up Leo, my three-year-old, when a madman started slashing his way through the afternoon pickup line. A knife flashed in the bright California sun. To protect my son, I became a shield. I took a dozen cuts for him before collapsing into a spreading pool of my own blood. My husband, Landon, was a man who could move mountains. He had the attacker in custody and a team of the best surgeons in the state assembled before the ambulance even reached the hospital. As they wheeled me into the OR, I grabbed his sleeve, my voice a ragged whisper. “Leo? Is Leo okay?” His eyes, rimmed with a terrible red, met mine. “He lost too much blood, Stella. He was gone before they got here.” The world dissolved into blackness. I fainted before I could tell them, before I could remember to say the words that were always my responsibility: I’m immune to most anesthetics. I drifted back into a hazy, muted consciousness to the sound of Landon’s voice, low and cold, talking to one of the surgeons. “Mr. Hayes, the boy could have been saved. We had a window. Why did you tell us to stand down? That was your son. He was only three.” “I never intended for him to live,” Landon said, his voice devoid of any emotion I recognized. “His birth was a mistake. Then he had the audacity to ask me for a birthday present. What’s next? A claim on the company?” He continued, his tone chillingly reasonable. “My son with Vanessa is about to turn eighteen. I promised her the company as his gift. I won’t have anyone competing for it.” My marriage wasn’t a love story. It was a lie. It was my own private hell. Fine, I thought through a fog of pain and betrayal. You can have it all. 1 The surgeon, his voice laced with pity, glanced at the shredded ruin of my abdomen. “I’ve examined her. Given the severity of the trauma, it’s a miracle her uterus is intact. She might have a chance to be a mother again someday.” “Who gave you permission to save it?” Landon’s voice was sharp, a whip crack in the sterile room. “Remove it. I want it gone. I want to make sure she can never have another child.” The doctor’s shock was audible. “Mr. Hayes, you’re handing the company over in three days. Another child years from now wouldn’t be a threat. The woman just lost her son. You want me to take her womb, too? Why be so cruel?” I felt the phantom caress of Landon’s hand on my cheek, though he stood across the room. His next words were the most brutal of all. “Letting her have that bastard was the biggest mistake of my life. I swore to Vanessa that no one would ever threaten our son’s inheritance. Even after she married someone else, it was my duty to protect them, to eliminate any loose ends.” A knock at the operating room door. A man’s slick, careless voice sliced through the quiet. “Mr. Hayes, thanks for faking that psych evaluation for me. Got me off scot-free. I took care of the little brat for you, so about the payment you promised…” “Five million will be wired to your account. Take the money and get out of New York. Don’t ever let me see you near Stella again.” “Alright, get on with the surgery. I’ve got to pick up the gift I ordered for Harrison. Oh, and give her a heavy dose of anesthesia. I don’t want Stella to be in any pain.” The footsteps faded. I clamped my eyes shut so hard I felt a molar crack in my jaw, a dam against the tears that threatened to betray me. He wasn’t a madman. He was a hitman. A butcher hired by my husband to secure a future for the woman he truly loved. My little Leo. Only three years old. Murdered on his birthday by his own father’s design, for a crime he didn’t even know how to commit. My body doesn’t respond to the drugs. I was awake for every cold, metallic scrape inside of me, every pull and tear as they carved out the very core of my womanhood. The pain was a living thing. It finally consumed me, and I fell back into darkness. When I opened my eyes again, Landon was there, his own eyes swollen and red, his voice thick with a perfect imitation of heartbreak. “Stella, you’re awake. Does it hurt?” He clutched my hand. “I’ve been waiting right outside. You have no idea how scared I was. Losing Leo is the worst pain of my life… if I lost you, too, I wouldn’t want to live.” He stroked my hair, his performance flawless. “Stella, the doctor said… the damage was too severe. Your uterus… you won’t be able to have children again. But don’t worry. I’ll take care of you for the rest of our lives. We’ll be okay, just the two of us.” I looked down at my bandaged stomach. The wound was neatly stitched, a clean line on the surface. But underneath, there was only a hollow emptiness that echoed with a finality I could barely comprehend. I had lost the right to be a mother forever. “Leo?” I asked, my voice flat. Landon’s face crumpled with well-rehearsed guilt. “He’s at the funeral home. The cremation… the funeral is tomorrow. Stella, I’m so sorry. I failed him. I failed to protect our boy.” A fresh wave of agony washed over me, but I didn’t call him on his lies. My gaze fell to the bedside table. In a small, iconic blue box sat a platinum locket. “Landon,” I said, my voice thin. “Today is Leo’s birthday. We never got him a gift. Let this locket be buried with him. So he might have a long and peaceful life in the next world. Please?” A flicker of annoyance crossed his face before being replaced by that gentle, practiced sympathy. “Stella, darling, this is for a friend. He asked me to pick it up for his son. We can’t just take it.” He patted my hand. “Besides, this is for the living. It would just make Leo sad. And honestly, the material is nothing special. It’s not good enough for our son. I’ve already arranged for the finest burial offerings to be sent to the funeral home. He’ll have everything he needs.” I said nothing. The cold in my chest was absolute. After years as a stay-at-home mother, Landon had forgotten who I was before him. He’d forgotten that I was once one of the sharpest jewelry appraisers in the city. The locket was platinum, the craftsmanship exquisite, from a heritage brand whose custom pieces started in the six figures. Engraved on the back were the words, ‘Safe and Sound, Forever and Always.’ An inscription overflowing with a parent’s boundless love. For two months, I had seen him holed up in his study, sketching designs, obsessing over every detail. I thought it was for Leo. I was wrong. In his heart, it was my son and I who were never good enough. At my insistence, Landon arranged for my discharge. At home, he was the perfect, doting husband. He waved away the housekeeper, insisting on bathing me himself, carefully washing my hair, his touch gentle as he avoided the wound on my belly. He dried my hair with the tenderness of a lover. I used to find such comfort in his gentleness. Now, staring at the ugly, stitched line on my skin, the memory of Leo’s stolen life was a wall of ice between us. His touch was a violation. Late that night, while he slept, I slipped into his study. I opened his laptop and logged into his cloud drive. The password was Vanessa’s birthday. Inside were tens of thousands of photos and videos. A meticulously curated archive of another life. Vanessa’s pregnancy, the birth of their son, every milestone, every birthday, every family vacation. There was also a signed stock transfer agreement, ready to be executed. For fifteen years, Landon had spent months “on business trips,” “expanding the market.” In reality, he was playing house with his real family. And I, the stupid, trusting wife, had never once suspected. His messenger app was still open on the desktop. The top chat, pinned and precious, was a group called “Our Little Family.” It was a dagger in my eye. For eighteen years, he had showered Vanessa and their son with gifts I couldn’t even fathom. “Landon, Harrison just turned one, what’s he going to do with a Maserati? You spoil him! P.S. I adore the sapphire necklace. Mwah!” “Landon, my love, Harrison is three today! The private island you bought him is breathtaking. Your flight gets in this afternoon, right? He can’t wait to see his daddy.” This was a level of devotion Leo and I had never known. I gave up a brilliant career to marry Landon at twenty, to be the woman behind the man. I supported him through every crisis, helped him build his empire from the ground up. The stress took a toll on my body, and for years, I couldn’t conceive. He was always so calm about it, so reassuring. I thought it was because he didn’t want to pressure me. I was grateful for his patience. In our fifteenth year of marriage, I finally got pregnant. Landon’s reaction wasn’t the joy I had expected, just a polite, symbolic smile. Now, seeing the photos of him kissing Vanessa’s swollen belly, his face alight with pure ecstasy, I understood. He already had a child. To him, my Leo was an inconvenience. An appendix that needed to be cut out before it burst and ruined everything. No wonder Landon was always “out of the country for work” on Leo’s birthday. Harrison’s birthday was three days later. He needed time to prepare, to make sure his real family never felt anything less than cherished. My heart felt like a dead thing in my chest. I closed the laptop and called my best friend in Paris. “Chloe? I’m ready to take that job. I’ll be your head appraiser. I’ll see you in three days.” Then, I asked her for a few other, more complicated favors. After the call, I went to Leo’s room. It was exactly as he’d left it. His pillow still smelled of that sweet, milky scent unique to a small child. But my baby would never sleep here again. Under his pillow, I found a small glass jar, a “wish bottle.” Inside was a note, written in his teacher’s careful script, transcribing his words. “My teacher says big boys have to be brave, so this year I finally got the courage to ask Daddy for a birthday present. But I didn’t even finish talking before he got mad and walked away.” “I just wanted to ask if Daddy could spend one hour with me on my birthday. Thirty minutes would be okay, too. That would make me so, so happy.” The tears I’d been holding back finally broke free, hot and silent. This, Landon? This was the monumental ambition you were so terrified of? I printed the divorce papers, then spent the rest of the night in Leo’s bed, clutching his blanket, inhaling his fading scent, and crying until I had nothing left. The next morning, Landon, a man obsessed with cleanliness, personally cleaned the weeping wound on my stomach and changed my dressing, his touch meticulous. The housekeeper watched with an envious sigh. I felt nothing but a vast, cold emptiness. He saw my swollen, red-rimmed eyes and his face filled with concern. “Stella, I know you miss him. I miss him more than you can imagine. But you have to take care of yourself. I’ve already lost my beloved son. I can’t lose you, too. Why don’t you stay home and rest today? I’ll handle the funeral.” Handle it? The way you handled his life? The thought was a bitter acid in my throat. “No,” I said, my voice a dead monotone. “I have to be there. I have to see him off.” When we arrived at the cemetery, I saw them immediately. Vanessa and a teenage boy were flanking Landon’s mother, laughing and chatting, making the old woman beam with delight. It was a funeral. Everyone else was in black. Vanessa was in a fire-engine red designer dress. The boy, her son, wore a matching blazer, just as loud, just as inappropriate. Yet my mother-in-law seemed not to notice, or not to care. She held their hands, her eyes filled with a love she had never once shown me. She had one of her staff hold an umbrella over them, shielding them from the sun, as if they were the true daughter-in-law and grandchild. When Vanessa saw me, a smug smile played on her lips. “Oh, Eleanor, I’m not hot,” she said, her voice carrying across the lawn. “Stella’s here. Why don’t you give the umbrella to her? After all, she’s not like me. She’s grieving. And injured. She needs the special treatment, you know.” At her words, my mother-in-law shot me a look of pure disgust. “What are you crying about? It was just one ungrateful brat. Who are you putting on this pathetic show for? Have you no sense of decency? No respect for the Hayes family name?” She gestured toward Vanessa and the boy. “Look at them. They have more sense than you. They flew in immediately because they were worried about me. And Harrison brought me this beautiful jade bracelet. You could learn a thing or two from them, you worthless creature.” She’d always hated me. Said I wasn’t good enough for her son. For fifteen years, she called me a barren hen who couldn’t lay an egg. When Leo was born, she despised him, too, calling him a traitor for being so attached to me. Landon used to defend me. Now, his eyes were locked on Vanessa, his expression so full of adoration it was as if he were gazing at a holy relic. Vanessa shot me a triumphant, silent smirk before turning back to his mother. “Eleanor, darling, you mustn’t get upset. It’s bad for your heart. If you’ll have him, Harrison would be honored to be your grandson from now on.” My mother-in-law was overjoyed, praising her for being so thoughtful. Vanessa then glided over to me, the boy in tow. “It’s been a while, Stella,” she purred. “So sorry about our clothes. We just got off a flight from Europe and rushed right over. You’re so understanding, I knew you wouldn’t mind. Right?” She gestured to the boy. “Oh, and this is my son, Harrison Hayes.” He had Landon’s jawline, Landon’s eyes. He gave me a contemptuous once-over. “Wow, you’re ugly,” he said with the casual cruelty of the terminally spoiled. Then he turned to Landon and held out his hand. “Dad, you said you had presents for us when we got back. My eighteenth birthday is in two days. Last year you only got me ninety-nine things. This year, I want a hundred.” Landon didn’t even flinch at the insult to my face. He just ruffled the boy’s hair with a look of helpless indulgence. “I know, I know.” He took out the platinum locket and fastened it around Harrison’s neck, his expression tender, paternal. As if that wasn’t enough, he snapped his fingers. From behind the chapel, a procession of a dozen brightly colored supercars roared to life and drove onto the lawn. “There. I know you like bright colors. They’re all yours.” Vanessa wrinkled her nose and looped her arm through Landon’s. “Landon, what about me? You can’t just spoil our son.” He tweaked her nose playfully. “Of course not.” He snapped his fingers again. From each car, two attendants emerged, carrying velvet trays laden with jewelry. Dozens of sets—necklaces, earrings, bracelets—in every style and stone imaginable. Their only commonality was their astronomical price. One set, I recognized, had once belonged to a Qing dynasty empress. Vanessa squealed and kissed his cheek, her girlish act perfected over years of practice. “Wow! Isn’t this all from the royal auction in Monaco last week? The cheapest piece was over a million dollars! You bought it all for me? Oh, Landon, you’re the best. But won’t Stella be upset that you spent so much?” They had turned my son’s funeral into a vulgar showcase of cars and jewels. And me? In my old, ill-fitting black suit, no makeup, my eyes swollen to slits, I was a pathetic caricature of a grieving mother. Next to the radiant, exquisitely dressed Vanessa, I was a joke. A frumpy, tragic yellow-faced wife. In three years of life, all the gifts Landon had ever given Leo didn’t add up to the price of one of Harrison’s new tires. It was laughable. It was all so hideously laughable. Landon finally seemed to remember I was there. He cleared his throat, a flush of embarrassment on his cheeks. “Stella, don’t get the wrong idea. Vanessa and Harrison, they’re just used to a different… etiquette… from living abroad.” “And you heard Mom. She’s accepted Harrison as her grandson, so it’s only natural he calls me Dad. It’s his birthday soon, I just wanted to… show my appreciation. And the locket was…” He never finished. Vanessa swayed, pressing a hand to her forehead. “Landon, I feel dizzy. I think it’s heatstroke.” He dropped my arm instantly and scooped her into his. “What? How? I built you that villa in the mountains specifically to avoid the heat. You should have stayed there instead of coming to this… dreary place. Come on, I’ll take you somewhere to rest.” And just like that, before Leo’s ashes were even interred, he carried her away. I stood there, enduring the whispers and stares, and picked up my son’s small, heavy urn myself. It’s okay, my love. Daddy doesn’t love you, but Mommy does. But before I could place the urn in the niche, Harrison slammed into me, knocking it from my hands. It shattered on the stone path. Leo’s ashes, my son, scattered across the ground like gray dust. “Watch where you’re going, lady!” he sneered, not a hint of remorse in his voice. “Are you blind? My dad bought me this suit. It’s custom. You think you can afford to replace it if you get that dead kid’s dust on it? Disgusting.” He smirked and pulled out a plastic water bottle filled with cigarette butts. “Here,” he said with a laugh. “Don’t say I never did anything for you. You can put your son’s ashes in this.” Forgetting him, I turned to my mother-in-law, my eyes pleading with her to help me, to get another urn, to protect what was left of Leo. She just scowled. “What are you looking at me for? If you weren’t so useless, the box wouldn’t have broken. The water bottle is fine. I’m not spending another dime on that little traitor. Now hurry up and bury it. I have a mahjong game to get to.” Harrison kicked me aside. He had one of the groundskeepers sweep Leo’s ashes into the filthy bottle and toss it into the burial niche before sealing it shut. My fists clenched so tight my nails drew blood. How could they? How could they do this to my son? I turned, blind with rage, to find Landon. I found him in the small chapel, in front of the memorial display for Leo. He and Vanessa were tangled together, their clothes in disarray. “Landon,” she was whispering, her voice husky. “Harrison is growing up. He gets lonely. I want to have another baby for you.” Landon hesitated. “Vanessa, all these years, you’ve had to hide Harrison away so your husband wouldn’t find out. I’ve already made you suffer so much, being separated like that. I can’t put you through it again. And besides… this is Leo’s memorial. We can’t…” Her hand slid down his chest, her voice dropping to a seductive purr. “For you, Landon, I would suffer anything. And he’s never home. He’ll never know.” She pressed against him. “I’ve never done it in a chapel before. Don’t you want to try? You look so tired. Let me take good care of you…” A vein pulsed in Landon’s temple. He surrendered, his mouth crushing down on hers. The scene became more and more obscene. My hands trembling, I raised my phone and recorded everything. Then I turned and fled, collapsing in front of Leo’s desecrated grave. A violent shudder wracked my body. Landon, your son’s photograph is hanging right above your head. How dare you? Everyone was gone. No one cared about me or my son. I lit the ceremonial money in a small brazier, the tears I thought I’d run out of streaming down my face again. My marriage wasn’t a tragedy. It was a farce. The brazier was suddenly kicked over. Sparks flew, searing my hand. Vanessa stood there, smiling like a predator. “Seeing Landon and me together in front of your son’s memorial, Stella? Was it exciting? You can burn all the paper money you want. Your short-lived little ghost isn’t coming back.” Her voice was venomous. “If you’d remained barren, I wouldn’t have bothered with you. But you dared to have a child with Landon. No one takes a single penny that belongs to my son.” “The Hayes fortune is ours. Landon’s heart is mine. He was willing to have your son killed just to give me peace of mind. To be such a failure as a woman… it’s pathetic. If I were you, I’d throw myself off a cliff.” That was it. The final straw. I rose, my hand raised to strike her, but before I could move, she threw herself backward, tumbling down the short flight of stone steps. Before I could process what had happened, a powerful hand shoved me to the ground. Landon caught Vanessa, cradling her protectively. He looked up at me, his face contorted with rage. “Stella, are you insane?! How dare you touch her?!” Before I could speak, Vanessa sobbed into his chest. “Landon, I just wanted to comfort her. But she accused me of wearing red just to spite her. She said she was going to push me down the stairs to kill me, to make me pay for Leo’s death. She said she was going to hire a psychic to turn Leo’s ghost into a demon to haunt me.” Her wails grew louder. “I was so sad about Leo, too! I came straight from the airport! I was just worried, I didn’t think about my clothes! Landon, you know how sensitive I am… I’m so scared…” Landon’s face hardened. He glared at me. “It was your bad luck that you ran into a maniac, and you dragged Leo down with you! Vanessa came here out of the goodness of her heart to comfort you, and this is how you repay her? You have no gratitude!” He was shouting now. “So what if she wore red? She told you it wasn’t intentional! Maybe Leo liked bright colors! Why do you have to be so petty and cruel?” “And now you’re using your dead son to curse her? He’s not even at peace, and you’re using him like this? What kind of heartless mother are you?!” I dragged Leo down with me? I’m petty? I’m heartless? Tears of rage and disbelief streamed down my face. I pointed a shaking finger at Leo’s tombstone. “Landon! You think I’m heartless? Can you say you have a clear conscience?!” I screamed. “I dare you! I dare you to stand in front of our son’s grave and tell him why he died! Tell him what kind of surgery you ordered the doctors to perform on his mother!” Landon frowned. “What are you yelling about? He died because you failed to protect him. It’s that simple.” “As for the surgery, should I not have asked the doctors to save your life? Is that what you wanted? Stella, I think you’re losing your mind. Stop this hysterical act and apologize to Vanessa right now!” Vanessa tightened her arms around his neck, her voice a weak whisper. “It’s alright, Landon. Even though she tried to hurt me… she did just lose a child. Let’s be the bigger people. My ankle… I think I twisted it when I fell. It hurts so much. Can you take me to the hospital?” Landon gave me one last look of profound disappointment, then turned and carried her away without another word. As they left, Vanessa looked over his shoulder at me. Her lips formed a single, silent word. Loser. Watching them go, I knew. Landon and I were finished. Utterly and completely. I bought a new urn. I paid the groundskeeper to open the niche, to carefully gather my son’s ashes from the dirt and filth. I held him close and walked away. My Leo didn’t deserve such a pathetic funeral. And he certainly didn’t need such a heartless father. Back at the house, I gave the housekeeper an extended vacation. That evening, Landon called. “Stella, are you home? Don’t worry, Vanessa’s ankle is fine, just a sprain. Look, I was out of line today. I shouldn’t have spoken to you like that when you’re grieving. I didn’t mean it.” His voice was a smooth balm of reason. “But those stairs are so steep. If she had really fallen, if something had happened to her… what would Harrison do? We’ve lost our child. I just… I couldn’t bear to see him lose his mother, too.” “He’s my godson, after all. And Vanessa and I are old friends. It’s only right that I look after them. You shouldn’t read too much into it.” “I know,” I said softly. “It’s okay. You take care of them.” “That’s my girl. So understanding,” he said, relieved. “Listen, didn’t Leo always want to see the ocean? I’ve booked tickets. The day after tomorrow, we’ll go. Get away from all this. Even though he’s gone, we should still fulfill his wish for him. Wait for me. I’ll come home and get you.” All night, my phone buzzed with notifications from Vanessa. To appease her, and to delight Harrison, Landon had chartered a private jet. They were on their way to Las Vegas for a shopping spree. My Leo couldn’t get his father to take him to the beach once in three years. A final message from her popped up. A picture of them on the jet, champagne glasses raised. The caption: How can you even compete, Stella? She was right. I couldn’t. So I wouldn’t. The next day, Landon was still gone. The photos and videos from Vanessa became a deluge. Shopping sprees, high-stakes poker games, even explicit clips of her and Landon in their hotel suite. I didn’t reply. I just packed. Everything that belonged to me, everything that had belonged to Leo, I boxed up and sent to charity. On the afternoon of the third day, Landon finally remembered me. Stella, sorry, something came up at the office. My assistant will pick you up and take you to the airport. I’m on my way now. He didn’t know that one minute earlier, Vanessa had sent me another video. It was Harrison’s eighteenth birthday. Landon had rented out the most opulent ballroom in Vegas for his party. In the video, he was fastening a necklace around Vanessa’s neck—the centerpiece a pink diamond the size of a pigeon’s egg. He leaned in and kissed her forehead. “Vanessa,” he said, his voice thick with emotion for the camera, “thank you for giving me such a wonderful son. You are the hero of our family.” I didn’t reply. I blocked both of their numbers. I placed the signed divorce papers and a small USB drive into a manila envelope and had it messengered to the hotel in Las Vegas. I left the little slip of paper with Leo’s birthday wish on the dining room table. Then I picked up my son’s urn, took one last look at the house I had lived in for fifteen years, and walked out the door. I was going to the airport. Goodbye, Landon. At the hotel, Landon had just announced his intention to make Harrison his sole heir. He was about to sign the official stock transfer agreement. Suddenly, his assistant burst into the ballroom, his face pale, clutching a manila envelope. He rushed to Landon’s side, his voice a panicked, trembling whisper. “Mr. Hayes… it’s terrible. Mrs. Hayes… she was on a flight to Europe. The flight… it’s gone down over the Atlantic.”

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “385074”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

My mother was the villain of the story, but by the time I was born, the story was already over. The life of champagne brunches and Fifth Avenue sprees was gone, and the debutante who once graced magazine covers had become a social pariah. She’d been betrayed by my father, the hero of the story, and her family’s fortune had vanished overnight. A pampered princess who had never worked a day in her life, she had to learn everything from scratch. For me. 1 The nurses told me later that my mother, Genevieve, didn’t even know she was pregnant. She just thought she was getting fat. The truth hit her the day her family’s bankruptcy was announced. Every credit card was declined, every account frozen. The only cash she had to her name was twenty thousand dollars, tucked away in a savings bond a great-aunt had given her for her sixteenth birthday—a sum she’d once found so laughably small she’d never bothered to touch it. She was staring at that number on her banking app when the first contraction seized her, a pain so sharp it sent her straight to the hospital. And then, there I was. Even then, in the midst of ruin, she insisted on a private VIP suite, refusing to be wheeled into a standard maternity ward. Just like that, her balance lost a zero. She had two thousand dollars left. I arrived without an invitation. The first time she saw me, she just stared, baffled. A child had never been part of her plan, not even when she was deepest in love with my father. She needed too much love herself, the kind of all-consuming love only he could give, and it was meant for her alone. They had made a promise as children, a secret whispered between them. “Ethan’s heart is for Genevieve, and Genevieve alone.” For a long time, it was true. His love was a fortress built only for her. At eighteen, Ethan told her, “I love you. Only you.” He honored that childhood vow, and to everyone who knew them, Ethan belonged to Genevieve. When she grew possessive, their friends would just laugh it off. “The princess guards her treasures,” they’d tease. And at eighteen, Ethan found her possessiveness sweet. It felt like a green apple lollipop, a slow, perfect dissolve in his heart. He’d blush, wave goodbye to his friends, and run straight back to her arms, back to his happiness. But at twenty-four, her possessiveness was a cage. It was like a piece of sour candy that never turned sweet, an acrid lump he couldn’t swallow, filling his mouth with a dull, persistent ache. His friends weren’t teasing anymore; they were mocking him for being whipped. The frantic ring of his phone became a Pavlovian signal, a lead weight dropping in his stomach. When a repressed heart can’t find a door, it breaks open a window. So he started an affair. He knew it was a betrayal, a violation of everything they were, so he hid it. At first, the guilt was a heavy counterweight on the scales, but the stolen moments of joy, the secret thrills, began to pile up until the balance tipped irrevocably. When the lies finally shattered, the explosion was ugly. They screamed, they clawed at each other, turning their pristine Upper East Side apartment into a war zone. They ended it with a vow to never see each other again. They had just finalized their divorce last month. As the story’s villain, my mother’s love was a thing of fierce, paranoid obsession. The slightest dip in my father’s affection sent her spiraling. Three scheduled calls a day. Every outfit he wore, she had to approve. Home by seven p.m., no exceptions. But even with her standing guard, my father slipped through her fingers like a handful of sand, blown into the arms of another woman. It started with small things. A single strand of auburn hair on his blazer, a color that wasn’t hers. A cloyingly sweet perfume clinging to his collar that she didn’t recognize. The first crack appeared when she confronted him, her voice cold. “You smell.” It was a cheap, saccharine scent that made her head ache. To hide his guilt, he stripped off his jacket, feigning indifference. “I was at a department store. Must have brushed past someone.” Then it was a delicate silk scarf the housekeeper found in his coat pocket. A scarf that wasn’t hers. Then came the way he deliberately turned his back to her in bed, the way his eyes would drift away when they hugged. Genevieve couldn’t ignore the signs. She hired a private investigator. The photos arrived in a manila envelope. She couldn’t believe what she was seeing. He had cheated on her with the one person she despised most in the world. Maybe it was a villain’s intuition. From the very first time she’d met this woman, a deep, primal dislike had taken root. She was my mother’s opposite in every way. And now, in these glossy photographs, the man everyone saw as the perfect husband—the man who had sworn he loved only her—was holding this woman’s hand in broad daylight, kissing her on a park bench during his lunch hour. They moved together with an ease that spoke of years, not stolen moments. Just a year ago, Ethan had laid in bed with her, whispering about how much they both disliked this woman, how she was a professional victim, a master manipulator. Now, in a twist of cruel irony, that same woman was his lover. The third person in their marriage. My mother, in a desperate attempt to save her marriage, tried to talk to her. The woman refused. The second time, my mother went to her office building, waiting for hours in the lobby. She finally saw her, coming down in the elevator, tucked securely under my father’s arm. The moment Ethan saw my mother, his first instinct was to shield the other woman behind him. The sight was so absurd, Genevieve laughed. A hollow, brittle sound. “Ethan,” she said, her voice dangerously calm. “Aren’t you going to offer an explanation?” He ignored her, whispering something to the girl and sending her away in a cab. Once she was gone, he turned back, trying to take my mother’s hand. He didn’t deny it. He didn’t even try to lie. He just kept repeating, “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” over and over, even slapping his own face. Then he sank to his knees on the pavement, begging her not to divorce him. My mother stared at him for a long time before turning and walking back into their building. He expected divorce papers the next morning. Instead, she forgave him. “We can stay married,” she told him, her voice devoid of emotion. “But you have to promise me you will never see her again.” Then the tables turned. The other woman started showing up, trying to confront my mother, who refused to see her. Finally, she came to our apartment, waiting for Ethan. He saw his lover looking so lost and pathetic, and the sight broke his heart. He took her with him when he left. He didn’t come home for a month. When he finally returned, a cold, relentless rain was falling. He pushed open the door, bringing the storm in with him. Genevieve thought he was back for good, that he’d finally realized his mistake. But then he threw a stack of photos at her. The sharp corner of one cut her cheek. The dream shattered. He wasn’t here to reconcile. He was here to condemn her. “God, you’re disgusting, Genevieve,” he spat, his voice dripping with revulsion. “Every day you become more and more pathetic. Just looking at your face makes me sick. How can you be so venomous?” “You knew how important that charity gala was for Isabella. You knew it, and you still had your friends ice her out. Do you have any idea how many sleepless nights she put into organizing that event?” “Are you even human? Can’t you stand to see anyone else succeed?” Genevieve froze. She couldn’t comprehend that the man she had loved her entire life was screaming at her like this, for a stranger. In an instant, a dam of grief and betrayal broke inside her. “Yes! I can’t stand to see her happy!” she shrieked, her voice cracking. “Why should she be? Why does a woman who destroys a family get to have a better life? Why don’t you ask me about my sleepless nights? The nights I spent crying over you? The nights I stayed up helping you build your career?” “What right does she have? Tell me, Ethan, what right does she have?” Her roar dissolved into a desperate, wracking sob. She clawed at her own hair, her body doubling over as if in physical pain. The cold rainwater from his coat dripped down her back, extinguishing the last embers of warmth inside her. Ethan just watched her, his expression cold. He thought, This feels so familiar. There was a time when her tears would have shattered his heart. Now, all he felt was a desperate urge to escape. “Let’s get a divorce,” he said. Her mind went blank. She slapped him, hard, across the face. Ethan was stunned. “A divorce?” she whispered, her voice trembling with rage. “How dare you say that. We’re in this mess because of you.” “I don’t understand. When other couples have problems, they work to fix the problem. But you… you decided to fix the problem by getting rid of me! By cheating on me!” He’d had enough. They had never been good at backing down. He grabbed her arm and dragged her in front of the ornate, full-length mirror in the foyer. “What about you?” he snarled. “Have you taken a good look at yourself lately?” They both stared at the reflection. At the woman in the mirror. Her hair was a wild halo, a thin, red line traced a path down her cheek, and her eyes were red-rimmed and vacant, haunted by a grief and fury that twisted her features. She looked at herself, dazed. She remembered the day they got married, the first time they stood before this very mirror. They were both smiling then. Now, one face was etched with disgust, the other with rage. Suddenly, fighting for the marriage felt meaningless. The love was gone. And she had never been one to settle for a life without it. At the lawyer’s office, she stared at the signed divorce agreement for a long time. The paralegal asked if there was a problem. “After so many years,” she murmured, more to herself than to him, “we should at least say a proper goodbye.” She gathered the papers, stood up, and spoke with a weariness that seemed to settle in her bones. “I hope we never see each other again.” A month later, the news broke. The family fortune was gone. Genevieve was broke. She found out while she was packing up her life. The apartment was co-owned, but there was no reason to stay. When she drove back to her family’s mansion, she found it empty. A hollow shell. She never imagined that in the midst of losing everything, she would gain a child. She had lost her world, but she had been given me. I was like a fast-forward button on the VCR of her life, instantly splicing it into two distinct parts: Before, and After. It was sudden, but she accepted it. She accepted me. Then came the brutal realization that she could barely take care of herself, let alone a newborn. She had no idea a cab from her old penthouse to the hospital cost twelve dollars. She didn’t know that the gourmet meals she used to order on a whim now cost more than she had to her name. She still had the instincts of a rich girl, wanting only the best of everything. She was forced to learn how to survive. Forced to learn how to be a mother. She’d never wanted a child, but she seemed to adore me. She held me constantly, nuzzling her cheek against mine, her fingers gently tracing my tiny hands as she whispered to me. When the nurses cared for me, she would watch from the side, awkwardly trying to mimic their movements. The trashy novels on her phone were replaced with articles on parenting and infant care. More often than not, she’d fall asleep with the phone still in her hand. I loved to watch her sleep. She looked like the climbing roses outside the window, swaying softly in the breeze, peaceful and beautiful. When I slept, she would pat my back gently. She whispered to the nurse one afternoon, asking what kind of formula was best for a small baby like me. The nurse whispered back, “You could try this one. Your baby is so little. She seems like she didn’t get enough nourishment in the womb.” My mother looked at the price tag, then at me, blowing bubbles in my bassinet. Her face was a canvas of conflict. Finally, she gritted her teeth and bought a whole case. After that purchase, her bank account lost another zero. She had two hundred dollars left. I was well cared for at the hospital, but I slept almost constantly. A heaviness in my chest was a constant companion. My mother didn’t notice anything was wrong. She just called me her little pearl, sleeping twenty-four hours a day. Then the nurses ran a full panel of tests. The doctor told her I had a congenital heart defect. It was unlikely I would live to see adulthood. For days after the diagnosis, my mother just held me and cried. She was still recovering from childbirth, and the doctor warned her that the constant crying wasn’t good for her. He asked about the baby’s father. She just wept, unable to answer. Her life had been cleaved in two. The first twenty years were a gilded haze. Then, as if fate had grown tired of her easy life, it had thrown her into motherhood completely unprepared. And as if that wasn’t cruel enough, it twisted the knife. The head nurse was a kind woman who looked at my mother with a mixture of pity and frustration. “What kind of man did this to such a lovely girl?” she’d mutter. “Some things, you just have to let go,” she told my mother, patting her back. “In the face of life and death, most things don’t matter.” They even brought in a therapist to screen her for postpartum depression. The nurse would often sigh when she looked at me. She told my mother later that at first, she’d disliked her, thinking she was a terrible, self-absorbed mother. But then, she pitied her. “She looked like a new bud on a rosebush,” the nurse said. “So fragile that a single storm could knock her from the branch.” She saw women like my mother every year. Maybe it was because I was a quiet, cute baby, but the nurse took a special interest in me. She couldn’t bear the thought of me ending up an orphan. But no amount of pity could pay the mounting medical bills. They were crushing her. She had once fought desperately for a love she couldn’t save, debasing herself, throwing her family’s money at the problem, humiliating herself by throwing a glass of wine on the other woman at a public event. All she had ever wanted, since she was a little girl, was for someone to pick her up when she fell instead of laughing at her. And for her whole life, Ethan was the only one who ever had. Her own parents, exhausted by their miserable marriage, had no energy left for a child. So she grew up spoiled, arrogant, and rude, with no one to guide her. People bowed to her status, her money. Without that armor, she was just what the nurse saw: a fragile bud on a branch, about to be snapped by the wind. She knew this, but she didn’t know how to be any different. She had tried to hold onto the one piece of love she’d ever known with a grip so tight, she’d strangled it. In the end, she was left with nothing. … Taking a deep breath, she started calling the people she once thought were her friends. The calls either went straight to voicemail or were answered with a string of curses. She hesitated for a long time before making the last call. “Hello?” the voice on the other end answered. “Lindsey? It’s me.” “Well, well, if it isn’t Miss Genevieve herself.” The voice was slick with sarcasm. “To what do I owe the pleasure?” “Are you calling to borrow money? How much do you need?” My mother named a figure. Before she could finish, a sharp, ugly laugh cut her off. “You’re the great debutante, aren’t you? A wave of your hand used to be worth millions. Why are you calling a nobody like me for a few thousand dollars?” “I have the money,” Lindsey continued, her voice dripping with malice. “But I have a hard time believing you’ll be able to pay it back. Tell you what. Bark like a dog for me a few times. Maybe if I’m in a good mood, I’ll lend it to you.” Laughter erupted in the background. They weren’t just mocking her; they were making a spectacle of her fall. But this time, my mother didn’t hang up. Her voice was quiet. “Wasn’t I good to you?” The laughter on the other end stopped cold. “Yes, you were good to me,” Lindsey said, her voice turning hard and bitter. “But you owed me. You owed me for being born with everything I’ll never have. For years, I prayed for this day. I dreamed of you losing everything.” “And now that it’s happened, I couldn’t be happier. In fact, my friends and I are celebrating right now. Celebrating that you’ve finally fallen. Welcome to the real world. Welcome to being one of us.” My mother didn’t hear the rest. She let the phone slip from her ear and sat down slowly next to my bassinet, her hand gently stroking my blanket. She thought about the people who used to surround her. Even at her worst, she’d had a court of admirers. Some offered clumsy flattery, others subtle favors. Lindsey had been her favorite. She had seemed different. She cared, she didn’t just enable. She treated everyone as an equal, scorning the arrogance of the rich and the bitterness of the poor. She had prepared notes for my mother before exams, telling her not to cheat. She would give her a cold look when she did something wrong and patiently try to guide her. She had felt like family. But now, without the money and the status, she was just another stranger, another voice in the chorus of mockery and scorn. My mother finally ended the call. From her meager pile of belongings, she took a designer scarf and tossed it in the trash. As the payment reminders from the hospital flooded her phone, she finally dialed the number she’d been avoiding. First, she heard a cacophony of voices, men and women laughing. Then, his voice, familiar and distant. “Hello?” Before, she would have chirped his name, “Ethan!” Now, she could only manage a stilted, formal reply. “Ethan. It’s me.” Her voice was slow, stiff. “Can you… can you lend me some money?” More laughter crackled through the line, then the sound of rustling fabric. “Hey, stop it, hahaha…” His voice came back to the phone. “What did you say?” Just that one sentence, and all her courage evaporated. They had ended things so badly, screamed things at each other they could never take back. Ethan had once been a blazing sun in her world. Even if his light couldn’t reach the darkest corners of her heart, it had offered a fleeting warmth. She didn’t realize that the moment the divorce papers were signed, their entire past would be erased. With no other choice, she turned to the only person she had left: her mother, my grandmother, who lived in the South. My grandmother was Genevieve’s birth mother. She had divorced my grandfather when my mother was eighteen. Years of a miserable marriage had turned her hair white and put her on a steady diet of antidepressants. When my mother was a child, my grandmother lived in a single room in their mansion. She never went out, never spoke, just stared for hours at the white curtains. Once, when my mother was little, she went to see her. She found her trying to swallow a handful of white pills. The pills clogged her throat. The moment she saw my mother, she retched, and the pills scattered across the floor like tiny white seeds. A maid rushed in. “Ma’am, you can’t take so many of these! If you can’t sleep, I’ll warm you some milk. Maybe that will help.” My grandmother just stared blankly at the pills on the floor. After a long moment, she shook her head. My mother walked over and took her hand. She was too young to understand depression; she only knew her mommy was sick. My grandmother didn’t seem to notice her, her gaze fixed on something far away. After that, my mother never opened that door again. Her mother was like a porcelain doll, beautiful and empty. Sometimes she would pause outside the door, but it was always silent inside, as if no one lived there at all. Then, one day shortly after my mother turned eighteen, the door that had been closed for years finally opened. A woman so pale she was almost translucent emerged. It was her mother. A maid followed with her suitcases. She was leaving for good. She didn’t even look at my mother as she walked out. It was as if she had never given birth to her at all. And now, this was the only person she could turn to. Her father and stepmother had fled the country as soon as the bankruptcy hit, leaving her behind. My mother spent the last of her money on a Greyhound bus ticket. She had never been on a bus like this. It was crammed with luggage and trash, making it impossible to move. The seats were worn and the fabric felt greasy.

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Two hours before the quarterly performance reviews were posted, I saw my name on the layoff list in the system backend. The submission was from Ava, my direct supervisor and, for the last four years, my fiancée. A chill went through me. I called her. Her voice came through the phone, casual and unconcerned. “Oh, that. Ethan submitted it. He said he was just messing with you, seeing if you’d catch it before it went live.” She sighed, a little impatiently. “Just retract it yourself. It’s not a big deal.” Ethan. The fresh-out-of-college grad who’d joined the team three months ago and insisted Ava be his mentor. I stood there, phone in hand, and let out a short, bitter laugh. So the position I’d poured my life into for six years was nothing more than a game to them. A joke they could just toss around. The day I left, I packed my personal effects with a calm I didn’t feel. Ava grabbed my arm, her voice laced with a frantic edge I hadn’t heard in years. “I told you to retract the submission! Why are you actually leaving?” “Because,” I said, looking her straight in the eye, “I didn’t.” 1 The first time I saw my name on that list, I thought it had to be a system glitch. Just last week, going over my quarterly goals with Ava, she’d smiled and said, “You’re a lock for this review. Once it’s official, we’re getting married.” It was the plan we’d made four years ago. The moment I was promoted to department head, we’d use the bonus to finally buy the mermaid-style wedding gown she’d bookmarked and set a date. But now, the system displayed my employment status as “Pending Termination.” The submitter field was filled with her name, clear as day: Ava Reed. And in the comments section, a single, brutal line: ”Employee demonstrates insufficient role-adaptability. Recommend optimization.” If I hadn’t logged into the backend to double-check some data, I would have been blindsided when the official notices went out. I wouldn’t have even had a chance to defend myself. Taking a deep breath to quell the storm raging in my chest, I called Ava again. This time, her voice was sharp with irritation. “Ethan said he wanted to test your attention to detail. You know how important that is in our line of work, Leo.” A pause. “You can still retract it. Don’t make a mountain out of a molehill.” My eyes were glued to the words insufficient role-adaptability. My throat felt tight. “Ava, this isn’t a molehill. A termination request has to go through an entire approval workflow. How did he even get your credentials to submit it?” The sound of typing on her end stopped abruptly. Her tone turned to ice. “God, Leo, why do you have to be so petty about everything now? Ethan just graduated; he doesn’t know all the corporate red tape. So I’m covering for him. What’s the big deal?” Her voice rose, shrill and painful through the speaker. “Why do you have to fixate on this? Are you going to report him? Can’t you show him a little grace? He’s all alone in this city, and as his mentor, it’s my job to look out for him. I’ve told you this a thousand times! Is that a problem? If you want to file a complaint, you can file one against me, too!” The line went dead. The dial tone buzzed in my ear. I sat frozen in my chair, my gaze falling on the project binder at the corner of my desk, its margins filled with notes. Last year, when I was leading that brutal crunch-time project, Ava had stayed with me every night until the early morning hours. In this very binder, she’d scribbled, “Go Leo! We’re going to nail this.” And then there was the ring box tucked away in my desk drawer. I’d secretly bought her diamond last month for her birthday, waiting for this review to pass, for the promotion to finally be mine, before giving it to her. From college sweethearts to colleagues, we had been side-by-side. We’d squeezed onto crowded morning subway cars together, cooked instant noodles in our tiny studio apartment, and mapped out our entire future on late-night city streets. Colleagues always called us the office’s power couple. Our parents had met. The wedding was tentatively set for next spring. Everything was supposed to fall into place. But now, staring at the termination request on the screen, I felt every ounce of strength drain from my body. All I had to do was click the ‘Retract’ button, and my life would snap back onto its tracks. But her words—it was just a joke—were like a shard of glass lodged in my heart, and I couldn’t pull it out. A profound weariness washed over me, so heavy I didn’t even have the strength to lift my hand. 2 The office door creaked open, but I was still staring blankly at the screen. I looked up. It was Ethan, a steaming mug of coffee in his hand and a perfectly calibrated smile on his face. “Hey, Leo. I just finished my debrief with Ava. She mentioned you were in a bit of a mood, so I made you some coffee.” He approached my desk and set the mug down. His fingertips brushed the back of my hand—a fleeting touch he quickly retracted, looking down as if suddenly shy. “Ava said you might have misunderstood. I was honestly just joking around. I didn’t mean anything by it.” The steam from the coffee rose in a soft cloud, blurring the glint of triumph in his eyes. He’d been playing this game for three months. Acting the part of the earnest, respectful subordinate to my face, then running to Ava to whine about how I was “too demanding” and “not as understanding as she was.” I remembered Ava’s first impression of him. “This kid is too fragile,” she’d told me after his first day, when a client had yelled at him and made him cry. “I doubt he’ll even make it through his probationary period.” Then, last month, Ava had a sudden appendicitis attack on her way to a client meeting. I was on a business trip out of state. Ethan was the one who took her to the hospital. He stayed by her bedside for two days straight. After that, everything changed. Ava started bringing Ethan to high-level meetings. She assigned him key responsibilities on our most important accounts. At a team dinner, she’d even announced to everyone, “Ethan is like a little brother to me. I have to take good care of him.” The jokes started soon after. Colleagues would whisper that I was the “king in a coma,” and Ethan was the loyal brother-in-waiting, ready to claim the throne. I’d scowl every time I heard it. Ava would just laugh it off. “Don’t be ridiculous,” she’d say. “Leo and I are solid.” Now, I wasn’t so sure. She’d let him file for my termination and called it a joke. Seeing my silence, Ethan leaned in closer, his voice dropping to a softer register. “Leo, I know you’re mad. How about I buy you dinner? As an apology.” Just then, Ava walked in, holding a file. “Ethan, I told you to wait for me in the conference room. What are you doing here?” Ethan immediately snapped to attention, like a child caught with his hand in the cookie jar. “Ava, I just wanted to explain things to Leo. I was worried he was still upset with me.” The hardness on Ava’s face melted away. She walked over and patted his shoulder. “It’s fine. Leo’s not that petty.” She turned to me, her tone carrying a clear note of reprimand. “And you. Why are you getting worked up over a kid who just graduated? Ethan has already apologized. Can’t you be the bigger person?” Watching her shield him, I felt a surge of absurdity. “Ava, he abused your system privileges to file a termination request for a senior employee. That’s not a childish prank; it’s a serious breach of company policy.” I pressed on, the words tumbling out. “And for the last three months, he’s been bringing you breakfast every single day. He’s all over you in the office, and he stays in your office with you until midnight when you’re working late. Do you really believe that’s just a mentor-mentee relationship?” The color drained from Ethan’s face. His eyes welled up, and tears began to stream down his cheeks like broken pearls. “Leo, I didn’t… I just think Ava’s a great person, and I want to learn as much as I can from her…” Ava immediately stepped in front of him, her voice turning glacial. “Leo, what is wrong with you? Why have you become so cruel? Ethan looks up to you like a brother, and you slander him like this!” She let out a cold, humorless laugh, her eyes filled with disappointment. “I see what this is about. You’re not mad about the termination request. You’re just jealous that Ethan is younger than you, that he knows how to connect with people better than you do!” Her voice hardened into a weapon. “No wonder you haven’t been promoted all these years. With a mindset as small as yours, you’ll never make manager.” 3 That last sentence was a knife, and it found its mark. I never imagined Ava, of all people, would ever call me incompetent or small-minded. Not after all those years I’d spent taking on assignments in remote, undesirable territories just to build our savings, just to give her a better life. Not after all those nights I’d worked on proposals until my nose bled. She had seen it all. And now, she could dismiss it so easily. I stared into her eyes, searching for a flicker of the love I once knew, but all I found was a fierce protectiveness for Ethan and a weary annoyance with me. “So that’s who you think I am?” Ava looked away, her voice losing some of its conviction. “That’s not what I meant. I just think you don’t need to pick on Ethan.” Her gaze hardened again. “He’s just a kid. He doesn’t know any better. You should apologize to him, and we can all move on from this.” “Apologize?” I let out a laugh, hollow and full of self-mockery. “Let me get this straight, Ava. I’m the one who had a termination request filed against me, I’m the one being slandered, and you want me to apologize?” Her tone became rigid, a clear threat. “Leo, are you seriously going to fight me on this? Do you want this to affect our wedding plans?” The wedding. The word was like a needle to the heart. What was once my most cherished dream had just become her bargaining chip. Suddenly, the will to argue just vanished. I stood up and grabbed the cardboard box from under my desk. “There’s no need for that.” Ava stared, taken aback. She hadn’t expected this. “What does that mean? Are you quitting?” “Not quitting,” I corrected her, my voice even. “I’m being laid off. Since you think this is all just a joke, I’ve decided to play along.” With that, I turned and walked toward the door. Ava reached out to stop me, but I sidestepped her touch. The corner of my box hit the doorframe with a dull thud that echoed the beat of my own heart. Heavy, but somehow, free. Back at my desk, there was still an hour to go before the review results were officially published. A system notification was blinking on my screen: “Termination request will be processed at 18:00. Retract now?” I stared at the button for a long time before closing the window. I opened LinkedIn and started browsing for positions at firms nearby. My phone buzzed. It was a message from my buddy, Mark, followed by a video. “Leo. I’m at the downtown promenade. Just saw Ava with that Ethan kid. They’re buying matching bracelets.” The video was shaky, but clear. Ava and Ethan were standing at a jewelry kiosk. Ethan slipped a silver chain onto Ava’s wrist, then leaned in and whispered something in her ear. Ava laughed and playfully swatted his arm, her eyes dancing with a joy I hadn’t seen directed at me in a long time. Another text from Mark popped up. “Dude, now they’re going into a bridal shop! I just saw Ava trying on a wedding dress. Ethan’s standing there watching her with this look on his face… Leo, you need to get down here. Now.” My fingers hovered over the screen, suddenly ice-cold. So when she’d told me, “Once the review is official, we’ll go get the dress,” she had already been trying it on with someone else. My phone rang. It was her. I hesitated, then answered. Her voice was syrupy sweet, dripping with forced affection. “Leo, I’m sorry, my tone was harsh earlier. Don’t be mad. Please just retract the submission, and tonight we can go to that Italian place you love. My treat, okay?” I watched the video again, the image of her in a white gown, glowing under the boutique lights. “Ava,” I said softly. “We’re done.” There were a few seconds of dead silence on the other end, then a furious roar. “Leo, don’t you dare push your luck! You’re going to break up with me over this one little thing?” “A little thing?” I laughed. “You filing my termination is a little thing? You getting cozy with Ethan is a little thing? You trying on a wedding dress with him is also a little thing?” Her voice immediately shifted to panic. “How did you know… Ethan and I are just friends! We were just helping his sister pick out a dress, that’s all…” “Don’t,” I cut her off. “I don’t need your excuses. And I don’t want to be a part of this anymore.” I hung up and blocked her number. Then I blocked Ethan’s. Mark texted again to say Ava and Ethan were now fighting outside the bridal shop. Ethan had thrown something on the ground, and Ava had walked off in tears. I didn’t reply. I just kept scrolling through job listings. Outside, the sky began to darken. My colleagues filed out one by one, leaving me alone in the quiet office. The clock on my monitor ticked over to 18:00. A pop-up appeared: “Termination request has been processed. We wish you the best in your future endeavors.” I shut down my computer, picked up my box, and walked out. The evening breeze hit my face, cool with the last breath of summer. I took a deep breath. For the first time, a future without Ava didn’t seem so terrifying after all.

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The night of the American Gem & Design Awards—the night that was supposed to be my coronation—became my execution. My masterpiece design was swapped for a stolen piece of antique jewelry, and I was arrested on the spot. Five years. Eighteen hundred days in a cage, counting sunbeams slicing through iron bars, enduring a kind of torment that strips you down to nothing. When I finally walked out, my husband, Michael, and our son, Noah, were there. He draped a coat over my shoulders with a careful, almost reverent touch. Noah, my sweet Noah, buried his face in my stomach, his small body trembling with sobs. In that moment, I let myself believe the nightmare was over. At least I still had them. Then, I received the video. It was filmed in Michael’s study. Noah, now ten years old, was looking up at his father, his expression earnest. “Dad, I swapped Mom’s design for Aunt Isabelle’s. Did it make her happy?” A pause. Noah’s voice became smaller. “But… Mom went to prison for five years. Everyone whispers about her. The kids at school make fun of me…” Michael’s hand rested heavily on his son’s head. His voice was low, serious. “This stays between us, Noah. You can never speak of it again.” He knelt down, his face level with our son’s. “It was your mother’s fault for being selfish. Your Aunt Isabelle grew up with nothing, bouncing from one foster home to another. This award meant everything to her. Your mom has everything, Ellie, and she still wouldn’t step aside for her. She earned what she got.” My heart didn’t just break; it felt like it was physically ripped from my chest. The five years of living death I’d endured… a gift, handcrafted by the two people I loved most in this world. 1 “Don’t worry, Dad. I’ve gotten really good at pretending all these years. The stupid woman has no idea.” The voice was Noah’s, but the words were monstrous. Michael’s voice was laced with caution. “Just be careful. Don’t let anything slip before the party. We still need her at Isabelle’s birthday gala.” “Why?” “Because tonight, your grandfather is going to publicly introduce Isabelle as his adopted daughter, the new heiress to the family. Your mother has to be there. Her presence will absorb the gossip, shield Isabelle from the worst of it. With her standing in front, Isabelle will be protected.” Noah scoffed, a sound of pure disdain. “Please. With you there, who would dare say anything?” “Noah!” Michael’s voice was sharp. “Fine, fine! I’ll go tell her. It’s not like she deserves an invitation anyway.” A bitter mutter followed. “If it weren’t for Isabelle, why would I even want a felon for a mom?” I stared at the screen, at the boy who was once small enough to sleep in the crook of my arm, his face now a mask of contempt. Every word from their mouths was alien, poisoned. Five years ago, I was arrested. For five years, I endured. When I was released, I learned my mother had died from a deep depression, and my father had taken out an ad in the paper publicly disowning me. Everywhere I went, I was trailed by whispers and pointed fingers. Even the housekeeping staff at our own home treated me with sneering disrespect. I remember standing on the edge of our rooftop terrace, the wind pulling at my clothes, thinking how easy it would be to just step off. It was Michael and Noah who talked me down, their voices soft with promises. They believed me, they said. They would get me justice, they swore. When strangers sneered at me in public, they stood in front of me, a human shield. I saw them as the light that had found me in the darkness. I would have died for them. And now I knew. My five years of agony were nothing more than a calculated sacrifice to pave the way for Isabelle, the scholarship student my family had sponsored since she was a teenager. Tears flooded my vision, blurring the phone in my hands. I thought they were my saviors. They were just my executioners, tossing me scraps of affection to keep me quiet after they were done using me. Scrambling, I hid the phone, curling into myself in the silent refuge of Michael’s study. And that’s when I saw them. Lined up perfectly on his desk was a collection of custom-made porcelain dolls. Each one exquisitely crafted. Each one with the same delicate beauty mark just below the eye, a perfect mirror of Isabelle. Michael was a world-renowned luxury goods designer. His custom pieces were fought over by collectors, worth a fortune. After we were married, I had begged him to make one for me. He always said he was too busy, that he didn’t have time. I couldn’t get a single one, yet he had made a whole collection for her. It wasn’t about time. It was about worth. And I wasn’t worthy. In his eyes, Isabelle’s dolls were all smiling, their painted lips curved in gentle joy. My hands clenched around the one I’d picked up, the porcelain cold against my skin. I wanted to smash it to pieces. Because my husband cherished her, she became the glittering new star of the jewelry world. And I became the convict everyone despised. That evening, they came home. Noah ran to me, calling out “Mom!” with his usual practiced affection. Michael handed me a small box from my favorite bakery. These small gestures used to warm my heart. Now, they chilled me to the bone. The next morning, after they left, I walked out of the house and called a car. It took me to an old, out-of-the-way athletic club on the edge of town. I found the locker I had rented under a false name, a contingency I prayed I’d never need. I typed in the code and placed a single, sealed envelope inside. On it were just three words. “I was wrong.” He had told me once, long ago, that if I ever regretted my choice, all I had to do was say the word, and he would come for me. When I got home, Michael’s car was already in the driveway. He and Isabelle were standing near the front door, with Noah dancing around them animatedly. Isabelle was laughing, bent over at the waist, and Michael was watching her with a look of pure, undisguised adoration. The sound of my car door closing made them all freeze, the happy tableau shattering. My eyes locked on the tiara sparkling in Isabelle’s hair. It felt like a punch to the gut. Michael’s face flushed, a flicker of guilt in his eyes. “Ellie. Isabelle didn’t have anything appropriate for the gala tonight, so I told her she could borrow this. Just for the evening.” Isabelle’s almond eyes crinkled. She covered her mouth with a delicate hand. “Michael is just so thoughtful. He saw I didn’t have a signature piece to wear and insisted I take this.” She gave me a saccharine smile. “I’ll give it right back after the party, I promise.” Their intertwined hands were a pale, glaring knot in the afternoon sun. A thousand tiny needles pricked at my chest, making each breath a sharp pain. Since I’d been released, Michael had made excuses for me to miss every single party, every public event. He never appeared with me. He said it was to protect me from the gossip. I was naive enough to believe him. Now I saw he just didn’t want to be tainted by my prison sentence. Seeing my silence, he pressed on. “It’s just collecting dust in the safe, Ellie. Why not let Isabelle get some use out of it? She needs things like this to build her image right now.” “Do you hear yourself, Michael?” My own voice was a trembling stranger’s. That tiara wasn’t just a piece of jewelry. It was a custom piece, designed by one of the greatest jewelers in the world for our wedding. Its creation was featured in Vogue. I had worn it only once, on that day. The rest of the time, it sat in a climate-controlled glass case, a sacred object. It was the symbol of the lady of the house, of his wife. Giving it to Isabelle… what did that make me? Sensing my anger, Michael quickly changed the subject. “It’s just a thing, Ellie. Don’t make a big deal out of it. It’s Isabelle’s big night. You should come with us.” Noah grabbed my hand, his touch now feeling reptilian. “Yeah, Mom, please come! I feel like we haven’t gone out together in forever.” The image from the video—his face full of contempt—flashed in my mind. A deep cold spread through me, but I kept my gaze level. “A felon at a black-tie gala? I wouldn’t want to embarrass you.” Isabelle linked her arm through mine, her touch cloying. “Don’t say that, Ellie. We’re family. Besides, you haven’t seen your father since you got out.” At the mention of my father, a heavy silence fell over me. Finally, I nodded. Michael and Noah breathed a visible sigh of relief. The driver pulled Michael’s custom Bentley around. Michael smoothly opened the passenger door for Isabelle. As I moved to get into the back, Isabelle turned, her voice dripping with faux concern. “Oh, Ellie. This gown is so voluminous, I’m taking up the whole back seat. Maybe it would be better if you took a separate car?” From the front seat, Michael frowned. “She’s right. We have to be careful with the dress. I’ll call you an Uber.” “Don’t bother.” I turned and walked away before he could finish. I saw his momentary confusion before Isabelle’s voice, sharp and impatient, cut through the air. “Let’s go, Michael. We’re going to be late.” His hesitation vanished. “Let’s go,” he told the driver. The car peeled away from the curb, leaving me in its wake. Funny. Not a single one of the Landon family drivers was available. I, the lady of the house, couldn’t even get a ride. Our villa was in a gated community miles from anywhere, and I couldn’t get a car service. As dusk settled, I had no choice but to start walking. Then the sky opened up. A cold, driving rain. By the time I arrived at the grand hotel, soaked to the skin and shivering, the gala was in full swing. I saw them immediately. Michael and Isabelle, standing side-by-side, bathed in the warm glow of the ballroom. They were a portrait of perfection, smiling and laughing, accepting congratulations. My father stood nearby, beaming like a proud patriarch. The air was thick with murmurs of approval, guests whispering what a perfect couple they made. And me? I was stopped at the door by security, a drowned rat with water dripping from the hem of my ruined dress. The commotion drew my father’s attention. His face darkened into a thunderous scowl as he marched toward me. “Who told you to come here?” he hissed, his voice low and vicious. “This is your sister’s night. Haven’t you caused enough shame?” His next words were a hammer blow. “A convict. If I were you, I’d have the decency to kill myself. If you have any sense left, you’ll sign the divorce papers and let them be happy.” He gestured toward the couple. “I’ve already announced my intention to formally adopt Isabelle. What are you still clinging to Michael for?” “Dad, I am Michael’s wife! She’s nothing but a charity case we took in. How can she be your daughter?” Crack. The sound of his hand striking my face echoed in the marble foyer. My ears rang. Suddenly, I was the center of the universe, the star of a horror show. “You animal!” my father roared. Isabelle flinched dramatically, scurrying into the protective circle of Michael’s arms like a frightened rabbit. And my son, the boy I had raised, the boy who used to cling to me, didn’t even spare me a glance. His small body was a rigid shield in front of Isabelle. “You’re a felon,” my father spat. “What right do you have to question me? If you had a fraction of Isabelle’s grace, you would have died in that prison instead of showing your face here!” Guests were gathering, their phones held up, recording my humiliation. I clutched my burning cheek, drowning in shame. Michael looked uneasy. He started to speak. “Sir…” “Michael, look, Mr. Davison is here. We should go say hello,” Isabelle purred, tugging on his arm. “But…” “Ellie will be fine. He’s her father, after all.” Michael hesitated for a fraction of a second, then allowed himself to be led away. He wrapped an arm around Isabelle’s waist, steering her toward the crowd without a single look back. I stood there, alone, trembling under the weight of a hundred mocking eyes. My son, my Noah, didn’t even break his stride. He just shot me a look of pure disgust before trotting after Isabelle. Finally, I broke. I ran, fleeing the laughter and the stares, my father’s final curse chasing me down the hall. “You knew this would happen! A little late to feel ashamed now, isn’t it?” I found an empty service corridor and collapsed, silent tears streaming down my face. A moment later, footsteps approached. It was Isabelle. Her face was alight with triumph, her eyes filled with scorn. “How does it feel, Eleanor? To have everything you ever loved taken away by me?” She leaned in, her voice a venomous whisper. “Did you enjoy the five years I gave you? It was so easy. All I had to do was cry a little, and your precious son was eating out of my hand, ready to swap out his own mother’s masterpiece.” She laughed, a giddy, cruel sound. “You know, you could have gotten out sooner. The initial recommendation was two years. But your loving husband was so worried I might get dragged into it, so worried about my ‘trauma,’ that he had his lawyers push for more. Three years. Then five. He’s the one who told your father to disown you, to make sure you had nothing and no one to turn to when you got out. So you could never fight me.” My family. My husband. My son. They watched me rot in that hell for five years, all for her. Five years of beatings, of humiliation, of being ground from a diamond into dust. A primal rage, hot and blinding, surged through me. I lunged, my hand raised to slap that smug smile off her face. Before my hand could connect, she crumpled to the floor with a theatrical cry. “Ellie, I’m sorry! I’ll take the tiara off, I’ll give it back right now!” The next thing I knew, Noah slammed into me, sending me staggering backward. My head hit the sharp corner of a metal service cart. Pain exploded behind my eyes, and I felt something warm and wet trickle down my temple. Michael rushed in, scooping Isabelle up from the floor as if she were a fragile doll, as if she were the one who had been hurt. She buried her face in his chest, her voice muffled and thick with fake tears. “Michael, Ellie’s angry with me. I should just give her the tiara back…” Michael saw the blood on my face. The flicker of concern in his eyes was instantly extinguished by a wave of cold fury. “I gave it to you. It’s yours. What use does a convict have for fine jewelry?” His voice was ice. “Eleanor, are you so pathetic you’re fighting over a necklace now? If you so much as lay a finger on Isabelle again, I will make you understand what real consequences are.” “Did you hear him?!” Noah shouted, his little face contorted with rage. “You’re a bad woman! You don’t deserve to be my mom!” Michael lifted Isabelle into his arms and walked away without another word, ignoring the blood dripping onto my collar. Over his shoulder, Isabelle looked back at me. Her smile was pure, victorious venom. As I watched them disappear, my heart turned to stone. It was alright. The message had been sent. Help was on its way. Soon, I would be gone. When I finally made it home, I was running a high fever, the world swimming in and out of focus. As I stumbled through the front door, I saw the trash bins by the curb, overflowing. My birthday gifts to Noah. Every single one. Every year, even in prison, I had made him something by hand. A hand-stitched leather wallet embossed with his initials. A cashmere sweater I’d spent months knitting with contraband needles. A small, perfect tiger carved from a block of wood, its stripes painstakingly painted. Now, all of it—the priceless and the precious—was crammed in with greasy takeout containers and crumpled cigarette packs. Noah saw me and stormed off to his room, slamming the door so hard the walls shook. I was too sick to care. All I wanted was my bed. But as I reached my bedroom, I saw the door was ajar. Through the crack, I saw Isabelle, her arms wrapped around Michael’s neck as he kissed her with a desperate, hungry force. He tore at the constraints of her gala gown, and the tiara—my tiara—was ripped from her hair and tossed carelessly to the floor. It landed with a sickening crunch, a diamond skittering across the hardwood. Beneath him, Isabelle’s eyes found mine through the crack in the door. A slow, mocking smile spread across her face. She bit down hard on his lower lip. A low groan of pain and pleasure escaped him. The dam of his long-suppressed desire finally broke. In that instant, my heart stopped beating and died. I slid down the wall, my legs giving out, and sat on the cold floor of the hallway. I listened to the sounds of their passion all night long, a witness to my own erasure. The next morning, Michael emerged from the room, stretching languidly. He stopped short when he saw me huddled on the floor. “Ellie? What are you doing out here?” He ran a hand through his hair, suddenly awkward. “Isabelle was… upset after last night. I was just comforting her.” A laugh, brittle and sharp, escaped my lips. “Comforting her? All night? On my bed? It looked like you comforted every last inch of her.” His face cycled through a series of emotions—shock, guilt, and then, finally, righteous anger. “Don’t be ridiculous!” he snapped. “You’re a convict, Eleanor! If it wasn’t for my pity, we’d have been divorced the day you were arrested! Do you have any idea what I’ve put up with for you?” Tears, hot and useless, streamed down my face. He was right. He was the brilliant, powerful CEO, and I was the pariah, the stain on his reputation. My silence seemed to be the answer he wanted. He took it as acquiescence. With a look of relief, he straightened his shirt and walked away. After he was gone, I went to my desk and placed the divorce papers I’d had drawn up weeks ago on the polished surface. Michael, you got your wish. I walked out the front door, climbed into the black Maybach that was waiting for me at the curb, and never looked back.

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