Category: English

In a live-stream room dedicated to testing the loyalty of partners, the guest submission was practically hyperventilating with rage. “My boyfriend is a complete, boosted parasite!” she cried. “He literally begged me to carry him to Challenger every season just so he could flex on his friends. And then, just to play duos with other girls, he lied to me and said those high-tier accounts belonged to his sister who does professional boosting!” “If you don’t believe me, send him a friend request from an account with a Regional Badge. He’ll accept it in a heartbeat!” A second later, my own gaming avatar and profile ID flashed across the stream. Staring at the streamer’s profile—which boasted several top-tier regional badges of her own—I clicked accept. The next moment, I was pulled into her game lobby. A soft, sweet voice drifted through my headset. “Hey there, handsome. Down for some duos?” I let out a cold laugh, lowered my pitch to a deep, smooth drawl, and replied, “I’d love to.” 1 Lately, a new trend had taken over the gaming community. People were hiring streamers with sweet, attractive voices to run “loyalty tests” on their significant others. It had become my favorite dinner entertainment. Every evening, I’d sit back with my food, scroll through these streams, and laugh as one toxic partner after another got caught red-handed. Tonight, the girl on stream was sobbing as she poured her heart out. “He’s just using me for my rank! He’s barely a Diamond-level player on his own, but he forces me to carry him to Challenger every single season just so he can brag.” “Whenever we lose, he screams at me. When we win, he tells me I’m trash compared to the rest of the team!” “He’s constantly playing with other girls, claiming those accounts belong to his sister’s boosting business. It’s all a lie!” “Just add him. If you have any high-rank badges on your profile, he’ll accept instantly.” Her voice cracked as she dissolved into tears. I shook my head, taking a bite of food. I couldn’t help but feel bad for her. How could anyone be so naive? The guy was clearly using her as a free boosting service. The chat was already flying by, filled with righteous indignation. What a pathetic loser! Girl, stop crying. Block him and run! Lmao, ‘my sister’s boosting account.’ Classic. Add him, streamer! Let’s watch this trainwreck live! After finishing my dinner, I scooped up half a watermelon with a spoon, settling in for the show. But a second later, the avatar and gamer tag that popped up on the stream made me freeze. The avatar was a picture of my cat, Binx. The username was my exact gamer tag: Phantom_Luke. My spoon slipped, and the watermelon splashed back into the bowl. The chat went wild, instantly feeding on the drama. The streamer, a girl with a gentle, comforting voice, was trying to soothe the crying guest. “I get it, sis. I just sent him a request. He hasn’t accepted yet, but don’t worry.” She was telling her not to worry? I was the one about to have a panic attack! Mainly because I didn’t even have a girlfriend! On top of that, every single Regional Badge on my account was earned through hours of grueling solo queue. When did I become a “boosted Diamond parasite” who needed a girl to carry him? I scrambled to log into the game on my phone. Sure enough, there was a pending friend request. Setting up my tablet next to me to keep the stream open, I confirmed that the request was indeed from the streamer. I never expected that one day, I’d end up being the entertainment. I accepted the request. My initial instinct was to jump into the lobby and demand to know who the hell this guest was. But as the adrenaline cooled, I decided to play along. While I could be incredibly loud and aggressive in game chat, in real life, I was quiet and kept to myself. Most of my friends were laid-back, polite guys from my college dorm. Who could possibly hate me enough to pull a stunt like this? On stream, the streamer was looking over my profile, and the chat erupted again. Holy shit, this guy has more Regional Badges than the streamer does! Wait, is this actually a boosted player? His stats are insane. Maybe the guest is just mad because she got dumped and she’s trying to ruin his life? Obviously he bought the account, guys. No way a Diamond loser has these stats. The submitter quickly typed in the chat to defend her narrative. He paid a professional booster for those badges! He’s actually terrible. I’ve seen him play in person—he can barely handle a low-tier Master lobby on his own! Seen me play in person? I never played games anywhere except my dorm room or my bedroom at home. A cold realization washed over me. Was the guest one of my roommates? 2 While my mind raced, the streamer pulled me into her lobby. A soft voice echoed in my headset. “Hey there, handsome. Down for some duos?” I took a slow breath, consciously dropping my voice to a deeper, more resonant register. “I’d love to.” Wow, his voice is actually really hot. He doesn’t sound like a bad guy. Please, the guys with voices like that are always the biggest players. To get to the bottom of this, I had to keep my temper in check. “Let’s go then,” the streamer giggled, starting the matchmaking queue. During the draft phase, she drop-hinted that she wanted me to play Fae—a pocket support champion that literally attaches to another player’s character. I pretended not to hear her and locked in Lyra, a high-damage, musical mid-lane mage. The submitter immediately started mocking me in the chat. He’s playing mid. This game is a guaranteed loss. The viewers followed her lead. This guy really had the balls to lock Lyra in a Challenger lobby? Confidence is a hell of a drug. When we lose, he’ll just blame the champion’s lack of mobility. “Don’t worry, handsome. Just clear your waves in mid, and I’ll come gank for you,” the streamer said, her tone patronizing, as if she were talking to a child. I smiled tightly. “Sounds good.” Because our profiles both showed high-rank badges, the matchmaking system put us against a incredibly coordinated enemy team. Within three minutes, our side lanes collapsed. Our teammates refused to defend the jungle, completely ruining the streamer’s farming rotation. By the ten-minute mark, the enemy was pushing our high-ground gates. My teammates had completely given up, repeatedly spamming the surrender button. The stream chat had stopped arguing about my relationship status and was now debating whether the game was winnable. I kept my mic muted, quietly farming whatever resources I could find. The streamer had stopped flirting too, desperately trying to coordinate a defense in team chat. As the enemy team gathered to push our final tower, a chaotic team fight broke out. Watching the enemy’s positioning, I threw out Lyra’s second ability, landing a perfect, split-second stun on their main damage dealer. Using my ultimate to dodge a lethal projectile, I flashed directly onto his face, unleashed my full combo, and eliminated him instantly. With a sliver of health left, I managed to weave through the chaos. Instead of retreating to the safety of our fountain, I hovered at the very edge of the fight, cycling my healing abilities to keep my remaining teammates alive. I picked up four assists in the clean-up. We pushed straight down the map and shattered their Nexus. When the victory screen faded, the MVP card popped up on my screen. I had dealt 32% of our team’s total damage. The streamer fell completely silent. The chat, however, went absolutely ballistic. Lyra dealt 32% damage? Lmao, the streamer got carried so hard. Is this the guy you called a ‘boosted parasite’?! With macros like that? He could easily be a professional booster himself. Streamer, this is a script. I’m out. Where did the guest go? Why is she quiet now? After a long pause, the submitter finally typed a message. It makes sense now. They’re living together! The girl he’s living with is the one actually playing his account right now! I was drinking water and nearly choked. This girl was a creative writer. The stories just kept coming. But the chat, hungry for any reason to validate their biases, swallowed it whole. A live-in girlfriend boosting him? Wow. Some guys are so pathetic, they’ll do anything for a rank. The chat devolved into a massive flame war. Some were arguing about the “live-in booster” theory, while others started pointing out the inconsistencies in the guest’s story. The streamer was clearly caught off guard by the twist, but she was a professional. She quickly recovered her composure and began showering me with praise. Wanting to keep the viewers hooked—and to figure out if I actually had a “live-in girlfriend”—she asked sweetly, “You’re so good, handsome. Down for another one?” “Of course,” I replied smoothly. During the next champion select, the streamer suggested, “You must be tired after that carry. Why don’t you take Fae this game, hitch a ride on my character, and let me carry you?” I smiled, my voice remaining calm and steady. “Actually, I don’t really like playing support.” Without hesitation, I locked in Mirage—the absolute highest-skill-cap assassin in the game. “Why don’t you play support and hitch a ride on me? I’ll show you how to jungle.” Lmao, he’s doubling down! Where are all the people who said he was being boosted by a live-in girlfriend? Look at his champion pool! The chat was scrolling so fast it was a blur of colors, interspersed with the submitter’s desperate insults. I couldn’t help but grin. The streamer let out a nervous laugh. “Wow, I didn’t know you played Mirage. Not many people can pull him off. Did your girlfriend teach you?” “Of course not,” I answered instantly. “I don’t even have a girlfriend.” Even with my direct denial, the chat refused to believe it. The submitter took the opportunity to play the victim again. No wonder he keeps his relationship status hidden on his profile. It’s so he can flirt with other girls on stream! Once the match started, the streamer kept backseat-gaming, telling me where to path and when to take objectives. During the first fight at the dragon pit, the enemy team caught me off guard, taking half my health. “Get out, get out! Abandon the dragon!” she yelled through the headset. Before she could finish her sentence, I activated Mirage’s ultimate. Executing a flawless chain of mirror-images, I danced through the enemy backline, dodging their crowd control, securing a triple kill, and escaping with double-digit health. The double-kill, triple-kill announcements echoed in our headsets. The streamer—and her entire chat—went dead silent. Finally, she let out a breathless laugh. “Oh my god… you are actually insane.” Fully immersed in the game, I forgot to keep up my deep, mysterious persona. “Just a casual Tuesday. No big deal.” The chat was flooded with “GG” and “WTF” spam. The submitter, completely losing her mind, spammed several messages in a row. It’s fake! It’s all fake! He’s a factory worker! He doesn’t know how to play Mirage! The girl he lives with is the one playing! Her messages were immediately buried under the wave of praise. The rest of the match was a personal highlight reel. Ganking lanes, invading the enemy jungle, securing objectives—I controlled the entire map. In every team fight, I used my mirror clones to bait out the enemy’s ultimate abilities before diving their backline. I ran circles around the enemy jungler, leaving him with a miserable 0/5 stat line. At eleven minutes, the enemy Nexus exploded. My final score was 12/0/4. Another undisputed MVP. The streamer didn’t even try to hide her admiration anymore. “Oh my god, Luke, that was incredible. How do you play like that?” As I was about to reply, someone in the chat pointed out something new. Guys, I looked up his account. His relationship status isn’t hidden—it’s completely empty! And looking at his match history, he only plays solo queue. The stats are completely consistent. Wait… is it possible the guest is just a liar? Suddenly, a loud voice cut through my room. “Alright guys, lights out in five! Keep it down if you’re staying up!” It was my dorm leader making his nightly rounds. Naturally, the streamer heard it. “Wait, are you in a dorm?” I pulled the blanket over my head, lowering my voice to a whisper. “Yeah. I live in a college dorm.” 3 At that, the entire narrative collapsed. A college dorm? So where is this live-in girlfriend coming from? I knew this was a setup! The guest has some explaining to do. First she says he’s a boosted parasite, then she says he’s being boosted by a live-in girlfriend, and now it turns out he lives in a male dorm! Did this girl get rejected and decide to ruin his life? A few trolls still tried to argue that he could have a girl hiding in his bed, but they were quickly roasted by the rest of the chat. Most of the viewers were now tag-spamming the submitter, demanding she show her face and explain herself. I lay in bed, watching the drama unfold with amusement while chatting with the streamer. “How old are you, Luke?” she asked. “Nineteen. Just started my sophomore year.” After several minutes of silence, the submitter finally typed in the chat. He’s not a college student! He’s a factory worker who dropped out of high school! He’s living in a factory dorm! It was fascinating to watch how quickly people would rally behind a lie, even without a shred of evidence. The moment she typed those words, some viewers immediately shifted back. Streamer, ask him which college he goes to! Ask him to show his student ID. The streamer hesitated, clearly trying to figure out how to ask without sounding accusatory. But I had nothing to hide. “I go to Austin University. It’s a pretty decent school, you’ve probably heard of it.” Austin University? That’s an Ivy-equivalent school! Wait, I go to AU! Are you the Phantom from our esports club? The one who won the state championship last semester? Explain! Oh my god, I remember that match! Our Mirage player carried the entire team to the trophy, and he was insanely good-looking! Is it really him? I didn’t expect someone in the chat to actually recognize me. Streamer, meet up with him in person! Let’s see if he’s the real deal! Yeah! Let’s see what Phantom actually looks like! Sensing a massive spike in viewership, the streamer seized the opportunity. “Oh my god, I go to AU too! We’re literally on the same campus! Would you be down to grab coffee tomorrow?”

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “479973”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

Lola and I had been at each other’s throats for as long as I could remember. She said I was too pale, too soft—a pretty boy who didn’t belong in a fistfight. I told her she was a menace, a loudmouthed tomboy who didn’t know how to shut up. We traded insults for over a decade. Until senior year, when the new transfer kid confessed to her. She threw a sideways glance at me, smirked, and said, “Sorry, but you’re just not my type.” The crowd of classmates started chanting, “Oh, come on! Let me guess—you only have eyes for guys like Dan?” Lola let out a soft, lazy laugh, leaning back. “Yeah, actually. I like them with a bit of muscle, a bit of an edge. What of it?” Later, we went to college together, got married, and spent a lifetime bickering. Just before she passed away in that sterile hospital bed, she held my hand, laughing like a little girl. “Look at you. Still so scrawny, and your cooking is still terrible. Next time around, I’m definitely finding myself a handsome, built guy.” With tears burning my eyes, I gave her shoulder a gentle nudge. “Fine. Go find your muscle man. I’ll find someone who actually lets me live in peace.” Then I opened my eyes. And I was right back to the day the transfer kid confessed to her. “Lola, I… I really like you. Would you give me a chance?” Lola raised her eyes, spared me a brief, unreadable glance, and looked away. A slow smile curved her lips. “Sure. Let’s give it a shot.” 1 Zack’s eyes went wide, instantly shiny with disbelief. “Really… seriously?” Lola gave a careless shrug. “Yeah. You’ve got great abs, you’re handsome. Definitely my type.” I clenched my fists in my pockets, my fingers trembling. The crowd around us erupted. “Whoa, Lola! You actually like guys like Zack? We all thought you and Dan were a thing.” Lola lazily raised her eyelids, her lips twitching with amusement. “Who’d want him? He’s like a pretty boy. Too soft, too fragile.” The classroom exploded into laughter. “Dan’s good-looking, sure, but there’s nothing to him. No meat on those bones.” “Exactly. Girls want a real man. Someone strong.” I stood there frozen, the air turning to ice in my lungs. In my last life, at this exact moment, Lola had turned Zack down. Right in front of everyone, she had declared her feelings for me. My teenage heart had pounded so hard I thought it would burst out of my chest. That night, I tossed and turned under my covers, unable to sleep a single wink. The next morning, when I dragged my feet downstairs with dark circles under my eyes, Lola was already waiting by the porch. She had looked me up and down, clicking her tongue. “Did you spend all night robbing banks, Dan?” I had snapped at her, and she had just laughed. After graduation, she was the one who asked me out properly. “You might be scrawny, but I guess you’ll do. Want to be my boyfriend?” I playfully punched her arm. “Who’d want to be your boyfriend?” She had clutched her shoulder, laughing, calling me a stubborn idiot who could never just admit what he wanted. Then college. Walking through autumn rain, kissing under the streetlights. Marriage right after graduation. A son, a daughter. Decades of beautiful, noisy, chaotic bickering. Once, we had a cold war that lasted a whole month. Everyone thought we were done. But Lola would just snap at them, “What do you know? This is foreplay.” And then she’d turn to me, grinning, “Right, honey?” Even on her deathbed, she was still teasing me, telling me she’d find a strong, handsome man in her next life. I thought she was just trying to get a rise out of me one last time. I didn’t realize she actually meant it. I pulled myself out of the wreckage of my memories. Looking at Lola, I forced my voice to remain steady. “…As if anyone would want to date you anyway. Loudmouthed tomboy.” Then I turned on the rest of them. “And you guys? Half of you look like bloated pigs and the other half like starved monkeys. You’ve got a lot of nerve talking about anyone else’s body. Go look in a mirror before you open your mouths.” Without waiting for a response, I turned and walked out of the classroom. 2 If I stayed another second, the tears would have spilled over. In the bathroom, I splashed freezing water onto my face over and over again. The cold droplets rolled down my jaw, soaking into my collar, freezing against my collarbone. I stared at the eighteen-year-old reflection in the mirror. My eyes were bloodshot, raw. This wasn’t a dream. Lola and I had both come back. Only this time, she had decided I wasn’t worth choosing. When I walked back into the classroom, Zack was sitting in my seat next to Lola, looking entirely too comfortable. I stopped by the desk, my voice cold. “Move.” He bit his lip, casting a helpless look at Lola. “But… Lola told me to sit here.” Right on cue, Lola walked in, holding her insulated thermos. “I told him to sit there. He’s my boyfriend now, so of course he sits next to me.” She pointed toward Zack’s old desk near the back. “Go sit over there.” When the teacher had first assigned seats, she was the one who had begged to sit next to me. She’d said, “You’re too small, Dan. Someone’s gonna bully you. I’m here to protect you.” I didn’t say a word. I grabbed my backpack from my old desk, and under the stunned gazes of our classmates, I walked straight to the very back row. “What is he doing? Is Dan going to sit with Maeve?” “Even if he wants to, there’s no way Maeve is going to let him.” Lola’s brow furrowed, her eyes following me. I tapped on the wooden desk in the back corner. The girl buried in her arms slowly blinked her eyes open, looking up at me. Her gaze was detached, cold, carrying a faint trace of annoyance at being disturbed. “Can I sit here?” I asked. She stared at me for a beat, then closed her eyes again, turning her face away. I pulled out the chair and sat down. The whispers around the room didn’t stop until the bell finally rang, plunging us into a tense silence. I opened my textbook, but my mind was a chaotic mess. My eyes kept drifting toward Lola. She was resting her chin on her left hand, her gaze locked onto the side of Zack’s face. A soft, contented smile played on her lips. She used to look at me just like that during lectures. She’d say, “You know when you’re the most adorable, Dan? When you’re actually paying attention to the teacher.” After we got together, the look remained. “Dan, you’re so pretty. I just want to kiss you.” And after we got married: “Husband, I want to be with you in this life, the next life, and every life after that.” Suddenly, a packet of tissues appeared on my desk. I looked down, only to realize a dark, wet circle had bloomed on the page of my textbook. Maeve had already pulled her hand back, leaning lazily against her chair, looking straight ahead as if she hadn’t done a thing. Her voice was a low, dry murmur. “If anyone walks in, they’re going to think I bullied you.” Two lifetimes added up to nearly a century of living, yet here I was, crying like a baby in front of an eighteen-year-old girl. The grief was quickly swallowed by a wave of pure mortification. I wanted nothing more than to sink through the floorboards. When the final bell rang at the end of the day, Lola walked over, carrying Zack’s backpack over her shoulder. Her tone was casual, almost indifferent. “Go on home without me. I’m walking with Zack today.” She took two steps, then paused, looking back. “And don’t you dare tell my parents I’m dating someone.” She turned back to Zack, her face lighting up with an effortless smile. “Come on, I’ll take you to get those amazing churros down the street.” Lola loved those churros. In our past life, she dragged me there every single afternoon. But now, she had someone else to share them with. I had spent the entire afternoon drowning in misery, but as I watched them walk away, something clicked. I understood now. Even if she had loved me fiercely in another life, that was a past that no longer existed here. I needed to let go. I needed to move forward. 3 I turned to my aloof new deskmate. “Hey. Want to get some hot pot? I know this place that makes the most incredible, numbing broth.” Maeve gave me a look like I had sprouted a second head. She swung her backpack over her shoulder and slipped past me, throwing a chilly line over her shoulder. “Are we friends?” Brutally rejected, I walked out of the school gates alone. The silence was jarring. Since kindergarten, the walk home had always been a shared routine. In college, I walked her back to her dorm every single night. When we got married, I’d leave work early just to wait outside her office so we could commute together. How could someone who loved me that deeply suddenly flip a switch and become a stranger? The frustration flared up, hot and sharp. I kicked a loose pebble on the sidewalk, sending it flying. “Selfish jerk!” I muttered. The pebble soared through the air and struck the back of a head a few yards in front of me. The person stopped dead in their tracks and slowly turned around. My stomach dropped. Maeve’s eyes were like chips of ice as she stared at me. “Who are you calling a selfish jerk?” My brain scrambled for an escape route. I pointed quickly at a stray golden retriever lounging by the brick wall. “The dog. I was talking to the dog.” The retriever blinked at us innocently, giving its tail a lazy wag. Maeve’s lips curved into a cold, dangerous smile. “You talk to dogs with rocks?” “…It was a slip of the foot. I didn’t mean to.” She walked back, stopping right in front of me. Her voice dropped to a quiet, threatening register. “Dan. Were you throwing that at me?” I waved my hands frantically. “No, no! I swear! I was cursing out Lola. Really.” Maeve went quiet for a moment, her eyes searching mine with a strange, unreadable intensity. “Why were you cursing her out?” “Because she’s… a selfish jerk.” Maeve arched an eyebrow. “So. Lola dumps you, you call her a selfish jerk, and I get a rock to the head?” I choked on my words. From an outsider’s perspective, I had indeed been dumped. When I first realized I had traveled back in time, I wanted to scream with joy. I thought I was getting a whole second lifetime to love her. Who could have guessed she’d be off eating churros with her new muscle-bound boyfriend? I took a deep breath. “What do you mean she dumped me? We were never even together. Besides, a girl like her—someone who forgets her promises, who betrays our… our friendship—she’s not worth my time anyway.” A small, unexpected chuckle escaped Maeve’s lips. “Right. Well, you still owe me an apology.” I hung my head. “I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean to hit you. Do you need to go to the nurse?” “No.” She turned to walk away. On some bizarre impulse, I called out after her. “Let me buy you dinner to make up for it. That hot pot place really is amazing.” She stopped. She didn’t turn around, but her cool voice drifted back to me. “Lead the way.” After sweating through a bowl of ridiculously spicy hot pot, I dragged Maeve to a street cart for fried chicken and skewers. The heavy weight in my chest finally began to lift, dissolved by the simple comfort of grease and spices. When I finally walked into my apartment courtyard, the first thing I saw was Lola sitting on a concrete bench. Beside her was a grease-stained paper bag of cold churros. Seeing me, she stood up, her face instantly souring. “Dan, did you lose your way? Why did it take you so long to get home?” I rolled my eyes and walked right past her. As our shoulders brushed, I said casually, “I was out having dinner with Maeve. Lost track of time.” A hand gripped my backpack strap, jerking me to a halt. Lola’s voice exploded behind me, raw with anger. “What did you just say? You had dinner with Maeve?” She spun me around, her eyes wide with sheer disbelief. 4 “You don’t even know her! Why the hell are you having dinner with her?” I yanked my strap out of her grip, my voice flat. “None of your business.” “None of my business?” Lola let out a harsh, disbelieving laugh. “Dan, are you losing your mind?” “Since when is anything you do not my business? In preschool, you didn’t even know how to wipe your own butt, and I had to do it for you! In first grade, you lost a fight and cried, and I went back and punched the kid for you!” She rattled off a dozen childhood memories, her chest heaving. Watching her work herself into a frenzy, I felt a sudden, strange urge to laugh. “Who I eat dinner with is my choice. You and I are just neighbors, Lola. Lose the possessiveness.” “If you’ve got this much free time, go call your handsome boyfriend with the abs.” Lola ground her teeth. “Dan, you are unbelievable. You’re just doing this to get back at me. I only said yes to Zack because—” “I know,” I interrupted. “Because he has a six-pack.” I looked her straight in the eye. “And I went out with Maeve because she’s gorgeous. It’s nice to walk next to someone who actually looks good. Plus, she’s quiet. She doesn’t have a temper like a rabid dog.” Lola’s face went dark, practically purple with rage. I ignored her, turned around, and walked into my building. But the moment the heavy glass door clicked shut behind me, the tears broke. Large, hot drops spilled over my cheeks. It was so damn hard to let go. The next morning, the moment I walked into the classroom, I found a hot cup of sweetened soy milk and a breakfast sandwich sitting on my desk. It was my exact order—extra sweet, light on the ice. Zack was standing by the edge of my desk, offering a timid, polite smile. “Hey, Dan. Lola bought too much breakfast this morning, so she wanted you to have this.” Before I could even open my mouth, Lola’s voice drifted over from the desk behind him. “Zack, why are you wasting your breath? Just leave it there. If he wants to starve, let him.” She walked over, popped a straw into another cup of soy milk, and held it to Zack’s lips. Her eyes were warm, almost sickly sweet. “Drink this one. I added extra sugar. Sweet, just like you.” Zack blushed furiously as he took the cup, and a few classmates nearby started whistling. “Damn, Lola, since when did you become such a romantic?” “Seriously, I didn’t know you had it in you.” Lola smirked, her eyes casting a deliberate, sliding glance in my direction. “Depends on who I’m talking to.” I picked up the sandwich and the soy milk, walked over to the trash can, and dropped them inside with a heavy thud. Lola’s smug smile instantly froze on her face. At lunchtime, the moment I sat down at a cafeteria table with my tray, two people slid into the seats directly opposite me. Lola was clinging to Zack’s arm like a vine. She began picking the prime pieces of ribs from her tray and dropping them into his bowl, her voice practically dripping with artificial sweetness. “Eat up, babe. You need to keep those muscles fed.” Zack blushed, shaking his head. “It’s too much, Lola. I can’t finish all this.” Lola laughed, reaching out to ruffle his hair. “If you can’t finish, I’ll eat your leftovers. It’s not like we haven’t shared food before.” The surrounding tables went quiet, several heads turning our way. “Whoa, Lola, moving fast, aren’t we?” “Seriously, get a room, you two.” My grip on my fork tightened until my knuckles turned white. In our past life, Lola loved eating my leftovers. I was a notoriously picky eater, and she’d always lecture me about wasting food. She would complain the entire time, but she’d pull my plate over and polish off every single bite. I lowered my head, forcing spoonfuls of rice into my mouth, chewing desperately to swallow down the bitter lump in my throat. Lola suddenly looked up at me, her tone dripping with mock pity. “Dan, why are you eating all by yourself? Where’s your pretty new deskmate? Did she dump you already?” “None of your business,” I muttered, keeping my eyes on my tray. “Oof, still so touchy,” she mocked. She turned to Zack, her voice loud enough for the whole row to hear. “See? I told you he’s got a miserable temper. He doesn’t have a fraction of your sweetness.” As the words left her mouth, a tray slid onto the table right across from me. Maeve sat down, completely ignoring the tension in the air. She picked up her fork and began to eat her vegetables, chewing slowly and methodically. Her shoulders were broad enough that she completely blocked my view of Lola’s face. From behind her, I heard a sharp clatter of plastic. “I’m done. This place is giving me a headache,” Lola snapped. She grabbed her tray and marched off, Zack scrambling to catch up with her. The remaining students in the cafeteria stared. I finished my meal in silence, then looked up at Maeve. “Thanks.” She wiped her mouth with a napkin, her expression as blank as ever. “You owe me a meal.” “…Didn’t I just buy you hot pot yesterday?” “One meal replaces another. It’s a clean slate.” I stared at her, temporarily speechless. Who calculated debts like this? But looking at her, I realized she had just saved me from a massive amount of public embarrassment. “Fine. I’ll buy you dinner another day.” She stood up, throwing a final line over her shoulder. “Don’t flake on me.” That afternoon, I ran into Lola by the school gates. She was leaning against the concrete wall alone, holding a bottle of water. When she saw me, she straightened up. “Dan.” I didn’t stop walking. She caught up in three quick strides, stepping directly into my path. “What?” I asked, exasperated. She looked down at me, her throat bobbing as if she wanted to say a hundred things, but only one sentence came out. “Why aren’t you taking the bus today?” “I feel like walking. Good exercise.” “Then I’ll walk with you.” “No thanks. Go walk your boyfriend home.” She winced, looking away. “He had to leave early today. Family stuff.” I didn’t reply. I just kept walking. She fell into step beside me, unable to keep quiet for more than three seconds. “Since when did you and Maeve get so close? You’ve only been sitting together for two days, and suddenly you know she’s ‘quiet’ and ‘sweet’? And now you’re eating lunch together?” Her voice was taking on a frantic, high-pitched edge. “Dan, don’t tell me you actually like her? She’s not your type at all. She’s impossible to get along with. She walks around looking like the whole world owes her a million dollars…” I stopped so abruptly that she nearly crashed into my chest. “Lola. What is your point?”

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “479989”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

When I moved into my new apartment, I didn’t bother setting up Wi-Fi. It seemed like too much hassle, and my phone’s unlimited hotspot was more than enough for my daily needs. But then Janice Gentry from 603 decided to call me out in the building’s group chat. “The girl in 601—stop leaching off my Wi-Fi. Have some self-respect, will you?” I didn’t reply. She kept up the public rants for an entire month. Soon, the whole building was changing their passwords, avoiding my gaze in the hallway, and collectively freezing me out. I was too tired to explain myself. Until one evening, I casually reached down and switched off the dusty router sitting in my living room corner. Suddenly, the internet for the entire building collapsed. Janice was the first one to knock on my door. “Do… do you actually have internet in there?” I let out a soft laugh. “Who do you think was leaching off whom?” On the day I moved in, before I had even finished unpacking my first box, my phone buzzed. It was an invitation to the building’s group chat. … The landlord had casually added me to the “Emerald Ridge Building 6 Resident Chat” during our final walkthrough. Within two hours of joining, my phone had blown up with over ninety notifications. I scrolled all the way to the top. Every single message was from a user named “Janice Gentry – 603.” “Could the new tenant in 601 please do everyone a favor and stop piggybacking on other people’s Wi-Fi?” “My connection has been painfully slow the past couple of days. I checked my active devices, and there’s a new one logged on. This started the exact day 601 moved in. Where are your manners?” “@601 Resident—I’m talking to you. Are you seeing this?” I read the messages twice, making sure she was actually referring to me. 601. That was my apartment number. I had just arrived. My suitcases were piled in the center of the living room, my bedsheets weren’t even laid out, and I hadn’t even thought about setting up a broadband contract. I was running my laptop entirely off my phone’s personal hotspot. I didn’t reply. I was simply too exhausted to type. But the silence only invited others to chime in. “Are you serious? People still steal Wi-Fi these days?” “Janice, did you report this to the leasing office?” “That’s so cheap. Some people really have no shame.” Not a single person asked me if there had been a misunderstanding. No one suggested that maybe, just maybe, she had the wrong person. I tossed my phone onto the mattress and went back to taping open cardboard boxes. The next morning, as I stepped out to take the trash to the chute, I ran into a woman in her late forties standing outside 603. She had tight, permed curls, wore a silk bathrobe, and was holding a mug of coffee. She looked me up and down. “You the girl from 601?” I nodded. She put a hand on her hip. “Look, I know you saw my messages in the chat. Don’t play dumb. A grown woman leaching off her neighbors’ internet is pathetic. Aren’t you embarrassed?” I stood there, trash bag in hand, looking at her. “I’m not on your network.” “Oh, really? Then why did a new device suddenly show up the day you got here? It was working fine before, and now it drags. If it’s not you, who is it?” “I don’t even have broadband.” “No broadband? Then how are you getting online? Do you think I’m stupid?” I didn’t have the energy to argue with her. I turned and walked toward the elevator. She shouted after me, her voice echoing down the concrete hallway. “Running away? Guilty conscience!” When I got back inside, my eyes drifted to the far corner of my living room. There was a router sitting on a small ledge. It had been there when I moved in, left behind by the previous owner. I hadn’t touched it. The power cord was plugged in, and a thin layer of dust had gathered over the plastic casing. I hadn’t thought twice about it. I used my phone’s data. I had no use for a physical router. That night, the group chat exploded again. Janice posted a screenshot of her router’s connected devices list. “Look at this, neighbors. The device name is literally ‘iPhone-601.’ What’s your excuse now?” I tapped the image to zoom in. The device name on her screen wasn’t mine. My phone’s name was a default alphanumeric sequence that I had never bothered to change. But facts didn’t seem to matter to the group. “Caught red-handed.” “Janice, you should go straight to management.” “People like this shouldn’t be allowed to live in our building.” I backed out of the app and set my phone face down on the table. In the quiet of the dark living room, the green indicator light on the dusty router in the corner blinked slowly. I still didn’t pay it any attention. By the third day, the rumor had solidified into absolute truth. It wasn’t just Janice talking anymore; the story had spread to every floor. “The new girl in 601 is a Wi-Fi thief.” Whenever I ran into neighbors in the elevator, they would immediately look down at their screens, shifting away from me in silence. An older man who lived on the fifth floor—someone who had kindly held the lobby door open for me on moving day—now turned his back to me completely when we shared the elevator. I pressed the button for the lobby. He pressed the button for the garage. When the doors opened, he slipped out without a word. Then my packages started disappearing. I went down to the lobby’s smart locker to retrieve a delivery, but my pickup code came back as invalid. I called the courier, who sounded apologetic. “Someone from your building’s group chat told us there was an active tenant dispute regarding your unit. They instructed us to leave all your parcels at the leasing office.” I had to walk over to the front desk. The young woman behind the counter gave me a long, cold look before sliding my package across the desk. “We’ll be holding your deliveries here from now on,” she said. “The residents on your floor filed a notice.” “A notice about what?” “Just… that there’s some ongoing friction, and they’d prefer if delivery couriers didn’t linger on your floor.” I took my package and left. There was no point in arguing with her. On the fifth day, Janice pinned a new message in the chat. “Friendly reminder to everyone in Building 6: make sure to change your Wi-Fi passwords immediately. Make them as long and complex as possible. We have a chronic leech on our floor, and who knows whose network she’ll try to hack next.” The replies rolled in like clockwork. “Done and done.” “Changed mine to a sixteen-character code.” “Thanks for the heads-up, Janice. Can’t trust anyone these days.” The entire building—over thirty units—collectively changed their network security. All because of me. A person who didn’t even have an internet subscription. On the seventh day, the leasing office finally knocked on my door. A man and a woman in matching company polos stood in the hallway, clutching clipboards. “Hello, ma’am. We’ve received several formal complaints regarding unauthorized network access from your unit.” “I haven’t accessed anyone’s network.” “We understand your position, but given the volume of complaints, we have to file a formal report and conduct a routine check.” “Who filed the complaints?” The man flipped through his printouts. “Units 603, 605, 502, 503… eight units in total.” Eight units. I had been here for a single week, and eight of my neighbors had reported me. “Have you actually checked whether I have internet running in here?” The two employees exchanged a brief, awkward glance. “We don’t handle technical network diagnostics,” the woman said. “We’re just documenting the reports. If you feel there’s been a mistake, we suggest you speak directly with your neighbors to clear the air.” “Speak with them?” I looked at her. She didn’t meet my eyes. They left shortly after. I shut the door and stood in the middle of my quiet living room. In the corner, the green light on the old router kept blinking. I walked over, knelt down, and turned the device over to look at the sticker on the back. Model number, serial number, default SSID, and default password. The default Wi-Fi name printed on the label was: “EMERALD-B6”. Emerald Ridge, Building 6. I stood up, pulled out my phone, and opened my network settings. There it was. Full bars. “EMERALD-B6”. I stared at the name for ten seconds. The strongest signal in the entire building was coming directly from this dusty little box in my corner. The previous tenant had evidently set it up, plugged it in, and left it running. I had never connected to it. When I moved in, I had simply relied on my unlimited hotspot without ever opening my Wi-Fi menu. But the router had remained active. It had been broadcasting its open, default signal to the entire building. I opened my phone’s browser and typed in the default gateway IP address. I tried the factory-set username and password: admin and admin. The previous tenant hadn’t even bothered to change those. The admin dashboard loaded instantly. I clicked over to the “Connected Devices” tab. The list spanned three full screens. Twenty-three active connections. Phones, tablets, laptops, smart TVs, streaming sticks, smart speakers. I scrolled down. The names were incredibly specific. “Janice’s iPad,” “Janice’s Husb Phone,” “Living Room Smart TV,” “Marilyn’s Huawei – 605″… Some of them had literally put their full names and apartment numbers on their devices. Twenty-three devices, representing over a dozen households. The entire building was piggybacking on my router. I clicked over to the bandwidth usage statistics. The heaviest data consumer, by far, was a cluster of five devices belonging to Unit 603. Janice’s family. They had used 280 gigabytes of data over the past month alone. Second place was 502, with four devices and 190 gigabytes. Third was 605, with three devices and 160 gigabytes. I scrolled back through my WhatsApp history to Janice’s angry messages. When she had ranted about “a new device showing up on my Wi-Fi,” she had been looking at the admin panel of my router. She had been connected to my network for so long that she genuinely believed it was her own. She was publicly crucifying me for stealing her internet, while her entire household had been leaching off mine for weeks. No, probably for months—maybe even years, dating back to the previous tenant. I set my phone down. The apartment was perfectly still. Outside, the distant sound of someone walking their dog drifted through the window. I looked at the router. The little green light kept blinking. I left it plugged in. There was no rush. The next afternoon, I ran into Janice in the elevator again. She let out a sharp, theatrical sigh, keeping her eyes glued to her phone screen. “Changing the password didn’t even help. It’s still lagging,” she muttered to the woman from 605, loud enough for me to hear every word. “Some people are just relentless. You lock the door, and they still find a way to creep in.” The woman from 605 glanced at me nervously. She didn’t say anything, but she took a deliberate half-step closer to Janice. When the elevator reached the lobby, I stepped out first. Behind me, Janice’s voice drifted out. “See that? The guilty ones never have anything to say for themselves.” I walked out of the building. The afternoon sun was warm against my face. When I returned, I checked the router’s admin panel again. Twenty-three devices. Still active. They had changed the passwords on their own individual routers upstairs. But they had never changed the connection settings on their phones and tablets, which remained seamlessly logged into “EMERALD-B6” because no one actually knew where the signal was coming from. They probably assumed “EMERALD-B6” was some kind of complimentary community network provided by the property. Not a single person had stop to consider that the source was apartment 601. I took several screenshots of the dashboard. The device list, the data usage rankings, the connection uptimes. Then I locked my screen and laid the phone on the table. Still, I waited. In the group chat, Janice posted again: “@LeasingOffice is there an update on the 601 investigation? This needs to be handled. Don’t let her drag this out.” The leasing agent replied: “We are looking into the matter.” Someone else chimed in: “Exactly. We shouldn’t tolerate this kind of behavior.” I muted the chat. In the corner of my room, the green light kept flashing. Twenty-three devices, quietly drinking up my bandwidth. Janice didn’t stop there. By the second week, she changed her tactics. Trash started appearing outside my door. The first day, it was a plastic bag filled with greasy food containers, left right in the center of my welcome mat. I picked it up and threw it down the chute without saying a word. The second day, there were two bags. The third day, it was a leaking cardboard box with three words scrawled across the side in thick black Sharpie: HAVE SOME SHAME. I took a photo of the box, then disposed of it. On the fourth day, when I stepped out in the morning, I found a printed sheet of paper taped to the hallway wall next to the elevator. “ATTENTION RESIDENTS: The tenant in Unit 601 has been chronically stealing network bandwidth from neighbors. Despite multiple warnings, she refuses to stop. Please secure your personal information.” It was signed: The Tenants of the 6th Floor. There were only three apartments on the sixth floor. 601 was me, 603 was Janice, and 605 was Marilyn. “The Tenants of the 6th Floor” was just the two of them. I peeled the paper off the wall, crumpled it into a ball, and tossed it in the trash. When I came back that afternoon, a fresh copy was already taped in its place. The text was identical, but someone had added a handwritten note at the bottom: Cc’d to the Tenant Association and Management. I left it there. I let it hang. That night, Janice was back in the chat. “Just so everyone knows, I’ve officially filed a report with the neighborhood tenant association regarding the Wi-Fi thief in 601. We can’t let this slide. If she’s stealing internet today, who knows what she’ll steal tomorrow.” A neighbor replied: “Thanks for taking charge, Janice.” “Agreed. We need to look out for each other.” “My kid’s online classes have been freezing up lately. I bet she’s the reason why.” Out of thirty households, not a single person suggested taking a breath to look into the facts. Not one. By the third week, the tenant association actually sent someone. A woman in her mid-fifties named Martha arrived at my door, wearing a volunteer lanyard and a friendly but concerned expression. “Hi, dear. I’m Martha, the building’s neighborhood liaison. Some of your neighbors have raised concerns about your internet usage, and I wanted to see if we could chat about it.” “I’m not using anyone’s internet.” “Well, the reports we’ve received are quite specific. I just think it would be best if we could all find a way to get along and avoid any unnecessary tension.” “I don’t have a broadband contract,” I said plainly. “I use my phone’s cellular hotspot.” Martha peered past my shoulder into the apartment, her eyes scanning the living room. “Well, maybe just try talking to them? If there’s a misunderstanding, it’s always best to clear it up.” “I tried. Nobody cares to listen.” Martha gave a soft, helpless sigh. “Well, try not to hold a grudge. We all have to live in the same building, after all.” She turned and walked away. As I went to close the door, I heard the faint click of the lock next door at 603. Janice had been listening. I walked back into my living room and pulled up the router admin panel on my phone. The connected devices had jumped from twenty-three to twenty-five. Two new devices had joined. The new names on the list were “Martha’s iPhone” and “Association-Tablet.” During the ten minutes Martha had spent standing in my doorway, her phone and work tablet had automatically discovered and connected to my open, high-speed network. I couldn’t help but smile. I took a screenshot and saved it. My photo library now contained sixteen distinct screenshots. Device logs, data consumption tables, connection histories—all organized chronologically by date. I pulled up my contacts list and found the customer service number my landlord had left me. I dialed. “Hi, I’d like to verify the account details and billing status for my address, please. Could you email a formal statement to my account?” “Of course, ma’am. Please provide your address and the last four digits of the primary ID on file.” I gave her the details. When the call ended, I sat quietly on the sofa, staring at the router. The green light continued to blink. Twenty-five devices, resting peacefully on my connection. Almost time. By the fourth week, Janice did something that pushed things past the point of quiet tolerance. I went downstairs to grab a food delivery. A small group of residents was gathered near the entrance—Frank from 502, a young couple from 503, and Janice. The moment I stepped out of the elevator, their eyes locked onto me. Janice stepped forward, blocking the path to the delivery lockers, her arms crossed over her chest. “Perfect timing,” she said, turning to the others before looking back at me. “601, let’s settle this right now.” “Settle what?” “Are you going to look us in the eye and honestly claim you aren’t stealing our Wi-Fi?” Frank chimed in, his voice sounding more disappointed than angry. “Young lady, we all know what’s going on. If you’re going through a rough patch financially, just say so. There’s no need to sneak around.” The husband from 503 remained quiet, but his wife gave his sleeve a gentle tug, and they both took a small step backward. I looked at Janice. “I’ve told you multiple times. I am not on your network.” “Oh, please!” Janice scoffed, looking at the neighbors for approval. “Then how do you explain being online? You admit you don’t have a contract here. What are you doing on your laptop all day? Just staring at a blank screen?” “I use my phone’s cellular data.” “Cellular data?” Janice laughed. “In this building? With our reception? Who actually believes that?” Frank shook his head. “Data plans are expensive. No young person is relying on that for everything.” I didn’t answer. Janice took another step closer. “You can deny it all you want, but I’ve already spoken to management. They’re coming to inspect your unit’s connection. Let’s see what you have to say then.” “Let them check.” “Don’t act so smug.” “Just make sure you’re there when they finish,” I said. I walked past her, retrieved my meal from the locker, and turned back toward the elevator. Janice yelled after me, “Keep running! We all know you’re guilty!” I stepped into the elevator and let the doors slide shut. The warm steam of my dinner rose through the paper bag. My phone vibrated in my hand. An email had arrived. It was an official account confirmation from the internet service provider. The document listed the registered owner, the billing address—Apartment 601, Emerald Ridge Building 6—and the service details. Account Activation: Three years ago. Plan: Gigabit Business Fiber. Billing Status: Prepaid annually; account active and fully paid through next June. I didn’t know what the previous owner had done for a living, but he had installed a commercial-grade fiber line. When he moved out, he had simply left the prepaid service active. When I bought the apartment, the line had come with the property. The router was his, too. The default password had never been changed, and its powerful signal reached every corner of the building. I took a screenshot of the email, adding it to the folder on my computer that now contained twenty-seven images. Back in my apartment, I sat at my desk and organized the files. The first screenshot: Day two of moving in, showing twenty-three connected devices. The last screenshot: Today, showing twenty-five. In between were weeks of bandwidth logs, device names, and connection times. And finally, the official letter from the provider. I saved the folder to my desktop under the name “Records.” My phone buzzed again. It was the group chat. Janice had posted: “Confronted 601 today. Still denying everything. Some people are just pathological. Don’t expect her to ever do the right thing.” The responses followed immediately. “Forget it. You can’t reason with people like that.” “If management won’t do anything, we’ll just have to keep freezing her out.” “Unbelievable.” I set my phone screen-down on the desk. I walked over to the corner of the room, knelt down, and watched the small green light flicker in the shadow of the cabinet. Not tonight. Not tomorrow, either. I would wait until she had pushed every single neighbor onto her side, until she was absolutely certain of her victory. And then, I would turn it off. The next morning, the leasing office called. “Hello, ma’am. Regarding the ongoing network complaints from your neighbors, we need to schedule a brief in-unit inspection. When would be a convenient time for you?” “I’m free all day.” “Would three o’clock this afternoon work?” “Yes.” At precisely three, Toby and his colleague arrived. Toby was holding a small handheld network tester. “We just need to verify if there’s an active line running into your wall jacks,” he explained. “Go ahead.” I stepped aside, and they walked in. Toby knelt by the baseboard, plugged his tester into the ethernet port, and waited for the lights to blink. “We have a strong signal here,” he said, turning to look at his colleague before looking up at me. “Your unit does have an active broadband connection.” “I know.” “Oh?” The female colleague blinked, looking confused. “You knew? But you told us before that you hadn’t set up internet…” “I said I didn’t set it up. The previous owner did. It’s a prepaid yearly plan, active through next summer.” The two of them exchanged a silent, stunned look. Toby’s eyes drifted to the old router in the corner. “Is that router connected to the line?” “Yes. It was here when I moved in. I haven’t touched it.” “And it’s currently turned on?” “It’s been plugged in and running the entire time.” Toby walked over, kneeling down to look closer. “Is the Wi-Fi network named ‘EMERALD-B6’?” “See for yourself.” He pulled out his phone, opened his network list, and found the SSID with maximum signal strength. When he stood back up, the color had completely drained from his face. “This network… our leasing office computer has been running on this exact signal.” The woman leaned over to look at his screen, her expression instantly turning to one of sheer panic.

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “479974”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

After three years of marriage to Kelly, I’d become the poster boy for henpecked husbands in our social circle. She claimed she loved me down to my bones, which was her justification for curating everything—even my social media posts. She even subjected my meetings with female colleagues to an AI-driven risk assessment. The AI’s synthesized, robotic voice would regularly ping her phone with updates: “Subject displays blurred social boundaries. Recommend tighter oversight.” I was suffocating under the weight of this airtight, inescapable affection. Yet, I chose to believe it was just the intensity of her devotion. Until today. I was sitting in the passenger seat of her SUV, my phone inadvertently syncing with the car’s Bluetooth system. A young man’s laugh suddenly crackled through the premium speakers: “Hey Kelly, your husband is seriously well-trained. He’s more obedient than the AI.” “If he ever finds out you’re using an algorithm to track him, do you think he’ll still find it romantic?” Then came Kelly’s laugh, light and dismissive: “He’ll never know. He’s not as smart as the system.” I slowly lifted my head, watching the woman walking toward the car through the tinted window. She pulled the door open, her eyes meeting my quiet gaze. “Is everything okay?” she asked, her voice dripping with warmth. Right in front of her, I unlocked my phone, opened the tracking app, and tapped the voice input: “Evaluate the marital risk of a wife who stays out all night, subjects her husband to constant surveillance, and maintains flirtatious relationships with other men.” The screen flashed with a stark red warning box almost instantly: “Risk Level: Extreme.” “Recommendation: Divorce.” Kelly’s face drained of color in a heartbeat. I looked at her, offering a faint, tired smile. “Tell me… is it accurate this time?” 1 Kelly’s hand moved faster than her face could process. She snatched the phone from my grip. In less than three seconds, the app’s deletion progress bar was complete. “It was just a stupid joke by a clueless intern. Don’t overthink it,” she said, her tone instantly softening as she tossed the phone back onto my lap. “AI is a machine, Luke. It gets things wrong.” I stared at her. Her face had already settled back into its usual, gentle composure, as if the stark terror of a moment ago had been nothing but my imagination. “Who is he?” I asked. “Just a new intern. You know how kids that age are—no filter.” She started the ignition, resting one hand casually on the steering wheel. Her profile was elegant, sharp against the streetlights. “I’ve already had HR deal with him.” Her response was seamless. Flawless. I opened my mouth, wanting to press her about what using an algorithm to track me really meant. But she reached over, covering the back of my hand with hers, her thumb lightly tracing my skin. “Sweetheart, you’re my husband. What could I possibly keep from you?” The gesture was deeply familiar. Every time I pushed too close to a truth she wanted to hide, she used physical touch to derail my thoughts. Three years of marriage, and it had worked every single time. I remained silent. When we got home, there was a box waiting on the coffee table. Inside was a pair of cufflinks. Sapphire. Exquisite. “For the gala the day after tomorrow,” she said, standing by the walk-in closet and already coordinating my wardrobe. “Wear the royal blue suit—these will match beautifully.” I sat on the sofa, staring at the jewelry. In the past, whenever I was upset, she’d use gifts to turn the page. The first year it was roses. The second, designer ties. Now, in our third year, she had graduated to precious stones. The price tag was rising, almost as if she were trying to compensate for something she could no longer control. “I don’t feel well. I think I’ll skip the gala,” I said. She poked her head out of the closet, her brow furrowing slightly. “What’s wrong?” “My stomach. Just a dull ache.” She studied me for three long seconds. It wasn’t a look of concern; it was an interrogation. She was calculating whether I was just throwing a tantrum. “Get some rest then.” She didn’t push. She left alone, leaning down to press a kiss to my forehead before she walked out. Her lips were cold. Only when the front door clicked shut did I realize my fists had been clenched the entire time. I didn’t rest. Instead, I started sorting through my things. Not because I was packing to leave—not yet—but because I suddenly needed to know how much of this life actually belonged to me. My passport was locked in her study’s safe. My secondary debit cards synced directly to her phone, sending her alerts for every penny I spent. Even my messaging apps had been logged into her devices, duplicating my chat history onto her screen in real-time. I took inventory of my existence, item by item, feeling colder with every revelation. Finally, I walked into the closet to search for some old personal keepsakes I’d stored away. Sifting through a storage bin in the corner, my shoulder brushed against a decorative bronze sculpture on the shelf. It was a bronze stag. I remembered the day she brought it home, warning me: “This is incredibly fragile, Luke. Don’t touch it.” The stag tilted, and its heavy wooden base slid open a fraction of an inch. I reached out to steady it, and my fingertips brushed against a cold, coin-sized disc. A pinhole camera. The lens was positioned directly toward the center of the room—exactly where I stood to change every day. I pulled my hand back as if I’d been burned. I remained crouched there in the dark closet, a cold sweat breaking across my neck. She had told me her obsession was just a symptom of her love. Yet she had wired the space where I was most vulnerable. I didn’t touch the camera. I didn’t make a sound. I slid the base shut and carefully placed the stag back where it belonged. Then I opened my phone and placed an order online for a tiny, thumb-sized audio recorder. Overnight delivery. I needed to know just how much of my life was a curated stage play. 2 By the time the package arrived, Kelly was at her office. I crawled under the heavy mahogany desk in her study and taped the recorder to the underside. Then I got dressed and headed to work, pretending everything was normal. I worked as a project lead at a boutique architectural firm. On paper, I was the manager. In reality, Kelly called my boss every month to “check in” on my workload, dropping heavy-handed hints that I shouldn’t be traveling or taking on high-stress projects. My boss got the message. Slowly, quietly, the firm’s major accounts stopped coming my way. I was sidelined in my own career, yet I couldn’t even complain. Because whenever I tried, Kelly would look at me with soft eyes and say, “I’m just protecting your health, Luke.” I had barely settled at my desk today when HR paged me, letting me know an intern from another department was bringing over some files. I didn’t think much of it until the boy stopped in front of my desk. He was young, barely twenty-three, with a practiced, polished smile that felt like a luxury salesman’s pitch. But it was the scent that hit me first. It was the exact cologne Kelly had left on her vanity last night. “Hey there. I’m Dylan, from marketing. Here to hand off the Q3 files.” He extended the documents, deliberately lingering so his wrist rested in my line of sight. He was wearing a platinum watch. I had the exact same one. Kelly had spent two months on a waitlist to get it for me last Valentine’s Day. She’d told me it was one of only fifty in the world. “Nice watch,” I said, keeping my voice level. He glanced down at his wrist, a knowing smirk playing at the corners of his mouth. “Thanks. A really generous friend bought it for me. She’s got incredible taste—loves guys with a bit of energy.” He stared straight into my eyes, adding with a soft tilt of his head: “Honestly, it’s impressive how hard you work at your age. If I had a wealthy partner taking care of me, I’d just stay home and let myself be spoiled.” The silent current of hostility between us went unnoticed by the rest of the open-plan office. I didn’t stand, and I didn’t let my expression waver. I simply took the folder, opened it, and flipped through the pages. “Dylan, on this Q3 budget report, the distribution data is pulled from a defunct Q1 template. And your ROI formula is wrong.” I slid the folder back across the desk. “Did your supervisor actually review this before you brought it to me? Because these are amateur mistakes.” His smile faltered. “Well, I… I’m still new…” “Being new isn’t an excuse. A mistake is a mistake.” I pulled out my phone and tapped the memo app. “Take it back and fix it. I’ll CC your department head so we’re all on the same page.” Dylan’s face turned a deep, blotchy red. He snatched the papers and turned on his heel. As he walked away, he muttered under his breath, “Someone’s sensitive.” I ignored it. At three-thirty that afternoon, the office keycard scanner chimed. When Kelly walked in, a hush fell over the entire floor. Her face was a mask of cold fury as she marched directly to my desk. “Outside. Now.” Out in the hallway, she leaned against the wall, crossing her arms. “You threw a tantrum at a new hire today?” “I didn’t throw a tantrum. I corrected a flawed report.” “Dylan called his manager in tears, saying you deliberately humiliated him.” “His work was riddled with basic errors. Asking him to do his job isn’t humiliation.” She stared at me, her eyes flashing with that familiar, weary condescension. It was her “you’re being dramatic again” look. “Your emotions are all over the place lately,” she said quietly. “You need to cool down.” When we got home, she pulled out her phone and tapped the screen a few times, right in front of me. My phone buzzed in my pocket almost instantly with a notification: Smart Lock Passcode Updated. “Stay inside and get some rest. Don’t go out,” she said, her voice dropping back into its soothing, maternal register. “We’ll talk when you’ve calmed down.” She turned and walked out. I stood in the foyer, looking at the lock notification on my screen. She had locked me in with a gentle, “You need to cool down.” 3 She kept me locked inside for two days. The fridge was fully stocked, and the thermostat was set to a perfect seventy-two degrees. The fresh-cut flowers in the living room were immaculate, replaced by the housekeeper just before the lockdown. Everything was comfortable—a gilded cage, crafted down to the last detail. On the evening of the third day, the lock clicked. Kelly walked in, wearing a relaxed cashmere lounge set. “Feeling better?” she asked with the casual indulgence of a parent checking on a toddler who’d finished his tantrum. I sat on the couch, my old ginger cat, Rusty, curled up in my lap. “We have a dinner tonight with Gary and Mr. Henderson,” she said, setting a cup of chamomile tea beside me. “Wear the charcoal suit. You look incredibly handsome in it.” I knew exactly what the dinner was. It was a performance. She needed her trophy husband by her side to show our high-society friends that everything in our marriage was perfect. And if I refused, the door would lock again. I put on the suit. Dinner was at a private, members-only restaurant downtown. There were three other couples at our table. Mr. Henderson patted my shoulder, chuckling. “Kelly really dotes on you, Luke. I heard she won’t even let the firm send you on business trips because she misses you too much.” Kelly sat beside me, keeping my water glass filled, laughing off the wine offers on my behalf. Every movement was practiced, flawless. “He has a sensitive stomach, so please keep his courses light,” she told the server warmly. The other husbands looked at me with pure envy. None of them could see beneath the heavy linen tablecloth, where my hands were trembling. Because I had just caught a glimpse of her screen. She was actively texting Dylan. I set my fork down. “Are you alright?” she murmured, leaning in close. “Excuse me. I need to use the restroom.” In the privacy of the marble stall, I pressed my forehead against the cool tile and closed my eyes. Then I pulled out my phone and dialed my old college mentor, Professor Kingsley. He had reached out last winter about an open regional director role in Chicago—a fresh start away from Kelly’s shadow. The call connected. “Professor, is that Chicago position still open?” “Luke? Yes, absolutely! Have you finally changed your mind? With your talent, you should have made this jump years ago. I’ll set up the interview for next week.” I hung up, taking a long, shuddering breath. When I returned to the table, Kelly suspected nothing. She was deep in conversation with Henderson about a new country club development. I sat there quietly and ate the rest of my meal. The next morning, a text from Professor Kingsley arrived: Luke, I’m sorry, but we have to cancel the interview. Your wife called the firm and politely declined on your behalf. She said your health isn’t up for a relocation. I stared at the screen, my fingertips turning numb. A second later, another notification came through from my bank: Your account ending in 3367 has been converted to a joint-authorization account. Any transaction exceeding $500 requires secondary approval. A text from Kelly popped up right beneath it: Sweetheart, have you been feeling stressed lately? Don’t exhaust yourself trying to change things. If you need anything, just ask me, okay? The tone was as tender as always—a velvet glove, slowly closing around my windpipe. Every exit route was blocked. I opened my contacts list and scrolled from top to bottom. Gary’s wife—Kelly’s golf partner. Mark—introduced by Kelly’s business partner. Every name was someone Kelly had vetted, curated, or handed to me over the last three years. In three years, she had systematically erased everyone from my life who wasn’t loyal to her. Rusty padded out of the bedroom, slowly brushing his warm flank against my ankle. He was old and frail now, with a tiny notch missing from the tip of his tail—a battle scar from a stray dog years ago. He was the last physical connection I had to my mother after she passed. I leaned down and scooped him up, burying my face in his soft, warm fur. “Hey, Rusty,” I whispered. “You’re the only one she couldn’t control.” He nudged my chin with his wet nose, letting out a soft, rattling purr. 4 2:17 AM. A strange sound woke me. It wasn’t Rusty’s usual lazy meow. It was a frantic, choking gasp—a desperate struggle for air that sounded like he was being strangled. I bolted upright in bed. He was collapsed on the hardwood floor beside his bed, his limbs stiffening. His mouth was wide open, his tongue tinged a terrifying shade of blue. His chest heaved violently, but no air was getting through. “Rusty!” I scrambled across the floor and pulled him into my arms. His small body was shaking uncontrollably. He was eleven years old, and his heart had been failing. The vet had warned me during his checkup last month that if he had another episode, every second counted. I had to get him to the 24-hour clinic immediately. The emergency clinic was only a ten-minute drive away. I cradled him against my chest and sprinted toward the front door. I threw my weight against the handle. It didn’t budge. I tried again, rattling it frantically. The lock’s digital screen glowed with a sterile, blue light: Security Mode Active. Administrator Authorization Required to Unlock. The administrator was Kelly. And she wasn’t home. I pulled out my phone, my hands shaking so hard I could barely type. I called her. First call. Six rings, then voicemail. Second call. Straight to voicemail. Third call. “The subscriber you are trying to reach is unavailable.” “Kelly!” I screamed at the dead line. “Unlock the door! Please, just unlock the door!” The automated voice coolly offered to record a message. I called the building’s security desk. “I’m sorry, sir,” the night guard said, his voice laced with practiced neutrality. “That’s a high-end private security system. We don’t have override codes for individual units. Only the primary account holder can unlock it remotely.” “I can’t reach her! My cat is dying! Can you please come up and break the door down?” “Sir, those are reinforced commercial steel doors. We don’t have the equipment to breach them without a locksmith, and that takes hours.” The phone slipped from my fingers. In my arms, Rusty’s tremors were beginning to slow. I sank onto the freezing tile of the foyer, holding him close. The stone chilled me right through my clothes. His eyes were glazed, half-open, his pupils dilated to the edge. He kept gasping, his mouth opening and closing like a fish stranded on dry sand. “Hang on, buddy. Please, just hang on a little longer…” I cupped my hand over his tiny chest, trying to press my warmth into his failing body. I could feel his heartbeat. Fainter. Slower. Like an old grandfather clock winding down its final, agonizing seconds. I tried everything. I threw myself against the door, but the reinforced steel didn’t even vibrate. I ran to the windows, but the double-paned ballistic glass was indestructible. She had insisted on it during the remodel, boasting about our safety. I pressed my forehead against the cold floor, cradling him. In the dark, a memory flashed through my mind with sickening clarity: Kelly, smiling, tracing the line of my jaw: “Everything in this house is the best money can buy, Luke. I built this to keep you safe.” Safe? She had built a prison. And now, her prison was suffocating the last piece of family I had left. Rusty let out one final, razor-thin whimper, a tiny sound that felt like he was calling my name. Then, his body went entirely limp. The frantic rising and falling of his chest stopped. I sat there in the dark, cradling that small, cooling bundle of fur. His eyes remained half-open. I gently closed them with my fingertips. I lost track of time. The darkness slowly dissolved into gray, then the pale, sterile white of morning. At exactly 6:00 AM, the lock gave a sharp, cheerful beep. The screen flashed: Security Mode Deactivated. Timer-Release: 06:00. A pre-set timer. Six in the morning. That was when my punishment was scheduled to end. Because I had been too cold to her during the day, she had pulled the lever. And the door opened at six because those were her rules. She was the architect. She calculated my tolerance down to the minute, assuming my obedience would remain intact. She just hadn’t factored the life of a cat into her equations. The latch clicked open. The warm hallway light spilled across the entryway. I looked down at Rusty. His body was stiff. I forced myself to stand, my legs entirely numb. I held him close and walked out of her apartment. 5 Kelly came home at 9:00 AM, carrying breakfast. Two oat milk lattes, a sourdough breakfast sandwich, and a small bundle of dried lavender she’d picked up from the bakery. “Sweetheart? You awake?” Silence met her. The living room was pristine. A throw blanket was folded neatly on the sofa; the coffee table was bare. The quiet was heavy, unnatural. She set the bags down and walked toward the bedroom. The bed was made. The closet lights were off. The bathroom door swung open to an empty room. She walked back to the kitchen and stopped at the dining table. Laying flat on the dark wood were my wedding band and a set of divorce papers. Every signature line was filled out. My handwriting was steady, showing no trace of hesitation. Beside them lay a small leather strap—Rusty’s collar. It was red, the leather worn at the edges, its tiny brass bell silent. Kelly stared at the three items for a long time. Then, she let out a dry, breathy laugh. “Another dramatic exit,” she muttered. She pulled out her phone to track my location. The signal was gone. She opened the home security app. Every camera feed was black. She checked the device manager. My phone, my watch, my tablet—all offline. She strode into the master bathroom and froze. At the bottom of the deep porcelain tub, submerged under inches of cold water, lay the phone she bought me, the platinum watch, my earbuds, and the sleek smart-tracker band she had insisted I wear. Her smile vanished. She began to dial. First, my number. The number you have dialed is no longer in service. Second, my closest friend, Zach. He answered on the second ring, his voice ice-cold. “What do you want, Kelly?” “Is Luke with you?” “Do you have any idea that Rusty is dead?” There was a sharp silence on the other end of the line. “…What?”

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “479990”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

Coming home after a grueling three-month business trip, the first thing I noticed was that my front door lock had been changed. I knocked twice. A middle-aged woman, her face twisted in a scowl, yanked the door open. She was wearing my silk pajamas. “What the hell is your problem?” she snapped. “If you wake up my grandson, you’re paying for it.” Through the crack in the door, I caught a glimpse of my custom-designed, sprawling living room. The European oak floors were covered in sunflower seed shells and unwashed laundry. In the center of it all, a feral-looking boy of about five was violently scribbling with a black Sharpie all over a handbag that cost more than a luxury sedan. My blood ran cold. “This is my home,” I said, my voice eerily calm. “Who are you?” The woman froze for a split second. Then, she dramatically hurled the greasy bowl she was holding onto the hardwood floor and began to scream at the top of her lungs. “Help! Help! Somebody grab the homewrecker!” Her shrill voice echoed down the corridor, instantly drawing out the neighbors. The master bedroom door swung open. A strange, shirtless man sauntered out, scratching his stomach. He took one look at me and smirked. “Wow, you actually had the nerve to show up?” he drawled. “I told you a hundred times, I paid cash for this penthouse. It’s for my mother.” He pointed a finger at me. “You can throw a tantrum all you want, but you aren’t getting a single square foot of my property. Now get the hell out of here.” I stood there, looking at this mother-son duo, their faces dripping with unwarranted righteous indignation. I listened to the murmurs and insults of the neighbors gathering in the hall. I didn’t scream. I didn’t cry. I took a slow step back, pulled out my phone, and dialed. “911? I need to report a home invasion.” I kept my eyes locked on the shirtless man. “Yes. Intruders have barricaded themselves inside my property. They are actively destroying high-value assets. The estimated damages are exceeding three million dollars. Send officers immediately.” … 1 I had been running on fumes for ninety days straight. When my red-eye flight finally landed, I bypassed the office and headed straight for my downtown high-rise. This place—a three-thousand-square-foot penthouse with half a million dollars in custom finishes—was my sanctuary. I had sacrificed five years of my twenties to the corporate meat grinder for it. I had drained my savings, working nights, weekends, and holidays, just to hold the deed to this sky-high fortress. During the last three months on the road, through endless hotel rooms and board meetings, the only thing that kept me from breaking was the thought of coming home. I just wanted to sleep in my own bed. Standing in front of my door, dragging my carry-on, I was looking down at my phone, firing off one last email. Pure muscle memory guided my thumb to the smart lock. But the texture was wrong. Instead of the sleek, cool glass of the biometric scanner, my thumb hit a chunky, rubbery button. I whipped my head up. The brushed steel door of my apartment had been violently retrofitted with the ugliest, cheapest keypad deadbolt you could find at a hardware store. My heart did a painful stutter-step. I’m on the wrong floor, I thought wildly. I took a step back and looked at the brass plaque. 1801. This was my home. I knocked twice, hard. When no one answered, I pulled out my phone to call the building’s concierge. But before it could ring, the door creaked open. A wave of nauseating air hit me—a suffocating mix of stale grease, sour milk, and unwashed bodies. I literally choked on the smell, stumbling back a step. Standing in the doorway was a heavy-set woman in her mid-fifties. She was shoveling some sort of greasy, microwaved chili into her mouth from a chipped ceramic bowl. But it wasn’t the smell or the bowl that made my vision blur with rage. It was what she was wearing. She was wrapped in a La Perla silk robe—a ridiculously expensive housewarming gift I had bought for myself. The tags were still hanging off the collar. She rolled her eyes, chewing open-mouthed as she looked me up and down. “What’s the banging for?” she demanded. “It’s barely morning. You wake my grandson up, you think you can afford to deal with me?” I stared at the robe. I stared at the mutilated doorframe. A high-pitched ringing started in my ears. “Who are you?” I demanded, my voice trembling with an anger so deep it terrified me. “Why are you in my apartment? Who authorized you to change my locks?” “Your apartment?” The woman laughed, a wet, ugly sound. She slammed her spoon into her bowl. “You’re a pretty young thing, but you’re a terrible liar,” she sneered. “This is my son’s condo. Back off and get lost. You smell like the airport, it’s making me sick.” My grip tightened around the handle of my luggage. I leaned to the side, looking past her shoulder into the apartment. It took one second for my heart to shatter. My living room. My beautiful, minimalist, meticulously curated living room. The imported Venetian plaster walls were smeared with something dark and sticky. The custom micro-cement floors were buried under a carpet of crushed chips, dirt, and sticky puddles. Several trash bags, leaking God-knows-what, were piled in the corner, staining the baseboards. Right in the middle of the room, they had dragged in a folding table. It was covered in rotting takeout containers. Flies were buzzing lazily in the air. But the killing blow was in the corner. A large cardboard box—a shipment of my own designer clothes and vintage bags I had sent ahead of my return—had been ripped open. A grubby little boy, maybe five or six, was squatting on the floor. In his hand was a thick black permanent marker. He was aggressively scribbling circles all over a vintage, limited-edition Chanel flap bag. The quilted white leather was already obliterated by a massive, ugly black stain. “Stop!” I didn’t think. I shoved past the heavy woman, sprinting the two steps into the room, and snatched the marker out of the kid’s hand. The boy gasped, staring at his empty hand for a second. Then, he threw himself backward onto the ruined floor, kicking his legs and wailing like a siren. “Gramma! The bad lady hit me! She stole my toy! Kill her!” The woman in the doorway went rigid. She hurled her bowl onto the floor, splattering greasy red chili everywhere, and lunged at me. She shoved me hard in the chest, scooping the screaming child into her arms. “You lay hands on a baby?!” she shrieked, pointing a thick, trembling finger in my face. “You shameless little tramp, I’ll tear your hair out!” She backed toward the open door, pivoting to face the hallway, and let out a blood-curdling scream. “Help! Help! Homewrecker! Come look, everybody! The little tramp is here beating on kids!” It was just past nine in the morning. Luxury buildings have great soundproofing, but nothing stops a banshee wail with an open door. Within two minutes, the hallway was populated. The couple from 1802, the guy from 1803, and even a few older women who had been waiting for the elevator crowded around. “What on earth is going on?” “Jesus, these girls today have no shame.” “Dressed so nice, but acting like a common thug. Hitting a child? Disgusting.” The whispers swelled into a chorus of judgment. My whole body was shaking. The adrenaline was a toxic rush in my veins. I pointed to the ruined Chanel bag on the floor, then at the squalor around me. “Are you out of your minds?!” I yelled, my voice cracking. “Look around! This is my property! My name is on the deed!” I turned to the neighbors. “This woman broke in! She is trespassing, and she is letting a child destroy hundreds of thousands of dollars of my personal property!” At the mention of the deed, a flicker of panic crossed the older woman’s face. But she quickly masked it, emboldened by the gossiping crowd. “Don’t listen to a word this psycho says!” she cried out. “My son, Wayne, paid cash for this place! It’s his!” She clutched her chest dramatically. “He bought it for me to retire in! This… this whore has been stalking my son, demanding he put her name on the deed! He said no, so she broke in here today to rob us!” “Lord have mercy,” one of the neighbors muttered. “Hey, keep it down out here!” The heavy door to the master bedroom clicked open.

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “479975”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

I am an ER attending physician. I had just finished a brutal night shift and stepped out through the hospital’s revolving glass doors when my phone vibrated in my pocket. It was a call from the nurses’ station. “Dr. Lawson, you need to come back right now. We just got a massive trauma case, and the Chief of Surgery wants you scrubbed in immediately!” Autopilot took over. I spun around, my exhausted body ready to march right back into the fray. But suddenly, the air in front of me shimmered. Glowing, ticker-tape letters materialized out of thin air, scrolling violently across my field of vision. DO NOT go into that OR! Do not touch this patient! The patient is already brain-dead. They are dragging you in to take the fall for the Director’s daughter! This family has ruthless connections. If you go in there, your career is over, you’ll end up behind bars, and the fallout will drive your parents to suicide! My boots froze on the pavement. For a few agonizing seconds, the cold morning air whipped around me. I felt a deep, primal chill settle in my bones. I decided to trust the glowing words. I decided to gamble my life on them. My eyes darted frantically across the concrete, locking onto a section of the sidewalk cordoned off by flimsy orange netting—an open, exposed utility shaft leading straight down into the city’s underbelly. I gritted my teeth. I squeezed my eyes shut. And I threw my body forward, plunging directly into the abyss. … I have been an emergency room doctor for nearly a decade. In my world, a patient’s life has always superseded my own comfort, my own sleep, my own sanity. So, when the urgent call came from the department, hesitation wasn’t even in my vocabulary. I immediately turned on my heel, heading back toward the glaring neon sign of the Emergency entrance. I was barely fifty feet from the doors when the impossible happened. Sentences began floating in the air, glowing with an unnatural, jarring luminescence. I stopped dead in my tracks. I shook my head, pressing my palms into my eye sockets, utterly convinced that the ninety-hour workweek had finally triggered a psychotic break. But when I opened my eyes, the words were still there, hovering relentlessly above me. It’s a trap. The second you step foot in that OR, they’re calling the time of death. They are literally waiting for you to walk in so they can make you the scapegoat. The whole surgical team is in on it. They are protecting Ruth, the Director’s daughter. They’re going to say your surgical error killed him. Watch your back! My jaw slacked. Ruth. We had been roommates for four years of undergrad. She was supposed to be my best friend. Why would she set me up to take the fall for a fatal malpractice suit? A chaotic swarm of questions buzzed in my skull, paralyzing me. I didn’t know what to do, what to believe. Just then, the chatter of a few nurses walking past caught my attention. “Did you see the wreck on the news? A blacked-out G-Wagon went straight off the overpass into the river.” “Yeah, they just rushed the driver into Trauma 1. Word is, he’s a heavy hitter. Major old money.” Before I could process that, my phone buzzed in my hand. Two rapid-fire texts. From Ruth. Rebecca, where are you? Hurry up! Prep is done. We are literally just waiting for you to scrub in. Run. I’m waiting at the OR doors for you. Staring at those three frantic bubbles of text, the blood in my veins turned to ice water. Could the universe really spin a coincidence this perfectly? A patient with terrifyingly powerful connections. Ruth, practically begging me to take the lead on a surgery she was already assigned to. When I forced my panicked mind to quiet down, the logic crumbled. The ER was fully staffed. There were plenty of brilliant, well-rested trauma surgeons on the floor. There was absolutely zero protocol that required a doctor who had just clocked out of a gruelling night shift to be dragged back to run a code. Looking at it through that lens, the glowing warnings in the air felt sickeningly real. The moment I slipped my arms into those sterile blue scrubs, I would become the sacrificial lamb. The patient’s death would be pinned entirely on my hands. With an entire team of coworkers bought off to testify against me, I wouldn’t stand a chance in any court. I couldn’t let my mind go down that dark rabbit hole. The more I thought about it, the more the hair on the back of my neck stood up. I didn’t reply to Ruth. Nearly ten minutes had passed since the initial phone call. In the span of a single breath, I made a choice. If the floating words were right, if I was walking into an execution… I was going to beat them at their own game. If I never made it into the building, no one could pin a damn thing on me. My eyes scanned the perimeter of the hospital plaza, immediately locking onto an ongoing plumbing excavation near the ambulance bay. The heavy steel cover of a deep utility shaft had been removed. I forced my legs into a hurried, purposeful jog, making it look like I was sprinting toward the ER doors. As I approached the lip of the hole, I clenched my jaw so hard my teeth ached. I squeezed my eyes shut. And I stepped off the edge, letting gravity rip me downward. The sensation of weightlessness was terrifying and instantaneous. My muscles coiled on instinct. A second later, I slammed into the unforgiving concrete at the bottom of the shaft. The sickening crack echoed off the damp walls. The impact sent a shockwave of agony straight through my internal organs. Thankfully, the shaft was dry, but the bare concrete offered zero mercy. A blinding, searing pain exploded from my right leg and the back of my skull, radiating through every nerve in my body. My body convulsed. Cold sweat instantly soaked through my shirt. I knew, with the clinical certainty of an ER doctor, that my leg was shattered. This old utility access had been under maintenance all week. The heavy iron grate had been moved, and the only thing guarding the drop was a pathetic ring of yellow caution tape. In my “rush” to save a life, I hadn’t seen it. I had simply lost my footing. It was the perfect, undeniable accident. A few feet away, my phone had tumbled out of my pocket and was ringing incessantly. The cheerful marimba tone was deafening in the pitch-black, suffocating silence of the hole. But I didn’t move a muscle. I let it ring. Let it stop. Let it ring again. I kept my eyes squeezed shut in the dark. An unconscious woman cannot answer a phone. All I had to do was lie here and wait for the world to find me. And for my alibi, the longer that took, the better. Fifteen minutes later. A city maintenance worker arrived to replace the grate. He spotted my leather tote bag discarded near the edge. I heard his sharp intake of breath before his shadow fell over the opening. A heavy beam from a flashlight sliced through the dark, illuminating my crumpled, unmoving body. “Holy shit! We got a woman down in the hole! Call 911!” I heard him screaming into his radio. I maintained my act, letting my limbs stay limp, my eyes shut tight. I let the chaos erupt above me. Heavy boots pounded on the pavement. Shouts echoed down the concrete pipe. A crowd was gathering. I could even hear the faint, rapid clicks of smartphone cameras. Sirens wailed in the distance, growing louder until the fire department and paramedics swarmed the plaza. A rescue tripod was set up in record time. A firefighter rappelled down, gently securing my battered body into a harness, and I was slowly winched up into the morning light. When I broke the surface, the crowd gasped. My face was a mask of dark, slick blood. I let out a weak, barely audible groan. Wasting no time, the paramedics loaded me onto a stretcher and sprinted the fifty yards straight into the Emergency Department doors I had been trying to avoid. As I lay there, waiting for the trauma bay to clear, the glowing text in my mind fed me the rest of the missing puzzle pieces. Ruth and I were med school peers. We shared late-night study sessions, cheap coffee, and tears. We were as close as sisters. We both landed residencies at this prestigious, top-tier hospital. But the paths we took diverged sharply. I earned my spot through grueling hours and flawless board scores. Ruth got hers because her father was Dr. Richard Lockwood, the Hospital Director. She had spent years living in my shadow, and over time, that insecurity had fermented into something toxic. She needed to prove she was better. Today, she had been the one running the trauma bay when the G-Wagon driver was brought in. But her skills were rusty, her ego too big. She had panicked, pushing the wrong protocol, resulting in catastrophic brain death. Her first instinct wasn’t to save the patient. It was to throw me to the wolves. It was a brilliant, sick two-for-one deal: she avoids federal prison, and she permanently removes the woman she resented. Reading the truth in my mind, a profound, icy numbness spread through my chest. For four years, I had loved her like family. I had celebrated her wins and carried her through her losses. I had no idea I was sleeping across the room from a monster. But thank God. I had won the bet. Let’s see her pin a dead man on a doctor lying at the bottom of a hole. The doctor assigned to patch me up was Dean, a colleague I had worked alongside for years. When he pulled back the curtain and saw my bloody face, his hands froze mid-air. His pupils dilated in sheer panic. “Dr. Lawson?” Dean blurted out, his voice cracking. “What… what are you doing in here? Shouldn’t you be up in OR 3 right now?!” Before I could answer, the responding police officer who had followed my stretcher in stepped forward. “You know her? She took a nasty spill down a twelve-foot utility shaft out front. Fire department just pulled her out.” Dean stared at me, visibly trembling. He opened his mouth, closed it, and swallowed hard. He knew. But with a uniformed officer standing three feet away, he didn’t dare say a word. He simply picked up his suturing kit with shaking hands and began cleaning my forehead. The process was agonizing. It took three deep stitches to close the gash on my hairline. My right leg was definitively fractured, requiring a heavy, suffocating fiberglass cast. They wheeled me into the CT scanner. Thankfully, it was just a mild concussion. Once I was settled back in an observation room, looking a little more lucid, two police officers walked in with their notepads to take a standard accident report. “Dr. Lawson, could you walk us through exactly how you ended up in the shaft?” I leaned back against the thin pillows, furrowing my brow like I was struggling to piece it together. “I just got off my shift. I was walking to my car when the department called, demanding I sprint back to the OR for an emergency trauma.” “I was running. I was sleep-deprived. I completely missed the warnings and just… stepped into thin air.” The officers nodded sympathetically, jotting everything down. A moment later, a security guard from the hospital’s control room hurried in, handing a tablet to the officers. It was the exterior security footage, requested to confirm there was no foul play in my fall. The video was crystal clear. It matched my story down to the exact second. The officers murmured to each other, satisfied it was a tragic, straightforward accident. That was my cue. I let out a sudden, panicked gasp. “Oh my god! The surgery!” I yelled, perfectly mimicking the adrenaline-fueled panic of a dedicated doctor. “They’re waiting for me! How long have I been down?!” Ignoring the throbbing agony in my leg, I shoved the blankets off and threw my weight forward, desperately trying to get out of bed. “Get me a wheelchair! Please, I have to get to the OR!” The officers rushed forward to gently push me back. “Doc, you need to calm down. You have a severe concussion and a broken tibia. You can’t operate.” I played the role of the frantic, bleeding-heart physician flawlessly. I grabbed the bedrails, hauling myself into a nearby wheelchair. “No! You don’t understand, I need to know what happened to the patient!” They couldn’t stop me. But by the time Dean wheeled me up to the surgical floor, the hallway was a morgue. The red light above the OR doors was dark. A crowd of elegantly dressed, sobbing people—the patient’s family—were huddled together, their grief heavy and volatile. Standing in front of them, still in her blood-spattered surgical gown, was Ruth. She kept her eyes cast downward, playing the role of the devastated surgeon with Oscar-worthy precision. “I am so, so sorry. We did everything we could. But the injuries were too severe. Time of death was 9:42.” The family shattered. A woman, presumably the wife, let out a visceral, gut-wrenching scream that echoed down the sterile corridor. Then, Ruth shifted her weight. Her tone grew quiet, laced with a calculated, tragic hesitation. “To be completely honest with you… his vitals were stabilizing. He had a real chance. But the attending surgeon, Dr. Rebecca Lawson… she made a series of catastrophic errors during the primary closure. That’s what triggered the hemorrhage.” It was a lit match thrown into a powder keg. The grief in the hallway instantly mutated into violent, unhinged rage. “Where is she?!” “She killed him! I want her head!” The family members became a mob, demanding blood. I sat quietly in my wheelchair at the end of the hall, watching Ruth weave her masterful web of lies. In the chaos, a man from the family turned, his eyes locking onto the laminated badge pinned to my ruined scrubs. He read the bold letters aloud, his voice dripping with venom. “Attending ER Physician. Rebecca Lawson.” The entire hallway snapped their heads toward me. The widow, who had been crumpled on the linoleum, shot up like a predator. Her eyes were bloodshot, feral. She lunged down the hall, slamming into me. “You!” she shrieked, her perfectly manicured nails digging deep into the flesh of my collarbone. “You murdered my husband!” Her violent shaking jostled the wheelchair. White-hot pain exploded in my freshly casted leg. The rest of the family swarmed, a tidal wave of pushing, screaming, and spitting. “You’re a butcher!” “How do you sleep at night?!” “I’ll see you rot in a cell for this!” Confined to the chair, with a shattered bone and a concussion, I was utterly defenseless. All I could do was grip the armrests, swallowing the physical pain and the bitter injustice. “It wasn’t me!” I cried out, my voice cracking, playing the victim perfectly. “I wasn’t in that room! I never touched him!” But logic doesn’t exist in the face of raw grief. My words were drowned out by the roar of the crowd. Standing safely behind the mob, Ruth watched me get torn apart. A tiny, wicked smirk played at the corners of her mouth. “Rebecca, please. Have some decency,” Ruth called out, raising her voice just enough to be heard over the weeping. “You made a fatal mistake. You ran out, and now you’re faking an injury to get sympathy? You are a disgrace to this hospital!” Her words were the final nail. The crowd completely lost its mind. A young man—maybe the victim’s brother—let out a primal roar. “Faking it?! Let’s see how fake this is!” He drew his leg back and delivered a vicious, full-force kick to the side of my wheelchair. The chair tipped. I went flying, crashing hard onto the polished floor. Before I could even process the fall, the man raised his heavy dress shoe and brought it down with crushing force directly onto my broken, plaster-wrapped shin. “AGH!” A scream ripped from my throat that I didn’t know I was capable of making. It felt like a hot iron rod was being driven through my marrow. I curled into a fetal position, my body seizing with uncontrollable tremors. Hearing the commotion, the two police officers sprinted out of the elevators, shoving their way through the violent crowd to shield my body. “Back off! Step back right now!” the older cop roared, hand resting on his utility belt. The widow grabbed the officer’s uniform shirt, her face streaked with mascara. “Officer, arrest her! She’s a murderer! She killed my husband, and we have the surgeon right there who witnessed it!” The chorus of voices rose again, demanding I be hauled out in handcuffs. Everyone in that hallway was utterly convinced I was a monster. Except Ruth. For the first time, her smirk faltered. She looked at the police officers, then at the blood on my face, a flicker of genuine confusion crossing her features. She hadn’t known I was in the ER downstairs. The lead officer looked at the furious widow, then glanced down at my broken body. His eyes were dead serious as he looked back at the crowd. “Let me get this straight. You are alleging that Dr. Lawson was inside that operating room, performing a surgery, and made an error that killed this man?” “Yes! Exactly!” the family screamed back. The officer let out a dark, incredulous laugh. “Well, that is quite the trick.” He reached into his pocket, pulled out the security tablet, and held it high above his head for the entire hallway to see. “I suggest you all take a very close look at this.” When the screen lit up, Ruth’s eyes widened. All the color instantly drained from her face, leaving her looking like a corpse. The roaring crowd fell into a stunned, absolute silence.

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “479991”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

On the eve of our wedding, I accidentally connected to Natalie’s Bluetooth earbud. I was about to disconnect when I heard her voice—but she wasn’t talking to anyone in the room. She was speaking to her future self, ten years down the line. “Do not marry Lester Davis!” the voice warned, a frantic, desperate whisper in my ear. “He’ll find out the marriage certificate is fake. It won’t just destroy you—it’ll kill your first child with Jared, and he’ll throw acid in Jared’s face!” My mind went entirely blank, a sudden, deafening static roaring in my head. The Jared she was talking about was Jared Parker. My best friend. My brother. Just minutes ago, Jared had slapped Natalie across the face in a fit of rage because she had forgotten to adjust my tie before the rehearsal dinner. To the outside world, they were water and oil. They couldn’t stand being in the same room. Trembling, I looked out toward the balcony where Natalie was standing, her silhouette framed by the city lights. She murmured into her phone, her voice chillingly casual: “Don’t worry. This time, I’ll be careful. I won’t let Lester lose his mind, and I won’t let Jared suffer a single second of pain. I’ll protect them both.” … When Natalie walked back inside, the faint pink outline of Jared’s handprint was still fading from her cheek. My limbs felt leaden, cold. The echoes of her future self’s hatred and venom still vibrated through my head, making it hard to draw a full breath. “Does it hurt?” I asked. She touched her slightly reddened cheek, offering a tight, dismissive smile. “You worried about me? Then when are you finally going to cut ties with that lunatic?” Her voice carried the same sharp disgust she’d always shown toward Jared. Just minutes prior, Jared had lost his temper when he noticed she had neglected to fix my tie. He had struck her, claiming he couldn’t stand her treating me like an afterthought. For a fleeting second, I tried to convince myself I was having a breakdown. Maybe the voices were a hallucination. Ever since Natalie and I got together, Jared had treated her like poison. He claimed a wealthy heiress like her could never be faithful, that she was just playing with my feelings. Natalie, in turn, accused him of trying to poison our relationship, sparking bitter arguments whenever they crossed paths. I had spent the last two years caught in the crossfire, playing the desperate peacemaker. But then, the voice of the future Natalie crackled through the earbud again. You need to tread carefully! You and Jared were reckless in the restroom just now. If I hadn’t warned you to swap your dress, Lester would have already figured it out! My gaze dropped. I realized Natalie was wearing a different dress than the one she’d arrived in. And Jared had slipped away right after her. A violent, sour wave of nausea hit my stomach. A cold sweat broke out across my back. “Lester? What’s wrong? Your hands are freezing.” I shook my head, my throat too tight to release a single word. Natalie quickly draped her cashmere coat over my shoulders. She gestured to the kitchen staff to bring out a bowl of slow-simmered beef broth, my favorite comfort soup. Her eyes drifted to my ear. “How do the new earbuds feel? I had the research team design them specifically around your preferences.” The memory of the voice in my ear made my chest tighten. Before I could form a response, Jared materialized from the hallway. He reached out, snatched the earbud from my desk, and threw it to the floor. “What kind of garbage is this? Giving Lester a half-baked prototype?” Jared sneered. “Natalie, if you actually cared about him, you wouldn’t try to pacify him with trash.” That was when I noticed Jared had changed his shirt. And just above his collar, partially hidden, was a fresh, dark mark on his neck. I knelt, picked up the earbud, and slipped it back into my ear. My voice was flat. “Stay out of my business, Jared.” Jared’s face stiffened. “Lester, are you mad at me? It’s literally a test model. She’s insulting you.” I didn’t answer. I just kept the earbud pressed to my ear. And the voice returned. Jared is too soft-hearted. I had the team make his custom set first, but he refused to take them, insisting I give the prototype to Lester to keep up appearances. I already can’t give him my name; I couldn’t bear to let him suffer even in these little things. What is Lester’s problem? Jared was looking out for him, and he gives him attitude? Does he suspect something? A flash of panic crossed Natalie’s eyes. She masked it quickly, turning on Jared with cold anger. “Whatever I choose to give Lester is between us. It has nothing to do with you.” Jared’s face paled. He stared at me, waiting for me to take his side as I always did. When I remained silent, his expression hardened into bitter resentment. “Fine!” Jared snapped. “Lester, when she eventually dumps you on the street, don’t come crying to me!” He turned on his heel to leave. “Look out!” someone screamed from across the dining room, pointing upward. Above us, the massive crystal chandelier groaned, snapping from its mountings like a falling star. In my peripheral vision, Natalie, who was standing closest to me, didn’t hesitate. She threw her body over Jared, pinning him to the floor to shield him from the impact. I was thrown backward. The heavy iron and glass structure shattered over my legs and torso. Thousands of sharp, burning shards sliced into my skin. Blood pooled around me, warm and thick. My vision began to blur. Through the haze, I saw Jared push Natalie aside. He scrambled toward me on his knees. “Lester!” He dug through the piles of broken glass with his bare hands, his desperate, agonizing cries echoing through the high ceilings. When I woke, everything was sterile and white. Jared sat by my bedside, his eyes bloodshot, every one of his fingers wrapped in thick gauze. “Lester? Can you hear me? God, you scared me to death.” The relief and terror on his face looked exactly as they had for the fifteen years we’d known each other. But beneath it lay a tiny, flickering shadow of guilt. A dull, throbbing ache pulsed through my limbs. I stared at him. “Do you really hate Natalie that much?” He frowned, his answer immediate and fierce. “Of course I do! You have to believe me, Lester. She’s a snake. She’s unfaithful. Do you know what she—” “Jared! That is enough!” Natalie kicked the door open, her sharp voice cutting him off. “How I treat Lester is none of your business. Stop trying to poison his mind!” I looked at her, then silently touched my ear, turning on the earbud. Immediately, the future Natalie’s voice slithered back into my mind. Thank god you got here in time! Jared is so incredibly stupid. He thought confessing the truth would save Lester from getting hurt, without realizing that Lester is a ruthless sociopath who doesn’t care about old times! In the future timeline, once I discovered their betrayal, I had lost my mind. I had pushed Jared down a flight of stairs and, in a fit of rage, poured sulfuric acid over his face. Natalie had been the one to send me to prison. And now, she was stopping him from confessing—not to save my feelings, but to protect him from the monster she believed I would become. I slowly withdrew my hand from Jared’s grip. The last traces of my energy seemed to drain into the thin hospital mattress. “Natalie,” I said softly. “I’m going to ask you one last time. Are we still getting married?” Natalie looked puzzled, leaning down to stroke my palm. “What kind of silly question is that? If I don’t marry you, who else would I marry?” But her eyes darted to Jared. There was a lingering, heavy look between them—a silent dialogue they thought I was too blind to read. What is Lester playing at? the future voice wondered. The five-million-dollar mock city hall set is finished today. The actors are trained. Does he want to call it off? Or is he just throwing a tantrum because you shielded Jared at the restaurant instead of him? Natalie’s expression shifted slightly. She knelt by the bed, her face a mask of frantic concern. “Lester, about the restaurant… it was pure instinct. I know how much Jared means to you. I knew that if anything happened to him, you would never forgive yourself. I didn’t think… I just reacted.” She squeezed my hand. “I promise, from now on, I will always protect you first.” A bitter laugh threatened to choke me. What a beautiful, twisted lie. To swear love with her mouth while her body instinctively chose someone else. My mind drifted back to a year ago. My parents had died in a head-on collision. Within the same week, my firm brought in a well-connected executive to take the promotion I had spent five years working for, and I was let go. Overnight, I felt entirely erased from the world. I locked myself in my dark apartment, refusing to see anyone. It was Jared who finally kicked the door off its hinges, staying by my side day and night to keep me breathing. And when my grief turned self-destructive and I reached for a blade, it was Natalie who grabbed my hand, letting the steel slice her own arm instead. “Don’t be afraid, Lester,” she had whispered, her blood dripping onto my floor. “No matter what happens, I will always hold onto you.” And Jared had sworn, “If anyone ever tries to hurt you again, I’ll be the first to make them pay.” Yet here they were, holding the knives. My chest burned with a mixture of grief and fury. Suddenly, Natalie went pale. She gasped, clamping a hand over her mouth, and rushed into the en-suite bathroom. Jared rose instinctively to follow her, then caught himself, darting a guilty glance at me. But the panic in his eyes was impossible to hide. Then, the voice in my ear spoke again. Jared already knows you’re pregnant. He knows Lester is infertile, which is why he convinced you not to use protection. He wanted you to give the baby to Lester so he’d finally have a family. Jared does everything for him, suffers so much, and Lester doesn’t even have the grace to be grateful! The words felt like physical blows. I recalled how Natalie had gained a little weight recently, how her stomach had begun to curve gently. She had laughed it off, claiming she was just stress-eating before the wedding. And I had believed her. Natalie emerged from the bathroom, her face paper-white. Before she could speak, Jared stepped in to cover for her. “Her stomach has been acting up lately,” he said quickly. “Must have been some bad takeout…” “Jared,” I interrupted, my voice quiet. “Do you remember why I can’t have children?” Jared’s face twitched, the color draining from his skin. The ghost of six years ago rose between us like a wall of ice. In our freshman year of college, Jared and I had been cornered in an alley by three thugs. When we fought back, one of them pulled a switchblade, aiming straight for Jared’s chest. I didn’t hesitate. I threw myself over him and took the blade in my lower abdomen. The internal damage was severe. The doctors told me I would never be able to father a child. I had never regretted that sacrifice—until this exact moment. Jared averted his eyes, his voice choked. “I haven’t forgotten, Lester.” Seeing him falter, Natalie rushed over, wrapping her arms around me to steer the conversation away. “Silly,” she murmured. “We don’t need kids. A life with just the two of us is perfect. And if we ever want a family, we can always adopt.” But the future Natalie was already sneering in my ear. Is Lester serious? So what if he can’t reproduce? It’s not like he lost his life! Does he have to throw his injury in Jared’s face every time he wants to guilt-trip him? Jared has spent years punishing himself out of remorse. What more does Lester want from him?! The resentment in my ear and the tender display in front of me fused into a sickening reality. I looked at Natalie’s forearm, where the faint silver line of the scar she’d taken for me still sat. That scar had been the key that unlocked my heart. And now, she used those same hands to touch Jared in the dark. A violent shudder ran through my fingers. Dirty. They were so incredibly dirty. I pushed her away, pulling my knees to my chest. “I’m tired. I want to sleep.” Natalie nodded softly, adjusting my pillows. “I’ll come back tonight to check on you.” Jared stood frozen for a second before silently following her out the door. The moment the door clicked shut, I called a friend in private security. Ten minutes later, a PDF arrived on my phone. Natalie Ward. Seven weeks pregnant. I traced the dates back. It aligned perfectly with the anniversary of my parents’ death. While I was kneeling in the rain at their graves, they were tangled in each other’s sheets. A heavy, suffocating wave of grief threatened to drown me. But I took a deep breath and forced it down. I wouldn’t become the lunatic the future voice warned about. They weren’t worth my sanity. I saved the files, backed up the screenshots, and waited. That evening, Natalie returned with a bag of takeout. “I got us wontons from Joe’s on 4th Street,” she said, setting the bowl in front of me. But as she leaned over, the faint, warm scent of Jared’s woody cologne clung to her sweater. I forced myself to take a bite of a wonton. The moment the flavor hit my tongue, my throat closed. I spat it into a napkin, coughing violently. Natalie panicked, rubbing my back. “What’s wrong? Eat slower!” “Natalie,” I choked out, wiping my mouth. “These are chive wontons. Not shrimp.” Her face went completely rigid. I had a severe, life-threatening allergy to chives. She had known this since our very first date. For two years, she had double-checked every menu, terrified of a mistake. “The restaurant must have messed up the order,” she stammered, her eyes darting around. “I’m so sorry, Lester. I’ll have someone go back and get a new batch.” Her face looked remorseful. But the earbud told a different story. Chive is Jared’s favorite. You mixed up the bags. Since leaving the hospital, Jared has been a wreck. He won’t eat anything. You need to get those wontons to him before his ulcer flares up. He can’t starve. Before I could say a word, Natalie stood up, grabbing her keys. “Actually, Lester, I’ll go myself. I don’t trust the delivery guys to get it right.” She swept out of the room before I could even reply. The steam from the leftover bowl rose slowly into the cold hospital air. I reached up, wiped a single tear from my cheek, and let my lips curl into a cold smile. Natalie. Jared. Since you both decided to discard your humanity, don’t look for mercy from me. On the morning of our scheduled wedding registration, I stepped out of the luxury town car. Jared walked beside me, his hands deep in his pockets, his face pale and drawn. He kept glancing at me, his mouth opening and closing like he was suffocating. “Lester… are you absolutely sure about this? Marriage is… it’s a massive commitment. Maybe you should take some time.” I brushed his hand off my shoulder, my voice ice-cold. “I’ve never been surer. Besides, today is a milestone. I invited some old friends to witness it.” Natalie, walking ahead of us, didn’t suspect a thing. The “county courthouse” she had driven us to was bustling with people—couples holding hands, families smiling, even a few bitter-looking couples in the divorce wing. If I hadn’t already known the truth, I would have believed it. But this entire building was a hollow stage, populated by actors she had paid to play their parts. Just as we were about to walk up to the registry window, Jared muttered that he felt sick and headed toward the restrooms. The moment he left, Natalie’s phone vibrated. The screen read Secretary Parker. She had hired a new personal assistant named Parker last year. When I had asked about it, she claimed she did it to keep her work life separate from us. Now, I knew the truth. Natalie slipped away to answer the call. I pressed the earbud into my ear and tapped the record button on my phone, capturing the feed. “Natalie, we have to stop this,” Jared’s voice pleaded, raw and trembling. “If Lester ever finds out this is all a lie, it will kill him.” “We can’t stop, Jared,” Natalie’s voice was firm, completely devoid of her usual sweetness. “We’re already legally married. This time, I’m giving you and our child the life you deserve. As for Lester… we just have to make sure he never finds out.” Hearing the confirmation of their legal marriage tore a physical ache through my chest. The betrayal settled into my bones, hardening into a quiet, relentless rage. Natalie hung up and walked back to me, a radiant smile on her face. “Lester, they’re ready for us.” I let her take my hand and lead me to the counter. In my ear, the future Natalie was still screaming. Listen to me! Lester is a psychopath! He will destroy Jared’s life if you let this go on! Natalie reached up, gently smoothing the lapel of my suit. “You look so handsome today, Lester. I promise to make you the happiest man alive.” Ahead of us, the clerk signaled for us to step closer. You can have Lester! the future voice wailed. But I need Jared. I want him safe. He lost everything because of Lester. You cannot let him discover the truth! Natalie took her seat at the counter, her fingers tightening around mine. The clerk reviewed our papers and looked up. “Confirming for the record: you are both entering this marriage voluntarily, of your own free will, with no legal impediments?” “Yes,” Natalie said softly. “Perfect. I will now apply the official seal. Your marriage is legally binding.” The heavy metal embosser came down with a sharp clack, leaving a raised seal on the paper. Natalie grabbed the document, throwing her arms around my neck. “Lester! We’re finally husband and wife!” Once, I had dreamed of this exact moment. Now, I peeled her arms off my neck. I took the red leather-bound certificate from her hands. I turned toward the entrance, where three of my former college classmates were walking in: two plainclothes detectives and a senior investigative reporter. “I believe we have all the physical evidence we need now,” I said clearly, my voice echoing through the silent room. “Natalie Ward is already legally married. I am filing charges for bigamy.”

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “479976”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

I filed for divorce the exact moment I discovered my wife had redirected the only rescue pod capable of saving our daughter from the deep ocean—all to save her childhood sweetheart’s son, who had merely swallowed a mouthful of water at a shallow beach. After the papers were signed, I threw myself into deep-sea salvage like a man possessed. I spent a decade learning the dark currents of this ocean until I knew them better than my own living room, eventually becoming the only specialist capable of executing a rescue at a depth of a thousand meters. And then, the file of that same boy who had choked on water landed right back on my desk. I stared at it, a cold smile tugging at my lips, before sliding the folder back to my partner. “Not this time. I’m not diving.” 1 “Are you out of your mind, Davis?” Sally snatched the folder off the desk and slammed it open in front of me again. “Ten million dollars. Do you know how many life-threatening risks we have to take to make that kind of money? If you’re passing on this, you need to give me a real reason.” I pulled my heavy work gloves back on, ignoring her as I began my daily maintenance on the dive gear. “I’m not diving. That’s the reason.” “Then look at this.” Sally flipped the pages to the back of the file. “The structural integrity of his submersible is failing rapidly. The cabin is deforming, and he has less than twenty-four hours of oxygen left. There is a living, breathing twenty-three-year-old kid trapped in there!” My hand froze on the pressure valve. My daughter, Daisy, was twenty-three when she died down there. “Davis, you’re the only diver in this entire sector who can execute a docking rescue at that depth,” Sally said, leaning in and lowering her voice. “If you don’t go, he’s dead. It’s that simple.” I tightened the valve with a sharp twist, then turned to face her. “Sally, you’ve worked with me for seven years. Have I ever turned down a rescue because of a personal whim?” She hesitated, caught off guard. “No. Never.” “Then leave it.” “But I don’t understand,” she pressed, her frustration bubbling over as she grabbed my arm. “Whether you know him or not, they are paying in cold, hard cash—” “I wouldn’t dive for a hundred million.” I gently but firmly pulled my arm from her grip. My voice remained flat, entirely devoid of emotion. “Don’t ask me why. In seven years, I can count the number of jobs I’ve rejected on one hand. Just trust me on this one.” Sally’s face flushed red, a dozen arguments clearly fighting for passage behind her teeth. She had been with me since the beginning, back when I first got my deep-sea certification and was operating out of a rented tin shack on the docks. She had seen me get three ribs shattered by a rogue current at four hundred meters. She had seen me drag a breathless teenager back onto the deck and spend the rest of the night dry-heaving over the stern of the boat. But she had never seen me like this. “Fine,” Sally said finally, snapping the folder shut and tossing it onto the table. “I trust you.” She turned toward the door but paused, her voice sounding muffled. “But that kid is still a living human being. If you change your mind… we’re ready to go.” The heavy metal door clicked shut behind her. Left alone in the equipment room, I stared at the folder on the table. On the cover, the photo of Meredith Croft, the head of Meredith Marine, looked slightly older than she had ten years ago, but those sharp, uncompromising eyes hadn’t changed at all. A decade ago, my daughter was slowly suffocating, one agonizing breath at a time, at eleven hundred meters. And Meredith had diverted the only available rescue vessel because Sean had panicked over the phone, screaming that their son, Noah, had fallen into the water. Noah had been in the shallows. He had lost his footing and swallowed a mouthful of saltwater. I closed my eyes, pushing the file to the far corner of the desk. My phone buzzed in my pocket. It was a text from Sally: The client is on the line. She’s demanding to speak directly with the head of operations. Do you want me to patch her through? I stared at the screen for a long moment before typing back two words: Patch her. 2 “Hello? Am I speaking to the head of deep-dive operations?” The voice on the other end was sharp, carrying the same effortless arrogance I remembered from a lifetime ago. Ten years hadn’t softened it. “Speaking. Go ahead.” My own voice was barely recognizable. A decade of breathing pressurized helium-oxygen mixes in freezing depths had permanently ravaged my vocal cords, leaving me with a harsh, gravelly rasp. “Good. This is Meredith Croft from Meredith Marine. I assume you’ve reviewed the file.” She paused, expecting a deferential response, but when I remained silent, she continued, “Name your price.” “I’m not taking the job.” There was a brief silence on the line. Then, she let out a dry, humorless laugh. “I don’t think you heard me. I said name your price. Whatever it is, I’ll pay it.” “And I said, I’m not taking it.” “Fifty million.” Her voice didn’t waver. To her, it was just a number. “Fifty million in cash. Half when you submerge, the other half when you bring him up. There isn’t another salvage crew on earth getting an offer like this.” I kept my mouth shut. Taking my silence for hesitation, she pushed harder. “If you want equity, we can discuss that too. Half a percent of Meredith Marine’s non-voting shares, registered under your name. The annual dividends alone would—” “Ms. Croft,” I interrupted, my voice cutting through her pitch. “My refusal has nothing to do with money.” I could hear her breathing turn heavy and erratic. “Then tell me why.” “There is no why. I have the right to refuse a contract.” “Your right?” Her voice suddenly turned ice-cold. “Do you have any idea what the situation is down there? The cabin is deforming at over a thousand meters. That is a human life!” “I am aware.” “You’re aware? And you’re still sitting there saying no?” Her words began to spill out faster, thick with panic and rage. “You are the only person in this sector who can reach him in time. You didn’t even hesitate to reject the call… this is criminal negligence. You’re leaving him to die!” I gripped the phone so tightly my knuckles turned white. “Leaving him to die…” I murmured. “Coming from you, Ms. Croft, that’s a fascinating choice of words.” “What is that supposed to mean?” “Nothing,” I said, regaining my composure. “The point is, I cannot help you. You’ll have to find someone else.” “There is no one else!” she nearly screamed. “I’ve already run the logistics. Your base has the only rig ready to deploy on this coast! If you won’t save him, you owe me a reason!” “Then I suppose you’re out of luck.” “You—” She took a sharp, ragged breath, clearly trying to master her temper. “Listen to me very carefully,” she whispered, her voice low and venomous. “I don’t care about your reasons, and I don’t care about your attitude. I am giving you exactly two hours to reconsider. If your answer is still no by then… I will personally ensure that you and your little salvage yard are blacklisted from every harbor in the country.” I closed my eyes. “Ms. Croft, I suggest you save your breath. If you don’t start looking for other options right now, you won’t even have a body to bring home. Good luck.” I hung up. Sally poked her head into the room, her eyes wide as she tried to read my expression. “Davis… that woman… did she threaten you?” I slipped the phone back into my pocket and bent down to inspect the oxygen lines. “She can’t touch me.” “But she—” Sally hesitated. “She said she’d shut us down.” “She can say whatever she wants. I don’t owe her a damn thing.” Sally didn’t push any further, but as she turned to leave, her expression was incredibly strained. “Davis… what did that family do to you?” I tightened the final connection and wiped the grease from my hands. “She owes me a life.” 3 Around three in the morning, Sally practically broke down my dorm room door. “Davis, we have a problem.” I sat up instantly. She was pale, her hands shaking so violently she could barely hold her phone. “It’s my son…” she choked out. “Toby’s company… they just transferred him out of accounting. They put him on the night-shift inspection crew for the deep-water drilling rig.” A heavy weight settled in my chest. “When?” “Just now. He texted me. He got a sudden notice from HR telling him to board a helicopter tonight. Davis, he doesn’t know anything about offshore work! He has a degree in finance! He doesn’t even have a basic marine safety certification!” “Did you try calling him?” “Yes, but the signal is blocked out there.” Sally’s eyes filled with tears. “His last text said he just landed on the platform and told me not to worry. Then the phone went dead.” I took her phone. The message had been sent thirty minutes ago, accompanied by a blurry photo of a dark, steel deck overlooking a pitch-black ocean. Just landed, Mom. The wind is crazy out here, but I’ll call you tomorrow. Goodnight. “Davis!” Sally dropped to her knees, burying her face in her hands. “It’s her. I know it’s that Croft woman. She’s doing this to get to me!” “Don’t panic, Sally.” “How can I not panic?” she sobbed, clawing at her hair. “You know what the inspection crew does on those rigs. They walk the outer cat walks in the middle of the night. If a rogue wave hits…” “She won’t actually let anything happen to him,” I said, trying to steady her. “She wants you to beg me.” Sally froze. Slowly, she looked up, her forehead resting against the cold concrete floor. “Davis…” “Get up, Sally.” “Davis, I know she must have done something unforgivable to you. I shouldn’t ask this of you, I shouldn’t… but Toby is only twenty-two. He’s terrified of the water. He won’t even go near the docks if he can help it…” She wept, her shoulders heaving. “Please. For the seven years I’ve stood by you… scream at me, fire me, do whatever you want… but please save my son.” I knelt beside her and placed a hand on her shoulder. “Sally, look at me.” She raised her tear-streaked face. “I promise you, Toby is going to be fine.” “But are you…” “I have other ways of handling her,” I said, pulling her up from the floor. “I will get your son off that rig. But I am still not taking her contract.” Sally stared at me, bewildered and unable to speak. Suddenly, a deafening roar shook the walls of the compound. The rhythmic, heavy thudding of helicopter rotors grew louder, vibrating through the floorboards. A sleek, black helicopter bearing the silver crest of Meredith Marine was descending onto our gravel landing pad. Before the rotors had even fully spun down, the cabin door slid open. Meredith stepped out, dressed in a sharp, dark business suit, flanked by two burly security guards. Behind her came a man I recognized instantly. Ten years, and Sean hadn’t changed at all. Still the same soft-edged, fragile man who looked like he had never spent a day in the sun. “It’s them,” I murmured, turning to Sally. Sally’s fear was rapidly turning into blind rage. She clutched her fists, her whole body trembling. “Davis, they brought security…” “It doesn’t matter,” I said, grabbing my heavy canvas jacket from the rack. “Let’s go.” Meredith stood in the center of the pad, her assistant hovering closely at her side. She cast a dismissive glance over our meager base—the rusted shipping containers, the oil-slicked docks, the frayed mooring lines. Her lip curled in effortless disgust. Then, her eyes landed on me. Her gaze lingered for barely a fraction of a second before moving past me. She didn’t recognize me. I suppose I couldn’t blame her. The man standing before her now bore no resemblance to the husband who used to hold her hand every morning ten years ago. “Who’s in charge here?” Meredith asked, her patience already exhausted. Sally instinctively looked at me, and I took two steps forward, putting myself between them. “I am.” She finally looked at me properly, her brows drawing together. “You?” “Me.” She let out a cold, sharp laugh and whispered something to the guard beside her. Then, she turned her attention to Sally. “So, you must be Sally. I trust your son is enjoying his new assignment on my drilling rig?” 4 Sally lunged forward, but I caught her by the shoulder, holding her back. “Stay put.” Meredith watched Sally struggle against my grip, her smile widening into something cruel. “I told you that you had two hours to think about it. Since you didn’t call, I decided to come collect your answer in person.” Sean stepped forward from behind her, his face a mask of performative anguish. “I know you must think we’re being monsters,” he said, his voice trembling. “But that is my son down there. Noah is only twenty-three, and he’s been trapped in that dark cabin for fourteen hours…” His eyes welled with tears as he reached out to clasp Meredith’s hand. She gently patted his arm, her gaze hardening as she locked eyes with me. “Fifty million. I’ll wire it right now. Put on your gear and get in the water.” “I told you on the phone, Ms. Croft. I am not taking the job.” “Are you trying to negotiate with me?” She tilted her head, a dangerous glint in her eyes. “Fine. What’s your number? A hundred million? Two hundred? I know your type. You’re just holding out for a bigger payday because you think you have me cornered. Name your price, and I’ll pay it.” “It has nothing to do with money.” “Then what is it?” She took a step closer, trying to use her stature to intimidate me. “If it’s not about the money, then what? Do you have some personal vendetta against me? Have we ever even met?” I looked deep into her eyes. Once, those eyes had looked at me with tenderness. Now, they held nothing but cold, impatient transaction. “No,” I said quietly. “We’ve never met.” “Then there is no reason for this ridiculous holdout.” She waved her hand dismissively, issuing her final ultimatum. “I don’t care who you are, and I don’t care about your pride. My son is suffocating at the bottom of the ocean, and you are the only one who can get him out. You have two choices: take the money and dive, or…” She glanced sideways at Sally. “Toby is just an intern out there. He doesn’t have his safety certifications. If there’s an accident on the catwalk tonight, it won’t even qualify for a worker’s comp claim.” Sally’s face went entirely bloodless. “What are you saying?” “I’m not saying anything,” Meredith replied smoothly. “I’m simply pointing out that accidents happen on oil rigs all the time. Especially to inexperienced greenhorns who don’t know how to watch their footing.” “You… you’re threatening my son’s life!” Sally screamed. Meredith didn’t bother to deny it. She just kept her eyes on me. “And as for you—if my son dies down there, you had better pray you never have an ‘accident’ of your own out on the water. I will make sure this ocean becomes a very dangerous place for you.” Sean stepped forward, his eyes pleading. “Please, sir. I know this is terrible, but you’re a human being. Surely you can understand a father’s heart? My Noah is down there in the dark… he must be so cold, so terrified…” He reached out to touch my shoulder. I took a sharp step back. “Don’t touch me.” Sean’s hand froze in midair, a flash of irritation crossing his face before he quickly masked it with sorrow. “I didn’t mean to offend you… I’m just desperate…” Meredith pulled him back to her side, her eyes cutting into me like knives. “This is your last warning. What is your answer?” “No.” She laughed again, a harsh, mocking sound. “Fine.” She pulled her phone from her pocket and dialed a number. “Get me the supervisor on Rig 4… Tell him to put the new intern on the outer platform patrol tonight. Yes, alone. Have him walk the lower deck.” Sally lost all control. She broke away from me and threw herself toward Meredith. “No! You can’t do this!” One of the security guards stepped in, shoving Sally back with enough force to send her crashing into a metal container. “Davis!” Sally cried, scrambling up from the gravel and dropping to her knees in front of me, her face smeared with tears and dirt. “Davis… please… I beg you…” Meredith hung up her phone and looked down at us. “See? It could have been so simple. You brought this on yourselves.” I looked down at the blood trickling from a scrape on Sally’s temple, watching her whole body shake as she wept on the ground. Then, I looked up at Meredith. She still had that same self-righteous, untouchable expression. It was the same look she wore ten years ago, and the same look she wore now. To her, other people’s lives were nothing more than bargaining chips. “Do you honestly think I’m afraid of you?” I asked. “Fear doesn’t matter to me,” she shrugged. “If you don’t go down, your partner’s son becomes a tragic statistic by tomorrow morning, and your little base will suffer a devastating accident shortly after. Is your pride really worth all of that?” Sean tried to play the peacemaker again. “Please, sir. All you have to do is make one dive, and this all goes away. We’ll pay you, we’ll fund your base, and the boy on the rig goes home to his mother. Why make this harder than it needs to be?” He smiled, his voice dripping with gentle persuasion. I closed my eyes and took a slow, deep breath, letting the freezing sea air fill my lungs. “I cannot rescue the boy who killed my daughter,” I said, my voice barely a whisper. “And if you force me into that water, I will disconnect his hatch myself, and make sure we both stay down there forever.”

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “479992”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

I woke up at two in the morning to the sound of Giselle shuffling around the bedroom. Her brow was furrowed, tight with a tension I knew all too well. I sat up, the sheets slipping down my chest, and asked quietly, “You’re back? Did you two have a fight?” She stood by the edge of the bed, silent for a moment, before giving a slow, reluctant nod. I got out of bed, my voice gentle as I tried to soothe her. “He’s still young, Giselle. Spoiled, really. He’s just throwing a little tantrum. Buy him that vintage watch he’s been staring at, or maybe some new gear for his gaming rig tomorrow. He’ll come around.” She stared at me, a long, searching look that held a weight she couldn’t put into words. In the end, she didn’t say a thing. I lay back down and fell asleep, peaceful and untroubled. Four years. It had taken me four years to transition from a hysterical, self-destructive wreck of a husband into her most sensible, understanding confidant. … By seven, Giselle was out of the bedroom. She glanced at me as she adjusted her coat. “What’s on your schedule today?” “Just grabbing tea with a friend,” I said, pushing a bowl of warm oatmeal toward the empty seat across from me. “Sit down. Have some breakfast?” She didn’t sit. Instead, she pulled a sleek cream envelope from her leather portfolio and slid it across the marble countertop. “See if you like these.” Inside were two VIP passes to a modern art exhibition. I tucked them into my shirt pocket. “Thank you. What brought this on?” “Jesse likes that artist,” she said, her voice dropping slightly. “They’re… extras.” I nodded, offering a faint smile. If this had been four years ago, that bowl of oatmeal would have been dripping down her designer blouse by now. But I had learned not to waste food. I took a quiet sip of my coffee. She lingered, waiting for some kind of reaction, some crack in the armor. When I remained silent, she turned and walked out. It wasn’t long before my phone lit up with an unfamiliar number. There was a time when I would screen every unknown call, terrified of hearing his voice, but I had outgrown that anxiety. I picked up and slid the bar to speakerphone. “Hey, Jude. It’s Jesse. Giselle left some important documents at my place. Do you mind swinging by to pick them up?” I scooped up another bite of oatmeal. “She’s got a car and an assistant, Jesse. Tell her to get them herself.” “Honestly, I just wanted to talk. There are some things I’ve been keeping inside…” My face remained completely blank. “I’m busy this afternoon. Some other time.” I hung up. I wasn’t a generous man by nature. Jesse had been poking at my boundaries for exactly four years and eight days, and I kept a meticulous tally of every single slight. In the beginning, I was highly combustible. I reacted to everything, turning myself into a public spectacle. Later, on the advice of mutual friends, I stepped back and focused on my own life, leaving him to his own devices. So Jesse changed his tactics. He stopped hiding. Instead, he started shoving himself into my orbit. One day he’d post a picture of the new phone Giselle bought him; the next, he’d text me screenshots of their intimate conversations. Eventually, I snapped. I went to confront him. But in the end, Giselle always chose his lies over my truth. I refused to back down, escalating the drama, making myself look worse and worse until I was trapped in a toxic loop of my own making. But now? None of his strategies worked anymore. At three in the afternoon, I had been sitting in the quiet lounge of the hotel for barely half an hour when Giselle suddenly walked in. She rarely crashed my social circle, making this a rare surprise. “I was in the area,” she said, sliding into the leather booth and aimlessly flipping through the menu. My friend, picking up on the shift in energy, made a polite excuse and left. I looked at her. “Is something wrong?” “Did Jesse call you this morning?” “Yes.” “What did he say?” I looked up at her, studying her face. What else would he say? He’d probably brag about how wild she was in his bed, compared to how distant she was in mine. I remembered the very first time he called me. It was our second wedding anniversary. I had put together a small, intimate dinner party at an upscale restaurant, inviting a few close friends to celebrate our marriage. I waited for her until the candles had nearly burned down. Near the end of the night, an unknown number called. When I answered, all I heard was the sound of heavy, ragged breathing. Just as I was about to apologize and hang up, thinking it was a wrong number, a familiar female voice bled through the speaker—breathless, raw, and desperate: “Jesse, stop biting.” The entire table went dead silent, wine glasses frozen mid-air. Before my friends left that night, they all offered the same cautious, well-meaning advice: “Jude, Giselle is running a massive company now. The pressure is immense, the temptations are everywhere. Just sit down and talk to her when she gets home. Don’t do anything rash.” I listened to them. That night, she and I sat in the living room until three in the morning. I didn’t raise my voice once. But she confessed. She said it was a stupid mistake. She said she’d had too much to drink and had mistaken Jesse for me in the dark. Then she got down on her knees, crying, swearing she would never do it again, promising that I was the only one she loved. And I believed her. I thought that by exposing Jesse’s pathetic attempt to ruin our anniversary, Giselle would finally see him for the manipulative child he was and cut him off. Surely, a sensible woman wouldn’t allow herself to be played like that? But she did. She didn’t put any distance between them. In fact, she found his reckless behavior romantic. She actually felt sorry for him, convinced he was “willing to risk everything for her.” Behind my back, she bought him a luxury condo downtown, feeding his ego and his lifestyle with her wealth and her affection. That was when the truth finally settled in. There was no drunken mistake. She was perfectly sober. Jesse wasn’t an accident. He was her choice. And I was the one left behind, forced to smile and pretend to be the bigger person. My mind snapped back to the present. I looked at her and shook my head. “No, nothing major.” But I knew her well enough to recognize the underlying tension. Something was off. It usually meant I had somehow “injured” Jesse again without even trying. I set down my teacup. “Did he complain to you about me?” “What is it this time? Did he say I hired someone to mess with him? Or did I go to his building to make a scene? You can tell me directly, Giselle. No need to test the waters. I can explain.” In the past, his provocations had driven me to do countless stupid things, and Giselle always happened to catch me red-handed. The narrative of the jealous, irrational husband wrote itself, and I’d find myself frozen out once again. But I had grown wiser. I didn’t rush to defend myself, nor did I plan a counterattack. I simply took a slow, deliberate sip of my tea, waiting for her to lay down her cards. She blinked, her face darkening slightly. “He didn’t say anything.” “Well,” I murmured, “that’s a first.” Her lips parted, then closed. She rotated her teacup half a turn on the saucer. “I came back last night because we had a fight. But that wasn’t the only reason.” “Right,” I said, gesturing to the waiter for a refill. “The fight was the main reason. What else?” “Could you please stop doing this?” she snapped suddenly, rubbing her temples with an exhausted sigh. “If you’re angry, just say it. Let it out.” “I’m perfectly fine, Giselle. You’re projecting.” She didn’t reply, her eyes locked onto mine. I didn’t know how to convince her otherwise. Honestly, I could barely believe it myself. How could I be ‘fine’ when I had lost every shred of dignity in this marriage? There were no words for it. But then I remembered her favorite fallback line, and realized how incredibly liberating it felt to use it: “If that’s how you want to see it, I can’t stop you.” She stared at me, letting the words sink in, before rising and walking away without another word. I watched her retreating figure for a moment, then turned back to my book. Over the last four years, those endless nights waiting for her had worn down my spirit until there was nothing left to break. I had screamed, I had threatened to end my life, and all it had gotten me was a deeper descent into madness. Now that I truly didn’t care, she suddenly wanted me to be vulnerable again. Before Giselle, I was a man of logic and restraint. Back when I was making moves on Wall Street, I never imagined I’d reduce myself to a petty, suspicious spouse over a failing relationship. Love makes you greedy. It makes you want to own someone entirely. And when you realize you can’t, the loss of control tears you apart. But once the love is gone? You get to have yourself back. Around eight that evening, as I was preparing to head home, a voice note from Jesse popped up on my phone. I tapped it absentmindedly. “Hey, big guy. Giselle’s completely hammered. She’s demanding I take her home, but honestly, I’m not her husband. It feels wrong. Why don’t you come get her instead?” A pin drop followed, locating an upscale bar downtown. I didn’t go. Instead, I called Frank, our driver. “Giselle’s had too much to drink. I’m sending you the address. Please go pick her up.” At eleven, Frank brought her back, smelling heavily of gin. She nearly stumbled into the entryway when I opened the door. “Where’s Jesse?” I asked Frank. “The bartender said… well, Mr. Jesse expected you to show up. He wanted to force her to make a choice between the two of you right there. He didn’t expect me. He tried to drag her out of the bar anyway, but she wanted to keep drinking. I couldn’t just leave her there, so I brought her home.” I helped her onto the bed and began unbuttoning her coat. Suddenly, her hand shot out, gripping my wrist. “Do you… do you even love me anymore?” “You’re drunk, Giselle.” “I’m not,” she whispered, her eyes bloodshot and watery. “You used to cry. You used to scream and throw things. Now, even when he rubs my face in it, you don’t even flinch. What is going on in your head?” I pulled my wrist from her grip. “Get some sleep.” She rolled over, burying her face in the pillow. “You didn’t come for me…” I had to hold back a laugh. Come for her? Every single time I had tried to play the rescuing husband, I was met with a locked door. Even on the anniversary of my father’s passing, when I drove to her office to pick her up so we could visit his grave, she bailed at the last second because Jesse called complaining of a migraine. “Jude, it’s an emergency,” she had told me, rushing out to her car. “I have to get him to the hospital. We don’t know what’s wrong.” Her entire staff watched me stand in the lobby holding a bouquet of memorial flowers. I stood there for thirty minutes before driving to the cemetery alone. I was always the option she discarded in her endless game of two-choice ultimatums. They never seemed to tire of the game, but I had checked out long ago. The next morning, before she was even awake, I went down to the bank. The teller looked up from her screen. “Mr. Barlow, are you sure you want to liquidate this certificate of deposit into your checking account? There will be a penalty for early withdrawal.” “I’m planning an extended trip abroad,” I replied quietly. “I need the liquidity.” As I walked out of the branch, I ran right into Jesse. He was leaning against the glass door, wearing a smug, knowing grin. “Well, look who it is. What a coincidence.” Four years of dealing with him meant I knew every play in his book. In the past, I would have let him bait me, leaving me shaking with rage while Giselle watched the fallout. Now, he was just background noise. “Coincidence indeed,” I said, not breaking my stride. “Don’t you want to know what happened at the bar last night?” he called out after me. I kept walking, refusing to give him the satisfaction of a backward glance. “You don’t love her anymore, do you?” he yelled, his tone turning desperate. I stopped. That was a question I couldn’t leave unanswered. I turned around slowly. “Of course a husband loves his wife. But you’re just the side distraction, Jesse. Why are you so worried about us?” His mouth fell open, utterly speechless. When I got back to the penthouse, Giselle was awake, sitting on the sofa with a glass of bourbon. I frowned slightly and opened the terrace doors to let the stale smell of alcohol escape. “You might want to keep a tighter leash on your boy,” I said, walking over to the coffee table. “He’s been following me around.” I opened the drawer beneath the table, pulled out a velvet-lined box I had prepared weeks ago, and slid it toward her. “Here. It’s a limited-edition Audemars Piguet. Use it to keep him happy.” Her fingers froze over her glass. “Oh, and by the way,” I continued, ignoring her sudden stiffness, “the allowance fund you keep in my account for him? He’s burning through it incredibly fast these past two months. Tell him to budget. It gets tiring keeping track of his tantrums.” This was part of the ceasefire we had negotiated. Every dollar she spent on Jesse had to clear through my accounts first. I couldn’t stop her from funding her lover, but I refused to let her hide it. Seeing the numbers was better than letting my imagination run wild. Her expression darkened, and she gave a curt, dismissive nod. “The bank manager called me,” she said, her voice dropping to a low murmur. “They said you liquidated your accounts. Are you leaving?” I was surprised she even noticed, given how little attention she paid to me these days. Our marriage had fractured because of lies, and the cracks had only widened when the truth finally came out. I had no intention of keeping secrets now. “Yes. I’m planning to study abroad for a while.” A heavy silence filled the room. When she finally spoke, her voice carried a rare, leaden weight. “Are you setting up a divorce?” Divorce? This arrangement kept me comfortable, wealthy, and socially secure. As long as I didn’t let greed or emotion get in the way, it was a highly lucrative setup. I had no desire to change it. “I just want to travel,” I said honestly. “And what about me?” I looked at her, genuinely amused. “Giselle, if these four years have taught me anything, it’s that you have to put yourself first. You should do the same. Stop worrying about whether I’m angry or not. Just do whatever makes you happy.” She stood up, her throat tight. “I’ve told you a thousand times, Jesse is just… forget it. What if I told you I’m ready to cut him off? For good.” “That’s your choice. You don’t need my permission.” Cut off Jesse, and another one would take his place. Infidelity is a threshold; once crossed, the numbers lose meaning. Before she could reply, the apartment buzzer rang. Giselle pinched the bridge of her nose, letting out a sharp breath, and went to answer the intercom. It was Jesse. Of course he had followed me home. He really didn’t need to try this hard. If anyone else had been in my shoes, he wouldn’t have lasted four years. But the person keeping him from the husband’s spot was never me. The young man pushed past her into the foyer. “Is Jude here? I need to speak to him.” I watched him from the living room. My mind flashed back to the first time I saw him. He was fresh out of college, glowing with youth and energy. Giselle’s blatant favoritism had driven me mad. I spent months trying to compete with a ghost. Because he was young, I started going to high-end medical spas—getting fillers, laser treatments, whatever promised to freeze my face in time. Because he was active, I took up boxing, rock climbing, even skydiving. But I could never compete with her devotion. During that dark period, the local tabloids were filled with my desperation: “Jude Barlow in public brawl with wife’s younger lover,” complete with embarrassing, unhinged photos. I made myself a laughingstock, and it didn’t bring my wife back for a single second. Those four years of fighting had drained me completely. They made me forget that marriage and love are merely the seasoning of life, not the main course. Giselle blocked his path. “Go home, Jesse.” “No!” For the first time, he yelled directly at me, ignoring her presence entirely. “Jude, stop playing this saintly victim role! You don’t love her anymore. Why won’t you just sign the papers? Why are you holding onto a title that means nothing to you?” I stood up from the sofa and walked calmly to the door. “Hey, Jesse. Good to see you,” I said, my voice smooth and polite. Then I turned to Giselle. “Some friends invited me to a poker game. I’ll head out so you two can have some space.” I made a move to step past him, but Giselle grabbed my wrist, pulling me back with surprising force. “You just got back. Stay here.” Her voice was muffled, strained. She turned to Jesse, her eyes cold. “Whether we divorce or not is between my husband and me. Stop acting like a child.” I stood quietly at her side, offering no comment. Years ago, Giselle used to tell me how sweet and innocent Jesse was, how he didn’t care about money or status and only wanted her affection. She told me I needed to be more understanding. I had fought tooth and nail to prove his greed. Now, I simply let it play out. They could argue about his status all they wanted, as long as they left me out of it. Seeing my indifference, Jesse snapped. “Jude, what kind of sick game are you playing?!” I looked at him, completely unbothered. “You’ve been with her for four years, Jesse, and you still haven’t convinced her to marry you. Why are you asking me for answers?” It was the simple truth. If Giselle truly wanted to marry him, I couldn’t have stopped her. But she valued her social standing and her corporate reputation far too much to deal with the fallout of a public divorce. Our wedding had been a grand, city-wide affair. The vows we took were heavy, and she lacked the courage to rip them up publicly. Jesse’s eyes welled with tears as he looked at her. For once, Giselle didn’t offer any comfort. She just stared at me. I felt as though she were trying to drill a hole through my skull with her eyes. But what did it matter? If I didn’t say something, she would later accuse me of being passive-aggressive. I had learned to state my boundaries clearly and keep myself beyond reproach. Jesse turned and ran out of the apartment. Giselle didn’t chase after him. Instead, she walked out to the balcony alone. I went back to the bedroom, pulled out my suitcase, and began packing. I didn’t hear her approach, but suddenly she was leaning against the doorframe. “Your visa cleared?” “Yes,” I said, folding a shirt. “I leave next Wednesday.” “When did you decide this?” “Three months ago.” She fell silent. Three months ago, Jesse had poisoned my Golden Retriever, Cooper. In retaliation, I had gone to his place and killed his prized rabbits. After a night like that, any decision seemed reasonable. But I hadn’t asked for a divorce. Yet, from that day on, she made sure to come home every single night. She cancelled meetings, declined invitations, acting as if she had suddenly remembered how to be a wife. The tragedy was, I no longer cared. “Get some rest,” she whispered, turning back toward the study. On Wednesday morning, I carried my suitcase downstairs. Giselle was sitting in the living room, looking as though she hadn’t slept in days. On the glass coffee table sat a duplicate set of legal documents. Her signature was already inked at the bottom. I looked at her, raising an eyebrow. She slid the divorce agreement toward me. “Isn’t this what you wanted? Sign it, and you’re free.” I didn’t even glance at the pages. I picked up my suitcase and began walking toward the door. “Stop,” she commanded, rushing to block my path. Her face was pale. “What are you doing, Jude?” I looked back at her. “I’m not signing. And I’m not divorcing you.” A flicker of relief, almost like hope, washed over her eyes. She thought I was still the desperate man who loved her too much to let go. “Jude, if you still care about me, we can—” “Love has nothing to do with this,” I laughed, cutting her off. “You said it yourself, Giselle. We’re adults. We don’t deal in feelings; we deal in assets. This marriage is highly beneficial to me.” Her expression froze. Whenever I had threatened divorce in the past because of Jesse, she would always use my financial situation against me. “I support your entire lifestyle,” she had said back then. “Without me, you wouldn’t even have a roof over your head. Think carefully before you throw a tantrum.” She had been so protective of Jesse’s feelings, blaming my lack of maturity for every argument. She knew she had complete control over me because she knew how deeply I loved her. But that cheap, desperate love was dead. All that remained was a calculated transaction. I decided to lay it out for her. “Three months ago, I started negotiating an international investment project. Do you know why they approved my proposal? Because of my association with your firm.” Her eyes widened slightly. “How many major accounts do you think my design studio has landed over the last four years? They didn’t hire me for my charm, Giselle. They wanted access to your corporate network.” I gave her a small, cold smile. “My decision to stay married isn’t about love or hate. It’s just business.” She stood there, looking as if she had taken a physical blow to the chest. “Do whatever you want with Jesse,” I said, opening the front door. “I’ll be in London for the next six months. Let’s keep things convenient for both of us. Oh, and try not to get pregnant. A child out of wedlock is messy, and the press would have a field day.” I rolled my suitcase out into the hallway without looking back. In the mirrored wall of the elevator, I caught a glimpse of my reflection. There was no joy, no sorrow—just a vast, quiet emptiness. I had lied to her. If this London venture went the way I planned, I had no intention of ever coming back. At the airport gate, just as I pulled out my passport, two plainclothes officers stepped into my path, flashing their badges. “Mr. Barlow, you are a person of interest in a homicide investigation. Please come with us to the station.” I stood still, letting out a soft, tired laugh. Another one of Jesse’s games. He never got tired of trying to ruin my life. I tried to step around them. But one of the detectives held up a photograph of a crime scene. My breath caught in my throat, and my eyes went wide.

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “479977”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

Even after the divorce and the affair that broke our family, my dad still swallowed his pride and made me ask my mom for money. I didn’t ask for much. Just fifty dollars a month. Every time Mom sent the money transfer, she attached the same note: Tell your father to stop raising you to be as shameless as he is. This month, for the first time, I gathered the courage to ask: Mom, can you please send me a thousand? She replied with a voice memo within seconds, her tone dripping with ice. It’s only been three years, and you’re already just like him. Greedy. Insatiable. But then, the bank notification popped up. She’d wired two thousand. If you want a penny more, tell your father to crawl back here and get on his knees to beg for my forgiveness. I stared at the screen, my hands shaking so hard I could barely hold the phone. Mom didn’t know. Dad was already dead. All I wanted was to cover the thousand-dollar cremation fee. … “Sweetheart, where is your adult?” the lady behind the hospital billing window asked, her forehead creasing with a frown. I stood on my tippets, straining to press my cracked phone screen against the thick glass barrier. “I have the money now, ma’am. My mom just sent me two thousand dollars. Can you cremate my dad now?” The lady froze, then let out a heavy sigh. “Sweetheart, it’s not just about the money. Cremation requires an immediate family member’s signature. You’re too young. Where is your mother? Have her come down here herself.” My chest tightened, and I lowered my gaze to my worn-out sneakers. “She’s busy. She won’t come. Besides… she doesn’t want to see my dad.” The lady shook her head, her tone turning firm. “That won’t work. Rules are rules. Call your mother again. Otherwise, your father has to stay in the cooling unit.” The refrigeration room was freezing. I’d gone in to see him once. He lay there with his eyes closed, a thin layer of frost dusting his eyelashes. Dad had always hated the cold. I didn’t want him to stay there. I retreated to the quietest corner of the waiting room. On my phone, the screen was still open to my mother’s last voice memo. …tell him to crawl back here and get on his knees. I swallowed hard, took a deep breath, and dialed her number. “Mom,” I whispered. “What now, Todd?” Her voice was flat, devoid of any warmth. “Your father wanted a thousand, I gave you two thousand. Is that still not enough? What kind of game is Dave trying to play this time?” I shook my head rapidly, even though she couldn’t see me. “No, Dad isn’t playing a game. Mom, can you please come to Marvin County Hospital?” A pause on the other end, followed by a bitter, mocking laugh. “Marvin County Hospital? He gets the money, and now he’s faking an illness? Tell Dave to drop the pathetic theatrics.” “Katherine, honey, who is that?” A soft, smooth male voice drifted through the receiver. I knew that voice. It was Simon. Back when Dad used to take me to Mom’s office, Simon would always smile and give me candy. But after Dad and I left, Simon took Dad’s place beside Mom. “It’s Todd,” Mom’s voice softened slightly as she spoke to him. “Todd? Is Dave using the kid as an excuse to harass you again?” Simon sighed. “Dave really is something else. He’s the one who made his bed, yet he keeps using the child as a bargaining chip. Don’t let him get to you, Katherine. It’s not worth ruining your day.” Mom gave a cold murmur of agreement. “Todd, I don’t have time to play house with your father. Three years ago, he pretended to be so noble, asking for a measly fifty dollars a month. I guess he can’t keep up the act anymore, can he? If he wants to use you to squeeze money out of me, tell him to crawl over here and ask me himself.” Tears hot and heavy welled in my eyes. “Mom, Dad can’t come. He really can’t. Please, just come and sign the paper. It’s so cold in the freezer. Dad is going to freeze.” Silence stretched over the line. After a few seconds, Mom spoke again, her voice sharp with ancient anger. “Three years ago, he sold out my company just so he could sleep with my best friend for cash. Now he’s teaching you to lie like this? A freezer? Why doesn’t he just tell you he’s dead and be done with it!” The line went dead. The dial tone buzzed painfully in my ear. I lowered the phone, staring at the dark screen. It reflected my messy, unwashed hair and my red, swollen eyes. Mom didn’t believe me. She thought Dad was lying. But Dad was really dead. I shoved the phone into my pocket and walked out of the hospital into the biting wind. It nearly knocked me over. Three nights ago, Dad was lying on our mattress, so thin his bones looked like they might pierce his skin. He couldn’t keep any food down. Every cough rattled his chest, bringing up thick spatters of blood. But that night, he suddenly seemed energetic. He called me to the bedside and touched my cheek, his palm slick with cold sweat. “Todd, Daddy is going to take a very, very long nap.” I squeezed his hand, shaking my head. “Don’t sleep, Daddy. I’m scared.” He smiled weakly, a single tear slipping into his hairline. “Be a good boy, Todd. Daddy is just so tired. Every month, on the first, you must remember to text your mother. Don’t ask for much. Just fifty dollars.” I didn’t understand. “Why only fifty, Daddy? Fifty dollars isn’t enough for rent.” His eyes grew unfocused, staring at some distant point on the peeling wallpaper. “Fifty is small… as long as she sends it, it means she still recognizes you as her son. If she still wants you… then after I’m gone, you’ll still have someone in this world.” Those were the last words he ever said to me. Then he closed his eyes. I called his name for hours, but he never woke up. Later, the landlady came by for the rent. She smelled something in the apartment and called the police. The officers took Dad away, bringing him to this cold, sterile hospital. I rubbed my frozen fingers together and walked to the bus stop. If I couldn’t explain it over the phone, I would tell her in person. Dad couldn’t stay in the freezer forever. The doctor said he needed to be cremated. If we put him in a warm little box, he wouldn’t be cold anymore. The bus jolted and swayed for over an hour before stopping in front of the tallest skyscraper downtown. Marvin Enterprises. I used to hold Dad’s hand as we walked here to bring Mom lunch. Back then, Mom would lift me up, laughing, and press warm kisses to my cheeks. Now, the building was the same, but I couldn’t get past the lobby. A security guard blocked my path. “Hey, street rat, you can’t come in here.” I looked down at myself. I’d slept in the corner of the hospital waiting room last night. My jacket was covered in dirt and soot. I did look like a street rat. I looked up and said quietly, “Sir, I’m looking for Katherine Marvin. She’s my mom.” The guard let out a harsh laugh. “Katherine Marvin’s son? Get real, kid. Scram before I call the cops.” I didn’t leave. I stood just outside the revolving glass doors, shivering. The wind grew stronger, and the gray sky threatened rain. I tucked my hands into my sleeves and kept my eyes glued to the elevator bank inside. My legs went numb from standing. Finally, the elevator doors chimed open. A group of executives in tailored suits walked out. At the front was Mom. Her brow was furrowed as she listened to a junior assistant. Simon walked beside her, leaning in to whisper something that made her lips twitch with a faint smile. I threw myself against the glass doors, banging with all my might. “Mom!” Mom froze. She turned her head, and through the thick glass, her gaze landed on me. There was no shock in her eyes, no maternal instinct to run to me. Only an overwhelming, heavy exhaustion. The guard rushed over, terrified. “Hey! I told you to beat it!” “Wait,” Mom’s cool voice sliced through the air. The glass doors slid open, and she stepped out into the cold. Simon followed right behind her. Her eyes swept over my filthy jacket and my blue, chapped lips. “Did Dave send you?” I shook my head, but the cold air hit my lungs, throwing me into a fit of coughing. “No, Dad didn’t… Dad is…” “Why didn’t he come himself?” Mom cut me off. “Using a seven-year-old for sympathy. Dave’s tactics are getting pathetic.” Simon stepped forward, offering a gentle, pitying smile. “Todd, how did you get so dirty? Your father really is heartless. Even if he wants to play the victim, he shouldn’t drag you into the mud like this.” He turned to Mom, his voice dropping to a soothing murmur. “Katherine, the boy is innocent. It’s freezing out here. Let’s not let him catch pneumonia.” Mom didn’t look at Simon. She kept her eyes locked on me. “Todd, your father teaching you to perform these little sob stories… it’s shameless.” I didn’t know what that word meant, but I knew she was insulting my dad. I stomped my foot, my tears finally spilling over. “He didn’t! Dad didn’t teach me anything! He’s asleep, and I can’t wake him up! Mom, please come to the hospital with me. If you just sign the paper, we can bring him out.” I reached out my dirty, freezing hand to grab hers, but she took a step back, avoiding my touch. Simon chimed in smoothly. “Todd, a good boy doesn’t tell lies. I saw your dad’s Instagram posts from Cabo just a few days ago. The beaches looked beautiful. He looked like he was having the time of his life.” I stared at him, my chest heaving. “You’re a liar! Dad has been in bed for months! He coughs and coughs and can’t go anywhere!” Simon’s face fell into an expression of hurt. “Todd, how can you speak to me like that? I’m only telling the truth.” Mom’s expression turned entirely to stone. “What else has Dave been teaching you? Lies and manipulation. You’re turning out exactly like him.” She turned away from me, addressing her assistant. “Gary, drive him back. And tell Dave this is his absolute last warning. If he sends this child to disrupt my office again, I will file charges for what he did three years ago.” With that, she spun on her heel and walked back into the warmth of the skyscraper. Simon followed, casting a small, satisfied look over his shoulder at me. Gary, the assistant, sighed beside me. “Come on, Todd. Let me take you home.” I stood frozen, watching the elevator doors close behind my mother. My tears tasted salty as they slipped into my mouth. Dad was right. Mom hated him, but she wouldn’t let me starve. She just didn’t care whether Dad lived or died. The sedan drove smoothly. Gary kept glancing at me through the rearview mirror. “Todd, tell me the truth. What’s going on with your dad?” I looked down, remembering the officer at the hospital telling me my dad was dead. I didn’t fully understand what death meant, but they said it meant he could never come home. “He’s dead,” I whispered, rubbing my numb fingers. Gary slammed on the brakes, pulling the car abruptly to the curb. He turned around, his eyes wide. “Todd, that’s not something you joke about!” I stared out the window at the gray street. “I’m not joking.” Gary stared at me for a long moment, then shook his head and shifted the car back into drive. “Your mother was right. Your father has completely ruined you.” He didn’t speak to me for the rest of the drive, dropping me off at the entrance of our narrow alley. “The street is too tight for the car. Walk the rest of the way, Todd.” I nodded and got out. But I didn’t walk toward our apartment. I turned around and began the long walk back to Marvin County Hospital. By the time I reached the hospital morgue, the sun had set, and the clerk at the window had gone home. I slipped past the empty security desk and found my way into the cooling room. It was so cold. I dragged a small step stool from the corner, climbing onto the high stainless steel gurney. I pulled back the heavy white sheet and crawled into my dad’s arms. His body was colder than ice, covered in a frost that didn’t melt when I touched it. “Don’t worry, Daddy,” I whispered, wrapping my arms tight around him. “Todd is here to keep you warm.” The cold seeped deep into my bones, making my entire body shiver violently. But after a while, holding him close, the shivering stopped. I didn’t feel cold anymore. Just very, very tired. My eyelids felt like lead. In the quiet darkness, I drifted back to a time long ago. We were all together—Mom, Dad, and me. On the coldest winter nights, Mom’s arms were always the warmest place in the world. Then it was just Dad and me in that drafty, leaking apartment. Dad would hold me just like this, stroking my hair. ‘Sleep now, Todd. Close your eyes. Once you’re asleep, you won’t feel the cold.’ I pressed my cheek against his frozen chest and closed my eyes. I thought it would be nice to stay here with Dad forever. I wouldn’t have to beg for fifty dollars anymore, and Mom wouldn’t have to push me away. Even if I never woke up… it would be okay. Meanwhile, in the library of the Marvin estate. Katherine sat at her mahogany desk, the wind rattling the glass panes. A strange, cold unease clawed at her chest. If Dave was just trying to extort money, why hadn’t he called to gloat? It had been years since she last saw him. What if… what if something actually was wrong? She stood up, reaching for her car keys, deciding she would see for herself. But just as she reached the door, her phone vibrated violently. Todd’s name flashed on the screen. The momentary worry vanished, replaced by instant irritation. Of course. He was still playing his games. The daytime stunt hadn’t worked, so now he was trying a late-night call. She answered, her voice sharp. “Todd, what does your father want now?” But it wasn’t my voice that answered. It was a deep, authoritative voice of an officer. “Is this Katherine Marvin? Your son was just found in the County Hospital morgue. He is suffering from severe hypothermia. We are performing emergency resuscitation right now.” Katherine’s anger flared. “What is Dave doing?! Leaving a child in a morgue in the middle of the night?! Is this his idea of parenting?! Put him on the phone!” A heavy silence hung over the line. “Mrs. Marvin, Mr. Dave Marvin cannot come to the phone.” Katherine let out a dry, bitter laugh. “Coward. He’s too ashamed to face me, isn’t he? To use our son’s life for a payout—he’s lost his mind!” “Ma’am, please shut up!” the officer snapped, his voice crackling with anger. “Dave Marvin isn’t playing a game. He is dead.”

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “479993”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel