Category: English

The morning of the convention, the clock was ticking down to doors-open, but I was still fumbling with the satin ribbons of my cosplay. I’d spent nearly an hour staring at the character poster, trying to replicate that perfect, gravity-defying bow, but my fingertips were slick with frustration and sweat. That’s when Daniel leaned over. He picked up the fallen ends of the ribbon, his hands moving with a practiced, fluid grace. In seconds, he’d turned the limp fabric into a crisp, voluminous bow. I caught his reflection in the mirror, my eyebrows climbing. “Since when did a software engineer learn how to do that?” He straightened up, giving me that easy, boyish smile I’d loved for seven years. “Anything for you, right?” I did a slow pirouette, admiring the silhouette, but Daniel frowned, tilting his head as he studied his handiwork. He muttered under his breath, “Wait… something still isn’t right.” I stopped mid-turn and looked up at him, my voice barely a whisper. “What’s wrong with it?” 1 Daniel’s fingers twitched for a second, but he didn’t answer. He just laughed it off, reaching out to ruffle my hair. “We’ve got to move, or you’re going to miss the opening ceremony. Weren’t you dying to get a photo with that guest artist?” I stayed rooted to the spot, my eyes dropping to his hand as he gripped the strap of my gear bag. “You’ve tied that bow for someone else before, haven’t you?” The air in the room seemed to vanish for half a beat. The smile on his face didn’t disappear, but it grew thin, brittle. I watched the slight movement of his throat as he swallowed before he bent down to pick up my prop staff. “What goes on in that head of yours, Jo?” he asked, his tone perfectly light. “Remember when I worked at that high-end gift wrap shop during grad school? I spent eight hours a day tying bows for rich ladies’ Christmas hampers. I could tie these in my sleep back then. It’s muscle memory, that’s all.” It was a perfect explanation. Natural. Logical. I remembered that job. I used to bring him coffee while he worked behind a counter piled high with gold foil and velvet ribbon. He wasn’t lying about the experience. But as I stared at the bow on my hip, a cold, nagging sensation settled in the pit of my stomach. Something was off, but I couldn’t put a finger on the shape of the wrongness. I watched him carefully pack my bag, making sure to include the portable charger, the cooling mist, and even a small clip-on fan because I’d complained once about how hot the convention halls get. “All set,” he said, checking his phone. “And I found that gourmet taco truck you wanted to try—it’s parked right by the north exit. We can hit it on the way out.” I forced a smile. That nameless anxiety felt silly in the face of such thoughtfulness. Maybe I was just projecting my own stress onto him. We made it just as the hall lights dimmed for the opening. This was the biggest fan expo the city had seen in years, and I’d been counting down the days for months. I was busy recording the stage on my phone when Daniel leaned in, whispering in my ear as the cosplayers began their walk. “That one’s from Elden Ring, right?” “And that’s the lead singer from Starry Skies!” He didn’t miss a single one. Even when an obscure NPC from a niche indie game appeared, Daniel leaned over and whispered the character’s name and their specific backstory. The music was deafening, the crowd a sea of neon and joy, but my heart was sinking like a stone in deep water. Daniel is a classic tech guy. In our seven years together, he’d treated my hobbies with a sort of polite, distant tolerance. Usually, if I tried to get him to watch an anime with me on the couch, he’d be snoring by the second episode. The unease I’d tried to bury came roaring back. People don’t just wake up one day with a PhD in a subculture they’ve ignored for a decade. I lowered my phone, my hands shaking slightly. I tried to keep my voice casual, as if we were just chatting. “When did you become such an expert? I don’t even recognize half of these.” He rubbed the back of his neck, the tips of his ears turning a tell-tale shade of pink under the strobe lights. “You’re always saying I don’t take an interest in what you love,” he said. “I’ve been following this one creator on YouTube who does deep dives into lore. I guess I’m a fast learner.” I bit my lip. “That’s a very thorough YouTuber.” His gaze flickered for a split second before he pulled me into his side, his arm heavy around my shoulders. “Honey, they’re a pro. I just wanted to be able to talk to you about this stuff. I wanted to be part of your world for once.” I didn’t say anything else. I just nodded and let him hold me. The rest of the afternoon passed in a blur of forced smiles. A question was taking root in my mind, growing thorns: Is he doing this because he loves me, or because he’s practicing for someone else? When the convention wrapped, Daniel—who usually hates crowds and street food—insisted on taking me to the night market nearby. I watched him order extra-spicy skewers, something he’s never been able to handle. He bought two cups of sickly sweet boba tea, even though he’s a black-coffee-only purist. That night, back at the hotel, he left his phone on the nightstand while he went to shower. An ad popped up on his screen from a shopping app—recommendations for three different floral perfumes. I have chronic allergies. I haven’t worn perfume in seven years. In that single, quiet moment, the floor fell away. I knew. Daniel was seeing someone else. 2 When Daniel came out of the bathroom, he reached for me like he always did, his skin warm and smelling of hotel soap. I pulled away, instinctively. “I’m exhausted, Dan. My feet are killing me.” He didn’t push. He just leaned over and kissed my forehead. “Goodnight, baby.” He was asleep within minutes. I lay there in the dark, staring at the ceiling, replaying every bow he’d tied and every character name he’d whispered. After an hour of agonizing, I reached out and took his phone from the nightstand. He hadn’t changed the passcode. I went through everything. Photos, texts, call logs—nothing. His Uber history showed only home and the office. His Venmo was just rent and split dinners with friends. It was a clean phone. Too clean. I felt a wave of relief so strong I almost cried. I was being paranoid. I was the crazy girlfriend. But as I went to put the phone back, a notification chimed. An app I didn’t recognize—a boutique marketplace for handmade goods. I tapped it. The shop was called “Zoey’s Craft Haven.” It was a small-scale page, mostly custom cosplay commissions and accessories. On the surface, it looked like a dozen other shops. Then I saw the model in the featured banner. She was leaning against a brick wall, her hair grazing her collarbone, a playful, dimpled smile on her face. She was wearing the exact same costume I’d worn today. Using a reverse image search was easy. Within minutes, I found her social media. Her handle was @ZoeyNotTheZoo. Her bio read: Cosplayer/Artist. Commissions open. She was based in a city only two hours away from ours. I scrolled down to a pinned video. She was dressed as a cat-girl, lounging on a bed, posing for someone behind the camera. I was about to exit when I heard a voice from the speakers. “Baby, don’t move. Just one more shot.” It was Daniel’s voice. That specific, indulgent tone he used when he was looking at something he adored. The exact same inflection he’d used with me for seven years. He even used the same nickname. The sound felt like a physical blow to my eardrums. My body began to tremble, a cold sweat breaking out across my skin. I closed my eyes and the images flooded in. Daniel holding her. Daniel kissing her—forehead, nose, lips. Daniel staying up late to help her sew a costume, learning the lore of her favorite shows so he could impress her. The tears came silently. I had thought we were the lucky ones. Seven years, and we were supposed to be the “happily ever after.” But you can’t argue with a ghost in a video. I couldn’t lie to myself anymore. 3 I spent the rest of the night like a masochist, scrolling through every post she had. Her name was Zoey. About six months ago, Daniel’s company had hired her cosplay troupe to do some promotional work for a product launch. That was the spark. At first, it looked professional. She mentioned him in a post, thanking “the lead engineer” for helping with the tech setup on stage. Daniel had been the same as always during that time—coming home for dinner, bringing me my favorite snacks, listening to me vent about my boss. He’d laugh at his phone sometimes, but he’d always say it was just “crap from the group chat.” When did it change? Three months ago. She posted a photo of a hospital wristband at 2 AM. The caption: “Scary night with food poisoning, but thank God someone was there to drive me to the ER.” Daniel had been on a “business trip” in her city that weekend. Daniel stirred in his sleep, his hand reaching out blindly for mine. “Baby… come here…” I wiped my face, but the tears wouldn’t stop. On his lock screen, our photo from last summer was still there. We looked so happy. But now, I didn’t know which “baby” he was dreaming about. I couldn’t wrap my head around it. We were high school sweethearts. He was the man who told every friend he ever had that he’d marry me. He was the man who stayed awake for three nights straight in a plastic chair when I had my appendix out. How does that man just… disappear? What choked me the most was that he was willing to learn a whole new world for her—a world he’d dismissed when it was mine. It was a jagged pill I couldn’t swallow. I sat there until the sun began to peek through the hotel curtains. Then, I put his phone back, picked up mine, and booked two train tickets to Zoey’s city. When Daniel woke up, I told him I’d changed our plans. His smile faltered. “Why there? I thought we were going to the theme parks for your birthday? I spent a fortune on those express passes, Jo. You know how hard they are to get.” I held up my phone, cutting him off. “There’s a legendary artist doing a signing there. You know, the one I’ve talked about a million times? It’s a one-day-only thing.” He looked like he wanted to argue, so I added the finisher: “Plus, my mom really wanted me to pick up some of that specialty sourdough from the bakery there. You wouldn’t mind, would you?” The tension in his shoulders bled out instantly. “Oh. Sure. It just caught me off guard.” He kept glancing at his pocket. There was a bulge there—a small, square box. I pretended not to see it as I urged him to pack. “Hurry up! I want to get there before the line gets crazy.” By the time we arrived in Zoey’s city, Daniel was glued to his phone. He kept checking his notifications, a small, secret smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. Before we left the hotel, he helped me with my dress again. His movements were so practiced now, so effortless. “You’ve really mastered this,” I said, watching him in the mirror. “I’m a fast learner, remember?” “Right. Oh, by the way, I hired a local freelance assistant to help us at the signing. The lines are supposed to be brutal, so she’s going to meet us to help hold our spot.” “That’s my girl,” he said, kissing my temple. “Always thinking ahead. I’m looking forward to learning more about your scene.” I smiled. “Pay close attention, then.” After we bought the gifts for my parents, I led him to a themed cafe in the arts district. When Daniel saw the girl waiting at the corner table, the blood drained from his face so fast I thought he might faint. “Hi there,” I said, extending my hand with a bright, fake smile. “You must be Zoey?” 4 “Hi…” Zoey had been looking down, adjusting the lace on her skirt. When she looked up, her smile was radiant—until she saw Daniel standing behind me. She froze. The girl’s eyes began to well up almost instantly as they locked onto his. I kept my arm looped firmly through Daniel’s, tilting my head innocently. “Why are you guys looking at each other like that? Do you already know each other?” “No. No, we don’t,” Daniel blurted out, his hands waving dismissively. Zoey’s eyes turned a deeper shade of red. The lunch was a masterclass in torture. Daniel sat there like he was in an electric chair, making every excuse to leave the table—to use the restroom, to check the parking meter, to take a “work call.” Every time he left, Zoey’s phone would buzz with a text. I acted like I noticed nothing. I insisted on taking “cute” photos with Daniel, posing him so his arm was around me, making sure the flash on my camera was bright and obvious. Zoey’s composure was disintegrating. By the time our “commission” was over, her face was flushed. “Are you okay? You look like you have a fever,” I said with faux concern. She bit her lip, throwing a desperate glance at Daniel. He looked at the ceiling. Zoey looked down, her voice trembling. “I’m sorry. I’m just not feeling great today. I’ve ruined the mood. I’ll… I’ll give you a discount on the fee.” I smiled sweetly. “Don’t worry about it. Your outfit is stunning, though. Can you send me the link to your shop?” She nodded, reaching for her phone to add me on social media. Daniel lunged forward, grabbing my wrist. “Jo, let’s go. This style isn’t for you anyway. It’s a bit… juvenile, don’t you think?” He practically dragged me out of the cafe. At the door, I turned back and waved at Zoey. “I’ll definitely be booking you again!” Daniel didn’t say a word. He hailed a cab and basically shoved me inside. Seeing his face—the raw, panicked fury behind the mask—I felt a tiny, cold spark of satisfaction. By the time we got back to the hotel, Daniel had smoothed his features back into that “devoted boyfriend” look. I sat on the edge of the bed, chatting idly. “That girl today was so pretty. How old do you think she is?” “Younger than you,” he snapped. The air in the room turned to ice. Realizing his mistake, he cleared his throat. “I mean… she looked young. Just a guess.” “I see.” Daniel didn’t want to talk anymore. He started rummaging through his suitcase for his pajamas, the sound of the zipper harsh and frantic in the quiet room. “Get some sleep,” he said, tucking me in with exaggerated care. “We have to be up early for the Stevensons’ wedding tomorrow.” I closed my eyes. At midnight, I heard the rustle of clothes. The door opened a crack, a sliver of hallway light cutting across the carpet, and then clicked shut. I was alone. I opened my phone. Zoey had posted a new video thirty minutes ago. She was holding a wine glass, crying her eyes out. The caption was just one line: Even after all this, I still love you. Daniel had commented five minutes ago. “Wait for me.” I stared at those three words for a long time. Then I turned off the screen. Daniel didn’t come back that night. I didn’t sleep a wink. In the morning, he walked in carrying a bag of fresh pastries. He looked at me, dressed and ready, and forced a smile. “I went out early to get these. Your favorite—almond croissants from that place down the street.” He pressed the bag into my hands. I could smell a faint, unfamiliar perfume clinging to his collar. “By the way, baby,” he said, his voice dropping into that romantic register. “I have a huge surprise for you today.” I smiled back. “So do I.” 5 I’d known about his “secret” for a week. My best friend had been dropping hints about ring sizes. Daniel had been having “top secret” dinners with the groom. He’d been obsessively talking about our “journey” as a couple. Everything pointed to one thing. People think women are intuitive, but the truth is, we only miss the details when we choose to trust. Once the trust is gone, every detail is a scream. I put on my most flawless makeup. I wore my favorite dress. Daniel and I arrived at the wedding looking like the golden couple. He leaned in, his breath warm against my ear. “You look breathtaking today, Jo.” I looked at him in his custom suit and smiled. “You too.” “It’s a special day, after all,” he whispered. The Stevensons had been together for ten years. Watching them exchange vows, seeing that raw, honest happiness, actually made me cry. I was mourning a version of us that had already died. The bouquet toss was at the end of the night. The bride walked straight off the stage and pressed the flowers into my hands. The band shifted. They started playing “Our Song”—the one from our very first date. Suddenly, the giant projector screens in the ballroom flickered to life. It started with a slideshow of our life. Our college orientation. Our first shitty apartment. That sunset in Maine last summer. Seven years of us. I watched it all, tears streaming down my face. How could two people who loved each other this much end up here? The final slide was a photo of us on a pier, silhouettes against the orange sky. The text underneath read: Seven years was just the beginning. Will you give me forever? The room erupted. People were cheering, whistling, clapping. Every eye was on us. Daniel took a deep breath, his hands shaking as he dropped to one knee. He pulled a velvet box from his pocket, his eyes shining with what looked like pure, unadulterated devotion. “Joanna, will you marry me?” Time stopped. The whole world was waiting for me to say yes. I looked into his eyes—those eyes that had looked at Zoey the same way—and I let out a soft, jagged laugh. “Daniel,” I said, my voice carry across the silent room. “Which ‘baby’ are you asking right now?”

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In this life, I am still the executive assistant. My boss is still the girl I grew up with. In my last life, when the boy who hung the moon in her sky handed her a joint venture proposal, I quietly intercepted it and turned it down behind her back. As a result, she made my life a living hell, systematically destroying everything I cared about until my family was left with nothing. When the fatal car crash finally took my life, she stood over my broken body, gave a soft, dismissive laugh, and whispered, “If there’s a next life, stay out of my business.” Now, I am breathing again. And when that same proposal crosses my desk, I don’t reject it. I hand it right to her. Not long after, her empire crumbles into bankruptcy. And I turn around, walking straight into the arms of my billionaire father. 01 “Catherine, this is the development proposal from Wesley Hawthorne.” I watched as Catherine Dupont, who had been wearing her usual icy CEO mask, suddenly lit up, her hands trembling slightly as she took the portfolio from me. The only reason she was this excited was because Wesley was her ultimate “what-if”—the golden boy she had spent her entire adolescence pining for, the one who always managed to slip through her fingers. But looking at the reality of the situation, Hawthorne Industries and the Dupont Group were apex predators in the same sector. They were fierce competitors. Not to mention, Wesley hadn’t bothered to initiate contact with Catherine in over a decade. For him to suddenly extend an olive branch out of the blue… anyone with a shred of business acumen would pause to look for the poison on the leaves. “Wesley actually reached out to me? Elliot, hurry up, schedule a meeting for us to sign the paperwork.” Catherine’s face was glowing. She was entirely incapable of sitting down to weigh the pros and cons. If this were my previous life, I would have spoken up to stop her. After all, childhood loyalties are nothing but loose sand in the face of corporate greed. People change. I did exactly that in my last life. And she screamed at me, her face twisted in rage. “Elliot, do you think everyone in the world is as cold-blooded and ungrateful as you are?!” “If Wesley hadn’t pulled me out of that lake when we were kids, I would have died!” I knew she was blindly devoted to him. The more I tried to reason with her, the more she hated me. So, I took the hit. I went behind her back and formally rejected the partnership. I didn’t do it out of jealousy. I didn’t care that she loved him instead of me. I did it because that “partnership” was a ticking time bomb Wesley had custom-built to blow the Dupont Group to pieces. Before I died in my last life, I never regretted what I did, even when Catherine found out, threw apocalyptic tantrums, and made my daily existence an absolute nightmare. At the very least, the Dupont Group survived. Catherine was her father’s first female heir, appointed against the immense pressure of their conservative board. Everyone was waiting for her to fail. Everyone wanted to see the empire burn in her hands. I couldn’t bear to see her break. So I volunteered to be her right hand, her shield. The price I paid was agonizing. I became the unforgivable villain in her love story, the obstacle keeping her from Wesley. My adopted family lost their jobs because of her petty retaliation. And the most pathetic part? I took the impact in that car crash to save her life. As I lay dying, she smiled down at me. “With you gone, Elliot, there’s nothing standing between Wesley and me anymore. If there’s a next life, do yourself a favor and leave me alone.” Only after I died did I realize that the crash was never an accident. It was her plan. A plan to eradicate me. Now, I’ve been given a second chance. Since Catherine doesn’t care about protecting her own legacy, why should I? Everyone has their own fate. This time, I will not entangle myself in her karma. If she wants a happily-ever-after with Wesley so desperately, I will personally hand her the bitter fruit she’s begging for. After all, you reap what you sow. To help my boss pluck the moon from the sky as quickly as possible, I played the role of the dutiful assistant to perfection. I didn’t waste a single second. I immediately contacted Wesley’s office and locked in an afternoon slot to discuss the terms. In the fifteen minutes between those calls, I pulled out a piece of paper I had memorized—a private investigator’s tip-line attached to a multi-million dollar reward for a missing heir. I dialed the number. “Hello,” I said, my voice steady. “My name is Elliot. I’m the biological son you’ve been searching for.” 02 There was a heavy pause on the other end. The voice that finally answered sounded exhausted, brittle with years of false hope. “Another scammer?” I let out a soft laugh. “This one is the real deal. Just tell me where and when you want to do the DNA test.” It was true. After I died in my last life, I discovered that my biological parents were fiercely private, ultra-wealthy billionaires. My adoptive parents were just working-class people who had found me abandoned by a patch of tall grass off a busy street. The only reason I grew up knowing Catherine and Wesley was because my adoptive mother worked as a housekeeper at the Dupont estate. My adoptive dad worked grueling shifts, so my mom had no choice but to bring me to work. Day after day, I trailed behind Catherine, and she trailed behind Wesley. Over time, we became a trio. When we were kids, the companionship was genuine. But as we grew older and the invisible walls of social class began to solidify, things changed. Catherine and Wesley never said it out loud, but deep down, they looked down on me. I was the help’s kid. Now, breathing the air of a second life, I couldn’t wait to see the looks on their faces when they realized who I really was. Suddenly, my phone vibrated violently against my thigh. I answered it quickly. Catherine’s shrieking voice blasted through the speaker. “Elliot, where the hell are you?! I am giving you exactly twenty minutes to get back to the office!” “Oh, and detour to Fifth Avenue to pick up the dress I ordered! Their courier is too slow. Move your ass, Elliot! If you make me late to see Wesley, I will end you!” She hung up before I could utter a single syllable. I let out a low, cold breath. It was just a preliminary business meeting, but she was treating it like she was walking down the aisle. That was the power of the golden boy. I had guarded her quietly for twenty years, and it amounted to nothing compared to a man who had ignored her for a decade. Well, I was officially retiring from the role of the pathetic lapdog. But, considering she was technically still my boss, I drove toward the boutique. By the time I picked up her dress, I was already fifteen minutes past her deadline. I wasn’t in a rush. As I walked past a high-end designer window, my eyes caught a stunning white dress. A phantom image flashed through my mind, and on a whim, I walked in and bought it. When I finally made it back, Catherine was, predictably, ballistic. “What is wrong with you today, Elliot?! Everything you do is a beat too slow! Did you know I was meeting Wesley? Are you doing this on purpose?!” She knew I had feelings for her. Wesley had been the one to tell her. Before that, Catherine just found my working-class background a bit distasteful. But after Wesley snooped through my private journals and outed my feelings to her, her distaste curdled into absolute disgust. Wesley had casually dropped the bomb with a smirk. “You know, Catherine, Elliot wouldn’t be a bad choice for you. I kind of ship it.” From that day on, Wesley deliberately iced Catherine out. Not because he actually cared about her, but simply because he loved torturing me. The more miserable I was, the more entertained he was. His resentment stemmed from the fact that, growing up, I outperformed him in everything. Academics, sports, you name it. A nobody eclipsing the shining heir apparent. For a narcissist like Wesley, it was an unforgivable offense. But how was that my fault? Gold shines, no matter where you bury it. I let Catherine hit my arm a few times, her manicured nails digging into my jacket, before I stepped back. My voice was dead calm. “Are you done?” In my last life, Catherine used my love for her as a weapon to endlessly torment me. But this time, carrying the physical memory of a crushed ribcage and shattered glass, I wasn’t going down that road again. Having seen the ugly, rotten core of who she really was, loving her was a physical impossibility. Catherine froze, her hand hovering in the air. “Did you just snap at me, Elliot?” I needed to buy time. I hadn’t officially reunited with my biological family yet, so I couldn’t completely blow up my life here. I swallowed the vitriol and forced a veneer of patience. “We are less than thirty minutes away from the meeting. If you don’t hurry up, you’re going to leave him with the impression that you’re unpunctual. I imagine that’s not what you want.” I paused, letting my tone drop casually. “Besides, I heard Wesley is bringing his new executive secretary today. Word is, she’s absolutely gorgeous…” I feigned indifference, but it worked like a charm. Catherine’s eyes widened, her brows snapping together in immediate insecurity. “Well, what are you standing there for?!” she snapped. “Grab the files and get the car ready!” 03 Seeing her agitated actually brought a quiet sense of peace to my chest. I tossed the white dress I had bought for myself into the trunk just as Catherine rushed out of the building. It was true that Wesley had recently hired a stunning Ivy League grad as his secretary. Even though Catherine rarely interacted with him, I knew she obsessively tracked his every move through backchannels. Her interest in Wesley was purely romantic; she couldn’t care less about his actual business operations. Because of that blind spot, she hadn’t given this joint venture a second thought. She just saw it as a VIP ticket to finally getting the guy. “Hey. Elliot. How do I look?” I turned around. She was standing by the car, arms crossed, chin tilted up in a pose of absolute arrogance. The look in her eyes was loud and clear: Look at how perfect I am. You don’t deserve to even look at me. I had to admit, to outshine the rumors of Wesley’s new secretary, Catherine had gone to war. If you didn’t know it was a corporate M&A meeting, you’d think she was walking the red carpet at the Met Gala. She had completely sacrificed her own sharp, commanding style to cater to what she thought Wesley’s aesthetic was. I felt a brief flicker of pity, quickly followed by apathy. It wasn’t my problem anymore. I got in and drove us to the venue, pushing the speed slightly. I entirely “forgot” that Catherine suffered from severe motion sickness. Calling it an accident would be a lie. I did it on purpose. In my last life, I accommodated her every need. I drove her everywhere myself because I didn’t trust anyone else with her safety. I knew that if I drove too fast, the acid reflux would make her violently ill. “Elliot, you did that on purpose! Ugh!” I watched Catherine lean against the brick wall outside the venue, dry-heaving. I let a faint smile touch my lips. “You’re accusing the wrong guy, Catherine. I’m just setting the stage for you and Wesley to have a moment.” She shot me a venomous, red-rimmed glare. I held my hands up defensively. “Come on. Men love a damsel in distress. Playing the fragile, vulnerable card is the fastest way to trigger a guy’s hero complex.” I was being overly cynical, but Catherine hadn’t clawed her way to the CEO chair by being stupid. She caught the subtext instantly. She wiped her mouth, straightening up with a harsh, mocking laugh. “Why should I believe a word you say? It’s no secret you’re obsessed with me. I’ve told you a million times, it’s never going to happen. Stop trying to climb the social ladder through my bed. Wesley is the only one on my level.” She didn’t even try to hide the contempt. I put on my best hurt expression. “That’s exactly why I’ve decided to give up on you.” The moment the words left my mouth, Catherine actually went rigid for three full seconds. “Oh, please,” she finally scoffed, recovering her sneer. “You claim to love me, but you fold at the first sign of trouble. You’re pathetic, Elliot.” She turned on her heel and marched through the glass doors without looking back. I watched her go, my eyes narrowing into a cold stare. If I let myself repeat the same mistakes in this life, that would be pathetic. Wesley’s team had just arrived. The private conference room held only the four of us: me, Catherine, Wesley, and his secretary, Jordan. “Wesley, what made you suddenly want to work with us?” Catherine completely ignored the chair I pulled out for her across the table, glaring at me before practically throwing herself into the seat right next to Wesley. It was a four-person table, and she had stolen the seat meant for his secretary. “We’ve known each other forever, Wesley. No need to keep things so formal,” she purred. Wesley shot me a deliberate, mocking look. He draped his arm over the back of Catherine’s chair, letting it rest just millimeters from her shoulders. I took in his smug, territorial display with zero emotional reaction. In fact, it took everything in me not to laugh. A grown man, the CEO of a major corporation, still playing high-school dominance games like a dog marking a fire hydrant. I watched Catherine practically drowning in Wesley’s eyes. Knowing she would drag this out, I was about to speak up to push the deal forward, but the woman next to me beat me to it. “Mr. Hawthorne, Ms. Dupont,” Jordan said, her voice clipped and professional. “Since everyone is present, I suggest we begin.” Catherine, furious at having her flirting interrupted, shot the secretary a murderous glare. I took a moment to observe Jordan, then glanced at Catherine. In terms of pure glamor, Catherine had definitely outdressed Jordan today. That was probably the only reason Catherine hadn’t demanded the woman be fired on the spot. Because Catherine was entirely focused on Wesley, the contract review went dangerously fast. As Wesley stood up to leave, I smoothly stepped in front of him. “Mr. Hawthorne, our CEO is feeling a bit under the weather today. For old times’ sake, would you mind driving her home?” Catherine, who had been looking crestfallen at his departure, instantly perked up. She stepped close to him, putting on a soft, helpless voice. “Please, Wesley? Elliot is completely incompetent. He drove so erratically I got incredibly carsick. Would you mind?” I kept my eyes on Wesley, catching the microscopic flicker of irritation in his jaw before I gave him a polite smile. Once Catherine and Wesley were in his car, Jordan reached for the passenger door. Catherine immediately snapped from the backseat. “Wesley, I really prefer not having random employees know where I live.” Jordan looked genuinely speechless. Trying to hide my amusement, I gently pulled her back by the elbow. “Mr. Hawthorne, thank you for ensuring our CEO gets home safely. It’s a perfect opportunity for you two to discuss the finer points of the partnership.” As the car pulled away, Jordan dropped her leather briefcase onto the pavement with a heavy thud. “Is she psychotic? Just throwing her weight around to abuse the working class? She acts like everyone is dying to get their hands on that piece of trash.” Hearing her vent, I couldn’t help but laugh out loud. “Well, to be fair, you’re the daughter of a billionaire. You’re hardly the ‘working class’.” 04 Jordan’s expression instantly turned lethal. She locked eyes with me, her posture shifting into something dangerous. “How do you know that?” I only knew because, after I died, I found out my billionaire father had a daughter two years older than me. To protect her from the suffocating pressure of the media, my father had scrubbed her existence from the public record. It gave her the freedom to live an actual life and experience the world on her own terms. While I was still lost in my memories, Jordan suddenly snapped a brutal kick aimed straight below my belt. I reacted purely on instinct, dodging just in time. “Who sent you? What’s your angle?” Jordan’s face was terrifyingly cold. I threw my hands up in a desperate surrender. “Hey, hold on! Are you trying to end your own bloodline?!” Jordan froze, then immediately pivoted to launch another kick. “What kind of psycho are you? You think you can just call me sister and I’ll buy it?” I blocked her leg with my forearm. “You don’t have to buy anything. We can do a DNA test right now.” Right on cue, my phone started vibrating furiously. I held it up to show her the screen. “I literally just scheduled the private doctor with the estate manager. Come on. Let’s go bleed for science.” With that, I popped the trunk, pulled out the white dress I had bought earlier, and tossed it to her. By the time we arrived at the discreet location I had arranged with my father, the estate manager was already waiting. To prevent anyone from buying off a public hospital, my father used the family’s exclusive private medical team. Because the stakes were so high, the lab ran the rush order flawlessly. The results came back within hours. Jordan stared at the paper, her eyes wide. “You really are my little brother.” My billionaire dad broke down, pulling me into a crushing hug, sobbing uncontrollably. The only tragedy was that I was a year too late. My biological mother had passed away from an illness twelve months ago. Her dying wish had been for them to find the son they had lost. Now that I was back, my father wanted to call a massive press conference and announce my return to the world. I immediately shut the idea down. My revenge wasn’t complete. The traps hadn’t been sprung. Showing my hand now would ruin the game. I pulled Jordan aside. “Hey, you hate Wesley, right? I hate him too. How about a little sibling bonding exercise to take him down?” Wesley was the quintessential bloodsucking capitalist, treating his employees like disposable batteries. Jordan had been sick of him for months. She raised an eyebrow. “I’m listening.” As I laid out my blueprint, Jordan clicked her tongue. “Damn, little brother. You’ve got some deep-seated trauma with this guy.” She hit the nail on the head. I did. In my previous life, my death was entirely intertwined with Wesley Hawthorne. He was far more dangerous than anyone realized. 05 This entire “partnership” was a premeditated scheme designed by Wesley to gut the Dupont Group from the inside out. Right now, both companies were heavyweights in the same industry. Two tigers can’t share one mountain. Wesley was desperate to swallow Catherine’s empire whole. Because Wesley placed so much emphasis on this joint venture, Catherine became utterly obsessed with it. She worked me to the bone, piling on tasks that had never been part of my job description. She really had learned from the best. Growing up with Wesley had taught her how to be a ruthless capitalist. Honestly, I could have just thrown my resignation letter in her face right then and there, walking away to inherit my billions. But if I did that, my brutal death in the last life would go unanswered. They would win. Besides, before I officially stepped into my family’s empire, I needed to build a solid foundation. I found out that my father was currently eyeing a massive plot of land in the Southside Yards. Coincidentally, Wesley was desperate for that exact same parcel. But based on the memories from my past life, the Southside Yards project was poisoned chalice. It looked like a goldmine, but it was rotten to the core. Even though it was adjacent to the city’s new commercial hub, the land had a dark history. It used to be a low-income neighborhood. Due to deep political corruption and violent, forced evictions orchestrated by shell companies, families had been destroyed. People had died. The scandal had been buried deep. Worse, the geological survey had been doctored—the ground was inherently unstable and prone to catastrophic sinkholes. My father had only recently returned to the US and wasn’t privy to the local, buried dirt. He was still deciding if the land was worth the investment. Wesley, on the other hand, thought he was playing 4D chess. His plan with Catherine was to build a massive residential complex on the Southside Yards. Dupont Group would be the public face—buying the land and building the structures—while Hawthorne Industries would act as a silent, shadow backer. If the skeletons in the closet were unearthed, or if the ground caved in, the public would burn Catherine at the stake. Wesley could just sever ties, keep his hands clean, and watch his biggest competitor die. If the project succeeded, he raked in half the profits with zero risk. Wesley thrived on dirty deals disguised as brilliant business moves. In my last life, I saw right through his trap. I fought tooth and nail to protect Catherine, saving her company, her reputation, and her father’s legacy. My reward was being treated like garbage. This time? I wasn’t just going to sit back and watch. I was going to give them a little push over the edge.

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Returning home from a three-year overseas assignment, I expected the quiet embrace of my late father’s estate. Instead, I found it violently carved into an illegal, overcrowded boarding house by the very estate manager he had trusted. To reclaim what was rightfully mine, I went undercover. I posed as a prospective tenant, quietly gathering photographic evidence of the blatant fire code violations and structural hazards, preparing to report him and force a full restoration of the property. When I brought up standard safety concerns, the estate manager sneered. “I call the shots around here. If you don’t like it, pay the ten-times penalty fee to break your lease and get the hell out.” His retaliation was swift and vile. He padlocked the second-floor kitchen and bathrooms, barring the tenants from using them, and even resorted to slipping live rats into my room, hoping the sheer disgust would force me to break my contract. What truly chilled me, however, wasn’t his cruelty, but the spinelessness of the other tenants. The same people who had quietly cheered me on for demanding to see his permits suddenly turned on me. They blamed me for rocking the boat, cursing me for bringing the landlord’s wrath down upon them. After the last shred of my sympathy evaporated, I pulled up a contact in my phone—a high-end demolition and zoning contractor I’d kept on retainer. “I’ll sign off on the demolition plan right now. I cover all out-of-pocket expenses,” I told the man on the other end. “But I have one condition.” “Name it.” “Your crews need to be on-site, engines running, by eight o’clock tomorrow morning.” 1 I stood on the front steps of the Greenwich estate, the crisp evening air biting at my cheeks. Three times I punched the passcode into the security pad. Three times, it flashed red. This sprawling colonial was my inheritance, left to me by my father. For three years while I was expanding our firm’s portfolio in Dubai, it was supposed to sit empty, maintained and pristine. Instead, the foyer was swarming with strangers. “You here to rent, too?” a woman asked, holding the heavy oak door open with a welcoming, albeit tired, smile. I froze, the breath knocked out of my lungs. The grand, sun-drenched living room with its vaulted ceilings had been butchered. Cheap drywall partitions sliced the space into cramped, windowless bedrooms. The sprawling mahogany terrace had been enclosed with flimsy plywood to create single occupancy units. Through the hallway, I could see my father’s old study—once a sanctuary of leather and literature—stuffed with two bunk beds, the heavy velvet drapes crudely pinned up to divide the space. A vein throbbed against my temple. “Who is running this place?” I managed to ask, my voice tight. “I need to see the person in charge.” My father had been an intensely private man. Barely anyone knew the security codes to this house. My mind raced through a very short list of suspects, but when the man finally emerged from the back hallway, I still felt a shock of disbelief. Frank Cobb looked exceedingly pleased with himself. He held a clipboard, his eyes raking over me with a dismissive sweep. “You look a bit young, but whatever. You looking for a room?” He was my father’s most trusted estate manager. Because I spent my life flying between international offices for the family company, I had left Frank in charge of my father’s care during his final months. He had never actually met me face-to-face. “I was under the impression this was a private residence belonging to Mr. Davenport,” I said, keeping my tone perfectly measured. “Who authorized chopping it up into a boarding house? Was it… you?” Frank’s eyes narrowed, a flash of defensive anger crossing his face. He slammed the clipboard down onto a makeshift folding table. When he looked at me again, there was nothing but contempt. “I am the master of this house! Its name is Cobb now!” he barked. “This Mr. Davenport you’re talking about? He was just my employer. Look, kid, if you’re here to start trouble, there’s the door.” He took a step forward, raising a hand as if to shove me out. “I only welcome paying tenants. Not your kind.” “Wait.” I planted my feet. There was no way I was letting this parasite keep his claws in my family’s legacy for another night. “I’m a tenant. I want to move in today.” I pulled a platinum credit card from my bag and tossed it onto the table. Frank’s eyes instantly lit up, the greed overriding his hostility. “Well, listen here, you can’t afford the big rooms, but there’s a small unit at the far left of the second floor. It’s perfect for you,” he said smoothly. “Five thousand a month. Utilities aren’t included.” My stomach turned. Five thousand? I pressed him on the other units. They ranged from five to ten thousand dollars a month. Looking around, I mentally counted the doors. The estate had been chopped into at least twenty micro-units. Frank was pulling in hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in illegal rent. I feigned hesitation, complaining about the price. I casually mentioned knowing Mr. Davenport, claiming we had met once or twice. “What do you know? This is prime real estate. People are lining up down the block to live here!” Frank lifted his chin, his tone dripping with arrogance. “It’s a luxury estate. Hell, real estate developers offered me top dollar to buy the land, and I turned them down.” He laughed, a harsh, grating sound. “That Mr. Davenport you’re so fond of? He was just the guy who paid my checks. Died a few years back. Guess he didn’t have the luck to enjoy this place.” As he spoke, he shot his cuffs, deliberately flashing the heavy, gleaming watch on his wrist. My pupils dilated. It was a custom vintage Patek Philippe. The exact one I had bought for my father for his sixtieth birthday. He had loved it dearly but lost it in his final months. We spent half a year looking for it. Frank hadn’t just stolen the house. He had stolen my father’s memory. He was still rambling about the amenities when I cut him off, a cold, empty smile curving my lips. “Fine. I’ll take it.” 2 I paid six months’ rent upfront, without blinking. The lease agreement was handed to me by Frank’s son, Tyler. It was five pages of draconian rules restricting the tenants, with zero accountability for the landlord. I signed it all without a word. I followed Tyler up the grand sweeping staircase, down the hall to the smallest room at the end of the corridor. It used to be my childhood storage closet. Less than fifty square feet. It was where I used to keep my old model airplanes and dusty building blocks. Now, it was my apartment. I scanned the second floor, my brow furrowing deeper with every second. The open-concept loft had been floored over with cheap steel grating to create a communal bathroom. Right next to it, they had tapped directly into the mainline to rig up a makeshift gas kitchen. It was a ticking time bomb. One spark, one structural shift, and the whole floor could collapse or go up in flames. “Wait,” I said, my voice dropping to a dangerous register. Tyler turned, annoyed. “This is a massive safety hazard. I want to see the deed to the house. I want proof you actually own this property.” Tyler stiffened. He whipped his head around, staring at me like I had lost my mind. Doors along the hallway cracked open. Tenants poked their heads out, drawn by the confrontation. “Are you psycho? Of course this is my house,” Tyler spat. “I installed that bathroom and kitchen for your convenience. Who the hell are you to question me?” “You’ve tapped into the gas line illegally. The wiring is completely exposed. And you’re renting out non-residential space,” I pointed toward the enclosed balcony. “You won’t show the deed because you’re subletting. Or worse, this isn’t even your house to begin with.” Murmurs rippled through the hallway. Someone in the back, clearly fed up, spoke out. “She’s right! Look at what they’ve done to the place. I bet he is a scammer. Show us the papers!” “I’ve been saying that gas line smells funny for weeks! We’re gonna get blown to pieces!” The commotion echoed down the stairs. Heavy footsteps thundered up, and Frank appeared, his face purple with rage. “You little brat! You’ve been a pain in my ass since you walked through that door!” Frank roared. “The contract is signed. You live here, or you get out! Say one more word and I’ll shut you up myself!” He wasn’t done. He looked me up and down, his lip curling at my tailored trench coat and silk blouse. “Look at you, dressed up like some Wall Street snob. I bet you’ll be bringing all sorts of trash back here. You’re in my territory now. You play by my rules.” He jabbed a stubby finger in my face. “Otherwise, I’ll make one call to the executives at Pinnacle Holdings, and I’ll have you blacklisted from the entire Tri-State area! You’ll never work again!” Pinnacle Holdings? I went perfectly, utterly still. Frank took my silence for fear, puffing his chest out. “That’s right! My wife is a senior manager at Pinnacle. She’s the CEO’s right hand!” he bragged. “She could crush you like a bug. Nobody messes with me and gets away with it!” So that’s how it was. Diane Cobb. A mid-level project manager who used to bow so low she practically kissed my shoes every time I walked into the boardroom. “Is that so?” I whispered. A woman next to me grabbed my sleeve, her eyes wide with panic. “Don’t do it, honey,” she hissed. “Her husband isn’t joking. Somebody tried to report them to the housing authority last year, and they got evicted the next day!” “She’s right, you don’t want to make an enemy out of them!” I kept my eyes locked on Frank and Tyler. Slowly, deliberately, I pulled out my phone and dialed the fire marshal’s tip line. Before the call could connect, a glass beer bottle flew through the air and shattered against the doorframe right next to my head. Shards rained down. A sharp pain sliced across my forehead. Blood trickled down into my brow, blurring my vision. “You little bitch, you’re calling the city?” Tyler screamed, stepping forward. “We’re breaking your lease! Right now!” I stepped back, calmly wiping the blood from my skin. I pulled the lease from my bag and dropped it at his feet. “You want to break the lease? Fine,” I said softly. “But read section four. If the landlord terminates without cause, you owe me ten times the security deposit and rent.” Tyler snatched the paper, ripping it in half. Fire danced in his eyes. “Pay you? In your dreams!” He leaned in and muttered something to his father. Frank’s eyes gleamed with a vicious, calculating light. Suddenly, his whole demeanor changed. He walked over and slammed heavy padlocks onto the second-floor bathroom and kitchen doors. “You know what? As a responsible landlord, I need to listen to my tenants,” Frank announced, his voice dripping with mock concern. “You think it’s unsafe? Fine. The second-floor kitchen and baths are strictly off-limits. You want to eat or piss, you go downstairs to the courtyard.” He looked directly at me. “Try to do a good deed, and this is the thanks I get. Can’t risk getting reported, can we?” With two sentences, he had masterfully turned the entire floor against me. 3 I tried to explain, but it was useless. The same tenants who had just been demanding to see his permits turned their fury onto me. They cursed me for being naive, for angering the landlord. One woman even told me I needed to get on my knees and apologize so they could have their kitchen back. Frank spat on the floor, a smug, triumphant grin on his face. He checked the locks one last time and strolled back downstairs toward the master suite. He had a private en-suite bathroom and a fully remodeled chef’s kitchen on the first floor. This didn’t affect him in the slightest. Refusing to stand there and be yelled at, I walked into my cramped room and slammed the door, falling back onto the narrow cot. Outside my tiny window, where my mother’s rose garden and a cedar swing set used to be, there was now a hideous cinderblock structure covered in cheap tar paper. More illegal housing. If this place caught fire, twenty people would die, and legally, as the owner of the estate, their blood would be on my hands. My heart hammered against my ribs. I pulled out my phone and called the demolition contractor. The man on the line laughed with sheer relief when I told him to authorize the leveling of the property. “Finally, Ms. Davenport! The land value alone is astronomical,” he said. “We can have the site cleared and the escrow funds released to your account within the month.” But when I told him it had to happen tomorrow, he hesitated. “Tomorrow at 8 AM? That’s going to require pulling double shifts and paying premium fees to the city for expedited permits.” “I’ll cover the premium, the hazard pay, and I’ll give your crew an extra percentage point on the back end,” I replied without missing a beat. Money talks. He agreed instantly. I let out a long breath. I was just about to get up and stretch my legs when I heard a scratching sound by the door. Three massive, sewer-slicked rats squeezed through the gap beneath the doorframe, scurrying into my room. My breath caught. Instinct took over. I grabbed a heavy wooden bookend from the dusty shelf and hurled it at the closest one. Crack. From the hallway, I heard Frank’s raspy chuckle. “If you’re scared of a little wildlife, sweetie, just pack your bags,” he taunted through the wood. “Pay me my ten-times fee, and I’ll even be nice enough to come in there and catch them for you.” He thought he could terrify me into submission with cheap tricks. He had no idea who he was dealing with. I moved with clinical precision. I scooped up the dead rat with a trash bag, ripped the door open, and hurled the carcass directly at his chest. Frank shrieked, his face draining of color as he stumbled backward. “I’ve spent time in the Australian Outback,” I said, my voice lethal. “I’ve seen bugs bigger than that. Try harder.” I slammed the door in his face, a cloud of dust settling around my feet. The adrenaline crash left me exhausted. I laid down and actually managed to fall into a deep sleep. When I woke up, the room was suffocatingly hot. I went to open the door, but the handle wouldn’t turn. It was padlocked from the outside. No matter how hard I kicked or shoved, the heavy oak didn’t budge. “Frank! You spineless coward!” I yelled, slamming my boot into the wood. “You lock a tenant in their room?” I kicked again, the wood splintering slightly. Finally, a voice hissed from the other side. “Stop it! Are you trying to wake up the whole house?” “You brought this on yourself with all that reporting nonsense!” another tenant yelled through the door. “Because of you, we can’t cook, and we have to walk outside to use the bathroom. You deserve this!” Idiots. They wanted me to be the sacrificial lamb. They wanted me to fight the landlord, but the second it inconvenienced them, they were perfectly happy to leave me in a cage. I remembered one of the tenants whispering to me earlier about how the roof leaked near the electrical boxes and how the gas smelled like rotten eggs. That’s how I knew they were terrified. Disgusted, I stopped kicking. “Yeah, that’s right! Give up!” Frank’s voice echoed in the hall. A second later, a wave of foul, murky laundry water sloshed under the door gap, soaking my shoes. I jumped back, the stench of mildew and dirt hitting my nose. “Keep making noise, and I’ll leave you in there to rot!” Frank spat. 4 I spent the entire night in that room, sitting in the dark, watching the hours tick by on my phone. Three hours left until the demolition crew arrived. I couldn’t just sit there. I tapped lightly on the adjoining wall, whispering to the young guy in unit 203. I promised to Venmo him five hundred dollars if he slipped out and broke the padlock. He did. The house was deathly quiet in the pre-dawn hours. I crept softly down the stairs, pausing when I heard voices murmuring from the master suite. “Dad, you think that girl asking about the deed knows something?” Tyler asked. Frank scoffed, a thick, arrogant sound. “Impossible. Davenport died overseas years ago. If he had family that cared, they would’ve shown up to claim this place by now.” “I heard he had a kid, though. A daughter, maybe?” “Died in a plane crash a couple of years back. I heard it through the grapevine at Pinnacle. The kid is dead. The house is ours. Nobody is coming for it.” A plane crash? He wasn’t entirely wrong. There had been a massive aviation disaster three years ago involving a flight I was supposed to be on. It had been a clerical error that kept my name on the manifest, but I had missed the boarding by ten minutes. Frank had banked his entire illegal empire on the assumption that I was dead. Just then, Tyler’s phone rang. It was the demolition contractor, doing a courtesy call to the current occupant. Frank grabbed the phone, put it on speaker, and cursed the man out before hanging up. “Bullshit! Tell me to pack my bags? Let’s see them try to touch my house!” I didn’t linger. I slipped out the side door, breathing in the crisp morning air, and drove straight to the contractor’s office to finalize the paperwork. When I returned to the estate an hour later, the street was rumbling. I rode in the passenger seat of the lead excavator, a massive, yellow beast of a machine. Behind us, a fleet of bulldozers and dump trucks idled, their engines vibrating against my chest. “ATTENTION RESIDENTS. YOU HAVE THIRTY MINUTES TO GATHER YOUR BELONGINGS AND EVACUATE. THIS PROPERTY IS SCHEDULED FOR IMMEDIATE DEMOLITION.” The megaphone cracked through the quiet suburban street. The front doors blew open. Frank charged out, leading a mob of half-dressed, panicked tenants. “Like hell you are! Without my signature, nobody touches a single brick!” Frank roared, his face purple. Tyler pushed to the front of the crowd, brandishing a baseball bat. “This is illegal eviction! You touch this house, and I’ll have the cops here so fast you’ll spin! You’re trespassing!” The site foreman looked up at me in the cab, hesitating. I gave him a single, curt nod. The excavator’s massive steel arm raised high into the sky, blotting out the sun. Then, it swung down, smashing straight through the wrought-iron gates and obliterating the illegal brick extension in the front yard. CRASH. Wood splintered. Brick exploded. A massive cloud of dust swallowed the lawn. I opened the cab door and stepped out onto the treads, looking down at Frank with eyes like ice. “That was your thirty-minute warning,” I said, checking my watch. “You now have fifteen minutes. I suggest you start packing.” Frank choked on the dust, coughing violently. When he looked up at me, his eyes were bloodshot with absolute fury. “Who the hell do you think you are?!” he screamed. “I should’ve kept you locked in that room and beat you senseless!” He waved the ripped lease agreement in the air. “You’re violating your contract! I’m calling the police!” “Oh, please do,” I replied, crossing my arms. “In fact, tell them to hurry. I’d love to explain to them how you’ve been squatting on a dead man’s property.” I raised my hand, giving the foreman another signal. The excavator swung again. This time, the bucket crashed directly through the bay windows of the master suite—Frank’s room. “You bitch!” Frank shrieked, dropping his phone. “You want to play rough? My wife is on her way right now! When she gets here, she’ll end you! You have no idea the kind of power she has!” Really? How convenient. A slow, terrifying smile spread across my face. “I can’t wait to see,” I said softly, “exactly how much power your wife thinks she has.” For three years, I had let the rot fester in this house, and in my company. It was time to cut it out. Down the street, two black Lincoln Navigators tore around the corner, screeching to a halt at the curb. Diane Cobb stepped out of the lead car, dressed in a sharp St. John power suit. She completely ignored the heavy machinery, marching straight toward the wreckage with the fury of a woman who thought she owned the world. “Who authorized this?!” she shrieked, her voice cutting through the rumble of the engines. “Who dares to touch my property? Show yourself! I’ll ruin you!” I stepped down from the excavator, the dust clearing as my heels hit the pavement. I looked up. I watched the exact moment the blood drained from Diane’s face. I heard the collective, sharp intake of breath from the lackeys standing behind her. Her eyes widened in absolute, primal terror. “Ms… Ms. Davenport?” she gasped, her knees visibly shaking. “Is that… you?”

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Standing in the auditorium, I stared up at the podium. Professor Evelyn Mercer. She practically radiated cold, untouchable perfection—the human embodiment of absolute, freezing abstinence. I chewed on the inside of my cheek, unable to shake my doubts. I called out to the System in my head. Sys, are you absolutely sure we have the right target? Looking at her, it was impossible to connect this pristine academic with the profile of an obsessive, unhinged stalker. The System’s robotic voice chimed back in a panic: It’s because she hasn’t developed feelings for the male lead yet! Once she falls for him, her dormant possessive-psycho attributes will completely detonate! You have to distract her, host. Under no circumstances can Evelyn be allowed to intervene in the romantic arc of the male and female leads! I stroked my chin, mulling it over for a few seconds before a spark of inspiration hit me. Fight fire with fire, right? If she was supposedly a dormant, dark-romance psycho, why not out-creep her and see what happened? Acting on impulse, I pulled out my phone, typed up an anonymous text, and hit send: Professor, your skin is so pale. I wonder if the rest of you is just as flawless under those clothes. Up at the podium, Evelyn picked up her phone, glanced at the screen, and set it back down. Not a single muscle in her face twitched. I raised an eyebrow. Impressive. An absolute master of composure. So, I sent another: Your waist is incredibly narrow. I bet if someone held you tight enough, their fingers would leave beautiful bruises. This time, I finally saw her brow furrow. Hmph. So what if you’re a dark, possessive psycho? I thought. Let’s see how a straight Ice Queen handles getting relentlessly targeted by an unhinged queer girl. 01 Unsurprisingly, my number was promptly blocked. The look of disgust on Evelyn’s face lasted only a fraction of a second. She smoothly regained her composure, her dark eyes scanning the lecture hall with total indifference. “The department is launching a new experimental research project. We require one undergraduate assistant,” she announced, her voice like chilled glass. “Do I have any volunteers?” The entire room went dead silent. You could have heard a pin drop. Even the frat boys who usually salivated over Evelyn quickly buried their heads in their textbooks, terrified of making eye contact. It was a universally acknowledged truth on campus: Professor Mercer of the Biology Department was unequivocally the most stunning woman at the university. She was also, unequivocally, its most ruthless tyrant. In her three years of teaching, she had overseen dozens of massive experiments. To this day, not a single student had ever walked out of her lab smiling. The silence stretched for three agonizing minutes. Not a single hand went up. Evelyn didn’t look surprised. She simply picked up the student roster, preparing to pick a sacrificial lamb at random. Right as her lips parted—about to call out Declan Wright’s name—I threw my hand into the air. “Professor Mercer. I volunteer.” Instantly, the collective gaze of the entire class snapped toward me. Their eyes were brimming with the kind of profound respect usually reserved for martyrs. Evelyn looked up, her gaze landing on me. She slowly closed the roster. “And your name is?” she asked, her tone impeccably flat. I flashed her a radiant, blinding smile. “Jordan. Jordan Ellis.” “Well, Jordan Ellis,” she said coolly. “I look forward to working with you.” 02 On the walk back to the dorms, Declan wouldn’t stop buzzing in my ear. “Jordan, you were acting so weird today!” he exclaimed, matching my stride. “Volunteering for Mercer’s lab? I thought you despised bench work.” I gave him a breezy, fabricated excuse. “I’m short on credits. Might as well knock them out.” “But Professor Mercer is brutally demanding. If you do this… you definitely won’t have time to chase after Naomi.” Naomi Foster. The female lead of this world. A wealthy, beautiful graduate student in our department. The System had originally assigned me the role of the tragic, throwaway side-character—the pathetic roommate of the male lead, Declan. In the original plot, “I” was Naomi’s ultimate, desperate simp. My entire existence revolved around finding new, humiliating ways to win her over, entirely ignoring my studies. Of course, as cannon fodder, all my efforts were doomed. Upon discovering that my goddess actually had a crush on my roommate, “I” was supposed to be consumed by jealousy, frame Declan for something awful, get exposed by Naomi, and be universally despised until I was forced to drop out. I wasn’t even supposed to be a footnote in the storyline between Declan and Evelyn. The System gave me this throwaway identity purely for the freedom to operate off-script. Now that my target was Evelyn Mercer, there was zero reason to maintain my original persona and keep playing the role of Naomi’s tragic lapdog. So, I kept my eyes on my phone, furiously typing as I casually replied, “Naomi is way too much work. I’m exhausted. I think I’m over her.” Declan’s eyes went wide with disbelief. He studied my face to make sure I wasn’t joking. When he realized I was serious, he let out a very quiet, very hopeful, “Oh.” Then, his curiosity shifted back to my phone. “Jordan, why do you keep staring at your screen today? And why are you smiling like… like a creep?” “Just messing with my digital pet,” I lied smoothly. “It’s highly entertaining.” “Digital pet? Like a Tamagotchi app?” “Uh… yeah. Something like that.” Just an ordinary, delightfully vulgar little game called ‘Pretend to be an Unhinged Lesbian to Terrify a Straight Woman.’ Evelyn had already blocked two of my burner numbers. But it didn’t matter. With the System acting as my ultimate tech support, I generated a third number and went right back to my harassment campaign. Professor, don’t waste your energy blocking me. No matter how many numbers you block, I’ll always find a way to reach you. Professor, you looked so incredibly sexy today. That silk blouse was fighting for its life against your chest. I just wanted to tear it open and devour you. Professor, your hands are so beautiful. They look like they’re meant to be soiled with something filthy. Want to try mine? Professor… Watching the little ‘Read’ receipts pop up beneath every single ignored message, I finally burst out laughing. Evelyn’s facial expressions right now had to be absolutely priceless. It probably never occurred to her—a dormant, obsessive psycho—that she would suddenly be targeted by an even more deranged, heavyweight stalker! I sent text after text, utterly relentless. Only when I had exhausted the entire notes app filled with ‘dark romance stalker quotes’ I’d curated did I finally take a breath. I assumed Evelyn was just going to ignore me into oblivion. I was just about to shove my phone into my backpack when the screen lit up with a reply. You better hope I never catch you. Because if I do, I will make you wish you were dead. I smirked, thoroughly unbothered. I already knew an unhinged psycho like her wasn’t someone to cross lightly, which was exactly why I was brilliantly hiding behind a digital smokescreen. She wanted to catch me? Good luck even figuring out my gender, sweetheart. Muahahahaha. 03 The next morning, I dragged myself out of bed, ready to report to the lab. Suddenly, Declan popped up. “Jordan, let’s walk together. I really want that scholarship, so I begged Professor Mercer to let me join the project too.” My stomach dropped. Hell no! The entire reason I sacrificed my precious sleep to become a lab rat was to physically block him from getting close to Evelyn! Why was he coming?! I carried a knot of dread in my stomach all the way to the science building. It was only when I walked into the lab and saw Naomi standing there that I secretly exhaled a sigh of relief. Right. Evelyn and Naomi were cousins. It made perfect sense for Naomi to join her older cousin’s project. Declan was almost certainly here for Naomi. He had always harbored a crush on her, but out of loyalty to me—his tragic, simp roommate—he had buried his feelings. My little declaration yesterday about giving up on Naomi must have been the green light he was waiting for. He was here to spark up a romance with the female lead. Perfect. I nudged him with my elbow and beamed. “Declan, if you like her, go for it! I’m rooting for you.” Declan flushed bright red and ducked his head, looking completely bashful. I was just about to tease him a little more when a highly irritated voice snapped through the room. “Jordan? What the hell are you doing here? When is this going to end?” I rolled my eyes to the ceiling. Turning around, I was met with Naomi’s face, practically radiating annoyance. “This is a professional laboratory, not a playground for your obsession!” she hissed. “I don’t care how much you like me, you don’t get to stalk me here!” I swallowed my temper and offered a deadpan explanation. “Naomi, I’m here for the credits and the scholarship. Not for you. I am completely over you, so please, put your ego away.” Naomi froze. Her eyes darted nervously toward Declan for a split second before she lowered her voice. “I really hope you’re telling the truth this time. Don’t play games with me.” I couldn’t help but scoff. She reeked of that classic, obnoxious pick-me energy. Oh hell no. I wasn’t letting her win this round. Seeing that it was just the three of us in the lab, I aggressively rolled up my sleeves, planted my hands on my hips, and shamelessly stepped up onto a stool to gain the high ground. I unleashed on her. “Naomi, I swear to God, if I’m lying, I hope I get hit by a bus tomorrow! I’m totally over you! Actually, I’m obsessed with Professor Mercer now!” “You know what?” I continued, dropping into a vicious, rhythmic freestyle. “Compared to her, you’re nothing but a wilted piece of lettuce! She destroys you in looks! She destroys you in brains! She destroys you in body! Yeah! Absolutely wrecked!” My flawless execution left Naomi standing there, her face turning an impressive shade of bruised purple. I was just about to add some hand gestures for dramatic flair when a voice cut through the air behind me. “It seems my students are overflowing with energy today. Since that’s the case, we’ll add two more rounds of extractions to the schedule.” 04 And just like that, my beautiful Saturday was slaughtered on the altar of science. Staring resentfully at the elegant curve of Evelyn’s back—her long legs, that impossibly narrow waist—I pulled out my phone with a vengeance. Time for more digital harassment. Professor, you look so excruciatingly sexy today. I want you to step on me with those heels. I bet it would feel like heaven. Professor, the way you stare so intensely at those slides… I want to blind you to everyone else so you only ever look at me. Across the room, Evelyn picked up her phone. She glanced at the screen. Her brow furrowed sharply as her thumbs flew across the keyboard. Are you spying on me? I typed back at lightning speed: Ah~ The Professor finally replied! I’m so happy~ You’re absolutely right. I hid cameras in the lab. And in other places too… but I can’t tell you where. Professor, I’ll never take my eyes off you. For the rest of your life, you’ll never escape me! CRACK. The sharp sound of shattering glass echoed through the lab. “Professor Mercer!” Declan gasped. “Are you okay?!” I quickly shoved my phone in my pocket and hurried over. Evelyn’s hand was bleeding, a jagged cut sliced across her palm from a beaker she had apparently just crushed in her grip. Declan scrambled to find alcohol wipes and bandages, but I snatched them right out of his hands. Moving with ruthless efficiency, I cleaned the wound and taped up her palm before she could even process what was happening. She opened her mouth, likely to say she could do it herself, but I was already done. Declan: “…” Naomi, who had rushed over and contributed absolutely nothing: “…” Evelyn stared down in silence at the slightly crooked bandage on her hand. After a long moment, she looked up at me. “Thank you, Jordan.” “Don’t mention it,” I chirped. Considering I’m the one who pissed you off enough to shatter solid glass, it’s the least I could do. Heh. Because of Evelyn’s injury, the two extra rounds of experiments were mercifully canceled. In an incredibly sunny mood, I packed up my bag and left the building with Declan. Right as we stepped outside, I realized I’d left my notebook behind and jogged back inside. Passing the trash can outside the lab doors, I spotted the bloody alcohol wipe and the wrapper from the bandage sitting right on top. A slow smirk spread across my face. Dodging the angle of the hallway camera, I carefully picked it up. I snapped a photo and sent it to Evelyn. You threw this away, didn’t you? It still has the scent of your perfume on it. Ah… I couldn’t resist tasting it. I was so insanely jealous of the guy who bandaged your hand. I wanted to chop his fingers off. But I feel much better now. You need to be a good girl from now on. Don’t do things that make me angry. You are mine! You can only be touched by me! Do you understand? Hitting send, I violently shuddered, rubbing the goosebumps erupting on my arms. Were my curated stalker quotes a little too psychotic? Was Evelyn actually this deranged in secret? Thinking of her pristine, Ice Queen demeanor, I shook my head hard. Nah. No way. There was no way she was this unhinged… right? 05 A week of relentless harassment passed. Aside from two texts telling me to “Go to hell,” I received absolutely no response from Evelyn. That was a minor issue, though. Right now, I had a catastrophic, five-alarm fire to put out. I watched as Declan approached Evelyn for the fifth time that hour, holding up a clipboard of data and practically shooting heart-eyes at her. I let out a heavy, stressed breath. Nudging Naomi, who was standing beside me, I muttered, “Hey. Your boy is blatantly hitting on my girl. Aren’t you going to do something about it?” Naomi turned to look at me. Her eyes were deeply mournful, her expression tangled in a bizarre, complicated mess of emotions. I sighed, rubbing my temples. I hadn’t anticipated this. Ever since the day I stood on a stool and screamed that I was obsessed with Evelyn, the dynamic in this room had mutated into something horrifying. Naomi’s looks toward me were getting increasingly sorrowful and longing. Meanwhile, Declan wasn’t hitting it off with Naomi at all. Instead, he was aggressively orbiting Evelyn like a moth to a very cold flame. Everything was backward. The only silver lining was that my digital terrorism seemed to be working. Evelyn genuinely appeared wary that her psychotic stalker might lash out. As a result, she maintained a rigid, icy distance from everyone. Right as Declan leaned in close, she seamlessly took a step back. There wasn’t an ounce of romantic tension on her face—just pure, merciless professionalism. I stared at the bizarre love triangle playing out until Naomi’s voice broke my concentration. “Jordan,” she asked softly. “Do you… really like Professor Mercer?” I glared at her. “None of your business.” Naomi let out a soft huff. “I think you just said all those things to make me jealous. You’re so immature, Jordan.” I couldn’t even formulate a response to that level of delusion. I turned away, heading toward a quiet corner to draft my next harassing text to Evelyn, when her voice suddenly rang out, cutting through the hum of the lab. “Jordan. The data sets you submitted are flawed.” Her tone left absolutely no room for argument. “Come to my office immediately after lunch break.” 06 Heart in my throat, I knocked on Evelyn’s office door. When I walked in and saw the stack of red-inked lab reports on her desk, I let out a stealthy exhale of relief. Thank God. It really was just about the data. Five minutes into her lecture, my brain completely short-circuited. Evelyn truly lived up to her reputation as the university’s most terrifying academic. Even without raising her voice or saying a single insulting word, the atmosphere in her office was suffocatingly oppressive. If I were a normal person with an ounce of shame, I would have been mortified by the elementary mistakes she was pointing out, wishing the floor would swallow me whole. Unfortunately for her, I had absolutely zero shame. Her words flowed in one ear and right out the other. Instead, my eyes locked onto her mouth as it moved. Her lips were a beautiful, plush shade of pink. They looked so soft. So incredibly yielding. It would be the perfect time to drop a line from my stalker notes. “Professor, your lips look so—!!” I slammed my mouth shut in absolute horror, my eyes going wide. Holy shit! I had completely zoned out! I had almost said the actual filthy text message out loud! Evelyn paused, her dark eyes lifting from the paper to pin me down. “My lips look so… what?” “Dry! Really dry!” I scrambled forward, practically lunging for the pitcher on her desk to pour her a glass of water. “Professor Mercer, you’ve been talking for so long, you must be parched! Here, hydrate! Save your voice!” Evelyn stared at me in dead silence. After what felt like an eternity, the faintest, most inexplicable smile ghosted across her lips. She reached out, her fingers brushing against mine as she took the glass. “Alright. That’s enough for today,” she murmured softly. “Go back and re-verify your numbers, Jordan. Bring them to me tomorrow.” I pressed my lips tightly together and nodded like an obedient golden retriever. Stepping out of her office, I pulled the door shut and immediately sagged against the cool hallway wall. I stared down at my hand, absentmindedly rubbing the fingers that had just grazed hers. Her skin had been cold. Smooth and heavy, like touching polished jade. I pressed a hand over my chest, feeling the frantic, hammering rhythm of my heart. I let out a frustrated breath. Damn it. For an unhinged, fatal-attraction psycho… she was actually incredibly seductive. 07 The relentless, punishing hours in the lab had completely drained my life force. Sitting in an 8 AM lecture the next day, I was practically comatose. Through the haze of exhaustion, I remembered I hadn’t completed my morning quota of harassing Evelyn. Dropping my heavy head onto my desk, I blearily opened my phone, copied a paragraph from my notes app, and sent it off: Professor, I had the most beautiful dream last night. I dreamt I made you cry. Your eyes were so red, and you were begging me to stop. But I couldn’t. You look too pretty when you cry. I just want to lock you in a room so I can watch you cry for me forever. I hit send, locked the screen, and prepared to pass out for the rest of the lecture. But against all odds, the second my eyes drifted shut, my phone vibrated twice. Evelyn, breaking her week-long silence, had actually replied. I’ve seen this exact paragraph three times now. Are you going to send it a fourth? Three times?! The adrenaline spiked so fast I nearly fell out of my chair. Sleep vanished. I was wide awake and sweating. No wonder that paragraph felt so familiar as I was pasting it! I’d already sent it! I frantically scrolled up through our chat history. Oh, it was a bloodbath. Not only had I sent that dream text three times, but there was another text I’d accidentally sent twice! Mother of God! This was the karma I deserved for being too lazy to update my dark romance quotes! I furiously typed out a desperate save: I will. Not just a fourth time, but many times. Because every time I make you cry in my dreams, I have to be a good girl and report it to you. And soon, I’m going to make you cry in real life. You can look forward to it~ I wiped the cold sweat from my forehead, mentally giving myself a high-five for that brilliant recovery. Just as I thought the crisis was averted, my screen lit up with one final text. I’ll be waiting. Staring at those three short words, an involuntary shiver crawled down my spine. The back of my neck felt suddenly, terribly cold. Did she… did she know something?

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In the end, during that final mission, Regina didn’t hesitate. She pulled the trigger to save the man who had always been the ghost in our relationship—her “one who got away”—and the bullet tore right through me. She knew. She knew I had the Protocol backing me up. To her, my death was nothing more than a temporary glitch, a brief nap before the reboot. For three days, she stayed by Becket’s side, nursing him, comforting him, erasing me from her mind as if I’d never existed. By the time she finally remembered I was a person who actually occupied space in her life, she wasn’t greeted by a sleeping fiancé. She found a corpse beginning to succumb to the heat. I remember asking her, just before we set out, clutching onto a final, pathetic shred of hope: “Would you ever actually kill me, Reggie?” She had gone quiet for a long time before the words tumbled out: “No.” At that moment, both I and the Protocol felt a heavy sink in our collective chest. We knew it was a bad omen. If she had just said yes—if she had actually killed me by choice—my mission would have ended right then and there. But that “no” made me delusional. It made me think she actually loved me. It made me think the mission was about to get a whole lot more complicated. Looking back, all that worrying was for nothing. It wasn’t love. It was just me, making a fool of myself until the very end. … I sat on the edge of the roof, reaching out as if I could brush the stars with my fingertips. Before I could lean out too far, the Protocol’s voice hissed in my ear, sounding genuinely bewildered: [Host, please tell me you aren’t doing something stupid. We’ve put in too much work to get this close to the finish line. Don’t you dare jump.] My mouth twitched into a grimace. “Relax. I’m just catching the breeze. Do you really think I’m that fragile?” In fairness, the view from the roof was spectacular. It gave me a front-row seat to my fiancée wrapped in another man’s arms in the garden below. Becket looked like the protagonist of a tragic indie film, his eyes brimming with a manufactured sorrow. “You have to forget me, Regina. We’re a secret that can’t survive the light. This isn’t going to end well for us.” Regina spoke to him with a tenderness I had never once been allowed to taste. “I’ll take care of everything. I just need a little more time.” But Becket wasn’t playing along this time. “I’m almost thirty, Reggie. How much more time am I supposed to waste waiting in the shadows?” Regina started to say something, her lips parted in a desperate plea, but Becket cut her off with a sharp wave of his hand. “I’ve agreed to the setup my mother arranged. A blind date. A real future. Reggie, I’m begging you… let me go.” Regina turned her face away, her jaw tight with irritation. “Becket, stop being dramatic, okay?” He gave a hollow, bitter laugh and turned on his heel, disappearing into the darkness of the driveway. I watched her standing there, a lonely silhouette against the manicured lawn, and shook my head. “See that? That’s the tax you pay for an affair.” The Protocol chimed in: [Technically, you two aren’t married yet.] I rolled my eyes. “You don’t know a damn thing. Watch this. I’m going to go down there and push her buttons. If I’m lucky, she’ll get pissed enough to just stab me and get it over with.” The Protocol gave me a mental thumbs-up. [High-risk, high-reward. I like it.] I kept my pace light and bouncy as I walked down the stairs, finding Regina exactly where I expected—looking like a woman whose world had just collapsed. “Ouch. You look like you just got dumped. Want to talk about it? I’m a great listener,” I said, flashing a grin and throwing an arm over her shoulder. Her face remained a mask of stone. She shoved my arm off with a cold efficiency. “It’s nothing.” Nothing? No, that wouldn’t do. I needed more fire than that. “Come on, Reggie. I saw the whole thing from the roof. Getting dumped isn’t the end of the world, it’s just—” I didn’t finish the sentence. Her hand flew out, catching me by the throat with a strength that felt like iron. She looked like something that had crawled out of a nightmare. “You were spying on me?” she hissed. Her eyes were bloodshot, shimmering with a terrifying intensity. “Have I been too kind lately? Have you forgotten who you are in this house?” Looking into her murderous eyes, I felt my lips curl upward. Yes. That’s it. Just squeeze. Kill me. Let me go home. “Yeah, I followed you. So what?” I gasped out, leaning into the pressure of her grip. “Are you really that ashamed of being caught acting like a common tramp? I don’t blame him for leaving. A woman who wants the whole world while she’s already got a man at home? Even I’m starting to find you pathetic.” I poured every ounce of venom I could into my voice, terrified she might soften. Her grip tightened. Her knuckles turned white. To be honest, the sensation of dying isn’t pleasant—it’s a panicked, primal sort of pain. But the thought of home, of ending this grand humiliation, was a powerful anesthetic. Then, abruptly, she let go. I crumpled to the pavement, my lungs burning as I hacked and coughed, trying to pull in air. “I was wrong to snap,” she said, her voice dropping back into that terrifyingly cool professional tone. “I’ll keep my distance from him from now on.” My heart stopped for a different reason. I looked up at her, eyes wide with disbelief. But she didn’t look back. She just gave me the cold view of her retreating back. “Protocol… what the hell was that?” I whispered, my voice trembling. The Protocol sounded just as stunned. [She let you go? Are you kidding me? A woman who treats men like disposable tissues actually showed mercy?] I rolled my eyes so hard it hurt. But nothing could change the fact that I was still here. By the time I was halfway through my third bag of chips in the kitchen, the Protocol finally spoke up. [Host, why are you eating your feelings?] I crunched down viciously on a chip. “I’m going to get so fat she can’t stand the sight of me. Maybe then she’ll finally put a bullet in my head.” The Protocol decided I had finally snapped and went quiet, leaving us both to sit in our shared misery. It was a pathetic scene: one man and one invisible AI, failing at suicide-by-fiancée. I was plotting my next move when a knock sounded at the door. It was Becket. He stood there with a thin, polite smile, holding a crisp white dress shirt. “I’m so sorry to bother you,” he said, his voice dripping with faux-humility. “Regina stayed over at my place a few nights ago and I… well, I accidentally got some wine on her shirt. I didn’t want you to get the wrong idea if you found it, so I brought it back myself. You aren’t upset over such a small thing, are you?” I knew what he wanted. He wanted the explosion. He wanted me to scream and throw a punch so Regina could come running to his rescue. But I had too much on my mind to play my part in his melodrama. “Thanks. Appreciate it,” I said, reaching for the shirt. Becket’s smile faltered. The lack of a reaction clearly bothered him. He suddenly grabbed my wrist, his grip surprisingly tight. “What are you acting for?” he spat, his voice dropping the polite facade. “I’m telling you, it doesn’t matter how ‘understanding’ you are. she’ll never truly look at you. If I hadn’t moved away, you wouldn’t even be a footnote in her life. You’re just a cheap placeholder. A discount version of me.” It was a textbook provocation. Amateur hour. “Believe whatever helps you sleep at night,” I said. “Now let go.” I tried to pull my hand back, barely using any force, but the moment I moved, he went limp. He collapsed toward the floor like a puppet with cut strings. “Ah!” he cried out. Before he could hit the hardwood, Regina appeared as if summoned by a spell. I didn’t even have time to blink before her palm connected with my face. Crack. “Ewan, I’ve warned you so many times,” she said, her voice trembling with rage. “Why can’t you just behave?” My cheek burned. The pain was sharp enough to bring involuntary tears to my eyes. I didn’t defend myself. I just stared at Becket. He buried his face in Regina’s shoulder, a calculated sob escaping his throat. “Reggie, it’s my fault. All my fault. I shouldn’t have upset him. You two are getting married… don’t let me be the reason you fight.” He made a weak motion as if to pull away. “I just wanted to see you one last time. Now that I have, I’ll leave you both in peace.” Regina wasn’t about to let that happen. She gripped his hand with a fierce protectiveness and led him toward the master bedroom, brushing past me as if I were a piece of furniture. She didn’t even give me a second glance. The look she had given me—the sheer, unadulterated disgust—left no doubt in my mind. If Becket hadn’t been there to play the victim, she might have actually finished what she started earlier. “What are you still standing there for?” Regina’s voice drifted back, cold and hollow. “Get out.” I looked down at my phone. A message had just come in from the rescue coordindator. I felt a ghost of a smile touch my lips. “Regina,” I called out. “If I keep hurting him… would you kill me?” She went silent. I already knew the answer, but I wanted to hear it. If the end was already written, I wanted the closure of the spoken word. She didn’t answer right away. I didn’t wait. The rescue team was blowing up my phone. A notorious cartel cell had moved into the valley. People were dying, the medical teams were overwhelmed, and they needed every able body. I sighed. “The protection is in the drawer. I probably won’t be back for a while. Do whatever you want.” I shouldered my pack and turned to leave. But just as my foot hit the threshold, I heard it. Her final answer. “No.” Two days of grueling travel later, I arrived at a hidden mountain village. The team leader barely looked up before tossing a trauma kit at my chest. “Move! We’ve got casualties that won’t last another hour!” I’d heard stories, but the reality was a visceral shock. The ground was littered with the wounded, their cries a dissonant chorus of agony. It was a slaughterhouse. “How did it get this bad?” I asked, already kneeling over a man with a jagged shrapnel wound. The leader’s face was grim. “These people are monsters. Right now, our priority is getting the hostages out of the compound across the ridge.” I frowned. “There are more?” The compound was a fortress. Trying to pull someone out of there was a suicide mission. The leader sighed. “Yeah. Some poor kid. Apparently, he was lured out here by a girl he met on a dating app. He’s been in there for twenty-four hours. God knows what’s left of him.” My heart went out to the guy. Even in this “scripted” world, I’d spent enough years here to feel for the locals. Most of them were just ordinary people trying to survive, no different from the office drones I knew in my real life. The cartel had sent word: they would trade the hostage, but only for a medical professional and a full trauma kit. They were bleeding out over there, too, and they were desperate. I volunteered. It wasn’t because I was a hero. It was because the Protocol guaranteed my resurrection as long as the mission wasn’t “complete.” Regina knew that. It was the safety net that allowed her to be as cruel as she wanted. I walked toward the enemy lines, the trauma kit heavy in my hand. When I was only a few yards away, a sharp gasp cut through the mountain air. “Ewan?” I looked up. My heart skipped a beat. Looking back at me, his eyes wide with terror, was Becket. What the hell was he doing here? The cartel gunman didn’t give us time for a reunion. He pressed the barrel of his rifle against Becket’s temple. “Don’t just stand there! Hand over the kit if you want him to live!” Becket was a mess—bruised, bloody, and shivering. He looked broken. “Are you deaf? Give it to them! Move!” If I weren’t a member of this team, if I didn’t have a code of ethics to uphold for every life, I would have dropped the bag and walked away. I took a breath and held out the kit. “Take it. Now let him—” Before I could finish, men surged from the brush on either side. A heavy boot slammed into the back of my knee, and I hit the dirt hard. “You bastards! We had a deal!” I snarled. the leader laughed, a cold, rasping sound. “You talk about deals with us? Here’s the truth: we never planned on letting you go. An extra hostage is just an extra insurance policy.” I felt a surge of genuine fear. Resurrection or not, the pain was real. These men weren’t the type to give you a quick, clean exit. “Why waste your breath on him? He’s a dead man anyway.” I was already calculating my escape when I saw it. Becket wasn’t being held down anymore. He calmly untied the ropes around his wrists and sat down on a grimy sofa in the back of the room. The realization hit me like a physical blow. The wounds, the terror—it was all a performance. He wasn’t a victim. He was a partner. “Why?” I asked. I used to think he was just a petty, jealous man. But this? This was a different level of evil. He chuckled, leaning back. “You really thought I was at university in Europe all those years? Please. I dropped out months in. This business pays way better than a desk job. Every man for himself, right, Ewan?” I went quiet. When I looked up, I just felt a weary kind of pity. “What do you want?” He pulled a knife and traced the flat of the blade along my cheek. He gave me a brilliant, manic smile. “I want to play a game.” A cold pit formed in my stomach. “What game?” He checked his watch. “Regina will be here in a few minutes. I want to see who she chooses. You… or me?” All this effort, all this blood, just to play a sick game of “who do you love more” with Regina. I didn’t know whether to be disgusted or impressed by the sheer scale of his obsession. But I couldn’t say a word. They taped my mouth shut before I could respond. Time became a blur of silence and mountain wind. Eventually, the sounds of an arrival echoed from outside. “Miss Thorne! What an honor to have such a powerful woman visit our humble home!” The cartel leader grinned and shoved both Becket and me toward the door. We were bundled like cargo. Regina’s eyes swept over the scene. Her gaze didn’t even pause on me; it locked onto Becket immediately. “Let them go. Name your price. I have the wire transfer ready.” The leader scratched his ear. “You misunderstand, Regina. It’s not about the money anymore. I want to play.” “What?” Regina’s eyes narrowed, her hand drifting toward her holster. “I know you’re armed,” the leader said. “But my boys have their fingers on the triggers. One wrong move, and we all go up in flames.” Regina stopped. “What do you want?” He pointed at the two of us. “Simple. You can take one man with you. The other… you have to shoot him yourself.” “…Name a price for both. I’m not playing this,” Regina said after a long, agonizing silence. The leader barked out a laugh. “You think you’re in a position to negotiate? You have ten seconds. If you don’t choose, I’ll kill them both.” I looked at Becket. He was actually risking his own life for this. If Regina chose me, he’d die. He was insane. Bang. The bullet tore through the air before I even realized what was happening. I felt the impact, a sudden, blinding heat in my chest. My body began to tilt backward. Blood sprayed into the air, vivid and bright against the gray sky. Regina hadn’t even hesitated. She had made her choice in a heartbeat. All those promises, those years together—they meant nothing. Not even a second of doubt. As my spirit drifted from my body, I stood there, a ghost watching the wreckage. I watched her sprint past my cooling corpse, not even looking down as she stepped over my arm to reach Becket. She gripped his hands, her voice frantic as she checked him for injuries. She really did hate me that much. Suddenly, a triumphant chime echoed in my head. [Congratulations, Host! Mission Complete. Proceed to return to the real world?] [Warning: Upon return, this body will be truly deceased. No further resurrections will be possible in this plane.] I watched Regina’s retreating back as she led Becket away. I smiled. “Yes. Do it.”

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The tragedy of my last life began with a leaked corporate proposal. That afternoon, my uncle found the evidence on my cousin’s computer, and the finger was immediately pointed at me. I was the only other person who had touched her desk. Faced with my cousin’s breathless, tear-soaked pleading, my heart had softened. I swallowed my defense and took the blame, muttering something about a misclick. From that moment on, I was branded the family curse. The loss of her job, the derailed career—it was all hung around my neck. My relatives tore me apart at every family gathering. My parents, exhausted and humiliated by the relentless screaming from my aunt and uncle, eventually forced me to my knees to beg for forgiveness. Later, when my cousin’s own startup imploded, leaving her drowning in a mountain of debt, my aunt and uncle showed up at my door. They demanded I sell the small condo my grandmother had left me to bail her out. They said I owed them. In the violent scuffle that broke out on my landing, my uncle shoved me. I fell down the concrete stairwell. My neck snapped. I died instantly. The grief and shock destroyed my parents; they both fell ill and followed me to the grave within the year. But today, my eyes snap open. I am back on the exact day the proposal leaked. And this time, I’m not carrying anyone else’s cross. 1 “You ungrateful little parasite! After everything this family has done for you, you sell our company’s secrets to a competitor?!” “What kind of sick game are you playing? I’m calling the cops right now!” My uncle’s palm cracked across my cheek like a gunshot. The explosive, stinging heat radiating across my skin jolted me completely awake. I blinked against the harsh fluorescent lights. Scattered manila folders covered the office floor. My cousin, Brittany, was crouched by her leather desk chair, sobbing into her hands. Her mother—my Aunt Carol—was standing over me, hands on her hips, spitting venom. My laptop bag sat right where I’d left it on the glass table. I had actually come back. Back to the exact moment I took the fall. In my past life, this slap had completely disoriented me. Just as I opened my mouth to swear I hadn’t touched Brittany’s files, I had met her eyes. They were wide, brimming with tears, begging me silently. I had caved. I took the hit. I promised my aunt and uncle I would find a way to make up the financial loss. I didn’t know I was buying a one-way ticket to hell. Because of me—supposedly—Brittany lost a multi-million dollar bid and got fired. My uncle’s family made sure everyone in our zip code knew I was a backstabbing snake who ruined her bright future. The disgust in my relatives’ eyes. My parents, beaten down by the sheer volume of Aunt Carol’s hysteria, dragging me over to their house to grovel. Then came Brittany’s doomed business venture. The six-figure debt. My aunt and uncle, eyes red with greed and desperation, pounding on my door, screaming that this was my karmic debt to pay. They knew my grandmother had left me that little house in the suburbs. They brought men to physically pry the keys from my hands. The weightlessness of the fall. The agonizing crunch of my skull against the concrete. The sight of my parents, broken and weeping by my hospital bed as I slipped away. The memories rushed through my blood, freezing it into ice. I dug my fingernails so hard into my palms that the skin broke. The sharp pain grounded me. In this life, I would rather die than take the fall for her. Seeing me just standing there, Brittany dialed up the waterworks. She threw herself against her father’s chest. “Dad, stop, don’t hit Jo anymore! She probably didn’t mean to do it! She came by to hang out yesterday, she was messing around near my desk… she must have clicked the wrong thing…” It sounded like mercy. It was actually a perfectly executed trap to establish that I was the one on her computer. Aunt Carol pounced immediately. “Didn’t mean to?! This little bitch is just jealous of your salary! She did this to ruin you! You’re too sweet, Brittany, you’re letting her stab you in the back and you’re still trying to protect her!” “Do you have any idea what you’ve done?” my uncle roared at me. “That was a multi-million dollar contract! You’ve destroyed her life!” A low murmur rippled through the open-plan office. The other employees were watching the spectacle. “Jo is usually so quiet when she comes around,” someone whispered. “Always so polite. Why would she do corporate espionage?” “You never know with people,” another muttered. “Paul is her own uncle. He wouldn’t falsely accuse his own niece, would he?” “Maybe she really was jealous of Brittany…” The whispers acted like gasoline on my uncle’s rage. Breathing heavily, his face flushed purple, he raised his hand to strike me again. I didn’t freeze this time. I took a sharp step back, dodging his hand effortlessly. When I spoke, my voice was absolute zero. “I didn’t leak that proposal.” 2 The office went dead silent. Brittany’s sobbing abruptly hitched, a flash of genuine panic cutting through the faux-tears in her eyes. My uncle glared at me, his jaw working. “You expect me to believe that? If it wasn’t you, who was it? Brittany said you were on her computer yesterday. Who else could have done it?” “I came to the office yesterday to see her, yes.” I locked eyes with Brittany. “But I never touched your computer. Not even the power button. I came to borrow a GRE prep book. You told me it was on your desk and to grab it myself. When I walked over, your monitor was black. I grabbed the book and walked out. I was in your cubicle for sixty seconds.” Aunt Carol practically foamed at the mouth. “Liar! You’re just trying to save your own skin! If you didn’t touch it, how did our competitor get the exact file?!” “It’s incredibly easy to prove,” I said, my voice steady, cutting through her hysterics. “Brittany’s computer has an activity log. What time the file was opened, what time it was sent—it leaves a digital footprint. Check her email, her Slack, her cloud drives. There will be an outbound record. Furthermore, this company has security cameras. Pull the tape from yesterday. See exactly how long I was at her desk, and see who else sat in that chair.” Aunt Carol wasn’t backing down. “You’re a tech major! You know how to hack! You probably remote-accessed her desktop!” A harsh, dry laugh escaped my throat. “So I spent four years mastering network security just so I could hack into Brittany’s completely unencrypted, password-free desktop?” I paused, turning my gaze back to my cousin. Her face had lost all its color. “Brittany, you just told everyone I ‘clicked the wrong thing.’ So which is it? Was I an accidental klutz, or an elite hacker? And if I clicked the wrong thing, tell me—what email address did I accidentally type out perfectly? At what exact time?” Brittany opened her mouth, but only a pathetic, raspy breath came out. Her fingers twisted the fabric of her silk blouse into knots. She couldn’t meet my eyes. I had spent the last two years helping this office out with their IT issues for free, just as a favor to my uncle. The staff liked me. Unlike Brittany, who treated the receptionists and tech guys like the help, I actually talked to them. Gary, the senior systems administrator, finally stepped forward, clearing his throat. “Jo has maintained our servers for months. We all know her character. If she wanted to steal a file, she wouldn’t do it from Brittany’s physical machine and leave a trail a mile wide.” My uncle hesitated, his anger momentarily replaced by confusion. He looked down at his daughter. “Brittany… is she telling the truth?” “I… I don’t remember,” Brittany stammered, her voice trembling—this time for real. All her self-righteousness had evaporated. “I was just so panicked! I saw her near my desk, and then the file was gone…” “You don’t remember?” I sneered. “A million-dollar contract on the line, and your memory gets fuzzy? Think harder, Brittany. Was it an accident, or did you send it to someone yourself?” Aunt Carol exploded. “How dare you speak to her like that! Why the hell would Brittany send it on purpose? Is she insane?!” “Only she knows the answer to that,” I said quietly. “Stop it! Dad, Mom, please, I just want to go home, I’m having a panic attack…” Brittany immediately reverted to the helpless, fragile girl routine, knowing it was her parents’ kryptonite. Realizing there was no smoking gun to immediately hang me with, Aunt Carol grabbed her purse. She shot me a look of pure venom. “Don’t think you’re getting out of this with your smart mouth. I will find the proof, and when I do, I’ll make sure you pay for this.” She grabbed Brittany by the arm and stormed out, my uncle trailing behind them. The glass door slammed shut behind them, rattling in its frame. Once they were gone, the adrenaline left me in a rush. My knees buckled, and I collapsed into the nearest rolling chair. I had survived the first hurdle. But I knew Aunt Carol and Brittany. They had lost the contract and humiliated themselves in front of the office. They wouldn’t let this go. The file really was in the competitor’s hands, because Brittany had sold it to them. And she would move heaven and earth to make sure I took the fall for her greed. 3 Sure enough, by 7:00 AM the next morning, the family group chat was a warzone. Aunt Carol led the charge. She sent over twenty voice memos, each one dripping with manufactured tears, twisting the events of the previous day into a bizarre work of fiction. In her version, I was a jealous, sociopathic monster who bit the hand that fed me. “Everyone, you have to hear this! When has Paul and I ever treated Jo with anything but love? Her parents work crazy hours, so she practically grew up in our house! Brittany treated her like a sister. She shared everything with her!” “And how does she repay us?! She steals Brittany’s proposal and sells it to a rival firm because she can’t stand that Brittany makes more money than her! Millions of dollars, gone! Brittany was fired! Her life is ruined! And Jo won’t even admit it! She brought her little IT friends to gang up on us! We tried to talk to her, and she practically raised her hand to hit Brittany! Is she even human?” “Her parents are just as guilty for raising such a toxic, rotten kid! I’m saying this right now: if Jo doesn’t pay us back for Brittany’s lost wages and get down on her knees to apologize, our side of the family is cutting her off. We’ll go to her parents’ workplaces and let everyone know what kind of criminals they’re raising!” Following her mother’s barrage, Brittany dropped a long text paragraph, accompanied by three selfies showing her red, swollen eyes. “Hi aunts and uncles… I know you all love Jo. I never thought she’d do something like this to me over petty jealousy. When I saw her at my desk, I just thought she was looking at my things. I never imagined she was stealing from me. I’m completely broken right now. I lost my job, and the person closest to me betrayed me. I don’t want to ruin Jo’s life, but I need her to take accountability and give my parents some closure. When you make a mistake, you have to pay the price, right?” It was a masterclass in manipulation. Within minutes, the chat was swarming with relatives taking the bait. The ones who usually sucked up to Aunt Carol for favors were the first to draw blood. “Jo is so out of line. How could she do this? Disgusting behavior!” “Brittany has always been such a sweet girl, she wouldn’t lie about this. Make Jo pay for the damages!” “This is what happens when you let someone else’s kid eat at your table. Paul and Carol wasted their love on her.” Even the relatives who usually stayed quiet chimed in, eager for the drama. “Family is family, but if Jo stole something, she needs to face the music.” “Millions of dollars is a big deal. The least Jo could do is show some remorse.” My phone rang. It was my parents. “Jo, honey, what is going on?” my mom’s voice was trembling with anxiety. “What is Carol saying about you? Tell us it’s just a misunderstanding.” Hearing my parents’ voices—alive, healthy, frantic with worry—sent a wave of fierce warmth through my chest. In this life, I wouldn’t let anyone touch a hair on their heads. “Mom, Dad, breathe,” I said softly. “It has nothing to do with me. Brittany leaked the file herself, and she’s trying to use me as a human shield. I have the proof. I’m just waiting for the right moment to drop it. Do not reply to the group chat. I have it handled.” They hesitated, but my parents trusted me. “Okay, sweetie. We believe you. But if they try to come over here and harass you, your dad and I aren’t going to just stand by.” “I know. I love you.” I hung up. I sat on my bed, scrolling through the toxic sludge in the group chat, quietly screenshotting every single message. Seeing that I wasn’t responding, Brittany grew bolder. She tagged me directly, demanding I come out of hiding. She warned that if I didn’t show my face, they were coming to my parents’ house. Aunt Carol took it a step further. She dropped a pin of my parents’ address into the chat. She invited everyone who lived nearby to come over at 7:00 PM to “demand justice” and watch my parents “discipline their thief of a daughter.” A cold, sharp smile touched my lips. Perfect. The stage was set. The audience was invited. It was time to pull the trapdoor. 4 At exactly 7:00 PM, cars started pulling up to the curb outside my parents’ house. Aunt Carol, Uncle Paul, and Brittany got out, followed by three of my louder aunts and uncles. They marched right onto our front lawn. Aunt Carol didn’t even bother ringing the doorbell; she just started screaming at the second-floor window. “Jo! Get your ass out here! Hiding in your bedroom like a coward won’t save you!” “Come out here and look your cousin in the eye! Pay up or we’re throwing a brick through your window!” “Come out here and explain yourselves!” an aunt yelled at my parents’ silhouettes in the window. Neighbors started stepping out onto their porches. People walking their dogs stopped on the sidewalk. Whispers broke out. Brittany stood slightly behind her mother, playing the tragic victim perfectly. She kept wiping her dry eyes, looking up at our window with a sickeningly triumphant smirk hidden just beneath her hands. She was waiting for me to break. Inside, my dad was shaking with rage. He reached for the front door handle. “I’m going down there. I’m not letting them speak to you like that.” “Dad, no.” I gripped his forearm tight. “Don’t get in the mud with them. It just makes you dirty.” I pulled my phone from my pocket. “Watch. Today, they’re going to choke on every single word they just spat out.” Down on the lawn, Brittany was still staring up at my window, waiting for my surrender. Then, a voice cut through the crisp evening air from the sidewalk behind her. “Brittany?”

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Three days. That was the countdown flickering in the back of my mind before I could finally claw my way back to reality. The cold, electronic drone of the System echoed in my skull just as I felt myself slipping toward the edge of consciousness. It told me the narrative arc had finally reached its conclusion. The nightmare was almost over. I’ve always been “genetically predisposed,” as the doctors put it—a high-fertility asset in a world that treated me like a biological machine. By the fifth year of my captivity under Gideon, I was carrying twins for the third third time. That afternoon, a little girl snuck into my room. She had a mischievous glint in her eyes and whispered that she had a gift for me. My throat tightened, and my eyes burned as I looked at her. She was my daughter—my own flesh and blood—whom I hadn’t been allowed to hold in years. “Sophie,” I choked out her name. She didn’t hug me. Instead, she giggled and pressed something into my palm. It was a small, rusted pocketknife. “Daddy says you’re having another baby, and that it makes you sad,” she said, tilting her head with a terrifying, airy lightness. “I already have enough brothers and sisters. We don’t need the ones in your tummy. Why don’t you just use this and die? Wouldn’t that be better?” A primal chill raced through my veins. I looked at her, searching for any trace of the toddler I once loved. “Sophie… do you even know who I am?” She blinked, her smile as innocent as a summer morning. “Of course. They told me you’re the woman who birthed me. But it’s okay. I have Mommy Lydia. She’s the only mother I need.” Those words were the final twist of the blade. A jagged, tearing pain erupted in my abdomen, and I felt the sickening warmth of blood beginning to soak through my clothes, pooling between my legs. Gideon was there suddenly, his eyes bloodshot as he knelt by my bed. “Norah, stay with me! Hang on! I promised you—once you gave Lydia three sets of twins, I’d let you go. I’ll wipe the slate clean. You can even raise these two yourself.” I was too far gone to speak. The pain was an ocean, but beneath it, a singular thought kept me afloat: Thank God. I’m finally going home. … The twins were taken the second they drew breath. I didn’t even hear them cry. Gideon returned a few hours later, his face glowing with a frantic sort of triumph. “Norah, you really are a miracle. Another set of twins. A boy and a girl.” He leaned in, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. “They look just like us. Do you want to see them? Or… do you want to start making arrangements to keep them this time?” I forced my head to turn away, my voice a thinned-out rasp. “No need, Mr. Craig. Whoever you decide should raise them is fine by me.” He froze. “What did you just call me?” I didn’t answer. His shock was pathetic, really. It was the first time I hadn’t used his name—the first time I hadn’t reached for the man I used to know. The last time I called him “Gid” was right after my first delivery. He had been standing by the door, already reaching for the bassinet to take my baby to Lydia. I had crawled out of bed, trailing blood and IV lines, clutching at his expensive wool slacks. I had begged him. I had screamed his name until my vocal cords tore, pleading with him to leave me just one. He had simply peeled my fingers off his hem with clinical precision. “Be a good girl, Norah,” he had said, looking down at me as if I were a tragic but necessary sacrifice. “Lydia can’t conceive, and you… you were made for this. You’re just sharing the blessing. You wouldn’t want to be selfish, would you?” I had watched his silhouette vanish down the hallway, my tears hitting the hardwood floor like lead. He had promised me once—long ago, in a life that felt like a movie I’d watched once—that he would only ever love me. That I would be his wife. But he broke that promise for status, for the “perfect” marriage with Lydia. And to keep his conscience clear, he decided that my children should be the tribute he paid to his new life. He never thought he was the villain. I kept my gaze fixed on the sterile white wall, which only served to ignite his temper. “Norah! Are you seriously playing these games with me? You went through hell to bring them here, and you won’t even look at them just to spite me?” It was almost funny. After the first birth, when I had fought him, he watched my hysterics with a cold, detached boredom before taking the child anyway. Then, he had forced me to stand outside in the freezing rain all night as a “lesson” in obedience. If it hadn’t been for the System’s protection, that night would have broken my body forever. It would have rendered me barren. But the script required me to be the “fertile tragic lead,” so I survived. I fell pregnant again. I had hoped, foolishly, that the second time would be different. But when the babies came, Gideon was there like a debt collector. He told me Lydia needed them. “Norah, she’s the Mrs. Craig. If she only has one set of twins, the women in her social circle will talk. You’re so good at this. Do it for me, okay?” The System’s invisible hand clamped over my throat, forcing back the “No” that was screaming to get out. I was a tool. A plot device. I wasn’t allowed to defy the protagonist. He didn’t even let me see their faces that time. I was shattered, but the cruelty didn’t stop there. Lydia would purposefully bring the children by my window. I once saw her raise a hand as if to strike my eldest son, who wasn’t even five yet. I lost my mind. I burst through the doors and shoved her away, pulling my boy into my arms. And then, the world stopped. My son—my own little boy—reached up and slapped me across the face. It wasn’t a hard hit. His hands were too small for that. But the sting was deeper than any physical blow. I looked into his eyes and saw no recognition—only a mirrored reflection of Lydia’s coached spite. “Don’t touch me, you crazy lady!” he screamed. I gripped his shoulders, my lips trembling, trying to ask him if he knew who I was. Gideon arrived a second later. He kicked me away with a force that sent me sprawling. I didn’t even feel the impact; I was still staring at my son. The boy burst into tears, leaping into Gideon’s arms. “She tried to hurt me, Daddy! She’s the bad lady! I want my mommy!” Lydia scrambled up from the floor, weeping gracefully, clutching the boy. And Gideon? He looked at me with utter disgust. “Teach her a lesson,” he told the guards. Then he walked away with his perfect family. The ringing in my ears was only drowned out by the thud of fists against my ribs. After that, the punishments became routine. The kneeling, the beatings, the isolation—they were just the background noise of my life. But the only thing that truly killed me was the look in my children’s eyes. “Since I can’t keep them,” I said to Gideon now, my voice devoid of emotion, “there’s no point in looking. It just adds to the heartbreak.” He bristled, letting out a sharp, jagged laugh. “Still haven’t learned your place, have you? Fine. You don’t see the children until you learn how to behave.” He thought he still had leverage. He thought the children were the leash that kept me tied to him. But I had let go. I was going home. If Lydia wanted them so badly, let her have them. At least they’d be fed and clothed in that gilded cage. My silence drove him into a frenzy. He stormed out, barking orders at the staff to lock me in. Beth, the young maid who usually looked after me, looked at me with pitying eyes, but she didn’t dare cross him. I sat in the silence, waiting for the clock to run out. But on the third day, just as the countdown reached its final hours, I overheard the gossip in the hall. “Stepmothers are never the real thing, are they? That poor baby… so tiny, and she’s already bruising him.” “I know. I heard she nearly choked the life out of the little one last night.” I bolted upright and threw open the door, grabbing the two maids by their shoulders. “What did you say?” They shoved me back with a sneer. “What’s it to you? You’re a useless bird in a cage. You couldn’t protect them if you tried.” Panic, raw and agonizing, flooded my chest. I thought Lydia just wanted the status of being a mother. I didn’t think she was a monster. I had to see them. I had to know. I tried to slip out the side exit, but I ran straight into Beth. I expected her to scream for the guards, but she just quietly unlocked the small service gate. “Norah,” she whispered, her voice trembling. “You saved my life three years ago when I had that fever. I can’t help your babies, but I won’t stand in your way.” I thanked her through tears and ran toward the main mansion where Gideon and Lydia lived. I reached the nursery window, my lungs burning, and what I saw stopped my heart. Lydia was standing over the bassinet. Her face was a mask of cold fury. Her hands were clamped around the throat of the newborn infant—the one who wasn’t even three days old. The baby was so fragile. Before I could even scream, the tiny struggle stopped. “What are you doing!” I shrieked, throwing myself against the glass. I didn’t care about the pain as the window shattered, raining shards over my skin. I scrambled inside, my eyes fixed on the limp form in the crib. “You stole them!” I sobbed, clutching the cooling body of my child. “You took them from me! Why would you do this?” Lydia’s expression didn’t change. “Because they look too much like you, Norah. Every time Gideon looks at them, he sees your face. I won’t have it.” “You monster!” I lunged at her, but she didn’t fight back. Instead, her face transformed in an instant. She collapsed to the floor, wailing. “Norah, please! I know you’re angry I’m raising them, but how could you? He’s just a baby! How could you kill your own son?” “You—” “Norah!” Gideon’s voice thundered from the doorway. In that heartbeat, I realized the trap. Lydia had orchestrated the gossip. She had known I would come. Gideon didn’t ask questions. He crossed the room in two strides and backhanded me so hard I hit the floor. He hauled me up by my collar, his eyes burning with a murderous light. “How could you be this evil? To kill your own child just to hurt Lydia?” I saw Lydia over his shoulder. She wasn’t crying anymore. She was smiling. “It was her!” I screamed, struggling against his grip. “She choked him! Gideon, look at his neck! She killed your son!” He didn’t look. He just looked at me with a mixture of pity and rage. He threw me down onto the bed of broken glass. I couldn’t move. My old wounds reopened, and new ones bloomed. Blood dripped from my hair onto the floor. “Gideon… please…” Lydia whimpered, clinging to his arm. “It’s my fault. I’m a failure. I can’t give you children, and I can’t even protect the ones we have.” She looked like a saint in her white silk nightgown. Gideon’s anger softened into a cold, hard resolve. “Take her back to the cottage,” he told the guards. “Lock her in. Permanently.” As the guards dragged me away, I saw Lydia lean against him. She looked at me and slowly raised a hand to her own throat, mimicking the act of strangulation. She was going to kill them all. One by one. I couldn’t let it happen. With a final, desperate burst of strength, I tore myself away from the guards. They weren’t expecting it. I grabbed a jagged shard of glass from the floor and lunged at Lydia. If I was leaving this world, I was taking her with me. Gideon was caught off guard, hampered by Lydia’s weight in his arms. But just as the glass was about to find its mark, a small shadow darted out. Sophie. She threw herself in front of Lydia, glaring at me with pure, unadulterated hatred. “Don’t you touch my mommy!” I froze. The glass was inches from her eye. If I hadn’t stopped, I would have blinded my own daughter. “Pin her down!” Gideon roared. The guards slammed me into the floor. I heard the sickening snap of my wrist as they twisted it behind my back. My face was pressed into the blood-soaked carpet. Gideon gently placed Lydia on the bed before walking toward me. He knelt down, his voice terrifyingly soft. “Norah, you just won’t learn, will you?” “Kill me,” I spat, my voice thick with blood. “Just kill me, you coward!” He laughed. “Oh, I can’t kill you. I still need you to provide for Lydia. But you need to remember this moment.” He signaled the guards. They dragged someone into the room. It was Beth. She was unrecognizable. Her face was a pulp of bruised flesh, her clothes soaked in red. “Beth?” I whimpered. Gideon leaned down to my ear. “See? Because you were a ‘bad girl,’ your little friend has to pay the price.” He nodded to a guard. The man grabbed Beth by the hair and yanked her head back. I saw her mouth—her tongue had been cut out. “No!” I screamed. “Shh, Norah. Be quiet.” I broke. I didn’t care about pride. I didn’t care about the System. I crawled to Gideon’s feet and began to bang my head against the floor. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry, Mr. Craig! Please, stop! I’ll do anything! I’ll give her a hundred babies, just let Beth go!” Gideon looked down at me, bored. “It’s not me you should be apologizing to.” I turned to Lydia’s bed and bowed until my forehead hit the ground. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Craig. It was my fault. I was arrogant. Please, save her.” Lydia looked down at me, a cold smirk playing on her lips. “Norah, you’re making this so difficult. I want to forgive you, truly. But this girl… she’s the one who let you out. If we don’t handle this…” She looked at Gideon with faux concern. “You’re right,” Gideon said. He raised a hand. With a swift, practiced motion, the guard ended Beth’s life right in front of me. I stared at her body. I tried to scream, but the sound died in my throat. The room began to spin. The walls blurred into a dizzying smear of red and white. Beth… Beth… “Warning: Hostile environment detected. Vital signs failing. Extraction protocol initiated.” The electronic voice was back. “Three… two… one…” As the countdown hit zero, the world went black, and I felt my soul slip through the cracks of the script.

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I stayed late at the office to finish a project, and when I saw a colleague struggling with his filing, I decided to be a decent human being and help him organize his documents. I didn’t think twice about it. By the time I walked into the office the next morning, the entire company was whispering about “us.” When I checked his Instagram, my blood turned to ice. He’d posted two photos. The caption read: Nothing beats coming home to a woman who knows how to take care of her man. The first photo was a candid shot of me, head down, focused on the paperwork. The second was a deepfake—an AI-generated image of him and me locked in an intimate kiss. The office group chat was exploding with people cheering, telling me I should just marry him already. I didn’t say a word to anyone. Instead, I opened our private chat and sent him a single photo: my actual wedding portrait with the CEO. Underneath, I typed: Your photo is an AI fake. Do you think mine is? 1 Silence. It lasted for maybe ten seconds. Then, Brad’s reply popped up. [LOL, nice Photoshop skills. Almost had me there. You didn’t actually think I’d fall for that, did you?] He followed it with a mocking, toothy-grin emoji. I set my phone down and looked over at his cubicle. He was leaning back in his chair, spinning a pen between his fingers, chin tilted up in a smug, self-satisfied gesture of victory. I stayed silent. When I first saw his post last night, I’d tried to brush it off. I figured he was just one of those men who didn’t understand boundaries—someone who thought a “joke” justified anything. I had even prepared a mental script: if he apologized sincerely, I would let it go. Of course, Brad didn’t apologize. A few minutes later, he swaggered over to my desk. He leaned a hand on my workstation, looming over me with an expression he clearly thought was “smoldering.” “Carlton, I saw the group chat,” he said, his voice dropping into a performative huskiness. “Don’t be mad. I just figured I’d help you say the things you’re too shy to admit yourself. I know you’re the modest type.” He let out a short, dry laugh. “Anyway, we’re both single. Why not give it a shot? Who knows, maybe the AI was just predicting the future.” I looked up at him, studying him as if he were a specimen in a lab—something fascinatingly broken. “Brad, if these rumors cause serious damage to my reputation, I can and will sue you.” My voice was flat. “Delete the photos from the group chat and your social media. Post a public apology stating that the images were AI-generated. Now.” Brad’s grin vanished instantly. He straightened up, shoving his hands into his pockets. “Seriously? It was one picture, Carlton. Everyone’s having a laugh, keeping the office vibe light. You’re really going to turn this into a federal case?” I didn’t blink. I just watched him. He shifted under my gaze, looking uncomfortable for the first time. “Fine, fine. I’ll delete it. God, you’re so high-maintenance.” He turned and walked away. No apology. I waited all morning. Brad did delete the photo from the group chat, but then he posted a new one on his story: an AI image of a couple in wedding attire, hands intertwined. You couldn’t see the faces, but the message was clear. The caption: [Someone’s getting shy and told me to stop showing off our love. Fine, I’ll take it down for her, but you can’t hide true happiness. Those who know, know. 😉 ] The comments were a flood of “LMAO” and “We get it, Brad!” He had “deleted” the evidence, but he’d only reinforced the lie. And because the faces weren’t visible in the new photo, I couldn’t even prove it was me he was claiming to be with. I stared at my screen, feeling a heavy, suffocating sense of powerlessness. 2 The next morning, the atmosphere in the office was even more suffocating. As I pushed through the glass doors, the girl at the front desk gave me a look that was a cocktail of pity and judgment. My phone buzzed. It was a DM from Sophie in Accounting: [Carl, have you seen the group chat?] She sent a screenshot of Brad’s latest post—a photo of a homemade breakfast for two. I opened the main company Slack channel. The notifications were well over 999. I scrolled back to 7:13 AM. Someone had asked: “Hey Brad, did Carlton cook that for you?” He had replied with a coy: “I’m not saying yes, but I’m not saying no. Let’s keep it private, guys.” The channel went nuclear. [Damn, Brad’s the man!] [Wait, are they living together already?] [Is this the official announcement?] [Wedding! Wedding! Wedding!] Everyone was caught up in the spectacle. I closed the app and walked to my desk. Sitting there was a massive bouquet of ninety-nine red roses. The card read: To the most beautiful girl in the world. I picked up the bouquet and set it on the floor, ignoring it. This wasn’t the reaction Brad expected. He probably thought I’d be blushing and demurely accepting the “public’s” blessing. But I didn’t say a word to him. Around noon, he sent me a text: [I’ll put the flowers in your car later so you don’t have to carry them on the train. Lunch together?] I glanced at it and locked my phone. Fifteen minutes later, he couldn’t take the silence anymore. He marched over, bracing his hands on my cubicle wall and looming over me again. “Carlton, I’m being serious here.” I kept typing, my eyes fixed on the monitor. He chuckled. “You don’t have to be shy. I’ve known you’ve had a thing for me for a while. Ever since the company retreat when you brought me that water… I saw the way you looked at me.” The retreat? The water? I remembered it. It was three months ago. A hundred degrees outside during a team-building hike. He’d been standing in the sun, talking someone’s ear off. I was walking by with a bottle for myself, the cooler was right there, so I grabbed an extra one and handed it to the person standing closest to me. Him. That was it. I stopped typing and finally looked him in the eye. “Brad, don’t send me flowers. If you actually want to do something for me, stay at least ten feet away at all times. Thanks.” His face twitched with embarrassment. “Why are you playing hard to get? I get it, you want to keep it professional at work. I can wait.” He patted the top of my cubicle and walked off. I watched his back, realizing how terrifyingly delusional he was. And then, the “pursuit” truly began. 3 Every morning, there was a Starbucks latte on my desk with a smiley face and “For my love” written on the side. I walked it back to the front desk every time and told them it was a “wrong delivery.” Brad continued to post photos of the breakfasts he supposedly “made for me.” The comments were a never-ending stream of encouragement for him and teasing for me. I remained a ghost in his digital world. Then, he cornered me in the parking garage. He was leaning against the elevator wall, holding a small bouquet of baby’s breath. “Carlton, why are you ignoring me?” “I’m not ignoring you, Brad. I’m working.” “Then why don’t you answer my texts?” “Because I’m working.” His brow furrowed. He stepped closer, and I caught the heavy, cloying scent of his cheap cologne. His voice dropped into something that sounded less like romance and more like a threat. “You know the whole office is watching us, right? When you act like this, you make me look bad.” I almost laughed. “Brad, let me be very clear one last time. Helping you with those files that night was a professional courtesy. I would have helped anyone who was that far behind on their deadline. It had nothing to do with you personally.” His face darkened. “You know, I’ve met girls like you before. You say no, but you’re secretly loving the chase. You think it’s fun to keep me on a leash?” “I’m not keeping you on any—” He waved me off, that “I know all your secrets” smirk returning to his face. “Whatever. I get it. You have to keep up appearances. I’ve got patience.” He tossed the flowers into a nearby trash can and walked away. I stared at the bouquet lying among the coffee cups and waste paper, and it finally clicked. If I didn’t accept him, I was “ungrateful.” If I fought back, I was “playing games” or being “dramatic.” Brad’s posts became increasingly bold. When the office chatter became unbearable, I tried posting a message in the company Slack: [Brad and I are not in a relationship. Please stop spreading misinformation.] Brad replied within seconds: [Copy that! Lesson learned, boss lady! I’m shutting up now!] Immediately, the thread was flooded: [LOL!] [Brad’s whipped!] [Is this what public flirting looks like now?] I tried talking to him privately, being as cold and professional as possible. “Brad, I have no romantic interest in you. Your behavior is harassment. If you continue, I will go to HR.” Brad just spun his pen, looking at me with an expression that made my skin crawl. As I turned to leave, he muttered, “Women always say the opposite of what they mean.” I was so angry I had to stand in the hallway for five minutes just to breathe. That night, I stayed until 8:00 PM. When I went to pack my bag, my car keys were gone. I tore through my drawers, my purse, my pockets. Nothing. I was about to call an Uber to go home and get my spare set when I saw my car parked near the building exit. The door was unlocked. On the passenger seat was a note: Your car was filthy. I took it for a wash. No need to thank me—it’s what a boyfriend does. I stood by the car, my entire body shaking with rage. He had taken my keys. He had entered my car. He had violated my private space without a second thought. This wasn’t a “joke” anymore. This was a crime. I took a deep breath, photographed the note and the car, and called a valet service to drive me home. The next morning, I went to the building security office and pulled the surveillance footage. It was clear as day: Brad using a key to enter my car at 6:00 PM, driving away, and returning two hours later. I copied the footage and went to a local mechanic to check for any tracking devices or hidden cameras. The mechanic found nothing, but as I sat in my car afterward, I felt drained. I couldn’t just sit back and hope he’d stop. I had to end this.

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My wife had her heart set on a new Porsche. Every document was signed, every box ticked; all that was left was for me to swipe the card. I’d taken the afternoon off work to play the supportive husband, standing there in the sleek, glass-walled showroom while she ran her hand over the hood like it was a holy relic. But just as I reached for my wallet, her phone vibrated on the marble counter. A voice note played—loud enough for the entire room to hear. It was her “junior assistant,” a kid named Cody. “Hey, boss lady,” his voice oozed, “Remember what you promised? This car is our private sanctuary. Just the two of us.” Before I could even process that, a second message pinged. “And don’t you dare let certain people ruin the vibe by sitting in my passenger seat. I don’t want it smelling like… well, you know.” Nina snatched the phone up, her face a mask of cold indifference. She didn’t look guilty; she looked annoyed that I was hearing it. She turned to me with a look of practiced superiority. “Cody’s just being a brat,” she said, her voice light, dismissive. “He’s young. Don’t take it personally. Anyway, you should probably figure out your own way home. I’m taking the car out for a spin.” I froze. I was the one paying the six-figure down payment. I was the one whose credit score was on the line. And I wasn’t even allowed to sit in the front seat? Seeing my silence, Nina’s expression soured. She opened her mouth to snap something at me, but I beat her to it. I grabbed my Amex off the desk, tucked it back into my wallet, and looked the salesman straight in the eye. “The deal’s off,” I said, my voice vibrating with a coldness I didn’t know I possessed. “Whoever wants this car can buy it themselves.” … I didn’t wait to see the shock on her face. I turned on my heel and headed for the glass double doors. Nina stood paralyzed for a heartbeat before her heels started clicking rapidly against the tile behind me. She caught my arm just as I hit the sidewalk, her fingers digging into my blazer. “Elliott! What the hell was that?” she hissed. “You just humiliated me! We negotiated for weeks! You’re seriously going to throw a tantrum now?” I wrenched my arm away. “I’m not ‘throwing a tantrum,’ Nina. I’ve decided I don’t want to spend my money on a ‘sanctuary’ I’m not allowed to enter. It’s my money. I’m done.” She stepped in front of me, blocking my path, her eyes flashing with genuine panic—or maybe it was just greed. “If you don’t buy this, how am I supposed to explain it to Cody? I promised him!” “Tell him whatever you want,” I said, sidestepping her and walking toward the bus stop at the corner. The salesman had followed us out, too, holding the mobile card reader like a desperate offering. “Mr. Vance—I mean, sir! This was for your wife! I’ve never seen a man go back on his word like this. Look how excited she was. What about the deposit?” I looked at the card reader, then at him. He didn’t care about my marriage; he cared about his commission. He didn’t seem to understand that the person holding the purse strings wasn’t the woman shouting at me. Nina was right on my heels, her voice rising to a shrill pitch that drew stares from passersby. “You wonder why I don’t want to come home anymore? It’s because of this! This psychotic behavior! Cody told me you were getting unstable, and even the salesman thinks you’re being a prick!” Cody. I let out a sharp, jagged laugh. If that kid hadn’t spent every waking hour whispering poison into her ear, Nina might still remember the man she married. For ten years, I’d been the architect of her “ideal life.” I’d started with nothing. I’d delivered pizzas in the snow; I’d worked three jobs at once, scraping by on caffeine and grit to build my firm. We’d finally hit the big time a few years ago. Then she hired Cody. Within a month, I was no longer her partner. I was “stifling.” I was “boring.” She told me I wasn’t “attuned to her needs” like Cody was. She’d even used her position as a board member to sideline me at my own company because Cody “felt intimidated” by my management style. Every time I went to the office, he’d smirk at me from her desk. He told me not to call her after six because “work-life balance was essential,” yet he was the one holding her phone during dinner. When I finally confronted her about it, she just sighed with bone-deep exhaustion. “Elliott, do you think Cody and I have time for your insecurities? This is the new company policy. Even I have to follow it.” Buying this car was supposed to be a peace offering. A way to bridge the chasm between us. But the passenger seat comment was the final straw. It wasn’t just a car; it was the last piece of my dignity she was trying to sell. I didn’t look back. I stepped onto the bus, leaving her standing on the curb in her designer heels, screaming my name into the wind. I hadn’t even made it through the front door of our house before my phone started blowing up. It was my best friend, Marcus. “Elliott, man, what’s going on with you and Nina?” Before I could answer, he sent a screenshot of her Instagram story. It was a black-and-white photo of her looking “wistful” out a window. The caption read: Finally realizing who my real rock is. Some people use money to control you, but they can’t control a woman who’s finally found her own strength. In the comments, Cody had already chimed in: Some guys think a bank account gives them the right to treat their wife like a subordinate. They don’t realize you’re an alpha now. You don’t need his scraps. I stared at the screen until the words blurred. I tried to click on her profile, but I couldn’t. She’d blocked me. A laugh bubbled up in my chest—bitter and hollow. I spoke into the phone to Marcus. “If she thinks I’m a monster for not spending my ‘blood and sweat’ money on her and her boyfriend, then fine. I’m the monster. And the monster is officially closing the vault.” I hung up. If she wanted to be an “alpha woman,” she could start by paying her own mortgage. I was in the kitchen, mechanically changing the cat’s litter, when the phone rang again. It was Nina. I hit decline. It rang again. And again. Finally, I picked up. “Elliott! Get down to the mall right now,” she commanded, her voice bright and forced, as if the afternoon hadn’t happened. “Cody and I are at the tech store. He picked out this incredible 85-inch QLED for you. It’s perfect for your gaming. Come pay for it so we can get it delivered.” “You want me to come pay for a TV?” I asked, my voice flat. “Nina, listen to me: I don’t have the money. And even if I did, I wouldn’t spend a dime on you.” “Elliott! Don’t be a child!” she shrieked. Then Cody’s voice filtered through the background. “Hey, man, don’t be like that. Come on down, buy the TV, and let’s put this bad energy behind us. Nina’s even looking at shirts for you. She wants to make it up to you.” The suggestion caught me off guard. Was she actually trying? Was she finally seeing how far she’d pushed me? We had ten years and two kids between us. If she was actually trying to fix this, I didn’t want to be the one to burn the bridge. I grabbed my coat and drove to the mall. When I found them, Nina was holding a $7 latte, her face a mask of boredom. She didn’t greet me. She just turned and walked into a high-end menswear boutique. I followed her, my heart hammering against my ribs. She did a quick lap of the store, glanced at me with a look of profound disapproval, and turned to the clerk. “Where’s your clearance rack? The stuff you’re trying to get rid of?” I blinked. Before I could speak, Cody leaned in, smelling of expensive cologne I’d probably paid for. “Don’t take it the wrong way, Elliott. Nina’s budget is a little tight right now. Plus, with your… situation… we didn’t want people thinking you were living off her success. It’s better to look humble.” “Humble?” I repeated. Nina rolled her eyes, pulling a thin, scratchy white T-shirt from a bin marked $19.99. “Just wrap this up,” she told the clerk. Cody rushed to tap his phone on the reader to pay the twenty bucks, looking like a saint. The shirt was a size small. I haven’t been a size small since high school. “Okay, now that Cody’s got you a gift,” Nina said, grabbing my arm and pulling me toward the Rolex boutique next door, “you should show him some appreciation for all the hard work he does for our family. He’s had his eye on a Daytona.” I stopped dead. I looked at the $19.99 plastic bag in her hand, then at the luxury watch display. The sheer, ballsy audacity of it made my head spin. I took the bag from her and dropped it on the floor. “Twenty bucks for a shirt that won’t fit me, and you want a thirty-thousand-dollar watch in return?” I looked at Cody. “You want the watch? Buy it yourself.” Nina’s face transformed. “What is wrong with you?” Cody stepped in, playing the peacemaker. “Elliott, man, I’m just trying to keep the peace. I work for her. She just doesn’t want us fighting anymore.” He turned to the salesclerk. “Show us the cheapest thing you have.” “No!” Nina snapped. “I want the one we picked out earlier! The Platinum one!” The clerk brought out a piece that cost more than a mid-sized sedan. I didn’t say a word. I turned to walk away. “Elliott! You are not walking away from me!” Nina screamed, her voice echoing through the mall. Cody caught up to me, grabbing my shoulder. “Man, I’m giving you signals! Just buy the watch and give her the ‘attitude’ she needs to forgive you! Just play the part!” “The part?” I turned on him. “The part where you destroy my marriage and I thank you for it with luxury jewelry?” I looked at my wife. “If I buy him this watch, does he leave? Does he disappear from our lives?” Cody chuckled, a dry, nasty sound. “Wow. You really are paranoid, aren’t you? You don’t even trust your own wife? Nina has been under so much pressure because of how you treat me at the office. We’re letting you stay home, fish, and drink tea all day. What more do you want?” I took a breath. I was ready to tell her I’d go back to work. I’d take the reins again. I’d do anything if she just sent this parasite packing. But Nina spoke first, her voice dripping with artificial trauma. “I can’t do this anymore! Everyone, look!” she shouted, gesturing to the growing crowd of shoppers. “Look at the man who installed hidden cameras in my office! The man who tracks my every move because he’s convinced I’m cheating!” The mall went silent. Then the whispers started. Creep. Controlling. Loser. I was stunned. “The cameras were because of the data leak, Nina! Someone was stealing our bidding secrets! I was trying to find the mole!” She let out a harsh, theatrical sob. “He’s so suffocating! I’ve tried to be a good provider, but he’s obsessed!” A woman in the crowd hissed, “I’d leave him in a heartbeat. Poor girl.” Another man added, “He’s just scared of losing his golden goose.” Nina looked at me, a predatory glint in her eyes. She leaned in close, so only I could hear. “You want a reason to be paranoid, Elliott? Fine. I’m sleeping with him. I’ve been sleeping with him for months. And I’m going to make sure you walk away with nothing.” She straightened up, looking like a broken victim again. “There! Are you happy now? I said it!” Cody looked at me with pure triumph. “You pushed her to this, Elliott. If you’re so lonely, I can give you the numbers for some professionals. Just stop harrassing her.” The crowd laughed. The humiliation was a physical weight, crushing the air out of my lungs. “I’ve spent ten years building a life for you,” I whispered, my voice shaking. “Apologize. Right now.” “Or what?” Cody sneered. “If you keep lying about us, maybe next time we’ll let you watch from the middle of the bed.” That was it. The snap. I didn’t think. I just launched a kick into Cody’s chest. He went down hard, gasping for air. The crowd gasped. Nina screamed and lunged for me. I stepped back, but Cody scrambled up, fueled by adrenaline and spite, and kicked my back leg out. I hit the floor, landing on my knees right at Nina’s feet. “Apologize to her!” Cody barked, standing over me. “Why do you have to ruin everything?” Nina looked down at me, disgusted. She took the $19.99 shirt and threw it in my face. “Elliott, apologize now, or I’m filing for divorce.” I felt the fabric hit my skin. I looked at the floor, then slowly stood up. The heat in my chest had gone cold—a deep, Arctic chill. I reached into her expensive handbag. “These are the keys to the office,” I said, pulling them out. “I built that company. They’re mine.” “This is the secondary credit card,” I pulled out the black card. “The account is in my name. I’m taking it.” Cody grabbed my wrist, his face red. “You’re accusing her! You’re the one who should leave with nothing!” I looked at Nina. She was a stranger. A cruel, hollow stranger. “You think you’re the one in charge?” I whispered. “Wait until your gambling-addict father finds out the checks are stopping. Wait until you realize you haven’t actually worked a full day in six years.” I picked up my phone and dialed my lawyer. “I want the divorce papers,” I said, loud enough for the whole mall to hear. “And I want them filed by tonight.”

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The light from my phone was a surgical strike to my retinas in the 4:00 AM darkness. My own reply to my best friend’s message was still sitting there in the text bubble, a testament to my own blindness. “Bro, my wife’s pregnant. Three months. We’re finally making it official with a ceremony!” His words felt like shards of glass under my eyelids. “That’s incredible, Jackson! I’m honored to be your best man!” My response from that morning felt like a sick joke now. A punchline to a gag I didn’t know I was starring in. It turned out that in this wedding, I wasn’t the best man. I was the redundant extra. Talia stood in front of me now, holding two garment bags. Inside were two tuxedos. One was a standard off-the-rack number, maybe five hundred dollars. The other was a bespoke masterpiece, the kind of silk-wool blend that screamed old money—half a million dollars’ worth of craftsmanship. “Keep the five-hundred-dollar one,” I said, forcing a smile that felt like it was tearing my face apart. I reached out to touch her hand, desperate for a spark of the sweetness we’d shared for three years. She just nodded, her expression as cool as marble. Her voice carried a casual, devastating cruelty. “The cheap one was always for you, Noah. The bespoke suit is for Jackson.” She smoothed a phantom wrinkle on the expensive sleeve. “He’s got an ego. He wouldn’t be happy if he didn’t outshine you at the altar.” The room began to tilt. I felt the air leave my lungs as if I’d been struck by a physical blow. I just stood there, paralyzed, as she reached out to hook her arm through mine. Her smile was a beautiful mask, hiding a truth that turned my blood to ice. “The truth is, Jackson and I have been married for six years. We kept it quiet for the sake of the business. Three years ago, during a high-stakes game of Truth or Dare, he got pissed off and literally bet you away to me.” She leaned in, her scent—that expensive jasmine I used to love—now making me gag. “I actually did end up falling for you, Noah. But I’m carrying his child. Three months along. So, we’re just going to do the wedding together. One big happy family.” Every memory of the last three years—the late-night talks, the promises, the whispered ‘I love yous’—crumbled into ash. All that was left was the bone-deep cold. … My limbs felt like lead. It took everything I had to find my voice. “Why?” Three years of my life. Three years of a curated lie, all because of a drunk bet. Talia looked at me with genuine confusion, as if I were the one being difficult. “Noah, in our circle, nobody cares about the paperwork. To the world, you’ll still be my husband. One of them, anyway.” I wrenched my arm away from her touch. “How can you say that? How can you stand there and justify an affair like it’s a business merger?” Talia stepped closer, wrapping her arms around my waist, refusing to let go. “I just knew him first, that’s all. But I love you more. How is that an affair?” My stomach turned. I felt the bile rising. “Either you divorce him, or we’re done. Right now.” Talia’s grip slowly loosened. Her warmth vanished, replaced by a gaze as piercing as a winter lake. “I’m carrying Jackson’s legacy, Noah. I won’t let my child grow up without a father.” Three months. Suddenly, the ‘late nights at the office’ made sense. The times she’d come home in the small hours, letting me hold her, smelling of a cologne that wasn’t mine—traces I’d convinced myself were just my imagination. I never suspected Jackson. My best friend. My brother. I thought of the toy car I’d found in the backseat of her SUV last week. I’d been so excited, so hopeful. I’d asked her, “Talia, maybe it’s time? Maybe we should have a baby of our own?” She’d told me then that a child would only get in the way of ‘us.’ She didn’t want a child. She just didn’t want mine. Fury roared in my ears. Seeing my anger, Talia tried to soften. She stepped back into my space, her hands tracing the line of my jaw. “Don’t be like this. Tell you what, I’ll buy you a better suit. Whatever you want.” She looked exactly the same as she did six months ago when I went down on one knee and she screamed Yes through her tears. The face was the same. The woman was a stranger. A phone rang, shattering the silence of our standoff. She didn’t even try to hide the screen. The caller ID flashed a single word: [Husband]. It hit me then, like a physical weight. She had a special ringtone for him. A special label. Talia glanced at me, then turned her back to take the call. I found myself holding my breath, feeling like a thief in my own home, a squatter in a life that didn’t belong to me. I opened my own phone and went to my messages. My two pinned chats were side by side. [Jackson] [Talia] I was the clown, the third wheel trying to wedge himself into a marriage that had already been built. I scrolled to Jackson’s latest Instagram post. It was a photo of him and Talia sitting with her parents. They were all beaming. The caption read: “Early Christmas gift from the in-laws: a new brownstone in the West Village! Taking the wife for her three-month ultrasound tomorrow!” The date was yesterday. Yesterday, Talia had canceled our anniversary dinner, claiming she had a migraine. She hadn’t been in bed. She’d been at an ultrasound, holding Jackson’s hand. My hands began to shake, the text on the screen blurring into a smear of light. Talia hung up and turned around, her expression perfectly composed. “Noah, about tonight… I might have to—” I didn’t wait for the excuse. I pushed past her and walked out the door. The hallway was freezing, but her voice followed me, colder than the draft. “Think long and hard, Noah. Don’t do something you’ll regret.” I stepped into the elevator and let the doors slide shut. I felt my heart sink in sync with the car, dropping into a pit of nothingness. I walked the streets aimlessly until I found myself near the hospital. The sterile white building loomed over me like a tombstone. “Noah! What are you doing here?” It was my mother. She looked exhausted, but her face lit up when she saw me. “Toby heard about the wedding and he’s been in such high spirits. He’s been insisting he’s going to be your junior usher, even if he has to do it in a wheelchair!” The words I’d been prepared to scream—about the lies, the betrayal—died in my throat. I forced a smile. “How is he, Ma?” “Not great,” she whispered, her voice cracking. “The doctors say the cancer is spreading again. If it wasn’t for that experimental treatment Talia’s paying for… I don’t think he’d still be with us.” Talia’s name hit me like a lead pipe. Since I’d started dating her, my brother’s medical bills—the ones that had been drowning my mother, forcing her to work three cleaning jobs—had vanished. He was in a private wing now. He had the best specialists. The doctor had been clear: without the imported drugs and the specialized team Talia funded, Toby wouldn’t survive the month. “Listen to me, rambling on,” my mother said, patting my cheek. “You’re the pillar of this family now, Noah. Seeing you marry a woman like that, seeing you start a real life… your father is looking down from heaven with so much pride.” My father died two years ago. A freak accident on a construction site. The company claimed it was ‘operator error’ and refused to pay a cent of worker’s comp. They’d smeared his name, calling him negligent. We’d lived under the shadow of that shame until Talia’s family lawyers stepped in and fought the case, clearing his name. I realized then, with a sickening clarity, that I couldn’t just walk away. My dignity was a luxury I couldn’t afford. “You’re so lucky to have her, Noah,” my mom continued as we walked toward the ward. “She really loves you.” Does she? I wondered. Maybe there was a version of love there. When I was at my lowest, when Toby was dying and we were broke, Talia had appeared like an angel. I’d been too afraid to even date, knowing I couldn’t afford a movie ticket, let alone a dinner. I’d only ever been able to cook for her at my place. And I remember how she, a woman who grew up with Michelin-starred chefs, had devoured my simple pasta like it was the best thing she’d ever tasted. “This is incredible, Noah. I’m so happy here with you.” The second year we were together, I’d been caught in a massive pile-up on the interstate during a blizzard. I was trapped in the car, my leg crushed, shivering in the dark as the snow buried me. The signal was dead. The roads were blocked. And then, out of the white void, Talia had appeared. She’d hiked three miles through the snow with a rescue team she’d hired herself. “Noah, don’t close your eyes. I’m here. I’ve got you.” She had been my light. And today, she told me that our entire beginning was just Jackson tossing my contact info to her because he’d lost a bet. My mom pushed open the door to Toby’s room. She nudged my arm, grinning. “Look who’s here, Noah.” Talia was already there. She was sitting by Toby’s bed, laughing with him. There was a tray of high-end organic food on his table and a new gaming console I knew cost more than my monthly rent. Toby’s pale face lit up. “Noah! Talia was just helping me pick out my tie for the big day. I’m gonna look sharper than you!” My mother’s voice echoed in my head: Be grateful for a woman like her. I looked at Talia. She looked back at me, her eyes steady, full of a terrifying, quiet power. She knew. She knew she owned me. What if the ‘greatest blessing’ of my life was just a game my best friend played because he was bored? Toby’s condition seemed to stabilize with the new medication. I didn’t have the courage to cancel the wedding. Not yet. Three days before the ceremony, Jackson showed up at the hospital. I was holding a box of Toby’s meds, my grip so tight the cardboard was crumpling. Jackson was talking to Toby, who was offering his congratulations on Jackson’s own ‘private’ marriage and the baby. “I hope your kid is healthy and happy, Jackson,” Toby said softly. Jackson shot me a smug look. “Yeah, me too. But the key to a happy kid is a stable home, right Noah? Everyone in their proper place.” Toby’s eyes welled up. “You’re right. I’m glad he won’t grow up like us—without a dad.” I turned away, the bridge of my nose stinging with suppressed tears. Jackson followed me into the hallway. “Even your kid brother gets it. Why don’t you?” I spun around, my voice a low growl. “Why? Why would you do this? You were my brother, Jackson. You ruined my life for a joke.” He looked at me with bored amusement. “Why? Because it was fun, Noah. Did I ever mention my family owns the development firm your dad worked for?” The world stopped spinning. “What?” “The construction site. The accident. That was our project,” Jackson said, leaning against the wall. “Talia told you she ‘cleared’ his name? Please. She just made a few calls to my dad. We buried the evidence so she could look like a hero to you. You really are a sucker.” I felt the blood drain from my face. My fists clenched so hard my nails drew blood. My father’s death—the shame that killed my mother’s spirit—it was them. They were the ones who had destroyed us, and then they had played the saviors. “You bastards,” I whispered. “I’ll kill you.” Jackson laughed. “With what? You have nothing. You go to the cops, the funding for Toby’s meds disappears. You make a scene at the wedding, your mom loses her house. Just play your part, Noah. Be the pretty little accessory Talia wants you to be.” He reached out to pat my shoulder. I didn’t think. I just lunged. I shoved him back with everything I had. He tripped over a cleaning cart and hit the floor hard. “Jackson!” Talia had appeared out of nowhere. She ran to him, pushing me aside. Jackson stayed on the floor, groaning, putting on a performance for the ages. “Talia… I was just trying to talk to him… I wanted to check on Toby, but he just snapped…” He looked at me with mock terror, making me look like a violent lunatic. Talia looked at me, her eyes red with anger. Slap. The sound echoed through the sterile hall. My head snapped to the side. “Noah, Jackson is your best friend! And he’s the father of my child!” she hissed. “Why are you being so small-minded? So petty?” She helped him up, giving me one last look of pure disappointment. “If anything happens to him, or the baby, I’m done with you. And you know what that means for your brother.” They walked away together. I leaned against the wall, trembling. I had to find proof. I had to take them down. But that afternoon, the lead doctor called me into his office. “Mr. Miller, I’m afraid the specialists from Zurich have suddenly pulled out of Toby’s case. And the pharmaceutical company has revoked his access to the clinical trial drugs.” The room went dark. I couldn’t breathe. “Please,” I whispered. “There must be a mistake.” “They said the funding was ‘diverted,’” the doctor said, not looking me in the eye. I called Talia. She didn’t answer. I drove to her penthouse, my heart hammering against my ribs. I burst through the door, and the sight stopped me cold. Clothes were strewn across the hardwood floor. In the living room, Jackson had Talia pinned against the sofa. They were mid-kiss, his hands possessive on her waist. “Tell me,” Jackson murmured against her neck. “Who’s better? Me or the charity case?” Talia’s voice was breathy, cruel. “He doesn’t even belong in the same conversation as you.” Even though I knew. Even though I hated them. Seeing it—the woman I’d loved for three years and the man I’d trusted for a decade—it felt like being flayed alive. Talia looked up, seeing me in the doorway. She didn’t even try to cover herself. “Get out.” I didn’t move. I sank to my knees. “Please. Save Toby. I’ll do anything. Please.” Talia looked at Jackson, then back at me. “Fine. But you’re going to pay your debt at the wedding. You’re going to apologize to Jackson in front of everyone.” “You pushed him,” she continued, her voice cold. “You could have hurt the baby. So, at the ceremony, you’re going to tell the guests that you’re the one who forced your way into our lives. You’re going to admit you were just a stalker, a mistake.” I thought of Toby, gasping for air in that hospital bed. He just wanted to see me happy. He just wanted to see a wedding. He was never going to see one. The day of the ceremony arrived. I was dressed in the cheap tuxedo, standing in the wings as a ‘groomsman’ for Jackson. Down in the front row, I saw my mother. She was crying, arguing with a group of socialites who were whispering loudly. “My son is a good man!” she was sobbing. “He’s not a homewrecker! They’ve been together for years!” But then, I stepped onto the stage behind Jackson. The cameras were everywhere—this was a high-society event, covered by every lifestyle blog in the city. Jackson handed me the microphone. I looked at the sea of faces. I looked at my mother’s confused, breaking heart. “My name is Noah Miller,” I said, my voice hollow, echoing through the chapel. “And I am a lie. I am the man who tried to tear apart Talia and Jackson’s marriage.” “I manipulated my way into their lives. I tried to steal a wedding that wasn’t mine.” “I’m nothing. I’m a parasite.” The room erupted in murmurs. “I knew he was a loser,” someone whispered. “Look at him, selling his soul for a seat at the table.” “Poor Talia,” another said. “To be harassed by a man like that.” My mother’s face went gray. She looked at me like she didn’t recognize her own flesh and blood. Jackson leaned in, whispering so only I could hear. “Now, get on your knees. Apologize for hitting me. Or your brother dies today.” I dropped. My knees hit the marble floor with a sickening thud. I began to slap myself. Hard. Left, then right. “I’m a homewrecker,” I said, the words tasting like copper. “I’m pathetic.” Talia’s brow furrowed. She reached a hand out toward me, then stopped. For a second, I saw a flicker of something—guilt? Pity? “Enough,” she said quietly. “I’ll call the hospital. I’ll restore the meds.” My mother suddenly screamed. She lunged onto the stage, her hand catching me across the face with more force than Talia ever could. “How could you be so weak!” she shrieked. “I didn’t raise a coward! Noah, why are you doing this?” She clutched her chest, her eyes rolling back. She collapsed onto the stage. “Ma!” I screamed, scrambling toward her. At that exact moment, my phone vibrated in my pocket. A text from the head nurse. “Mr. Miller, I’m so sorry. Toby’s vitals crashed. We couldn’t stabilize him without the equipment. He’s gone.” The phone slipped from my hand, the screen shattering into a web of black glass. The tears didn’t come. I felt something inside me simply stop. Talia seemed to realize the gravity of the chaos. “Call an ambulance! Now!” She tried to help me up, her eyes filling with tears. “Noah, it’s over. Jackson’s had his fun. The wedding is still happening, we’ll fix the press, we can still be together…” I looked at her. I didn’t see the woman who saved me from the snow. I didn’t see the woman who ate my pasta. “Talia,” I said, my voice dead. “Toby is dead.” She froze. Before she could process the words, I stood up and walked toward the arched window overlooking the cliffs. Then came the scream—

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