Category: English

The holidays were screaming toward us—that frantic, tinsel-draped stretch between Christmas and New Year—when my parents dropped the bomb. They were leaving. Not for a vacation, but for good. “Tyler and Madison said things are too crazy at work,” my father announced, not looking me in the eye as he packed a crate of old records. “They can’t get the time off to fly back here. It’s too much of a hassle.” “So your father and I decided we’ll just go to them,” my mother added, her face lit with a glow I hadn’t seen in years. She looked twenty years younger just talking about it. “If Madison and I hit it off, we might just stay through the spring. Maybe longer.” She leaned in, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. “They’re going to start trying for a baby soon. They’ll need me there. A grandmother’s touch, you know? It’s different from hiring help.” They kept talking, their voices overlapping in a frantic, joyful duet. They were already mapping out a new life in a city halfway across the country, a place where my brother Tyler had built a life they actually wanted to be part of. I felt a coldness settle in my chest. “And me?” I asked, my voice cutting through their excitement. “Where am I supposed to go for the holidays?” My mother paused, a look of genuine confusion flickering across her features. “Don’t you have Mark’s family? You’re married, Nora.” … “You’re one of them now,” she continued, patting my hand as if she were comforting a distant cousin. “Spend the New Year with the in-laws. When you have a long weekend, you can fly down and visit us. You’ll be our guest.” A guest. The word tasted like ash. My brother gets married, and suddenly my childhood home—the very concept of ‘home’—migrates to whatever city he happens to live in? I looked at her, my mind racing back to three years ago. Back to the reason I was even standing in this kitchen in suburban Ohio. I had been in love with Simon. We had been together for eight years, a lifetime of shared jokes and Sunday mornings. He was perfect—or as close to it as a human can get. His family was the kind you see in Hallmark movies, and more importantly, his city was the hub for my industry. Moving there wouldn’t have just been a romantic choice; it would have been a career leap. My salary would have tripled overnight. But my mother had spent every night for a month weeping. She’d sit at the edge of my bed, her eyes red-rimmed, clutching my hand. “They say travel is easy now,” she’d sob. “A three-hour flight, they say. But you’ll have a life, Nora. You’ll have a job. You won’t have two days to waste on airports just to sit in this living room for a few hours. You’ll make excuses. You’ll stay away.” She’d bring up the neighbors. “Look at Sarah. She moved to Seattle and we haven’t seen her in three years. There’s always a sick kid or a deadline. I only have maybe thirty years left, Nora. Am I only going to see you thirty more times before I die?” That was the line that broke me. It was the ultimate emotional ransom. I chose my mother over my soulmate. I walked away from Simon and the high-paying career, moved back to this sleepy town, and married Mark—a “stable” local guy I met through a family friend—just to be near her. I wanted to be the daughter who took her for walks when her knees gave out, the one who brought her favorite pastries on a Tuesday just because. And now, the moment Tyler—the golden son—called from the sun-drenched coast, her “thirty years” didn’t seem to matter. Her proximity to me was suddenly a disposable luxury. It was a masterclass in hypocrisy. “But Tyler’s city is thousands of miles away,” I said, my voice eerily calm. “If you and Dad move there, you won’t be coming back here much, will you?” My mother laughed, a light, airy sound. “Why would we come back? My son is there. My grandson will be there. That’s where the roots are now. I suppose they’ll fly us back in boxes when we’re gone, but until then? We’re looking forward, Nora.” She didn’t even look sad. She was vibrating with the thrill of a fresh start, one that didn’t include me. “But I’m still here,” I whispered. “I married a local man. It’s going to be hard for me to just drop everything to see you.” She didn’t even register the hurt in my voice. “Oh, honey, you need to focus on your own little family. Build a good relationship with your mother-in-law. Be a good wife so Mark doesn’t have a hard time. And really, you two should start thinking about kids. It’s time.” She kept preaching about how I belonged to Mark’s family now, how my duty was to them. If that was the case, why did she chain me here three years ago? I didn’t scream. I didn’t throw a fit. What would be the point? To force a hollow apology? To make her stay and resent me the way I secretly resented her? I wasn’t going to beg for a place in a heart that clearly had no room for me. I numbly helped her pack. I drove them to the airport. I watched them disappear through security without a single backward glance. A week later, she called. “Madison’s pregnant! It’s happening, Nora! We’re selling the house here—we need the cash to help them put a down payment on a bigger place with an in-law suite. If anyone wants to tour the house, I told the realtor you’d have the keys.” Even the house wasn’t mine to return to. The last physical tether was being severed for a down payment in a city I’d never been to. On the second day of the New Year, I was at Mark’s parents’ house, doing exactly what was expected of me. I was the “good wife,” hosting his sisters and their families, managing a mountain of laundry and a twelve-person dinner by myself. I didn’t mind the work. The busyness kept the silence in my head from getting too loud. I told myself I could handle this. People move on. Families change. But then, the doorbell rang. Standing on the porch was a woman I recognized from old photos on Mark’s phone. It was Becca, his ex. She was holding a toddler who looked to be about two years old. “He’s Mark’s,” she said, her voice trembling but defiant. “And Mark needs to step up.” I froze. The world seemed to tilt on its axis. Mark walked up behind me, his face turning a sickly shade of gray. “Becca? If you were pregnant when we broke up, why the hell didn’t you tell me?” She let out a harsh, jagged laugh. “Your mother hated me, Mark. She made it clear I wasn’t ‘good enough’ for this family. If she knew I was pregnant, she would have shredded me. I wasn’t going to let her touch my baby.” I knew their story. They had been “the” couple in high school. Madly in love, until Mark’s mother decided Becca’s family background wasn’t prestigious enough. She had used every guilt trip in the book—the tears, the “heart palpitations”—to force them apart. It was a mirror of my own story, only Mark had folded even faster than I had. “Why now?” I asked, my voice sounding like it belonged to someone else. If she had come forward sooner, I never would have married him. Becca looked at me with bored eyes. “I’m young. I want a life. I found someone—a guy with money—and he doesn’t want another man’s baggage. This kid is a Miller. He belongs to you people.” She practically pushed the boy into Mark’s arms and walked away. Mark didn’t stop her. He just stood there, holding a child that was a living testament to a life he’d lived before me. Inside, the house erupted. Mark’s mother and sisters were already hovering, cooing over the boy. “Look at his eyes,” his sister whispered. “He’s the spitting image of Mark at that age.” The joy in the room was suffocating. They had a new toy, a new legacy. No one looked at me. No one asked how I felt about my marriage being firebombed on a Tuesday afternoon. That night, Mark sat on the edge of our bed, his head in his hands. “The timeline works out,” he said. “I’ll do a DNA test tomorrow, but… if he’s mine, Nora…” He looked at me, and I saw the resolve in his eyes. “I can’t turn my back on my own blood.” “So I’m just supposed to be a stepmother?” I asked. “Just like that? Overnight?” I started shoving clothes into a suitcase. He jumped up, trying to grab my arm. “Where are you going? Your parents sold the house, Nora. You have nowhere to go.” It’s the classic line from a bad movie. Where will you go? You have no one. I lived ten minutes from the street where I grew up, and my husband was telling me I was homeless. “There are hotels, Mark. We need space. I need a plan. Because I’m telling you now: I didn’t sign up for this. If this is the new reality, I want a divorce.” I wasn’t being cruel; I was being honest. I had spent my life being the “sensible” one, the one who sacrificed. I wasn’t going to sacrifice my future for a child that was a product of a lie by omission. But as I tried to leave, his mother and sisters blocked the hallway. They took my suitcase out of my hands. They swarmed me like a hive of angry bees. “The baby is here, Nora. You can’t just put him back!” “Even if you leave, who are you going to find? A thirty-year-old divorcee? You’ll just end up with some other guy’s kid anyway. At least this one is family.” “Don’t be so selfish. This is a blessing for the Miller family.” I couldn’t even finish a sentence before they drowned me out. I was trapped. I had a phone, but who was I going to call? My parents were three time zones away, busy playing house with Tyler. I had stayed for them, but when the storm hit, I realized I was standing in an open field alone. I locked myself in the guest room and cried until my throat burned. When Mark eventually came in, he didn’t apologize. He didn’t hold me. He just got into bed and turned his back to me. “He’s my son,” he said into the darkness. “I’m not giving him up.” The betrayal felt like a physical weight. I had tried so hard to be the perfect daughter, the perfect wife. And in the end, I was just a placeholder. I thought about Simon. I wondered if he was happy. I wondered if he had a wife who didn’t have to fight for her right to exist in her own home. For the first time since I said goodbye to him, I felt the sharp, agonizing sting of regret. The next morning, I woke up with a fever that made my bones ache. My throat was so swollen I could barely swallow. But the house was empty. They had all gone to the clinic for the DNA test, then to look at preschools. They had started their new life without me. I needed help, but it was the holidays. Every friend I had was busy with their own families. I lay there, shivering, the silence of the house mocking me. Eventually, I had to crawl—literally crawl—to the kitchen to pour myself a glass of lukewarm water from the tap. The DNA results came back a few days later. 99.9%. When they gathered in the living room, glowing with the news, I handed Mark the papers. “I want a divorce.” The insults started immediately. They called me heartless. They called me “less of a woman” for not having an instinctual love for the boy. “You think you’re so special?” Mark’s mother hissed. “Go ahead. Leave. See where you end up. Your brother won’t want you cluttering up his new guest room.” Mark didn’t defend me. He just watched me walk out the door. The only stroke of luck I had was a single cancelled ticket on a train heading east. As I sat in the quiet car, watching the Ohio landscape blur into a grey smudge, I sent Mark a draft of a settlement. I told him I’d let the lawyers handle the rest. I was going to a city where I knew no one. I was starting over with a bruised heart and a resume that was three years out of date. But as the train picked up speed, I felt a strange, terrifying lightness. I was finally, for the better or worse, on my own.

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I was moving to London to teach, and Declan was my biggest cheerleader. Everyone told me I’d hit the jackpot with him. They whispered that he was secretly planning a wedding, a grand romantic gesture to surprise me before I left. But then I found the files. Hundreds of emails and formal requests saved on his laptop, all petitioning the department head for one specific transfer. He wasn’t just sending me away; he was trading me. He was bringing a girl named Lacey back to the States. And the wedding files in the hidden folder? The bride wasn’t me. I didn’t scream. I didn’t throw things. I didn’t even cry. I actually found myself wishing them well. Because, honestly? I just didn’t care anymore. I only felt bad for the Declan who would look for me later, the one who would eventually lose his mind when he realized I was gone for good. 1 “Nora, are you absolutely sure about this? You know checking this box makes the transfer indefinite, right?” The department secretary lowered her voice. “And… shouldn’t you check with Declan about the date? This clashes directly with that ‘big event’ he’s planning.” I stared at the screen of Declan’s open laptop, my eyes unfocused on the rows of pdfs. My colleagues had been winking at me all week, telling me to act surprised, that Declan was in full groom-mode. Declan himself had been tight-lipped, vibrating with a nervous energy I had foolishly mistaken for romance. I thought, Finally. After eight years, he’s trying. But every vendor contract, every venue inquiry, every draft invitation on this screen bore the names Declan & Lacey. Not Nora. It all made sense now. The way he’d practically packed my bags for London. He wasn’t supporting my career; he was clearing the board. My departure was the condition for her return. A one-for-one swap. I bit down on my lip until I tasted copper, then looked the secretary in the eye. “The wedding… it doesn’t concern me. Keep the flight date as is.” Eight years of devotion, and this was the severance package. If that was the price of his love, I couldn’t afford it anymore. The moment the ticket confirmation landed in my inbox, Declan’s ringtone cut through the air. “How long are you going to make everyone wait?” His voice was sharp, impatient. “I know it’s your going-away party, Nora, but do you have to act like a princess and show up late?” I glanced at the clock. The reservation wasn’t for another thirty minutes. His irritation had arrived ahead of schedule. I mumbled a non-committal excuse and hung up. My eyes fell on his phone case—a custom one I’d bought us as a joke for our anniversary. He hated it. Called it tacky. Said it made him look unprofessional at the university. He’d promised to only wear it at home, to humor me. Looking at it now, a wave of nausea rolled through me. I tossed it into the nearest trash can and headed for the restaurant. The moment I walked in, a colleague shoved a massive bouquet of red roses into my arms, winking frantically toward Declan. “You sure know how to pick ’em, Nora! Look at this!” Usually, when I upset Declan, he bought flowers to apologize. But never roses. It was always carnations—cheap, supermarket filler. My colleague, caught up in the excitement, snatched the small card from the bouquet and read it aloud before I could stop her. “To my dearest Lacey. You are as timeless as a rose, and I will always protect you. Love, Declan.” The room went dead silent. I dug my fingernails into my palms, letting the sharp pain tether me to my dignity. I forced a smile. “Oh! Right. These… aren’t for me.” Footsteps clicked on the hardwood floor behind me. A petite woman in a pale dress stopped at my side. She reached out, took the heavy bouquet from my hands, and buried her face in the blooms, inhaling deeply. “Declan hasn’t changed a bit,” she sighed, her voice sugary and light. “He always sends me roses.” She turned to me, beaming. “You must be the ‘bro’ Declan talks about! Thank you so much for agreeing to the swap so I could come home from London.” 2 I looked at the roses in her arms and let out a soft, dry laugh. I remembered a night years ago. Declan had smashed a set of dishes in a temper tantrum. He hadn’t replaced them. When I came home late from work, hungry and tired, there were no plates. He felt guilty, so he ran out into a pouring rainstorm. He came back soaking wet, holding a bundle of white carnations. At the time, I had laughed, calling him hopeless. “Who buys carnations for an apology? They look like funeral flowers.” Seeing Lacey holding those deep red roses, I realized he wasn’t hopeless. He wasn’t lacking in romance. He just didn’t want to waste it on me. That was why, for eight years, I only ever got the cheap stuff. “Right,” I said, my voice steady. “I’m Declan’s ‘bro.’ Let me show you to the table.” When Declan saw Lacey walk in, he shot out of his chair, his eyes glued to her. Carter, Declan’s best friend, slid into the seat next to me. “Nora, look, don’t read into it. He just hasn’t seen Lacey in a long time. Don’t be that jealous girlfriend.” I waved a hand dismissively. “Who’s jealous? Don’t they look good together?” Carter frowned. This was the same man who had watched me drag myself out of bed with a 102-degree fever to bring Declan hangover meds. The man who had answered my 3:00 AM calls when Declan didn’t come home. To Carter, and probably to Declan, I wasn’t a partner. I was a placeholder. A warm body. That’s why he felt comfortable coordinating Lacey’s arrival. Carter didn’t know what to say, so he drifted away. Declan had left his phone on the table. I flipped it over. The case was gone—the one I bought him. In its place was a clear case, displaying a passport-style photo of him and Lacey, heads leaning together. I picked it up, my hands trembling. In eight years, Declan didn’t have a single photo of me on his phone. “We see each other every day,” he’d say. “Why do we need photos?” I believed him. Like an idiot, I believed him. But his laptop was a shrine to Lacey. Thousands of photos. Every angle. Every smile. The party that was supposed to be my farewell turned into Lacey’s homecoming. Declan didn’t leave her side. He blocked every glass of wine offered to her. When I kept a polite, frozen smile on my face, Declan leaned over and hissed, “Stop looking at her like that. Can’t you be generous for once? What is wrong with you?” My head pounded. The acid in my stomach rose. He had traded my life for hers, and I was the one being selfish? I grabbed a margarita from a passing tray, needing something to dull the edge. Declan’s hand shot out, knocking the glass from my grip. It shattered. Red liquid splashed everywhere. His other hand immediately clamped over Lacey’s eyes. “Lacey, don’t look! You know you faint at the sight of blood.” Lacey giggled, peeling his fingers away. She pinched his cheek. “Oh my god, Declan. That was a lie I told during Truth or Dare in high school. You still remember that? You dork.” Tears finally pricked my eyes. Not because of the wasted drink. But because Declan remembered a throwaway lie from high school, yet he couldn’t remember a single thing about me. I hated the color blue. I’d told him a hundred times. Yet when we moved in together, he painted the living room navy. “I thought you liked blue,” he’d said, looking genuinely confused. I used to tell myself he just had a bad memory. I was too afraid to admit the truth: he didn’t want to remember. Eight years is a long time to leave no trace. Lacey walked over, patting Declan’s chest soothingly. “Nora, don’t be mad. He gets intense when he drinks. I used to make him hot water with honey, and he’d settle right down.” 3 I didn’t answer. I just watched Declan lean into her touch, like a plant turning toward the sun. “Nora,” Lacey chirped. “Do you have honey at your place? I can text you the recipe. You should make him some.” She was the childhood sweetheart. The one who got away. How could I compete with that mythology? I couldn’t. It was better to just fold. “Why don’t you come back to our place and make it for him?” I said. Declan’s head snapped up. He looked shocked, then panicked. We hailed a cab. There was only one. Declan opened the back door for Lacey, ushering her in. He started to hold it for me, but I stepped back. “No thanks,” I said. “I wouldn’t want to intrude on a reunion ten years in the making.” Declan ducked his head, refusing to meet my eyes. Inside the cab, I watched them. Declan rested his head on her shoulder. When he felt sick, he sat up and breathed through the window. I laughed out loud. “What, you aren’t going to puke on her?” When I used to pick him up, he’d vomit all over the upholstery. I was the one who had to apologize to the driver and pay the cleaning fee. He respected her too much to ruin her dress. He caught my eye in the rearview mirror and looked away after two seconds. But he stayed upright. When we got to the apartment, the honey water worked its magic. “Declan,” Lacey said, looking around with wide eyes. “I just got back and… I haven’t found a place yet. Can I crash here?” Declan agreed before she finished the sentence. He grabbed her luggage and carried it straight into the master bedroom. “Declan,” I asked, leaning against the doorframe. “Are you sleeping in there with her tonight?” He stopped. His voice was ice cold. “That’s none of your business.” I chuckled. Why did I even ask? I went to the guest room. To my surprise, Declan followed me in a few minutes later. “Nora, look. It’s not what you think.” I almost applauded the audacity. “I know,” I said. “I get it.” “But, Declan… we’re breaking up.” He frowned, opening his mouth to argue, but Lacey burst into the room, tears streaming down her face. “Declan! I’m scared! I feel like someone is watching me through the window!” We lived on the 28th floor. Unless Spiderman was a peeping tom, nobody was watching her. But Declan didn’t hesitate. He rushed to her, wrapping his arms around her trembling shoulders. “It’s okay. Don’t be scared. I’ll stay with you.” I watched him make a pallet on the floor of the master bedroom. Fine by me. Let them have the bed I paid for. Back in the guest room, I knocked over a lamp in the dark. It shattered, slicing a deep gash into my palm. Blood welled up immediately. I had to go to the ER. Declan saw me in the hallway, holding a towel to my hand. He frowned. “I’ll drive you.” Old Nora would have been grateful. New Nora just shook her head. “No.” His face darkened. He walked me to the door, his hand on the knob. “Nora,” he said, his voice low. “Don’t do unnecessary things to get attention.” There it was. When you don’t love someone, even their pain is an inconvenience. The last flickering ember of my love for him finally went out. 4 I dragged myself home at dawn. Declan was in the kitchen, cooking breakfast. In eight years, he had never cooked for me. Not once. Even when I was pulling double shifts, he’d call me to ask when I was coming home to make dinner. The smell of bacon and eggs made my stomach turn. I wasn’t qualified to eat his cooking. That was a premium subscription feature reserved for Lacey. I ignored the bowl of porridge he’d set out for me and grabbed a packet of instant oatmeal. Declan snatched the packet from my hand. “You just got back from the hospital—” “Declan!” Lacey’s voice drifted from the bedroom. “Come read to me! I want to sleep in a bit longer!” She poked her head out, looking at me with big, innocent doe eyes. “Sorry, Nora. He’s just so used to babying me. You don’t mind, do you?” Declan dropped the oatmeal packet. “Ignore her,” he muttered to me, and walked away. My phone didn’t ring, but his did. Over and over. “Hello, sir. Regarding the wedding venue… any other specific requests?” To ensure this bridge was thoroughly burned, I decided to leave them a parting gift. I sat at the table eating my dry toast. Declan walked in, holding Lacey’s hand. When he saw me, he dropped her hand like it was hot iron. “She… she gets dizzy in the mornings. I didn’t want her to walk into a wall.” I smiled pleasantly. “Good idea. Wouldn’t want her to bruise before the big day.” Declan stared at me, stunned. Usually, I fought for every scrap of affection. I used to start a war if I caught him texting another girl. Now? I was Zen. “Nora,” Lacey said, buttering a piece of toast. “Declan booked a bridal fitting for me this afternoon. It’s a surprise for… well, just for fun. You should come help me choose!” “Declan, you’re crazy,” she giggled, hitting his arm. “Making me wear a wedding dress right after I land!” I shook my head. “Can’t. Haven’t finished packing for London.” Declan slammed his fork down. “What is wrong with you? She doesn’t know anyone here. Would it kill you to be nice for one afternoon?” I set my spoon down gently. “I am moving to another continent. My flight is next week. I need to pack. Is that valid enough for you?” Declan deflated slightly. He looked down at his plate. “The flight isn’t until next week?” He was pushing me out the door, yet didn’t even know when I was leaving. When I didn’t apologize, his temper flared again. “Nora, you think I’m going to beg you to stay? You think that little breakup speech last night means anything?” He laughed, a cruel, sharp sound. “Fine! We’re done! Happy?” He grabbed Lacey’s hand and stormed out. I finished packing. I looked around the apartment and realized there was almost nothing of me here. I checked Declan’s social media. His pinned post was an announcement for a “Welcome Home” party tonight. A wedding reception in all but name. My flight was actually today. I’d lied about the date. I recorded a video message for the happy couple, scheduled it to send, and headed to the airport. As I sat on the tarmac, my phone began to buzz. Once. Twice. Then a continuous vibration. “Where are you?! Why did you post that video?” “It’s not what you think!” “Come back right now!” I declined the call and powered off the phone. The engines roared to life.

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All because I refused to cook a goddamn meal for the man Victoria had spent her whole life loving. That was why she pulled the plug on my mother’s treatment. I was burning up with a hundred-and-three-degree fever, kneeling in the freezing sleet outside her townhouse for an entire night, begging her. I called her phone over and over, my fingers numb and bleeding from the cold, until the line finally went dead. She had blocked me. By the time I dragged myself back to the oncology ward, my mother was already gone. She died in agonizing pain. And Victoria’s golden boy? He was posting a photo of the two of them on Instagram. In the picture, they were smiling, flushed with wine and the thrill of being together. The caption read: “If you’re the one waiting at the end of it all, I don’t mind that it took this long.” I went numb. I handled my mother’s cremation with hollowed-out efficiency, sent Victoria a text saying we were done, and tried to disappear. But she wouldn’t let me go. 1 “Victoria. We’re done.” I could endure the neglect. I could stomach the countless times Victoria cast me aside the second Spencer snapped his fingers. I could even swallow my pride and play the role of the dutiful, invisible boyfriend while she chased the ghost of her childhood sweetheart. But I would never—could never—forgive her for treating my mother’s life as collateral damage. She had cut off the funding and revoked the specialist care for my mom’s stage-four cancer without a second thought. She knew. She knew better than anyone that time was the only thing keeping my mother breathing, that every delayed hour was a death sentence. And she signed the order anyway. All because I wouldn’t play private chef for the man she was having an emotional affair with. It was absurd. It was so profoundly sick. In her eyes, a living, breathing human being was worth less than a moment of her lover’s fleeting comfort. My mother’s life weighed less than a plate of food. After the funeral, I went back to the house to pack the last of my things. It wasn’t until I was sitting in my cramped, temporary studio apartment that I realized I had left the locket behind. It was a delicate silver thing, hand-crafted for my eighteenth birthday. Mom had taken it to Father Thomas at our old parish to have it blessed. I had left it on the dresser in Victoria’s master bedroom. I had no choice. I had to go back to the estate. I thought the house would be empty. But the moment I pushed open the heavy oak doors, I found myself staring dead at Victoria and Spencer. They looked exhausted but glowing, designer luggage scattered across the marble foyer. God knows where they had just flown in from. Victoria caught sight of me, a cynical, mocking smirk twisting her lips. “So, you finally decided to crawl back?” “Spencer is going to crash here for a few days,” she ordered, tossing her coat onto a chair. “Go upstairs and get the guest suite ready.” I stared at her, genuinely marveling at the sheer audacity of her mind. Why was it that every time Spencer graced us with his presence, I was expected to play the help? Looking at them now, it felt like I was the beaten-down spouse being forced to fluff the pillows for the mistress. Before I could even formulate a rejection, Spencer flashed me a practiced, apologetic smile. He casually, almost territorially, draped his arm over Victoria’s shoulder. “Cole, man, I’m so sorry. Vic and I just got back from Gstaad, and the jet lag is brutal. We’re just too wiped to deal with hotels right now. You don’t mind taking care of us for a couple of days, do you?” “You’re cool with that, right?” A laugh tore out of my throat. It was jagged and ugly. So that was it. While my mother was suffocating in a hospital bed, they were skiing in the Swiss Alps. A week ago, Spencer had a sudden craving. He mentioned to Victoria that he wanted to try “Cole’s famous home cooking.” He wanted me to make him dinner. I had a fever that was cooking my brain, and I was terrified for my mother whose vitals were dropping. I politely declined. Spencer threw a subtle, passive-aggressive fit. I have no idea what he whispered to Victoria behind closed doors. But the next morning, I got the call from the hospital administrators. Victoria had revoked the medical mandate. The hospital was part of the Kensington Medical Group. Her family owned the board. They had the best oncologists in the country on payroll. Without Victoria’s explicit authorization, no one there would touch my mother. I called her until my phone battery died. I got nothing. Two days later, the delay in treatment caused massive organ failure. My mom died screaming. And Victoria? She was flying across the Atlantic with the love of her life. When my world was ending, she didn’t even bother to look back. While my mother was howling in the ICU, while I was freezing my knees off in the snow—what was she doing? She was curled up in his arms. My entire body was vibrating. I had to curl my hands into fists so tight my nails cut into my palms, just to keep myself from doing something I couldn’t undo. “Victoria, we are broken up.” My voice was eerily calm. “From this second forward, your life is none of my fucking business. And do not ever ask me to do another goddamn thing for Spencer.” 2 I bypassed them entirely, walking straight toward the master closet to retrieve the locket from the jewelry stand. When I crossed back through the living room, Victoria and Spencer were sitting thigh-to-thigh on the sofa. Victoria was swirling a glass of Cabernet. She fixed me with a dark, glacial stare. “Stop right there. Did I say you were dismissed?” “Do you think my house is a revolving door? You walk out when you throw a tantrum and waltz back in when it suits you?” “Cole, if you take one step out that door today, you can go ahead and plan your mother’s funeral.” I froze. My foot hovered over the carpet. She was… she was holding my mother hostage? Victoria knew exactly how much my mother meant to me. She was the center of my universe. And Victoria leveraged that. She knew that as long as my mom was sick, I couldn’t afford to leave. I was trapped. I had to be her obedient little dog, taking every ounce of disrespect, every blatant betrayal involving Spencer, because I needed her money to keep my mom alive. But she didn’t know the game was already over. I had buried my mother yesterday. There was nothing left keeping me here. Any thread tying me to Victoria Kensington had been incinerated in that crematorium. Misinterpreting my silence as surrender, Victoria lifted her chin, her tone dripping with arrogant triumph. “I’m starving. Go make dinner for me and Spencer. Do that, and I’ll pretend this little rebellion of yours never happened.” God. Who the hell did she think she was? I looked at her, my eyes entirely dead. “Are you deaf, Victoria? I said we are done. You want me to cook for you and your little side piece? You aren’t worth the dirt on my shoes.” I had never spoken to her like that. For years, I was the peacemaker. I smoothed out the rough edges. I swallowed my pride. But standing there, knowing my mother was in an urn on my cheap apartment counter, Victoria Kensington meant absolutely nothing to me. She was just a stranger in an expensive suit. Her face darkened instantly, a storm brewing behind her eyes. “Watch your mouth, Cole. My patience has limits.” I knew that. God, I knew that better than anyone. In six years, every fight ended with me apologizing. She never once tried to comfort me. Every dinner date, I arrived thirty minutes early because Victoria didn’t wait for people. I remembered our first hiking trip, back when things were new. I asked her to wait ten minutes while I grabbed us water from a crowded kiosk. When I got back, she was gone. She had just started the trail without me, leaving me in the dust without a text. From that day on, my eyes were glued to my watch. Victoria only had patience for Spencer. It didn’t matter if it was 3:00 AM; if Spencer called, she was in her car, speeding through the rain. If Spencer kept her waiting for hours, she sat there with a smile. Never a complaint. Never a sigh. Everyone in our social circle knew the truth: Victoria Kensington had been waiting for Spencer for six years. They met in prep school. They were the golden couple. Then Spencer took off for Europe, chasing art or business or whatever excuse he used to avoid settling down. And Victoria waited. And then… she bumped into me. I was just the placeholder. The understudy. I met her in my senior year of college. She was brilliant, radiant, untouchable. In a crowded room, she was the only thing I saw. I fell for her, hard and fast. But I was drowning. My mom had just gotten her diagnosis. I was working three jobs, trying to scrape together enough money for chemo. That was when Victoria swooped in. She paid the bills. She saved us. I thought it was fate. I thought we were soulmates, drawn together by tragedy and love. I didn’t know her heart was already occupied by a ghost everyone else seemed to know about. None of her friends told me. None of our mutuals warned me. I played the happy idiot for three years, convinced I was the love of her life. I even proposed. I bought a ring. I thought I was the luckiest man alive. Then, six months ago, Spencer moved back to the States. The day he landed was the day of my mom’s high-risk surgery. Victoria and I were in the car, heading to the hospital. Her phone rang. She took the call, pulled the car over, got out, and hailed a cab. She didn’t show up for the surgery. Because Spencer’s flight had touched down at JFK. Since that day, Victoria morphed into someone else. The canceled dates turned into blatant, unapologetic abandonments. Spencer started showing up at our house, claiming his territory, taking what he wanted. She couldn’t spare ten minutes to sit with me in the oncology waiting room. She couldn’t wait two minutes for me at a restaurant. On our anniversary, I woke up violently ill. I popped ibuprofen, praying the fever would break. Victoria hadn’t even come home the night before. I was so dizzy I couldn’t stand. The migraine was blinding. I couldn’t even see the screen of my phone to call for help. Victoria went to the restaurant I had booked. She sat there for exactly ten minutes before calling me. “You’re two minutes late. Where the hell are you?” I tried to ask her to call me an ambulance. She scoffed, called me pathetic, and hung up. Leaving me alone on the bathroom floor, too weak to dial 911. That night, my fever finally broke. I opened Instagram. The first thing on my feed was a photo of her and Spencer, shopping on Fifth Avenue. She was smiling a smile I hadn’t seen in years. She couldn’t wait two minutes for me. She abandoned me when I was half-dead on our floor. But she was perfectly happy waiting three hours for Spencer to try on watches. The memory fractured as Spencer stepped in front of Victoria, looking at me with feigned disappointment. “Cole, listen. Even if you don’t want to cook for us, there’s no need to talk to Vic like that. Throwing around the word ‘breakup’ every time you throw a tantrum… it’s toxic, man.” I let out a harsh breath, shaking my head. “Who the fuck do you think you are? This is between her and me. Keep your mouth shut.” Spencer’s smile faltered. He immediately dropped his gaze, playing the victim perfectly. “Cole… I’m sorry if I overstepped. I just…” As he spoke, he took a clumsy, theatrical step forward. He “tripped,” his hand jerking out. The full glass of red wine splashed directly onto the silver locket in my hand. Spencer let out an exaggerated gasp, grabbing his sleeve to frantically dab at the metal. In the chaos, his hand shoved mine. The locket slipped. It hit the marble floor. The clasp snapped. The delicate silver chain broke apart, the tiny beads and religious medals scattering across the stone with a sickening, chaotic clatter. The jade cross my mother had worn around her neck for twenty years—the one housed inside the locket—shattered right down the middle. I snapped my head up. Through the mess of apologies, I caught the fleeting, venomous smirk in Spencer’s eyes. He did it on purpose. Something inside me—the last remaining thread of my sanity—snapped. Before I even realized my feet were moving, my fist was already connecting with his jaw. 3 Neither of them expected the violence. The room plunged into a suffocating, echoing silence. The smack of bone on bone seemed to ring off the high ceilings. It took a few seconds for reality to set in. Victoria lunged forward, grabbing Spencer’s arm to steady him. When she looked at me, her eyes were absolute murder. “Cole! Have you lost your damn mind?! Who gave you the right to touch him?!” Spencer cradled his cheek, his voice trembling perfectly. “Cole, man, I swear it was an accident. I’ll pay for the necklace, whatever it costs…” “Heh… hahahaha…” The laughter bubbled up from my chest, raw and hysterical. Tears blurred my vision, threatening to spill over, but I forced my eyes wide, glaring at Spencer with pure, unadulterated hatred. “Pay? Pay for it?!” My voice cracked, echoing in the massive room. “With what, Spencer? Are you going to give me a life for a life?!” My mother was dead. This was the only thing I had left of her. And now it was ruined. Just like everything else. Victoria scoffed. The sound was so cold it chilled the blood in my veins. “It’s a cheap piece of junk, Cole. It broke. Get over it. I’ll buy you a thousand of them.” Before I could react, she reached down, snatched the broken half of the locket from the floor, and threw it hard against the marble. But that wasn’t enough. In her designer heels, she brought her foot down. The stiletto heel dug into the fragile silver casing, crushing it completely flat. I stared at the mangled metal, my brain misfiring. The grief, the rage, the profound exhaustion of the last six years surged up, threatening to blow my skull apart. I threw myself toward her, my voice tearing from my throat. “Stop! Get off of it!” Victoria didn’t even flinch. She just kicked me back, a sharp thrust of her heel into my shin. Then, right in front of my eyes, she ground her heel in again, twisting it until the silver was nothing but a deformed piece of scrap. When she was finished, she looked down at me, her expression completely detached. “Apologize to Spencer.” I collapsed onto my knees. My hands were shaking uncontrollably as I reached out to gather the jagged shards of the locket and the shattered jade. The sharp edges sliced into my fingertips. Blood beaded up, mixing with the tears falling from my chin, but I couldn’t feel the pain. I just tried, frantically, to piece it back together. When I didn’t answer, Victoria’s jaw clenched. She reached down to grab my collar. I whipped my head around. The look I gave her—the absolute, soul-deep revulsion radiating from my eyes—made her hand stop in mid-air. She instinctively pulled back. “I won’t say it again, Cole.” In that moment, I hated myself more than I hated her. Mom, I’m so useless. I couldn’t even protect the last thing you gave me. Victoria seemed to register the shift in me. She opened her mouth, the anger faltering slightly, but Spencer cut her off. He tugged on her sleeve, whimpering. “Vic, my jaw is killing me. Can you look at it?” A bruise was already forming, angry and purple, where my knuckles had connected. Victoria’s eyes darted to his face, softening for a fraction of a second, before snapping back to me, the fury returning tenfold. “Cole, I have been way too lenient with you. I am giving you one last chance. Apologize to Spencer. Now.” It was an ultimatum, heavy with threat. “And if I don’t?” I asked, my voice barely a whisper, holding her gaze. She narrowed her eyes, delivering the killing blow. “Do you just not care if your mother lives or dies anymore?” I let out a breath. And then, I smiled. It was a broken, tired smile. “I’m laughing at how stupid you are, Victoria. Do you really think I’m the same guy you can just push around? You think you can just snap your fingers and I’ll drop to my knees? If you had bothered to make a single phone call, you wouldn’t be standing there making threats you can’t cash.” If my mother were still breathing, I wouldn’t just apologize to Spencer. I would wash his feet if it meant keeping her safe. But she was gone. Victoria had no leverage left. She had nothing. Spencer stepped forward, his voice rising in panic. “Vic, I told you! I told you guys like him are manipulative liars!” “If his mom was really that sick, why is he acting so calm right now? I bet he’s been faking the whole thing just to drain your bank account!” “Shut your fucking mouth!” I roared, the sound ripping from my chest, cutting his slander dead. “You parasitic piece of shit!” Victoria had seen the reality of my mother’s illness. She had been there when the chemotherapy made her vomit blood. She knew the sacrifices I made. But as Spencer called me a liar, she stood there. Silent. Complicit. And then, she delivered the final verdict. “Cole, this is the last time. Say you’re sorry to Spencer, and I will pretend none of this happened. Your mother keeps her doctors.” 4 “Go to hell.” That did it. The ice in her eyes shattered. She let out a harsh, incredulous laugh, still fully believing she held all the cards. “I got your mother the best oncologist on the East Coast. If you swallow your pride right now, I’ll make sure the treatments continue.” “But you’re really pushing it, Cole. It seems like you need to learn the hard way.” She pulled out her phone, her manicured thumb tapping aggressively at the screen. I watched her with a dead, hollowed-out expression. There was a sick part of me that wanted her to press call. I wanted her to realize how monumentally stupid she was. I wanted her to feel the floor drop out from under her. When I didn’t drop to the floor and beg, her finger trembled slightly. But her pride won. She hit the dial button, calling her executive assistant. The phone was on speaker. The assistant’s voice came through, frantic and confused. “Ms. Kensington? Mr. Cole’s mother… wait, did you not know? She passed away.”

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “394633”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

I was caught red-handed by the owner of a Rolls-Royce in the parking lot while trying to slip him flyers. What’s even more embarrassing is that the owner turned out to be my ex-boyfriend from five years ago, the one I dumped because he was poor. What’s that saying again? It’s not that I’m afraid of exes being awful, it’s that I’m afraid of exes who are successful! My ex smiled and said, “Now that I’m rich, you have no reason to dump me again, right?” 1 The rain was a fine, freezing mist, slicking the pavement of the private parking garage. I shoved another flyer under the windshield wiper of the idling Rolls-Royce Phantom, tugging the hood of my cheap plastic poncho down to shield my face. Even the bodyguard holding an umbrella near the driver’s door was wearing a suit that cost more than my life’s net worth. I awkwardly shifted the canvas bag full of flyers behind my back, calculating the exact angle required to snatch the neon paper back and vanish into the concrete labyrinth without being noticed. But I was too slow. A hand, pale and elegant, reached out from the cracked window and slid the flyer out from under the wiper blade. “’Lonely? Need a listener? Voice companionship, ten dollars for thirty minutes.’” A short, derisive scoff cut through the damp air. “Harper. Is this really what you’ve been reduced to?” Oh, God. I wanted to know the answer to that question myself. Harper, the brilliant overachiever in college. Harper, the cold, pragmatic realist who dumped her dirt-poor boyfriend without a second thought to throw herself into the arms of a trust-fund heir. By all accounts, my future was supposed to be bright and lined with silk. How the hell had I ended up at the bottom of the barrel? And as if my spectacular failure wasn’t tragic enough, why did the ex-boyfriend I ruthlessly discarded have to suddenly be filthy rich? I kept my chin tucked to my chest, my voice muffled by the plastic collar of my poncho. “Sorry, man. You’ve got the wrong girl.” I spun on my heel to bolt, but a long arm shot out, blocking my path. The black umbrella didn’t quite cover his outstretched arm. I watched the freezing rain bloom into tiny, dark flowers against the fabric of his sleeve, disappearing instantly into the expensive, non-waterproof wool. Then, Cole’s voice drifted over, cool and detached. “Harper. I’ll pay ten times that. I’m buying an hour.” Look at this. A plot straight out of a trashy soap opera. The destitute boy, ruthlessly abandoned in his youth, returns as a billionaire, eager to use his newfound wealth to humiliate the wicked woman who broke his heart. “Not for sale,” I muttered. I might be desperate for cash, but I wasn’t an idiot. “Are you sure?” Cole’s tone was dangerously slow. “This is a private garage. The fine for soliciting and distributing flyers is five hundred dollars. Do you want me to call security?” My neck stayed rigidly locked, staring at the concrete until I thought my cervical spine might snap. “Your time starts now. You have fifty-nine minutes.” Cole gave a microscopic nod to his bodyguard. The heavy door swung open. “Get in.” 2 I climbed into Cole’s car. Years ago, I had been the girl who callously declared, I’d rather cry in a Porsche than be happy on the bus. Now, thanks to peddling cheap flyers, I was sitting in a car that made a Porsche look like a toy. But the owner of this car was the ex-boyfriend who hated me down to his marrow. The social mortification was a physical weight on my chest. How was he going to tear me apart? Would he call me a gold digger? Tell me I got exactly what I deserved? As my mind spun, vividly imagining Cole stepping all over my remaining dignity, my nose tickled. I couldn’t stop it. A violent sneeze ripped through me. A thick, blindingly white towel immediately hit me square in the face. “Dry yourself off. Don’t ruin my leather.” Fierce. I rubbed the dampness from my face and hair, noticing that the heat was already blasting. The biting cold of the garage melted away. He leaned back in the seat next to me, eyes closed, silent. For a long stretch, I wondered if he had actually fallen asleep. I glanced at my cheap wristwatch. He had the perfect opportunity to stand on the moral high ground and verbally eviscerate his heartless ex, and he was sleeping through it? His brain must be short-circuiting. I decided to quietly excuse myself. But the moment my weight shifted to rise, the man beside me opened his eyes. His voice was colder than the rain outside. “You have thirty-five minutes left.” Jumpscare. He wasn’t asleep. I sank back into the plush leather, unable to hold back anymore. “Cole, what exactly do you want from me?” If he wanted revenge, couldn’t he just make it quick? He didn’t even bother to fully raise his eyelids. “Just shut up.” I snapped my mouth shut, but my eyes betrayed me, drifting over to his face. The boyish softness was gone, replaced by sharp, unforgiving angles. His skin was paler, the chest beneath his tailored shirt looked solid and tense, and I swear his legs were inches longer than I remembered. Damn it. How was this bastard still so gorgeous? “Harper.” The man with his eyes closed suddenly spoke, the tips of his ears flushing a suspicious shade of pink. “Turn your head around.” I whipped my gaze toward the window. “How do you know I’m looking at you?” “Because your hot breath is blasting directly onto my forehead. Obviously.” I swallowed hard. “Sorry.” A few minutes later, the car rolled to a smooth stop. The window hummed down. Cole, who had been perfectly still, suddenly sat up straight, pointing a long finger at a bustling, high-end retail street outside. “See that? My commercial real estate.” He waved his hand. The car glided forward, stopping a few blocks later outside a towering, ultra-luxury residential high-rise. “The development I built.” Down into another subterranean garage. “My car collection.” Finally, we drove out to the edge of the city, stopping near a sprawling, meticulously kept orchard in the valley. “My hundred-acre cherry orchard.” Cole arched an eyebrow, his voice dripping with venomous satisfaction. “I can juice them, I can dry them, or I can let them rot on the branches. I do whatever I want with them.” I stared at the endless rows of trees. “Why are you showing me this?” “Pure spite,” Cole answered, clean and sharp. “When you dumped me for Brooks, I thought you were at least stepping up in the world. Looks like I overestimated you.” “I doubt you ever imagined the broke kid you couldn’t stand the sight of would be sitting where I am today.” His dark eyes locked onto mine. “Harper, this is your karma.” 3 Dammit. He really nailed the delivery. When he finally let me out near my neighborhood, I furiously plucked two massive handfuls of cherries from the branches near the gate and stuffed them into my coat pockets, just to feel a shred of vindication. I finished handing out the rest of my flyers and trudged back to my apartment building, only to freeze. Smeared across the brick exterior in glaring red spray paint was a single word: CONDEMNED. Eviction. I slapped a hand over my mouth. Tears, hot and heavy, spilled over my lashes, my shoulders shaking as a sob trapped itself in my throat. My landlord, a burly guy in a stained undershirt, clapped a heavy hand on my shoulder. “What the hell are you crying for? It’s my building getting torn down. Pack your crap and get out. And when are you paying the three months of rent you owe me?” I wiped my face, sniffing aggressively. “Look, since I’ve rented this place for so long, don’t I technically get a cut of the developer’s buyout money?” He smiled. He told me to go to hell. Beautiful, poetic English. Thirty minutes later, because I was flat broke and refusing to leave, my landlord dragged me to the local police precinct. Thirty minutes after that, Cole walked into the exact same precinct to file a report because my cheap paper flyer had jammed the window motor of his Rolls-Royce. Cole and I stared at each other from across the fluorescent-lit room. Even the desk sergeant looked confused. “Harper,” Cole said, pinching the bridge of his nose. “You didn’t need to go to these extremes just to try and get me back.” Good God. Kill me now. It was literally my first day handing out flyers! I didn’t know the paper was that thick! 4 Cole bailed me out anyway. And, for some inexplicable reason, he paid off my back rent. “You’re going to be in debt either way. Might as well be in debt to me,” he said. The city neon blurred into streaks of light outside the passenger window. The scent of cedarwood—so familiar, so maddening—filled the enclosed space. His voice was buried in the dark, stripped of any readable emotion. “I’ll pay you back.” “Pay me back?” He tilted his head, his gaze sweeping over me in the dim light. “How?” I immediately crossed my arms over my chest, suddenly hyper-aware of my surroundings. I might be desperately poor, but I had boundaries! He let out a dry, disgusted laugh and turned his eyes back to the road. “In your dreams.” “The window repair, the rent—every single cent goes on your tab.” Right. Of course. With his current net worth and that face, he could have any woman in the city. There was absolutely no reason for him to pick up the trash he threw away five years ago. When we pulled up to the curb outside my condemned building, I quietly thanked him for the ride. He held out a hand, palm up. “Uber fare for this distance is thirty-two bucks.” I stared at him, aghast. “Did you think your ‘thank you’ was legal tender?” His face was stone. When he saw my freezing, trembling hands fail to produce even a few quarters from my pockets, he waved me off. “Forget it. Add it to the tab.” He rattled off a string of ten digits. “My number. You transfer the installment on the first of every month, and you send me a screenshot.” I nodded. “Did you memorize it?” I nodded again. It was the same number he had in college. I knew it by heart. The tension in his jaw seemed to soften for a fraction of a second before the window rolled up, severing us. I watched his taillights disappear into the mist before turning toward the stairwell. Just then, something massive hurled out of a second-story window. It hit the overgrown bushes with a sickening thud. I ran over. It was my duffel bag. My landlord leaned out the window above. “Your rent’s paid, my building’s getting leveled. We’re square. Get out tonight.” Before I could speak, a cascade of my meager belongings rained down on me, scattering across the wet grass. “Hey! At least let me come up and pack properly!” I yelled into the dark. “Yeah right, so you can squat in the bathroom? I changed the locks! Don’t make me call the cops again!” The window slammed shut. The blinds snapped down, and the lights clicked off. I was left standing in the mud, picking up the pieces of my life. There wasn’t much. A few worn-out clothes, some cheap toiletries, and a photograph from years ago—Cole and me. Faded t-shirts, bright, unburdened smiles. My hands shaking from the cold, I quickly slid the photo behind a picture of just myself, hiding it inside a wooden frame with cracked glass. Once everything was shoved back into the bag, I sat down on the concrete steps of the open-air stairwell. The streetlights flickered with an ugly yellow glow. I could barely make out a few stars through the overcast sky. I tried to hype myself up, making mental plans of where I could sleep, what I could do. But the bone-deep exhaustion pulled me under, and I fell asleep sitting against the brick wall. The next morning, the world came into focus as two incredibly long legs in tailored trousers planted themselves in front of me. I blinked through the haze and mumbled, “Cole?” “Yeah.” The adrenaline spiked, and I shot up straight. It wasn’t a dream. “What are you doing here?” “You didn’t add me on iMessage,” he said, staring down at me. His eyes were pitch-black and unreadable. “Reason?” “Oh.” My brain was running on a delay. “My phone died. Sorry. On the first of the month, I’ll send the money, I promise.” He ignored the apology, his gaze drifting from my shivering frame to the bulging duffel bag beside me. “What’s this?” “Ah.” I rolled my deadened shoulder. “I’m moving.” His lips pressed into a harsh, thin line. His brows snapped together, and it took him a long moment to force out the words. “Running away?” “What? No.” I shook my head frantically. “I’m just moving.” “Where?” “I… haven’t figured that out yet.” “So, you’re running. Where’s Brooks? Is he just leaving you out on the street?” “We broke up a long time ago.” Cole stared at me, his eyes heavy and dark. Without another word, he reached down, grabbed the strap of my duffel bag, and started walking toward his car. “Cole!” I scrambled after him, my legs numb and uncooperative. “My stuff is garbage! It’s not worth anything, it won’t cover my debt!” He didn’t answer. “I swear on my life I’ll pay you back!” But my short legs were no match for his stride. By the time I reached the curb, my bag was already in the trunk of the Rolls-Royce. “Look, man, that’s everything I own in the world. Please don’t throw it away.” I stood by the door, hobbling slightly, pressing my palms together in prayer. He popped the passenger door open. “Get in.” Huh? He looked at me over the roof of the car. “If you want your stuff, get in.” I numbly climbed into the leather seat. He didn’t speak to me for the entire drive, not until we pulled through the gates of an aggressively modern, stunningly expensive piece of architecture. “Where are we?” “My house.” His voice was his usual brand of cold detachment. “Harper, your moral compass is practically nonexistent. I don’t trust you. To make sure my money doesn’t vanish into thin air, you’re staying where I can keep an eye on you until the debt is paid.” What? “Live… here?” “Rent is two grand a month. Added to your tab.” “No, stop, I can’t afford that!” I lunged for my duffel bag in his hand. My crappy apartment had been eight hundred dollars! He lifted the bag effortlessly out of my reach. “If you agree to do some light housekeeping, we might be able to negotiate.” “But—” “If you cook, we can knock off a little more.” “Look, I—” “If you feed the cat and walk the dog, I might even end up owing you money.” I stared at him. “Deal.” 5 By some cosmic joke, I was living with my ex-boyfriend. Five years ago, he was penniless, and I kicked him to the curb. Five years later, he was drowning in money, and I was his indentured servant. Life comes at you fast. Cole showed me to my room. It was sprawling, flooded with natural light. Central heating, an en-suite bathroom, endless hot water. No roaches, no fear of rats chewing through my bags in the middle of the night. “The sheets and duvet are brand new,” Cole said, dropping my bag on the floor. His phone buzzed. He took the call, speaking in low, rapid business jargon for a few minutes before hanging up and looking at me. “I have to head to the office.” I nodded, watching him walk toward the door. At the entryway, he programmed my fingerprint into the smart lock. “I’ll be back for dinner around seven.” He paused, his hand on the handle. “You can clear your schedule for that, right?” I nodded again. Once he was gone, I unpacked my few things and immediately opened my gig-economy apps. I picked up a promo shift at a nearby grocery store handing out milk samples. The pay was daily. I spent eight hours in a suffocatingly hot, plush cow costume. By the time I stripped it off, I was dizzy and on the verge of a heatstroke. But I had a crisp hundred-dollar bill. I bought groceries on the way back, took a scalding shower, and got to work in his massive, stainless-steel kitchen. Just as the chicken soup started to simmer, the electronic chime of the front door echoed through the house. I glanced at the clock on the stove. It wasn’t even close to seven. Assuming Cole was home early, I popped my head around the corner to say hi. Instead, I froze. There was a woman slipping off her heels in the foyer. Jesus. Cole hadn’t mentioned he was having company. As she straightened up, the blood drained from my face. It wasn’t just any woman. It was Vanessa. Beautiful, polished Vanessa. The girl from our university who had thrown herself at Cole relentlessly, even when she knew perfectly well that he and I were together. She jumped when she saw me, her perfectly manicured hand flying to her chest. As her eyes adjusted and recognition set in, her expression morphed into pure, unadulterated disgust. “Harper?” I forced a polite, dead-eyed smile. “Hi, Vanessa.” She looked me up and down, taking in my wet hair and oversized t-shirt. Her brow furrowed into a tight knot. “What the hell are you doing here?” The tone was venomous. As far as she was concerned, I was a rat in her kitchen. “I owe Cole some money, so I’m staying here temporarily to pay off the debt.” I figured if she had the passcode to his house, they were deeply involved. I needed to de-escalate immediately. “Owe Cole money?” She repeated the words slowly, then let out a sharp, mocking laugh. “You? The girl who practically tripped over herself to leave him for Brooks because Cole’s wallet wasn’t thick enough?” She stepped closer, her eyes narrowing. “Let me guess. You saw he made it big, got jealous, and now you’re trying to claw your way back into his bed?” I kept my face perfectly blank. “No.” “No? It’s been five years. Why on earth would you suddenly owe him money? Did you track him down, cry about how pathetic your life is, and use this little ‘debt’ scheme to squat in his house?” She scoffed. “God, you are so repulsive.” I took a slow breath. “This is between Cole and me. If you have an issue with it, take it up with him.” I turned on my heel to walk back to the stove. The soup was going to boil over. Before I could take three steps, a freezing wall of water slammed into the back of my head, soaking my shirt and dripping down my spine. “Have some dignity, Harper!” Vanessa screamed, holding an empty crystal vase. “Cole hates you. He told me he despises traitors, and he will never forgive what you did. The only reason he’s letting you stay here is to watch you humiliate yourself. He wants to see the pathetic little gold-digger grovel. Do you really want to stay here and play the clown?” She dropped the vase onto a rug with a muffled thud. “If I were you, I’d crawl back into whatever hole you came out of so you stop making the rest of us sick!” The cold water dripped steadily off my nose and chin. I wiped my eyes with the back of my hand, calmly picked up a half-full glass of water from the island, and chucked the contents directly into her face. Vanessa shrieked, stumbling backward in pure shock. She clearly hadn’t expected the rat to bite back. She cursed violently, frantically wiping at her face. In her panic, one of her false eyelashes peeled off, hanging precariously from her eyelid. My eyes were dead. “Like I said, this is between me and him. I don’t owe you an explanation.” “Fine! You want to play it like that?” Furious, she ripped open her designer purse and pulled out a platinum credit card, hurling it at my chest. “You owe him? This has ten grand on it. Is that enough? I’ll pay him for you!” When I didn’t react, she started pulling out card after card, snapping them at me like throwing stars. One clipped my cheekbone. “I don’t care what sick game you’re playing, Harper. You walked away five years ago. Do not come back and try to ruin us!” Her voice was shrill, echoing off the high ceilings. “He is my boyfriend!” Boyfriend. The word stung, just a little. It had been five years. I didn’t expect him to live like a monk. But if he had a girlfriend, what the hell was he doing locking me in his house just to set me up for this kind of humiliation? “Harper, I brought the Rainier cherries you like. Try not to embarrass yourself.” The front door clicked shut. The orchestrator of this little domestic nightmare had arrived. Cole walked in, slipping his shoes off, looking perfectly at ease with a brown paper bag in his hands. He looked up, finally taking in the scene: Vanessa and me, both dripping wet, standing in the middle of his living room like drowned rats. His brows snapped together. He dropped the bag on the console and crossed the room in three long strides. “Cole,” Vanessa started, her voice suddenly trembling and fragile, a masterclass in playing the victim. Cole didn’t even look at her. He bypassed her completely, coming straight to me. His large hands came up, framing my face, his thumbs brushing over my wet cheeks, his eyes scanning every inch of my features. His voice was tight, laced with an urgency I hadn’t heard in years. “What happened to your face? Why are you soaking wet?” I pushed his hands away. My spine was rigid, my smile perfectly polite and entirely hollow. “There’s chicken soup on the stove. You and your girlfriend enjoy it. Consider it interest on the loan. No need to thank me.” I turned, walked into my bedroom, grabbed my duffel bag, and marched straight out the front door. 6 I ran until my lungs burned. The early spring wind cut through my wet clothes like glass. The streetlamps flickered overhead, blurring together into streaks of yellow. Crap. I had been running blind. I stopped, spinning around on the empty pavement. I had no idea where I was. Panic flared in my chest for a second before a voice drifted through the dark. “Lost?” I whipped around. Cole was standing at the end of the block, wearing a heavy camel-hair coat. The tips of his ears were red from the cold. Before I could run again, he closed the distance between us, shrugging off his heavy coat and aggressively wrapping it around me, swaddling me like a burrito. Then, he lifted a hand and flicked me hard on the forehead. “I knew it. Harper, your character is fundamentally flawed. You’re entirely untrustworthy. Trying to skip town before the debt is paid.” He flicked me again for good measure. “Little liar.” I rubbed my forehead, furious but genuinely shocked that he had run after me instead of comforting his girlfriend. Was he really that desperate for my two thousand dollars? Cole sighed, crouching down in front of me. He unlaced his impeccably polished leather oxfords and placed them by my feet. “Not only do you try to skip out on a debt, you try to steal my slippers while doing it.” I looked down. I was wearing his oversized, open-toed house slides. My ten toes were bright cherry-red from the freezing asphalt. Honestly, the adrenaline had been pumping so hard I hadn’t even realized I left the house in them. “Let’s go.” When I didn’t move, he literally picked up my foot and shoved it into his massive, warm leather shoe. He stood up, looking down at me. “Pay your debts. Come home for dinner.” I stared at his feet, now shoved into the flimsy house slides. It was objectively ridiculous, but I couldn’t find it in me to laugh. “Cole, your girlfriend said she’d pay off my debt.” “Girlfriend? Who? Vanessa?” He let out a dark, mocking laugh. “She’s not.” He paused, looking away. “I’ve been single.” What? Cole? Single? With that face, that body, and that bank account? Cole reached out and gently pushed my jaw up, closing my gaping mouth. “If I wasn’t single, do you think I’d be insane enough to move you into my house? Am I suicidal?” His thumb brushed my cheekbone again, lingering this time. “And for the record, if someone throws something at your face, throw something back. Don’t just stand there and take it. Are you stupid?” He reached into his pocket, pulled out a massive, flawless cherry, and popped it past my lips like he was pacifying a toddler. “It’s sweet. Eat it and you won’t hurt as much.” I chewed stubbornly, my voice muffled. “I didn’t throw anything at her face. I threw water at her.” I thought I’d see a flash of pity for Vanessa in his eyes, something to prove he was lying. But there was none. If anything, he looked profoundly satisfied. “Good. If I’m not around, I can’t have people bullying you.” He grabbed my duffel bag and started walking. I had no choice but to follow, shuffling clumsily in his massive shoes. “But she had the code to your house. Girls don’t just walk into guys’ houses.” “That’s because my passcode is incredibly stupid.” “What is it? 1-1-1-1-1-1?” “No.” Cole looked back at me over his shoulder. In the dim light, his dark eyes lost that icy, untouchable edge. “My childhood pig’s birthday.” Excuse me? He raised pigs? “She still called herself your girlfriend!” “A lot of people call themselves that. Doesn’t change the fact that I’m still…” He trailed off, the words dying in his throat. We walked in silence for a long time before he finally spoke again. “Harper, you just have terrible taste.” I didn’t know how to respond.

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The first time I took a boyfriend home, the road grew narrower, the trees grew thicker, and the air grew heavy with the smell of damp earth and isolation. He grew terrified. As we approached the Border Patrol checkpoint near the jagged edge of the South Texas brush, he did something I never expected: he leaped out of the moving truck. He scrambled toward the officers, sobbing, clutching a bewildered agent’s tactical vest, screaming that I was trying to sell him into a cartel labor camp. After that, I stopped telling people where I grew up. Then came the new guy. Three months in, he told me he wanted to take me to his hometown. I handed him my ID, my phone, and a smile of twenty-four-karat trust. When I opened my eyes and saw the sun-bleached, lawless cluster of shacks near the Mexican border—a place where the law ends and the “disappeared” begin—I didn’t scream. I smiled. If you don’t hunt me, I won’t hunt you. But if you try to sell me? I’ll sell you back to the devil ten thousand times over. 1. After we hopped off the cross-country bus, I told him the itinerary: a Greyhound, a local shuttle, a rusted-out van, a couple of dirt bikes, and finally, a literal horse-drawn cart. If we timed it right, we’d hit his “home” by 9:00 PM. My boyfriend’s face was ashen, a sickly shade of gray beneath his designer stubble, but he managed a weary, trembling smile. “Babe,” he whispered. “We’re serious about each other, right? This is… this is really your family’s place?” “Of course,” I said, patting his hand. “You’ll see when we get there.” He seemed even more terrified now. Maybe it was the sheer scale of the mountains, the way they loomed over us like silent judges. It was a little bit overwhelming, I suppose. The van was nearly empty, bouncing violently over the unpaved ruts. A few locals sat in the back, speaking a thick, melodic Tex-Mex dialect that tasted of dust and tequila. One guy with a full sleeve of tattoos—let’s call him Big Rick—started chatting with his buddy. Thinking my city-boy boyfriend couldn’t understand a word, they began openly mocking his thin frame and soft hands. Rick even reached out and squeezed my boyfriend’s bicep, tsk-tsking with a patronizing smirk. You don’t need a translator to know what a “tsk” means. It’s the universal sound for pathetic. I glared at the man, snapping a warning in the same sharp, local dialect. Rick grunted and went silent, looking out the window. I slept through the next leg of the trip. My boyfriend, however, couldn’t even blink. He stared out the window as if he were looking for a sniper. When I finally drifted awake, I saw him frantically sending his GPS location to his mother. Probably describing the “rustic charm” of the wilderness. It was the hottest part of the afternoon. Not a single living thing moved in the brush. The road was a mess of jagged limestone and red clay—our local specialty—so the van couldn’t go more than twenty miles per hour. Through the cracked windshield, I saw a tattered American flag snapping in the wind ahead. My boyfriend suddenly nudged me. “Hey, Nora… give me your ID. I’ll keep it for you.” “You lose everything, babe. It’s safer in my bag.” He insisted, his voice tight. “No, really. Let me hold onto it. For safekeeping.” I dug through my messy tote bag, grumbling about how hard it was to find. “Just let me keep it, okay? It’s buried in here.” “Babe, just find it. We have so much gear; I don’t want it getting crushed or lost in the shuffle.” After a minute of digging, I fished it out and handed it over. His voice instantly loosened. “It’s so stifling in here. I’m going to crack the window… I feel a bit carsick.” My heart went out to him. I reached over and helped him slide the heavy glass pane all the way back. The next second, he moved like a panicked animal. He gripped the frame, swung his legs out, and threw himself out of the moving van. Good God! The mountain road was a jagged mess of rocks. One wrong move and he’d be a collection of broken bones. “Stop! Stop the car!” I screamed at the driver. “My guy just jumped out!” “Don’t run!” I shrieked at my limping boyfriend, who was already scrambling into the brush. “Come back!” The more I called out to him with genuine concern, the faster he ran on that twisted ankle. Honestly, I hadn’t seen him move that fast when we were training for a 5K last spring. Luckily, he ran straight toward a Border Patrol station. I caught up to him, breathless, only to find him clutching a burly, confused agent. He was practically buried in the man’s chest, refusing to let go. “Officer, you have to save me! It’s her! They… they’re human traffickers! All of them!” I stood there, stunned. My house was a little remote, sure. And yes, it was uncomfortably close to the lawless border zones. But how did he manage to hallucinate a quiet Ivy League grad like me into a cartel boss? The agents checked our IDs. They checked the van. They even knew the driver—he’d lived there for forty years. But it didn’t matter. My boyfriend insisted on staying at the station. He called his parents to come drive twelve hours to “rescue” him. I looked at him, disgusted. “You’re a grown man. Have some backbone!” He wouldn’t even meet my eye. He just kept muttering the same thing: “The mountains are too scary. I want to go home.” That night, I walked into my house empty-handed. My parents looked up from the table. “Where’s the boy?” I sighed. “He jumped out of a window and ran away.” They didn’t say anything. They just piled an extra mountain of brisket onto my plate. After dinner, my older brother, Silas, stared out at the dark, looming silhouettes of the peaks. “Don’t sweat it, Nora,” he said. “That’s only your first one. I’ve had three girlfriends ditch me before we even hit the county line.” Well, at least I wasn’t the only one. When the holidays ended, I went back to the city. I planned to lock my heart away forever. But, being the fool I am, I fell in love again. Three months in, my new boyfriend, Lucas, suggested we go to his hometown. “Babe, you really don’t mind that I’m from the middle of nowhere? You’re willing to go back there with me?” “Of course I don’t mind,” I said, showing him my 24K trust. “Let’s buy the tickets today. We leave tomorrow!” I made sure he knew I had absolute faith in him. After all, it’s a civilized country. How many criminals could there really be? “Here,” I said, handing him everything. “My ID, my ticket, my phone. You keep them all. I trust you completely.” 2. After we got off the bus, Lucas repeated the same grueling itinerary: shuttle, van, dirt bike, horse-cart. He told me we’d arrive around 9:00 PM. I nodded obediently. “Sure. I’m going to sleep in the van. Don’t wake me up.” He saw how chill I was and rubbed his hands together excitedly. “Don’t worry, babe. Get some rest. I’ve got everything handled.” Ever since the last heartbreak, I’d been playing a part. I didn’t use my local slang; I spoke with the polished, neutral accent of a news anchor. I even took a speech elective to perfect it. I was committed to being a “city girl.” Lucas thought I grew up in some cookie-cutter suburb. I used that persona to prove I was “open-minded” and “didn’t look down on rural folks.” I figured I’d wait to see just how remote his place was before I told him I was basically his neighbor. The van jolted over the rugged mountain passes. I leaned my head on Lucas’s shoulder and pretended to snore. Besides the driver, a guy named Bo, we’d picked up another couple. The guy mentioned his family lived somewhere out in the sticks, too. As we drove, the landscape began to look familiar. My heart started racing with excitement. This was my town! Wait… was Lucas a scholarship kid from the next valley over? I remembered hearing about a guy who’d gotten into a top-tier school a year before me. No way. Could it be? He was the “golden boy” from Cattle Creek. I was the “smart girl” from Devil’s Ridge. It was destiny! My mother would never have to worry about a boyfriend looking down on our dusty little corner of the world again. I couldn’t stop grinning. The other girl in the van, Sadie, looked miserable. From the moment she boarded, she’d been white-knuckling her backpack, her face pale and drawn. She reminded me of my ex. To lighten the mood, I looked out at the rolling blue ridges. “Lucas, growing up here must have been amazing. I’m so jealous.” Lucas’s jaw twitched. He didn’t answer. Bo, the driver with the blurred tattoos, caught my eye in the rearview mirror. He and Lucas exchanged a look—a silent, confused question: Does this girl seriously like this hellhole? “How much longer?” Sadie’s voice was brittle. “Almost there,” her boyfriend, Cody, said. “Just over the next ridge. Then we switch to the cart for the final stretch.” “A cart?” Sadie’s voice spiked. “You said your family lived right outside the city!” The air in the van turned to ice. I tried to play peacemaker. “Hey, the country is great! Fresh air, honest people. Don’t worry, Sadie. It’s not like both our boyfriends are secretly human traffickers, right?” 3. Across the valley, past the river that marked the border, you could see the flickering lights of the “no-man’s-land” villages. The van we were in even had some faded Spanish lettering on the dashboard that looked like it belonged to a cartel transport. As soon as the words left my mouth, the temperature in the van dropped another ten degrees. Sadie went ghost-white. She stared at Cody. “Give me my ID. Now.” “Stop being dramatic,” Cody said, trying to grab her hand. She shoved him away. “Give it to me!” Bo slammed on the brakes. Everyone lurched forward. “We’re here.” We were in a clearing halfway up a ridge. A battered old horse-cart sat there, an old man with a hunched back holding the reins. Usually, these carts were for farmers selling produce, gathered under the giant oak tree in town where everyone shared news. But this was isolated. Just one cart. Waiting. “I’m not going,” Sadie said, backing away. “I want to go home.” The smile vanished from Cody’s face. “Don’t be difficult.” “There are no road signs,” she whispered, her voice trembling. “And now a horse-cart? Nora, don’t you think this is weird?” I tried to soothe her. “Well… some of these mountain hollers are really deep in. We’re still on the US side of the river, Sadie. It’s okay!” When she heard that, her eyes filled with pure despair. She turned to run back toward the main road. Cody lunged, grabbing her around the waist. She started screaming. Bo cursed and reached under his seat for a tattered rag. The next thing I knew, Lucas caught the rag Bo tossed and pressed it hard over my nose and mouth. It happened so fast. Before the darkness took me, I saw Bo and Cody hoisting a limp Sadie onto the cart. Damn it. This was embarrassing. I was being kidnapped in my own backyard. My Ivy League degree was about to be canceled out by the sheer humiliation of being sold three miles from my uncle’s house. Right before I went under, I heard Lucas mutter: “This one’s a college grad. We can get fifteen grand for her, easy.” 4. When I opened my eyes, I was in Cattle Creek. Well, at least I wasn’t being sold in my own village. I was being sold right in front of my uncle’s place instead. Sadie was gone—taken somewhere else. Lucas and Bo had me tied up, and they dumped me unceremoniously onto the dirt from the cart. It was pitch black, but I recognized the stone marker at the edge of the village. Bo was itching for a cigarette. “Go ahead,” he told Lucas. “I’m gonna go see my girl for a few days. Catch up with me when the deal’s done.” Lucas nodded. “Don’t get yourself killed over some woman.” Bo grinned, looking me up and down. “You’re the one who’s always so disciplined. Why not have some fun before we ship her off? Look at Cody and the other girl…” “Forget it,” Lucas snapped. “His girl is worth five grand. Mine is worth fifteen. No comparison.” Bo left, and Lucas dragged me toward a small shack. “Don’t even think about running,” he hissed. “These mountains are a maze. You’ll never find your way out without me. If you want to make this easy on yourself, do what the buyer says. You’ll get beaten less that way.” “Is Lucas even your real name? Was our whole relationship just a long con to sell me?” I asked, giving him the ‘soul-searching’ triple question. He ignored me. “You know you’re breaking the law, right? If I keep my job in the city, I can make eighty thousand a year. You’re selling me for fifteen? You’re a terrible businessman.” He laughed. “You’d give me eighty thousand? I can make fifteen in a day. You’re the college grad—do the math.” I nodded slowly. “Got it. You’re right.” Since he’d made up his mind to sell me, I didn’t need to be polite anymore. He looked at me suspiciously. He couldn’t understand why I wasn’t sobbing or screaming. “Why aren’t you scared?” “I’ve always loved the mountains,” I said calmly. “Being here… it feels like coming home. Like I finally belong.” He stared at me, looking like he’d just swallowed a fly. I could see the thought crossing his mind: Is she brain-damaged? We walked a bit further, and I saw a familiar wooden flagpole by the road. As a kid, I’d spent every summer terrorizing this village with my cousins. Cattle Creek still whispered legends about me—the girl who climbed onto the roof of the general store to catch the mayor cheating with a local widow. The boy who’d climbed up there with me was my loyal sidekick—Josh.

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At the company holiday gala, my name was pulled for the grand prize: a Hermès Kelly bag with a market value of around forty-five thousand dollars. Thrilled, I had rushed out to get it authenticated so I could sell it and finally have some breathing room. Instead, the appraiser looked at me with pity and told me it was a cheap knockoff. After the holidays, I went straight to the office to report it to our CEO. But I was intercepted by our Head of Operations. “Don’t bother Valerie with trivial things,” she had said, her voice smooth and dismissive. “Bring the bag to me. I’ll handle the feedback process.” That same afternoon, I was handed a termination notice and a lawsuit. The Operations Manager’s face twisted into a victorious sneer. “The seal on the box was broken. You expect us to believe your ridiculous story? You obviously sold the real bag, bought a counterfeit, and now you’re trying to extort the company!” I was buried under a mountain of legal fees and debt. Crushed by the suffocating weight of it all, I stepped off the roof of my apartment building. Then, I blinked. The heavy bass of the holiday gala’s DJ filled my ears. I was back. Gemma, the Operations Manager, was standing right in front of me, handing me a pristine, shrink-wrapped orange box with a strange, calculating glint in her eyes. I took a breath, letting the phantom feeling of the wind whipping past my falling body fade away. I turned on my heel, walked straight up to our CEO in front of a dozen colleagues, and held the box out to her. “Thank you for everything you’ve done for us, Valerie,” I said, pitching my voice bright and loud. “A gift this exquisite really belongs to you.” 1 Valerie’s eyes lit up. “Oh, Harper, that’s… I couldn’t possibly,” she murmured. But her hand was already lifting, reaching for the iconic orange packaging. This was exactly why I chose her. Valerie was a woman obsessed with status symbols. In my past life, I’d heard rumors that she had been aggressively hunting for a Kelly bag to complete her collection. If she was the one who received the fake bag, what would happen? Would a wealthy, fierce executive with zero tolerance for embarrassment be more capable of unearthing the rot in this company than a powerless junior employee like me? “Wait!” Gemma practically sprinted over, her heels clicking frantically against the marble floor. Panic flared in her eyes. “Harper, company policy strictly states that gala prizes are registered to the winner. They are non-transferable.” She positioned herself between the box and Valerie. “Operations is about to log all the winning serial numbers. If you just give it away, it throws the entire inventory process into chaos.” Valerie’s hand froze mid-air. The warm smile on her face iced over. I sneered internally, but kept my face a mask of wide-eyed confusion. “But it hasn’t been logged yet, right?” I asked innocently. “Gemma, couldn’t you just write Valerie’s name down instead of mine? The raffle ticket was blank anyway. It’s just whoever holds the prize.” Gemma flinched. She clearly hadn’t expected me to push back so directly. She darted a nervous glance at Valerie and realized the CEO was staring at her, eyes narrowed in sharp displeasure. Desperation made Gemma’s voice sharp. “Corporate benefits are meant for the employees, Harper. Using a company prize to kiss up to your boss? How does that look? What will the rest of the team think?” The room went dead silent. That crossed a line. Heads turned. People at the nearby tables were blatantly eavesdropping now. The implication was ugly enough to make Valerie flush. Her pride couldn’t take the public hit. She withdrew her hand, her tone turning clipped and distant. “It’s a sweet thought, Harper, but we do need to follow policy. Gemma is right. Keep your prize.” She didn’t look at the orange box again. My heart sank. I awkwardly pulled the box back to my chest, apologizing profusely. “I’m so sorry, Valerie. I wasn’t thinking.” Gemma let out an audible breath of relief and patted my shoulder, her grip a little too tight. “Just remember to come over to the registration desk before you leave, Harper. Don’t hold up the line.” My mind was a chaotic blur. I set the box down at my assigned table and headed straight for the restroom. I knew one thing for sure: the ballroom was heavily surveilled. As long as I didn’t leave the building with the bag, no one could accuse me of swapping it. I had just locked myself in a stall and sat down on the closed toilet lid when I heard the click-clack of Gemma’s heels storming into the bathroom. 2 “…I know! I told you I’ll have the money soon! It’s forty-five grand, right? …Let them threaten me! So what if they call my family? Stop harassing me!” A pause. Then a harsh, breathless laugh. “Find out? How could they possibly find out? As long as that idiot takes the bag out of the building tonight, she can scream until she’s blue in the face. Everyone will just assume she pocketed the forty-five grand herself. Who’s going to believe a junior copywriter over the Operations Manager?” I stopped breathing. The cold porcelain chilled the back of my legs. “Valerie was practically drooling over it today… Next week, I’ll pitch a ‘policy update’ to her. I’ll suggest that for any physical prize valued over ten thousand dollars, the company reserves the right to recall it and issue a cash bonus instead. When we do that, I’ll force Harper to pay back the market difference! I get my debt cleared, buy a real bag to kiss up to Valerie, and I’m totally in the clear.” Another pause as the person on the other end spoke. “And if she can’t pay it back?” Gemma hissed viciously. “Then the company sues her for embezzlement of corporate assets!” The voice on the phone muttered something else. “Shut up!” Gemma barked, her voice echoing off the bathroom tiles. “Why do you think I took such a massive risk? You think I like having those loan sharks breathing down my neck? Just get through tonight, and we’re fine.” The call ended. The heels clicked rapidly away, stopping briefly near the door. “Where the hell is that stupid girl? Why hasn’t she come to register yet…” The bathroom door swung shut. Inside the stall, I was trembling. A profound, bone-deep ice spread through my veins. So that was it. It wasn’t a simple mistake. Gemma had drowned herself in predatory online debt. She had swapped the real prize for a fake, sold the genuine Kelly bag for forty-five thousand dollars to cover her loans, and needed a fall guy. I was the chosen sacrifice. The moment I walked out of this hotel with that box, the stain on my name would become permanent. Even if I didn’t try to sell it tomorrow, she already had a plan to legally corner me into coughing up money I didn’t have. I could not leave this party with that bag. There were two hours left before the gala ended. Before then, I had to get this counterfeit out of my hands. 3 The second I sat back down in the ballroom, my phone started vibrating furiously. Gemma was blowing up the company Slack channel. @here Attention everyone. All physical prizes MUST be registered at the Operations desk before you leave the venue. Employees with unregistered prizes are not permitted to exit. Please cooperate. We are currently waiting on exactly ONE employee to register. Please come to the desk immediately so we can wrap up. People at the tables around me were already packing up their coats. They turned to look at me, irritation plain on their faces. “Harper, are you the holdup?” “Just go sign the paper, come on. We want to go home.” Before I could deflect, a couple of coworkers practically herded me over to the Operations desk. Gemma sat behind it, the registration ledger spread out in front of her. She looked up at me, her chin tilted in smug triumph. I stood there, motionless. Next to the desk stood Kelsey, a loudmouth from the marketing team who was tight with Gemma. She had a habit of making my life difficult. “Look at her,” Kelsey projected her voice so everyone could hear. “Wins the grand prize and suddenly she thinks she’s royalty.” Kelsey had been glaring daggers at me all night; she was deeply, toxically jealous of the bag. “Some people get the luckiest break of their lives and just want to play hard to get. If you don’t want it, Harper, I’ll take it! God knows I wouldn’t act like a snob about it.” A few people chuckled, eager for the drama. I let my face flush, pretending her words had pushed me over the edge. I shoved the heavy orange box right into Kelsey’s chest. “Fine! Take it! You act like I’m begging to keep it!” Kelsey let out a startled gasp, instinctively wrapping her arms around the box. Her shock instantly melted into wild ecstasy. She hugged it tight, as if terrified I would snatch it back. She whipped around to Gemma. “Gemma! Quick, put it under my name! Harper voluntarily surrendered it to me! Ha! Some people just can’t handle nice things.” But Gemma’s face had drained of color. Her voice cracked, shrill and panicked. “No!” Kelsey froze, her triumphant smile faltering. “…What do you mean, no?” I mirrored Kelsey’s confusion. “Yeah, Gemma. I’m willingly giving it to her. Aren’t you two close anyway? Just make an exception for her.” Gemma shot me a look of pure, unadulterated hatred. She choked on her words for a second before snapping, “No means no! I am following protocol! The prize must be registered under the original winner’s name. It has to be Harper!” Kelsey looked like a kid who just watched her balloon float away. Her face turned violently red, and she pointed a manicured finger right in Gemma’s face. “Are you fucking kidding me, Gemma?! Protocol? Since when do you care about protocol unless it’s to kiss executive ass? Don’t pull this bureaucratic bullshit with me! I’m keeping this bag!” 4 Kelsey’s voice was piercing. It immediately drew the attention of the stragglers who hadn’t left the ballroom yet. Gemma, sweating and desperate to contain the scene, grabbed Kelsey’s arm and hissed, “Come here! Let me explain it to you!” She practically dragged Kelsey into a quiet corner. I watched them whisper furiously. Kelsey’s expression morphed from outrage to deep suspicion, her eyes darting over to me every few seconds. Just then, a small group of senior management strolled over, clearly lured by Kelsey’s screaming match. Leading the pack was Monica, the VP of Marketing. She was famously at war with Valerie over department budgets. Monica’s sharp eyes landed on the bright orange box resting on my chair. She let out a low, amused laugh. “Well, well. Is that the infamous Hermès everyone’s whispering about?” She looked over her shoulder at Valerie, who was trailing slightly behind. “Valerie, isn’t this the exact Kelly bag you’ve been obsessing over? I swear I saw on your Instagram that you were begging your personal shopper in Paris for this exact model.” Valerie’s face tightened. She didn’t say a word. Monica, sensing blood in the water, wasn’t about to let it go. She looked Valerie up and down, feigning sudden realization. “Oh, that explains why you’ve been glaring at this table all night. You want it. It must be agonizing, watching an entry-level employee walk away with your dream bag while you just have to sit there.” “Watch your mouth, Monica,” Valerie snapped, her voice like cracking ice. Monica just smirked and turned to me. “Harper, honey. Didn’t you try to give this to Valerie earlier? Whatever happened to that?” Suddenly, every eye in the vicinity was pinned on me. I ducked my head, hunching my shoulders into a posture of perfect, trembling anxiety. “I… I did want to give it to her. But Gemma told me company policy explicitly forbids it. She said I wasn’t allowed to transfer it to an executive.” “Oh!” Monica drew out the syllable, her eyes gleaming with malice. “So it’s a policy issue. How fascinating.” She pivoted fully to face Valerie, her tone dripping with condescension. “Since when does Operations dictate what our CEO can and cannot accept? Valerie, you’re telling me you let an admin manager police your gifts? You’re really that toothless? Taking orders from the party planner?” 5 Every word was a perfectly aimed dagger. Monica was pretending to praise Valerie’s ethics while publicly emasculating her. She was calling her weak. Valerie’s chest heaved. She shot a venomous glare across the room at Gemma, who was still oblivious, whispering frantically into Kelsey’s ear. Valerie snapped. She lunged forward and slammed her hand on my table. “Harper! I’m buying the bag. Right now. Market value is forty-five thousand. I am transferring it to you this second.” The entire room seemed to stop breathing. Playing the terrified, overwhelmed subordinate, I fumbled with the lid, hastily pulling the bright orange leather bag out of its dust bag. Valerie snatched it from my hands. She didn’t even bother to look at the stitching. She just whipped out her phone. “Zelle. Now.” I gave her the email tied to my account. Three seconds later, my phone buzzed. Transfer Received: $45,000.00. Valerie gripped the handle of the fake bag, shot Monica a look that could kill, and marched out of the ballroom, her heels echoing like gunshots. Monica chuckled softly, adjusted her blazer, and led her team away. I immediately turned back to the registration desk. The last line on the ledger was completely blank. I picked up the pen and, under ‘Prize Description’, I wrote in neat, block letters: Hermès Kelly Bag (Est. Value $45,000). I signed my name. Then, in the large ‘Notes/Exceptions’ column, I wrote: Liquidated on site. Sold directly to CEO Valerie Mercer for cash. Transaction finalized and cleared. I capped the pen, closed the empty box, and stepped back. Just in time. Gemma and Kelsey had finally finished their little huddle and were walking back over. Kelsey’s face had softened, though she still looked at me with a heavy dose of schadenfreude. “So, Harper,” Kelsey drawled. “Are you giving me the bag or not? Because I already texted my friend at the consignment shop. I’m banking on that cash for my trip to Tulum next month.” Gemma stepped behind the desk, her mask of professional authority firmly back in place. “If you’re going to transfer it, do it now. I’m only making this exception once, and it’s irreversible.” They had clearly struck a deal in that corner. I looked down, rubbing my arms, projecting deep regret. “Um… I changed my mind.” “What?” Kelsey barked. I lifted my chin, playing the part of a defensive, greedy girl perfectly. “I said I changed my mind! I already signed the registry. I’m keeping it for myself!” Kelsey looked furious, turning her glare onto Gemma. “Are you kidding me? If I hadn’t listened to your stupid gossiping, I would have had it!” Gemma looked like she was struggling not to laugh, her face twitching as she maintained her stern facade. “Well, you should have decided earlier. Stop wasting my time.” 6 I clutched the empty box to my chest like a paranoid thief and turned to leave. “Not so fast, Harper,” Gemma called out, stepping out from behind the desk. “Since you registered it, standard protocol requires a photograph of the physical prize for the inventory archive. Open the box.” She was careful. I’ll give her that. I let my face contort into defensive hesitation. I pulled out my phone, pretending to open my camera app. In reality, I hit Record on my voice memos. “Pictures? Sure… actually, Gemma, do you mind if I take a bunch of close-ups too? Like, of the hardware, the date stamps, the stitching… I heard super-fakes are getting insanely good lately. If the company accidentally bought a counterfeit, I need to know so I can file a police report right now.” Gemma’s face instantly drained of all color. She backpedaled so fast she nearly tripped. “Never mind! Forget it!” she sputtered. “We don’t need an unboxing. Do you really think corporate procurement would buy a fake? Just… take a picture of the outside of the box! That’s fine!” I smiled, finally compliant. I snapped a useless picture of the cardboard. Then, right in front of them, I casually tore off the carbon-copy receipt from the registry ledger. “I’ll just keep the yellow copy for my records. Have a good night, ladies.” I walked out of the ballroom, clutching the empty box. Behind me, I could faintly hear Kelsey’s mocking laughter. “God, look at her. She actually thinks she won the lottery…” On the first day of our holiday break, I posted a story to my Instagram. No photo. Just text on a plain black background. Took my new baby out to brunch with the girls today. Finally get to see how the other half lives! ✨ I set the privacy settings so it was only visible to my ‘Close Friends’ list—which, for this account, was strictly company coworkers. Sure enough, ten minutes later, Gemma posted a vague-booking status on her own feed. No names mentioned, but the venom was palpable. Pro tip: if you’re carrying a cheap knockoff, don’t try to mingle with the big leagues. Real recognizes real. Don’t wait until you embarrass yourself in public to realize you’re a fraud. She was trying to bait me. She wanted me to panic, realize the bag was fake, and come crying to the company, right into her trap. Right after she posted that, I watched her ‘Like’ and comment on Valerie’s latest post. Valerie had posted an immaculate flat-lay of an invitation to a high-society charity gala. The caption read: Decided the new Kelly is making her debut tomorrow night. Gemma, assuming Valerie had gone to a boutique to buy a real one, had commented: Congratulations, Valerie! Gorgeous piece. It completely suits you! I locked my phone screen and let out a long, slow breath in the quiet of my living room. The bait was set. Now, we wait for the blood in the water. 7 First day back in the office after the holidays. Gemma practically kicked the door to the bullpen open, clutching a stack of freshly printed memos. “Listen up, everyone!” she shouted over the hum of the computers. “Per emergency executive orders, an audit revealed a compliance issue with all high-value physical prizes from the holiday party. We are recalling them immediately. Operations will appraise them and issue cash bonuses in their place!” The office erupted into groans and complaints. “Are you serious? I already opened my espresso machine!” “Why wasn’t this announced at the party?” “Cash bonus? Based on retail or what you think it’s worth?” Gemma clapped her hands loudly, silencing the room. Her eyes cut through the crowd and locked onto me like a laser. “This is mandatory policy. It is to protect the company from unauthorized reselling of corporate assets.” She marched straight to my cubicle and held her hand out. “Harper. The bag. Hand it over.” I looked up at her, perfectly blank. “Bag? What bag?” Gemma let out a theatrical scoff, loud enough for the entire floor to hear. “Oh, don’t play stupid with me, Harper. You think you can just keep the Hermès and play dumb? The entire company saw you win it.” “I did win it. But I didn’t take it home.” Gemma looked at me like I was the most pathetic liar on earth. Her voice rose to a shrill pitch. “You didn’t take it home? You walked out holding the box! It’s on the security footage! If you’re trying to fence company property, Harper, legal will have you arrested by lunch!” People were standing up from their desks now, openly staring. I opened my mouth to reply, but before I could, the heavy glass doors to the department violently swung open. Valerie stormed in. She radiated a dark, suffocating fury. In her right hand, she was white-knuckling the bright orange Kelly bag. Gemma saw her and instantly dropped her aggressive posture, slipping back into a sycophantic smile. “Valerie! Good morning! Oh, you brought the bag, it looks so stunning on you—” Before Gemma could finish her sentence, Valerie whipped her arm forward and hurled the bag directly into Gemma’s face. The heavy hardware smacked against Gemma’s cheekbone with a sickening thud. “Do I look like a woman who carries a fucking counterfeit?!” Valerie screamed, her voice tearing through the silent office. “Gemma! You are going to explain this right now!” “Why did you use company funds to purchase a forty-five-thousand-dollar piece of garbage?!”

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Annual Performance Review. Once again, I was rated a zero-star Loan Officer. I stared at the review sheet in my hand, the paper cheap and flimsy against my thumb. Right there, in the comments section next to my name, the same line that had haunted me for years was stamped in bold: [Contractor Status. Ineligible for Performance Grading.] I asked the Branch Manager when I could finally transition to full-time. Her answer was a broken record, skipping over the same scratched groove: “Just keep your numbers up, Miles. It’s only a matter of time.” “A matter of time.” I’d been waiting on that promise for seven years. For seven years, I had been the mule. I originated more loans than anyone else in the branch. I took home the lowest salary in the building. Benefits? 401k matching? Health insurance? None of it applied to me. This time, I didn’t bother sending the email appealing the rating. I was done. The illusion was shattered. Thirty days from now, Manager Cole was going to look at her crimson-red quarterly projections and lose her absolute mind. 1. “Miles! Hey, get over here and help me haul this crap.” I sighed, the sound lost in the hum of the office AC. It was Todd, a senior officer who treated the bank like his personal country club. I ripped the review sheet in half, then into quarters, and let the confetti drift into the recycling bin. When I walked over, Todd was huffing and puffing, dragging a pallet of heavy cardboard boxes across the carpet. “What’s inside, Todd?” I asked, genuinely curious. He wiped sweat from his receding hairline, his tone sharp. “Why all the questions? Just lift.” My jaw tightened. In their eyes, I wasn’t a colleague. I was hired help. A glorified intern with a seven-year tenure. I didn’t snap. Not yet. I bent my knees and helped him stack the boxes in the breakroom. Todd leaned against the counter, catching his breath. “These are the holiday bonuses from Corporate. Gift baskets. Premium hams, wine, the works. Twenty-seven of ’em.” Twenty-seven? “There are twenty-eight people working in this branch, Todd,” I said. Todd looked at me, a sneer curling his lip. It was a look of genuine confusion, as if I had claimed the sky was green. “Who told you there are twenty-eight people? You don’t count.” “You’re just a contractor, Miles. Agency hire. You don’t qualify for Corporate perks.” “You want a ham? Go ask your temp agency.” He waved his hand dismissively, like shooing a fly from a sandwich. When they handed out bonuses, I was invisible. When they needed quotas filled, I was “part of the family.” When they went to happy hour, I wasn’t on the invite list. But when the toilet clogged or the archives needed organizing? Miles, get in here. Where exactly was I lacking? I did the same job. But I lived in a different economic reality. Sure, the first year I was green. I had to learn the ropes. I missed my targets then. But every year since? I didn’t just meet the quota; I crushed it. Year two: $2.5 million in personal loans. 6.5% of the branch’s total. Year three: $3.4 million. 9%. Year four: $4.5 million. 12%. … This year: $7.8 million. 23% of the entire branch’s output. There were seventeen loan officers in this building. I was miles ahead of the pack—pun intended. So why was I lesser? My paycheck remained a stagnant pool: $2,800 a month, after taxes. Commissions, quarterly bonuses, year-end profit sharing? If I saw a dime of that, it was a miracle. When I pushed for answers, Manager Cole would lean back in her ergonomic chair and say, “You’re agency, Miles. We can’t adjust your comp until you’re converted to FTE (Full-Time Employee).” I believed her. I drank the Kool-Aid. I spent seven years running myself ragged, chasing a carrot that was nailed to a stick. And for what? Where was my contract? Nowhere. Enough. I went back to my cubicle—the small one near the bathroom—and printed my resignation letter. A colleague walked by. “Whatcha printing? Loan apps?” “Client files,” I lied. She smirked. “Oh, look at our Zero-Star Superstar. So dedicated.” I ignored the barb. I took the resignation letter and drove straight to the staffing agency that legally employed me. When I slapped the paper on the desk, the agency rep, a woman named Janice, looked up with confusion. “Excuse me?” I slid the paper forward. She picked it up, her eyes widening. “Miles? You’re quitting? You’ve been there seven years. You haven’t converted to bank staff yet?” She pulled my file, flipped it open, and actually laughed. A dry, rasping sound. “Seven years. Zero-star rating every single year.” She looked up, her expression dripping with pity that felt a lot like mockery. “You know, everyone else from your intake group converted years ago. The bank loves my recruits. They usually tell me I have an eye for talent. You’re the only stain on my record.” “The others either had the numbers or the social skills. Why couldn’t you just play the game?” “No wonder you’re quitting. Honestly, if you didn’t leave, they were probably going to cut you loose. Ha.” I bit the inside of my cheek until I tasted copper. I forced the words out through gritted teeth. “Just sign it.” She sighed, annoyed, and scribbled her signature. “Thirty days notice. Then you’re out. I’m not even going to call the bank; I’m too embarrassed. You tell them.” “And don’t say I didn’t warn you. The market is trash right now. If you couldn’t make it work as a temp, what makes you think you’ll survive out there?” “Don’t come crawling back here when you can’t pay rent. I don’t re-hire failures who can’t close a conversion.” I stood up, buttoning my cheap suit jacket. “I know exactly what I’m worth, Janice. You don’t need to worry about me.” I turned and walked out, the bell on the door jingling behind me. In the parking lot, I pulled a crumpled recruitment flyer from my pocket. I hesitated for a long moment, staring at the number. Then, I dialed. “Hi, this is Miles. I’m calling about the Senior Loan Officer position… Yes, the full-time role.” When I got the confirmation for an interview, I took a deep breath. The air tasted like exhaust fumes and freedom. Come on, Miles. You can do this. Prove them wrong. 2. The moment I walked back into the bank, the atmosphere shifted. “Cole is looking for you,” a colleague muttered. Then, without asking, he dumped a stack of manila folders on my desk. The pile slid, nearly knocking over my coffee mug. “Call these people when you get a sec,” he commanded, not even looking at me. I put a hand on the files. “Stop. This isn’t my caseload. I’ve already finished my calls.” He paused, looking at me like my head had spun around. “These are bank clients, Miles. Why are you acting brand new?” He adopted that patronizing tone again. “You do the cold calls every year. It’s almost fiscal year-end. Chop chop.” My voice dropped an octave. Hard. Cold. “No. I manage my clients. These? These aren’t mine.” He let out a sharp laugh. “Yours? Ours? It’s all the same pot, buddy. Just make the calls. It’s grunt work. What else are you good for?” I stood up. “What am I good for? I closed twenty percent of this branch’s volume this year. What did you do?” I pointed a finger at him. “You, Todd? Did you even hit two million? Where do you get the nerve?” He wasn’t used to Miles the Doormat fighting back. His face flushed a blotchy red. His voice cracked, spiraling into a screech. “Miles! Who the hell do you think you’re talking to? My numbers are none of your business!” “Yeah, you hit twenty percent. So what? You’re a Zero-Star officer!” “I missed my quota, and guess what? I’m still Three Stars! You can’t compare yourself to me!” “I can order you around because you are a temp! You don’t even technically work here!” He was right. I carried the branch, and I was a zero. He barely showed up, and he was a solid three. By metrics alone, I should have been Five Stars since year two. But my caste determined my worth. The shouting match drew a crowd. I could hear the whispers circling like vultures. “What’s up with Miles? Why is he so aggressive today?” “Probably the ratings again. It’s hilarious he thinks he’s one of us. Letting him participate in the ceremony was a charity case.” “It’s embarrassing, honestly. Someone tell Cole to just ban him from the meetings.” The anger in my chest was a physical weight. I shoved the stack of files back across the desk. They spilled onto the floor. “Call them yourself. If you dump your trash on my desk again, I’m shredding it.” Todd glared at me, venom in his eyes. “You’re dead, Miles. Watch.” Five minutes later, my phone rang. Manager Cole. Perfect. I wanted to tell her I was done anyway. As soon as I walked into her office, she started. “Miles! I hear you’re causing a scene on the floor.” Causing a scene? I had been the silent workhorse for seven years. I raise my voice once, and I’m the problem. She tapped her acrylic nails on the mahogany desk. “I know, I know. You’re upset about the star rating. It’s just policy, Miles. It’s not personal. We fought to even get you listed on the sheet. That’s recognition!” “Besides,” she leaned in, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper, “if you keep your head down and hit the numbers, I’m going to bat for you. I promise.” “Clear this list of clients this month, and I will personally go to Corporate and demand they convert you. We’ll get that contract signed.” She slid a list across the desk. Then, she smiled. It was the same smile I’d seen for seven years. Sugary, rehearsed, and completely hollow. From the first time I complained about my pay, this was the face that fed me lies. Then, she reached under her desk and pulled out a gift basket. “Todd told me you were feeling left out. That was an oversight on his part. Of course you’re part of the team!” “Finish the year strong! The bank takes care of its own.” I looked at the plastic-wrapped ham and the cheap bottle of Merlot. I looked at the layers of foundation settling into the lines of her insincere smile. I decided right then not to tell her I had resigned. It wasn’t my job to give them a heads-up. They wanted to feed me empty promises? Fine. I’d feed them a nasty surprise. 3. That night, for the first time in history, I didn’t stay late. Manager Cole had emphasized how “urgent” the new leads were. I didn’t care. Did the urgency come with a commission check? No? Then it wasn’t my emergency. In thirty days, I was a ghost. I hummed a tune as I walked into my apartment. My younger brother, Toby, looked up from his textbooks, eyes wide. “Miles? You’re home? It’s still light out.” The apartment smelled of sodium and cheap beef flavoring. “I made food this morning before I left,” I said, gesturing to the fridge. Toby looked sheepish. “I was starving at lunch. I ate it all then.” I froze. I’d been so buried in work, trying to prove my worth to people who hated me, that I hadn’t noticed. Toby was seventeen. He was growing. And he was skinny. I felt a sting of tears in my eyes. “I’m sorry, Toby. That’s on me. I didn’t make enough.” “Put that cup away. I’m making real dinner tonight.” Toby grinned, and the room brightened. Our parents died in a car wreck when I was twenty. Toby was ten. I dropped out of college because we couldn’t afford the tuition and the rent. I cut hair. I worked in a warehouse. I did day labor. Then the staffing agency got me into the bank. It looked respectable. It was warm in the winter and cool in the summer. It put food on the table. But it stripped me of my dignity. Seven years. And they wouldn’t even give me a contract. I shook my head, willing the tears away. Toby had his SATs coming up. He wasn’t going to end up like me. I was going to pay for his college. I was going to find my worth. The next morning, the morning briefing was a funeral service. Manager Cole stood at the front, her face a mask of thunder. “Construction loan. J&G Builders. It defaulted this morning. One. point. five. million. dollars. Whose account is this?” Silence stretched across the room. Todd’s hand went up, trembling like a leaf in a gale. I suppressed a scoff. Todd spent his days playing fantasy football and flirting with the tellers. He didn’t know the first thing about risk assessment. Manager Cole turned her laser gaze on him. “It’s… it’s my account,” Todd stammered. “But… but Miles does the maintenance calls! He handles the monitoring!” I spoke up, my voice steady. “Six months ago, I analyzed J&G’s cash flow. They were eight months behind on supplier payments. Their operating account had less than twenty grand in it. I flagged it. High risk.” I turned to Todd. “And what did you say, Todd? You said, ‘Miles, you’re such a worrywart. Jim is a big player. A million bucks is nothing to him. Relax.’” Manager Cole cut in, snapping at me. “Excuses! Why didn’t you report it to me?” I pulled out my phone. “I did. Here’s the email. Dated August 12th. What was your reply?” I read it aloud. “Miles, you’ve been here five minutes. The risk algorithm didn’t flag it. You’re a contractor. Do you think you know better than the system? Stay in your lane.” She opened her mouth, then closed it. The silence was deafening. I savored it. Later that afternoon, I was in the breakroom getting water when I heard whispers from the hallway. “Corporate is furious. They want a head on a spike for the J&G default.” “Todd’s been crying in Cole’s office for an hour. Begging her to save him.” “I heard Cole say they’re going to pin it on Miles. He doesn’t have performance bonuses to lose, and since he’s agency, they can just terminate the contract. Clean break.” A chill went down my spine, followed immediately by a wave of heat. Sure enough, five minutes later, I got the summons. When I pushed open the door, Todd was sitting there, eyes puffy, looking pathetic. “Manager Cole, what am I gonna do? If this goes on my record, my career is over. I have a mortgage! The Audi payments!” When he saw me, he lunged out of the chair and grabbed my arm. “Miles! Buddy! You gotta help me. Please. Take the fall for this one? You’re a contractor! Worst case, they cut you loose, and you go back to the agency. I’m staff! If I get fired for cause, I’m blacklisted!” “I can’t lose this job, Miles. I can’t!” And I can? I thought. My survival is optional? Before I could shake him off, Manager Cole slid a report across the desk. “Sign it. It states that you failed to conduct the quarterly check-in. It absolves Todd and the branch of negligence.” 4. “Why?” I looked at them, genuinely baffled by the audacity. “Why on earth would I do that?” Manager Cole didn’t even blink. “Because you’re the contractor. You take this hit, and I’ll make sure Todd cuts you a check. Three grand. Cash. And if you survive the review, I’ll fast-track your conversion next year.” Todd nodded frantically. “Yes! Miles, please! Three grand! Make it five! Five thousand dollars!” Did they think I was brain-dead? A default investigated by Corporate wasn’t just a “fired” offense. It was gross negligence. It could be legal trouble. “Do you think I’m stupid?” I asked, a smile touching my lips. Cole slammed her hand on the desk. “Miles! Watch your tone!” “We’ve done this before. We pay you a little extra, you take the heat for a minor screw-up. Everybody wins.” She was right. We had done this before. Back when I was naive. Back when she said, Take one for the team, Miles. Loyalty gets you hired. Three years ago: The Lee account. Missed paperwork. $500 fine. I took it. Two years ago: The compliance audit. Risk scores ignored. I took the blame. Last year: A bad debt from Cole’s own cousin. I took the reprimand. I was the perfect tool. The designated scapegoat. All of the blame, none of the bonus. “Cat got your tongue?” Cole shouted, standing up. “Let me tell you something. You’ve been here seven years because I let you stay. Because you’re useful. If you weren’t eating our mistakes, you’d have been gone years ago!” “You don’t sign this today, I will dock your pay to zero. I will make sure you never work in finance in this state again!” I bit my lip. I wasn’t going to sign. And since I had already resigned, her threats were toothless. Cole slapped the paper against my chest. “Last chance! Sign!” Todd, fueled by panic, rushed me and shoved my shoulder. “Miles! Are you deaf?! Sign the paper!” I touched my chest where he hit me. I looked him dead in the eye. “No.” Todd crumbled, looking back at Cole. Cole’s face twisted into something ugly. “Fine. You want to play hardball? I’m calling Corporate right now. I’m reporting you for intentional negligence and fraud.” “Let’s see who they believe. The Branch Manager, or the temp?” “I tried to help you. I tried to get you a severance. But now?” She pulled out her phone. “I’m calling the agency to have you terminated immediately.” “Don’t bother,” I said quietly. I reached into my pocket and pulled out my copy of the resignation letter. “I already resigned. Effective immediately.” Cole froze. “What?” “I quit. You don’t have to fire me. I’m leaving.” Cole slammed her phone down. “You can’t just quit! You tried to sneak away? I will report this to the top! You are taking this fall, Miles, whether you like it or not!” I turned to the door. “Miles!” she screamed. “Walk out that door and you’ll regret it for the rest of your life!” Regret it? I pulled my phone out of my pocket and hit [Stop Recording]. Did she think I came in here unprepared? Who was going to regret this? And their problems were just beginning. I opened an app on my phone. A private group chat. [Small Business Owners of [City Name]] It was my client group. They constantly complained about the other officers—lazy, rude, slow. I was the only reason they stayed. “If Miles leaves, we leave.” “Miles is the only one who actually answers the phone.” I typed a message: “Hey everyone. Just wanted to let you know I’ve resigned from [Old Bank]. I’ll be interviewing with competitors soon. If I find a place with better rates and actual service, you’ll be the first to know.” The phone buzzed instantly. Wait for us! We’re with you, Miles! Finally! That bank didn’t deserve you. I smiled. This was the leverage of a free man.

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“Happy Thanksgiving, Resident Rachel Miller.” The elevator doors slid open. On the digital display in the lobby, the building management’s holiday greetings scrolled upward in elegant gold lettering against a maroon background. “To the resident of Unit 1801 at The Palisades, Rachel Miller: We wish you and your family a joyous Thanksgiving.” I froze. Resident. Rachel Miller. That was my name. But wasn’t this condo supposed to be my mother-in-law’s? A voice echoed down the elevator shaft from the eighteenth floor. “Rachel! The gravy is separating! What the hell is taking you so long down there?” I looked up. The impatience in her voice tumbled down eighteen flights of steel cable, heavy and demanding. I didn’t move. The screen was still glowing. “Resident Rachel Miller.” 1. Thanksgiving Day. The whole city was settling down for the holiday, the smell of roasting turkey and woodsmoke hanging in the crisp November air. I stood in the elevator, staring at that line of text, my fingertips going numb. Resident Rachel Miller. Not Barbara. Not David. Rachel. Me. The elevator doors bumped against my shoulder, retreated, and tried to close again. The sensor beeped, confused by the human who simply wouldn’t move. “Rachel! Are you down there or not? Get up here!” Barbara’s voice struck like a hammer again. I hit the button for the 18th floor. The car lurched upward. My mind was spinning with a single, desperate rationalization: It’s a glitch. The HOA system made a mistake. Because this was Barbara’s house. When we moved in back in 2016, she had made it very clear. “I paid cash for this place,” she had said, her chin tipped up. “Four hundred and fifty thousand dollars. My entire life savings, poured into these walls. You get to live here, Rachel. You should be grateful.” Eight years. For eight years, I had cooked in that kitchen, scrubbed those hardwood floors, and loaded that dishwasher. And every single month, I transferred eight hundred dollars of “rent” to my mother-in-law. She took it without a flinch. “You’re living under my roof. Chipping in is the least you can do, don’t you think?” I hadn’t thought it was unreasonable. I had always believed that when you lived in someone else’s house, you were inherently smaller. You owed them. The elevator pinged. The doors opened. Barbara stood in the hallway. No apron. Hands on her hips. “I asked you to go down and grab the package from the concierge. It’s been twenty minutes. Are we having Thanksgiving dinner or not?” I stared at her. She was sixty-three. She had just gotten her hair blown out and was wearing a new burgundy silk blouse. It was a holiday, after all; she had to hold court. She looked exactly like the lady of the house. For eight years, she had been the lady of the house. “Barbara,” I started, my mouth dry. “The screen downstairs in the lobby… the HOA system—” “What about the HOA? Let’s eat! Brian and the baby are starving. Hurry up!” She turned on her heel and marched back inside. The words Resident Rachel Miller were swallowed by the click of her heels. I stood in the doorway, clutching the cardboard box in my hands. The condo was filled with loud, festive noise. My brother-in-law, Brian, and his wife, Jessica, had flown in for the holiday. Barbara was thrilled. She had been on my case since 6:00 AM. I had brined the turkey. I had peeled the potatoes. I had baked the pies from scratch. Twelve different dishes. Made entirely by one pair of hands. Mine. I swapped my boots for house slippers and walked in. The dining table groaned under the weight of the feast—golden, steaming, and perfect. Jessica, Brian’s wife, was lounging on the sectional, scrolling through Instagram. Brian was yelling at the football game on TV. My husband, David, was pouring his mother a glass of chardonnay. Not a single one of them was in the kitchen. “Come on, sit, sit, before it gets cold,” Barbara beckoned Brian’s family. “Here, Brian, try the stuffing. It took three hours to make.” It took three hours. I spent three hours making it. But there was no “I” in her sentence. “Rachel’s a great cook,” Jessica offered offhandedly, not looking up from her phone. Barbara waved a dismissive hand. “She has the time. Besides, it’s the least she can do. She lives in my house; a little elbow grease is expected.” Jessica offered a tight, polite smile and let it drop. I sat down. I picked up my fork, then set it back down on the linen napkin. Resident Rachel Miller. The words were a metronome in my head. Barbara was serving Brian the best cuts of turkey, pouring juice for Jessica’s toddler, humming a happy little tune. My husband sat beside me, eyes glued to his plate, chewing methodically. He said nothing. He never said anything. In eight years of marriage, I had never once heard David defend me to his mother. Not because he didn’t love me, but because he didn’t see the point. In his world, whatever his mother said was gospel. It was her house. Her rules. I glanced at the family portrait hanging above the mantel. Taken last Christmas. I was positioned on the far right edge, practically leaning out of the frame. You could crop me out without touching anyone else’s shoulder. A thought pierced through the fog in my brain. What if it wasn’t a glitch? What if this house actually belongs to me? Then what the hell have I been doing for the last eight years? “Rachel, what are you spacing out for? Pass the cranberry sauce.” Barbara’s sharp tone yanked me back to the present. I stood up. I walked into the kitchen. The gravy boat was still on the counter. I picked it up. My hands were shaking. And it wasn’t because the porcelain was hot. 2. To understand these past eight years, you don’t need to look at grand tragedies. It was all in the small things. Things so small that if I complained about them out loud, people would tell me I was being “too sensitive.” The day we moved in, Barbara established the law of the land. “I bought this place for four hundred and fifty thousand dollars. It’s my life’s work,” she had said, sitting at the kitchen island. “You two get to live here, but we need to set some ground rules.” I thought she was going to talk about keeping the place clean. Instead, she slid a printed piece of paper across the marble. a. Monthly rent: $800. b. No nails in the walls. No hanging art. c. Do not change the window treatments. d. No pets. e. All overnight guests must be approved two weeks in advance. f. The thermostat cannot go above 72 degrees in the winter or below 74 in the summer. I had laughed. I genuinely thought it was a joke. David tugged at the hem of my sweater. “It’s my mom’s house, Rach. Let’s just do what she wants.” From that day on, I wasn’t a wife building a home. I was a tenant. During our first year, I bought a beautiful framed print to hang above our bed. Barbara walked in, took one look, and shook her head. “You put a nail in that drywall, you ruin the integrity of the room. Do you know how much a skim coat costs?” I slid the painting under the bed. In the third year, the kitchen cabinets started to warp. The hinges gave out, and grease would coat the shelves. I paid out of my own pocket to have the entire kitchen refaced. Fifteen thousand dollars. The next day, I heard Barbara talking to the neighbor in the hallway. “Oh, I just dropped fifteen grand upgrading the kitchen. I’ve invested so much into this property.” I was standing right there, holding a bag of groceries. I said nothing. In the fifth year, Brian got married and brought Jessica to stay with us for two months while they were between apartments. Two months. I cooked for four adults. I washed dishes for four adults. I didn’t wash their laundry—but I had to fold it when it piled up in the dryer. Jessica didn’t pay a dime in rent. I brought it up to David once, quietly, in the dark. The next day, Barbara confronted me. “Brian is my own flesh and blood. You expect him to pay to stay in his own mother’s house? You think you and him are the same?” We weren’t the same. I was an outsider. The outsider who paid eight hundred dollars a month to scrub floors, who wasn’t allowed to hang pictures, change curtains, or touch the thermostat. The prodigal son got to live here for free, eating the meals I cooked, treating the place like a hotel. Over eight years, how much rent had I paid? I had never calculated it. I was too afraid to. Because if I did the math, I’d have to face exactly how pathetic I had become. Once, I was mopping the living room floor. Barbara was on the sofa, watching her daytime soaps. I mopped right up to her slippers. She lifted her feet slightly, never taking her eyes off the television. I maneuvered the mop around her chair, back bent, hands gripping the plastic handle. The wet wood gleamed. I caught my own reflection in the polish. Bent over. Subservient. I looked like the hired help. When I finished, I rinsed the mop, put it on the balcony, changed my shoes, and started wiping down the kitchen counters. When David came home from work that night, I whispered to him in our bedroom. “I spent three hours deep-cleaning the floors today. Your mom didn’t even acknowledge I was in the room.” He sighed, loosening his tie. “If she didn’t say anything, it means she’s happy with it. You’re overthinking it, Rachel.” I never brought it up again. But there was one more thing. Last October, a cardboard box of mine—filled with my college textbooks, my diploma, and the letters my dad wrote to me before he died—was cleared out of the storage closet by Barbara. Thrown away. By the time I got home from work, the sanitation truck had already come and gone. “That closet was a disaster hazard,” Barbara had said, sipping her tea. “It’s my house, and clutter attracts pests. Your box of junk was taking up an entire corner.” My dad’s letters. He had been gone for five years. He wrote those letters from his hospital bed. Seven letters in total, one for every week he was in hospice. The last one was unfinished. Gone. I crouched by the empty space in the storage closet. I didn’t cry. The capacity for tears had been hollowed out of me a long time ago. David knelt beside me and rubbed my back. “Just buy a plastic bin and keep your stuff under the bed next time. You know how my mom gets about organization.” Keep it somewhere else. In the home I had lived in for eight years, there was not a single corner that belonged to me. Because it wasn’t my house. It was Barbara’s. Her word was law. 3. The Thanksgiving weekend passed in a blur of leftover turkey and forced smiles. By Monday, the HOA management office was open again. I called in sick to work and walked down to the lobby. The receptionist was a young girl, sipping an iced coffee, looking bored out of her mind. “Hi, I need to check the ownership records for Unit 1801,” I said. She glanced up. “And you are?” “Rachel Miller. I live in the unit.” She typed something into her computer. “Rachel Miller?” “Yes.” “Well, you’re the owner.” She spun the monitor around so I could see. Black and white. Owner Name: Rachel Miller. Social Security Number: Mine. Date of Deed Recording: March 17, 2016. We had moved in June of 2016. The deed had been registered in my name three months before I ever packed my first box. “Excuse me,” my voice came out as a raspy whisper. “Do you have the original purchase agreement on file?” “I’d have to check the physical archives. Do you have your ID?” I did. Twenty minutes later, I was holding a photocopy of the closing documents. Buyer: Rachel Miller. Payment Method: Cash/Wire Transfer. Total Price: $450,000. Originating Account Name— I stopped breathing. Thomas Miller. My dad. He died in February 2016. The closing date on this contract was January 2016. One month before his heart finally gave out, my father used every cent he had to buy this condo. In cash. And he put it in my name. I sat down on one of the faux-leather chairs in the lobby, staring at the copy. Four hundred and fifty thousand dollars. My dad was a high school history teacher. He spent thirty-five years grading papers at the kitchen table. My mom died when I was young, and he raised me on a single public school salary. When I married David, my dad hadn’t made a fuss. He didn’t demand a grand wedding. He just held my hands and said, “Rachel, I’ve set something aside for you. I’ll explain it all when the time is right.” A month later, a massive coronary took him. I was on a business trip when it happened. I never got to say goodbye. He never got the chance to tell me what that “something” was. It was a home. He had saved pennies his entire life, bought a sanctuary in secret, and put my name on the title. He knew David was passive. He knew Barbara was overbearing. He wanted me to have an escape hatch. A fortress. But he died before he could tell me. Which meant the person who handled the estate… I stood up. I walked out of the double glass doors of the lobby. The November wind was brutal, biting at my cheeks, but I didn’t feel the cold. I pulled out my phone and took a picture of the last page of the contract, zooming in on the signatures. Under the line labeled Authorized Proxy for Buyer, there was a signature. David. My husband. He was the proxy who finalized the paperwork. He had known. From the very first day.

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Bad news: I’m dead. Good news: I’ve transmigrated into a book. Bad news: I woke up in the womb of a rural farm wife, destined to be the “Fake Heiress” in a trashy melodrama. Good news: I’ve read the book. Cover to cover. I know exactly what happens. The “True Heiress” returns, weaponizing our parents’ guilt to dismantle my life. She orchestrates a scandal, framing me for an incestuous affair with my brother. The scandal destroys the Calloway family’s reputation, my parents kick me out in a rage, and I end up dying alone in a rain-slicked alleyway. So, I started planning early. At five years old, I emptied my piggy bank and hired a little beggar girl to knock on our front door and claim she was the long-lost daughter. At eight, I hired the second one. At ten, the third. … By the time I turned fifteen, the Calloway mansion was stuffed with eight “True Heiresses.” The ancients didn’t understand the science of DNA, and neither did the modern pseudo-science peddled in this book’s universe. They just knew that when you mixed alum with water, blood merged. And miraculously, the blood of all eight girls blended perfectly with the Marquis and Marchioness. As for how one missing daughter turned into eight… As the family’s spiritual guru—a Monk from the Hills—said: “Destiny is ineffable.” Then came the year I turned sixteen. The real True Heiress finally showed up. 1 “I’m looking for Senator Calloway, or Lady Catherine. Please, just tell them… I’m their biological daughter. There was a switch at the hospital sixteen years ago.” The day Tiffany, the actual True Daughter, came to claim her birthright, the rain was coming down harder than a scene from The Notebook. She stood ramrod straight at the wrought-iron gates. Her cheap, thin clothes clung to her starving frame, outlining every rib. Rainwater streamed down her matted hair, and her skin was the color of old paper. But her eyes? They burned with a terrifying, manic brightness. Or, as Old Man Miller, the gatekeeper, put it: “That girl’s got a few screws loose, standing out in a hurricane like that.” “Besides, I can’t drag a soaking wet stray in front of the Senator and Her Ladyship. If she tracks mud on the Persian rugs or gets everyone sick, it’s my head on the block!” Miller looked at the shivering girl with a pained expression. Ever since the mansion started collecting daughters like Pokémon, every month brought a few new hopefuls claiming to be the lost Calloway heiress. Most were frauds. But you never knew when a real one might slip through. When the news reached the inner parlor, I was sitting with Mother. Hearing that another daughter had arrived to claim her bloodline, Mother physically shuddered. “Oh, dear God. When will it end? I don’t have any fingers left to prick!” She held up her hands, looking utterly tragic. Ten fingers, all wrapped in bandages. “Do you know how long it’s been since I played the piano? I see a needle now and my phantom pain flares up.” She thrust her bandaged hands into my face, pouting like a child. “Mommy needs ten of your special lattes to recover from this trauma.” I laughed, carefully cradling her hands and blowing on them gently. “Okay, okay. I’ll make them this afternoon. With the extra caramel drizzle you like.” “Why couldn’t she come when your father was home?” Mother sighed, defeated, but she still extended a finger for the maid to unwrap. “Why does it always have to be my blood?” Jinx, Mother’s personal assistant, brought over the gilded bowl and carefully took a drop of blood. “Let’s just hope this is finally Number Nine. Then we can stop the bloodletting,” Jinx muttered. “Heaven have mercy, this has to be Sister Nine!” I said cheerfully. The whole household knew the prophecy: Nine daughters would return. Counting me, that made ten. Mother always said I was the one who made the family “a perfect ten.” When the first “True Daughter” arrived, the blood merged, and my parents wept tears of joy. When the second one’s blood merged, Father cried, but Mother grabbed a decorative sword from the wall—until her blood merged too. By the third, they hired the Guru. The Guru stroked his beard and declared, “Nine is the number of the ultimate. Through a twist of cosmic fate, the Calloway destiny has split into nine avatars.” Why nine? Ineffable. With so many “True Daughters” running around—and so many fakes trying to get in—I, the “Fake Daughter” who grew up by their side, actually became a rare commodity. I was the constant. The emotional support animal. Plus, I had a silver tongue. Being the favorite was simply my paycheck for managing this circus. Jinx returned with the bowl. Naturally, Tiffany hadn’t even met Mother yet. DNA testing—or this world’s mystic blood equivalent—was an industrial assembly line at the Calloway estate. Mother looked at the two merging drops of blood in the bowl and wept tears of relief. “Finally! Number Nine! Get a suite ready! And tell security: if anyone else comes claiming to be my daughter, release the hounds!” 2 Tiffany was cleaned up and brought to the main courtyard. Why the courtyard and not the living room? Honestly, there were too many of us. We wouldn’t fit on the sectional. Tiffany, looking bewildered in fresh designer clothes, was immediately swarmed by a gaggle of beautiful, loud women. “How old are you, sis?” “Don’t be stupid, she’s the same age as us!” “Where have you been living? Why did it take you so long to come home?” “Did you go to school? What’s your GPA?” “You look anemic. Have you been taking your iron supplements?” “What’s your talent? We can trade skills!” Mother looked on with a satisfied, maternal glow. Sure, it was chaotic, but they were all her good girls. Sister One came back early; she’s a prodigy in arts and literature. Sister Two, the General, isn’t into the arts. She leads the “Extinction Unit” in the Special Forces. She’s rarely home. Sister Three grew up poor and terrified, so she became a Wall Street shark. She manages the family’s investment portfolio now. Sisters Four through Eight came later, but they all hustled. Four is a fashion designer—her embroidery is so exclusive even the Royal Consorts have to get on a waitlist. Five is a painter. Six is a top-tier surgeon. Seven is a PR genius who knows everyone. Eight is young but brilliant, currently interning as a companion to the Princess. And me? I control the food supply. I introduced modern cuisine to this world. I own their stomachs. And Tiffany? As far as I knew, she had zero skills. The farm wife who raised her was poor. Tiffany didn’t suffer abuse, but she didn’t get piano lessons or coding boot camps. “Who… who are they?” Tiffany asked, her voice trembling. “Oh, sweetie, these are your sisters. Come, say hello,” Mother said, beaming. Tiffany looked like she was about to faint. This wasn’t in the script. She traveled hundreds of miles to reclaim her life, only to find the mansion already stocked with eight other versions of herself? “No! Impossible! I am the real one! I am your only daughter! Mother, they’re lying to you!” Silence fell over the courtyard like a heavy blanket. The smile faded from Mother’s face. She frowned, elegant brows knitting together. “Nine, don’t speak nonsense. These are your flesh-and-blood sisters. Their blood merged with mine just like yours. How could they be fake?” “Blood? What blood?!” Tiffany screamed, losing it. “Them! They have to be fakes! It’s a trick! Mother, you have to believe me, I am the only one!” She was shaking, her eyes darting wildly across the faces of the sisters. Finally, her gaze landed on me, standing right next to Mother. It was like she found the smoking gun. Her finger stabbed the air in my direction. “It’s her! It has to be her! Beatrix! You did this, didn’t you?! You came back too, didn’t you?!” “You knew I was coming, so you hired these imposters to gaslight me, right?!” I stood there, holding a half-peeled pine nut I was preparing for Mother, and let a look of perfect, innocent confusion wash over my face. Mother’s face went dark. She pulled me behind her protectively. “Number Nine! Have you lost your mind? What ‘coming back’? What imposters? If they are fakes because their blood matches mine, then what does that make you?” “Jinx! Take Miss Nine to her quarters. She is not to leave without my permission. And call Dr. Evans. Have him check her head.” “I won’t go! I’m not crazy! Mother, believe me! Believe me!” Tiffany was dragged away by two sturdy housekeepers, kicking and screaming, hair flying everywhere. “Beatrix Calloway! You will die screaming! Just you wait! I won’t let you get away with this! I am the True Heiress! I am the one—” Tiffany’s outburst revealed a lot. Mother didn’t understand it, but as a seasoned reader of the genre, I did. Tiffany was a Rebirth case. Oh, wow. A “True vs. Fake Daughter” story just mutated into “Reborn True Daughter vs. Transmigrated Fake Daughter.” Spicy. 3 After a few days of solitary confinement, Tiffany learned to play the game. The day she was released, she went straight to Mother and dropped to her knees with a thud. Tears fell before she even spoke. “Mother, I was wrong.” She sobbed, shoulders trembling. “That day… seeing so many sisters… I was just so scared.” “I was afraid… afraid that because I came back last, because I can’t compare to them, you wouldn’t love me…” She lifted her face—which looked about 60% like Mother’s did in her youth—eyes swimming with tears. “I never knew I could have such a gentle, beautiful mother… that I could live a life where I didn’t have to feed chickens or scrub floors…” Looking at that thin, pale face and hearing about the hardships of farm life, Mother’s heart melted instantly. She sighed and bent down to help Tiffany up. “There, there. We don’t talk about the past. You’re home now. We are family.” “Your sisters are good people. You’ll see once you get to know them. As for love…” Mother stroked Tiffany’s hair tenderly. “You are all my daughters. Naturally, I love you all.” Tiffany buried her face in Mother’s chest, sobbing a muffled, “Yes, Mother. I understand.” But from an angle only I could see, she shot me a look of pure, venomous triumph. A few days later, Father came home. He stood in the hallway, staring at the room full of blooming, beautiful daughters, and closed his eyes in resignation. By now, everyone in the Capital knew the Calloway family was unique. Nine daughters! All biologically linked! The Guru said these were the avatars of a celestial goddess, a great blessing for the House of Calloway. What could the Senator say? He couldn’t argue with a blessing. “Well, since everyone is here,” Father cleared his throat, using his Senate-floor voice. “It’s time we threw a Gala. A proper debut for our daughters!” The news spread, and the mansion went into overdrive. Tailors were measuring nine girls for gowns. Jewelers were commissioning nine identical sets of diamonds. Everything had to be equal. Down to the millimeter. Tiffany was suspiciously quiet during this time. Aside from greeting Mother in the mornings, she stayed in her room. When a toddler goes quiet, they’re drawing on the walls. When a villain goes quiet, they’re plotting a murder. In the original book, this Gala was where Tiffany orchestrated the scene where I was found in bed with my brother, Harrison. That led to my public shaming, expulsion, and eventual death. Tiffany wasn’t satisfied with just exile; she hired thugs to assault and kill me in the rain. But since I transmigrated, I’ve kept a strictly platonic, ten-foot distance from my brother, Harrison. I also started brainwashing my parents early. I told them a real man serves his country. I told them the Calloway title was at risk if we didn’t show some military grit. I mentioned how Grandfather built this house on valor, and how sad his rusty spear looked on the wall. Apparently, Father had a dream that night where Grandfather chased him with a stick. The next day, Harrison was shipped off to the Border. He hasn’t been back in three years. Even for this Gala, Harrison only sent back ten identical white jade bracelets from the frontier. I was very curious. Without Harrison, what script was Tiffany going to write? It turns out, you can be reborn, but you can’t transplant a brain.

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My mother’s pancreatic cancer took a sharp, brutal turn, and I found myself sobbing into the phone, begging Carter for the $150,000 we needed for a last-resort experimental treatment. He promised to wire it immediately. I sat in the sterile chill of the hospital waiting room for three agonizing hours. What I saw instead, while endlessly refreshing my phone, was Harper’s Instagram story: a screenshot of a $150,000 wire transfer hitting her bank account, captioned with a heart. My mother died in the quiet, unforgiving hours of the early morning. Carter’s money didn’t arrive until the sun was up, far too late. Later, Carter stood before me in a bespoke Tom Ford suit that cost more than a car, his face a mask of mild inconvenience. “I’ve been transferring money to Harper a lot lately for the new portfolio,” he said, adjusting his cuffs. “It was muscle memory. A simple mistake.” Harper stood beside him, the diamonds of the $150,000 necklace he’d bought her resting against her collarbone. Her red lips curled into a smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “Maddie, please,” she murmured, her voice dripping with weaponized sympathy. “I’m sure Diana is looking down from heaven right now, and she completely understands. You really shouldn’t make a scene. Carter’s career is at a critical juncture, after all.” Six years of absolute devotion. Six years of building a life together, reduced to a punchline. To them, my mother’s life was nothing but collateral damage on their climb to the top. I clenched my fists so hard my manicured nails bit into my palms. Blood and tears fell in tandem, hitting the pristine, icy linoleum of the hospital floor. 1 A sea of black umbrellas. The low, mournful hum of a cello playing through the pavilion speakers. I stood before my mother’s casket, the cold wind whipping my hair across my face, my fingers white-knuckling the phone in my pocket. I had just hit ‘send’ on a single email. I accept the offer. I’ll be in New York in three days. I looked down at my mother’s peaceful face, the lines of pain finally smoothed away. I could still feel the phantom weight of her frail hand in mine, could still hear her final, breathless whisper: Maddie, my sweet girl. Don’t ever shrink yourself down just to fit into someone else’s life. I hear you, Mom. I finally hear you. “Madeline Frost! Do you honestly think playing the tragic orphan is going to win you any sympathy points? Carter isn’t coming back to you!” The sharp, grating voice cut through the somber quiet of the cemetery. Harper pushed her way through the crowd of mourners, a vivid splash of scarlet against the sea of black. She was wearing a tailored crimson suit, her Christian Louboutin heels clicking aggressively against the wet stone pathway. She gestured wildly at the floral arrangements. “Look at all this! I have to admit, Maddie, your little performance is top-tier!” I turned slowly. Carter was trailing a few steps behind her, a look of profound irritation etched onto his handsome face. He was wearing his standard charcoal mourning suit, but tied neatly around his neck was a crimson silk tie—the exact shade of Harper’s suit. A tie she had bought him. He was wearing another woman’s colors to my mother’s funeral. “Shut your mouth,” I said. My voice wasn’t loud, but it possessed a jagged edge that sliced through the murmuring crowd. “You are not welcome here.” The guests froze. Conversations died in their throats. Every eye darted toward us. Carter frowned, slipping effortlessly into that condescending, authoritative tone I used to mistake for leadership. “Maddie, lower your voice. Look at where we are. Don’t make this harder on your mother’s memory than it needs to be.” My vision blurred with a rage so pure it felt like a religious experience. Who made it hard on her memory? Who starved her of her last fighting chance by giving her lifeline to his shiny new toy? “Carter,” I rasped, the sound tearing out of my throat like shattered glass. “How dare you even speak her name standing on this grass?” Harper immediately shrank back, looping her arm through Carter’s and pressing her chest against his bicep. “Carter, just let it go,” she whispered loudly enough for the front row to hear. “Losing a parent makes people completely unstable. Though, Maddie…” She looked at me with wide, Bambi eyes. “Throwing a tantrum like this? It’s really not a good look for your mother’s legacy.” Every word was a perfectly calculated strike. I looked at her, my voice eerily calm. “My mother’s legacy requires zero input from a woman who sleeps her way onto a cap table.” “Excuse me?!” Harper gasped, her hand flying to her chest. Tears sprang to her eyes with terrifying speed. “I am just trying to be supportive! After all, we’re both Carter’s…” “Enough.” Carter cut her off, but his glaring eyes were fixed squarely on me. “Madeline, when are you going to stop this hysterical crusade?” I stared at the man standing before me. The man I had pulled all-nighters for. The man whose startup I had built from the ground up. He was actually standing over my mother’s grave, scolding me. A laugh bubbled up in my chest. A dark, hollow sound that startled even me. I was laughing at my own six-year blindness. At my pathetic, unwavering loyalty. “From this second forward, Carter, we have absolutely nothing to discuss.” I reached into my black clutch and pulled out the crisp, white envelope I had carried for three days. With a flick of my wrists, I tore the resignation letter in half, then into quarters, letting the pieces flutter like snow over the damp grass. “I, Madeline Frost, officially resign as Head of Acquisitions.” I looked him dead in the eye. “Orion Capital, you, and your little parasite over there—you are dead to me.” Dead silence draped over the cemetery. I turned my back on them, facing my mother’s portrait resting among the white lilies. “Watch me, Mom,” I whispered, the dam finally breaking as hot tears tracked down my frozen cheeks. “I’m going to build my own empire now. I’m done being the architect for someone else’s.” The memories of the last six months crashed over me, a suffocating wave of deceit. 2 It had started on a crisp, sunlit Monday morning. I was in my glass-walled office, running risk models on a tech merger. In my six years at Orion Capital, my portfolios had generated over fifty million in pure profit. My projections were gospel. “Morning, team. I’m Harper Montgomery. I’m the new Investment Manager, and I’m so thrilled to learn from all of you.” The boardroom doors had swung open, and she strolled in. She looked like she had stepped off a Pinterest board for ‘quiet luxury.’ A black tweed Chanel jacket, a vintage Patek Philippe on her delicate wrist, and red-soled pumps. But the brands weren’t what made the room stop. It was her face. She possessed that untouchable, poreless beauty of someone who had never known a day of real struggle. She radiated the intoxicating, dangerous energy of a girl who always got what she wanted. Carter was at the head of the table. When his eyes landed on Harper, I saw something shift in his posture. A hunger. A spark I hadn’t seen directed at me in years. “Harper’s resume speaks for itself,” Carter said, his voice dropping an octave, smoothing out into something warm and velvety. “An MBA from Wharton, aggressive international portfolio experience. I have no doubt she’s going to shake things up around here.” After the meeting, Carter called me into his corner office—the office we had celebrated securing, the one decorated with a framed photo of us in Napa and the Montblanc pen I bought him when we hit our first million. “So, Maddie. Thoughts on the new blood?” He was standing by the floor-to-ceiling windows, staring out at the Chicago skyline. There was a thrum of electricity in his voice. “She looks the part,” I said honestly, sinking into the leather sofa. “But female intuition tells me she didn’t take a mid-level job at our boutique firm just to crunch numbers.” Carter turned around, flashing a brilliant, boyish grin that made my stomach flip. “You’re always so analytical. But you’re right to be sharp. Her resume is pristine, and her family background… well, it’s significant.” I brushed it off, too busy managing my own accounts to pry. A week later, Carter pulled me into his office again. This time, he shut the door and clicked the blinds closed, pitching the room into conspiratorial shadows. “Maddie, I have the holy grail,” he said, practically vibrating with adrenaline. “The Apex Trust is restructuring. They’re looking for a new external management team.” My heart did a violent stutter-step. The Apex Trust. It was a ten-billion-dollar fund. Landing that account would catapult us from a successful boutique firm to Wall Street royalty. It was the white whale we had been chasing for six years. It was the reason I had declined offers from Goldman and Morgan Stanley. “Are we actually in the running?” I breathed, my hands suddenly clammy. “Better than in the running.” Carter leaned across his mahogany desk, his eyes wild. “Harper Montgomery is Richard Montgomery’s niece. The founder of the Apex Trust.” I stared at him. “So… she’s here to…” “Audit us.” Carter grabbed my hands, his thumbs tracing my knuckles. “Maddie, she’s her uncle’s proxy. This is the golden ticket.” I was so blinded by the prospect of our shared dream coming true that I missed the red flags snapping in the wind. “What’s the play?” I asked. Carter’s gaze darkened into something intensely calculating. “We need a narrative. A dynamic. I need you to play the heavy. Be hard on her. Question her proposals, make her feel a little targeted.” I blinked. “Why?” “Because then I can step in,” he said smoothly. “I’ll play the mediator. I’ll defend her against the ‘harsh, veteran executive.’ Women like her—sheltered, trust-fund girls—they love a white knight. If I can make her feel protected, I win her trust. And if I win her trust, we get the fund.” I nodded slowly. It sounded manipulative, but corporate finance was a blood sport. “And then what?” “Then we secure the bag, Maddie. We win.” He kissed my forehead. “We’re so close.” God, I was so naive. I thought we were writing a masterpiece together. I didn’t realize he was just scripting my exit. 3 The plan worked seamlessly. Too seamlessly. Our first ‘performance’ was at the Friday pitch meeting. Harper presented an acquisition strategy, and right on cue, I tore it apart. “Harper, your risk assessment here is practically nonexistent,” I said, leaning back in my chair, projecting icy indifference. “Before you try to reinvent the wheel, perhaps you should familiarize yourself with our baseline conservative models?” Harper’s lower lip actually trembled. The tears welled up instantly, shining in her massive eyes. “Madeline, I know I’m the junior here, but I spent all weekend pulling these analytics. The market trends…” “Trends change with the wind,” I interrupted with a cold laugh. “We deal in hard data, not textbook theories.” The tension in the boardroom was suffocating. The junior analysts were staring at their laptops, terrified to breathe. Right on cue, Carter cleared his throat. “Maddie, let’s dial it back.” His voice was a masterclass in gentle authority. “Harper might be new to our specific culture, but her angle is incredibly innovative. We can’t let seniority blind us to fresh perspectives.” Harper looked at him like he had just pulled her from a burning building. The raw hero-worship in her eyes made my stomach churn, even knowing it was supposedly part of the plan. “Thank you, Carter,” she breathed. “I promise I won’t let you down.” At first, I compartmentalized it. I told myself it was just business. But then, the lines began to blur. Carter started quietly reassigning my flagship accounts to Harper. He gave her my two best junior analysts. He even moved her office from the bullpen to the executive floor, directly across the hall from mine. “Don’t you think you’re overdoing it?” I cornered him in the breakroom a month into the charade. “She’s practically co-director at this point.” He didn’t even look up from his espresso. “You have to commit to the bit, Maddie. We have to show her we value her beyond her last name. Think of the big picture.” The big picture. The illusion shattered the night I forgot my laptop charger and went back to the office at 9 PM. The lights were off, save for the warm glow spilling from Harper’s office. I walked quietly down the hall. Carter was standing behind Harper’s leather chair. In his hands was a velvet jeweler’s box. “Happy birthday, Harper,” his voice was a low, intimate murmur that sent a shockwave of nausea through me. She popped the box open and gasped. Nestled inside was a diamond collar necklace. It was blinding. “Carter, my god… this is too much. I can’t accept this!” “Take it,” he insisted, his voice thick with an emotion I hadn’t heard in years. “You deserve the best.” He stepped closer, brushing her hair over her shoulder, and fastened the diamonds around her neck. His fingertips lingered on her bare skin for a long, heavy moment. I stood in the shadows of the hallway, the blood roaring in my ears, feeling my world tilt on its axis. The next morning, I threw a printed photo of the jeweler’s receipt—which I had found on his assistant’s desk—onto Carter’s keyboard. “Is this the plan, Carter?” I demanded, my voice trembling. “A hundred-and-fifty-thousand-dollar diamond necklace?” He glanced at the paper, his jaw clenching in immediate defensive anger. “What is your problem?” “My problem? You’re dropping six figures on a twenty-something’s birthday! Is this part of the ‘strategy’?” “Do you know nothing about ROI?” he snapped, pushing back from his desk. “A necklace is a drop in the bucket. When we sign the Apex Trust, that money comes back tenfold!” ROI. The word tasted like ash. “You’re treating emotional manipulation like an investment strategy?” “Madeline, Jesus Christ!” He slammed his hands on the desk, his face flushed with sudden, explosive rage. “Can you stop being so incredibly suffocating? I am doing what it takes to secure our future! And frankly, I’m getting sick of your constant paranoia!” He shoved past me, his shoulder clipping mine so hard I stumbled sideways. My arm slammed into the sharp edge of the marble credenza. A dark, ugly bruise would bloom there by evening. I cradled my arm, staring at the back of the man I loved. “You’ll do whatever it takes?” I asked the empty room. “Whatever it takes,” he threw over his shoulder without looking back. “Even if it means dealing with your goddamn jealousy.” The door clicked shut, severing six years of history like a guillotine. 4 Then came a relentless, rain-soaked night in November. I was buried in spreadsheets, trying to salvage an account Harper had neglected, when my cell phone vibrated. It was the hospital. “Ms. Frost, your mother has taken a sudden turn. You need to get here immediately.” I abandoned everything, sprinting to my car. The rain lashed against the windshield, blurring the city lights into a smear of neon, mirroring the panic rising in my throat. When I reached her room, my mother looked translucent, swallowed by the hospital bed and a maze of IV tubes. The oncologist pulled me into the hallway, his expression grim. “The cancer has metastasized to her liver. She is in rapid decline.” The sterile hallway spun. I braced my hand against the wall. “What can we do? There has to be something.” He hesitated. “There is an experimental immunotherapy compound. It’s not FDA-approved yet, so insurance won’t touch it, but it has shown miraculous results in European trials. We have to administer it tonight, or… or she has a month, at best.” “How much?” I asked, my voice cracking. “I don’t care what it is.” “A hundred and fifty thousand dollars.” A hundred and fifty thousand. The exact price of a diamond necklace. My fingers shook as I dialed Carter’s number. “Yeah?” he answered. There was thumping bass in the background. A club. And the unmistakable sound of a woman’s breathless laugh. “Carter, it’s my mom. She’s crashing. The doctors need $150,000 for an experimental treatment right now, can you please wire…” “Wait, what? A hundred and fifty grand?” The irritation in his voice was instant. The background noise muffled slightly as he walked away from the music. “Are you serious?” “Please, Carter. It’s life or death. She’s out of time!” I was sobbing right there in the open corridor. “Okay, okay, calm down,” he sighed, the patronizing tone slipping back in. “I’ll handle it. I’ll initiate the wire. Just wait for the confirmation.” “Thank you. God, thank you so much, Carter.” “Yeah, whatever. I gotta go, I’m in the middle of something.” Click. I sat in the plastic chair outside the ICU. An hour crawled by. Then two. Then three. Every notification bell made my heart leap, only to crash when it was just an email. At 3:00 AM, my screen lit up with a banking alert from our joint corporate account. I opened it, ready to sprint to the billing department. Instead, the words on the screen made my blood run cold. Transfer Complete: $150,000.00 wired to Harper Montgomery. Remaining Balance: $24,500.00. Wired to Harper. I blinked hard, thinking the sleep deprivation was making me hallucinate. But the numbers didn’t change. The money—my mother’s literal lifeline—had gone to Harper. I hit Carter’s contact. It rang endlessly. Finally, a groggy voice answered. “What?” “Carter! You wired the money to Harper!” I screamed, not caring who heard me. “My mother’s treatment money!” “Huh?” There was a rustle of sheets. He was in bed. “Oh. Shit. Look, I’ve been wiring her funds for the new escrow account all week. I must have just hit her contact on autopilot. Muscle memory. I’ll just redo it.” Muscle memory. “My mother is dying right now! The pharmacy needs the funds to release the drug!” “Maddie, stop being so dramatic,” he groaned, clearly exasperated. “The wire cutoff has passed. It won’t clear until banking hours open at 8 AM anyway. It’s a few hours. Just wait.” I looked through the glass window at my mother, her chest barely rising. “Carter… do you remember what you promised her?” I whispered, my voice breaking. “You sat by her bed and told her you would look after me. That you’d treat her like your own mother.” “I know, I know. And I am,” he deflected smoothly. “I said I’d send the money, didn’t I? She’s a tough lady, she’ll make it to morning. Just relax. I have a massive pitch tomorrow and I need sleep. We’ll handle it in the morning.” The line went dead. I slid down the wall, hitting the cold floor, completely and utterly shattered. 5 I remembered the day Carter met my mother. He had brought her an extravagant basket of imported teas. He held her fragile hands in his and smiled that golden-boy smile. Consider me the son you never had, Diana. I’ve got Maddie. You don’t ever have to worry. My mother had cried happy tears that day. She thought her daughter was safe. Now, her “safe harbor” was sleeping soundly while she suffocated, having accidentally given her life savings to his mistress. At 5:00 AM, the monitors in the room started alarming. I rushed in. My mother’s eyes fluttered open. She looked at me, her gaze terrifyingly clear. She squeezed my hand, her grip weak but desperate. “Maddie,” she breathed, her voice like dry leaves. “I don’t think I’m going to see the sun come up.” “No, Mom, don’t say that! The money is coming at 8 AM. We’re going to get the medicine. Just hold on!” I begged, burying my face in her shoulder. “My sweet girl.” She offered a heartbreaking, knowing smile. “I know how it is. Promise me… don’t you ever shrink yourself down for anyone again.” “Mom, please…” Those were her last words. At 6:13 AM, the monitor flatlined into a solid, deafening tone. At 8:00 AM sharp, as the sun broke over the Chicago skyline, my phone buzzed with a bank notification. $150,000 had arrived. I stared at the glowing screen for a long time. Then, I dialed Carter’s number. “Hey, it went through, right?” he answered, sounding chipper, already at the office. “Keep it,” I said, my voice as dead and hollow as the room I was standing in. “She’s already gone.”

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