Category: English

1 While helping Leo search for his laptop, I accidentally stumbled upon his wedding proposal plans. To surprise him, I quietly hid inside the wedding venue, preparing for a reverse proposal. Under the crystal chandeliers, Leo knelt on one knee. But standing before him was my own sister! “Ruby, from the first moment I saw you, I knew you were the only one for me in this life.” My sister lowered her head, covering her mouth, shaking her head vigorously. “No, we can’t do this. Vivian has been with you for five years. What about her?” My mother walked over, laughing. “Don’t worry, does she dare to disagree?” “Mom already knew who Leo truly cared for. What brother-in-law would buy you a mansion worth hundreds of millions and jewelry worth tens of millions? She never got that kind of treatment.” My father directly handed over the household registry. “Let’s just get the marriage certificate today. A double celebration!” “At worst, you can have your children raised by her in the future. That would repay her for saving you two years ago by having her uterus removed.” A metallic taste of blood surged in my throat. I watched, my eyes wide, as they kissed. The ring slipped silently from my fingers. This family, I didn’t want it anymore. … I dialed Leo’s number, my hands trembling. “Where… are you?” He was too happy to notice the catch in my voice. “Vivian, I’m on a business trip. Get some rest. I have to go, talk later.” Ruby bit her lip, frowning. “Did Vivian find out something?” Leo smoothed her brow, scoffing softly. “She’s not that smart. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have given up her advanced study spot for me back then.” Three years ago, he’d approached me, his face full of guilt. “Vivian, can you put off your studies for now? I’ve just started my business, and I’m afraid I can’t manage without you.” I believed him, gave up my dream, and immersed myself in domestic life. But Ruby returned from studying abroad the following year and became his personal secretary. At the time, my parents didn’t approve of Leo and me dating. It was only after Ruby joined Leo’s company that they relented. “It’s all my fault.” Ruby’s eyes were slightly red. “If it weren’t for me, Vivian wouldn’t have been kidnapped, lost her virginity, and lost the ability to be a mother…” Her words dragged me back to the most painful day of my life. That day, I received a call saying Leo had been in an accident in the suburbs. I rushed there, frantic. He was suspended above a cement mixer, covered in blood. “He owes us millions. You’re his girlfriend, you pay it back.” I was penniless then. The thugs laughed. “No money? Then whenever you make us comfortable, we’ll let him go.” I struggled, begged, fought back repeatedly. “I’ll pay! Any amount, just give me some time.” “Money? We want fun.” Five hours? Or ten hours? Or longer? I couldn’t remember. I only remembered waking up to the doctor’s cold notification. “Uterine rupture, requiring removal.” Leo held me, sobbing uncontrollably, promising he’d never betray me. I gripped my palms tightly. My mother’s next sentence sent shivers through my body. “A sister’s debt is a sister’s responsibility. This is what she should do. Don’t blame yourself.” She gently hugged Ruby, comforting her. My father also sighed deeply. “You borrowed money from online lenders for Leo’s business; what’s wrong with that?” “If anyone’s to blame, it’s her for being so stupid, not even noticing such an obvious loophole.” Leo pulled her into his arms. “You are a goddess, and it’s only right for her to sacrifice for you.” “In the future, we’ll let her raise our children. That will be enough to repay her.” My mind buzzed as if struck by lightning. It turned out, this was all planned by them. I stayed in the country, becoming Ruby’s “scapegoat.” Five years of devotion, from head to toe, completely squeezed dry! “Who are you?!” The security guard shouted, drawing Leo’s attention. The moment our eyes met, his pupils contracted sharply. 2 “Vivian?” Leo’s face flashed with panic for a moment, then he quickly regained composure. “Since you’re here, I won’t bother explaining.” He grabbed Ruby’s hand as if asserting ownership. “Ruby and I are getting married next week. Don’t blame me; you can only blame yourself.” “Myself?” I looked up, incredulous. Leo gave a mocking laugh. “My family is a prominent one; do you think I’d marry a woman who can’t have children?” “Besides, if you don’t find yourself dirty, I do.” Fury surged through me, blood gushing from my nose, smearing my face. “You clearly ruined me…” Leo stared at me, momentarily lost. “Vivian, I know you’re hurting, but you can’t force feelings.” Ruby nestled into his embrace, a defiant look in her eyes. “You’ve been used by so many people, your insides must be rotten and foul. Even if I were Leo, I couldn’t stomach it.” “Bang—” My high heel flew, splashing near Ruby’s feet. She shrieked in fright. “Ruby!” Leo’s face darkened, and he glared at me fiercely. “Vivian Ruffalo, don’t push your luck! Ruby is right; your furious face is disgusting!” Ruby sobbed. “Vivian, you won’t even let me tell the truth?” The disgust in Leo’s eyes was overflowing. “Apologize immediately! Otherwise, don’t blame me for ruining your reputation!” I stared fixedly at the video on his phone, no longer able to hold back my furious roar. “You said you destroyed it!” “Leo, you lied to me! Why are you doing this to me?! Am I not your girlfriend? Didn’t you say you’d protect me forever?!” I cried hysterically, unable to vent all the hatred in my heart. A flicker of something that looked like regret crossed his eyes. “Enough!” My mother stormed over, slapping my face. “Aren’t you ashamed?! You’re not welcome here, get out! Don’t ruin your sister’s good day!” My father’s face darkened. “You’d best face reality. Ruby and Leo are a match made in heaven!” My cheek burned. I looked up, meeting Leo’s pitying gaze. “Be good, just apologize properly, and Auntie and Uncle will try to accept you, try to love you.” “Isn’t that what you always wanted?” I looked up, meeting their disgusted eyes. Yes, I was their daughter too, but from childhood, they only loved Ruby. In high school, Ruby led the bullying against me. Dragged me into the bathroom, forced me to drink toilet water. Spread rumors that I was dating some scummy guy, got me drunk, and put me in his bed. It was Leo, passing by, who intervened, swinging an ashtray at the guy, dragging me out of that hell. “Your sister is a piece of trash! Don’t worry, she won’t get away with it. I’ll beat her every time I see her!” Under the moonlight, Leo, panting, stood up for me. After we started dating, he’d often say. “Your sister shamelessly keeps asking you for money!” “When we get married, your husband will get even for you!” Thinking of this, my heart felt like a piece had been brutally ripped out. I wiped away the tears from my face, a calm almost akin to destruction settling over me. “I won’t let any of you get away with this.” I turned and walked away, dialing a number that had been dormant for a long time. “Professor… I need to take back everything that belongs to me.” 3 I obtained Leo’s business trip records from over the years. In a self-destructive manner, I cross-referenced them with Ruby’s social media posts, one by one. The day they watched the sunset on Bali beach, I was suffering from severe period pain and the flu, with a fever of 102 degrees. I asked Leo if he could stay with me. He said he had to attend an industry summit in Europe. I chuckled apologetically, only to be met with his comment about my immaturity. Something suddenly clicked in my mind. I opened the home surveillance. Three days ago, I attended a class reunion. In the video, just as I left, Ruby arrived. In the entryway, the two kissed passionately, and under her trench coat, she was wearing nothing. They were in my marital bedroom, on my bed, using my pillows. Finally, Leo opened my closet, took out my underwear, and bent down to help her put them on. I slammed the laptop shut. Kneeling on the carpet, I vomited until only bile came out. My phone suddenly rang. It was an unknown number. “You dirty bitch, come out and play with me? I promise I’ll serve you better than those other guys.” I abruptly hung up. The next second, malicious texts instantly flooded my inbox. “Who are you trying to fool?! You’ve been used by so many people, your insides are rotten and stinking!” “President Leo is so unlucky, stuck with a slut like you, truly disgusting! You’re an embarrassment to women!” My face was ashen. The trending topic title was blindingly bright. [President Leo’s Girlfriend: A Promiscuous Woman Whose Uterus Was Removed Due to Abuse.] I rushed into Leo’s company. A group of people surrounded me. “Slut! You still have the nerve to show your face! You deserve to die, you whore!” “Let’s get revenge for President Leo!” “You tramp, if you’re lacking men, I’ll take good care of you!” I was pinned to the ground, countless hands roaming over my body. “Let me go! Where’s Leo?!” My shirt was ripped, and the moment my pale chest was exposed, I burst into uncontrollable sobs. “Stop!” A powerful force pulled me up from behind, holding me tightly. Leo’s face was dark as he swept his gaze over the attackers, then ordered his assistant. “Call the police! Arrest every single one of them!” Ruby’s face was very grim. In the office, Leo looked at me reassuringly. “The video was accidentally exposed. I’ll take care of it.” Ruby suddenly spoke. “Vivian, you wouldn’t have staged all this yourself, would you?” “Are you trying to gain our sympathy, mine and Leo’s, by deliberately releasing the video and forcing Leo to marry you?” I looked up in disbelief, meeting Leo’s suspicious gaze. My whole body was numb with pain, my heart seizing. “It was you!” Meeting Ruby’s challenging eyes, I lunged at her. Ruby screamed, dodging behind Leo. “Leo, protect me! Vivian is desperate now that I’ve exposed her!” Leo shielded her, then fiercely shoved me away. I hit a nearby teapot, and scalding hot water poured onto my face. “Ah—!” The intense burning pain made every inch of my skin scream. But Leo didn’t even turn his head; he was only anxiously checking if Ruby was hurt. “Vivian Ruffalo, stop your pathetic act! Ruby is carrying my child, and I won’t allow anyone to hurt her! Especially you!” I clutched my scalded face, trembling with pain. A guttural sound escaped my throat, but I couldn’t utter a single word, and I simply collapsed. 4 I woke up in the hospital. The face in the mirror had a huge blister, clinging to my face like a grotesque worm. “Awake?” Ruby looked at my disfigured face, her smile growing even brighter. “Do you know why I stole so many things from you, but never Leo?” She leaned closer to me, smiling gleefully. “Because Leo has been mine from the very beginning, you know?” She looked at me, grinning. “What made you think he would save you? Or fall in love with you? It was all my doing, you see.” “I just wanted to watch you fall in love, then cut you off at the root, completely shattering your heart.” She deliberately winked. “How is it, my dear sister? Do you like the gift big sister sent you?” Countless sweet memories of Leo flashed through my mind. My head buzzed and then exploded. I resisted, my eyes wide with fury. “How could you do this to me?!” The bodyguards by my side held me firmly to the hospital bed, making it impossible to struggle. Ruby’s long, sharp fingernail traced my chin. Then she violently pressed it into the blister on my face. “Ah—!” Yellow pus splattered everywhere, choking my throat, sending a searing pain through me. I screamed, heartbroken, blood and tears mingling on my face. Ruby reveled in my agony, her smile growing even more defiant. I stared at her, then suddenly broke free and lunged. “Bang—” Leo, his face filled with savagery, kicked me away. My grotesque scars crawled all over my face; he paused for a moment, then spat viciously. “You reap what you sow!” Ruby clutched her lower abdomen, gasping. “Leo, my stomach hurts so much!” Leo strode forward, abruptly grabbing my throat. “Vivian Ruffalo, I’m warning you one last time. My wife will only be Ruby. If you dare to bully her again, I promise I’ll make your life a living hell.” He lit a cigar, and the thick, burning tip, as if to vent his anger, seared my tender facial flesh. It sizzled. I choked, clutching his hand, slowly sliding down as I covered my face. Leo paused, then tossed a tube of ointment at me. “Don’t play dead. This is excellent healing salve; it’ll prevent scarring.” “In three days, Ruby and I are getting married. You must be there.” “I want everyone to know that you are the one who wronged me!” Watching his retreating back as he carried Ruby away. I clenched my fists tightly, murmuring, “You two will regret this.” Three days later. At the wedding, everything proceeded in an orderly fashion. Leo scanned the room but didn’t find me. Ruby, in a pearl-white satin wedding gown, was incredibly beautiful, like a ripe, alluring pearl, exuding a tempting luster. Yet, Leo was unexpectedly distracted. He remembered the day they designed the wedding dress, and his mind was filled with images of me wearing it. “Leo?” Ruby called him several times before he snapped back to attention. For some reason, a vague unease settled in his heart; he simply attributed it to pre-wedding jitters. The ceremony continued. “Now, now the groom may kiss the bride.” The emcee’s words brought the atmosphere to a crescendo. The moment Leo leaned in, the entire venue plunged into sudden darkness. The next second, the big screen lit up. The scene showed two people entangled, naked. “Leo, when do you think that idiot Vivian will find out that we’ve been hooking up for ages?”

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Five years ago, Luke and I entered this strange world as broke outsiders, marrying the wealthy Astor sisters. A devastating car crash three years later left Luke paralyzed and me blind. Unable to accept his condition, Luke ended his own life. While grieving, I overheard my wife Anne and her sister Eleanor. Anne asked if Eleanor had Luke’s spine broken to protect someone named Simon. Eleanor replied coldly, then revealed Anne had blinded me with pills, making me believe the crash was the cause. Anne responded, “As long as Simon is safe, nothing else matters. We married these nobodies to use them as shields.” The truth hit me like ice. Every loving gesture had been a lie. We were just pawns, sacrificed to protect Simon. My best friend’s death will not be in vain. Now that I see the truth, I will make them pay. 1 I fished my phone out of my pocket and dialed a number I had committed to memory. “I need you to draft divorce papers. I am leaving Anne.” Once the lawyer confirmed, I ended the call. I was just about to turn and navigate my way down the hall when Anne’s voice drifted out from the ajar door again. “The truth is, Luke’s spine could have been saved. Simon was careless during the surgery and severed the nerve. This malpractice could cost him his medical license and his upcoming board review. We have to bury this at all costs.” Eleanor hummed in agreement. “Consider it done.” “Those pills you are feeding Arthur. You know the side effects can cause severe cognitive decline, right? Do not give him more than one a day, Anne.” I heard the rustle of clothing as Anne shook her head. “No. He is too sharp. If I don’t keep him docile, he might piece together our connection to Simon. If he exposes everything, it would ruin Simon.” My fingers curled into tight fists, fingernails digging sharply into my palms. Luke had a chance to recover. He didn’t have to die. I didn’t have to lose my sight. A sudden ringtone shattered the quiet. It was Eleanor’s phone. I heard her gasp, her voice spiking in pitch. “What do you mean Luke jumped?” The room went dead silent. A second later, the door swung open violently. I didn’t have time to hide. Anne froze the second she saw me standing in the corridor. Panic laced her voice. “What are you doing out here? Did you hear something?” I prepared to shake my head, but her hands were already gripping my arms, her fingers digging in tight. She let out a shaky breath. “Thank God you are safe. Please, Arthur, promise me you won’t do anything stupid. Promise me you won’t leave me like Luke left Eleanor. I wouldn’t survive it.” Her hands were trembling against my skin. She felt genuinely terrified. But I could no longer tell where the brilliant actress ended and my wife began. Five years ago, Luke and I arrived in this world with nothing but the clothes on our backs. The Astor sisters claimed it was love at first sight. They defied their incredibly powerful family, causing a massive scandal just to put rings on our fingers. I remember trying to talk Anne out of it. I told her we were just two broke guys who didn’t deserve them, and I didn’t want to ruin her relationship with her family. She had thrown her arms around me, holding on for dear life. She told me nothing else mattered as long as we stayed by their side. So we braved the endless mockery of the elite circle, became the Astor husbands, and helped build their empire to the towering heights it sat at today. Just this morning, when Luke was told his lumbar vertebrae were pulverized beyond repair, he cried. He told me the Astor relatives were already looking at him like garbage. He said he refused to drag Eleanor down. He said we would be brothers again in the next life. Then he pushed himself off the windowsill. I lunged to grab him, but I grasped nothing but empty air. The sickest joke of all was that it took his death for me to see the truth. These women never had a single ounce of love for us. Anne guided me back to my hospital bed. She pressed a handful of pills and a glass of warm water into my palm, her fingers gently brushing over my sightless eyes. “You need to take better care of yourself, Arthur. You can’t see. What if you trip and hurt yourself? Swallow these so you can heal faster.” I traced the chalky surface of the pills with my thumb. A bitter smile touched my lips. A one-a-day prescription, and she was handing me over a dozen at once. Did she want to turn me into a brain-dead vegetable that badly? “It is too many. I don’t want them.” The temperature in the room plummeted. Anne’s voice turned remarkably cold. “This is not the time to throw a tantrum. Take the pills, Arthur, or I will force them down your throat.” She signaled the doctor. Heavy hands pinned my shoulders to the mattress. Anne pried my jaw open, shoved the bitter handful into my mouth, and poured water right over them. I choked, coughing violently, feeling like I was drowning. I thrashed wildly on the bed, but Anne just stood there, watching in absolute silence. Only when I finally swallowed did she help me up from the floor where I had fallen. She carefully wiped the spilled water from my face, her voice returning to a sickeningly sweet whisper. “The doctor was too rough. I will have him disciplined later. But you have to take your medicine. It is for your own good.” My blood ran cold. My heart felt like a block of lead. The moment her footsteps faded down the hall, I stumbled into the bathroom, shoved two fingers down my throat, and threw up everything. Without the heavy dose of toxins clouding my system, my vision actually cleared a fraction. I could make out blurry shapes and moving shadows. I needed air. I needed to calm down. I made my way up to the hospital roof, only to find Anne and Simon already there. 2 Simon was in his white lab coat. His eyes were red and puffy. He looked like a kicked puppy. “I made a catastrophic mistake during Luke’s surgery. He ended up paralyzed and killed himself because of me. The medical board is going to strip my license. I will never be a surgeon again.” “What do I do, Anne? I am so scared.” Anne gazed at him, her eyes practically overflowing with a deep, hidden adoration. She reached out and gently stroked his hair. “It is okay. Eleanor and I will handle the board. We will buy off whoever we need to. And if we can’t keep it quiet, we will pay witnesses to say Arthur caused the surgical complication by interfering. We will send him to prison for a few years. Your reputation will remain spotless.” Simon laughed through his tears, wiping his face. “Won’t your husband hate you for that?” Anne shook her head with absolute sincerity. “I don’t care if he hates me. Your safety is the only thing that matters. You are the only person I care about protecting.” Simon wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her flush against him. He lifted a hand to trace her bottom lip. “Am I really just a little brother to you? Watching you pretend with that blind charity case breaks my heart. You must be so disgusted playing the dutiful wife.” “Let me make it up to you…” Anne flushed. She hesitated, looking around. “Our family has too many enemies. If I show you any affection in public, they will put a target on your back.” Her words were swallowed by his mouth. Anne abandoned her restraint, clinging to his shoulders as they kissed passionately. In the middle of locking lips with my wife, Simon opened his eyes, locked his gaze right where I was standing in the shadows, and gave me a look of pure, unadulterated mockery. A chill crawled up my spine. But I didn’t step out. I didn’t scream. I pressed the stop button on my phone’s video recorder, slipped it into my pocket, and quietly walked back to my room, pretending I was still perfectly blind. Three days later, we held Luke’s funeral. It was supposed to be a quiet, private service, but the Astor family turned it into a massive spectacle. When Anne guided me into the hall, I could feel the hostile stares. The whispers buzzed around me like angry wasps. “Is that the Astor heiress’s husband? Why is he wearing dark glasses?” “I heard he went blind. He was already a gold-digging loser from the slums. Now he is completely useless.” “Poor Anne. Shackled to a crippled parasite. If I were him, I would have the decency to jump off a bridge rather than embarrass her.” “The dead guy was his best friend. Two leeches sucking the Astor wealth dry. Good riddance to one of them. Too bad they both didn’t jump.” The venomous insults echoed off the marble walls. My hands trembled slightly. Noticing my reaction, Anne gripped my fingers tighter. She turned sharply toward the crowd, her voice cracking like a whip. “Enough! Arthur is my husband. Say one more word about him in my presence, and I swear I will ruin you and your entire family by nightfall!” The great hall fell deathly silent. During the service, I stood at the front, holding my brother’s urn, numbly accepting the hollow condolences of people who hated us. Then Simon walked in, carrying a massive bouquet of white lilies. “My deepest condolences, Arthur,” he said, his voice dripping with fake pity. “It is a tragedy, really. But honestly, with a shattered spine, he would have been a bedridden vegetable for the rest of his life. He would have drained his wife’s youth. Dying was probably the kindest thing he could do.” “To think, he actually took my advice and jumped out that window…” My breath caught. Simon had goaded Luke into jumping. I expected to hear at least a shred of guilt in his voice. Instead, he leaned in close so only I could hear. “You are half a cripple yourself now. When are you going to do the world a favor and follow him? You two parasites have infected this family for way too long.” My knuckles turned white around the urn. I wanted to tear him apart, but I refused to cause a scene in front of Luke’s ashes. Suddenly, Simon threw himself to his knees. He raised his hand and began slapping his own face violently. He wailed, his voice echoing through the silent hall. “I am so sorry! It is all my fault! My surgical skills weren’t good enough! I couldn’t fix his spine! I don’t deserve to be a doctor!” Anne shoved her way through the crowd just in time to see Simon kneeling on the floor, his cheeks bruised and swollen. He was pulling at his hair, weeping hysterically, curling into a ball of misery. He grabbed a heavy marble paperweight from the registry desk and raised it above his hands. “Arthur is right!” Simon sobbed. “I am a failure! I killed Luke! I will crush my own hands so I can never hold a scalpel again! It is the only way to pay for my sins!” Anne let out a terrified shriek. She lunged forward, snatching the heavy marble from his grasp, and pulled him fiercely into her chest. She looked up at me, her eyes filled with absolute disgust. “How can you be so vicious, Arthur? Luke’s spine was destroyed in the crash. You were the one driving! If you had kept your eyes on the road, none of this would have happened!” “A surgeon’s hands are his life! How could you try to force him to destroy his career? You stay here and think about what you have done!” She barked an order, and the entire Astor entourage filed out of the room, following her and Simon. The grand memorial hall emptied out in seconds. I hugged the cold urn to my chest. It didn’t matter. Luke hated these snobs anyway. We didn’t need their fake tears. I turned to leave the hall. Before I could take a step, a heavy hand grabbed the urn and ripped it out of my arms. 3 I lunged forward to grab it back, but a blunt object smashed into the back of my skull. The world spun wildly. As I collapsed to the marble floor, my blurry vision focused on the men standing over me. They were notorious rivals of the Astor family. Vicious men who operated in the city’s underbelly. The leader popped the lid off the urn. With a cruel sneer, he dumped Luke’s ashes directly onto the floor. They stomped their heavy boots right into the gray dust, grinding it into the tiles, before spitting a mouthful of saliva onto the pile. “Anne and Eleanor stole a massive shipping contract from us,” the leader snarled. “They told us if we had a problem, we could come find them. Well, ruining their favorite little pets seems like a great place to start!” “This dead one is boring. But the live one looks like he can take a beating.” “What do you think, boys? Break his arms? Shatter his kneecaps? He has a pretty face. Let’s carve it up so every time Anne looks at him, she remembers who runs this city.” Laughter bounced off the walls. They dragged me into a dark corner like a piece of dead meat. My hand slipped into my pocket, my fingers blindly navigating my phone’s screen to dial emergency services. Before the call connected, a steel-toed boot crashed into my ribs. Over a dozen men swarmed me. There was no holding back. They intended to beat me to death. Bones cracked. Knives flashed, leaving long, burning cuts across my chest and arms. It felt like they were trying to drain every drop of blood from my body. By the time the distant wail of police sirens echoed through the hall, I couldn’t even twitch a finger. Then came the frantic sound of high heels. Anne had finally returned. When she saw me lying in a pool of my own blood, she screamed. She tore away the paramedics, dragging me into her own car, speeding toward the hospital like a madwoman. Her face was twisted in absolute agony. She kept shaking my shoulders, refusing to let me close my eyes. “I am so sorry, Arthur. I was just angry. I shouldn’t have left you alone. I didn’t know they would come for you.” “You have to stay awake. You have to live. If you die because of me, I will never forgive myself as long as I live!” Hot tears spilled onto her cheeks and dripped down onto my cold skin. But later, as I lay drifting in and out of consciousness in the trauma ward, I heard Anne whispering furiously to her head of security. “Arthur was the bait. I needed to draw out the rats who wanted to hurt Simon. Now that they have shown their faces, wipe them out. Make sure the city is safe for him.” “I do feel slightly guilty about this. I will make sure Arthur is taken care of. Being a part of the Astor family and enjoying our wealth is more than enough compensation.” “The most important thing is keeping Simon’s name completely out of the police reports. No media leaks.” A single tear slipped from the corner of my eye, soaking into the pristine white pillowcase. For the first time in five years, I violently regretted saying “I do”. When I finally opened my eyes, Anne rushed over, wrapping her arms tightly around my neck. I stared at the ceiling and spoke with absolute clarity. “I want a divorce.” Anne froze. She pulled back, looking confused. “What did you say?” “I said, I want a divorce, Anne. I don’t love you anymore.” Her grip on my hands tightened painfully. She opened her mouth to argue, but a sudden commotion outside the room interrupted her. Simon stumbled through the doorway, looking disheveled, a horde of aggressive reporters practically breathing down his neck. He had a shallow scrape on his cheek. Cornered, he immediately hid behind Anne’s back. He was crying, his voice trembling perfectly. “Anne, I am so sorry. Someone leaked the video of us on the roof to the press.” “They are calling me a homewrecker. They are saying I seduced you. They are demanding I get on my knees and apologize to Arthur.” “It is my fault. I shouldn’t have fallen for you. I have ruined everything. I should just jump out this window and give everyone what they want!” Without warning, he dropped to his knees, slammed his forehead against the tiles three times, then sprang up and threw one leg over the hospital window ledge. Anne’s eyes went wide with terror. She grabbed his waist and hauled him backward. “Are you insane?!” She cradled him against her chest. “Who dares call you a homewrecker? You did nothing wrong. I forbid you from blaming yourself.” The reporters were shoving their cameras right into their faces. Anne gritted her teeth. Without a second thought for my stitched wounds, she grabbed the collar of my hospital gown and yanked me violently out of the bed. She kicked the back of my knees. I crashed to the hard floor, landing directly on my shattered joints. My newly stitched wounds ripped open. A mouthful of blood spilled from my lips, splattering the floor. She completely ignored the blood. She pointed down at me and screamed, “Apologize to Simon, Arthur!” I stared at her, genuinely shocked. “I didn’t do anything. Why would I apologize?” “Because you pushed him to the edge! You made things difficult for him twice in one day. You drove him to suicide!” “Now the media is tearing him apart, and my family is a laughingstock! Are you happy now?” “No wonder you brought up divorce. You knew I would punish you for this, so you tried to play the victim to get the upper hand!” When I clamped my mouth shut and refused to speak, Anne lost her mind. She raised her hand and slapped me across the face in front of fifty flashing cameras. “You are so vicious, Arthur! You are determined to destroy an innocent man!” “If you won’t tell them the truth, I will!” She turned to face the blinding flashes of the press. She pointed directly at me. “The real cheater is Arthur Pendleton!” “He had an affair and tried to extort half the Astor fortune! I divorced him months ago, but he blackmailed me into keeping it quiet! Simon is entirely innocent! He was just comforting me during a difficult time, and someone took it out of context to ruin his career!” The room erupted. The reporters surged forward like bloodthirsty hounds. People passing in the hall started spitting on me. Someone shoved me hard. I crashed into a medical cart, sending shattered glass flying. A jagged shard sliced deep into my neck. Blood pumped freely down my collar. A doctor rushed forward to apply pressure, but Anne blocked him with her body. “Leave him! Let him bleed on the floor until he repents for his lies!” I lay there, watching my own blood pool around me. Right before the darkness took me, someone stomped their heel deliberately into the side of my head. Anne grabbed Simon’s hand and rushed him out of the room, demanding a full-body scan for his minor scrape. After hours of tests confirmed Simon was perfectly fine, her anger finally cooled. She pulled out her phone and called the hospital director. “Go check on Arthur. Stitch up whatever is bleeding. Remind him he is still my husband, and I will not be signing any divorce papers.” “Oh, and use the good anesthesia. He doesn’t like pain.” The director’s voice shook on the other end of the line. “Miss Astor… I was just about to call you. Arthur is gone. He left an signed divorce agreement and a USB drive for you.”

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1 It was my fifth year as a private investigator, and I’d just taken on a completely routine infidelity case. My phone vibrated in my pocket—a message from my wife, Iris Jiang. She said she’d be home late tonight to celebrate my birthday, adding mysteriously that she had a surprise for me. I was still looking at the message when the scene through my camera lens froze me. Iris, her clothes disheveled, was locked in a tight embrace with a strange man outside a hotel, kissing as if no one else existed. That profound tenderness was something she’d never shown me in our nearly ten years of marriage. It wasn’t until the click of the camera shutter that I snapped back to reality. I looked down at the familiar face in the photo, then up at the two still locked in an embrace not far away. A sense of absurdity washed over me. I gave a bitter laugh, thinking: What surprise could possibly compare to catching her cheating with my own eyes? … My finger hovered over the screen for a long time. I never sent the last message. Instead, I sent the photo I’d taken to Iris. When I returned home, Iris came back shortly after. Her face was calm, not a hint of panic at being caught. She was holding a birthday cake box. The atmosphere was silent. She didn’t say a word. It wasn’t until the cake box was placed on the dining table that I looked up at her. “You cheated.” My voice was hoarse when I said it, aching painfully. She frowned, no longer trying to hide it. “You already knew, didn’t you? You know I could never let go of Brett.” “Always have, always will.” Receiving the answer I’d expected, I thought I could truly remain calm. “He’s not doing well now, he’s in a lot of debt, and that’s the only work he can do.” “I’m just helping out his business. Don’t make it sound so awful.” Brett. It was Brett again. Ten years of marriage, and that name was a thorn in my heart. I thought with time, she’d eventually forget. I never expected that even now, she truly hadn’t let go. I found it somewhat ridiculous, and a film of mist welled up in my eyes. “Helping out his business all the way to bed?” “Did you forget we’re married? For ten years!” Iris tutted, rubbing her temples, her face full of helplessness and impatience. “Brett has a strong personality. He wouldn’t take money if I just gave it to him, so if I gave him money, he’d insist on providing a… service.” “So you just slept together?” I pulled out my phone, pointing at the photo on the screen, my entire body trembling. “He knows you’re married. What ‘strong personality’? I think he just wants to be a homewrecker!” The moment the words left my mouth, a sharp pain flared across my cheek. The taste of rust instantly spread in my mouth. Iris’s hand froze mid-air, stunned after the slap. Her lips trembled as she tried to apologize to me. “Mason, I…” The slightly ajar door creaked, and Brett poked his head in from outside. His expression was awkward when he saw the scene inside. “I… I came to bring Iris her lipstick. She left it at my place.” As soon as he spoke, as if making a decision, he immediately pulled the door open and drew Iris behind him. “Mason, I’m sorry. I was the one clinging to her, it’s my fault.” “Whatever anger you have, direct it at me. Iris is innocent.” His reaction immediately made Iris feel protective. The last trace of guilt she felt towards me completely vanished. “It’s none of your business. We didn’t kill anyone or set anything on fire. What’s all this talk of innocent or not innocent?” My tongue touched the inside of my cheek. The slap stung badly; I could see the imprint of five fingers on my cheek even through the mirror. “Since you already know, choose for yourself: divorce or stay together.” Her nonchalant words sent a sharp pang through my heart. It almost hurt too much to stand upright. She knew I couldn’t leave her, otherwise she wouldn’t have made such a ridiculous demand. I opened my mouth, but before I could speak, a jarring phone rang repeatedly. Brett, who had been protecting Iris, instantly paled. He fumbled to hang up the call. “Iris, the loan sharks are calling me again. I’m really scared.” “I, I need to go to work.” How could Iris let him leave now? Right in front of me, she tightly grasped Brett’s hand, her tone stiff. “Are you going to sleep with other people again? How much more do you owe? I’ll give it to you.” After she said this, she instinctively looked at me. “My secondary card still has fifty thousand. I can lend it to you.” My head buzzed, and I instinctively spoke out. “Are you crazy?! Do you know that money…” “Sorry, really, no need. It’s all my fault, I’m just so worthless.” Brett’s eyes were bloodshot. He pulled his hand away from Iris and left. Iris, her face full of worry, followed him. The front door slammed shut with force. The gust of wind it created chilled my heart to the bone. Ten years of marriage, and it amounted to nothing. Half my face was swollen high. I held ice to my cheek, staring blankly at our wedding photo on the wall. From the beginning of our relationship, I knew there would always be someone between Iris and me. When we were getting engaged, I took her to customize rings. That day, she stared at the display of ring samples for a long time. When I asked her about it, she subconsciously replied. “My first love never brought me here.” My hand, engraving a letter, paused. When I looked up at her, I saw tears streaming down her face. My lips trembled, and those around me looked at me strangely. “You still like him?” “Not like. Love.” After getting the matching rings, I was silent for a long time. I considered breaking up, but then she said. “That’s all in the past. What matters is that I chose you.” “If you really mind, we don’t have to get married.” Her words stirred my compassion. It was all in the past, and the future was with her. Time, perhaps, would change everything. Driven by this thought and a quiet stubbornness, I still chose to marry Iris. I thought she was willing to spend her life with me. It wasn’t until the first year of our marriage, after a work dinner, that I was rushed to the hospital with a severe stomach infection. The doctor examined me and said I needed surgery. But when I went to withdraw money from my bank account, I found that the money was gone. Tens of thousands, not a single penny left. I immediately contacted Iris. Only she knew the password to that card. We had agreed when we got married that the money in it was not to be touched unless absolutely necessary. Iris was silent for a long time on the other end of the phone before she spoke. “I lent that money to someone. I didn’t know you were sick.” She tried to explain but refused to tell me who she had lent it to. No matter how much I pushed or questioned, she wouldn’t say a word. When she learned I needed surgery, she rushed back from out of town. She borrowed money, nursed me back to health, and apologized profusely. “Mason, please forgive me. You can hit me, curse me, whatever, just no next time.” After enough money was raised, my illness still left me with chronic issues because the surgery wasn’t performed in time. When I was discharged, I brought up divorce to Iris. She even got down on her knees and begged me. “I just lent the money to someone who needed it. I truly didn’t expect you to get sick. You can’t divorce me over this.” “Money can be earned again.” She pleaded incessantly, but when I again asked her who she lent the money to, she still said. “I can’t tell you, but don’t worry, it won’t happen again.” Because of those desperate pleas, I eventually softened. The stinging pain on my face persisted; the ice had melted. Only now did I understand that the money all those years ago had been given to Brett. And all these years later, he still hadn’t paid it back. I wiped away my tears and took down the wedding photo from the wall. Since Iris couldn’t forget her ‘white moonlight,’ there was no need for me to hold on any longer. I cut off contact with Iris. For about a week, she didn’t come home. Until today, my phone rang incessantly. It was Iris calling. When I answered, a sharp, angry voice came from the other end. “Mason Lu, are you disgusting? What are you trying to do?” “Those photos sent to the company email, you sent them, didn’t you? Now everyone in the company knows about Brett and me. Are you satisfied?!” I gripped my phone, a little confused. I knew nothing of what Iris was talking about. Seeing my silence, she became even more frantic. “Don’t tell me you don’t know about this? You took those photos, didn’t you?!” I took a deep breath, my voice calm. “I don’t know what photos you’re talking about. If you mean the one of you cheating, I only sent it to you.” My words completely pushed Iris over the edge. The next second, our chat window was flooded with naked photos. My face turned ashen. Every single one was of her and Brett. Explicit photos. And a copy of her termination report. “If not you, then who? I really didn’t think you’d stoop to secretly taking photos?” “Satisfied? Because of this, I’m a laughingstock! Brett is hiding at home and dares not come out.” I closed my eyes, gritting my teeth. “Iris Jiang, your cheating is your fault. If you don’t mind being dirty, I do! Do you really think Brett is a good guy?” “Do you know that he!” Iris let out an angry laugh, directly interrupting me. “Since you won’t admit it, then you just wait and regret!” She slammed the phone down. I rubbed my temples, forcing myself to calm down and deal with other matters at the agency. However, not long after, several police cars pulled up outside my office. The police officers, their faces cold, looked around the agency. “Mr. Lu, correct?” “Someone has reported you for disseminating obscene material and violating privacy.” I froze, instantly recalling what Iris had said on the phone. She actually reported me to the police! “My agency is legal and compliant, and I absolutely did not disseminate anything!” “Mr. Lu, all the evidence currently suggests you are responsible. Your computer also contained secretly taken photos.” But that photo was merely a kissing photo. “Those were photos I took for work. They even have timestamps…” But no matter how I explained, it was useless. They sealed my agency. And I was detained for fifteen days. Fifteen days later, I was released from the police station. Before I could even fully process things, my former clients one by one came knocking. They crowded outside my office, all berating me fiercely. “Detective Lu, we hired you because we trusted you.” “Who would have thought something like this would happen!” “Leaking personal privacy, what was the point of signing a non-disclosure agreement? This is a crime!” Once something like this happened, no matter how innocent I truly was, in the eyes of others, I was tainted. Even if I repeatedly assured them I had never leaked their privacy, repeatedly stressed that I was framed, no one believed me. “Your agency has been shut down. Your words are garbage. We won’t believe a single word.” “Pay up! Pay up!” Some even sided with Iris, making a scene outside the office. They held banners and banged drums. Everyone on the street knew me. They accused me of being unfit for such work, of making dirty money. They all demanded compensation. Someone recorded the scene and posted it online. It spread widely. I was doxxed. My name and address were found. Every time I left home, I’d see various threatening letters, dead cats, and blood-stained razor blades outside. This made me afraid to leave the house for a long time. Iris returned about half a month later. She looked at the mess in the house, her eyes cold. “Mason Lu, had enough suffering lately?” “Go apologize to Brett, and I’ll forgive you and help clear your name.” Iris’s words made me snap my head up. My eyes were bloodshot, and I almost gritted my teeth. “Isn’t all of this because of you?” “What unforgivable thing did I do to make you hate me this much?” “Iris Jiang, we’ve been married for ten years! Damn it, even a dog gets attached after that long!” Iris froze. She couldn’t meet my gaze and quickly looked away. “Fine, even if it wasn’t you who spread the photos, the photo you sent me was indeed taken by you without permission.” “That’s a fact, and Brett and I were both implicated because of it.” “Brett has been kicked out of the club now, and no one is willing to let him work there anymore.” “His job loss is because of you.” Iris grew more and more self-righteous as she spoke. I scoffed. “His job is gone, so is mine still here?” Iris’s face grew increasingly impatient. She lowered her voice. “If you apologize, your agency still has a chance.” My agency was my life’s work for five years. I couldn’t bear to see it disappear just like that. I neither agreed nor refused. Iris arranged a dinner, just the three of us. In the private room, Brett looked timid and hesitant when he saw me. “Mason, I know you have issues with me, but I’m really struggling.” “Because of this, I lost my job, and I still have a large sum of money to repay.” Iris picked up a glass, already filled to the brim with white liquor. “Drink it, and this whole thing is over.” “I won’t contact Brett again, and you’re not allowed to do anything to him either.” “Your agency can also be reopened.” My face paled, and I looked up at Iris. She knew that my stomach had already developed chronic issues back then. She knew. All these years, I’ve had to take medication constantly to stabilize it, and my stomach problems would flare up from time to time, risking a perforated ulcer. “Drink it, is it so hard to drink a glass of liquor?” Iris impatiently pushed a full bottle of white liquor towards me. I forced a bitter smile. She had forgotten. I tilted my head back and drank the entire bottle of white liquor. I only stopped when a sharp, searing pain erupted in my stomach. Iris’s eyes held a complex expression. She reached out to grab me, but I fiercely pushed her hand away. “Satisfied? I’ve granted your wish, Iris Jiang. I won’t bother with you anymore.” I stumbled out of the private room. Picking up my phone, I opened the chat window of my earlier client. I sent the photo of Iris and Brett to the client, who was overseas. “I have captured the evidence of your fiancé’s infidelity.”

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When I finally learned that my long-lost daughter had been found, I immediately dropped everything and rushed back home. Stepping out of the car, a girl quickly approached me, intimately taking my hand. Her voice carried a hint of deliberate envy: “You must be my older sister, right? Look at your skin, so well-maintained. You must have never known hardship, unlike me, who tasted every bitterness in the countryside.” I hadn’t even fully processed this sudden address when she abruptly yanked my hand towards herself, dramatically falling to the ground. “Sister! How could you push me?” she cried, clutching her arm, tears instantly welling up. “If you really don’t want me here, I’ll leave right now. I won’t be an eyesore…” She choked back a sob, adding, “Please, don’t tell Mom and Dad. I don’t want them to be torn, and I certainly don’t want my presence to disrupt this family’s peace.” With that, she curled up on the ground, trembling like a leaf in the wind, drawing curious stares from passersby. I stood there, utterly bewildered—What older sister? I’m her mother! … “Sister, please don’t be angry…” “I… I know I was wrong… I shouldn’t be a bother here…” In front of me, Mishay was still on the ground, a picture of pure injustice. Passersby rushed to help her up, their gazes at me burning with anger. “You’re Elara Culver, aren’t you? The fake heiress adopted by the Culver family?” “How dare you push Mishay? You’re just an imposter, what right do you have to bully the real daughter?” “Fakes are always fakes; all they know is how to stir up trouble!” The crowd murmured, their eyes filled with disdain. “Please don’t talk about my sister like that…” Mishay suppressed her sobs, staggering forward and clinging tightly to my wrist. “It’s alright, Sister. You can hit me, you can scold me. I’m used to it, growing up in the orphanage…” “Only…” She paused, large tears streaming down her face. “Sister, could you please let me see Mom? I grew up in an orphanage and never even knew what Mom looked like…” Hearing this, the crowd instantly erupted. “Mishay is so pitiful! The true daughter of the Culver family, abandoned in an orphanage to suffer!” “Elara Culver, you’ve usurped her place for so many years, and now you won’t even let her see her mother? Are you even human?!” I looked at the crowd, my brows furrowed. When did I ever forbid her from seeing her mother? It’s her who didn’t recognize that I am her mother. These past few years, due to the sensitive nature of my work, I’d never appeared in public, so almost no one had seen me. Coupled with my meticulous skincare routine, I still looked quite young. But I never imagined I’d be mistaken for my adoptive daughter, Elara Culver. “Sister, I beg you…” Mishay suddenly dropped to her knees before me, gazing up with tear-filled eyes. “After I see Mom, I’ll leave immediately and never appear before you again… Please, Sister, I just need to see Mom once…” I looked down at her, a swirl of emotions in my heart. Last week, I was on a secret mission. It wasn’t until I left the lab today that I learned my daughter had been found, and I rushed back home. All the way, I’d been imagining our reunion, thinking about what to say. But I never in a million years expected that the first time my biological daughter saw me, it would be to frame me. “Get up first.” I bent down to help her. “Mishay, actually, I’m not—” My words were cut short. Suddenly. “What are you doing?!” A furious voice boomed from behind me. 2 “Mishay, you don’t have to be afraid of her.” Caleb Thorne walked up, helped her to her feet, and glared coldly at me. “You’re Elara Culver?” “Let me tell you, Mishay is my girlfriend. It’s not your place, you imposter, to bully her!” The moment he spoke, the surroundings erupted. “Girlfriend? Young Master Thorne is with Mishay?” “But Young Master Thorne has an engagement with Elara Culver! Is he publicly breaking it off? That’s a huge slap in the face!” “So what if he does? Mishay is the real heiress. What is Elara Culver anyway?” “Tsk, tsk, Elara Culver is completely humiliated now. If it were me, I’d crawl into a hole and disappear.” Listening to the chatter, my brows furrowed deeper. Caleb Thorne was the only son of the Thorne family, and I had personally chosen him as a suitable match for Elara. I had planned for the two children to meet after I finished my current projects. I never expected him to appear here so suddenly, or that he would be embracing Mishay and claiming she was his girlfriend. “Elara Culver, since you’re here today, I’ll make things clear.” Caleb stared at me, holding Mishay tightly in his arms. “I fell for Mishay at first sight. She’s the one I want to marry.” “As for you, my parents forced you on me. I wouldn’t be caught dead with someone who throws herself at people like you.” A burst of laughter erupted from the crowd. I clenched my fists, a cold sneer escaping my lips. This engagement, his parents had begged us to accept it. The Thorne family’s finances were on the verge of collapse a few years back, and it was my old friendship that saved them. If anyone was “throwing themselves at people,” it was his Thorne family, shamelessly clinging on. “Caleb, darling, don’t say that.” Mishay tugged at his sleeve, then looked up at me. “Sister, please don’t be angry. Caleb just can’t stand to see me wronged.” As she spoke, a flicker of triumph and pride flashed in her eyes. I stared at her face, my heart clenching painfully. Mishay had wandered off and been lost for over a decade, and I had searched for her all those years. I had yearned for her return, and now she was finally home. But I never imagined… she would become this kind of person. “Elara Culver, I know you must like me and want to marry me.” Caleb arrogantly tilted his head. “But I don’t like you. You should give up.” “Who said I like you?” I finally couldn’t help but chuckle, looking up at him. “Caleb Thorne, I’m already married. How could I possibly want to marry you?” The air quieted for a moment. Caleb was stunned, then burst out laughing as if he’d heard the funniest joke in the world. “Married?” “Elara Culver, what are you trying to pull? How could you be married?” “You’re not trying some ridiculous reverse psychology because you like me so much, are you? I told you, I’m not interested.” Listening to his words, I found it increasingly ridiculous. I had initially agreed to let him be with Elara because I’d seen him at a banquet once and thought he was presentable, worthy of my daughter. I never imagined that, in private, he would be such an arrogant, self-important fool. “Sister, I’m so sorry…” “But Caleb and I truly love each other. You’ve already taken everything from me these past years.” “Just let me have Caleb!” Mishay sobbed, tears streaming down her face, burying herself in Caleb’s arms, trembling. Caleb hugged her tighter, his eyes burning as if he wanted to flay me alive. I stared at her, truly at a loss for words. I had searched for her for seventeen years, fearing she would suffer, be bullied, or not live well. Yet now, she was publicly putting on an act, slandering her own mother, and stealing her sister’s fiancé. What was even more ridiculous was that the man she was stealing was someone of Caleb Thorne’s caliber. “Sister, I beg you!” Seeing that I still hadn’t spoken, Mishay cried out anxiously, “You can’t take Caleb away!” “You clearly… clearly already secretly with another man…” 3 Mishay’s words hung unfinished as she clapped a hand over her mouth, feigning regret for speaking out of turn. “Another man? What other man?” Caleb’s face darkened. “Mishay, what do you know? Speak clearly.” “I…” Mishay looked at him with feigned difficulty, then suddenly turned and bowed deeply to me. “I’m sorry, Sister… I didn’t mean to say it… I just didn’t want Caleb to be deceived…” With that, she pulled out a photo from her phone and held it up. It was a picture of me and a man embracing. My face was clear. The man, however, was only a blurred profile, unidentifiable. “Holy cow! Elara Culver has a boyfriend too? So what is this? Cheating on Young Master Thorne?” “Who’s that guy? Looks a little familiar.” “Doesn’t matter who. He doesn’t look young, does he? Tsk, tsk, I can’t believe Elara Culver would ditch Young Master Thorne for an older man. Her taste is… unique!” Listening to the whispers of the crowd, Caleb’s face grew uglier. The next second, he suddenly lunged forward, grabbing my hand, his eyes blazing with fury. “Elara Culver, how dare you cheat on me!” I was utterly dumbfounded by his absurd accusation. Firstly, I wasn’t Elara. Even if I were, and Elara did have a boyfriend, what business was it of his? The engagement hadn’t been formalized, and they hadn’t even met. He could be openly affectionate with Mishay and announce their relationship, but Elara had to remain chaste for him? What kind of logic was that? “Actually…” Mishay, seeing the situation, hesitantly uttered two more words. She shot me a provocative glance, then suddenly sighed. “Sister… actually, you’re not just involved with this one older man, are you?” “My people also caught you frequently entering those kinds of places, and the men around you were also…” At this, her voice stopped, and she looked at me, as if advising me. “Sister, a woman still needs to respect herself. You mingling with so many men is really…” Hearing this, everyone’s gaze swiveled to me. “I can’t believe it, this Elara Culver is actually that kind of person.” “She must have been used up by now, what a cheap whore.” “This imposter knows no shame? She should just get out of the Culver family!” The curses grew uglier, and the looks they gave me became incredibly lewd. I stood my ground, my eyes fixed on Mishay. I couldn’t believe it—my own biological daughter was spreading malicious rumors about me! “Sister, what’s past is past. I’ll definitely help you keep it a secret.” “And I certainly won’t let Mom and Dad know about this, don’t worry.” As she spoke, she suddenly reached out again, feigning intimacy, to take my hand. A chill seeped into my bones. I took two steps back, instinctively shaking her hand off gently. “Ah—!” Mishay suddenly shrieked and fell backward, hitting the ground hard, even rolling twice before stopping. “Mishay?! What happened? Who dared to push you?!” Hasty footsteps approached from a distance. The next second, a familiar figure burst through the crowd and helped Mishay up from the ground. I followed the sound and saw an incredibly familiar face. It was the man from the photo Mishay had just used to slander me. My husband of twenty years, her father. Arthur Culver.

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I’d promised my childhood friend, the one always getting picked on, that I’d transfer schools with him for a fresh start. But the day before the transfer agreement was finalized, he suddenly backed out. I’d inadvertently walked past his classroom door and overheard him talking to his buddies. “You sly dog! Playing the victim all this time, just to ditch Avery McEwan.” His friend’s voice was dripping with teasing. “But she’s been with you since you were kids. Can you really stand to let her go to a strange new school alone?” another voice pressed. Bobby Leslie’s reply was icy cold: “It’s just moving to another district for school. How far could it be?” “She’s always been clinging to me, it’s annoying. This way, I’ll finally get some peace.” I stood outside the door for a long time, until my legs went numb before I slowly turned and walked away. Back home, I crossed out “Oceanview High” on my transfer application and replaced it with the overseas boarding school my parents had already arranged. Turns out, everyone had forgotten that there had always been a chasm between him and me, as wide as the sky and the mud beneath our feet. 1 The truth hit me like a physical blow, my heart seizing in my chest. For the past month, Bobby had been the target of endless bullying and false accusations. I’d done my best to shield him, but there were always times I couldn’t. Finally, I’d suggested he transfer. He’d just had a bucket of ice water dumped on him, his handsome face pale and pitiful. He gripped my hand, looking utterly helpless. “Avery, I’m scared to go to an unfamiliar place alone.” Bobby and I were childhood sweethearts, practically, walking to and from kindergarten together, a routine that hadn’t changed in over a decade. Plus, I harbored a secret crush on him. So, swept up in the moment, I’d promised, “Don’t worry, I’ll go wherever you go.” But only now did I realize it was all an elaborate charade to get rid of me. I couldn’t help but wonder, did Bobby really hate me that much? The voices from inside the room continued. “Avery McEwan is totally devoted to you.” “If you send her to another school now, aren’t you worried she’ll fall for someone else?” “Her?” Bobby scoffed, as if he’d heard the funniest joke imaginable. “She’d block a group beating for me, even got her face bruised and swollen, but never backed down. You think she’d change her mind about me?” Someone murmured, “What if? Avery McEwan doesn’t look like someone to be messed with.” Bobby’s tone was lazy. “No ‘what if.’ There are plenty of rich kids at Northwood High. Have you ever seen her give anyone else a second glance?” His voice inevitably carried a hint of disdain. “Always following me around. Even a lapdog isn’t as clingy as she is.” A harsh laugh erupted from the room, like a slap across my face. I wanted to leave, but my feet felt rooted to the spot, forcing me to listen, to ache. Someone whistled. “First time I’ve seen a guy actively push away a girl who likes him. Gotta admire your game, man.” “But if you didn’t like Avery McEwan being so clingy, couldn’t you have just told her? She doesn’t seem like the type to hold a grudge.” Bobby clicked his tongue, a hint of impatience creeping into his voice. “Avery McEwan is too… intense. It wouldn’t have been easy to shake her off if I’d just told her straight.” He then changed tack. “Besides, Chloe always feels inferior and upset when she sees Avery. She only feels better when I’m with her.” “For Chloe’s sake, this was the only way. Avery will just have to be inconvenienced for a bit.” At his words, everyone immediately understood. Timing it out, Bobby’s decision to fake the bullying started about a week after Chloe transferred to Northwood High. Someone laughed, cursing Bobby good-naturedly. “You dog, you’ve been eyeing the new innocent girl since she got here?” “But Chloe is genuinely delicate and charming. Any guy would be drawn to her, it’s only natural.” “Unlike Avery McEwan. She’s got this intense personality and a perpetually cold face that keeps everyone at arm’s length. Doesn’t matter how pretty she is, that just won’t do.” The casual remarks about me in the room surged like a tide, wave after wave. And Bobby, the boy I’d secretly loved for years, offered no objection, no rebuttal, occasionally even nodding in agreement. I stood outside the door, my heart plummeting into a dark abyss, empty and aching. For a moment, I wanted to burst in and confront Bobby. Ask him why he lied to me. Ask him if he felt even a flicker of guilt or softness when he saw me getting beaten for protecting him. Ask him if he’d considered our decade-long friendship when he did all this. But ultimately, my mother’s words echoed in my ears: Don’t do anything unnecessary. People don’t just rot overnight. I turned and walked away from that room. 2 The pain, a sharp, lingering ache, hit me belatedly. Initially, I wouldn’t have been this upset. It was just a friend’s betrayal, nothing major. But that boundary, the line of ‘just friends,’ Bobby had been the first to cross it. The day we decided to transfer together, he’d dragged me to a bar to celebrate our ‘freedom’ with drinks. In the dim, ambient light, I looked at the man I’d secretly loved for years, feeling a little lost. So, when he leaned in and kissed me, I didn’t resist. Years of suppressed emotions erupted. Unable to hold back, I asked for confirmation, “Bobby, what are we now?” Bobby affectionately kissed my forehead again. “Silly, what else would we be?” Cheers erupted in the private room, the atmosphere as heated as my own burgeoning passion. It took only two days for Bobby to shatter my one-sided affection with his own words. I smiled, but tears streamed uncontrollably down my face. So, that mumbled, vague rhetorical question—was that also Bobby’s way of tricking me, trying to hurry me along for Chloe’s sake? The wind chime in my bedroom tinkled, slowly drying my tears. My broken heart began to piece itself back together. Bobby was wrong. He was merely the illegitimate son of the Leslie family, and I was the only daughter of the McEwan family. We truly shouldn’t cling to each other. Because, we weren’t a match. The transfer application in my hand was smudged by my tears, the ink bleeding, making it illegible. But it didn’t matter. If this one was ruined, I’d just get a clean one. The McEwan family never lacked alternatives. I printed a new form, and when I got to the ‘transferring institution’ section, I called my mother. “Mom, which overseas high school were you talking about wanting me to attend last time?” “Yes, I’ll go alone.” The wind chime in my room made a clear, melodious sound, as if celebrating with me. I closed my eyes briefly. This time, it wasn’t Bobby’s face that appeared before me. Instead, it was a man, three parts similar to Bobby in looks but even more striking and handsome, who smiled at me, just as he had two years ago, with the same certainty and seriousness: “Avery McEwan, you’ll give up on Bobby Leslie and choose me, eventually.” Back then, I’d thought he was joking. Now, I murmured inwardly. Bobby Leslie, I truly don’t want you anymore. After filling out the new application, I let out a long breath, my heart already quietly at peace. But then, a knock sounded at my bedroom door. I froze. I lived alone in this house; the only person who knew the code would be… I opened the door and, sure enough, saw Bobby’s face. His voice was as gentle as always. “Avery, you haven’t come to say goodbye to your friends in a while. I was worried about you.” I tried to keep my voice calm. “My stomach’s not feeling great, so I’m not going.” Just as I was about to politely dismiss him, my peripheral vision caught an unexpected figure. Chloe, petite, huddled beside Bobby. The moment her eyes met mine, she flinched. Bobby, ever attentive to her every move, immediately draped an arm protectively around her. “Avery, you’re scaring Chloe.” It was always like this. Chloe always acted fragile, as if I were some heinous villain out to harm her, even though I’d done nothing. My face grew cold. “I told you, I don’t like people coming to my house.” Bobby frowned slightly, displeased. “Chloe isn’t an outsider. Besides, she only came because she was worried about you.” Before I could argue, Chloe’s eyes suddenly welled up. “Avery, I’m so sorry. I know you’ve always looked down on me, but I shower every day.” She added, tearfully, “I won’t make your house dirty…” At her words, Bobby immediately furrowed his brow, looking at me with displeasure. “Avery, Chloe just comes from a less privileged background, she’s not as bad as you imagine. You treating her like this really disappoints me.” Chloe tugged carefully at Bobby’s sleeve, forgiving and understanding. “Bobby, it’s okay, please don’t argue with Avery…” She sniffled, offering a wronged yet stubborn smile. “After all, Avery said you two were childhood sweethearts. How could I ever compare to a relationship like that…” “What are you talking about? You’re unique.” Bobby tenderly cupped Chloe’s face, coaxing her with soft words. He then turned to me, his face as cold as ice. He spoke gravely. “Chloe isn’t feeling well. I’m taking her home first.” “You should seriously reflect on yourself. Don’t forget to get that transfer application stamped.” I did reflect on myself—on my terrible judgment of character. Then I went and changed the code to my front door. The knot of frustration in my heart finally loosened, if only for a moment. 3 The next day, I took my new application form to school for a stamp. Watching the bright red mark, signifying my departure, settle firmly on the paper, my heart felt strangely hollow for a moment. Lost in thought, someone blocked my path. Bobby frowned slightly. “Avery, did you change your door code?” “I dropped Chloe home yesterday and went straight to your place, but the door wouldn’t open…” I cut him off, succinctly. “Yep, changed it.” He seemed a little annoyed, as if nothing had happened, asking intimately, “What’s the new code? So I can come over and look after you.” I said calmly, “No need. I won’t be living around here after I transfer.” Bobby looked at the folded application in my hand, as if suddenly remembering something. “I completely forgot about this. Don’t worry, Avery, I’ll get mine stamped tomorrow.” These kinds of walk-and-talk moments with Bobby had become increasingly rare since Chloe transferred to Northwood High. I closed my eyes, indulging the lingering reluctance in my heart, and probed, “Between us, what’s there to worry about?” Bobby was silent for a long time, then abruptly spoke. “Avery, actually I…” Chloe suddenly appeared behind Bobby, carrying a stack of notebooks, complaining intimately to him. “Bobby, didn’t you say you’d help me with tutoring? How did you just disappear?” She handed him the notes. “I saw your study plan goes out two months, so I prepared the corresponding materials.” She winked playfully. “You won’t mind me peeking, will you, Bobby?” “How could I…” Bobby’s smile was strained. He glanced at me guiltily. Seeing no reaction from me, a flicker of disappointment actually crossed his face. So, while pushing me away, you had already planned a future with someone else. Just that your future, it never included me. I tried my best to maintain a dignified composure. Deep down, however, a bitter taste, like a rich, aged wine, spread boundlessly. I dug my nails into my palm, forcing myself to stay clear-headed. “You two chat. I’m leaving.” Chloe acted as if she’d just noticed me, startled. “A-Avery…” “Is it because Bobby and I are studying together that you’re unhappy?” “But I come from a humble background, unlike you with all your resources…” As she spoke, she actually started to sniffle again. I wasn’t in the mood to play along. I said coolly, “Move aside.” The thin sliver of guilt in Bobby’s eyes vanished. He grabbed my wrist, his voice laced with anger. “Avery McEwan, what kind of tone is that?” He dragged me unceremoniously in front of Chloe and roared, “Apologize to Chloe!” The last piece of sacred ground in my heart silently crumbled into rubble. This time, I didn’t hesitate. I raised my hand and slapped Bobby hard across the face. “Bobby Leslie, the one who should be apologizing is you.” “But not to Chloe. To me.”

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My roommate, Tiffany Moore, thrust a spare phone into my hand, complaining with an impatient sigh. She said her thirty-five-year-old online boyfriend was driving her crazy. He nagged her daily about memorizing vocabulary, writing reading notes, and even interfered with her weekend bar hops downtown. In her eyes, it was just a casual online fling, something to pass the time between sorority parties and dates, but he was possessive, acting more like a strict father than a romantic interest. I was initially indifferent, ready to bury my nose back in my microeconomics textbook, when suddenly a barrage of comments exploded before my eyes. Some said Tiffany was foolish, unaware her online boyfriend was a venture capitalist titan worth billions. Others explained it wasn’t possessiveness, but him grooming her to be his future wife. Still others predicted that when the “titan” returned to the States and found his chat partner had changed, he would surely deal with me, the stand-in sidekick, before returning to Tiffany for a dramatic reconciliation and a “chase-wife-to-the-moon” arc, our version of the over-the-top “chase-wife-to-crematory” trope. Reading this, I picked up the phone and smiled at Tiffany. I told her I’d gladly endure this “suffering” for her from now on. So what if I was a stand-in? Who cared about a “chase-wife” plot? My mind was already racing, eager to connect with that titan and ask if he knew any shortcuts to getting into a top-tier business school, Harvard, Stanford, Wharton, anything better than the small state university I was struggling to afford. 1 Right in front of Tiffany, I changed the registered phone number and handed her the spare phone back. She took it, glanced at me, and sneered, “That cheap old man might toss you a few bucks, but his demands are insane, like a college dean breathing down your neck. Enjoy.” She was right; a rich kid from the business school would casually buy her a designer purse worth thousands, so she probably looked down on a mere three thousand dollars a month. Tiffany grabbed her leather jacket and left for her date with a football player, and the dorm room grew quiet. I opened the chat box with no profile picture. The last messages were from last night. [This week’s Wall Street Journal headlines. Read them and send me a summary.] [Why aren’t you replying?] [You better get your attitude straight and take this seriously. I don’t have time for your games.] My eyelids twitched. I scrolled through six months of their chat history. They had met on a business forum. Tiffany, pretending to be a studious, cash-strapped pre-business student, had asked a question about startup funding, and this man, whose username was “J.Y.,” had answered with surprising depth. They’d exchanged contact info soon after. Their conversation held no flirtation or romantic undertones; it wasn’t a “cyber romance” at all. It mainly revolved around: What book did you read today? How many words did you memorize? Have you kept up with the latest economic data? It was clear he genuinely wanted to help Tiffany. Tiffany, with her decent English and knack for faking interest, took it seriously at first. But as time went on, she started faking illnesses, whining about “stress,” or just sending a perfunctory AI-generated response. J.Y. would initially patiently correct her, but later, sensing her laziness, his tone grew colder. Yet, he still sent three thousand dollars in living expenses every month, right on time, via Zelle, no questions asked. In Tiffany’s eyes, three thousand dollars was barely enough to cover her weekly coffee runs and sorority dues. But for me, a genuinely struggling student who worked four part-time jobs a month, barista, library assistant, tutor, and grocery store cashier, to barely cover rent and textbooks, it was a godsend. I’d grown up in a small town in Ohio, my mom a single waitress, my dad long gone. College was a miracle, and grad school felt like an impossible dream, until now. The comments started scrolling again: [J.Y. is Julian Yan, the legendary Chinese-American VC who shook the Silicon Valley scene! Any insider tip he drops is enough for an ordinary person to live comfortably for generations. And Tiffany just handed him over like that?] [Serena Carter, this cannon fodder, really thinks she got a bargain, huh? Julian hates deception. When he finds out he’s talking to someone else, he’ll definitely make her pay!] I ignored the malicious comments, my gaze fixed on the message asking for a reading summary. I was a finance student at Ohio State University’s regional campus, good grades, but no connections, no money for prep courses, no way to stand out to top business schools. I’d known since childhood that studying was the only way out of the cycle of poverty. After five grueling hours, I finished reading last week’s business reports, cross-referenced a lot of historical data, and wrote a summary, tight, logical, and full of insights I’d gleaned from my late-night study sessions. After checking the grammar, I sent the document. [Sorry, I had tonsil surgery these past two days, so my reply is late.] Fifteen minutes later, he replied: [You wrote the report yourself?] My heart clenched: [Yes.] …A long silence followed. I stared at the screen, my palms sweating. Had I messed up? Was it too good, too obvious that I wasn’t Tiffany? Then, a Zelle notification popped up on the screen. $50,000. [The entry point is quite novel. Much better than the previous empty rhetoric. This is a reward.] [Rest well since you’re sick. Goodnight.] Tiffany’s “cheap old man” just gave me fifty thousand dollars?! I stared at the zeroes, my fingers trembling uncontrollably. That was more money than my mom made in a year. The comments immediately turned sour: [OMG, the female sidekick has such good luck, getting fifty grand for a lousy summary?] [Julian valued Tiffany’s potential. Serena is just getting lucky, mooching off the female lead!] [Take it, take it. The more you take now, the worse you’ll die later. Gold diggers never have a good ending.] I gritted my teeth and sent the money back. This wasn’t about cash, it was about opportunity. I couldn’t blow it by looking greedy. J.Y. sent a question mark: [Not enough?] [No, no, it’s not that. It’s just that more than money, I want an opportunity.] [I want to apply to business school. I don’t have a good mentor or access to industry data.] […Can I greedy and ask to borrow a high-level terminal account from you?] After sending the message, it was like a stone dropped into the ocean. Half an hour passed, no activity. I stared at the screen, a layer of cold sweat forming on my palms. The comments went into full-on mockery mode: [Crashed and burned, huh? Acting all high and mighty, now you can’t even get fifty grand!] [What level of titan is Julian? He can’t see through this kind of trick?] [Exactly, an ordinary small-town student wanting to go to Wharton. Does she think Julian is running a charity?] Just as I thought I had overplayed my hand and ruined this path, my phone rang. It was an unknown number with a California area code. [Send me your detailed information.] His voice was deep, calm, and authoritative, no hint of anger. I immediately sent the materials I had already prepared: my transcript (4.0 GPA), my scores on the GMAT practice tests, and the results of a local business case competition I’d won last year. I omitted personal details, my mom’s job, my cramped apartment, the four part-time jobs, only focusing on what mattered: my potential. The next day, I received a call from an unknown number. “Hello, this is Mr. Lin, Mr. Yan’s executive assistant.” The voice on the other end was strictly business, no warmth. “The boss asked me to meet you to assess your situation. Are you free this afternoon? I’m in Columbus for a meeting.” I suppressed my excitement and calmly replied, “Yes, you name the place.” 2 That afternoon, I dug out my only clean blazer, thrifted, but well-maintained, and a plain white blouse, and arrived at Mr. Lin’s hotel conference room right on time. He was a sharp-dressed man in his forties, with a clipboard and a no-nonsense expression. He scrutinized me, a hint of surprise flashing in his eyes, probably not expecting the “stand-in” to look so… ordinary. The comments appeared on cue, mocking me: [The small-town bumpkin really overestimates herself, showing up to meet Mr. Lin dressed like a intern.] [He’s Julian’s right-hand man, he’ll definitely see through this woman’s fake identity at a glance.] My palms were slightly sweaty; I thought I was about to be exposed. To my surprise, he simply flipped through the documents I’d sent and didn’t delve into my identity at all. “The boss believes you have some foundation, but you’re still quite far from the requirements of a top-tier university, Wharton, Stanford, MIT. Your GMAT scores are good, but not great, and your industry experience is nonexistent.” I nodded, leaning forward slightly. “It’s precisely because there’s a gap that I need guidance. As long as I’m given the resources, I can definitely make up for it. I’m a fast learner, I always have been.” “The boss’s resources are not given out casually.” Mr. Lin closed the file, his tone firm. “He can provide you with access to his industry terminal, a personal tutor team (all Ivy League graduates), and even a stipend so you can quit your part-time jobs and focus on studying.” “The prerequisite is that you must absolutely follow instructions and complete all assessment targets. No slacking, no excuses. The boss doesn’t tolerate laziness.” “I’m willing!” I replied without a second thought. Quit my part-time jobs? Focus solely on studying? It sounded like a dream. He nodded. “Then from today onwards, your schedule and study plan will be fully managed by us. A car will pick you up tomorrow morning, you’re moving out of the dorm.” 3 Three days later, I moved out of the cramped dorm and into a penthouse suite in a luxury hotel in downtown Columbus. It had floor-to-ceiling windows, a wall of bookshelves filled with business and finance books, a top-of-the-line laptop, and three private tutors, two for GMAT prep, one for business case analysis, on standby. No frills, no distractions, just everything I needed to succeed. Every morning at 6 AM, I woke up to listen to CNBC and Bloomberg reports (in English, of course). At 8 AM, I began intensive GMAT training, quantitative reasoning, verbal, analytical writing. Afternoons were spent on high-intensity case studies, dissecting real-world deals from Silicon Valley and Wall Street. In the evenings, I had to report my daily learning progress to Julian without fail, sending him my notes and practice scores. His replies were always concise. Sometimes just “Read,” other times a lengthy criticism cutting straight to the point: [Your analysis of the Tesla-Maxwell merger is shallow, you missed the regulatory risks in the EU. Go back and research the EU’s antitrust laws and rewrite it by tomorrow morning.] He truly was like a strict dean, using high-pressure methods to reshape my thinking. The cold words on the screen, far from making me feel wronged, sparked a surge of excitement. Was this the world of the powerful? No gentle coddling, only results. And I was determined to deliver. One morning, Julian sent me a message. [Great progress recently. You have half a day off today. Go do something that isn’t studying.] I was praised! My lips couldn’t help but curl upwards. I hadn’t had a day off in weeks, I decided to go back to campus to pick up some of my things from the dorm and say goodbye to my few friends. As I pushed open the dorm room door, I bumped into Tiffany. She was dressed in a designer dress, clutching a Louis Vuitton handbag, her hair done professionally. She was with a group of sorority sisters, all laughing and gossiping. She scrutinized my plain jeans and white T-shirt and scoffed. “Oh, the super student deigns to return? What, did that old man dump you already? I told you he was cheap, three grand a month can’t even buy a single shoe from my new collection.” “No, he’s been helping me with my studies recently.” I told the truth, not wanting to brag or argue. “Helping with studies? Hahahaha…” She laughed loudly, drawing the attention of her friends. “Serena, are you out of your mind? Some random online guy who can’t even afford a decent gift, and you expect him to teach you anything? Teach you how to survive on ramen noodles and part-time jobs?” She poked the GMAT prep book in my hand with her newly manicured nails. “Andrew Vanderbilt is going to be the vice president of his family’s real estate company next month. He promised to get me a cushy job in marketing, no degree required. I advise you to be more realistic, Serena. A woman doing well is not as good as marrying well. What’s the point of holding onto these useless books every day? You’ll still end up working for people like me, slaving away for a paycheck.” I avoided her hand and said calmly, “To each their own. Three thousand is fine, and working is fine too.” I hoped to “suffer” this kind of hardship my whole life, hardship that led to progress, not stagnation. As expected, with the appearance of the “female lead,” the comments became active again: [If Tiffany knew she gave up a billionaire, she’d probably be kicking herself!] [Is this really the female lead? Why does she look so smug, more like a gold-digger than the sidekick? I’m low-key excited to see her face when Julian returns!] [Shut up, traitor above! The male lead has always belonged to the female lead, okay? Be sensible!] [Just wait and see, the male lead will take back all the resources, and Serena will be back to working four jobs. Serves her right!] I ignored the comments and walked away with my books. My brain couldn’t be taken back, could it? The knowledge I’d gained, the skills I’d learned, those were mine forever. Over the next two months, my progress was visible to the naked eye. My GMAT scores jumped 100 points, my case analyses grew sharper, and I even started contributing ideas to the industry reports Julian sent me. His attitude towards me also subtly changed. He no longer just issued instructions unilaterally. Occasionally, in the early hours (he was often in Asia for business), he would send a few casual photos, sunrise over Shanghai, a street food stall in Tokyo, a view of the Hong Kong skyline, with a short caption: [Tasted this dumpling today. You’d like it.] 4 But late one night, after reviewing my case notes on a tech startup, he suddenly sent a message. [Serena, your writing style has changed recently. It’s more rational and calm than before.] My heart leaped. He noticed. The comments began to celebrate wildly: [Julian is suspicious! The big reveal is coming soon!] [Serena, your storm is coming. Get ready to be kicked out and humiliated…] I steadied my breath, my fingertips flying across the keyboard: [You can take that as a compliment, you know. People always have to learn to grow. Right now, I just want to improve, for myself, and to live up to the trust you’ve given me.] After the message was sent, a long time passed before Julian sent a voice message. It was the first time I’d heard his voice, deep, magnetic, with a hint of discernible pleasure, like he was smiling as he spoke. “Very good. Keep that ambition and drive. It’s rare.” “I’ll be back in the States mid-next month to host a private business dinner in New York. You’ll attend as my companion. It’s time for your assessment, show me what you’ve learned.” Listening to the voice message, my fingers tightened. This day had finally arrived. The moment of truth, the chance to prove I wasn’t just a stand-in, but someone worthy of his investment. [Big scene alert! The love triangle is here, finally!] [Tiffany will definitely be there, she’s dating Andrew Vanderbilt, whose family is part of the New York elite. The real and fake online girlfriends are about to meet. This is going to be epic!] [According to the plot, Julian will expose Serena that night, throw her out of the banquet, and then go beg Tiffany to take him back. Classic!] Seeing those glaring words, I secretly clenched my fist. I had been studying and writing notes day and night, not to be a stepping stone for Tiffany. I was going to ace this assessment, no matter what. 5 Mr. Lin sent someone with an evening gown a day in advance, sleek, black, and elegant, not too flashy, and a fifty-page guest list. The names read like a who’s who of Wall Street and Silicon Valley: CEOs, venture capitalists, hedge fund managers, even a few celebrities. “The core assets and recent major investment intentions of tonight’s distinguished guests are all here.” Mr. Lin’s voice was serious over the phone. “The boss doesn’t need a pretty face to fill space. You need to memorize the information of the top ten core figures, their net worth, their company’s latest moves, their weaknesses. Remember, all of it. You’ll be expected to contribute to conversations, not just stand there and look pretty.” I didn’t dare to slack off, spending the entire night memorizing the list backward and forward. Not only that, but I also used the terminal account Julian had given me to dig up the recent financial reports of the ten titans’ companies, looking for insights and talking points. Whatever the outcome of the “reveal,” I had to be worthy of the resources he had invested in me. I owed him that much. In the evening, the car dropped me off in front of a sprawling mansion in the Hamptons. The air was filled with the scent of champagne and cigars, and guests conversed in hushed tones, seeming casual, but every word was a power play, every smile a strategic move. A single offhand comment could involve billions of dollars in financial flow. I picked up a glass of sparkling water (I didn’t drink alcohol, not wanting to cloud my judgment) and stayed in a quiet corner, silently matching the faces in the room with the information I had memorized the night before. I recognized a few faces from business magazines, Warren Buffett’s protégé, the CEO of Apple, the founder of a major hedge fund. My heart raced, but I forced myself to stay calm. Suddenly, a familiar female voice broke the silence. “Serena? What are you doing here?” I turned my head, unsurprised to see Tiffany. She was clinging to a tall, slick-haired young man, Andrew Vanderbilt, no doubt, staring at me in astonishment. She was wearing a bright pink gown, her neck covered in diamonds, clearly trying to stand out. “This is a top-tier business dinner. How did a poor student like you get in?” She sneered, leaning in like she was sharing a secret. “Don’t tell me you hooked up with a waiter and snuck in through the back door? That’s pathetic, even for you.” The comments floated across my vision right on time: [Tiffany’s words are rude, but she’s right. Serena only got in by deceiving Julian. She doesn’t belong here.] [Waiting for Julian to walk in and publicly expose her, this is going to be so satisfying!] [Popcorn’s ready, let the show begin!] I glanced at Tiffany, not bothering to reply, and focused my gaze on Andrew beside her. “Mr. Vanderbilt, your family’s real estate company was just cited for code violations in Chicago last quarter, and your main lender is threatening to recall the loan, correct?” Andrew had been observing me with a frivolous, dismissive look. Hearing my words, his face changed dramatically, from cocky to pale. I smiled slightly. “You’re not trying to fix this crisis, instead, you’re here, showing off your date and wasting time. Your grandfather must be proud.” “You… who are you? How do you know all this?!” His voice was already trembling slightly. These matters had been kept quiet, if they spread in this setting, it would ruin his family’s reputation and possibly cost them the loan. “If I were you, I’d immediately go talk to Mr. Carter from JPMorgan.” I nodded towards a gray-haired man across the room. “He has a sum of idle funds right now that he’s looking to invest in real estate. A few kind words from you might be enough to save your family’s company, instead of asking meaningless questions.” Andrew looked in the direction I pointed, his face a mixture of green and white. Finally, he glared fiercely at Tiffany. “Didn’t you say she was a bookworm who only knew how to study? How does she know more about the industry than I do!” He flung Tiffany’s hand away and hurried towards Mr. Carter, his pride forgotten. “Andrew! Where are you going?!” Tiffany stomped her foot in anger, glaring at me, gnashing her teeth. “What on earth are you doing? Do you think reading a few financial articles makes you a big shot in this circle? You’re still just a poor, small-town nobody!” I ignored her exasperation. A commotion at the front of the hall caught my attention. The large doors were pushed open from outside, and the banquet hall immediately fell silent. All eyes turned to the entrance. A tall man walked in, his facial features sharp and distinct, high cheekbones, a strong jaw, dark eyes that seemed to see everything. He was dressed in a tailored black suit, no tie, exuding an air of quiet power. He merely nodded in response to everyone’s greetings, and the entire atmosphere changed with his presence. Whispers broke out: “That’s Julian Yan.” “He’s even more handsome in person.” “I heard he just closed a $2 billion deal in Asia.” Julian Yan had arrived.

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When the CEO laid eyes on my resignation letter, he summoned me into his office. His face was etched with confusion as he asked me why I was still dissatisfied, pointing out that I had just received a year-end bonus of six hundred thousand dollars. I stared back at him expressionlessly, telling him there was actually only six hundred dollars left in my account. A scowl creased the CEO’s brow as he immediately called the Director of Finance on speakerphone right in front of me. A sycophantic voice came through the line, explaining that five hundred ninety-nine thousand, four hundred dollars had been transferred to the CEO’s wife’s account, and that he had covered his tracks perfectly. The CEO’s face turned a sickly shade of green in an instant. 1 When Dominic called me into his office, my resignation letter was already sitting on his massive mahogany desk. He tapped his index finger against the heavy paper. His eyes shifted from the document to my face, clouded with genuine confusion. “Scarlett, didn’t the year-end bonuses just go out? Six hundred thousand dollars. You got the highest payout in the entire company.” “What exactly are you dissatisfied with?” I stood perfectly straight, keeping my eyes locked on his. “Six hundred thousand?” “There are exactly six hundred dollars in my account.” The confusion on Dominic’s face instantly warped into a deep, aggressive scowl. He snatched his phone off the desk and dialed the Director of Finance. The moment the call connected, Dominic hit the speaker button. Richard’s signature sycophantic voice immediately echoed through the quiet office. “Mr. Reed, rest assured. It is all handled.” “That five hundred ninety-nine thousand, four hundred dollars has been transferred directly into your wife’s private account, down to the exact cent.” “I made sure the books are squeaky clean. Completely untraceable.” The air in the office turned to solid concrete. I watched Dominic’s face transition from bewildered, to horrified, and finally to a sickly, ashen green. On the other end of the line, Richard kept talking, completely oblivious. “Honestly, sir, your wife had a great point.” “She said a young girl like Scarlett might get reckless with that kind of cash. Having the company ‘safeguard’ the bulk of it is really for her own good.” “It was a brilliant move, don’t you think?” “Shut up.” Dominic forced the two words through his teeth. His voice dripped with absolute zero temperatures. He slammed his finger onto the end-call button. The office plunged back into a suffocating silence. I remained standing there, my expression completely blank, as if I were watching a movie that had nothing to do with me. The truth was, I was waiting. Waiting for Dominic to give me an explanation. Or rather, waiting for him to justify this absolute trainwreck to himself. His chest heaved. He was practically vibrating with rage. It took him a full thirty seconds to look up at me. The usually sharp, composed eyes of the CEO were currently caught in a violent storm. He wasn’t just looking at me. He was looking right through me, realizing something incredibly ugly about his own life. “When did you find out?” he asked. His voice sounded like cracked glass. “When the bank notification popped up on my lock screen,” I replied. My tone was flat. “Six hundred bucks.” “At first, I thought payroll had a glitch in the software.” “So, I pulled up my official pay stub.” “It clearly stated my year-end bonus was six hundred thousand dollars.” Dominic squeezed his eyes shut, fighting a losing battle to keep his composure. “And your first instinct was to just quit?” “Yes.” “Without even asking me about it?” A hint of accusation bled into his tone. “Mr. Reed.” I finally used his formal title. “I have bled for Apex Tech for five years.” “I climbed from an intern to the Director of Operations. I know for a fact that I have earned every single penny this company has ever paid me.” “I trusted the corporate structure here. I trusted you.” “But I do not trust a financial department that can magically turn a six-hundred-grand bonus into six hundred dollars.” “That is not a glitch.” “That is an insult.” I spoke calmly. No tears. No screaming. Just cold, hard facts. Dominic fell silent. He knew damn well it wasn’t a glitch. Richard had spelled it out perfectly on the speakerphone. Transferred to your wife’s account. He just didn’t want to believe it. He couldn’t fathom that the elegant, highly educated, picture-perfect woman he married would go behind his back to pull off something so incredibly cheap. Stealing an employee’s bonus? A massive six-figure sum? That wasn’t just simple greed. That was actively taking a sledgehammer to the foundation of his company. He took a deep breath and picked up his phone again. This time, his thumb hovered over the screen. He hesitated. I knew exactly who he was about to call. Victoria. His wife. I watched him quietly. I didn’t rush him. I didn’t interrupt. He had to rip this band-aid off himself. Finally, his jaw tightened, and he pressed the call button. Speakerphone again. The phone rang twice before connecting. A voice sweet enough to cause cavities drifted out of the speaker. “Hey honey. You’re calling early today. Miss me already?” It was Victoria. I lowered my gaze, hiding the ice in my eyes. This was the exact same voice that had called me just a few days ago, hissing: “Scarlett, don’t push your luck. Dominic pays you to be a worker bee, not to bleed him dry. That six hundred dollars is your phone stipend for the month. Learn your place.” Dominic swallowed hard. “Vic,” he started, his vocal cords tight. “I need to ask you something.” “Ask away, babe. What’s going on?” She sounded genuinely cheerful. “What happened to Scarlett’s year-end bonus?” He articulated every single syllable. There was a microsecond of dead silence on the other end of the line. It was incredibly brief. Almost imperceptible. But both Dominic and I caught it. 2 “Scarlett?” Victoria’s voice chimed back in. She had dialed up the innocent confusion to an award-winning level. “Her bonus? How would I know anything about that? Honey, you know I never interfere with your corporate stuff.” Her voice was soft, but it wrapped around Dominic’s nerves like a venomous snake. I noticed Dominic’s knuckles turning bone-white as he gripped his phone. “Richard just told me he wired a massive sum of money into your private account.” Dominic’s voice was dropping an octave, desperately trying to hold onto his dignity. “Money? Oh…” Victoria dragged out the vowel, pretending to search her memory. “Right, I remember now! Richard did wire me some funds. He mentioned the company had some tricky off-the-books accounting to deal with, and he just needed to park the cash in my account temporarily for liquidity.” “Don’t worry, honey. I’ve got it tucked away safe and sound.” “Does the company need it back right now? I can wire it over immediately.” It was a flawless performance. Bulletproof. She painted herself as the ultimate supportive wife, quietly handling her husband’s dirty corporate laundry behind the scenes. If Dominic hadn’t just heard Richard groveling on speakerphone five minutes ago, he probably would have bought the lie. But right now, her sweet words sounded like nails on a chalkboard. “Tricky off-the-books accounting?” Dominic repeated her words, the sarcasm practically dripping onto the desk. “Victoria, do you honestly think I am an idiot?” The venom in his tone clearly shocked her. “Honey? What is wrong with you? Why are you talking to me like this?” She expertly pivoted to playing the victim. “Is… is Scarlett in the room with you?” She suddenly switched targets, aiming straight for my throat. “Babe, do not listen to a word that manipulative bitch says! You know exactly what she’s trying to do!” “She is just a pretty young subordinate who constantly flaunts herself in your office. She’s desperate to sleep her way to the top!” “Did she come crying to you? Saying I bullied her?” “I swear to God, Dominic! I know how hard it is for a young girl to make it in the city. I’ve always gone out of my way to look out for her. How could she invent such disgusting lies about me?” Victoria’s voice escalated into a hysterical, tearful pitch. Her ability to completely rewrite reality made the air in the office feel toxic. Dominic looked physically ill. He stared at me, his eyes swirling with a chaotic mess of emotions. Anger. Doubt. The sheer agony of being betrayed by his own family. I knew exactly what was happening in his head. He was caught in a psychological meat grinder. On one side: his top executive, the woman who had single-handedly secured millions in revenue for his firm. On the other side: the woman who shared his bed. Human nature dictates that people want to believe the ones they sleep next to. Subconsciously, he was trying to find a way to make Victoria the victim and me the homewrecker. It was the oldest, cheapest trick in the corporate playbook. The “jealous wife claiming the female employee is a homewrecker” card. It was practically unblockable. “Put Scarlett on the phone. Now.” Victoria snapped an order through the speaker. The sweet wife routine was gone; she was now demanding obedience like royalty. Dominic shot me a look, silently asking what I wanted to do. I didn’t move a muscle. I just looked back at him. Then, I slowly shook my head. Argue with her? Not a chance. It would just devolve into a screaming match, and I refused to drag myself down to her level of the gutter. “Mr. Reed,” I said. My voice wasn’t loud, but it cut through the noise perfectly. “It seems this is a domestic dispute.” “Since that is the case, please process my resignation.” “As for my stolen compensation, my lawyers will be in touch with your legal department by tomorrow morning.” I turned on my heel and headed for the door. My goal was already accomplished. The grenade had been dropped right in Dominic’s lap. How he dealt with his wife was his problem. All I cared about was getting my cash and getting out. “Stop right there!” Dominic barked from behind his desk. I stopped walking but didn’t bother turning around. “Nobody leaves this room until we get to the bottom of this!” His voice was a desperate, commanding bark. I slowly turned around, meeting his gaze with absolute ice. “What else is there to discuss, Mr. Reed?” “Do you seriously think she is lying about you?” He pointed at the phone, his chest heaving. “You already know what the truth is,” I replied. “I need proof!” Dominic’s eyes were bloodshot. “Scarlett, I know how you operate. You are surgical. You wouldn’t walk in here and drop a resignation letter on my desk with nothing but a bank screenshot!” “Give me the smoking gun. Give me something that forces me to believe you!” He was practically begging. He was cornering me, but more importantly, he was cornering himself. He needed me to hand him the sledgehammer that would finally shatter his delusions about his marriage. Watching a powerful man break down like this didn’t make me feel an ounce of pity. I reached into my designer tote bag and pulled out a secondary device. It was a cheap, prepaid burner phone I strictly used for two-factor authentication codes. I hit a single button on the keypad. A crystal-clear audio recording blasted through the phone’s tiny speaker. It was Victoria. But the sweet, innocent tone was completely absent. She sounded vicious, arrogant, and cruel. “Let’s get one thing straight, Scarlett.” “My husband’s company is my company. I decide who gets paid and who gets starved.” “Six hundred thousand dollars? For you? Don’t make me laugh.” “You are nothing but a dog on Dominic’s leash. I am tossing you a six-hundred-dollar bone. You should be wagging your tail and thanking me.” The recording bounced off the glass walls of the office. The desperate hope on Dominic’s face died instantly. He looked like a corpse. On the speakerphone, Victoria’s fake crying abruptly stopped. She had heard it too. 3 “Scarlett! You little bitch! You recorded me?!” Victoria’s shrill, panicked scream exploded from the desk phone. Her mask had completely melted off, exposing the ugly, raving lunatic underneath. Dominic looked like someone had just severed his spine. He swayed on his feet and braced both hands against the edge of his desk just to stay upright. He stared blankly at the burner phone in my hand. His lips trembled, but no sound came out. The audio file kept playing. My own voice, calm and detached, echoed in the room. “Victoria, that bonus is legally contracted compensation for my labor. You have zero legal authority to withhold it.” Then came Victoria’s mocking laughter. “Legal? In this building, I am the law! One word from me, and not only do you lose your money, but you get blacklisted from the entire tech sector!” “Don’t flatter yourself just because you closed a few deals for my husband. To him, you are just a replaceable cog in a machine.” “Take your six hundred bucks and get out. If you try to make a scene, I will personally ruin you.” “I will make sure the entire industry thinks you are a gold-digging slut who tried to sleep her way into the C-suite and got fired for it.” The recording clicked off. The office fell into a graveyard silence. The only sound was the heavy, frantic static of Victoria’s breathing coming through the speakerphone. I slipped the burner phone back into my bag without breaking eye contact with Dominic. All the color had drained from his face. Pain, humiliation, rage, and the devastating realization of ultimate betrayal violently clashed in his eyes. In the end, it all settled into a bottomless, hollow exhaustion. He aged a decade in sixty seconds. His own wife had used the most vile, venomous language imaginable to degrade his most valuable executive. She hadn’t just stolen the money. She had weaponized his name, acting like a tyrant, treating the very foundation of his company like dirt beneath her designer heels. Replaceable cogs. A dog on a leash. Hearing those words spoken in his wife’s voice was the ultimate slap in the face. “Dominic… babe… please let me explain… it’s not what you think…” Victoria finally found her voice again. She was stammering, desperate. “She… she provoked me! She insulted me first! That audio is edited! It’s a deepfake!” Her lies were so pathetic they were almost insulting. Dominic slowly reached out. He picked up the desk phone and pressed it to his ear. His movements were sluggish, like he was moving underwater. “Victoria.” His voice was wrecked. It sounded like he had swallowed broken glass. “When we got married, I handed you an unlimited black card. I told you to buy whatever you wanted. No limits.” “I told you the wife of the CEO of Apex Tech should never have to look at a price tag.” “I give you an eight-figure allowance every single year.” “So tell me. Why the hell did you need to steal six hundred grand from Scarlett?” Every word struck like a hammer blow. It hit Victoria. And it hit me. She wasn’t hurting for cash. She didn’t need the money. She did this for the power. She did it for the twisted, sociopathic thrill of holding someone’s livelihood hostage. She wanted to prove that my entire career, my entire existence, meant absolutely nothing compared to her status. Victoria was completely speechless. “I… I just wanted to put her in her place…” she whispered, resorting to her final, desperate defense. “People were talking, Dominic. They said she was getting too much credit. That she didn’t respect you anymore. I just wanted to break her ego a little bit, so she wouldn’t become a threat to you…” “Heh.” A short, brutal laugh escaped Dominic’s throat. “Break her ego?” “You target my core Director of Operations, you cut off the right arm of my company, and you expect me to believe you did it for my benefit?” “Victoria. You absolutely disgust me.” He didn’t give her another second to speak. He slammed the phone down onto the receiver. He slowly lifted his head. His eyes were completely bloodshot. “I am sorry.” He forced the words out. “This is my failure.” “I failed to manage my own house, and you suffered for it.” I didn’t respond. I just looked at him. An apology? What was the point? The damage was done. The second trust shatters in the corporate world, you can never glue it back together. “I will wire you the missing funds immediately.” Dominic swallowed hard. “I am also adding another six hundred thousand as an inconvenience bonus.” “Richard is fired. I am turning him over to the feds by the end of the day.” “As for Victoria…” He paused. A muscle jumped in his jaw. “I will make sure you get justice there, too.” “Scarlett. Please. For the sake of the last five years…” “Don’t leave.” He finally laid his cards on the table. The apologies, the double bonus, the firing of the CFO. It was all a desperate bid to keep me in the building. The massive enterprise software contract I had just secured was entering its critical execution phase next month. I built that deal from the ground up. I knew where all the bodies were buried. If I walked out that door, a multi-billion-dollar project would crash and burn. That was what he actually cared about. I looked at the desperate plea in his eyes and slowly shook my head. “It’s too late, Dominic.” My heart was ice cold. Staying in this building for even one more second made my skin crawl. “The resignation stands.” “I won’t be logging on tomorrow.” My tone was absolute. Zero room for negotiation. The last remaining drops of color vanished from Dominic’s face. He knew he had lost me. His wife had personally taken his sharpest weapon and snapped it over her knee. I turned around, opened the heavy glass door, and walked out. Behind me, Dominic slumped heavily into his leather chair, surrounded by the wreckage of his pride. I didn’t look back. The moment I stepped out of the Apex Tech high-rise, the California sun hit my face. I took a deep breath. I felt incredibly light. My phone buzzed in my pocket. A banking notification. Incoming wire transfer to account ending in 3945: $1,200,000.00. Available Balance: $1,200,600.00. The money was there. My original bonus, plus the penalty fee. Dominic moved fast. But I knew exactly what this was. It wasn’t just compensation. It was hush money. He was terrified I would leak the audio to the press, tank the company’s stock, and turn his marriage into a tabloid circus. I smirked and swiped the notification away. He thought cash could fix everything. But he was about to learn that there are some things a wire transfer cannot buy. Like loyalty. Or what I was about to do next. 4 I didn’t go home. I hailed a black car and gave the driver an address in the financial district. We pulled up to a massive, imposing limestone building. It didn’t have the sleek, modern glass aesthetic of Apex Tech. It screamed old money and ruthless power. A heavy brass plaque by the entrance read: Reed Holdings. Reed Holdings was the parent conglomerate of Apex Tech. It was the absolute core of the Reed family empire. Dominic’s father, Tony Reed, the legendary tycoon who built the empire from scratch, had technically retired. But his private office was still on the top floor. I walked into the grand lobby. The concierge immediately stood up. “Ms. Scarlett. Mr. Reed is expecting you.” I nodded and bypassed security, heading straight for the private executive elevator. Half an hour ago, while riding away from Apex Tech, I had called Tony’s chief of staff. I told him I had a catastrophic operational risk to report regarding Apex Tech, and I needed five minutes with the Chairman. I got my confirmation in less than three minutes. The elevator doors slid open to a dark wood-paneled executive suite. Tony Reed sat behind a massive desk, nursing a glass of neat bourbon. He was in his late sixties, with silver hair and eyes like a hawk evaluating its prey. “Have a seat, Scarlett.” He gestured to the leather chair across from him. His tone was perfectly level. I sat down and rested my bag on my lap. “Tony,” I started. “You mentioned a catastrophic risk,” he said, taking a slow sip. “Let me guess. My son screwed up again?” He used the word again. Clearly, Dominic’s management style was not a secret to his father. I didn’t answer with words. I opened my bag and placed three items on the pristine desk. First, my bank statement, with the $600 deposit circled in red ink. Second, the cheap burner phone. Third, a freshly printed screenshot of the $1.2 million wire transfer I had received twenty minutes ago. I slid them across the polished wood. “Tony. This is a fatal flaw in Apex Tech’s financial security.” “This is a total breakdown of executive management.” “And this,” I tapped the printout of the $1.2 million transfer, “is your son attempting to use corporate funds as a golden parachute to bury his wife’s crimes.” I didn’t sugarcoat a single syllable. I didn’t mention Victoria by name. I didn’t frame it as a domestic issue. I stripped all emotion out of it. I framed it purely as a corporate liability. A financial disaster. Because when you are talking to a titan like Tony Reed, the only language that matters is leverage and risk. Tony’s hawk-like eyes scanned the three items. He picked up the bank statement first, his brow furrowing slightly. Then, he picked up the burner phone. I leaned forward and pressed play. Victoria’s vicious rant echoed in the quiet, opulent office. “…You are nothing but a dog on Dominic’s leash…” When the recording hit that specific line, the temperature in the room dropped ten degrees. Tony wasn’t angry that Victoria was a bitch. He was furious that someone had the audacity to refer to the core intellectual capital of his empire as a dog. That kind of arrogance destroys empires. When the audio finished, he remained silent. Finally, he picked up the screenshot of the wire transfer. “One point two million,” Tony murmured. “He paid what he owed, and he doubled it as an apology. Dominic isn’t entirely cheap.” “Tony, this isn’t about him being generous.” I corrected him without hesitation. “It is about him being compromised.” “He thinks throwing cash at a problem makes it disappear. But the money isn’t the root issue.” “The issue is that your Chief Financial Officer is willing to launder a million dollars to appease the CEO’s wife.” “The issue is that an executive’s spouse holds enough unchecked power to fire, starve, and blacklist your most vital personnel.” “Today, this happened to me. Tomorrow, it happens to the lead developers. Next week, it happens to the VP of Sales.” “When a corporate hierarchy can be hijacked by a spouse’s temper tantrum, that company is dead in the water.” My words were heavy artillery. Tony went dead silent. He looked at me, really looked at me. The predatory gleam in his eyes softened into something resembling genuine respect. He set his bourbon glass down. “You are a very smart girl.” His voice was a low rumble. “Much sharper than my son, who currently has his head shoved entirely up his own ass.” “I understand the situation.” He gave me his word. “I built Apex with my own bare hands. I will not watch it be cannibalized from the inside.” “I don’t care whose name is on the marriage certificate.” His words were spoken softly, but they carried the weight of an executioner’s axe. I knew I had won. I stood up, smoothing out my skirt. “Tony, my resignation is already filed. As of noon today, I no longer work for Apex Tech.” “Thank you for your time.” I gave him a crisp nod and turned toward the elevator. “Hold on a second.” Tony’s voice stopped me. “What’s your next move?” he asked. “Take some time off. See what the market looks like,” I replied honestly. “Right,” he nodded slowly. “You’ve earned a break. It’s been a hell of a run these last five years.” “Save my direct line in your contacts. When you get bored of sitting on a beach, call me.” “There will always be a seat for you at Reed Holdings.” That was a massive, unexpected victory. But I kept my face totally neutral. “Thank you, Tony.” I walked onto the elevator. The moment the doors slid shut and I was back on the street, I finally let out a long, heavy exhale. The fuse was lit. The explosion was now strictly Reed family business. And I was safely outside the blast radius. 5 When Dominic walked through the front door of his sprawling estate, the house was dead quiet. Victoria was sitting on the velvet sofa in the main living room, wearing a silk robe. A half-empty glass of red wine sat on the coffee table. She was clearly waiting for him. The second he walked in, she sprang up. Her face was a mask of panic and victimhood. “Dom, baby, you’re home… Please, you have to let me explain. It’s really not what it sounded like…” Dominic completely ignored her. He walked over to the adjacent armchair, slowly slipped off his tailored suit jacket, and tossed it aside. He undid his tie with slow, mechanical precision. Every movement was heavy, deliberate, and suffocating. Victoria felt the panic rising in her throat. “Say something, please… you’re scaring me…” She reached out to grab his forearm. Dominic took a sharp step back, dodging her touch like she was contagious. His eyes were completely hollow as he stared at her. “What is left to explain?” His voice was terrifyingly calm. “Explain how you conspired with Richard to siphon company payroll into your private accounts?” “Or maybe explain how you weaponized my name to threaten and humiliate my best executive?” “Victoria, I had no idea you were such a brilliant criminal.” The words sliced into her like a scalpel. All the color drained from Victoria’s face. “I… I wasn’t trying to steal! I just made a stupid mistake!” She burst into tears, large drops rolling perfectly down her cheeks. “I was jealous! Okay? I was so incredibly jealous! She gets to spend all day with you. She solves your problems. Everyone in your inner circle talks about how you can’t run the business without her!” “I was terrified! I thought she was going to steal my husband!” “I just wanted to teach her a lesson. I wanted to remind her who the wife is! I swear to God, I wasn’t thinking!” She sobbed, playing the tragic role of a woman driven mad by love. A few years ago, that performance would have earned her a tight hug and a diamond necklace. Tonight, Dominic just watched her perform with absolute disgust. “Jealous?” He scoffed. “So your jealousy is worth exactly five hundred ninety-nine thousand, four hundred dollars?” “You wanted to prove you were the lady of the house, so you treated her like a stray dog?” “Drop the act, Victoria. It’s pathetic.” “I didn’t come home to listen to your excuses.” Dominic reached into his briefcase. He pulled out a thick stack of legal documents and dropped them onto the glass coffee table with a heavy thud. The bold, black letters across the top page were impossible to miss. PETITION FOR DISSOLUTION OF MARRIAGE. Victoria’s fake sobbing stopped instantly. She stared at the divorce papers, then looked up at Dominic in sheer horror. “A divorce? You want a divorce?” Her voice pitched up into a hysterical screech. “Over that bitch? Are you out of your mind?!” “We have been married for seven years! Seven years, Dominic! And you’re throwing me out over an employee?” “I am not crazy,” Dominic said, his expression completely dead. “You are.” “You can play your pathetic high-society games with anyone you want. But you touched the core of my business.” “You alienated every single person who bleeds for my company.” “You turned me into a joke who can’t even protect his own staff!” “This isn’t about another woman.” “This is about Apex. And it is about me.” Victoria’s facade totally crumbled. She stared at the cold, ruthless man in front of her and finally realized that tears weren’t going to save her. Her face twisted into something feral. “Fine! You want to play hardball, Dominic? Let’s play!” “You think dumping me is going to be cheap? Half of Apex Tech belongs to me! It is marital property!” “You want to kick me to the curb? I will drag you through court for years! I will take half your empire! I’ll leak this to the press and tank your stock overnight! I will leave you bankrupt!” She was screaming now, completely unhinged, revealing the sheer greed that had always lived beneath her skin. Dominic just watched her throw her tantrum. “Half the stock?” He let out a dark, mocking laugh, like he had just heard a joke. “Victoria, did you suffer a head injury? Have you forgotten the prenuptial agreement we signed?” “Every single share of Apex Tech is classified as a pre-marital asset. You don’t get a single penny of equity.” “As for the mansions, the sports cars, the jewelry… I’ve bought you tens of millions of dollars’ worth of toys over the last seven years.” “The contract states you get to keep all of that.” “I will also cut you a final severance check. You’ll never have to work a day in your life.” “Sign the papers. It is the last shred of dignity you’re going to get.” Victoria froze. The prenup. Of course she remembered it. When they signed it, Dominic had kissed her forehead and told her it was just standard legal red tape to keep his father’s lawyers happy. He told her not to worry about it. She had been so blinded by the glamorous wedding that she signed it without letting her own lawyer read it. She thought it was just a meaningless stack of paper. Tonight, that paper was a death warrant. He had been protecting his assets from her since day one. The unconditional love was a myth. “Dominic!” Victoria’s eyes were practically glowing with venom. “You set me up!” “I will never sign this! I would rather die! I will go to the tabloids! I will tell them everything! I will ruin your reputation!” Dominic looked at her with ultimate exhaustion. “Do whatever you want.” He turned around and headed for the front door, not looking back once. “But let me give you one final piece of advice.” He stopped with his hand on the doorknob. “Richard is already in federal custody.” “He rolled over immediately. He handed the feds a mountain of evidence proving you manipulated him into cooking the books and committing wire fraud.” “He also mentioned he kept meticulous ledgers on all the other little ‘investments’ you’ve been making behind my back using company leverage.” “Victoria. Unless you want to spend the next fifteen years wearing an orange jumpsuit in a federal penitentiary…” “You will sign those papers by tomorrow morning.” He opened the door and walked out into the night. The heavy oak door slammed shut behind him. Victoria collapsed onto the marble floor. She stared at the divorce papers, the absolute silence of the massive house crushing the last remaining breath out of her lungs.

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My son and I were in a car crash on our way to confront my husband. When we woke up, we couldn’t remember a thing. And my husband, a psychologist, left us to travel the world with his old flame and her daughter, both of whom he claimed were suffering from severe depression. Eventually, our memories started to return. He noticed that the amnesia had changed us. We were quieter, more compliant. Independent. At first, he seemed pleased with himself, confident that he had perfectly balanced his family and his obligations to his old flame. That lasted until New Year’s Eve. He spent the holiday with them, and when he finally came home, he overheard a conversation between my son and me through the front door. My son asked, “Mommy, is that man really my dad? It feels weird every time I have to call him that.” I nodded. “I know what you mean. He’s not my type at all. I have no idea why I ever married him.” My son’s eyes lit up. “Mommy, you like Mr. Reed, don’t you? Every time he sees you after school, his ears turn so red they look like they’re about to bleed. And he’s always making up excuses to drive us home… I think you’ve got a shot!” I blushed and was about to shush him when he leaned in close. He whispered in a voice he thought was quiet but was perfectly audible from the hallway, “Mommy… what if we just… got a new dad?” 1. For dinner, I’d ordered two servings of ghost pepper wings. My son and I were sweating profusely, our mouths on fire, when a familiar yet distant voice cut through the air from behind us. “You didn’t wait for me?” We both flinched. Turning around, we saw a handsome man standing in the doorway, a chill radiating from him that had nothing to do with the winter air. His features were a clear echo of our son’s. It was Alistair Finch. My husband. My son’s father. He stepped closer, his brow furrowing in disgust at the sight of our grease-stained mouths and the fiery wings on the table. “We’ve been married for six years. Don’t you know I have a stomach condition? I can’t eat anything spicy.” My son, Noah, still gnawing on a wing, mumbled, “We didn’t get them for you. These are for us.” Alistair froze. I forced a dry laugh, trying to smooth things over. “Well, I saw on your social feed that you were at the amusement park with Serena and her daughter. I just assumed you’d be eating with them…” “Nina,” he cut me off, his voice laced with its usual impatience. “I’ve explained this. Serena and her daughter were abandoned by her husband. They have severe depression. I’m their doctor. It’s my professional duty.” “And you?” he continued, his tone turning colder. “As a wife and a mother, not only did you cause a scene at my clinic, but you’ve taught Noah to be nothing but a jealous, petty child.” He paused, his voice dropping to an icy whisper. “Wasn’t the car crash enough to make you two learn your lesson?” The memories flooded back. I remembered the moment I found out his round-the-clock “patient care” was actually for his high school sweetheart. I’d taken Noah and stormed his clinic to confront him. He had pulled us into a corner, his face a mask of weary resignation. “This is exactly why I didn’t tell you. I’m a doctor, Nina. I can’t just abandon my patients. It’s irresponsible.” “Don’t you dare make a scene in front of them with our son.” His calm, clinical tone made Noah and me feel like a pair of hysterical lunatics. So, I’d hired people to hold up banners outside his clinic: “SERENA AND DAUGHTER SEDUCE MARRIED MAN.” Noah had taken a megaphone to kindergarten and chased her daughter, Poppy, around the playground, shouting, “Her mom’s a homewrecker! Don’t play with her!” After that, Serena and Poppy had a public breakdown, threatening to jump from a building. To force us to back down, Alistair got me fired from my job and made sure Noah was ostracized at school. I finally shattered, threatening divorce. He relented, promising to keep his distance from them. And we believed him. We even booked a trip for our five-year anniversary, counting down the days to his rare vacation. We went to pick him up from the clinic, hearts full of excitement, only to receive a single, cold phone call. “A last-minute work trip. We’ll have to postpone the vacation.” We left, heartbroken. But as we rounded the corner, we overheard his colleagues chatting and laughing. “Dr. Finch is really dedicated to that Ms. Serena, isn’t he? Taking a six-month leave of absence just to oversee their recovery therapy!” “I know! I heard they’re on their way to the airport right now. He’s personally escorting them.” A roaring filled my ears, and a raw, physical pain tore through my chest. Before the tears could fall, I saw Noah’s small, pale face looking up at me, fat tears rolling down his cheeks. His voice trembled. “Mommy… does Daddy… does he really not want us anymore?” That single question made my sanity crumble. I grabbed his hand and we ran, a desperate need for an answer propelling us forward. We had to know. Did he still want this family, or not? We never caught up to him. The car crash came first. When we woke up, the world was a blank slate. We only remembered each other. And he, in turn, simply let us be forgotten. The memories receded. Noah and I exchanged an awkward glance. The facts were back, but the feelings weren’t. We couldn’t even comprehend the hysterical people we used to be. We stammered out apologies and promised we would never bother them again. Alistair’s expression only darkened. After a long silence, he slipped back into his familiar role of the one in control. “I’m taking them to the national park for a therapy session tomorrow. I need you to pack a lunch for three.” “And Noah, I need you to prepare a second set of your class notes for Poppy.” He turned to leave, adding over his shoulder, “You’d be wise to keep your promise this time. No more… embarrassing behavior.” The door clicked shut. Noah and I looked at each other and shrugged in unison. Then, I pulled out my phone and ordered a deluxe catered lunch to be delivered to the park for three. Noah messaged his teacher and politely requested a digital copy of the class materials. As for tomorrow? We already had plans to go hiking with Mr. Reed. We didn’t have time to worry about them. 2. Early the next morning, Serena’s soft voice drifted from the living room. “Alistair, is it just going to be us? Maybe… maybe we should ask Nina and Noah to come? I’m worried they’ll get the wrong idea. It’s not about me, of course, but Poppy is so fragile…” Poppy’s small voice chimed in. “It’s okay, Mommy. I’m fine. Noah… he didn’t mean it.” Alistair’s tone was gentle. “It’s okay, Poppy. Don’t worry about it. If we bring them, there’s no telling what kind of scene they’ll make. It wouldn’t be good for your recovery.” I sighed, rolled over, and drifted back to sleep. The next time I opened my eyes, I was being dragged from my bed by a rough hand. Alistair was practically hauling me into the living room. “Look at what your perfect son has done!” he seethed, his voice a low growl. “Just look at what he did to Poppy!” Serena was cradling a trembling Poppy, who was covered in food stains, her eyes red from crying. My son was sitting amidst a mess of spilled food, his small hands clutching three lunch containers to his chest. His face was blotchy and red, and huge tears splashed onto the floor. “I didn’t push her!” he cried out. “She’s a thief! She stole the lunch Mommy made for me! I was just trying to get it back!” Alistair didn’t even glance at him. He was meticulously wiping Poppy’s face with a wet cloth, murmuring comforting words to Serena. Only after he was finished did he turn to me, a look of weary, I-told-you-so exhaustion in his eyes. “Nina, just because I asked you to make a couple of extra lunches, you had to stoop to this? Teaching your son to pull these kinds of disgusting stunts?” “You made a promise just last night. Did you forget already?” I took a deep breath, trying to remain patient. “I didn’t do anything, and I believe Noah is telling the truth. I put your lunches on the dining table. Maybe Poppy just grabbed the wrong ones by mistake…” “Enough,” Alistair snapped, his eyes dismissing me as if I were a terrible actress in a cheap play. “Stop the performance. I haven’t forgotten what you two are capable of. The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. You need to take a long, hard look at yourself and figure out how to be a proper mother.” The words died in my throat. I remembered our agreement. We would each take a step back. As long as he kept his distance from Serena, we would be fine. After that, he did start coming home on time, reporting his every move. But if Poppy so much as scraped her knee at kindergarten, he would be the first one there, forcing Noah to apologize without even hearing his side of the story. When Noah tried to defend himself, Alistair would just stare at me coldly. “Nina, is your promise really that worthless? Stop this. Don’t exhaust all of my patience, all of my affection for you. If it comes to that, there will be nothing left for us to say.” The worst time, he had thrown the words at me like stones: “A son with a heart this black is no son of mine.” Noah was too young to bear such a thing. He had chased him out of the house, barefoot, his feet bleeding on the pavement, clinging to his father’s coat and confessing to crimes he never committed. “Daddy! I’m sorry! It was all my fault! I’ll never do it again! I’ll tell Poppy I’m sorry!” “Please don’t leave me and Mommy!” From that day on, my son never tried to defend himself again. I let out a soft sigh. What was the point of explaining? In his eyes, we were already convicted felons with a long history of offenses. I pulled Noah into my arms, my voice low and steady. “Noah, give them the lunchboxes.” His small body went rigid. Then, he scrubbed his face hard with the back of his hand, gave up the fight, and silently pushed the containers he’d been guarding so fiercely across the floor. Alistair didn’t look at us again. He bent down, scooped Poppy into his arms, and placed a steadying hand on Serena’s back, shielding them both as he turned and walked out the door. SLAM! The sound of the door was sharp and final, leaving the apartment in a dead, suffocating silence. It was just me and my son, surrounded by the mess on the floor. I quietly picked up a cloth and began to clean. Noah knelt down beside me, helping to pick up the scattered items. After a while, I asked softly, “Noah, if one day… Mommy and Daddy aren’t together anymore…” “Who would you want to live with?” I had asked him this once before, during the worst of our fights. He had sobbed his heart out then. “I don’t want you to split up! I want our family to be together forever!” But this time, he didn’t hesitate. He looked up at me, his eyes clear and certain. “I’ll stay with Mommy.” “No matter what happens, I’m with you, Mommy.” I looked at him, and a real smile spread across my face, the warmth of it melting away the last bit of ice in my heart. I ruffled his hair. “Okay.” Then there was nothing left to be afraid of. 3. Just as I wiped up the last of the mess, the doorbell rang. “Ms. Finch? Noah? Are you home?” Noah’s eyes lit up. “It’s Mr. Reed!” He scampered to the door and threw it open. Outside, a handsome young man with a kind face knelt down just in time to catch the small boy who launched himself into his arms. Seeing his red, swollen eyes, Mark Reed’s voice softened instantly. “What happened, Noah? Have you been crying?” The little guy buried his face in Mark’s shoulder and let out a muffled, heartbroken sob. “The lunch Mommy made… they took it…” “It’s okay,” Mark said, gently patting his back. “Mr. Reed made new ones. All of your and Mommy’s favorites.” He had a magic touch with kids. In a few sentences, Noah’s tears had turned to a watery smile. Mark finally looked up at me, a slightly apologetic smile on his face. “I’m sorry to intrude, Ms. Finch. You didn’t answer your phone, and I got a little worried.” “Please, don’t say that,” I said quickly. “You saved our lives, Mr. Reed. Call me Nina.” Six months ago, after the crash, it was Mark who had pulled us from the mangled car, running every red light to get us to the hospital. When he learned we had partial amnesia and our reflexes were slow, he took it upon himself to cook for us every day and handle Noah’s school drop-offs and pick-ups. Once our memories returned, he had gracefully retreated to a polite distance. But not long after hearing the full story of what led to the accident, he had somehow become Noah’s new kindergarten teacher. The tips of Mark’s ears turned pink. “Nina,” he said softly. “I’ve planned out the hiking route. We should get going.” He was as good as his word; everything was perfectly organized. He took all the heavy bags from me without a second thought. When Noah got tired, he knelt down effortlessly. “Hop on, Noah.” I felt a pang of guilt. “Don’t spoil him, Mark. You’re already carrying so much.” He just smiled, his hand hovering protectively near my back. “It’s nothing. I work out. I can handle it.” For some reason, looking at his clean-cut profile, my heart started to beat a little faster. The feeling hadn’t subsided even when we reached a rest area and he took Noah to buy some water. Just then, a small, familiar voice called out from a distance behind me. “Daddy! Let’s race!” It was followed by Serena’s cheerful tone. “Poppy, slow down! You’ll fall.” And finally, Alistair’s laughing reply. “Princess Poppy, Daddy’s gonna catch you!” I turned my head and my eyes locked with the three of them standing not far away.

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My husband Elias is the heir to the Shadowclaw pack Alpha. In the eighth year of our marriage, a group of Rogues ambushed the pack. Elias and I both died in their attack. When I woke again, we had returned to when we had just started dating. In my previous life, we were married for eight years. Our life should have been blissful, but he adamantly refused to have children. Later, I accidentally learned that he still couldn’t forget his first love, Serena. I was his fated mate. When he first met me, he broke up with Serena and swore on our wedding day that he would only love me for the rest of his life. But I never expected that after marriage, he still loved Serena. After being reborn, I decided to set us both free. We severed our mate bond and never saw each other again, becoming strangers. Eight years later, he had already become the Shadowclaw pack Alpha and announced at an inter-pack banquet that he and Serena would soon marry. Seeing me still attending the banquet alone, he mocked me. “Aisling, I know I’m charming, and you’ve loved me so deeply in both lifetimes that you can’t help yourself, but you don’t have to cling to me forever.” I pretended not to hear and took my son’s hand beside me. Elias’s face instantly turned bloodless, his eyes bloodshot as he demanded: “Didn’t you say you’d only love me for life? How could you have a child with someone else?!”

Eight years later at the joint pack banquet, Elias and I met again. After treating several patients in succession, I was dizzy with exhaustion. Without freshening up, I went straight to the banquet venue. In the crowd, Elias and Serena stood at the center with their fingers intertwined, receiving adoration from various werewolves. “Alpha Elias, you’re truly remarkable! Under your leadership these past years, Shadowclaw pack went from nearly being absorbed to firmly holding the northern territory. You’re a legend among us werewolves!” “Of course! I heard the Alphas from several surrounding packs are lining up to form alliances with him but can’t even get appointments. The meeting gifts alone are in the hundreds of thousands, worth years of our tributes.” “Alpha Elias, I have some resources. For old times’ sake, help me out?” Someone asked with a laugh: “Alpha Elias, seeing how sweet you and Serena are, are you getting married soon?” Serena’s cheeks flushed as she looked up at Elias tenderly. Elias squeezed her hand, his smile confident: “That’s right, February 25th.” Everyone offered congratulations. A werewolf suddenly asked: “Alpha Elias, you and Aisling were so passionate back in the day. Are you still in contact? I remember when you played guitar and sang love songs for Aisling in front of everyone!” Hearing my name, Elias’s smile froze for a moment, his lips pressed tight. But Serena gripped his hand tighter, her voice gentle and gracious: “Elias and I are about to get married. What do you think—has he moved on or not?” Everyone laughed and continued flattering them. But I remembered that the “love songs” the old acquaintance mentioned were what Elias had stayed up countless nights training to prepare when he confessed to me. In my previous life, at my 19th birthday party, I discovered Elias was my mate. And then I completely fell for him. He once cupped my face, his eyes blazing: “Aisling, I’ll marry you, mark you, make you the Luna of Shadowclaw pack!” I believed him and devoted myself wholeheartedly to him. Unfortunately, in my previous life, he deceived me. I walked into the banquet hall with a composed expression. Sharp-eyed old acquaintances immediately noticed me. “Aisling! You’re finally here—you’re late!” “Hey, for such a formal occasion, why didn’t you change into a proper dress? You just came in a casual shirt? Can’t afford one?” “Have you been living so poorly all these years? Do you need me to introduce you to a job?” Several people who saw my simple clothing couldn’t help but mock me. From the moment I appeared, Elias’s gaze locked onto me. I nodded slightly at him as a greeting. He froze, and those wolf eyes that once mesmerized me showed indiscernible emotions. “Aisling, after all these years, you’re still the same as before—no ambition.” Serena gently took Elias’s arm, looked me over, and said softly: “Elias, she hasn’t had it easy, but we shouldn’t keep rubbing salt in her wounds. After all, we’re old friends.” She changed her tone, “But wearing this to a banquet… is a bit casual. A woman over thirty should know to dress decently. I have a spare dress in my car. I’ll give it to you to wear so you’ll at least look presentable.” Her words drew a few low laughs.

Indeed, at that moment I contrasted sharply with them. Serena wore a haute couture gown, exquisite makeup, and a gentle smile. Elias was in a sharp suit, broad-shouldered and narrow-waisted, hair perfectly groomed, every gesture radiating elite sophistication. And I had just finished an all-nighter treating injured werewolves after a Rogue attack. My face was exhausted, wearing a wrinkled cotton shirt and pants, travel-worn. “Thank you, but no need.” I politely declined and went straight to the buffet area. Treating patients earlier had consumed too much energy. I was now hungry enough to eat an entire cow. Just as I was focused on eating, Elias suddenly walked over and placed a check beside my hand. Two hundred thousand. “This money—for old times’ sake, to help you out. You don’t need to pay it back. Go buy some nice clothes, find a decent job, treat yourself well.” “Aisling, let the past be the past. Don’t keep dwelling on memories.” “If back then… forget it, there’s no point talking about it now.” “What matters is, don’t give up on yourself just because I left, okay? You being like this makes things very difficult for me.” I set down my knife and fork and looked up at him in confusion. I suddenly found it laughable. What sin had I committed in my previous life to make him so decisive yet “merciful” in abandoning me after rebirth? In my previous life, we went from young and passionate to experiencing Shadowclaw pack’s rise and fall together. Shadowclaw pack was still a weak pack at the time. Elias was still the Alpha heir, constantly working to become Alpha, while I wanted to become a doctor and was always studying medicine. At that time, a highly skilled old doctor from another pack appreciated me and wanted to take me as a student. But because I loved him, I gave up the opportunity to advance my medical career and took on the pack’s logistics and medical affairs early on, using my meager strength to support our territory and his reputation within the pack. Time and again when he was injured in Rogue attacks and became dispirited, I shouldered all the treatment and recovery, coaxing and encouraging him with gentle words. I thought he understood my love. But when he was seriously injured once and urgently needed a rare herb for healing, and I showed difficulty because I couldn’t gather enough resources for equivalent exchange, he smashed all the medical equipment on the spot. He yelled at me with red eyes: “Aisling! It’s all your fault! If I hadn’t broken up with Serena, her family’s resources would definitely have brought me great help. I would have already become Alpha! How could I not even obtain one herb!” “Being with you was my biggest regret!” Later, he became dispirited for a long time. His father almost gave up on him and chose another son as the Alpha heir. And I was stabbed to pieces by his words of “regret,” unable to sleep night after night. But I didn’t give up. I wanted to salvage things. I hugged him and begged in a low voice: “Elias, let’s have a child, okay?” But he pushed me away hard, his eyes full of disgust: “I hate you! Having a child with you would make me sick! I will never have a child with you in this lifetime!” Those words were like ice picks piercing through me. The day those Rogues attacked the pack, when their poisoned blade pierced my chest, I actually felt a sense of relief. Now that we’ve both been reborn and tacitly chose to sever our mate bond and become strangers—that’s fine. I pushed the check back, my tone flat: “No need. I don’t need charity from strangers, thank you.”

Elias frowned, looking displeased. “Aisling, what do you mean? I’m a stranger?” I nodded: “What I wear is my freedom, and I can buy it myself. My job is also very respectable, not shameful. And I haven’t failed to move on. Donate this money to werewolves who need it.” His fingers holding the check turned slightly white, but he stood there without moving. Serena quickly walked over. Seeing the check, a flash of understanding crossed her eyes. Her face still wore a proper smile, but her tone had hardened: “Aisling, if you don’t want money, surely you’d accept a real job? I know a medical clinic at a fringe pack that’s short-handed. Five thousand a month. Not much, but you’d learn a skill and could eventually open your own clinic. I’ll give you the contact information for the person in charge. How about it?” I didn’t even raise my eyelids and continued eating. “Thank you, but I’m very satisfied with my current job and don’t plan to change.” Werewolves watching the excitement chimed in: “Aisling, stop being stubborn. They’re being kind to help you—don’t be ungrateful.” “Exactly. Living like this, can’t even afford nice clothes, coming to a banquet—isn’t it to make connections? The olive branch is right in front of you, and you’re still acting proud?” Serena’s face was plastered with a fake smile: “Everyone, don’t say that. Maybe Aisling really does like her current job.” She turned to me, “Aisling, we’re doing this for old times’ sake. Don’t be stubborn for the sake of pride.” I really couldn’t understand where this sense of superiority in forcing money and jobs on people came from. If we were being serious, all these people combined probably weren’t as wealthy as me. “Really no need, thank you.” Serena’s smile remained unchanged, but the contempt in her eyes was undisguised. Elias’s knuckles turned white gripping the check, and he began sneering: “You’re really pathetic! Given an opportunity and you don’t know how to take it—no wonder you’re poor!” This was like a signal. Several ill-intentioned werewolves gathered around. A portly werewolf walked up to me swaying with a wine glass. His eyes looked me up and down lecherously: “Aisling, seeing you so pitiful makes me feel bad. How about this—you let me touch your chest, and I’ll give you a thousand. Too little? I’ll add more.” Other werewolves laughed, and no one stopped him. I frowned. This banquet was truly foul. If I weren’t still waiting for someone, I would have left long ago. I was about to call a server when Elias suddenly grabbed the man’s wrist. His presence dropped dramatically, displaying his Alpha authority, his face terrifyingly dark. “What do you think this banquet is? If you want to throw your weight around, go somewhere else! She’s not someone you can touch!”

The man winced in pain but didn’t dare make a sound. Serena grabbed Elias: “Elias! What are you doing!” Elias’s eyes were ice cold: “I’m helping out, can’t you see? If you’re going to act crazy, I suggest getting your head checked!” He then threw the man’s hand aside. The man didn’t dare provoke Elias and could only glare at me viciously. I was somewhat surprised and glanced at Elias. He would actually help me? Serena could barely maintain her gentle expression and stiffly changed the subject: “I heard the Alpha King and his family are also upstairs. We’re lucky today—we might get to see them.” The werewolves got excited. “The Alpha King? That Caius who became Alpha King before thirty? I heard he married quite early, and the Luna Queen is so well protected she’s never appeared publicly!” “More than that! The Luna Queen seems to be a medical expert with quite exceptional medical skills!” “We might see them in person today? What a treat!” As the words fell, a group of Beta guards escorting a little boy about five or six years old walked into the hall. The crowd instantly erupted. “With this escort, it must be the Alpha King’s son! He’s so handsome!” The lecherous werewolf from earlier sidled up to me again, lowering his voice with foul breath: “Aisling, if it weren’t for Serena and Alpha Elias, how would someone like you ever be qualified to see such important people? If it were me, I’d have thanked them long ago. Just accept the arrangement obediently. Not only can you get that five-thousand-dollar job, but maybe…” His gaze swept over me lecherously, “You could also receive my affection.” I glanced at him coldly, preparing to call the guards. At that moment, the little boy being surrounded scanned the entire venue, and his gaze suddenly fixed on me. His previously expressionless little face instantly bloomed with a huge smile. He broke free from the guards and ran toward me. Under everyone’s astonished gaze, he plunged into my arms. “Mommy! I finally found you—”

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My mother was a witch who once saved the life of the Alpha of SilverFang Pack. After my mother passed away, Alpha Anderson found me and my sister. He told us we could each marry one of his sons. In my past life, Violet chose the Alpha’s heir, Caleb Anderson. But in the end, she was driven out of the Pack. Reborn to the day Violet and I chose our husbands, I discovered I could hear people’s thoughts. I heard Violet think: “This time, I must steal the good husband first.” Then she hurriedly dragged away the gentle husband I married in my previous life. And Caleb, who beat her every day in the past life, was left to me. I smiled. Did she really think the man I married before had good character? I was reborn to the day Violet and I were brought back to SilverFang Pack. In the Pack’s banquet hall, all important members gathered for a welcome ceremony held for us sisters. Alpha Anderson stood on the elevated platform, his two sons standing on either side. One was Caleb Anderson, Alpha Anderson’s eldest son, cold by nature. He had already been chosen as the Alpha’s heir. The other was Lucas Anderson, Alpha Anderson’s second son, gentle by nature. A perfectly measured smile hung on his face. [This time, I must steal the good husband first.] A female voice transmitted into my ears. It was Violet’s voice. I gripped my skirt tightly. Not only had I been reborn, but I could also hear people’s thoughts. And judging from these two sentences from Violet, she had also been reborn. Otherwise she couldn’t possibly say such things. Alpha Anderson’s voice echoed in the hall: “…Violet, Lily, you may freely choose one of my sons to become your mate.” Violet immediately stepped forward. “Lucas looks gentle and kind. May I… may I choose him?” After speaking, she secretly cast me a smug glance. [This life, you can take the beatings for me.] Her thoughts were crystal clear. Alpha Anderson nodded and looked at me. “Lily, since Violet has already chosen Lucas, then you will marry Caleb.” I stepped forward with a smile. “Yes, Alpha. I quite admire Caleb as well.” I turned and stood beside him. Caleb glanced down at me with no emotion whatsoever. Then he looked away, as if I were merely air. [What a beautiful little treasure.] Lucas’s voice came through. I whipped my head around and saw Lucas gently supporting Violet. A chill ran through my body, and I instinctively grabbed Caleb’s hand hanging at his side. His hand was large with prominent knuckles, and warmth transmitted through his skin, unexpectedly hot. He glanced sideways at me but didn’t pull his hand back. Although this man looked quite intimidating, I felt that staying with him was better than staying with that hypocritical psycho Lucas. In my past life, Violet had married Caleb. As the Alpha’s heir, Caleb was very capable and busy with Pack affairs all day long. I heard he was very cold toward his Mate… Violet sought him out repeatedly, but each time she was driven out of his room with injuries. As for Lucas, although his status in the Pack was inferior to Caleb’s, it was still enough to let me live comfortably in the Pack. He accompanied me every day, taking care of me attentively, spoiling me to the bone. Everyone in the Pack knew we had a good relationship. And later, Caleb suddenly died from poisoning. Alpha Anderson suspected Violet did it and drove her out of the Pack. Lucas then inherited the Alpha position. My status in the Pack instantly skyrocketed. Violet was jealous of me. When I went out, she drove into me, and we died together. But she didn’t know that Lucas wasn’t what he appeared to be… Lucas had always lived in his brother’s shadow. On the surface he pretended to be obedient and polite to everyone, but in reality he was a control freak and domestic abuser. He was just very clever—he never hit my face, so outsiders couldn’t tell at all. Every time he beat me savagely, he would then kneel down to apply medicine and beg my forgiveness. I closed my eyes. The pain from my previous life was still so real and clear. I shook my head, telling myself it was all in the past. This life, I must change my originally tragic fate. I want to control my own destiny, to be independent and not rely on anyone.

Violet and I held our wedding ceremonies together. In my past life, we also held them at this same time. Back then, Caleb didn’t come to the ceremony, but Lucas arrived early in the morning. Everyone said he was the more considerate husband. But in this life, Caleb didn’t miss the ceremony. Although he just stood to the side with a cold expression, I breathed a sigh of relief. After all, in the past life when Caleb didn’t attend the ceremony, Violet suffered much gossip and strange looks. But Violet looked somewhat frantic with rage. During the ceremony she kept glaring at me with resentful eyes, thinking: [Laugh all you want. I’ll see if you can still laugh after getting beaten later.] It wasn’t until the end of the ceremony that Violet impatiently said to Lucas: “I love you, Lucas.” Then she kissed his lips. After the kiss, she stared at me with a showing-off look. I knew she wanted to see me embarrassed. But I wasn’t stupid. I wouldn’t act like she did in the past life and leave the scene in anger. That made all the Pack members and Alpha Anderson present unhappy. I remember everyone said Violet wasn’t steady enough and didn’t deserve to be the Pack’s future Luna. So much so that after marriage, Caleb never gave her a kind look, making her suffer terribly in the Pack. I smiled graciously and didn’t rush to show affection in front of Caleb. Instead, I said to the members attending the ceremony: “Thank you all for your hard work throughout this day. I extend my regards to everyone and hope you enjoy the ball that follows.” As soon as I spoke, the murmuring below ceased. Alpha Anderson, seated in the place of honor, looked at me with newfound respect. SilverFang Pack was the most powerful Pack on the continent, deeply concerned with face and reputation. So as the mate of the Alpha’s heir, one must show proper bearing—not just compete for a man’s favor, but also care for the feelings of Pack members. Violet also saw Alpha Anderson’s gaze, and a flash of annoyance crossed her eyes. [How disgusting. I’ll definitely make you embarrass yourself later!] I felt that being able to hear thoughts was really a good thing. Having such a convenient ability made everything so much easier. When it was time for the opening dance, I calmly lifted my skirt and walked toward the center of the dance floor. Violet stared at me intently, counting in her mind [One, two, three.] The next second, I directly sidestepped and reached out to grasp Caleb’s hand. And Violet, who had been rushing toward me with wine, fell hard to the ground, the wine soaking her entire body. “Are you okay?” Lucas hurried to help her up. But in his mind he was criticizing: [What an idiot!] Everyone was looking this way. Alpha Anderson’s face was full of anger. “As the mate of the Alpha’s son, how can you be so careless?” “I’m… I’m sorry, Alpha Anderson. I didn’t mean to.” Violet quickly apologized, but her eyes showed unwillingness. If I were her, in this life I wouldn’t make trouble again—I’d just live peacefully. But she didn’t want me to have it easy, so naturally I wouldn’t suffer in silence either.

Because Violet made a fool of herself, the ceremony ended hastily. Alpha Anderson didn’t give her a kind look from beginning to end. But when looking at me, his eyes were full of approval. Alpha Anderson even instructed Caleb: “You must treat her well.” Because of the Alpha’s instruction, Caleb’s attitude toward me indeed became much warmer. That evening, Caleb actually returned to our bedroom. He opened the door, his face showing fatigue from handling affairs. In my past life, I heard from others in the Pack that Caleb didn’t return on the wedding night. Violet spent her wedding night alone in an empty room and was never marked by Caleb, becoming a laughingstock for everyone. She went to complain to Alpha Anderson but got scolded instead, told she was incompetent and couldn’t gain her own Mate’s attention. I hurried over. “Caleb, you must be tired today.” He only nodded and didn’t speak to me. I wasn’t angry. While Caleb was showering, I made the bed for him and prepared calming tea. Then I tidied up the sofa myself, preparing to sleep there alone. When Caleb came out and saw this scene, a trace of surprise flashed in his eyes. I quickly said: “You sleep on the bed, I’ll sleep on the sofa.” “Lily, are you playing hard to get?” He narrowed his eyes slightly, staring at me. Having just bathed, his chest was slightly exposed with water droplets clinging to it. I had to admit, his physique was truly striking. Worthy of being the Alpha’s chosen heir. I quickly looked away. “No, we didn’t have feelings for each other before. Sleeping together would be awkward for both of us.” “If possible, I’d like to cooperate with you.” “What do you mean?” “I know you don’t have feelings for me. I just want to live peacefully in the Pack—I don’t expect love. So we can maintain our independent lives privately and only maintain appearances publicly. If you find your destined Mate, I can step aside for her.” Hearing my words, he suddenly smiled. “You’re very smart.” “I was thinking the same thing. I can agree to this.” I only learned some herbal knowledge from my mother. I didn’t have the ability or confidence to control the heart of a future Alpha. After all, in the Pack, the members’ attitude toward me largely depended on the Alpha’s attitude toward me. I didn’t want to end up like Violet in the past life, ostracized by everyone. That wouldn’t benefit me at all. And clearly in the past life, there was intense conflict between him and Violet. I didn’t want to provoke him and repeat that mistake. So I chose to coexist peacefully with him. This life, I only wanted to control my own destiny and stand on my own two feet!

To maintain our public image of a harmonious relationship, I posted a photo of us together on social media. When it was time to sleep, he really did sleep in the big bed, leaving me alone on the sofa. He really didn’t know how to be considerate. Well, I should be content. The next morning, I was woken by the sound of Caleb’s morning workout. Early in the morning he was listening to music while doing high-intensity training. Sweat had already soaked his black tank top, outlining his clearly defined abs and bulging arm muscles. His movements were fluid and full of explosive power, each punch and kick accompanied by the sound of cutting through air. He had so much more strength than Lucas’s thin frame. “Stop staring. I’m not interested in you.” He suddenly spoke, ending his training. “Get dressed. Come with me for breakfast.” His subtext was clear: appear together, put on a show for everyone. Actually, I felt he was quite reasonable. Why did he have such conflict with Violet in the past life? After getting ready, I went out with Caleb. As soon as we left, I saw Violet and Lucas walking toward us hand in hand. Violet wore an overly revealing dress, with marks all over her collarbone and shoulders. She deliberately leaned close to show me. Her face was full of pride as she looked me up and down. Seeing that I wore a long-sleeved dress that completely covered my arms and legs, she thought to herself, then smiled smugly. [Wrapped up so tightly, she must have been beaten and is deliberately hiding the wounds.] “Lily, how was last night? You didn’t…” she deliberately inquired. I noticed that Luna Anderson was approaching from the other end of the corridor at that moment. This stern and serious noblewoman most detested improper dress and discussing private matters in public. But I had no intention of warning her. I just smiled. “Violet, according to Pack hierarchy, you should give the Alpha heir’s wife proper respect, not casually inquire about my private affairs.” Her face immediately darkened, and she bit her teeth in defiance. “Caleb never made such demands. What right do you have to demand this of me?” Then she looked at Caleb. “Caleb, say something.” I could feel the powerful, cold pressure from Caleb beside me spreading bit by bit. Lucas cursed in his mind: [Damn idiot, see if I don’t deal with you tonight!] Then he tugged Violet’s hand, signaling her to stop talking. But she remained completely unaware of how serious the situation was. Until Caleb spoke.

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