Author: Momo Chan

Eight years I’ve waited to marry him. Now his mother is telling me I have to let him sleep with his ex-girlfriend for three nights. “It’s tradition.” I stare at her. Then at Ethan. Then at the woman she just pulled into the room — long legs, glossy hair, smiling at me like she already knows how this ends. “This is Raelynn,” Mrs. Monroe says, patting her hand, “Ethan’s first love. They’ve known each other forever.” “And in our family,” she goes on, voice silky, “before a man marries, he spends three nights with his first love. To say thank you. It’s how it’s always been done.” I almost laugh. I turn to Ethan, waiting for him to shut this insanity down. He doesn’t. He just leans back on the couch, smirking. “It’s a tradition, Val. If you want to marry me, you respect where I come from.” Then, softer — that little tilt of his head he uses when he wants something, “Come on, baby. Eight years you waited. You can handle three nights.” Everyone in the room is waiting for me to lose it. Scream. Throw a vase. Walk out. I don’t. I smile. “Okay. I accept.” Three days later, our wedding goes off perfectly. That night, when Ethan kicks open the door to the honeymoon apartment, his groomsmen cheering drunkenly behind him — There’s already a man in our bed! I step out of the bathroom in a silk robe, drying my hair, and give Ethan a slow, sweet smile. “Forgot to mention, babe. My family has a tradition too. On the wedding night, the bride have to sleep with her ex first. In front of her husband.” … The day I told Ethan okay, he packed a bag and moved into Raelynn’s apartment. Didn’t even kiss me goodbye. Three days. Zero texts. Zero calls. The night before the wedding, I tracked him down at a rooftop bar downtown. I could hear them before I opened the door. “Honestly, Ethan, you’re a legend. First love AND a hot fiancée? Some men have all the luck.” I push the door open. The laughter dies. Ethan’s draped on the couch with Raelynn tucked under his arm. He raises an eyebrow at me. “What are you doing here?” “Sorry to interrupt the reunion,” I say flatly. One of his friends jumps in fast, fake-bright, “Val, listen, this is actually a thing in a lot of families. You sleep with the ex one last time, then you close the door forever. It shows you take the marriage seriously.” “After tonight, Rae’s done. He’s all yours, promise.” “Mm.” I nod. “I understand.” “See? Val gets it. Ethan, you trained her well.” Something flickers across Ethan’s face. Amusement. He likes that. Someone gets bold. “Hey, last night of freedom, right? Let’s make it count. Ethan — kiss Rae. French. We haven’t seen that since you two were nineteen.” Ethan smiles slow. Pulls Raelynn into his lap. And kisses her — deep, wet, hands in her hair — right in front of me. I look away. “Ethan.” My voice doesn’t shake. “I came to remind you. Wedding’s at noon. Don’t be late.” I turn to leave. Behind me, one of his buddies snickers. “Damn, Ethan. She watched you make out with your ex and didn’t even blink. What a wife. Where do I get one?” And then Ethan — lazy, smug, loud enough for me to hear. “She’s been with me eight years. Three miscarriages. Doctor said she can’t have kids anymore. Who else would even take her?” I freeze in the doorway. The deepest wound I have. Tossed out like a punchline. I take a deep breath. Ethan thinks all of that broke me. He thinks I’m damaged goods nobody else would take. But he’s wrong about a lot of things. The truth is — my body is just fine. And he is the one who’s nothing without me.

I drive straight home. Don’t cry. Don’t call anyone. Right before I fall asleep, my phone lights up. Ethan. His voice is lazy, half-bored. “You mad about the bar?” “No.” He laughs. “You’ve gotten weirdly chill lately, Val. It’s freaking me out a little.” Then, smoothly, “Listen. Rae flew in from London the second she heard I was getting married. She and I are ancient history, okay? You’re the one I’m marrying. The three nights thing is just a family thing—” “You don’t have to explain.” I cut him off. “I respect your family’s traditions. Just remember — mine has one too. You’ll respect it tomorrow.” “Sure, baby. What’s the tradi—” A soft moan cuts him off. “Ethan… focus. You said tonight was our last night. Don’t get distracted.” He clears his throat fast. “Okay, gotta run. See you tomorrow. I’ll be there. Promise.” I hang up. Power off the phone. Go to sleep. Numb is better than hurting. … Morning. I turn the phone back on and a text from Dani is waiting. It’s a video. Two bodies tangled in the bed. I know who are they. I close the screen. Calmly. Set the phone face-down. Drive to the venue. In the bridal suite, Dani is shaking she’s so angry, yanking the zipper up the back of my dress. “What is wrong with him? Family tradition? That is not a tradition, Val, that is cheating! Betrayal!” “You walked out on your parents for him. He swore on everything he loved that he’d treat you right. And now he’s posting sex tapes with his mistress the night before the wedding! Does he have any shame?” Probably not. I think. When I chose Ethan, my family lost their minds. They had someone picked out for me already — practically since we were childhood. I said no. I walked out for Ethan. Completely. He swore — swore — he’d never make me regret it. When did it start to change? Six months ago, maybe. A call from overseas. Raelynn crying down the line about some breakup in London. And just like that, his head was somewhere else. Dani grips my shoulders. “Val. I love you. But you cannot actually be marrying him after this. Please tell me you’re not.” I look at myself in the mirror. White dress. Steady eyes. “Dani. You’ve known me since we were six. You know how I work.” I smile. “Someone humiliates me? I humiliate them back. Same way. Twice as hard.”

Ethan strolls in twenty minutes before the ceremony. His groomsmen exhale like they’ve been holding their breath all morning. “Bro, we heard you hooked up like five times last night. We were genuinely scared you wouldn’t make it out of bed.” Ethan smirks. “Please. You underestimate me.” Then his eyes find mine — and for a second, something flickers. Surprise. Maybe even guilt. “Val. You look incredible.” He crosses the room, slips a hand around my waist, voice low and coaxing. “Don’t listen to those idiots. Rae wasn’t feeling great this morning, that’s what slowed me down.” I smile. Say nothing. And then she walks in behind him. Raelynn. In a soft pink dress that’s just a little too fitted, a little too bridal. Smiling at me like we’re old friends. “Val! Congrats, babe! I couldn’t miss this — I had to see you two tie the knot.” Ethan shrugs like it’s nothing. “Rae was a mess this morning, begged to come. I figured why not. The tradition’s done — we’re keeping our distance from here on out.” Dani opens her mouth. I squeeze her arm. “It’s fine.” Raelynn looks me up and down. Then she laughs, soft and mean. “Val, your suit looks kind of… cheap? Didn’t Ethan get you a Tom Ford?” She gasps, all fake-shocked. “When we were eighteen, Ethan promised me a Tom Ford for our wedding. The biggest ballroom in the city. A hundred tables, minimum. A million-dollar day — because that’s what I deserved.” Her eyes drift around the room. The folding chairs. The grocery-store flowers. The cheap linens. “This is… cute, though.” The air goes thin. Ethan coughs. “Rae, come on. Val and I have been together a long time. We don’t care about that stuff.” “Mm.” I say. That’s all. Because here’s the truth: I planned none of this. Ethan did. He said keep it simple. He picked the $80 dress off Amazon for me and chose the cheapest favors in the catalog. I’ve known for a while where his heart really was. The MC starts warming up the crowd. Our engagement photos slide across the screen — eight years compressed into thirty seconds. Raelynn starts crying. Loud, performative, beautiful tears. “I’m sorry, I just— I’m so happy for you, Ethan. You get to marry the person you love. I’ll never get that.” She wipes her eyes. “I got diagnosed with lupus last month. The doctor said it doesn’t get better. I always dreamed of a big wedding before I— before I couldn’t anymore.” Ethan’s face changes. I watch it happen in real time. He turns to me. “Val. Let Rae take your place in the ceremony.” Dani actually screams. “Are you OUT OF YOUR MIND? She wants to wear the dress now? Who exactly are you marrying today, Ethan?!” “It’s symbolic,” Ethan says, like he’s explaining to a child. “Just the ceremony. Paperwork’s still Val and me, tomorrow at the courthouse.” He turns back to me. That soft voice again. The coaxing one. “Baby. You gave me three days. What’s one more hour? It’s just a ceremony — the wedding night is what matters, right?” “I swear. Let Rae have the ceremony. You and I have the wedding night. Deal?” The guests are already whispering. The groomsmen are looking at me with pity. I look up at him. Calm. Steady. Smiling. “Okay.” Ethan exhales. Leans down and kisses my forehead. “That’s my girl. Always so understanding. Head up to the apartment. I’ll be there the second this is done.” Perfect. I didn’t really want to walk down that aisle anyway. We’ll just skip straight to the wedding night.

Watch👉 https://cps-front.novelix.live/app-api/ext/new/20260624TBi50SwZGd 🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “Novelix” app 🔍 search for “ni632229”, and watch the full series ✨! #Novelix

When Zachary Cross sat down for his first major television interview, the atmosphere in the studio was warm, almost reverent. The host smiled warmly, shifting her notes before bringing up a love letter he had written ten years ago. She quoted a few lines—gorgeous, devastatingly romantic prose that read like poetry. It was entirely at odds with his reputation as a cold, ruthless venture capitalist. Zachary remained silent for a long, heavy moment. He didn’t deny writing it. “What you all see as a romantic tragedy of youth,” he said, his voice flat and devoid of warmth, “was actually nothing more than a rich girl’s cruel little game. Back then, she deigned to date me. I was naive enough to think she actually loved me, while she was busy humiliating my poverty in front of everyone we knew.” The moment the interview aired, the internet exploded. I was dragged to the very top of the trending topics, vilified by millions of strangers. But before any public apology or defense could be mounted on my behalf, my death certificate found its way online. “Stop hounding her. Isabel Mercer died three years ago.” In his sleek, modern kitchen, Zachary had just finished preparing a quiet dinner. When the notification flashed across his screen, his face twisted into a look of pure, cynical amusement. He pulled up the contact info for the number he had blocked a decade ago and typed out a message: “Isabel, is this your latest performance? Do you honestly expect me to buy this?” … After hitting send, Zachary stared at the screen, momentarily lost in thought. A few seconds later, his phone buzzed with a reply. “Who is this? You’ve got the wrong number. My name isn’t Isabel.” Zachary’s brows knit together. A flash of familiar impatience crossed his features as his thumbs flew across the keyboard. “You’ve used this number since middle school. Don’t play games with me.” The reply came almost instantly: “Look, you definitely have the wrong person. The previous owner deactivated this line. I registered this number three years ago.” A cold sneer settled on Zachary’s face. “Do you really think I’m that gullible? Ten years later, and you haven’t changed at all. Still lying through your teeth.” I floated near the ceiling, suspended above the brass chandelier, looking down at the bitter hatred burning in his eyes. I remembered a rainy afternoon during our sophomore year. We had watched a girl hand a beautifully folded letter to a boy in the courtyard. Zachary had caught the faint, wistful look in my eyes. He had laughed, pulling me close under his umbrella, and promised he would write one for me, too. “Whatever other girls have, my girl gets too,” he had whispered. The absolute sincerity in his eyes back then was something I had carried with me to my grave. I never expected that the reply letter I spent weeks drafting would be intercepted and swapped for a cruel, mocking forgery—one that exposed his deepest insecurities and made him the laughingstock of the entire campus. I had grabbed his hand, desperate to explain, but I was met only with an icy wall of resentment. He became entirely convinced that our three years together had been nothing but a wealthy girl’s twisted amusement. Seeing that no further messages were coming through, Zachary tossed his phone onto the counter with an irritated sigh and carried the plates over to the dining table. Courtney Lane walked into the dining room, her eyes flickering when she noticed the dish—shrimp scampi. She hid her brief grimace behind a bright, practiced smile and leaned down to press a soft kiss against his cheek. “Thank you, sweetheart. You went to so much trouble.” She pulled out her chair, keeping her tone light. “Though, you know I don’t really eat shellfish. I heard your first love was obsessed with shrimp, though. I saw the trending topics today… you aren’t still holding onto her, are you?” Zachary’s posture stiffened for a fraction of a second. Without a word, he scraped the entire plate of scampi directly into the trash can. “That was a lifetime ago,” he said, his voice level. “I forgot her years ago.” Seeing the lingering pout on Courtney’s face, he sighed softly and drew her into his arms. “Don’t let her ruin our evening. What if she was my first love? You’re the one who stood by me when I had nothing. You’re the only one who matters now, and the only one who will be here in the future.” Courtney flushed with pleased embarrassment, playfully swatting at his chest. Zachary smiled, reaching into his pocket to produce a small velvet box. He slipped a brilliant emerald tennis bracelet onto her slender wrist. “Stop being jealous,” he murmured. “A little gift. Do you like it?” Courtney leaned her head against his shoulder, admiring the heavy, glittering stones. “I suppose I can forgive you this once. Honestly, I don’t believe for a second that she’s actually dead. She probably ran off with some older, wealthy businessman after her father’s company went under, and she’s too embarrassed to show her face. It wouldn’t be the first time she lied to escape a mess.” She giggled, her fingers tracing the clasp of the bracelet. “Actually, I should probably thank her. If she hadn’t walked away from you back then, I wouldn’t have this beautiful life today.” Zachary’s gaze drifted toward the dark window, his jaw tightening slightly as he suppressed whatever thought had just crossed his mind. Courtney pulled up her phone, looking at their high school alumni group chat. A notification had just been pinned by the class president regarding their ten-year reunion. She smiled up at him. “Don’t think about it anymore. I’ve already hired a personal stylist for us for the reunion. We are going to make sure everyone sees exactly how far you’ve come.” Zachary didn’t refuse. Watching the two of them try on their elegant, custom-tailored outfits, a dull, familiar ache bloomed in my chest. When we were young, Zachary came from nothing. Dating me had earned him endless whispers and cruel jokes about climbing the social ladder. Now that he was a self-made billionaire and my family was bankrupt, it was only natural for him to want to show off his success. It was a pity I wouldn’t be there to give him the satisfaction. When Zachary and Courtney arrived at the private dining room of the upscale downtown restaurant, the class president rushed over, his face flushed with excitement. “Mr. Cross! Courtney! Look at you two—absolutely stunning. The perfect couple.” The surrounding classmates nodded eagerly, their voices thick with flattery. “Seriously, Zachary. To achieve this much success at your age and marry the prettiest girl from our class… you’ve truly won at life.” It was a stark contrast to the sneers and mocking laughter they had directed at him a decade ago. Looking at Zachary’s impeccable suit and quiet authority, one of the alumni sighed wistfully. “It really goes to show you should never underestimate a poor kid with drive. I wonder if Isabel regrets her choices now.” “I heard that after her dad’s business collapsed, she was left with mountains of debt. If she hadn’t broken things off with Zachary…” At the mention of my name, the lively chatter in the room came to a grinding halt. Our relationship had been loud, passionate, and heavily scrutinized. Most of our peers had bet on our downfall, but none of them had anticipated it ending in such an ugly, public ruin. Zachary set his wine glass down with a slow, deliberate click. “Why are we bringing her up?” he said, his tone dripping with indifference. “It’s bad luck.” Eager to please him, a man sitting across the table scoffed openly. “Exactly. A superficial gold-digger like Isabel never deserved you anyway, Zachary. Word on the street is she got herself a sugar daddy to pay off those debts. Some old guy who used to work with her father. If her dad knew, he’d be turning in his grave.” Several people chimed in, offering sycophantic smiles to Courtney. “Courtney was always the elegant, sensible one. She stayed by your side through everything. You two are a match made in heaven. She’s ten times the woman Isabel ever was.” Zachary idly toyed with Courtney’s fingers, offering a faint, polite smile under the weight of their approving gazes. “Marrying Courtney was the best decision of my life,” he murmured. Courtney’s cheeks pinked, and she tugged at his sleeve with a hushed whisper. “Let them have a little fun at her expense later to get some payback for you. Don’t go soft on us.” Zachary pinched her cheek affectionately. “Whatever pleases you, darling.” Just then, the heavy double doors of the private dining room swung open. Zachary’s shoulders tightened instinctively. But when he saw Jared Campbell walk through the door, a flicker of disappointment crossed his eyes. Jared paused just inside the entryway, taking in the cruel laughter and the mocking comments about me. His expression hardened. “You don’t need to wait around for her,” Jared said, his voice cutting through the noise. “Isabel isn’t coming. She passed away three years ago.” He walked closer to the table, his gaze sweeping over the classmates. “And that rumor about a sugar daddy is complete garbage. Her father’s debts were settled by a longtime family friend who couldn’t bear to see her drown.” Zachary tilted his head, his eyes narrowing as he looked at Jared. A cold, mocking smile touched his lips. “I didn’t realize you were so intimately acquainted with her financial affairs, Jared.” The room erupted into knowing, suggestive snickers. An alumnus who had clearly had too much to drink leaned forward, shouting, “Hey, Jared, you were always trailing after her. You weren’t her little sidepiece, were you?” “Right? No regular classmate gets this defensive. I bet behind closed doors…” Listening to the crude remarks echoing around the table, Jared’s eyes turned murderous. He slammed his hand against the wood. “Shut up. All of you, shut your mouths.” His chest heaved as he stared down the room. “You pathetic, spineless hypocrites. How many of your families did Isabel’s father help when they were on top? The second they went under, you couldn’t wait to kick her. You spread lies to make sure she couldn’t keep the only decent job she managed to find.” Jared’s voice cracked with a mixture of rage and grief. “And now she’s dead, and you’re still dragging her name through the mud. Every single person in this room who gossiped, who stood by and watched, who turned their backs—you all have her blood on your hands.” A classmate scoffed, rolling his eyes. “Oh, come on, Jared. Stop trying to scare us. How much did Isabel pay you to put on this little show?” “Yeah, remember when you claimed she was terminally ill and tried to guilt-trip us into a GoFundMe campaign? Turned out her mother had died and she just wanted cash for a burial. What’s the scam this time?” Jared took a long, shaking breath. He reached into his leather briefcase and pulled out a thick stack of medical files, tossing them onto the table. “You want to know why I know everything? Because I was her primary oncologist. If you don’t believe me, read it yourselves.” He slid the death certificate and the biopsy reports across the polished mahogany. The classmates glanced at one another, hesitating, before silently nudging the documents down the table until they rested directly in front of Zachary. Zachary stared at the medical paperwork, his eyes widening slightly. His hand trembled as his fingers closed around the edges of the death certificate. Sensing his sudden shift in composure, Courtney quickly wrapped her arms around his bicep, offering a dismissive laugh. “Zach, sweetheart, who knows if this is even real? Remember how she swore up and down that the letter she sent you was a fake, too?” At the mention of the letter, Zachary’s expression darkened into a mask of pure fury. He swept his arm across the table, violently knocking the files to the floor. “Get this garbage out of my sight.” I didn’t miss the flicker of smug satisfaction in Courtney’s eyes. When Zachary and I had been together, nobody supported us. Yet, we had held onto each other for three years despite all the rumors and disapproval. When he promised to write me a love letter, I had been overjoyed. He had begged me, with bright, hopeful eyes, to write him one in return. I had spent days choosing the perfect stationery, drafting countless versions, and placing his favorite dried pressed flowers inside the envelope. I never could have imagined that Courtney, who had harbored a silent, obsessive crush on him for years, would swap my letter for a cruel forgery—or that she would arrange for it to be opened and read aloud in front of the entire class. In that fake letter, “I” had mocked his deceased parents, ridiculed his dreams, and told him a poor orphan would never be anything more than a footnote in my life. It was a calculated strike designed to shred a proud, sensitive boy’s dignity. Our classmates, eager to see him fall, had distributed copies of the letter. The humiliation became unbearable. When his elderly grandmother, who had raised him, came to the school to bring him lunch, she walked into a group of boys jeering at him. The shock and distress triggered a massive heart attack, and she died right there on the pavement. I had run to him, desperate to explain, only to receive a phone call that my father’s company had filed for bankruptcy. By the time I managed to return to school to clear my name, Zachary’s eyes held nothing but absolute, freezing hatred. “Is it fun, Isabel? Playing with people’s lives?” “If you looked down on me, you could have just broken up with me. You didn’t have to drag my dignity through the dirt. You killed the only family I had left.” I had wept, falling to my knees and begging him to listen, but he had simply wrenched his hand away and walked out of my life. A few weeks later, while trying to secure an evening shift at a diner to help with our living expenses, I was cornered in a dark alleyway by three debt collectors. As their hands tore at my jacket, panic seized me. In a desperate, blind instinct, I dialed Zachary’s number. “Zachary, please… there are men cornering me behind the campus diner… please help me, I’m so scared…” The sound of fabric tearing and the men’s coarse laughter echoed clearly through the receiver. But all I heard in response was Zachary’s laughter. Cold, sharp, and empty. “Isabel, when you were destroying my life, did you ever stop to think about what it felt like? This is your karma. Enjoy it. I’ll be sure to call the police for you when you’re done.” The line went dead. My screams were swallowed by the shadows of the alley. When I finally dragged my bruised, shivering body back to our apartment, I arrived just in time to see my father leap from the roof of our building. His body hit the pavement with a sickening thud, his warm blood splashing across my shoes. My mother, witnessing the fall, suffered a severe stroke that left her partially paralyzed. To pay off the loan sharks and keep up with her medical bills, I dropped out of college. I worked eighteen-hour days, but every cent I earned was stripped away by the collectors before I could even buy groceries. Eventually, because we couldn’t pay the hospital bills, my mother was wheeled out onto the street. That was when I ran into Jared. Out of pity for an old classmate, he quietly arranged for her transfer to a hospice facility and helped me apply for medical grants. But the debt collectors still found us, threatening to dismantle the facility if they didn’t get their money. Just when we had reached the absolute end of our rope, an old business associate of my father’s stepped in, quietly clearing the outstanding balance out of respect for my father’s memory. But just as things began to quiet down, I started coughing up blood. Biopsy results: advanced gastric cancer. I looked at the double-digit balance in my bank account and smiled weakly at Jared. “I’m not doing the treatments. Just… don’t tell my mother.” Jared refused to give up. He badgered me daily to fight, and even tried to organize a quiet fundraiser at our old university. But my mother found out anyway. She sat by my bedside, weeping, telling me she was nothing but a burden dragging me down. That night, she slipped out of her room and threw herself into the river. When the rescue team finally recovered her body and wheeled her towards the municipal crematorium, Zachary’s brand-new luxury sedan pulled up alongside the curb. He rolled down the window, a thick stack of hundred-dollar bills clutched in his hand. He threw them carelessly out the window, letting the green paper flutter down onto my face and my mother’s cheap shroud. He looked at me with a lazy, satisfied smirk. “I heard your mother died and you couldn’t even afford a pine box. Consider this my charity.” Then, he stepped on the gas and left me in a cloud of exhaust. After my mother’s death, I lost any remaining desire to fight. The chemotherapy was a quiet, agonizing torture that left me too weak to swallow water. Whenever I felt myself slipping, Jared would sit by my bed and tell me about Zachary’s rising success in the business world. Strangely, it was my lingering, stubborn love for him that kept me breathing through those final months. Until the afternoon I saw him walk into our hospital wing, holding Courtney’s hand as they headed toward the executive suite for their pre-marital health screenings. Seeing the heavy platinum band on his ring finger, a violent spasm wracked my chest. I choked, vomiting dark blood onto my sheets. That night, I quietly packed my few belongings and checked myself out. By the time Jared tracked me down, I was sitting in a small, empty cemetery plot I had purchased with the last of my savings. Before I took my final breath, I wanted to close the book. I dialed his number one last time. When the call connected, a tiny, foolish spark of hope flared in my chest. But it was Courtney’s voice that answered, dripping with venom. “Isabel, today is my wedding day. If you’re going to die, go do it somewhere quiet. Don’t ruin our night.” The joyful brass music of their reception drifted through the speaker. The phone slipped from my numb fingers, shattering against the cold grass. My chest went entirely still. As the darkness took me, I fancied I could see my mother and father standing at the edge of the woods, waiting to walk me home from school, just like they used to. A loud argument snapped me back to the present. Jared was staring at Zachary with absolute disgust, ignoring Courtney’s frantic attempts to dismiss him. “The truth is right there on the floor,” Jared spat. “Believe it or don’t. Isabel left a package for you before she died, but honestly? You don’t deserve to touch it.” The reunion ended in a tense, uncomfortable silence. When Zachary returned home that night, he was quiet, his eyes unfocused. Just as he sat down in his study, an unknown number flashed on his phone. He answered it on autopilot. “Hello, is this Mr. Cross? This is the administration office at Oakwood Memorial. The lease on Ms. Isabel Mercer’s plot is up for renewal. Would you like to handle the payment?” Zachary’s brow furrowed in deep confusion. “You have the wrong number. Nobody in my family has a plot there.” Frustrated, he hung up, burying his face in his hands. Three days later, Jared walked up the winding path of Oakwood Memorial, only to find Zachary standing near the entrance, looking lost. Seeing the large bunch of baby’s breath in Jared’s hands, Zachary’s jaw clenched. “You’re bringing baby’s breath? Don’t tell me you’re visiting Isabel.” Jared didn’t answer. He simply nodded. The mocking retort died on Zachary’s tongue. He knew—he remembered—that baby’s breath had been my absolute favorite flower. He stared at the delicate white blossoms, a sudden, wild panic flickering in his dark eyes. Jared let out a cold, humorless laugh. “Are you brave enough to come see her, Mr. Cross?” I was buried in a modest plot next to my parents. The headstone was simple, bearing a engraved photograph of me at eighteen. I had chosen that photo because I wanted them to remember me when I was still whole, before the world broke me. Zachary stared at the headstone, his chest rising and falling rapidly. He forced a harsh, defensive laugh. “You really think a fake stone and an old photo are going to make me believe this elaborate stunt?” Jared placed the flowers at the base of the stone, his hands shaking with suppressed fury. “The letter you received ten years ago was swapped by Courtney. She hired someone to mimic Isabel’s handwriting. You spent a decade hating the girl who loved you, while sleeping next to the monster who ruined her.” Jared stepped closer, his voice dropping to a harsh whisper. “Isabel never owed you a thing, Zachary. It was your own blind, arrogant pride—and the woman you married—that destroyed her life.” Jared pulled a thick manila envelope from his coat and shoved it against Zachary’s chest. I watched, holding my breath, waiting to see how Zachary would react. But Zachary barely looked at the envelope. He glanced at my smiling face on the headstone, his features hardening into a mask of denial. He tossed the envelope onto the dirt and ground his heel into it, twisting his shoe until the paper tore. “Isabel was a liar and a cheat. Don’t you dare compare Courtney to her.” Watching his stubborn defense of the woman who had ruined us, a familiar, dull ache settled deep in my spirit. If he had trusted me even a fraction as much as he trusted her, would we have ended up here? But there were no second chances in the dark. Jared’s eyes turned blood-red with anger. “Isabel called you when she was dying. She took her last breath listening to the music from your wedding reception. Every single time you celebrate your anniversary, you are celebrating the day she died. She left this world with nothing but your hatred.” Zachary froze. His hands began to tremble violently. A low, ragged laugh escaped his throat. “If she’s really in there… then dig it up. Dig up the grave and prove it to me.” “Are you insane, Zachary?” Jared roared. But Zachary had already signaled his security detail. At his command, three large men stepped forward, shoving Jared back. They brought out shovels, striking the earth with brutal, systematic force. The headstone was tipped over. The soil was torn away. Within minutes, they reached the small, simple urn. In their haste to pull it out, it slipped, crashing against the concrete edge of the burial vault. The ceramic shattered. My ashes scattered into the cold wind, drifting over the grass like grey snow. Jared let out a raw, agonized scream, throwing himself onto the ground to gather what he could, but the wind was too quick. I reached out, trying to touch my own remains, but my fingers simply passed through the dust. I tried to cry, but my eyes remained dry. I had forgotten how to weep a long time ago. Zachary stood over the mess, his face pale but his eyes wild. He pulled out his phone and dialed my old number once again. “Isabel! Stop playing dead! I’ve dug up your grave!” he screamed into the receiver, his voice cracking. “Your parents are right next to you. If you don’t show up here in thirty minutes, I’ll have their graves dug up too!” The voice on the other end erupted in terror and fury. “Are you a fucking psychopath? I told you, I am not Isabel! You dug up a grave? I’m calling the police!” The line went dead. Zachary stared at the screen, his face turning an ash-grey. By the time the police cruisers arrived, the cemetery was a scene of utter ruin. The lead officer looked at the scattered ashes and the shattered urn, his expression turning grim as he recognized Zachary. “Mr. Cross,” the officer said, his voice heavy with authority. “We’ve pulled the vital statistics and social security records. Isabel Mercer was officially pronounced dead three years ago.”

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “465203”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

Since I was a kid, I’ve been a golden retriever in human form—blessed with a rare, relentless brand of optimism. A walking dopamine machine. That was until Wyatt Landry, a billionaire worth hundreds of billions, signed me to live in his sprawling estate. My daily allowance was one hundred thousand dollars. My sole KPI? Just stay happy. You see, Wyatt suffered from severe, treatment-resistant clinical depression. He lived perpetually on the edge of a precipice, always one bad day away from the roof. But somehow, our emotions became linked. As long as I was giggling, he felt the world was worth living in. The moment my mouth curved downward, he was looking for a rope. Last month, the male lead in my favorite TV drama died, and I let out a couple of genuine, heart-wrenching sobs. At that exact moment, in the middle of a high-stakes board meeting, Wyatt broke down in uncontrollable tears. The terrified executives spent three hundred million dollars overnight just to force the production team to shoot an alternate resurrection ending. From that day on, my happiness became the company’s highest classified secret. Until Wyatt went on an overseas business trip. That was when Isabel Caldwell—who fancied herself his rightful fiancée—marched into my walk-in closet with a flock of bodyguards. “What kind of garbage are you to spend Wyatt’s money just to keep yourself amused? It’s time someone taught you some manners!” She sneered, snatching a rare, limited-edition figurine from my hands and smashing it to pieces. Then she reached for the front-row concert tickets of my favorite artist, preparing to rip them to shreds. Staring at the broken pieces on the floor, I broke down and sobbed. The second my tears fell, I could almost hear the heavy, exhausted sigh from across the ocean—Wyatt stepping onto the ledge of a skyscraper, completely done with this world. Oh, God. This woman wasn’t just destroying my toys. She was about to destroy her future husband’s life. 1 I forced myself to stop crying. As soon as the first tear escaped, my entire body went rigid. Wyatt was wishing for death again. I reached down and clamped my nails deep into the flesh of my inner thigh, hard enough to draw blood. I gritted my teeth and forced a stiff, unnatural grin onto my face. “What are you smiling at?” Isabel demanded. She ground her designer stiletto heel into the shattered remains of my collectible figurine, the plastic crunching under her weight. “I smash your things and you laugh? Are you mocking me? Laughing because you think I don’t have the authority to put you in your place, or because you think I can’t touch you?” I’m trying to save your fiancé’s life. But I couldn’t say it. I just kept up my stupid, vacant smile. The emotional link was a Tier-S classified secret, a clause baked into my contract with Wyatt. If the public found out, the entire Landry corporate empire would implode overnight. “Miss Caldwell, you’ve got it all wrong,” I squeaked. “Wyatt and I… we don’t have that kind of relationship.” “He lets me live here because—” “Because why? Because you’re cheap?” Isabel spat, stepping closer. “Wyatt and I grew up together. Our families have had an understanding since we were children. Who do you think you are? A nobody with no family name, living in his mansion and spending his money?” She waved a manicured hand toward the closet. “Pack up everything she owns. Every single thing. Throw it in boxes and get it out of here.” “Don’t leave a trace.” Four hulking bodyguards in dark suits pushed past her, tearing through my drawers and cabinets. I didn’t try to stop them. Clothes could be replaced. A life couldn’t. “Miss Caldwell, I strongly suggest you stop this,” I said, my voice barely a whisper. “If you make me unhappy, something terrible will happen to Wyatt.” Isabel blinked, stunned for a fraction of a second, before bursting into a harsh, mocking laugh. “Oh, please! Listen to yourself. He’ll get hurt if you get upset? Who do you think you are? You think you control his heartbeat?” She rolled her eyes. “Unbelievable. The lies you gold-diggers spin get more pathetic by the day.” I thought back to a company retreat last year. A vice president named Mr. Gallagher had made a snide remark, calling me a useless trophy ornament. It was a single sentence, but it made my eyes sting with tears for all of three seconds. Just three seconds. Wyatt had smashed his glass in his office, stormed out, and confronted Gallagher directly. By that evening, Gallagher was committed to a psychiatric facility, stripped of every asset and title. His entire family spent two days kneeling in the rain outside the Landry headquarters, begging for mercy. “Cut the act,” Isabel said, snatching the concert tickets from my hand and ripping them down the middle, letting the confetti-like pieces flutter down onto my face. “I am the sole heiress to the Caldwell Group. My father holds fifteen percent of Landry stock. You think a creature like you can compete with me?” She leaned in, her breath cold against my ear. “I’m cleaning house for Wyatt today. If you have any sense left in that empty head of yours, you’ll pack up and crawl out of here on your own. Otherwise, I will make your life a living hell.” Suddenly, the sound of frantic, heavy footsteps echoed from the hallway. “Miss Caldwell! Stop! Please!” 2 Franklin, Wyatt’s chief of staff, burst into the room, drenched in sweat, his tie completely askew. The moment his eyes found the tear track on my cheek, his face drained of all color. In his trembling hand, his phone screen flashed with real-time biometric data streamed from overseas. Wyatt’s heart rate had plunged to forty-two beats per minute. “Miss—Miss Caldwell, you can’t touch Nora. I beg of you,” Franklin panted, practically gasping for air. “If she’s unhappy… Mr. Landry… he really will…” “He’ll what? Fly back across the ocean to strike me?” Isabel raised an eyebrow, amused. “He barely even looks at you people. You think you can use his name to scare me?” “No, you don’t understand—” Franklin’s face flushed a deep, terrified purple. His lips trembled, but the words died in his throat. He couldn’t break the non-disclosure agreement. “I’m begging you.” With a dull thud, Franklin dropped to his knees, his forehead hitting the marble floor. “Just let Miss Webb watch a funny video. Ten minutes. That’s all she needs to reset. Please, Miss Caldwell, this is a matter of life and death.” Isabel looked down at him, a slow, cruel smirk spreading across her lips. “An employee, kneeling on the floor, begging me to let some mistress watch comedy videos? What exactly is the relationship between the two of you?” “Are you sleeping together? Huh? Shacking up in Wyatt’s mansion behind his back?” “No! That’s not true! Don’t say such things—” “I’m lying?” Isabel kicked Franklin away. “Wyatt goes out of town and you show up. She cries and you’re on your knees. Who would believe you’re innocent?” She nodded toward her bodyguards. “Break his leg. Use that golf club over there.” One of the guards reached into the umbrella stand and pulled out a carbon-fiber driver. Franklin didn’t run. He couldn’t. The club swung down, connecting with his shin with a sickening crack. He collapsed, letting out a guttural scream of pure agony. “Stop! Please, stop!” I lunged forward to intervene, but a bodyguard shoved me back. My head struck the sharp corner of the wardrobe. The pain was instant. Fresh tears welled up in my eyes. Franklin lay on the floor, his face covered in blood, panting heavily. He didn’t beg for himself. Instead, he threw his arms around the bodyguard’s leg to hold him back, turned his swollen, bloodshot eyes toward me, and gasped out: “Nora! Think of something happy! I beg you! Anything! Just smile!” Isabel frowned. “Psycho,” she muttered. She knelt down, tapping Franklin’s bloody cheek with two fingers. “Since you’re so eager to protect this trash, you can join her.” She stood up and smoothed her cuffs. “Drag them both down to the basement storage room. Lock them in.” “Not a drop of water, not a scrap of food, until I say so.” 3 The basement storage room was deep underground, damp, dark, and smelling of rust and mildew. The guards threw me onto the cold concrete floor and slammed the heavy iron door shut, bolting it from the outside. Instantly, we were plunged into pitch-black darkness. I had been terrified of confined spaces since I was a little girl. My heart began to hammer against my ribs; my breathing grew shallow and rapid, and my hands turned ice-cold. My panic and despair were radiating straight across the globe to Wyatt. Right now, he must be standing somewhere high, the wind whipping around him, looking down at the pavement. No. I shoved my hand into my mouth, biting down on my own skin to stifle the tears. You can’t be afraid. You can’t cry. If you cry, he dies. CLANG. The iron door was kicked open a crack, letting in a sliver of blinding light. It was Dr. Evans, Wyatt’s private psychiatrist, clutching a medical kit. “Nora’s emotional telemetry has bottomed out!” he yelled, trying to push his way in. “If we don’t intervene now, Mr. Landry’s heart will stop!” But before he could take another step, the head housekeeper, who had been bribed by Isabel, blocked his path. “Who let you down here? Miss Caldwell gave strict orders. No one gets near them.” “She’s going to die! Mr. Landry is going to die!” Dr. Evans was shaking with rage and fear. The housekeeper pushed him back with cold indifference. “I don’t dare disobey Miss Caldwell. Your threats don’t work on me.” The door slammed shut again. The chains rattled into place. Darkness once more. I don’t know how much time passed before the door opened for the third time. Isabel walked down the stairs, her heels clicking softly. She wrinkled her nose in disgust. “Well, this filthy hole certainly suits someone of your background.” Behind her, the housekeeper held a stainless-steel dog bowl. Inside was sour, leftover food, gray gravy skin forming on top, with flies beginning to circle. “I heard you lose your mind if you miss a meal?” Isabel knelt, catching my chin in her tight grip. “Eat up. Consider it a gift.” She shoved the bowl toward my face. The rancid smell hit my nose, and I gagged, tears spilling over. “Crying again?” Isabel scoffed. She stood up and dusted off her hands. “If you think I’m treating you poorly, let me add a little garnish.” The housekeeper grabbed the back of my head and slammed my face down into the bowl. The sour, rotting liquid rushed up my nose and into my mouth. The taste of decay filled my throat. I thrashed, choking and gasping for air, as my vision began to vignette. Just then, a loud crash of breaking glass echoed from upstairs. It was Dr. Evans’ voice, shrill and completely hysterical: “The team overseas just called! Mr. Landry is on the roof!” “They said he’s already slapped himself seventeen times! His face is unrecognizable!” “If we don’t stop this, he’s going to jump!” A cold dread washed over me. Seventeen times. I lifted my head, staring at Isabel through the grime. “You think you’re torturing me,” I whispered. “But you’re killing Wyatt.” “If he dies, you have nothing.” Isabel tilted her head, cupping her ear. “What was that? Speak up, I can’t hear you.” “I said—” A heavy, stinging slap cut me off. “Don’t you dare speak his name, you filthy bitch!” Isabel’s eyes were bloodshot, filled with a wild, manic rage. “He was perfectly fine before he met you! If anyone should die, it’s you!” She stood up, her stiletto heel coming down hard on my fingers, grinding them into the concrete. “Tomorrow, I’m bringing people over to see what kind of creature Wyatt has been keeping.” “I want everyone to see what you really are.” She patted her hair into place. “Wash her up. Put her in something presentable.” “I want my friends to see exactly how cheap Wyatt’s little pet really is.” 4 The next morning, the sun was bright, but not a single ray reached the basement. When the housekeeper dragged me up to the living room, the space was already filled with people. Seven or eight young heiresses, dressed in designer clothes, sat around the coffee table, which was laden with fruit platters and afternoon tea. “This is her? This is the woman Wyatt Landry has been hiding?” A girl with dusty-pink hair leaned forward, looking me up and down with a sneer. “She looks like a stray. Even my cleaning lady dresses better than this.” Another girl, wearing oversized sunglasses, laughed as she cracked open a melon seed. “I heard she didn’t even finish high school. Used to sell roasted sweet potatoes on the street corner.” “Oh my god, seriously? When did Wyatt’s taste get so… municipal?” I stood in the center of the room, my head hung low, letting them dissect me. Isabel sat in the center of the plush sofa, her legs crossed. She beckoned me with a finger. “Come here.” “Kneel.” I didn’t move. “Are you deaf?” A bodyguard kicked me hard from behind, right in the back of my knees. I crashed onto the marble floor, the impact sending a shudder of pain through my kneecaps. Isabel smiled thinly. “Girls, Wyatt was so insistent that I take good care of her while he was away. And you know what? The more he talked about her, the more curious I got.” She leaned forward, her voice carrying across the room. “Whoever makes her cry and beg for mercy today gets the exclusive shipping contracts for the Caldwell Group’s southwest region next year.” Silence fell over the room for a brief second. Then, the pink-haired girl stood up. “Mind if I go first?” Isabel waved her hand generously. “Be my guest.” The girl walked over, stared down at me for a moment, and delivered a sharp slap to my left cheek. The sharp edge of her diamond ring sliced my skin. A bead of blood welled up and ran down my jawline, dripping onto my collar. I didn’t make a sound. I didn’t dare. If I cried, Wyatt would break down sobbing in some high-profile international boardroom. The European investors, waiting for any sign of weakness, would realize that the head of the Landry empire was unstable. I had to endure it. The slaps kept coming. When one grew tired, another took her place. They slapped my face, pinched my arms, and jabbed the backs of my hands with dessert forks. I clamped my jaw shut, absorbing the pain, refusing to let a single tear fall. But then, the girl in the sunglasses reached for the faded, dirty string around my neck. My pupils dilated. Attached to the string was a small, tattered rag doll, its paint long since peeled away. My grandmother had sewn it for me from scraps of old cloth before she passed away. Inside its belly, instead of cotton, was a tiny, cheap recording chip. Before she closed her eyes for the last time, she had pressed the record button one last time: “Don’t cry, my sweet girl. Grandma will always be here to make you smile.” It was the only thing I had left of her. It was the sole anchor of my happiness. “What is this garbage?” the girl sneered, ripping the doll off my neck. “Just a filthy piece of trash. Throw it away.” She tossed it casually. It flew through the air and landed right at Isabel’s feet. “No!” I lunged forward, my knees scraping against the marble, leaving a smear of blood behind. But just as my fingers brushed the string— Isabel’s stiletto heel came down on the doll. “So precious to you?” She picked it up by the string, pressing its belly. My grandmother’s raspy, tender voice drifted out of the worn fabric. “Don’t cry, my sweet girl. Grandma will always be here to make you smile…” “Oh my god, that is so tacky!” “Creepy!” “Please,” I sobbed, dropping my forehead to the floor. I banged my head against the marble over and over, the sound echoing through the room as blood began to trickle down my face. “That’s from my grandmother. It’s all I have left of her. Please, take anything else. Just leave me that.” “I’m begging you.” Isabel looked down at my bleeding forehead, her expression entirely devoid of warmth. “You know, an orphan looks quite beautiful when she’s begging.” She smiled. And then, right in front of my eyes, she ground her heel down into the doll’s chest. CRACK. The fabric tore. The stuffing spilled out onto the floor, and the tiny voice chip was crushed into plastic dust. The gentle voice—”Don’t cry, my sweet…”—cut off mid-word. I froze. The sound was gone. The light was gone. The warmth was gone. The part of me that was capable of feeling joy withered and died in that exact second. Isabel looked at me, hollowed out and limp on the floor, and clapped her hands together. She turned to a tripod setup nearby, waving at the live broadcast stream on her phone. “See, girls? She’s nothing but a cheap toy. Wyatt really lost his mind—” Before she could finish, a deafening roar shook the villa. A helicopter was hovering dangerously low outside. Heavier than the wind, the grand double doors and the massive floor-to-ceiling glass panes shattered inward. Before the shards even touched the floor, a man covered in dried blood, his designer suit shredded with blade cuts, charged through the cloud of dust. Wyatt. The heiresses shrieked, scattering in terror. Isabel froze, then quickly tried to put on a worried face, stepping toward him. “Wyatt! You’re back! Oh my god, you’re bleeding! Who did this to you—” Wyatt didn’t look at her. His bloodshot eyes were locked entirely on the motionless, bloody figure in the center of the room. He shoved Isabel out of his way. He didn’t yell. He didn’t strike anyone. His legs shook violently as he walked toward me. And then, with a heavy, hollow sound, he fell to his knees. The master of a multi-billion-dollar empire, kneeling before a broken girl covered in blood and filth. With a trembling, bleeding hand, he reached behind his back and drew a silver utility knife. He pressed the blade directly against his own throat, right over the pulsing carotid artery. Wyatt looked up at me, his face drenched in tears. His body was shaking with uncontrollable tremors. He looked into my empty, hollow eyes, and forced his lips into a wide, terrifyingly distorted smile. “Please,” he whispered, his voice cracking. “Smile for me.” “Or… just kill me.” “I can’t… I can’t hold on anymore…”

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “465202”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

The day I turned thirteen, I finally got the call. A heart was waiting. A second chance at a life that had barely begun. But ten minutes before they were scheduled to wheel me into the operating room, the dream evaporated. A nurse walked in, her face pale, and told us the donor heart had been “requisitioned” for an emergency. The recipient was the only daughter of Chicago’s most powerful billionaire. I watched my parents fall to their knees, their spirits breaking right there on the sterile linoleum. They sobbed, pressing their foreheads to the floor. “If she doesn’t get that heart, our little girl will die!” my mother shrieked, her voice cracking under the weight of her desperation. “Please, we’ll do anything. Just give us back the heart!” I will never forget the way that billionaire couple looked down at us. It wasn’t just indifference; it was a quiet, chilling disgust. “Does a piece of gutter trash really compare to my precious daughter?” the woman said, adjusting her designer coat as if my family were nothing but a smudge on her sleeve. “If she dies, she dies. Stop making a scene.” I didn’t die. I clung to life on heavy experimental drugs for three agonizing months, dragging myself through the dark until, by some miracle, another heart became available. Twenty years later, I became the leading cardiothoracic surgeon in the country, specializing in complex heart transplants. And then, on a Tuesday afternoon, the hospital chief walked into my office, personally delivering an urgent surgical request. I looked at the signature on the consent form, and a slow smile crept over my face. I tossed the paperwork onto the desk. “I’m not taking this case,” I said. 1 The smile on Chief Baldwin’s face froze. “Grace, this is incredibly urgent,” he said, taking a step closer to my desk. “You know as well as I do that you’re the only surgeon in the country who has successfully performed this kind of redo-transplant with complex reconstruction.” I flipped open my schedule, not looking up. “My schedule for today is fully booked. If they want me to operate, tell them to get in line.” I was trying to give him a polite out, but Baldwin took it as a sign of flexibility. He leaned in, his voice taking on a desperate, pleading note. “We can hand off your later surgery to someone else! I’ll arrange it right now.” I raised my head, locking my eyes onto his. “Someone else? Who exactly do you plan to put on that case, Chief?” He choked on his words. He knew the answer. Everyone in the department knew. The surgery scheduled for this afternoon was one that only I could perform. But unlike the file on my desk, that one was a charity case. The patient was a nine-year-old boy named Jamie, who was suffering from end-stage dilated cardiomyopathy. He had survived on the transplant list for two agonizing years before a donor heart finally became available. But his father had recently died in a construction accident, and his mother, who ran a small food stall, couldn’t afford the exorbitant post-operative care fees. I had personally fought to get Jamie approved through our hospital’s charity care program. I felt a cold laugh bubble up in my chest. Twenty years had passed, and yet the world hadn’t changed a bit. The lives of the poor were still treated as currency to be traded away at a moment’s notice. Baldwin’s expression soured. He abandoned his gentle approach and threw his hands up. “You don’t understand who the patient is, Grace! She’s the only daughter of the Mercer family. Her mother’s family, the Kingsleys, have dominated Chicago for three generations. Their influence is absolute.” He leaned over my desk, tapping his finger on the mahogany. “Her father runs the largest medical capital conglomerate in the world. Half of our hospital’s research grants are funded directly by the Mercer Foundation!” I let out a sharp laugh. “So, because they have money, their lives are worth more?” Baldwin’s face flushed. “That is not what I meant.” “Then what did you mean?” I stood up, leaning forward until we were eye-to-eye. “On one hand, you have a child from a struggling family who has waited two years for a chance to live. On the other, you have a billionaire’s daughter. You didn’t even hesitate, Chief. You wanted me to toss that boy aside. Tell me, how much are they paying you?” “Dr. West!” Baldwin’s voice boomed, his face turning a deep crimson. “Watch your tongue! You are stepping way out of line.” I offered him a tight, humorless smile, sat back down, and pulled my afternoon charts toward me. I was finished talking. The silence in the office stretched, heavy and suffocating. Realizing anger wouldn’t work, Baldwin let out a long sigh and softened his tone. “Grace, you’re a smart woman. The Mercers have promised that if the surgery is successful, they will fully fund the expansion of our cardiac center next year. On top of that…” He held up five fingers. “They’re offering you five million dollars. Personally.” He paused, letting the number hang in the air. “They also have immense pull with the International Medical Association. I know you’ve been trying to get nominated for the Lifetime Achievement Award in Transplantation. A single phone call from Charles Mercer will do more for your career than ten years of grinding.” I listened quietly, finding a grim amusement in the irony of it all. Twenty years ago, they used their power to steal my heart. Twenty years later, they wanted to use their wealth to buy my hands and my conscience. “My answer is still no,” I said. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, Chief, I have a surgery to prepare for.” Baldwin’s chest heaved. He pointed a trembling finger at me, trying to find the words to curse me out, but ultimately slammed his hand on the desk, grabbed the folder, and stormed out. Through the heavy oak door, I could hear him apologizing profusely to someone waiting in the hallway. A few minutes later, the door flew open again. Baldwin rushed in, sweat slicking his forehead, and thrust his phone toward my face. “Dr. West, Mr. Mercer wants to speak with you directly.” A strange, dark curiosity washed over me. I took the phone and placed it to my ear. “Dr. West,” a smooth, baritone voice spoke from the receiver. “I know that adding a last-minute surgery is a massive imposition, but my daughter’s condition is critical. I must ask you—” Before he could finish, a sharp, piercing female voice drowned him out. “Why are you wasting your breath begging her? She’s just a doctor! Who does she think she is?!” 2 I narrowed my eyes. It was Katherine. Her voice was just as arrogant and razor-sharp as I remembered, dripping with an unearned superiority. It was the exact cadence of her mother’s voice from twenty years ago. I heard a rustle of clothing, and then Katherine’s voice came through clearly, as if she had snatched the phone from her husband’s hand. “I am ordering you to schedule my daughter’s surgery immediately! We are paying you to do a job. Don’t flatter yourself by thinking you have a choice!” I smiled. Leave it to the ultra-rich to demand a favor with a knife to your throat. When my parents had begged for my life, how had they acted? They had stripped away every shred of dignity they possessed. They had pressed their faces to the cold floor, begging for mercy. I still remembered the day my parents found out my donor heart had been given away. They ran through the hospital corridors, begging doctors, department heads, the previous chief—anyone who would listen. Finally, a sympathetic resident admitted that a VIP patient had pulled strings to redirect the organ. The hospital couldn’t fight them. My parents had blocked the operating room doors, weeping. “Please, Mrs. Kingsley… your daughter is stable. But if our girl doesn’t get this surgery, she won’t survive the week! We will work for your family for the rest of our lives. Just please, let her have the heart…” They begged until their foreheads bled against the floor. Katherine’s mother had simply pulled her designer skirt away from my mother’s grasping hands, looking at her with pure disgust. “Is a piece of gutter trash really comparable to my precious princess? If she dies, she dies. Stop making a scene.” Mr. Kingsley had stepped forward then, tossing a check onto my mother’s bleeding head. “You only have yourselves to blame,” he had said, his voice flat. “Your child was born to inherit your poverty and insignificance. Here is fifty thousand dollars. Take it, shut up, and accept your daughter’s fate.” My parents had torn the check to pieces. But I refused to accept that fate. I refused to let them have the satisfaction of my death. I fought the reaper every single day. A month later, after another massive heart failure, I lay in the ICU, surrounded by tubes, unable to even whisper. And then, I saw her. Katherine, looking healthy and radiant in a pink princess dress, stood outside the glass doors of my room. Her parents had taken her on a stroll around the ward before her discharge, specifically pausing to let her look at me. “Katherine, look closely,” her father had said, pointing at my gasping form. “This is what happens to the lower classes. You were born to be a princess. You never have to care about people like this. They don’t matter.” Katherine had tilted her head, her eyes wide and curious. “Daddy, why isn’t she dead yet?” I had carved that memory into my soul. It was the burning hatred for the Kingsley family that had kept me breathing when my lungs wanted to collapse. “Hello?! Are you listening to me?!” Katherine’s screeching voice pulled me back to the present. “Talking to people like you is such a chore. Zero manners.” I let out a soft, cold chuckle. “Mrs. Mercer. Is this how you ask someone to save your child’s life?” She laughed, a dry, mocking sound. “Ask? You think highly of yourself, Dr. West. You’re just a girl with a scalpel. The Mercers and the Kingsleys chose you because you’re supposed to be the best. You should be honored. We don’t actually need you.” “Is that so?” I replied, my voice dripping with honeyed malice. “If you’re so confident, Mrs. Mercer, I suggest you find someone else.” I hung up. I handed the phone back to Baldwin and gestured for him to leave my office. The truth was, they did need me. The specific redo-transplant their daughter required was a highly specialized procedure that only a handful of surgeons in the world could perform, and none of them were in the state. Furthermore, the girl’s cardiovascular system was too unstable to survive a long-distance flight, and flying an international specialist in would take months of bureaucratic approvals. They were out of time. For twenty years, I had dreamed of getting even with the family that had nearly killed me. I just never expected them to hand me the knife. 3 Predictably, three days later, I returned to my office after a consultation to find Katherine and her husband waiting for me. Charles Mercer stepped forward first, his demeanor far more polished than his wife’s. “Dr. West,” he began, offering a polite nod. “Please accept my apologies for my wife’s outburst the other day. She was distressed. I wanted to personally bring her here to apologize, and to see if we could find some common ground regarding our daughter’s surgery.” In the next instant, Katherine burst into tears. “Dr. West… I am so sorry,” she sobbed, clutching a lace handkerchief. “I was out of my mind with worry. My daughter is only eight years old. She is everything to us. Please, don’t let a mother’s foolish mistake cost an innocent child her life. I beg of you, save her…” She wept beautifully, her shoulders trembling. To anyone else, she would have looked like a desperate, loving mother. But I saw the truth. I saw the cold, calculated venom in her eyes when she lowered her handkerchief to wipe her face. I watched her performance with an icy calm. “Mrs. Mercer, the hospital has strict protocols. Every patient must wait their turn.” Katherine’s crying stopped instantly. “But my daughter doesn’t have time! She is in critical condition!” I nodded smoothly. “I understand. Every single patient under my care is in critical condition. If you want me to perform the surgery, please submit the standard paperwork, and my office will schedule you for the next available slot.” A shadow crossed Katherine’s face. She raised her voice, letting it carry out into the hallway. “Dr. West, are you really going to just stand there and watch a child die? Where is your medical ethics?!” I noticed a few people lingering outside my open door, whispering. Someone was holding up a phone, recording. A setup. They wanted to paint me as the villain. I didn’t flinch. I stepped closer to the doorway, ensuring my voice was loud and clear for the camera. “Your daughter is precious, Mrs. Mercer. But so is every other child in this hospital. You are asking me to violate protocol and push your daughter to the front of the line. What about the child whose spot she takes? Do they just die so yours can live?” I leaned in, staring directly into her eyes. “Or do you believe that because your daughter is a Mercer, her life is inherently more valuable than a normal family’s child? Do you believe ordinary children should step aside and die for yours?” The murmuring in the hallway shifted. The relatives of other patients waiting in the corridor began to glare at Katherine. This was the cardiothoracic unit. Almost everyone standing out there had a loved one clinging to life. The idea of a billionaire family using their wealth to cut the line didn’t sit well with them. The atmosphere grew incredibly tense. Charles Mercer’s polite smile vanished. He understood the public relations nightmare unfolding before him. If Katherine continued to push, she would essentially be admitting that the ultra-rich viewed the public as expendable. Charles quickly signaled his security detail. “Clear the hallway. No recordings.” The bodyguards immediately stepped out, shutting the door and pushing the onlookers back. Once the room was quiet, Charles took a deep breath, smoothing his tie and reassuming his gentlemanly facade. “Dr. West, you misunderstand. We have no intention of disrespecting other patients. If those are the hospital’s rules, we will respect them. We will find another way. Apologies for the intrusion.” He grabbed Katherine’s arm, pulling her toward the exit. Katherine looked as though she were about to explode. She whipped her head around, glaring at me with raw hatred. “You’ll regret this, West,” she spat. 4 I simply watched them leave, a small, cold smile playing on my lips. For once, the tables had turned. And I held all the cards. But the next morning, as I was scrubbing in for Jamie’s transplant, the head nurse stopped me. Her expression was deeply troubled. “Dr. West… Chief Baldwin needs you in the executive conference room immediately.” I frowned, holding my hands up. “The patient is prepped. We’re about to open.” She looked away, unable to meet my eyes. “The surgery has been put on hold.” I froze. When I pushed open the conference room doors, the room was packed. Chief Baldwin, the board of directors, the head of public relations, and legal counsel were all seated around the long table. Charles and Katherine sat at the far end, looking like the aggrieved parties. Baldwin slid a document across the table. Notice of Temporary Suspension of Clinical Privileges for Dr. Grace West. I flipped through the pages. I almost wanted to laugh. They had suspended me from all of my major upcoming surgeries, including Jamie’s charity transplant. Furthermore, my upcoming promotion to department chair, my international travel grants, and my federal research funding were all “indefinitely deferred.” I looked up. “On what grounds?” The PR director handed me a tablet. “See for yourself, Dr. West.” On the screen was a video from yesterday’s confrontation. It had been heavily edited. In this version, Katherine was sobbing, begging me to save her dying daughter, while I stood over her, looking cold, arrogant, and entirely unsympathetic. The headline was designed for maximum outrage: Genius Surgeon Refuses to Save Dying Eight-Year-Old: Tells Billionaire Family to ‘Wait in Line and Die.’ The comment section was a toxic wasteland of public anger. Who does this doctor think she is? Playing God? Emergency cases are supposed to take priority! She’s doing this out of spite. The Mercers were so polite, and she treated them like garbage. Strip her license! Baldwin sighed, a performative gesture of regret. “Grace, the public backlash is too severe. The hospital has to protect its reputation. We had no choice but to suspend you.” He paused, glancing at the Mercers. “But… there is a way to resolve this.” Charles Mercer sat in silence, his expression smug and victorious. Katherine, playing her part, wiped a tear from her eye. “Dr. West… I don’t know why you harbor so much resentment toward me,” she whispered. “But if you agree to perform the surgery on my daughter, we will release a statement clearing your name. We will make this all go away.” The board members immediately began to chime in. “Grace, just take the deal.” “A doctor’s duty is to save lives, after all.” “Think of the child.” “This is the best outcome for everyone.” Their words were empty, wrapped in a thin veneer of morality. They wanted me to bow down, to believe that my defiance was a failure of character. I smiled. I stood up and walked slowly toward Katherine. I reached into the pocket of my white coat and pulled out a red surgical marker. Katherine flinched, her eyes darting to the pen. “What are you doing?” I leaned down, pressing the tip of the marker directly over her left breast, right where her heart was beating. “Does it beat well, Katherine? The heart you’re wearing?” I whispered, my voice cutting through the room like dry ice. “How could the girl whose heart you stole twenty years ago ever look at you with anything but hatred?”

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “465201”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

I had spent two grueling months running myself ragged on these godforsaken missions. And there I was, sitting in the velvet shadows of a private VIP lounge, slipping a six-carat diamond proposal ring onto my finger for the eighth time. I smiled to myself, thinking, This is it. I’ve got these boys wrapped around my finger. Easy money. But when I pulled up the system interface, the progress bar was sitting at a flat, mocking zero percent. I completely lost my mind. I mass-texted all eight love interests at once: Is your love even real, or is it just a copy-paste job? You don’t care about me at all! That very night, a pair of strong hands pressed a chloroform-soaked cloth over my face. I blacked out, waking up locked in a pitch-black room. Beside me, a man loomed in the darkness, his jaw clenched, his voice dripping with venom. “Baby,” he growled, “you let me propose to you eight times. I thought it was some kind of twisted foreplay. I had no idea you were just face-blind.” Adam Peterson wrapped his arms around my waist, his breath hot against my skin. “You can’t tell us apart with our clothes on? Fine. Let’s see if you recognize me with them off.” 01 In the lightless bedroom, Adam’s lips slammed onto mine. My brain stalled. The only thing registering in my vision was the pale, sculpted curve of his abdominal muscles shifting in the dark. Adam seemed entirely out of patience. He buried his face in the crook of my neck, his teeth grazing my skin in a sharp, possessive bite. “Do you see me now? Do you know who I am?” His voice carried a dangerous, upward tilt at the end, his eyes flashing with raw irritation. My focus was completely shattered. I couldn’t even form words. I tried to roll over and bolt, but Adam let out a low hum, hooking his fingers around my ankle and dragging me back under him. He pinned me down, a solid, immovable weight. Panic clawed its way up my throat. This wasn’t supposed to happen. This was supposed to be a cozy, reverse-harem dating sim where I was the pampered main character. How the hell did I end up in a dark, obsessive captivity novel? Just two months ago, I was standing on the rooftop of my office building, screaming curses at my boss after he denied my raise. In my blind fury, I took a step too far and tumbled off the edge. When I woke up, a cold, mechanical System informed me it had saved my life—for a price. “Host,” the voice had droned in my head, “because the original protagonist was incompetent and failed her missions, you have been brought in as the stabilizer. You must successfully capture the hearts of this world’s eight male leads before you can return to reality.” At the time, my heart skipped a beat. Did “success” mean early retirement, unlimited wealth, and getting rid of an annoying boss forever? With visions of a billion-dollar payout dancing in my head, I readily agreed. And so, for two months, I threw myself into the role of a professional siren. Every single day was a blur of outfit changes, sweet-talking, shifting venues, and more sweet-talking. It was a non-stop, exhausting cycle. To be fair, at first, it felt like playing a real-life otome game. It was actually kind of fun. But after two solid months of it, my brain was completely fried. I couldn’t even remember the names of the eight male leads. I could barely distinguish them by their personal styles, and I almost called them by the wrong names multiple times. Eventually, I gave up trying to keep track and just called every single one of them “Babe.” They were all incredibly sweet, wildly clingy, and practically threw money at me. Within a month, I was dripping in Prada and driving a custom Lamborghini. I secretly congratulated myself on being a natural-born player. Riding that high, I decided to push for the finish line and drop hints about marriage. The boys took the bait beautifully. Each one of them bought a massive, glittering rock and dropped to one knee to propose. When I got home that night, my smile was practically splitting my face. The mission was as good as done, and I had walked away with eight priceless diamond rings. Licking my lips in anticipation, I opened the system interface to check my progress. And saw that big, fat, humiliating zero. 02 I deflated like a popped balloon, collapsing onto the sofa and glaring at my phone screen as I typed out the angry text to all eight of them: Is the rock-sized diamond a copy-paste job? Is your love just a template too? Your affection is completely fake! Careful as ever, I staggered the sending times. Even in my fury, I was a professional. I had to make sure the messages didn’t arrive at the exact same moment. But God, it hurt. I had worked so hard, and these useless men hadn’t given me a single point of genuine affection. Disgusting. I took a few deep breaths and immediately went to my closet to pull out the ultra-sexy dress the System had rewarded me with. Its item description claimed it boosted my charisma by eighteen points. That evening, I squeezed into the dress and scheduled a date with one of the male leads at a quiet, upscale bar. Yes, I was a coward who accepted defeat quickly, ready to drag myself back to the grindstone and try again. I stared at the prompt on the system screen: Invite any male lead to a quiet bar. Initiate physical contact to deepen his impression of you. Recommended steps: hand-holding, playing intimate games. I sighed. I had done this exact routine dozens of times over the past two months. Even if they weren’t tired of it, I was. Sure enough, the elegant, aloof heir sitting across from me looked thoroughly confused. “Sweetheart,” he said, his brow furrowing slightly, “isn’t this the exact same game we played when we first met?” “Why do you suddenly want to play it again…?” I forced a bright, celebrity-grade smile, burying the urge to roll my eyes. Why? Because of you hypocritical bastards, that’s why! I sneaked a glance at the subtle contour of his chest muscles beneath his shirt. Well, for the sake of those abs, I could play nice. I fluttered my false eyelashes, keeping my expression sweet and sincere. “I stayed up all night thinking about us,” I lied smoothly. “It feels like we’re moving way too fast.” “A guy as amazing as you shouldn’t be pressured into a proposal so quickly. So, I was thinking… what if we start over?” I reached across the table and took his hand, looking up at him like a devout worshiper. “Let’s act like we just met today. We can take our time~” The man’s gaze darkened slightly. The denim jacket he wore pulled tight across his shoulders as he leaned back heavily into his chair. I got the distinct feeling he was angry, though I couldn’t fathom why. Don’t men hate commitment and prefer strings-free fun? He remained silent for a long moment, slowly pulling out a cigarette. “Excuse me for a moment, baby.” With that, he headed toward the restrooms. I vented my frustration by aggressively eating all the desserts on the table, muttering under my breath, “Hmph, who does he think he is, catching an attitude? I’m the one who should be mad here!” “None of you actually love me, yet you all put on this devoted act. Hypocrites, the lot of you!” As I was cursing them, a pair of large hands suddenly clamped over my mouth from behind. Before I could scream, the world went black, just like a scene from a horror movie. The memory faded, and reality rushed back as Adam suddenly pinned me against the headboard. My wrists were bound tightly above my head, leaving me completely helpless. His fingers slowly traced down from my temple, lingering on my lips. He leaned down, his kiss so fierce and desperate it nearly stole the air from my lungs. “I’m Adam,” he whispered, his voice trembling with a dark edge. “Remember it.” I nodded numbly. I knew from experience that if I didn’t answer him correctly in a few minutes, he would find a highly creative way to punish me. The heat of our bodies and the slick sheen of sweat mingled in the dim light. I looked up into his eyes, which were dilated with naked obsession. As I marvelled at his sheer stamina, a terrible realization slowly dawned on me. I had caught a glimpse of the wall clock a moment ago. It was exactly 9:30 PM. The exact time I had scheduled my first angry mass-text to go out. The messages were set to send in five-minute intervals. Five of those targets would be receiving them right about now. Right on cue, my phone on the nightstand lit up with an incoming text alert. But that wasn’t all. Inside the closed nightstand drawer, several other distinct notification chimes began to ring in rapid succession. My pupils dilated as the pieces fell into place. Beside me, Adam let out a dark, mocking laugh, his jaw tight. “Baby,” he growled, “you had me propose to you eight times. I thought it was some kinky roleplay. I didn’t realize you were just face-blind.” He slid his hand down to my waist, his grip tightening until it bruised. “Did you really think a change of clothes meant a change of person?” “You can’t tell us apart with our clothes on? Fine. Let’s see if you recognize me with them off.” Oh, dear God. My mind reeled. I hadn’t seduced eight different men. I had seduced the same man in eight different outfits! I stared at Adam’s ridiculously handsome face, so angry I couldn’t breathe. I lunged forward, scratching at his back and screaming, “You absolute bastard! Why do you have to be so versatile? You completely tricked me!” “How is one person allowed to be a tech CEO, an investment mogul, and a brand ambassador all at the same time?! You set me up!” An amused smile played at the corner of Adam’s lips as he pressed his face against mine, murmuring, “I thought you liked the multiple personas, so I gave you a new one every time.” “Besides, is it a crime to model for my own companies?” I gasped for air, absolutely livid. “Conceited jerk,” I hissed. Adam seemed to enjoy the insult. He pulled the comforter over us, wrapping his arms tightly around my waist. Terrified that he would start another round, I quickly squeezed my eyes shut and pretended to fall asleep. Seeing that I was genuinely exhausted, he finally relented. He quietly reached down to massage my aching lower back. I fought the urge to kick him out of bed and screamed for the System in my head. System! Get out here right now! If Adam Peterson isn’t one of my targets, who the hell is he? The System’s voice echoed in my mind, cold and entirely devoid of empathy: Host, Adam Peterson is the ultimate villain of this world. … My mind shrieked in horror: Why didn’t you warn me about something this important?! Do you have any idea how much time I wasted on him?!

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “465200”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

It was the third year since Talia’s borderline personality disorder had clawed its way back to the surface. And it was the third time she had put me in a hospital bed. When I finally drifted awake in the sterile, white room, the space beside my bed was empty. A familiar, cold spike of anxiety shot through my chest. I scrambled out of bed, my limbs heavy and trembling, and limped out into the corridor to find her. Instead, as I approached the heavy fire doors of the stairwell, I heard a voice. It was Cody, my best friend, his tone low but vibrating with a suppressed, furious roar. “You almost choked him to death, Talia! Do you even realize what you did?” A heavy silence followed, thick and suffocating. “The first time you spiraled, you shattered his left ankle,” Cody continued, his voice cracking with emotion. “He’ll never run again because of you. The second time, you scalded his hands so badly he can barely hold a pencil. And now, this? You almost took his life!” “Why won’t you just divorce him? Why won’t you let him go?” I crept closer, my breath catching in my throat. Through the narrow pane of the reinforced glass, I watched them. Talia didn’t answer with words. Instead, she leaned in, her movements desperate and starved, and pressed her lips against Cody’s. It was a long, agonizing kiss. When she finally pulled back, her face was a mask of torture. “You know what this disease does to me,” she whispered, her voice trembling. “It only destroys the people closest to me. If I divorce him and marry you… I’ll just end up hurting you, Codes. I can’t do that to you.” “I just can’t…” The blood in my veins turned to ice. I stood frozen in the hallway, the sterile smell of bleach suddenly making me violently ill. Right then, my phone vibrated in my hand. It was a FaceTime call from an unknown number. Mechanically, my thumb swiped the screen. The face that appeared on the screen made my breath hitch. It was Talia. But not the Talia in the stairwell—this was Talia at eighteen, her eyes bright, her face free of the heavy, manic shadow that would later consume her. “I’m the eighteen-year-old Talia, the one who finally got cured,” the girl on the screen said, her voice bubbling with a sweet, youthful hope. “You’re twenty-eight-year-old Jesse, right? Tell me, did we get married? Do we have kids?” “And Cody… that annoying shadow of a best friend, he didn’t keep ruining our dates, did he?” A sharp, physical pain bloomed in my chest. Slowly, silently, I angled the phone’s camera toward the glass window of the stairwell. “See for yourself,” I whispered. … Talia’s eyes were filled with a burning, desperate intensity as she looked at Cody. “Three years ago, when I relapsed for the first time… it was because I saw you accept a drink from another woman at our wedding reception,” she confessed, her voice hollow. “I didn’t want to hurt you. So I had to take it out on Jesse.” My hand tightened around the phone, the metal casing digging into my palm. I remembered our wedding night. Talia had spent it huddled in the dark corner of our bedroom, staring at me like a predator cornering a rabbit. She had picked up a heavy wooden chair and hurled it at my shins, her eyes wild and bloodshot. “If I break your legs, you’ll never be able to run away from me, will you?” she had screamed. I had blacked out from the sheer agony. When I woke up, there was a steel rod holding my left tibia together. My athletic career, my scholarships—gone in an instant. And only now did I learn the truth. I had spent seven years helping Talia manage the illness she thought she had beaten at eighteen. But all it took was Cody showing a little warmth to someone else for the madness to drag her back under. Cody turned his face away, tears spilling over his eyelashes. Talia reached out, her fingers trembling as she cupped his jaw, forcing him to look at her. “The second time I snapped… it was because you wrote a birthday card to a female colleague. What was I supposed to do? I had to find Jesse. I had to let it out.” The color drained from my face. My whole body began to shudder. After losing my athletic career, I had tried to rebuild myself, teaching myself digital design. I remembered the afternoon I had finally finished a major portfolio piece for a client. I had been so proud. Talia had walked into the study, carrying a kettle of boiling water. Without a word, she had poured it over my hands. “You’re working so hard,” she had whispered as I screamed in agony. “Are you trying to build a life without me? Just let me take care of you. Stay here.” Though she had panicked and driven me to the emergency room herself, the third-degree burns had already done their damage. My fingers were permanently stiffened. Even holding a stylus was an exercise in frustration. Cody shook his head desperately, trying to pull away from her touch. “Stop… please, Talia, just stop…” But she wouldn’t. “And this time? You texted me saying you were leaving the country. You were going to cut me out of your life forever.” I stumbled backward, my shoulder hitting the wall. Last night, I had spent hours cooking a beautiful dinner, waiting to celebrate her twenty-eighth birthday. She had burst through the door, her face dark with fury. “You made all this food, put on this little show… is this your grand farewell?” she had hissed. “You’re never leaving me.” She hadn’t listened to a single word of explanation. She had dragged me from my chair, slapped me repeatedly until my face was numb and swollen, and then wrapped her hands around my throat. Just before the darkness took me, I had seen Cody burst through the door, sinking his teeth into her arm to pull her off me. For years, I had blamed myself. I thought my own inadequacies, my obsession with my work, had triggered her anxiety. But it had never been about me. Every single time she broke me, it was because of Cody. Cody was sobbing openly now. “I give up. I won’t leave. I’ll stay. Just… please don’t hurt Jesse anymore.” On my phone screen, the eighteen-year-old Talia’s eyes had gone completely wild. Tears of rage and horror streamed down her youthful face. “I’m going to kill them,” she hissed, her voice a terrifying whisper through the speaker. “How could they do this to you? How could I do this to you?” I let out a weak, broken laugh, leaning my head against the cold wall. “Don’t,” I whispered to the screen. “I don’t want revenge. I just want the eighteen-year-old you… to let the eighteen-year-old me go.” The young Talia froze. Her lips parted, trying to form words, but only a desperate sob came out. “Wait for me,” she finally managed, her voice cracking. “I won’t let anyone hurt you again. Not even myself.” The screen went black. I dragged myself back to my hospital room, feeling like a ghost inhabiting a broken shell. A few minutes later, Cody walked in, his eyes red and swollen. Seeing me awake, he rushed to my bedside, his hands hovering over my bandaged neck. “Jesse, you’re awake,” he breathed, trying to look into my eyes. “I… I gave her a piece of my mind. She won’t lay a hand on you again.” I flinched away from his touch, staring blankly at the ceiling. “You told me last week you were moving to Chicago. When’s your flight?” In the corner of the room, Talia, who had been quietly peeling an apple, froze. The paring knife nicked her finger, but she didn’t seem to notice the blood dripping onto the fruit. Cody’s smile turned stiff. “I’m not going anymore. Not with Talia in this state.” When he saw me frown, he quickly added, “Jesse, we’ve been brothers since we were kids. I’ve always had your back. If I leave, who’s going to protect you from her?” Looking at his tear-stained, earnest face, I felt a sick sense of wonder. How had he kept up this lie? They had been sleeping together behind my back for at least five years. My mind drifted back to the first day I met Talia. She had been huddled on the curb, bruised and crying after her stepfather kicked her out. I had stolen my dad’s first-aid kit to clean her scrapes. I had brought her into my home, shared my life with her. And in return, her attachment to me had grown into something suffocating. When we were kids, if I accepted a candy bar from another classmate, she would bite my arm until it bled. In high school, if I whispered to a female lab partner, she would drive a pencil into my palm. Once, she had even held a small pocketknife to my ribs, forcing me to let her scratch her initials into my hip. And every time she crossed the line, Cody would step in. He would scream at her, fight her, put himself between us. He had always been my protector. “She’s out of her mind, Jesse! She’s a psycho!” he would tell me. And Talia, after every episode, would dissolve into a puddle of weeping remorse. “Jesse, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to. I’m just so scared you’re going to leave me like everyone else did.” When we graduated high school, I had stolen money from my parents’ safe to take her to a private therapist. That was when we first heard the words: Borderline Personality Disorder. My parents had found out about the money and beaten me within an inch of my life. I remembered Talia kneeling beside me, her hands hovering over the welts on my back, weeping because she was too afraid to touch me. “Jesse… you’re the only person in the world who truly loves me,” she had sobbed. “I believe you now. You’ll never leave me.” After that, her symptoms seemed to vanish. We went to college together. She worked herself to the bone to build a successful career, desperate to prove to my parents that she was worthy of me. Three years ago, we got married. And on our wedding night, the nightmare started all over again. Cody had arrived at the hospital back then, silent and pale, staying by my side until I was discharged. I had thought he was just being a loyal friend. But now I understood. I was the anchor that kept her stable, and Cody was the tempest that tore her apart. I took a deep, agonizing breath. I looked directly at Cody and let out a cold, humorless laugh. “You don’t need to worry about protecting me anymore,” I said. “I’m divorcing her.” Talia stiffened. The paring knife clattered against the linoleum floor. “Divorce?” she whispered, her voice dangerously quiet. “You want to leave me? Just because of one bad night?” If we were eighteen, Cody would have jumped for joy, telling me I had finally gained some sense. But now, he only looked at me with a heavy, patronizing sigh. “Jesse, don’t talk in anger,” Cody said softly. “You two have been through hell and back for a decade. You can’t just throw that away. She only lost control because she was terrified of losing you. Tell you what—I’ll move into your guest room. I’ll help you keep an eye on her.” I pushed his hands away, a wave of pure disgust washing over me. “She almost killed me, Cody! If one of us has to die for this marriage to work, why does it have to be me?” Talia’s face darkened, the violent, erratic energy rolling off her in waves. She forced a tight, chilling smile and handed me the blood-speckled apple. “But you’re still breathing, aren’t you? You’ve survived worse. Don’t be so dramatic.” “Dramatic?” I threw the apple against the wall, where it shattered into wet pieces. Before they could stop me, I ripped open my hospital gown, exposing my chest and torso. “Look at me, Talia! Look at my arms, my legs, my ribs! Is there a single inch of my skin that doesn’t carry a scar from one of your ‘episodes’?” “I gave you everything. And what did you give me?” For a second, she looked at my ruined body, and a flicker of something close to disgust crossed her face. My voice cracked, tears finally spilling over. “I’m done. We’re divorcing. If you don’t sign the papers, I’ll let my lawyer handle it.” Talia slammed her fist into the drywall, leaving a dent. She took a step toward my bed, but Cody jumped in, his face pale as he pushed her back toward the door. “Get out,” Cody told her, his voice tight. “Let me talk to him first.” Once the door clicked shut behind her, Cody let out a long breath and turned to me. “Jesse, before you married her, I asked you if you were sure. You swore to me, on your life, that you would protect her forever…” “When did it start?” I interrupted, my voice barely a whisper. He froze. “What?” I looked him dead in the eye. “Was it after college, when you suddenly turned down that stable state job your dad got you, just to move to our city? Or was it when we were getting my tux fitted, and Talia insisted you try one on too?” The color drained from his face. “You… you know?” his voice shook, the self-righteous anger vanishing instantly. “Jesse, I… I did it to protect you. After high school, I went to the same college just to make sure she wouldn’t hurt you again. We were always together, the three of us. And then, graduation night… we both got so drunk, and it just… happened.” He bit his lip until it bled. “But I’ve been in agony, Jesse! Every single day for the past three years, I wanted to end it. But Talia…” The betrayal felt like a physical blade twisting in my chest. I grabbed my pillow and hurled it at his face. “Get out!” I screamed, my voice breaking. “Get the hell away from me! Don’t you ever look at me again!” Cody choked back a sob, turned on his heel, and ran out of the room. I lay back, chest heaving, staring at the ceiling as the silence of the room closed in on me. A text buzzed on my phone. It was from the unknown number again. “Almost there… just hold on a little longer, Jesse. You’re going to be free soon.” I closed my eyes, my head throbbing with a brutal, blinding pain. Suddenly, a violent force grabbed my wrist. Before I could process it, I was dragged off the bed and slammed onto the hard floor. A sickening crack echoed through the room as my left leg—the one with the steel rod—twisted unnaturally. White-hot agony flared through my body. I looked up, gasping for air through the sweat dripping into my eyes, and saw Talia. Her eyes were completely black with rage. “What did you say to Cody, Jesse?” Ignoring my screams, she grabbed my collar and began dragging me down the hall. My elbows and knees banged violently against the metal doorframes, then against the concrete steps of the stairwell as she hauled me upward. By the time she threw me onto the gravel of the hospital rooftop, I was barely conscious. I forced my eyes open. Cody was standing at the very edge of the roof, his back to the drop. He looked down at my bruised, shivering form and screamed at Talia. “How could you do this to him? You promised me you’d never lay a hand on him again!” Cody turned to me, his eyes filled with a desperate, tragic guilt. “Jesse… I’m sorry. I ruined everything. I’ll give her back to you now. I’ll make it right.” I let out a bloody, bitter spit onto the gravel. “Is this a joke to you, Cody? Are you trying to play the tragic hero now? I treated you like a brother, and you crawled into my wife’s bed. Now you want me to bless your drama?” Talia glared at me, her chest heaving. “Shut up! Jesse, you’re the one who should feel guilty! If you hadn’t forced your way into my life, if you hadn’t taken the title of my husband, he wouldn’t be like this! He’s been depressed for years because of us!” She grabbed me by my torn gown and shoved me toward the ledge, right next to Cody. “If you can’t convince him to step down, then you can go down with him!” I lost my footing, my bad leg giving out. The cold night air rushed past my back as I began to tilt over the edge. But just as gravity took hold, a small, incredibly strong hand clamped onto my forearm. “I’ve got you,” a voice gasped. I was violently pulled back onto the gravel. I looked up, panting, and froze. Standing there, holding my arm, was the eighteen-year-old Talia. She was breathing heavily, wearing the vintage denim jacket I remembered from high school. I looked over at the twenty-eight-year-old Talia and Cody. To my horror, their bodies were beginning to flicker. They were turning translucent, like fading ink on wet paper. “What… what is happening?” Cody gasped, looking down at his hands as they began to dissolve into the night air. I looked at the young girl beside me. “What did you do?”

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “465199”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

Five years. Five years of loving him, and I still hadn’t managed to get a marriage license with my fiancé. Gavin lived his life by a transaction. He called it his “Relationship Points System.” Five points bought a hug. Ten points bought a kiss. A hundred points bought a night in his bed. And a marriage license? That required one hundred thousand points. To reach that impossible number, to finally become his wife, I spent years catering to everyone in the Pierce family, swallowing my pride to earn every single point. Finally, on our fifth anniversary, I hit the milestone. One hundred thousand points. But when I found Gavin, practically vibrating with excitement, his face was like stone. “Daisy, I can’t marry you,” he said, his voice devoid of warmth. “Cynthia reached her goal before you did. I have to keep my word.” Cynthia, my best friend, stood beside him with an innocent, wide-eyed smile as she pressed a gold-embossed invitation into my hand. “Daisy, we always promised we’d be each other’s maid of honor. You have to come!” She tilted her head, looking so sweet. “I was honestly just playing along. I never expected to hit ten points so quickly.” I stood frozen, the world tilting on its axis. “Ten points? What do you mean ten points? Why…” Gavin cut me off, cold and dismissive. “Her rules were different from yours.” He said it so casually, as if he were discussing a minor change in a corporate contract. “The system doesn’t stop here, Daisy. Once you earn another hundred thousand points, I’ll divorce her and give you another chance to pursue me.” I slowly shook my head, a hollow, self-deprecating laugh slipping from my throat. “I won’t be attending the wedding,” I whispered. “Keep the hundred thousand points. Consider it my wedding gift.” … Gavin let out a soft, amused sigh, reaching out to ruffle my hair the way he always did when he thought I was being difficult. “Alright, don’t be childish,” he said. “I’ll give you a goodnight kiss tonight. No points deducted.” I flinched, stepping out of his reach. Gavin’s brow furrowed, a flicker of irritation crossing his face. Cynthia laughed, stepping forward to slip her arm through mine in a show of cheap affection. “Oh, Daisy’s just teasing. She’d never break a promise to me. Right, Daisy?” She nudged my shoulder, her eyes sparkling with a venomous sweetness. A bitter ache blossomed in my chest. I stared at her, searching the face of the girl I thought I knew. “Right,” I whispered. All my life, I had never said no to Cynthia. She was my only friend. My lifeline. Back in middle school, when the entire class ostracized me, locking me in bathroom stalls and screaming slurs at me, Cynthia was the only one who stood in front of me. She had absorbed their blows so I wouldn’t have to. Cynthia squealed, clapping her hands. “I knew you wouldn’t let me down!” Gavin exhaled, his shoulders relaxing. He looked at me, his voice returning to that smooth, patronizing warmth. “I hate that it had to be this way, Daisy. But a man has to keep his word. You’ve always been so mature, so understanding. You’re not going to hold this against us, are you?” Before I could even swallow the lump in my throat, Gavin leaned down and pressed his lips to Cynthia’s. A single kiss. Something I had to hoard five hard-earned points to receive. And he gave it to her for free, without her even asking. The kiss deepened. His hands slid down to cup her waist, while she slid her arms around his neck, pulling herself flush against him. They melted into each other, completely forgetting I was standing right there in the entryway. My nose stung, tears blurring my vision before I forced them back. Clutching the fabric of my skirt, I turned to slip away, to find any corner where I could breathe. “Daisy!” Cynthia’s voice cut through the quiet. She peeked over Gavin’s shoulder, her cheeks flushed, her lips slightly swollen. “Hey, we’re out of condoms. Do you mind running down to the drugstore to grab some?” I froze. She blinked, as if suddenly remembering something, and reached into her purse to pull out a small sticker. “Oh, silly me. I forgot. This counts as a chore, which means you get a point, right?” She stepped close and slapped the tiny sticker right onto my forehead. “There. Now can you go?” In the reflection of the full-length mirror by the door, I saw myself. My nose was red, my eyes brimming with unshed tears, and stuck firmly to my forehead was a bright red “+1” sticker. I looked pathetic. An absolute joke. A clown in my own tragedy. Gavin glanced at me, a brief shadow of guilt crossing his features. “Cynthia, let her be. I think we have some in the drawer.” Cynthia giggled, kissing his jawline and gently pushing him toward the hallway. “Go take a shower first, babe. I want to chat with Daisy for a minute.” Gavin hesitated for a fraction of a second, then turned and walked toward the bedroom. Cynthia dragged my numb body over to the sofa. She pulled up her iPad, tapping open a gallery of wedding dresses. “Daisy, you have the best taste. Help me choose a dress.” She pointed to a stunning, low-backed silk gown. “What do you think of this one?” I stared at the screen. It was a Vera Wang. My favorite designer. Every time we went window shopping, I would drag her to the boutique display and whisper, “Cynthia, one day I’m going to wear a Vera Wang when I marry Gavin. And you’re going to be my maid of honor.” Back then, she would roll her eyes and laugh at how naive I was. “I don’t know what kind of spell Gavin has you under to make you agree to that ridiculous points system.” Cynthia’s voice shattered the memory, dripping with casual arrogance. “Oh, actually, I forgot to mention—I’m pregnant. So this fitted style probably won’t work.” My blood ran cold. I stared at her, my skin turning paper-white. “Why?” I choked out. Cynthia let out a sharp, mocking laugh. “Oh, sweet Daisy. What do you mean ‘why’? We didn’t use protection, so I got pregnant. It’s basic biology.” She traced a finger slowly over her bottom lip. “Actually, the first time Gavin and I did it… was right here. On this very spot where you’re sitting.” My entire body locked up. “Remember that day you asked why I was limping, and I told you I tripped?” Cynthia smiled, leaning closer. “It wasn’t a fall. Gavin was just so rough with me that my legs gave out. I could barely stand.” Watching her lips move, hearing the words spill from her mouth, a wave of violent, bone-deep nausea hit me. I violently pushed her away, stumbled blindly into the bathroom, and collapsed over the toilet, retching until my throat burned. I splashed freezing water over my face and looked up. The mirror reflected a ghost—pale, hollow-eyed, trembling. Memories crashed over me in a suffocating wave. I remembered that day. I had noticed her limping and spent the entire afternoon brewing a bone broth to help her heal, thinking she had hurt herself. When Gavin saw what I did, he had smiled and credited my account with a hundred points. He had stroked my hair so gently. “You’re such a good girl, Daisy.” I had practically leaped for joy. A hundred points! It brought me so much closer to being his wife. I had blushed like an idiot, teasing him: “Are you just giving me points because you can’t wait to marry me, Gavin?” What I hadn’t seen—what I had been too blind to notice—was the knowing, mocking look he and Cynthia had exchanged right over my head. Cynthia sauntered into the bathroom, leaning against the doorframe as she watched me struggle to breathe. “You okay, Daisy?” I wiped my mouth, turning to look her dead in the eye. “Why, Cynthia? Why are you doing this to me?” She blinked, and then she giggled. “Oh, Daisy. Because I wanted him.” She tilted her head, her expression a horrific blend of innocence and malice. “Think about it. Since we were kids, whenever I wanted something of yours, you always just gave it to me, didn’t you? Your dolls, your stationery set, that vintage dress you loved… why should this be any different? Are you suddenly getting greedy?” Tears finally broke through, scalding my cheeks. “Gavin isn’t a doll, Cynthia! He’s a human being! He’s not something you can just take!” My voice cracked, raw with agony. “I loved him. I loved him for five years!” I had built my entire existence around him. For five years, I counted every single point, dreaming of the day we’d finally stand at the altar. I treasured every hug, treated every kiss like a rare, precious gift. To me, Gavin was everything. After my parents died, he became my protector, my family, the anchor that filled the hollow ache in my chest. When I was sick, he would cancel multi-million dollar board meetings just to sit by my bedside. Once, when a sleazy investor tried to force me to drink with him, Gavin had thrown the wine right in the man’s face, pulling me out of the room by my wrist. “I swear to God, Daisy,” he had said, his eyes blazing, “I will never let anyone make you feel small again.” I believed him. I believed he was the one person in this world who would never break me. Cynthia sighed, a flicker of boredom crossing her face. “Daisy, you always say you love Gavin, and you love me. The two people you love most are together now. Shouldn’t you be happy for us?” The sheer absurdity of her words shattered something inside me. With a raw scream, I swept my arm across the vanity, sending the glass perfume bottles and jars crashing to the tile floor. “No, I am not happy!” I shrieked. Cynthia flinched, stepping back in genuine shock. Tears blinded me as I stood there, ignoring the sharp pain of glass slicing into my palm. Warm, dark blood began to drip from my fingertips, staining the pristine white tiles. Hearing the crash, Gavin rushed in, a silk robe thrown hastily over his shoulders. He froze when he saw the blood. “Daisy! What happened?” He stepped forward, reaching out to grab my wrist to inspect the cut. I violently twisted away. My eyes caught the faint, red scratch marks on his exposed collarbone, and my chest felt like it was imploding. “How much does this concern cost, Gavin?” I choked out, my voice trembling violently as I cradled my bleeding hand. “How many points do I have to pay to get you to care? Can I even afford it anymore?” Gavin’s face darkened, the concern instantly hardening into defensiveness. “Are you seriously blaming me for this, Daisy?” He let out a heavy, frustrated sigh, his tone shifting to that familiar blend of exhaustion and disappointment. “You have no idea how badly I wanted to marry you.” “Why couldn’t you have just worked a little harder? If you had, you would have won!” He rubbed his temples, pacing the small bathroom. “The points system was the only way I could protect you, the only way I could justify marrying you to my family! You didn’t push hard enough.” He stepped closer, his voice rising. “Did you ever stop to think about the pressure I was under? Do you think the board at Pierce Enterprises would ever let me marry an orphan with absolutely no family background or status? You’re being incredibly selfish, Daisy!” “Besides, Cynthia is your best friend. If she and I are married, the three of us can be together forever. Isn’t that the perfect solution?” I stared at him, my entire body shaking with a profound, terrifying disgust. “Do you even hear yourself, Gavin?” my voice was barely a whisper. “You want me to be your dirty little secret? Your mistress? A pet that you and your wife share?” A flash of shame flickered in his eyes, but he quickly covered it with anger. “Don’t make it sound so cheap!” he snapped. “I told you, once you earn another hundred thousand points, we’ll have our chance again!” I looked at him, truly looked at him, and realized I was staring at a stranger. “You are a monster, Gavin,” I spat, the words tasting like poison. “Move. Get out of my way. I’m going home.” Gavin let out a cold, sharp laugh. “Home? What home, Daisy?” Behind him, Cynthia let out a soft, mocking snicker. She stepped up, pretending to soothe me as she laid a hand on my shoulder. “Come on, Daisy, stop making a scene. Gavin is right. Ever since your parents died, you lived with my family. And after graduation, you moved straight in here. Where else would you go? You don’t have a home of your own.” The memories of the crash hit me like a physical blow. The smell of burning rubber, the screech of metal, my parents using their own bodies to shield me as the car crumpled around us. Don’t be scared, sweetie. Mommy and Daddy are right here… I had watched their blood pool around my feet, unable to move, unable to save them. A second later, the tank blew, and the world dissolved into a roaring furnace of orange flame. Since that day, the concept of “home” had been an empty word. It was Cynthia who had held my hand at the funeral, Cynthia who had brought me into her house and whispered, “I’m your family now, Daisy. I’m never leaving you.” I collapsed onto the cold bathroom floor, curling into myself as the panic attack clawed at my chest. I couldn’t breathe. The air in my lungs felt like fire. Gavin watched me sink, and for a fleeting second, genuine worry flickered in his eyes. But Cynthia gently caught his arm, her voice light and dismissive. “Don’t fall for it, Gavin. She always plays the victim when she doesn’t get her way. She’s been doing this since we were kids to make me look bad. I’m sick of her little performances.” Gavin stopped. He looked down at me, his expression hardening back into that cold, detached mask. “Get yourself under control,” he said quietly. He took Cynthia’s hand and began walking back toward the bedroom, throwing one last sentence over his shoulder. “You’re not a child anymore, Daisy. Crying and throwing tantrums won’t solve anything.” I lay curled on the floor, the silent tears burning my eyes. I lost track of time. Minutes or hours could have passed before the silence of the apartment was punctured by a sound that made my stomach turn. From the master bedroom, muffled but entirely clear, came the soft, rhythmic groans of their intimacy. Gavin gasped out a low warning. “Shh… Daisy is still out there. She’ll hear us.” Cynthia’s laughter was loud, breathless, and utterly unbothered. “So what? Doesn’t that make it more exciting?” My eyes burned crimson. I staggered to my feet and rushed toward the front door, desperate to escape. But the deadbolt was engaged. I grabbed the brass handle, twisting and pulling with all my strength, but it wouldn’t budge. They had locked me in. Behind me, the sounds continued, a dull, rusted knife sawing slowly through my chest. Cynthia’s breathless gasps turned into sharp, needy whimpers, met by Gavin’s low, heavy grunts. I slid down against the locked door, pressing my palms against my ears until they hurt. But the noise still seeped through my fingers, sharp as needles, piercing my eardrums and carving directly into my heart until there was nothing left of me but blood. Finally, the bedroom door clicked open. Without the wall to support me, I slumped onto the hardwood floor. Cynthia stood above me, wearing one of Gavin’s crisp white button-downs. The collar was askew, doing nothing to hide the dark purple bruises blooming across her collarbone. She looked down at me, a cruel smirk playing on her lips. “Enjoy the show?” I was entirely hollowed out, my voice a broken rasp. “Why, Cynthia? We were supposed to be best friends. When those kids bullied me in high school, you fought them off. You told everyone that no one was allowed to touch me…” Cynthia let out a soft, mocking laugh, cutting me off. “That was a lie, Daisy.” She knelt down to meet my eyes. “They bullied you because I told them you were a thief. I set the whole thing up.” My chest seized. I stared at her, unable to process the words. “And… and the night I had that terrible fever, and you climbed down the fire escape from the second-floor dorm just to get me medicine?” “Also a setup,” she said smoothly. “You got sick because I had been pouring expired milk into your coffee for a week.” Tears dripped silently onto my lap. “The time those thugs cornered me in the alley, and you took a blow to the shoulder protecting me…” “Fake, fake, all of it!” Cynthia snapped, her eyes flashing with a mix of boredom and triumph. “Honestly, Daisy, how are you this gullible? The night you got locked in the gym equipment room? My idea. The girls who slapped you in the locker room? I paid them. You thought I was your savior, popping up at the perfect moment? No, I was standing just around the corner, watching you cry. Once you were broken enough, I’d step in so you’d worship me.” A single, heavy tear fell, my throat so tight it felt like it was filled with ash. “And when my parents died… when you brought me into your home, when we lived as sisters for ten years… was that all a lie too?” Cynthia’s gaze flickered, a complex shadow crossing her face before she quickly suppressed it. “No, that part was real,” she whispered. She paused, her voice dropping into a cold, venomous register. “But the car crash… I was the one who tampered with the brakes.” The room went completely silent. My mind went entirely blank, as if my consciousness had been violently ripped from my body. Cynthia continued, her voice light, as if she were reminiscing about a childhood game. “Did you know we’re actually half-sisters? Your perfect father abandoned my mother and me so he could marry yours and build that beautiful, happy family of yours. Why did you get to have the white picket fence while I was stuck in a cramped apartment, getting mocked for not having a dad? I didn’t think it was fair. But I knew the tables would turn eventually.” “So when my mom finally married a wealthy venture capitalist from Chicago, I had the resources to learn a few things. Like how to cut a brake line so it looked like normal wear and tear.” She stared straight at me, a horrific, satisfied smile stretching across her face. “Honestly, I was just shocked you survived the crash.” A violent wave of grief and fury exploded in my chest, hot and blinding. I didn’t know where the strength came from, but I surged upward and slammed my palm across her face. “You monster!” I screamed. “How could you? How could you do that to them?” The force of the slap sent Cynthia stumbling backward, a bright red mark instantly blooming across her pale cheek. Gavin stepped out of the bedroom just in time to see her fall. With a roar, he rushed forward and shoved me backward, pulling Cynthia protectively into his chest. “Are you out of your mind, Daisy? She’s pregnant!” The force of his shove sent me flying back. My lower back slammed violently against the low windowsill, a sharp, white-hot pain shooting up my spine that made me gasp for air. Gavin cradled Cynthia, his hands cupping her face as his eyes scanned her for injuries. “Are you okay? Does your stomach hurt? Talk to me.” Cynthia whimpered, burying her face in his neck, but over his shoulder, she locked eyes with me. And she smiled. A small, victorious smirk. The pain in my back pulsed in heavy waves, but it was nothing compared to the slow, agonizing death of my soul. I looked at the two of them. And I realized my entire life had been nothing but a punchline. “The worst thing I ever did,” I whispered, the words barely leaving my lips, “was letting either of you into my life.” I turned away from them, looking out the open window into the dark, silent city below. I remembered a night years ago. A younger Gavin had stood beneath my balcony, his arms spread wide, calling up to me with a brilliant, boyish grin: “Daisy, I’m going to build us a home. I promise.” That was the first time in my life I had believed someone would actually catch me if I fell. I let out a soft, beautiful laugh. I placed my bleeding hands on the windowsill, climbed up, and leaped. The wind roared in my ears, the hard concrete of the driveway rushing up to meet me. Far behind me, echoing from the window I had just left, came Gavin’s desperate, shredded scream: “Daisy, no!”

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “465198”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

On the morning of what should have been my golden wedding anniversary, I accidentally connected to a video call with myself from fifty years ago. The girl on the screen was in a bridal boutique, slipping into a lace gown, getting ready to marry Kelvin Holloway. My voice broke as I screamed at the screen: “Don’t marry him! Take off that dress. If you put it on, you’ll be a widow for fifty years.” “On your first morning as his wife, he’ll fake his own death and flee the country with his pristine, untouchable ideal—his first love, Mandy Olivia.” “Three months in, he’ll have his mother drug your food to make sure you lose your babies. It’s a pair of twins.” “Six months in, Mom and Dad will track him down overseas. To protect Mandy, he’ll let them die in a staged car crash.” “And today—the day of our golden anniversary—the news will broadcast that Kelvin has returned to the country as an esteemed research professor, with Mandy on his arm, basking in his glory. And he will cast you aside like a worn-out maid, after you spent fifty years caring for his paralyzed parents and raising his younger brother.” “I have swallowed this bitter pill of a life for fifty years. I am done.” I screamed at my phone again: “You stupid girl, Cathy! Every single piece of misery in your life starts the second you say I do to Kelvin.” From the screen, my own youthful, untouched voice filtered through: “Excuse me, ma’am… did Kelvin hire you to test my loyalty?” 1 The girl on the screen was only twenty-two. Her skin was flawless, radiant with youth—free of the deep-set wrinkles of labor, free of the jagged scar Kelvin’s younger brother would one day carve across her cheek. Her eyes were bright, reflecting a pure, unruined love. She saw nothing in this world but Kelvin. A girl like that shouldn’t have to suffer for fifty years. If I could rewrite the ending, I had to stop her from marrying him. “I’m not a test,” I said, my voice raspy, holding back a sob. “Cathy, I am you. Fifty years from now.” Naturally, my twenty-two-year-old self didn’t believe me. I desperately held up my right hand to the camera. It only had four fingers. “When Kelvin wanted to flee the country with Mandy, he took out loans from dangerous people. When they came collecting and couldn’t find him, they took my ring finger.” I lifted my faded shirt, exposing the thick, puckered scar on my side. “Kelvin’s little brother needed a kidney. His family starved and beat me until I agreed to donate mine.” I pulled out my old medical records, the yellowed pages clearly detailing a forced miscarriage—twins. “This is what Kelvin’s love looks like.” The young Cathy looked bewildered, a flicker of pity crossing her eyes. “Ma’am, I think you have the wrong number. If you’re in danger, I can call the police for you.” At seventy, I was nearly driven mad by the sheer innocence of my twenty-year-old self. “Do you see this psych-ward commitment slip?” I hissed, holding it up. “Kelvin is having me committed today so he and Mandy can finally live openly. If you marry him, this is where you end up. You won’t even get to retire in peace with your best friend, sipping cocktails and laughing at bad reality TV.” Perhaps it was that last, absurd detail that caught her attention. Her posture shifted. “Ma’am,” she said slowly, “if you really are me from the future… can you show me your ID? Or your marriage certificate with Kelvin?” I was always so careful, so cautious about everything—except when it came to Kelvin. I believed every lie he ever told, and it ruined me. I froze. The screen was silent save for her breathing. “If you can show me an ID to prove you are Cathy,” she prompted, “I’ll believe you.” The phone burned against my palm. After a long pause, I whispered, “I can’t.” I had no proof. Right after our wedding, Kelvin claimed he wanted us to belong to each other forever. He tore up our marriage license right in front of me, whispering that this meant nothing but death could ever part us. He confiscated my ID, my social security card, my passport. For fifty years, as the world moved online and grew modern, I lived as a ghost. A non-person. 2 Without papers, I couldn’t get a real job. I couldn’t even sign up to do food delivery. I had to take off-the-books work—scrubbing greasy dishes in back alleys, doing hard labor in illegal sweatshops. My body gave out piece by piece. Now that I was old, I couldn’t even afford a two-dollar bottle of generic painkillers. Every night had been a battle of endurance in the dark. Suddenly, a male voice cut through the video. It was Kelvin at twenty-five. He walked into the frame wearing a tailored suit, his eyes swimming with a deep, tender devotion that the young Cathy simply could not resist. Panic flared in my chest. “Mandy is in the bridal shop right now!” I yelled. “Search the dressing rooms. One by one. You’ll find her!” The moment the words left my mouth, the screen went black. The call was still connected, but the camera was covered; only muffled, chaotic background noise filtered through. I remembered that day so clearly. We were supposed to go to a local boutique run by a college friend, but Kelvin changed the venue at the last minute. He claimed his client owned a high-end, bespoke bridal salon, and he insisted I deserved the most expensive, hand-stitched gown in the world because nothing else was worthy of me. I didn’t know the dress had been custom-made for Mandy. I didn’t know that while I was trying on gowns, Kelvin and Mandy were tangled together in a back dressing room. He only confessed it to me today, upon his return. I clutched the phone, pressing it to my ear, trying to make out the noises over the static, but there was nothing. A heavy, suffocating defeat washed over me. Is this really how my life had to end? A knock rattled the bedroom door. Kelvin, now an old man, stood in the doorway. He threw a cheap, oversized plastic woven bag at my feet. “You’ve played the role of Mrs. Holloway long enough,” he said, his voice devoid of warmth. “It’s time to give the house back to Mandy. She has waited for me for fifty years.” Beside him stood Mandy. She was draped in an elegant, silk cheongsam, her posture graceful. Even in her seventies, she looked remarkably preserved, her skin smooth and her hair dyed a soft silver. Wealth keeps a person young. But the wealth that sustained her all these years was drained directly from my veins. When I didn’t answer, Kelvin grew impatient. “My parents are gone,” he said coldly. “You have no purpose left in this house.” He was right. His parents spent their last ten years bedridden and paralyzed. I was the one who bathed them, turned them, and fed them spoon by spoon. The doctors had given up on them, but I kept them alive, giving them one more day, one more afternoon in the sun. In Kelvin’s eyes, my only worth was that of an unpaid, glorified nurse. But I had no strength left to fight him. The phone vibrated in my pocket. I closed my eyes, taking a long, shaky breath. “Give me one day,” I said quietly. “Just twenty-four hours, and I will pack my things and go.” Kelvin nodded curtly, taking Mandy’s hand as they turned away. I pulled the phone out. The call was still active. The young Cathy was standing right outside a row of dressing rooms. “Are you saying…” her voice was hushed, trembling with a fragile innocence. “Kelvin and Mandy are in there? Right now?” “Yes,” I whispered. If she believed me just this once, everything would change. “Okay,” she whispered back. “I’ll trust you this one time.” She reached for the brass handle of the fitting room door, her fingers shaking. If I were right, how would she survive the truth? But before she could turn the knob, a bridal consultant pushed the door open from the inside. “Miss Wen, are you ready to try on the next gown?” The door swung wide, exposing the room to the bright showroom lights. 3 Time seemed to freeze. I held my breath, staring at the screen. The room was empty. No Kelvin. No Mandy. No secret, breathless affair. It was completely empty. On the screen, I heard my younger self let out a long, relieved sigh. “See, ma’am?” she said, her tone light and airy again. “My Kelvin would never do that. I don’t know how you know Mandy, but she’s my senior from college. She’s been so good to me. When those thugs cornered me last year, she was the one who stood up to protect me. Please don’t say these things about them. It makes me angry.” A bitter, hollow laugh escaped my chest. “Did you ever stop to think that those thugs were hired by her? That the whole thing was a setup to make you trust her?” The young Cathy frowned deeply. Because my first warning failed, she was convinced I was just a delusional old woman. “Ma’am, if you keep talking like this, I’m going to hang up.” In that moment, I finally understood why my best friend, Lucy, used to say she wanted to shake some sense into my younger self. I wanted to reach through the screen and shake her too. How could I have been so incredibly blind? “Don’t hang up,” I pleaded, my voice cracking. “Please. Just keep me company for a little while. As long as you don’t hang up, you can do whatever you want. Just let me stay on the line.” Maybe I looked too pathetic, or maybe the sheer misery in my eyes touched her. She didn’t disconnect. After trying on the dress, she accompanied Kelvin to the county registrar’s office. During the drive, through the shaky camera angle, I caught a glimpse of Mandy slipping out of the bridal shop’s back exit. So that was it. They hadn’t been caught because they used the service door. At the registrar’s office, Kelvin held her hands, his face a portrait of solemn devotion. “I swear, Cathy, I will buy you a beautiful home one day. No one will ever say I’m just living off my wife’s family.” “And thank you, my beautiful girl, for letting me put my name on the deed.” The house was bought entirely by my parents, paid in full. When Kelvin faked his death, he sold it overnight, pocketing the cash along with the high-interest loans before vanishing into thin air. I wanted to scream at her to stop, but they were already sitting in front of the clerk. The clerk’s voice was monotone: “If you both could just sign here to finalize the deed transfer…” “Thank you,” Kelvin smiled. I made frantic, desperate noises through the phone. Finally, the young Cathy stood up, walking over to a quiet corner of the lobby to look at the screen. “Ma’am, what lies are you going to tell me about Kelvin now?” In the background, I could see Kelvin sitting on the bench, his fingers flying across his phone screen. He was texting Mandy. I knew the rhythm of his thumbs. “Check his phone,” I said urgently. “He’s already booked two plane tickets to London for next week—one for him, and one for Mandy. And check his bank statements. He’s already taken out three million dollars in loans using your name as a co-signer.” “Ma’am, Kelvin and I aren’t even legally married yet. How could he use my name for a loan?” Kelvin’s voice called out from across the lobby, impatient. “Cathy? I’m all done. Just waiting on you.” “Coming!” she called back. I wanted to reach through the pixels and grab her shoulders. “Don’t sign! Just check his phone first. I am begging you.” “If I check and find nothing, I swear I will never bother you again.” She hesitated, looking at the phone, then looking back at Kelvin, who offered her a warm, perfect smile. “Fine,” she whispered. “One last time.” She walked back over to him. “Kelvin,” she said, trying to sound casual. “Give me your phone. I want to check your messages.” 4 She was so transparent, so painfully naive. Not a single defensive bone in her body, not a single drop of cunning. No wonder Kelvin played me like a fool for fifty years. A blank sheet of paper stands no chance against a charcoal heart. Kelvin was visibly taken aback, but he recovered quickly, pulling the phone from his pocket. “The password is your birthday, sweetheart. Look through whatever you want. Call history, search engine, anything.” Even now, his charm was effortless, defusing the tension with a light laugh. My younger self giggled. “I knew you were the best.” She glanced at the screen, a triumphant look in her eyes, as if to prove to me that her Kelvin was no villain. The search took less than ten minutes. Texts, emails, search history, banking apps—she went through them all, and found absolutely nothing. It was a masterclass in erasing tracks. Cathy wrapped her arm around his, leaning in. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what got into me.” “Let’s go sign.” My heart dropped into a cold, dark abyss. Even with a lifeline to the past, was I still powerless to change my fate? Was Kelvin simply too clever to beat? True to my word, I didn’t say another word. But she didn’t hang up either. Perhaps out of pity. Time on her side of the screen seemed to warp, moving faster than my slow, agonizing day in this locked room. The next time I looked at my screen, it was her wedding day. She was radiant, a picture-perfect bride in white lace. My parents were there. They looked at her with tears in their eyes, and my own eyes welled up with tears of grief. My beautiful, loving parents, whom I condemned to a horrific death. I cared for Kelvin’s parents for fifty years, but I was never even able to bury my own. It all started with this wedding. This was my last chance. I could not give up now. But before I could speak, the door to my room was pushed open. Kelvin, now an old man, stepped inside. The fake warmth was entirely gone from his face, replaced by a cold, calculating sneer. “The reporters are downstairs,” he said coldly. “You’re going to tell them that you forced me to marry you, that you stole my birth certificate and threatened suicide to lock me down. Do this, and I’ll give you enough money to rot in a decent nursing home. Otherwise…” I have spent my whole life being a coward. I won’t bend my knee to him again. Seeing my silence, his tone softened into a manipulative plea. “If you don’t say this, Mandy will be branded a homewrecker. Have you forgotten that she saved you from being assaulted in college? You should show some gratitude, Cathy.” Mandy was innocent, and I was the villain? What a sick joke. “No,” I said. On my phone screen, the wedding was over. The young Cathy’s phone rang. It was the police. “Is this Cathy Wen? Your husband has been involved in a fatal car crash. We need you to come identify the body and sign the cremation papers.” I screamed at the screen: “He’s not dead! It’s a trick! Take his body to the crematorium on the east side, not the west side—” Before I could finish, the old Kelvin wrenched the phone from my hand, his face contorted in rage. “You’re insane,” he spat. “Out of your mind.” I don’t know if the young Cathy heard me. Because minutes later, the orderly arrived to drag me to the waiting ambulance bound for the asylum. 5 At the county morgue on the west side of town. Cathy held her breath. A week ago, she received a bizarre video call from an old, scarred woman claiming to be her from fifty years in the future. The woman had warned her that Kelvin’s death would be a hoax—a grand performance staged so he could escape to Europe with Mandy, leaving Cathy to slave away for his family for the rest of her life. She hadn’t believed it. The previous warnings had yielded nothing. But now, she stood before a sheet-draped body. The cold fabric covered the man she loved more than life itself. Kelvin’s parents were weeping on the floor. The old woman on the phone had also mentioned a younger brother, but Kelvin was an only child. How could he have a brother? Kelvin’s mother clutched Cathy’s hand, her face wet with tears. “Our family owes you so much, Cathy. My boy is gone…” “I have no son left.” “You’re all I have now. You wouldn’t leave us to rot alone, would you?” Cathy pulled her hand away slowly, staring at the white sheet. What if the old woman was right? “I want to see him one last time,” Cathy said. Kelvin’s father immediately stepped forward, blocking her path. The grief on his face flickered into sharp defensiveness. “The coroner said the injuries are severe. It’s too graphic, Cathy. You shouldn’t see him like this.” “Is that so?” His mother chimed in, grabbing her arm again. “Yes, sweetheart. Don’t look. Let him go in peace. We should cremate him quickly so his soul can move on.” Their urgency sends a chill down Cathy’s spine. If their only son had just died, wouldn’t they be clinging to his body? Why were they so eager to turn him to ash? “I need to see him,” Cathy said, her voice steadying. “I can handle it. He was my husband. I don’t care what he looks like.” She sidesteps Kelvin’s father and reached for the edge of the sheet. The room grew dead silent. Every eye in the room was pinned on her hand. She pulled the sheet back. Underneath was indeed Kelvin’s face. There were deep lacerations, dried blood, and bruising across his skin. His arms and legs were covered in horrific, raw cuts. His mother let out a loud, wailing sob. “My boy! Why did it have to be my boy?” As she cried, she shot a tense, furtive glance toward her husband. The father stepped in to pull the sheet back up. “That’s enough, Cathy. Let him rest.” “Wait,” Cathy said.

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “465197”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

At our girls’ night out, the conversation inevitably turned into a playful game of “spouse check-in” to see whose husband was the most generous. One by one, the girls FaceTime-called their partners, casually asking for digital cash or online shopping treats. Naturally, it became an exhibition of domestic bliss, everyone showing off how adored they were. Miranda suddenly turned her gaze to me, her eyes reflecting the dim restaurant light. “Do you think men lose their minds when they suddenly come into real money? Like, do they just forget where they came from?” I thought about the last three years—all those brutal, exhausting nights I’d spent helping Troy build his startup from nothing. I gave her a confident, easy smile. “Not Troy. The company is still in its infancy, barely turning a profit. He doesn’t even have the money to lose his mind with.” The table shared a knowing silence, letting the topic drop, but everyone’s eyes drifted back to Miranda. We all knew she’d recently started dating some wealthy business mogul who drove a sleek Mercedes, though none of us had actually met him yet. “Come on, Miranda,” Katie teased, nudging her shoulder. “Get your mystery millionaire to send over some champagne money!” Miranda’s smile faltered, a shadow of hesitation crossing her face. “He’s pulling an all-nighter at the office. It’s really not a good time.” A slight, awkward tension settled over the table. I was just about to open my mouth to bail her out when my phone buzzed on the dark wood. It was a text from Troy: Hey babe, caught in a late-night sprint at the office. Won’t make it home tonight. Love you. After the dinner wrapped up, I decided to take a detour to a late-night food truck market to pick up his favorite greasy comfort food—a little peace offering of hot, spicy street noodles for his long night. But as I rounded the corner near the downtown district, my heart stopped. I saw Troy step out of a brand-new Mercedes. He didn’t just greet Miranda; he pulled her tightly against his chest, his fingers digging into her waist, before guiding her toward the revolving doors of the five-star hotel across the street. … “Hey, babe. Are you still at the office?” I stood on the damp pavement opposite the hotel, my eyes locked on the polished brass frame of the revolving doors. “Yeah, sweetheart. Still chained to the desk,” Troy’s voice crackled through the receiver, heavy with a practiced, weary sigh. The early autumn breeze carried a sharp, biting chill. I looked down at the flimsy plastic bag in my hand. Inside was a container of hot, spicy street noodles. I’d stood in line for thirty minutes in the wind just to get it. “Have you eaten yet?” I asked, keeping my voice level. “Just choked down some instant ramen,” he sighed, the apology in his tone sounding incredibly genuine. “This new product launch is eating us alive. I’m sorry, babe. Don’t wait up for me. Get some sleep.” I kept my eyes on the other side of the street. Troy was whispering something into Miranda’s ear, his hand sliding down to cup her hip. Suddenly, her heel slipped on the curb. Troy reacted instantly, catching her and kneeling down on the pavement to gently massage her ankle. The tenderness, the easy familiarity of the gesture—it was a choreography we had shared a thousand times. They looked like a perfect, happy couple. “I drove past the Financial District earlier,” I said, my tone conversational, almost breezy. “I saw a Mercedes that looked exactly like the one you’ve been obsessing over.” On the other end, there was a microscopic pause. The sound of his breathing faltered for a fraction of a second. “Really? Must’ve been a coincidence,” Troy chuckled, his voice recovering its smooth, steady cadence. “I wish I could afford a machine like that. Let’s wait until the company’s margins double next year. First thing I’m doing is buying you a decent SUV so you don’t have to freeze on the subway during the winter.” “That sounds nice,” I said. “Since when do you do surprise check-ins?” His voice softened, taking on that low, intimate warmth he used to soothe me. “Are you feeling lonely at home? Hang in there, okay? Once this launch wraps up next week, it’s our anniversary. I’ll book us a trip to Maui. Just you, me, and the ocean.” “Don’t worry about it,” I said, my knuckles turning white around my phone. “Everything okay? You sound a little off.” “I’m fine.” I watched him scoop Miranda up into his arms, carrying her easily over the threshold of the lobby. “Alright, babe, my partner’s waving me over to go over some ledgers. I love you.” “Yeah.” The line went dead, leaving only the cold drone of the dial tone. I stood beneath the yellow hum of the streetlamp, watching the steam slowly vanish from the plastic bag. Condensation gathered inside the container, mixing with the red chili oil that slowly leaked through the seam of the paper bowl, staining my fingers. I remembered three years ago, when Troy first quit his stable job to build his dream. We lived in a cramped, drafty studio apartment, counting pennies just to order a cheap pizza. He would stay up until dawn writing code, and I would walk down to the nearest late-night cart to buy him a hot plate of cheap street noodles with extra eggs. He always refused to eat the best pieces, insisting on feeding the first bite to me. Rachel, he used to say, his eyes bright with ambition, once I make it, I swear to God you will never have to scrape by again. And I had believed him. I emptied my entire savings account—fifty thousand dollars left to me by my grandmother—to keep his fledgling company afloat when the first dry spell hit. I ate instant noodles with him, squeezed onto packed buses, and swallowed my pride at dinners to smile at obnoxious investors. Now, he had made it. He was driving a Mercedes, checking into five-star hotels, with my best friend curled against his chest. My phone buzzed again. It was a notification from our group chat. Miranda had posted a photo. It showed two glasses of Pinot Noir catching the soft light, set against a massive floor-to-ceiling window overlooking the glittering city skyline. Her caption read: He said the best views are only meant for the person you love most. Instantly, the other girls in the chat started flooding the thread. Oh my god, the mystery man finally took you out! That hotel looks incredibly expensive. You’re a lucky girl, Miranda! I tapped the photo and pinched to zoom. In the curved reflection of the crystal wine glass, I could clearly see the distinctive pattern of the designer shirt Troy was wearing. It was the birthday gift I’d bought him last month, spending my entire quarterly bonus. I didn’t reply to the group. I didn’t storm across the street to make a scene in the lobby. I walked over to the nearest trash can, opened my hand, and let the plastic bag drop. It landed with a heavy, wet thud. The warm noodles, along with every ounce of my hope and sacrifice over the past three years, sank into the garbage. The next morning, when Troy quietly slipped through the front door, I was sitting at the kitchen island, slowly sipping cold water. He carried the faint, crisp scent of high-end hotel soap—that expensive cedar and amber blend. “Morning, babe,” he murmured, tossing his keys onto the entryway table and setting a white paper bag onto the counter. “Brought you some breakfast.” He stepped closer, leaning in to press a kiss to my forehead. I tilted my head slightly, letting his lips miss my skin. He froze, his hand hovering near my shoulder for a fraction of a second before he pulled back, smooth as ever. He pulled out a barstool and sat down opposite me. “What’s wrong? Didn’t sleep well?” He loosened his tie, his voice dripping with gentle concern. “Just a bit of insomnia,” I replied, my eyes dropping to his hands. Those were the same hands that used to hold mine in the freezing winter, warming my fingers inside his coat pockets. “I keep telling you to stop late-night scrolling,” he said with a soft, affectionate laugh. He reached into the pastry bag and slid a clear plastic container toward me. “I stopped by that artisan bakery down the street. Got you the matcha crepe cake you’ve been craving.” I stared at the green, layered cake behind the plastic. I don’t eat matcha. I have a mild but painful allergy to one of the raw powder additives; it gives me terrible stomach cramps within an hour. Troy knew this. Years ago, during our first year of dating, he’d accidentally ordered a matcha latte for me, and I spent half the night in agony. Since then, he’d always been hyper-vigilant, questioning baristas and bakers about ingredients before buying me anything. But Miranda loved matcha. Her social media was practically a shrine to green tea pastries, which she called “the color of a healed soul.” “Not hungry?” Troy asked, his brow furrowing slightly when I didn’t open the box. “My stomach’s a bit upset,” I said, sliding the container back toward his side of the counter. “Your stomach again?” He instantly reached out to touch my forehead, his fingers cool. “Did you eat some of that greasy takeout again? I’ve told you a hundred times, those late-night trucks aren’t clean, Rachel. You never listen.” His tone was scolding, but his eyes swam with genuine worry. This specific brand of protective affection had once been the bedrock of my entire life. I looked at his handsome, familiar face, feeling a profound sense of vertigo. How could someone shatter a marriage so completely, yet still slip back into the skin of a loving husband without missing a beat? “Troy,” I said. “Yeah, babe?” He was already looking down at his phone, his thumb tapping out a rapid-fire text. “Were you really pulling an all-nighter at the office last night?” His thumb froze over the glass screen. The silence in the kitchen stretched, punctuated only by the soft click of the wall clock. He slowly raised his head, a flicker of panic darting through his eyes before a warm, easy smile smoothed it away. “Of course I was,” he said, setting his phone face down. He reached across and wrapped his hand around my wrist, his thumb gently tracing the pulse point there. “Where else would I be? Babe, have you been stressed out lately? You’re starting to get in your own head again.” Again. He loved that word. In his mind, I was always the insecure, fragile woman prone to irrational paranoia, while he was the long-suffering, saintly husband who constantly had to reassure me. “Maybe you’re right,” I said, quietly sliding my arm out of his grasp. “Don’t overthink things.” He picked his phone back up and stood, heading toward the hallway bathroom. “We’re in the middle of securing a major investment round. Once that wire clears, we’re house-hunting. You’ve always wanted that walk-in closet with the floor-to-ceiling windows, right? I’m going to make sure you get it.” He was always so generous with his promises when his conscience pinched him. It was his favorite trick—dangling a shiny future to keep me quiet in the present. He was utterly convinced I would never leave him, certain that a few sweet words would keep me working, sacrificing, and waiting just like I had for the last three years. “Oh, by the way,” he stopped at the bathroom door, looking back over his shoulder. “Did Miranda post more of her dramatic nonsense in your group chat last night?” His brow furrowed with a touch of distaste. “Honestly, Rachel, you should distance yourself from her. She’s incredibly materialistic—the kind of person who’d do anything for a quick buck. You’re too sweet and trusting to be hanging around someone like that.” I watched the bathroom door click shut. A second later, the sound of rushing water filled the hall, and a wave of pure nausea hit me. The sheer, shameless hypocrisy of it—contemptuously dismissing the very woman he’d held in his arms just hours prior. I walked over to the entryway and picked up his leather briefcase from the shoe rack. I unzipped the main compartment and sifted through the folders. Tucked deep into a zippered inner pocket, my fingers brushed against a folded piece of paper: a copy of a vehicle purchase agreement. The buyer listed on the title was Troy’s cousin. But the routing and account numbers used for the thirty-thousand-dollar down payment belonged to Troy’s personal bank account—the one where we kept our joint mortgage savings, along with his startup’s latest client payout. I pulled out my phone, snapped three clean, high-resolution photos of the document, and slipped it back exactly where I found it. That afternoon, I went to his office downtown. The receptionist, a sweet college student, smiled warmly when she saw me. “Hey, Rachel! Troy’s in a team meeting right now. Do you want me to buzz him?” “No, that’s okay. I’ll just wait in his office,” I replied, giving her a reassuring smile. I pushed open the glass door to his private office and walked straight to his desk. His secondary laptop—the one he used for personal finances and side projects—lay shut on the corner. I lifted the lid and typed in the password. It was my birthday. The screen unlocked instantly. I opened his local files and clicked into a folder synced to his personal cloud drive. There were several recently downloaded spreadsheets. One was labeled Q3 Tax Restructuring. To anyone else, it would look like dry, routine corporate accounting. But I had spent two years working as an accountant before we got married. The discrepancies screamed at me from the screen. Troy had been generating fake invoices and billing for non-existent consulting services, funneling over a hundred and twenty thousand dollars of company capital into three shell corporations. And the registered owners of those shell companies? Miranda’s sister and cousin. He wasn’t just stepping out on our marriage; he was systematically draining our marital assets. The doorknob clicked. I closed the window, slid my thumb drive out of the USB port, and slipped it into my pocket, folding my hands behind my back just as the door swung open. Troy walked in holding a legal pad. He stopped short when he saw me standing by his desk, his expression freezing for a second before his customer-service smile snapped into place. “Rachel! What a nice surprise. You should’ve texted me you were coming.” “I was just in the neighborhood and wanted to drop by,” I said, keeping my gaze steady. He walked over and reached out to pull me into an embrace, but as he leaned in, his nose flared. He paused, his brow furrowing slightly. “Are you wearing a new perfume?” “Just a sample I picked up,” I said, taking a step back to slip out of his reach. Before he could press the issue, the door opened again. Miranda walked in, wearing a sleek trench coat, carrying a cardboard tray with two cups of coffee. “Here’s that cold brew you wanted, Troy—” She stopped dead when she saw me. For a split second, sheer panic flickered in her eyes. But she recovered with the practiced grace of an actress, her face lighting up with delighted surprise. “Rachel! Oh my gosh, what are you doing here?” She stepped forward, hooking her arm through mine with casual intimacy. “If I’d known you were visiting, I would’ve grabbed you an iced latte.” I looked down at her neck. She was wearing a silk Hermès scarf, this season’s signature print. Last month, I’d stared at that exact scarf online, debating whether to treat myself or buy a new convection oven for our kitchen. Troy had wrapped his arms around me and whispered, Babe, cash flow is just too tight this month. Let’s wait until the next big invoice clears, and I’ll get it for you personally. I had believed him. I’d quietly deleted the scarf from my cart to save him the stress. And here it was, knotted elegantly around my best friend’s throat. “That’s a beautiful scarf, Miranda,” I murmured, staring directly at the silk. Miranda’s hand flew to her throat, her smile faltering, growing rigid. “Oh… this? My guy bought it for me. Honestly, he’s so extra sometimes, always spending money on things I don’t even know how to style.” Troy cleared his throat loudly, stepping in to break the tension. “Miranda, let’s keep the personal chatter out of the office,” he said, his voice dropping into his authoritative boss-tone. “Leave the quarterly reports on the desk and get back to the floor, please.” Miranda instantly dropped her bubbly demeanor, nodding politely. “Of course, Mr. Davis.” She turned on her heel, her stilettos clicking sharply against the hardwood floor as she left. Once the door clicked shut, Troy turned to me, a sigh escaping his lips. “Rachel, this is a place of business. You can’t just drop by unannounced like this. It doesn’t look professional.” He shook his head, a patronizing edge to his voice. “People are going to think you’re checking up on me.” Today was our fifth wedding anniversary. Historically, Troy would book a table at the intimate French bistro downtown where we’d spent our first anniversary. No matter how chaotic his startup got, this was the one night he always kept sacred. I sat by the window, watching the streetlights flicker to life in the autumn dusk. The candle in the center of the table was melting into a pool of wax. My ribeye had grown cold hours ago, a thin, white layer of fat congealing over the meat. The clock on the wall crept past nine o’clock. I checked my phone. No missed calls. No texts. I opened my social feed and scrolled past a few generic updates until my thumb froze. Miranda had posted a new story thirty minutes ago. It was a photo of a hand with an IV drip, a small bandage taped over the vein, set against the sterile backdrop of an ER cot. Her caption read: Double-folded with stomach pain tonight, but my hero dropped everything to be by my side. Thank you for always showing up when it matters most. In the bottom corner of the frame, the edge of a dark charcoal suit sleeve was visible. Glinting in the harsh fluorescent light of the hospital room was a brushed silver cufflink—the vintage pair I had tracked down from an estate jeweler for him last winter. I stared at the image for a long time, then tapped the heart icon. At nine-thirty, Troy finally burst through the restaurant doors. His hair was slightly disheveled, and his tie was askew. He slid into the booth across from me, grabbing his water glass and draining it in one long swallow. “I am so, so sorry, babe,” he panted, his face a perfect canvas of exhaustion and regret. “Just as I was leaving, a major enterprise client showed up unannounced. He insisted we go over next year’s integration pipeline over drinks, and I simply couldn’t walk away from that kind of money.” He reached into his pocket and slid a small, navy velvet box across the table. “Happy anniversary, beautiful.” I opened the box. Inside was a thin, generic silver chain. No pendant, no character. I recognized the packaging immediately. It was one of the bulk-ordered promotional gifts his company had bought for their client appreciation gala last week. “Thank you,” I said softly, snapping the box shut and setting it aside. Troy stared at me, visibly thrown by my lack of emotion. Normally, I would have cried or at least expressed some quiet disappointment, allowing him to play the doting husband who could smooth it over with a few sweet promises and a long hug. “Everything okay? Do you not like it?” He reached out, trying to cover my hands. I pulled my hands back into my lap, keeping my eyes locked on his. “Troy, you said you were with a client?” “Yeah,” he said, his gaze open and completely untroubled. “Mr. Peterson—you know how brutal he can be. We were sitting in that stuffy lounge downtown for three hours. Honestly, my own stomach is in knots from all the black coffee I had to drink.” He even made a show of rubbing his abdomen. If I hadn’t seen Miranda’s post, and if I couldn’t smell the unmistakable, sharp scent of hospital sanitizer clinging to his jacket, I might have actually felt sorry for him. “Well, thank you for working so hard for us,” I murmured, taking a slow sip of water. Troy let out a quiet sigh of relief, thinking he had slid past another crisis. He waved to the waiter, ready to order fresh plates. Right then, my phone buzzed on the table. It was an audio message from Katie, our mutual friend. Without plugging in my headphones, I tapped play. Katie’s high-pitched, excited voice cut through the quiet romance of the dining room. “Rachel! Oh my gosh, did you see Miranda’s story? Her mystery guy bought her a Chanel flap bag! I looked it up online—it’s like ten grand! She said he even canceled a huge business dinner tonight just to sit with her in the ER. Can you believe how incredibly spoiled she is? I need to find myself a guy like that!” Troy’s hand, frozen in the act of opening the leather menu, remained suspended in midair.

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “465196”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

Ten years into my binding with the Redemption System, Cynthia pushed me down the stairs. Blood pooled between my thighs, staining the cold marble. When Jared rushed over, I thought he was coming for me. But he didn’t even look my way. Instead, he swept his sobbing cousin into his arms. “Cynthia is pregnant,” he hissed. “Don’t scare her.” Three days after my miscarriage, Jared came into my room. He picked up the small wooden bassinet he had handcrafted months ago. “You won’t be needing this anyway,” he said, his voice flat. “I’m giving it to Cynthia.” He paused at the door, not looking back. “I’ve decided. Once Cynthia gives birth, I’m bringing her in as my official mistress.” “I’ll let you keep your dignity as my wife. Just… stop making things difficult for her.” If this had happened before, I would have broken down. I would have screamed, fought, demanded answers. But that day, I only nodded quietly. That night, I summoned the system interface that had lain dormant for years. [Host, do you wish to initiate the extraction process from this world?] This time, I didn’t hesitate. “Confirm.” 1. The next morning, Jared came back. I sat by the window, quietly folding white paper cranes for the dead, ignoring him completely. Jared didn’t seem annoyed by my silence. “Norma, don’t be like this,” he said gently, sitting on the edge of the bed. “We can have other children.” “I had the doctor write up a prescription for your recovery. Take it regularly, rest well, and your body will heal.” He reached out, taking my hand. His palm was warm, but I felt absolutely nothing. No spark, no comfort. The doctor he mentioned was the specialist he’d hired specifically to care for Cynthia’s pregnancy. He’d probably just asked the man to scribble a generic prescription on his way out, without even bothering to check my pulse. A bitter ache bloomed in my chest. This was the tenth year of my redemption mission. When I first arrived in this world, Jared was a hostage, broken and humiliated in a rival territory. According to the original plot, years of abuse and torture were supposed to turn him cold, ruthless, and violent—a dark warlord who would eventually seize control of the state and leave a trail of blood in his wake. My job was to save him. To redeem him. When the rival captors whipped him, I threw myself over his body, taking the blows. When he burned with a deadly fever, I climbed freezing mountains to find the rare herbs, slipping down a ravine and cracking two ribs in the process. When we finally returned to his homeland and he led the forces to war, I stood by his side, taking a poisoned arrow meant for him. He conquered his enemies, secured his power, and became the most feared commander in the nation. At his victory gala, the system notified me that my mission was complete. That was my seventh year here. That night, Jared got terribly drunk. He clung to me like a frightened child, burying his face in my neck, whispering, “Don’t leave me… please.” He was a brilliant, sharp man; he had long suspected I didn’t belong to his world. Looking at his tear-stained eyes, my heart softened. I closed the system prompt. I chose to stay. At the time, I truly believed I would never regret it. But in just three short years, we had come to this. Slowly, I pulled my hand out of his grasp. Jared sighed, trying to soothe me. “Norma, I’ve already arranged for a priest to pray for our baby’s soul. You need to let go.” “Cynthia is devastated too. Even with her pregnancy, she stayed up all night copying scriptures for the baby. Her wrists are so swollen she can barely hold a pen, but she refused to stop. She truly cares for you like a sister.” My hands froze mid-fold. Like a sister? With the woman who murdered my baby? I looked up, meeting his eyes. “Jared, Cynthia pushed me down those stairs.” Jared’s face hardened instantly. “Norma, do you hear yourself?” “You slipped. Cynthia cried for hours, blaming herself for not catching you in time, and now you’re trying to pin this on her!” “Cynthia wouldn’t even step on an ant. How could she possibly hurt you?” I stared at him, my heart entirely numb. I suppose when you experience enough disappointment, you stop feeling the sting. It just becomes background noise. Ever since Cynthia entered the picture, she was always twisting her ankle or coming down with mysterious headaches. And every single time, I was the one blamed. Once, unable to take it anymore, I confronted her, demanding to know why she was doing this to me. “Because… it’s fun,” she had whispered, her smile innocent and sweet. “Let’s play a game, sister. Do you think the Commander will believe you, or me?” The second the words left her mouth, she threw herself backward over the balcony railing, plunging straight into the lake. And just like that, another sin was added to my name. I had explained myself a thousand times back then. He never believed me once. Just as telling him the truth now was utterly useless. I stopped looking at him, lowering my gaze back to the paper crane in my hands. Jared let out a long, heavy sigh. “Norma, Cynthia has no one else in this world. She’s fragile, and she scares easily. She only wants a safe place to live. Why can’t you just tolerate her?” “Do you really want to see her pregnant and homeless before you’re satisfied?” A knock sounded at the door. “Commander, Miss Cynthia is suffering from severe morning sickness again. She’s asking for you.” Jared stood up immediately. “Get some rest. I’ll check on you tomorrow.” Without looking back, he hurried out of the room. A dull, familiar ache throbbed in my lower abdomen. I curled into a ball on the bed, cold sweat drenching my collar. Ping! The system’s chime echoed in my mind. [Congratulations, Host. Your points have been successfully redeemed. You will officially extract from this world in ten days.] A faint, tired smile touched my lips. Good. I was finally leaving. 2. The next morning, I walked down to the estate’s private canal, gently placing the folded paper cranes onto the water, watching them float away. Footsteps crunched on the gravel behind me. “My deepest condolences, sister.” I turned. Cynthia stood a few paces away, a delicate shawl draped over her shoulders. My fingers tightened into fists. A smug, mocking smile played at the corners of her lips, though her voice remained sweet. “Don’t look at me like that, Norma. I truly feel for you. You’ve been in this house for three years, and the moment you finally conceive, it’s gone.” She raised a hand, gently caressing her own rounded stomach. “Isn’t it funny how timing works? Two babies, almost the exact same age. One is blessed to enter this world, while the other is washed away in a puddle of blood.” “I guess some people just aren’t meant to have blessings. Don’t you think, sister?” The raw grief and hatred surged through me, snapping my restraint. I lunged forward, grabbing her by the collar. But before I could do anything, Jared appeared. He violently wrenched my hand away, shoving me back as he shielded Cynthia behind him. “Norma! She is pregnant! Even if you despise her, have some goddamn boundaries!” Cynthia cowered behind his back, her voice trembling. “Jared, don’t blame Norma… I only wanted to talk to her…” My wrist throbbed from Jared’s tight grip. I stared at him, a hollow laugh escaping my throat. “Jared, you have never once believed me.” How many times had we played out this exact scene since Cynthia arrived? I met her during our second year of marriage. A rebel faction had ambushed the northern border, and Jared led the counterattack. The battle ended quickly, and he returned victorious. But he didn’t return alone. He brought Cynthia. “Norma, this is Cynthia. I was injured and fell down a ravine; she saved my life.” The moment Cynthia saw me, she fell to her knees, weeping. “Please, Madame, have mercy on me!” “I don’t ask for a title or status! I only wish to serve as a maid, to stay by the Commander’s side…” She began to cough violently, gasping for air as if she might collapse. “Quick! Call the doctor!” Jared shouted, lifting her into his arms and rushing off before I could even process what was happening. He hadn’t given me a chance to speak. It was as if my permission didn’t matter at all. That night, he came to our bedroom late. He kissed my forehead gently. “Norma, I missed you so much.” “Don’t overthink things. Cynthia saved my life, and she was injured because of me. I have to take responsibility for her.” “Once her injuries are fully healed, I’ll arrange a place for her outside.” I had nodded. Jared was right. Cynthia was his savior; it was only right to care for her. So, I personally arranged for the best doctors and sent rare medicines to her courtyard daily. But a month later, Cynthia was poisoned. I tried to explain to Jared. “I had the doctors inspect every single batch of medicine before it was sent. There was nothing in them.” Jared sat at his desk, slowly turning the signet ring on his finger. When he looked up, his eyes were cold. “Norma, I remember you know your way around poisons.” I froze. Those deep, dark eyes stared at me, already delivering his verdict. Yes, I knew poisons. Years ago, when Jared contracted a deadly plague, I had experimented on my own body, tasting dozens of toxins to find a cure that could counteract the disease. He recovered. But my body was left permanently damaged. To this day, whenever it rained, my joints ached with an agonizing, deep chill. He knew all of this. And now, my sacrifice was the very evidence he used to convict me. “The poison was slow-acting. A normal doctor wouldn’t detect it,” Jared said, letting out a heavy sigh. “No one else in this manor has the knowledge to pull that off, Norma.” “I told you I have no feelings for her. Why must you resort to such underhanded methods?” That was the first time he falsely accused me. I felt a wave of devastation, but mostly, a burning anger. Anger that he could believe a stranger so easily over me. We had a screaming match that night, ending in a bitter silence. And now, here he was, shielding Cynthia in the exact same way. “Norma, I saw it with my own eyes. How do you expect me to believe you?” “For years, you’ve made her life miserable, trying to hurt her at every turn. Now that you’ve lost your own child, do you want to drag Cynthia’s baby to the grave with yours?” “When you were pregnant, didn’t you pray every day for our baby to be healthy? Why can’t you show her an ounce of that mercy?” “Even if you don’t care about yourself, you should at least show some decency to build good karma for our dead child!” Every word felt like a poisoned blade twisting in my chest. Tears spilled over my eyelashes, burning my cheeks. “Jared… then tell me, how did she get pregnant with your child in the first place?” Jared’s expression faltered. The grip on my wrist stiffened. A long, suffocating silence stretched between us before he finally spoke, his voice strained. “Norma, what’s done is done. We have to move forward.” “The baby is gone. Do you really want to destroy the lives of everyone who is still alive?” With that, he let go of my hand, wrapped an arm around Cynthia, and walked away. Move forward? I let out a bitter, silent laugh. He had no idea that for the two of us, there was no forward left. 3. I stumbled back to my courtyard, my limbs heavy and weak. That night, a raging fever took hold of me. My maid returned from the main house, her face red from crying. “Every single doctor in the estate was called to Miss Cynthia’s quarters. When I tried to beg them to come, her maids cursed at me and threw me out.” I rubbed my throbbing temples. It didn’t matter. I only had a few days left anyway; I didn’t have the energy to fight her. During my years traveling with Jared’s army, I had picked up some medical skills. I weak-handedly wrote down a simple herbal prescription and sent my maid to brew it. I had barely taken a single sip of the bitter liquid when my bedroom door was slammed open. “Norma! What is the meaning of this?” Jared stood in the doorway, his face dark with fury, holding my handwritten prescription in his hand. I didn’t know what crime I had committed this time. Exhausted, I muttered, “I’m sick. Am I not allowed to take medicine?” Jared let out a cold, mocking laugh. “Norma, at least make your lies believable.” “Your cheeks are flushed. Do you look sick to you?” “Cynthia is weak and needs the rare snow ginseng to sustain her pregnancy. You had to go and hoard the last of it for yourself? Do you really hate her that much?” My prescription did call for a small amount of snow ginseng. But the estate’s storeroom had plenty. I had only requested enough for two doses. How could it possibly have run out? “Believe whatever you want, Jared.” I tried to push myself up to walk away, but the room spun violently. My knees buckled, and I tumbled toward the floor. “Norma!” Jared lunged forward, catching me before I hit the ground. The moment his hand touched my skin, he froze. “You’re burning up. Why didn’t you tell me?” I had told him. He just chose not to believe me. Jared lifted me in his arms, carrying me to the bed. He ordered the maid to bring cold water, then soaked a cloth, gently wiping the sweat from my forehead. His movements were so tender, so familiar, that for a second, my mind drifted. I remembered when I first got pregnant. My morning sickness had been unbearable. One evening, after I had thrown up until my stomach was empty and raw, he had sat by my bedside just like this. He rubbed my back, whispering softly: “Sweetheart, stop torturing your mother. Daddy made a little wooden rocking horse for you. When you’re born, I’ll take you out to ride it.” During those weeks, his hands had been covered in tiny cuts and splinters. I had begged him to let a master carpenter handle it, but he refused, insisting on crafting it with his own hands. After weeks of clumsy work, he had finished that little rocking horse. But after my miscarriage, that very rocking horse had been carried off to Cynthia’s courtyard. A self-deprecating smile touched my lips. Of course. My baby was gone, but he would have other children to inherit his legacy. Jared didn’t notice my shift in mood. After wiping my hands, he sighed softly. “Norma, I’m sorry I misunderstood you. But you should have explained it to me clearly.” “Cynthia is fragile. She isn’t strong like you; she can’t just fight off an illness. Try to be understanding. Missing one ingredient won’t hurt you.” A cold ache settled deep in my bones. Even when I was recovering from a miscarriage and burning with a fever, I still didn’t rank higher than Cynthia’s mildest discomfort. I didn’t want to argue anymore. I turned my face to the wall. “I’m tired.” “Alright. Get some rest.” Jared carefully tucked the blanket around my shoulders and instructed the maid to watch me closely. Then, he picked up the remaining snow ginseng and left. I closed my burning eyes. Seven days left. It would pass quickly. 4. The next morning, I was awakened by a loud commotion outside. Servants were rushing back and forth across the estate. My maid told me that Jared was throwing a lavish birthday celebration for Cynthia, complete with a famous theatrical troupe from the city. I didn’t say a word. I simply picked up my baby’s small wooden memorial plaque, gently brushing away the dust. Hurried footsteps echoed in the hallway. Jared walked in, carrying a stack of decorative paper lanterns and writing paper. “Norma, I’m glad you’re awake. I need your help with something.” He set the items on my table. “After what happened, Cynthia has been anxious about the baby. She wants to release prayer lanterns tonight to bless the pregnancy.” “Your handwriting is the most elegant in the house. Cynthia wants you to write the blessings on the lanterns. She truly views you as her sister, which is why she wanted you to do this.” “You don’t have anything else to do today anyway. It’s only a thousand lanterns. You’ll finish in no time.” I stared at him, unable to believe what I was hearing. “Jared… our baby died only a week ago.” He didn’t even look up as he smoothed out the paper. “I know, Norma. But holding onto this grief will only destroy you.” “I’m doing this to give you something to do so you don’t sit in this room depressing yourself. Writing these blessings might help you heal.” “Besides, when Cynthia’s child is born, they will call you ‘Mother’ anyway. They will be your child too. What’s the difference?” A surge of pure rage and grief rushed to my head, making my fingertips tremble violently. “I won’t write them.” Jared’s brow furrowed. “Norma, why are you being so difficult?” “As the mistress of this house, you’ve ignored Cynthia’s pregnancy completely, and now you won’t even help with a simple favor? When did you become so petty?” “These inscriptions won’t take much of your time. Just write them quickly. Don’t delay the lantern release tonight.” He threw the papers onto the table and hurried back out to check on the festival stage. I wiped a tear from the corner of my eye. He was so busy. So busy that he had completely forgotten. Today was the seventh day since our baby died—the traditional day of mourning. Cynthia’s birthday celebration was incredibly loud. The music and laughter drifted over the high walls, echoing clearly in my quiet courtyard. I didn’t touch a single piece of the paper Jared had left behind. When he returned later that evening and saw the blank sheets, his face darkened with anger. But before he could unleash his fury, Cynthia gently touched his arm. “Jared, let it go. Sister doesn’t like me; it’s natural she wouldn’t want to write them. Please don’t blame her.” In the end, Jared only threw me a disgusted glare before leading Cynthia away. I watched them walk out. Outside, the night air was chilly. Jared carefully wrapped a thick cloak around Cynthia’s shoulders. She looked up at him, smiling softly as she leaned into his chest. They looked exactly like a happily married couple. I pulled my gaze away, forcing down the bitter ache in my heart. It didn’t matter. I was leaving soon anyway. Whatever they did had nothing to do with me anymore. I dragged my exhausted body to bed and closed my eyes. Late that night, I was startled awake by a sudden noise. I opened my eyes to see a dark silhouette standing right next to my bed. I let out a sharp scream, bolting upright. The figure panicked, scrambling out the window into the night. A second later, bright torches illuminated my courtyard. My bedroom door was violently kicked open, and the room filled with armed guards. The cold night wind rushed in, rustling a pile of unfamiliar men’s clothing scattered across my floor. Jared stood at the threshold, his face pale with rage, while a sobbing Cynthia clung to his side. “Norma. You had better have a very good explanation for this.”

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “465195”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel