Category: English

1 Seven years with Alan ended when he said he had a low sex drive. Before each time we were intimate, I would brew him a special herbal tonic. He drank it without refusing and even saw specialists. Then one day, as I entered with the steaming mug, I heard him scoff, “Are you really that desperate for a man?” A woman’s laugh came from his phone. She said, “Alan does not have a low sex drive. He was with me all afternoon. He just pictures you from high school, stripped bare on that bathroom floor, and it kills his mood.” Alan chuckled and pulled me close, telling me not to listen. But on the FaceTime screen, I saw her face—the same girl who had humiliated me years ago. Blind with rage, I grabbed the scalding tonic and forced it down his throat. … Alan choked, his face turning an angry shade of crimson as he clutched his chest. He glared at me, his voice a furious roar. “Rowan, are you insane? I told you she was joking. Can you not understand English?” The ceramic mug shattered at my feet. Sharp fragments nicked my ankles, leaving trails of red. I forced the corners of my mouth up into a twisted smile. “I am joking too. Is it funny?” His expression faltered. From the phone on the bed, the woman’s giggles continued. “Relax, Rowan. I just want his body, not his heart.” “He literally did not want to pull out of me earlier. I was the one who had to convince him to go home to you. Besides, this kind of thing is only fun when both people want it. No one likes a desperate girl forcing herself on a guy. Did those girls in high school not teach you your place?” Memories I had spent years burying clawed their way back to the surface. I lunged at the bed like a madwoman and ended the call. Looking at the mess on the floor, Alan picked up his phone, his eyes freezing over. “Are you done throwing a tantrum?” “If I knew you were this unhinged, I never would have saved you back then. You deserved to be stripped.” The moment the words left his mouth, a flicker of regret crossed his eyes. Not regret for cheating on me. Regret for getting involved in my mess back in high school and letting me attach myself to him. Right before our final exams, because I had beaten Sloane for the valedictorian spot, her little group of mean girls cornered me in the locker room. They tore my clothes off and threatened to take photos. In my most desperate, humiliating moment, Alan appeared like a savior. He chased them off and promised he would never tell a soul. I could still vividly remember the shy flush on his cheeks as he kept his eyes squeezed shut and wrapped his varsity jacket tightly around my trembling shoulders. He was the one who pulled me out of the darkness back then. And now, because of Sloane, he was shoving me right back into the abyss. Tears blurred my vision. I wiped them away frantically, my eyes red and burning as I stared him down. “Do you even know who she is?” He frowned, reaching out to wipe a tear from my cheek. “I know.” “But Sloane told me she was just young and stupid back then. She knows she was wrong. She wanted to make it up to you, but she knew seeing her would only trigger you. So when she found out we were having bedroom issues, she decided to make it up to me instead.” A sickening look of reminiscence washed over his face. “She is a true trust-fund girl, Rowan. Her skin is so soft it bruises if you just grip it. Being with her… that is the first time I actually felt like a real man.” “Today in the parking garage, she was straddling me, begging me to tell her who made me feel better. Ro, do you honestly think there is a comparison?” His face was plastered with absolute infatuation for Sloane. He looked nothing like the boy who had once held me, his own eyes red with sympathetic tears, swearing he would protect me and make Sloane pay for what she did. I lost whatever control I had left. I grabbed his shirt collar, shaking him. “Alan, what gives you the right to forgive her for me? What gives you the right…” He swatted my hands away. My interrogation was clearly starting to annoy him. “Ro, it has been years. Do you really need to hold onto a grudge for this long?” “Besides, Sloane knows she messed up. If it is really that big of a deal, I will have her apologize to you in person.” One flimsy apology. That was his solution to erase years of my trauma. A wave of pure nausea hit me. I sprinted to the master bathroom and dry heaved over the sink. He followed me, standing behind me to gently rub my back. He actually looked a little concerned. “Are you okay?” I slapped his hand away, my eyes blazing with disgust. He simply gathered my hair, pulling it over my shoulder, and wrapped his arms around me from behind, whispering into my ear. “Ro, instead of wasting energy being mad, you should figure out how to please me. If you were not so boring in bed, I would not have had to fake an impotence issue just to go sleep with Sloane.” “But do not worry. Going to her place is just a hobby. You are still the one I love.” Then, with absolute audacity, he opened his phone and shoved a video right into my line of sight. It was a video of them in his car. Sloane was moving on top of him, her face flushed with pleasure, her messy hair making her look effortlessly seductive. “Watch her and take notes, Ro. Once you learn how to do that, I will cut her off.” A suffocating sense of absurdity crashed down on me. I shoved his phone away and splashed cold tap water directly into his face. He scowled, wiping the water from his eyes. “If you do not want to watch her, then go watch some porn.” “Sometimes, you cannot just blame a man for stepping out. You need to look in the mirror and figure out what you are doing wrong.” I looked down at the red burn marks on my ankle. My chest hurt so much I could barely pull air into my lungs. So all those nights I stayed up late, sick with anxiety over his condition, boiling herbs and researching doctors… he was out holding the girl who had destroyed my life. His phone buzzed. He glanced at the screen and immediately started throwing on his jacket. “Sloane got spooked by you screaming earlier. I am going to go check on her.” “Study those videos. I expect to see some results when I get back.” Watching him walk out the door, I walked over to the bed, pulled the positive pregnancy test out from under my pillow, and threw it straight into the trash can. Then I pulled up my messages and found a familiar contact. “You do not need to prepare the next batch of supplements.” Reading the doctor’s quick confirmation, I let out a long breath. Just as I was about to lock my screen, a friend request popped up. “It is Sloane. Alan said you tried to force more weird liquids down his throat. Do you want me to teach you how to actually take care of a man in bed?” I stared at her profile picture for a long time. It was a photo of a man’s large, veiny hand gripping a woman’s tiny waist. It was aggressively intimate. The small birthmark on the man’s thumb was identical to Alan’s. I hit decline and immediately blocked her. Moments later, Alan’s calls started rolling in, one after another. The second I answered, his angry accusations blasted through the speaker. “Sloane tried to add you. Why did you decline?” “She is being the bigger person and offering to help you, and you are throwing it in her face? Add her back and apologize.” Listening to him defend her without a second of hesitation left my hands shaking so badly I could not even form a word. Tears spilled over my lashes, hot and fast. Suddenly, the unmistakable sound of clothing shifting came through the receiver, followed by Alan’s low, heavy breathing. “Sloane, stop it, I am on the phone…” His breath hitched. “What are you afraid of? Since she does not want to add me, we might as well teach her a lesson right now.” The sound of his breathing grew heavier and rougher with every second. I slammed the end call button. The sounds of their intimacy looped endlessly in my brain like a nightmare. I curled into a tight ball under the covers, staring into the dark until the sun came up. Early the next morning, with swollen, red eyes, I drove to our new house—the one we were supposed to move into after the wedding—to check on the renovations. The door opened. Sloane was standing there. She was wearing a sheer silk slip. Her neck was painted with dark bruises and bite marks. She leaned against the doorframe, looking down at me with pure arrogance. “We got a little carried away last night. Oops, we accidentally got your wedding dress dirty.” “I heard it was the last thing your mom left you before she died? Whatever, it could not have been worth much anyway. I will just buy you a couture gown to replace it…” I did not hear the rest of her sentence. I shoved her hard out of the way and ran into the living room. There it was. The dress my mother had spent her final days designing for me, crumpled into a heap on the hardwood floor. The pristine white fabric was covered in undeniable, disgusting stains. The last string holding my sanity together snapped. I lunged at Sloane and wrapped my hands around her throat. “I am going to kill you.” “Alan… help me…” she gasped. Strong arms wrapped around my waist, pulling me back. Alan locked me against his chest, looking entirely exhausted by me. “Ro, if it is dirty, just throw it away. I said I will buy you a new one.” Sloane rubbed her throat, pouting as she pressed herself into his side. “I literally offered to buy her a custom designer dress, and she still attacked me. She is just psychotic.” Alan looked at the red marks on her neck, and his expression turned ice-cold. “Rowan, you crossed the line.” I dropped to the floor, pulling the ruined dress into my arms, tears pooling in my eyes. Two years ago, when my mother was losing her battle with illness, Alan was there every single day, running errands and taking care of her. When he found out her biggest regret was not living to see me get married, he spent weeks tracking down fabrics and sketches so she could personally design my dress from her hospital bed. I remembered seeing his bloodshot eyes back then. I was so touched, my heart ached for him. I begged him to go sleep. “Alan, you do not have to do all this. As long as I get to marry you, I do not care what the dress looks like.” He had laid his head in my lap, looking exhausted but smiling so brightly. “Ro, it breaks my heart that she will not be there to walk you down the aisle. You wearing this dress on our wedding day will be a way to honor both of our wishes.” But now, looking at the dress, his eyes held nothing but disgust. Meeting his cold stare, I hugged the fabric tighter to my chest. “I only want this one.” He scowled, pulling a thick stack of cash from his wallet and throwing it at me. “Then take it to a dry cleaner. I am paying for it.” Bills fluttered to the floor around me. It was laughable. Three years ago, when he poured his heart and soul into making this dress a reality for my dying mother, I never could have imagined it would end up as a literal rag for him and another woman to ruin. As I turned around with the dress in my arms, my phone calendar alarm went off. It was the reminder for Alan’s routine clinic visit. I was just about to tell him, but Sloane suddenly grabbed her stomach and whined. “Alan, my OB-GYN appointment is in twenty minutes. We need to go.” My feet glued themselves to the floor. As she walked past me, her eyes dropped to the glowing screen of my phone. Her smile was loaded with poison. “Rowan, do you know when my last ultrasound was?” My stomach plummeted. I already knew the answer. Sloane stroked her flat stomach, her smile widening. “Last Sunday. Three in the afternoon.” That was the day of our seventh anniversary. I had spent two hours doing my makeup, bought a new dress, booked a Michelin-star restaurant, and told him I wanted to go to his clinic appointment with him before our date. He had smiled, kissed my forehead, and told me to just wait for him at the restaurant. I thought he just felt emasculated and did not want me in the room with the doctor. I had happily agreed. Now I knew the truth. He was terrified I would find out Sloane was pregnant. Watching Alan wrap his arm around Sloane’s waist as they walked to his car, I unlocked my phone and deleted the calendar app entirely. By the time I got the dress back from the specialty cleaners, Alan walked through the door holding a garment bag. “Picked this out just for you. Do you like it?” When I did not even blink, he held the glamorous evening gown up against my body, his voice softening. “Ro, stop being stubborn. I have a surprise for you later.” He essentially dragged me to the rooftop garden of an upscale hotel. Sloane, dressed in a stunning white gown, walked out of a crowd of cheering people and looped her arm through Alan’s. Her eyes scanned the dress he had bought me, flashing with mockery. “Rowan, Alan told me I had to apologize to you before he would propose to me. Do you like the dress I picked out for you?” “I stripped your clothes off back then. Today, I am dressing you.” Her sharp giggles drilled into my ears. It felt like literal acid burning through whatever dignity I had left. I looked at Alan. He gave me a flat, emotionless look. Those eyes that used to look at me with so much love were now filled with a dark, silent warning. Trembling, I backed up until I hit a corner wall. “Damn, Alan, only you could pull this off. Bringing the main girlfriend to propose to the side piece? Are you not afraid they are going to kill each other?” one of his friends laughed. Alan took a sip of his whiskey, glancing in my direction. “Rowan has been with me for seven years. She does not care about a title. But Sloane comes from a strict, old-money family. Since she is pregnant, I have to give her people an answer.” “I know I am putting Ro in a tough spot right now. I will make it up to her later.” His voice was low. But not low enough. Everyone around them heard it and started jeering. “Man, you really have the school valedictorian wrapped around your finger. But making her watch you put a ring on someone else? With her pride, she might actually snap. Do not push your luck.” Alan swirled the amber liquid in his glass, smiling with absolute, unshakeable confidence. “You guys have no idea. I have a permanent get-out-of-jail-free card with her.” “If it was not for me, photos of her naked body would have been plastered all over the internet. She owes me her life.” A wave of knowing smirks rippled through the group. My deepest, most agonizing trauma had just become his favorite party trick to show off how loyal I was. My nails bit so hard into my palms they drew blood as I walked straight up to him. The whispering stopped immediately. “Alan, is this your grand surprise? Bringing me here so you and your friends can humiliate me?” He set his glass down. Ignoring the crowd of people watching us like a reality show, he grabbed my arm and pulled me aside. “Ro, this proposal is just a show for the Kensington family. I am not actually going to marry her.” “She wanted you to be the officiant for the proposal. She is carrying my kid, Ro. I have to give her this one win.” He shoved a folded piece of paper into my hand. It was a speech. Line after line of sickeningly sweet vows dedicated to Sloane. “Read over it. Do not ruin this for me.” I had pictured his proposal a thousand times over the last seven years. I never could have imagined a reality this vile. I ripped the speech into shreds and threw the confetti of paper directly at his chest. “Alan, go to hell.” His eyes went dark with fury. He grabbed my wrist, his grip bruising. “Rowan, do you honestly have to make a scene and embarrass everyone right now?” “I told you she is pregnant. I have to do this for her.” Staring straight into his furious eyes, I slowly brought my free hand down to rest over my own stomach. “What if I told you… I am pregnant too?”

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My arranged marriage husband suddenly lost his memory. Every ounce of his past obsession and ruthless pursuit of me vanished from his mind. Now, he looks at me like I am a total stranger. Furious, I slapped divorce papers onto his desk. Then, I packed my bags and dragged my best friend on a singles cruise to let loose. But on the night of the party, a tall figure stepped out of the shadows, backing me into a corner. In a tone that left zero room for argument, he whispered. Isla, there is no divorce in this marriage. Only widowhood. 1 When I rushed into the hospital corridor, Victor’s assistant was already waiting by the door. I practically jumped out of the elevator, my voice laced with a frantic edge I didn’t even recognize. “How is he? Is it serious?” Simon offered a brief glance, his tone as steady and practiced as ever. “Please do not worry, Mrs. Sinclair. Mr. Sinclair is fine physically, but…” “But what?” “He forgot a few things.” Pushing open the heavy door, I saw Victor sitting up in the hospital bed. He turned his head at the sound of my entrance. A square of white gauze covered his temple, and a few shallow scrapes marred his sharp jawline. He lifted his heavy eyelids. His gaze washed over me, perfectly calm and terrifyingly cold. I froze in my tracks. Victor Sinclair had never looked at me like that. Whenever his eyes found mine, he looked like a starving wolf locking onto its prey, burning with an intense, suffocating possessiveness. This was the first time I had ever seen such absolute indifference in his expression. That was the exact moment I realized I was part of the “few things” he had forgotten. The neurologist explained that Victor’s amnesia was a result of the trauma to his head during the car crash. It was fragmented memory loss. It would not affect his daily routine or his ability to run his corporate empire. However, the recovery timeline was entirely unpredictable. It could take days, months, or years. He might never remember. And in a twist of cruel irony, every single memory of me had been completely wiped clean. When I stepped back into the private suite, Victor was alone, casually leaning against the pillows while flipping through a stack of legal documents. I took a hesitant step closer. “The doctor said they need to keep you for a few days of observation. If you need anything from home, I can bring it by.” Victor studied me in silence for a long moment before asking a question. “Are we happily married?” I looked down, pouring a glass of water from the pitcher. “It is terrible.” The room plunged into a deafening silence. “Why is it terrible?” His face remained expressionless, asking the question with the genuine curiosity of a man who truly did not know the answer. A sudden, inexplicable spike of irritation flared in my chest. I set the water glass down onto the bedside table with a sharp thud. “A forced match is never sweet.” Victor held my gaze, one dark eyebrow slowly arching upward. “How fortunate. I despise sweet things.” 2 I almost forgot. Delivering the most shameless remarks with an utterly straight face had always been Victor’s greatest talent. Back then, the Sinclair Enterprise’s sole condition for bailing out my family’s failing gallery was my hand in marriage. Even knowing I was deeply in love with my boyfriend, he refused to back down an inch. “Leave him. I am a much better fit for you.” Victor and I were virtually strangers. As the youngest heir and ruthless CEO of his family’s empire, he was notoriously unpredictable and fiercely guarded. I had only seen him once from a distance at a charity gala. We had never even shared a conversation. “With your wealth and status, you could have anyone you want. Why force a woman who does not love you?” He had leaned back in his leather chair, staring at me until a slow, dangerous smile curved his lips. “That sounds like a personal problem, Miss Isla. Am I truly that impossible to love?” He played the perfect gentleman that day. When I rejected him, he did not lose his temper. He even put on a flawless mask of understanding, claiming he respected my choice. It wasn’t until our family’s debt spiraled out of control, and not a single bank in Boston dared to offer us a loan, that I understood the reality. Victor held the city in his palm. The moment he extended an olive branch to my family, he silently banned anyone else from stepping in. He made it look like I had a choice, but he systematically burned down every other bridge until his path was the only one left. I had no choice but to surrender. The day I broke up with my boyfriend, the rain was pouring in sheets. I sat in the passenger seat of Victor’s Maybach, sobbing until my chest ached. Victor lowered his dark eyes, patiently using his expensive silk handkerchief to wipe the muddy water off my bare calves. “There is actually another way you can be with him.” “After we get married, you can slip a slow acting poison into my morning coffee. Once I am dead, your lovely boyfriend can take my place.” His tone was thick with dark humor, but his eyes were completely serious. For a terrifying second, I couldn’t tell if he was joking. I just stared at him, paralyzed. Then, a low chuckle rumbled in his chest, genuine amusement dancing in his eyes. “You really want to kill me, don’t you?” “I suppose I would allow it.” I glared at him through my tears. “You are despicable.” The smile never left his face. He simply reached over, intertwining his long fingers with mine, completely ignoring my resistance. He looked incredibly satisfied. “You can think whatever you want about me. It does not matter.” “All that matters, Isla, is that you are going to be my wife.” Victor leaned back against the hospital pillows, that exact same half smile playing at the corners of his mouth. It was the exact same arrogant smirk from three years ago. I took a deep breath, swallowing down the curse words burning on my tongue. I could not yell at him. The man literally had brain damage. Grabbing my designer tote, I turned to leave, nearly colliding with Simon as he walked in. He held out a sleek, rectangular velvet box. “Mrs. Sinclair, Mr. Sinclair asked me to bring this for you.” Inside rested a vintage Italian sable watercolor brush. I had lingered on a picture of it in an art magazine for maybe two extra seconds last week. It was always like this. Whenever I showed the slightest flicker of interest in something, it miraculously appeared in my hands a few days later. I cast a sideways glance at the man in the bed. He was deeply engrossed in his paperwork, acting as if the entire exchange had nothing to do with him. That familiar, suffocating knot tightened in my throat again. I tossed the velvet box onto the edge of his mattress. “I do not accept gifts from strangers.” 3 The sky outside the studio window slowly bled into a bruised purple. I had been sitting at my easel all afternoon, ruining sketch after sketch. My mind was an absolute mess. Victor losing his memory should have felt like a massive victory. But instead, a heavy, suffocating weight pressed down on my chest. It wasn’t sadness. It wasn’t pity. It was a bizarre, irrational wave of anger. It felt like… I actually cared that he had forgotten me. When he asked about our marriage today, my answer wasn’t entirely a lie. In the beginning, it truly was terrible. For the first two months of our marriage, I refused to eat at the same table as him. I treated him like a ghost haunting my own house. Even when I caught a horrific fever in the middle of the night, and he scooped me out of bed to force medicine down my throat, I just slapped him across the face. He didn’t even flinch. He just took the hit, his expression completely blank, and muttered, “You have no strength left. Take the pills, then you can hit me again.” Victor seemed to possess an infinite threshold for my anger. And somewhere along the way, my bitter resentment slowly morphed into a quiet, reluctant reliance. When exactly did the shift happen? I couldn’t pinpoint the exact day. Maybe it was the night of that corporate gala, when he introduced me to his ruthless business partners as “Isla, the brilliant artist,” rather than “Mrs. Sinclair.” Maybe it was during the Autumn Art Expo, when a rival gallery intentionally moved my pieces to a dark, hidden corner. Victor canceled a multi million dollar board meeting just to show up and tear the organizers apart. Or maybe it was the time I went on a mountain retreat to paint and got caught in a massive mudslide. The roads collapsed, the bridges washed out, and he walked five miles through a torrential downpour just to find me. Three years. He moved into my life like water, silently seeping into every single crack and crevice. By the time I finally noticed, he was everywhere. But now, he had wiped the slate clean. We were right back at square one. I sat in the dark for a few more minutes before throwing my brushes into the sink and grabbing my coat. The crisp night air hit my face, carrying the sweet scent of blooming jasmine. Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted a familiar black luxury car idling near the curb. I froze. Simon quickly stepped out and opened the rear door for me. And there, sitting in the leather backseat instead of a hospital bed, was Victor. “What are you doing here?” The white gauze was still taped to his temple, though his color looked much better. “I was on my way.” I didn’t even have the energy to roll my eyes. “This road leads to a dead end. Where exactly were you heading?” Victor let out a low chuckle. “Who said it leads to nowhere? It led me straight to you, didn’t it?” I ignored his smooth talking and slid into the seat next to him. The amber glow of the streetlights flickered across the tinted windows, illuminating the sharp angles of his face in flashes. “What do you want for dinner?” I turned my head to stare out the window. “I am not hungry.” Victor gave a soft laugh. “Are you not hungry, or do you just not want to eat with me?” I couldn’t stop myself from shooting him a deadly glare. His eyes only crinkled with deeper amusement. “Well, that is a shame, because I really want to eat with you.” “You are just going to have to suffer through it.” Even with his memories completely wiped, his ability to get under my skin remained absolutely flawless. 4 The Maybach pulled up to an exclusive French bistro downtown. The hostess guided us to a private booth by the floor to ceiling windows. While we waited for our appetizers, we sat in total silence. The only sound was the soft, melancholic melody drifting from the grand piano in the center of the room. Victor studied my face for a long time before casually tilting his head. “Were our dinners always this quiet?” “I don’t remember.” “Have we eaten here before?” “I have no idea.” “Do we go out on dates often?” “I couldn’t tell you.” Victor let out a quiet sigh. “Correct me if I am wrong, but I believe I am the one with amnesia.” That single sentence acted like a match to gasoline. I fell silent for a heavy second before flipping my phone face down onto the marble table. “And? Do you want a medal for forgetting?” Victor clearly didn’t expect the raw hostility in my voice. His playful demeanor vanished, replaced by a serious intensity. “Isla, that is not what I meant.” “I don’t care what you meant.” “Victor, I am not obligated to tutor you on our past. If you want to remember, figure it out yourself. If you can’t, then just let it go.” The rest of the meal tasted like cardboard. I set down my silverware and pushed my chair back. “I am going to the restroom.” The restrooms were tucked away at the back of the restaurant, past a dimly lit corridor lined with towering monstera plants. I kept my head down as I washed my hands, the cold water splashing against my skin. I didn’t notice the quiet footsteps approaching until a tall figure stepped up beside me. He didn’t turn on the faucet. I instinctively glanced up, meeting a pair of eyes in the mirror that were both deeply familiar and completely foreign. He was dressed in a tailored, expensive suit, radiating a quiet, refined maturity. He looked absolutely nothing like the struggling, broke college student I used to know. “Isla?” The unexpected reunion clearly caught Oliver off guard. His voice wavered with a hint of disbelief. I hadn’t expected to run into him here either. After he left me three years ago, we cut all contact. I only heard through mutual friends that he had moved to Europe. “It has been a long time, Oliver.” “A very long time.” Oliver pressed his lips together. He looked like a man drowning in a thousand unspoken words. His gaze eventually drifted down, landing heavily on the diamond ring flashing on my left hand. He swallowed hard. “Have you… been doing well these past few years?” I offered a polite, distant smile and tossed my paper towel into the trash bin. “I have been great.” “That is good.” After those three words, the air between us completely died. I noticed a cigarette pinched between his fingers. He kept twirling it nervously, making no move to light it. “I should get back to my table.” Oliver blinked, snapping out of his daze, and nodded quickly. “Right. Take care.” When I returned to the booth, Victor was leaning back in his chair, slowly swirling the ice water in his crystal glass. Seeing me approach, he set the glass down, his dark eyes locking onto my face for a split second. He asked the question entirely too casually. “What took you so long?” “There was a line.” “Do you want to order dessert?” “No, I am full. Let’s go home.” He didn’t press the issue. He simply stood up, wrapped his warm hand around mine, and led me toward the exit. Deep in the shadows of the corridor we had just left, a solitary figure leaned against the textured wallpaper. A tiny spark flared in the dark as the cigarette finally ignited, the cherry glowing dull red through the leaves of the monstera plant. 5 The Boston Autumn Art Salon was the biggest event of the year, and I was honored to be featured among the invited artists. Usually, Victor would be hovering right over my shoulder at these events, but today, he was nowhere to be found. Halfway through the exhibition, the gallery curator approached me, whispering that a VIP collector was extremely interested in one of my pieces and requested a private chat. When I stepped into the viewing area, I immediately recognized the broad shoulders facing my canvas. He was wearing a charcoal gray suit, a Patek Philippe watch gleaming subtly on his wrist. He looked like the epitome of low key wealth. Hearing my footsteps, Oliver turned around, a soft, nostalgic smile playing on his lips. “We meet again.” We both turned our attention back to the canvas. It was an oil painting of an old, ivy covered gazebo on our college campus. I had painted it six months ago, right after being invited back to the university to give an alumni speech. Oliver’s eyes softened completely. “The rain was pouring so hard that day. I still remember your canvas shoes were completely soaked.” The memory hit me instantly. That gazebo was the exact spot where Oliver and I had first crossed paths. We had both sprinted under the wooden roof to escape a sudden thunderstorm. It was an impossibly cliché, ridiculously perfect coincidence. I stayed quiet for a long moment before offering a tight, polite smile. “That is all in the past now.” Oliver looked down at me, the corners of his mouth curving upward. “Is it in the past? Because I remember every single detail.” He knew exactly when to pull back. He dropped the heavy nostalgia and seamlessly transitioned into a professional discussion about purchasing the artwork. We had only exchanged a few sentences about pricing when a chilling voice drifted from behind us. “Isla.”

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1. I took the bullet for Richard when his pet project crashed and burned. In exchange, he promised me a year-end promotion and a hefty raise. Yet the moment the layoff rumors started circulating, I was the very first person called into his office. “Harper, corporate is restructuring. Your metrics are at the bottom of the barrel, so we have to let you go.” I stared at the termination agreement. The words “Stack Ranking Elimination” glared back at me. I did not argue with him. I simply packed my things in silence. And then I took a seat in the office directly across from his. The one with the frosted glass marked “Exclusive Corporate Auditor.” … “Harper, regarding the restructuring, you are the first on the list.” Richard’s voice was completely devoid of warmth. I sat across from him in the conference room. The air conditioning was cranked up so high the chill seeped right into my bones. He slid a manila folder across the mahogany table. It was a formal termination notice. The words “Performance-Based Termination” stung my eyes. “Richard, I recall the performance reviews for this month. I was nowhere near the bottom.” My voice was dead calm. Richard barely lifted his eyes from his phone. “The company looks at the big picture, Harper. It is not just about raw sales.” “Besides, you know exactly how much money your mistakes cost us on Project Apex.” I stared at him, my mind going completely blank for a fraction of a second. Project Apex was his brainchild. His flawed decision-making nearly cost the firm ten million dollars. It was me who stayed up for three consecutive nights with my team, rebuilding the entire data model from scratch to stop the bleeding. And it was him who stood in my office, looked me dead in the eye, and said those exact words. “Harper, just take the bullet for me on this one. I swear I will make you Vice Director by December.” Now, that very same project was the weapon he was using to execute my career. The HR Manager, Davis, cleared his throat from the corner of the room. “Harper, our hands are tied here. You have to understand the business side of things.” “Just sign the paperwork. We are offering a very standard severance package to make this easy.” I did not even glance at the contract. My gaze drifted right past Richard and landed on Sophie, the new intern standing by the filing cabinet. Sophie was looking down, pretending to sort papers, but a smug smirk was plastered across her glossy lips. She was wearing a brand-new designer dress. The exact same limited-edition dress Richard had bought during his business trip last week. Even the potted monstera plant I had nurtured on my desk for three years had already been relocated to her cubicle. Richard sighed, tapping his expensive watch in annoyance. “Do not waste our time, Harper. We have a long list of people to get through today.” “Your performance is dragging the whole department down. People have been complaining to me for weeks.” I took a deep breath and stood up. “Understood.” I left the pen on the table, turned around, and walked out. Back at my desk, the bullpen was dead silent. My colleagues kept their heads glued to their monitors, typing aggressively to avoid making eye contact with me. A thick, suffocating awkwardness hung in the air. I began dropping my life into a cardboard box. Piles of market research, client files, and the crystal trophy engraved with my name. Richard had handed me that trophy himself after I secured the massive Southside Development deal. At the celebration dinner, he had raised his glass and announced to the whole room. “Harper is the lucky charm of this division! She is my absolute right-hand woman!” Now, he was chopping off his right hand just to save his own skin. My phone buzzed in my pocket. It was a Slack message from Greg. “Harper, what the hell is going on? I just heard you got pulled into the firing squad?” “How can they PIP you? You were literally the top biller last quarter!” I typed back. “It is about Project Apex.” Greg instantly tried to call me. I hit decline. I was not in the mood to talk. A wall of furious text popped up on my screen a second later. “Are you kidding me! If it wasn’t for you, corporate would have fired his incompetent ass months ago!” “He forced that project through against everyone’s advice, and you cleaned up his mess!” “You cannot just let him get away with this, Harper! Go to corporate HR! File an appeal!” I kept my fingers steady as I replied. “Calm down, Greg.” “He did this because he thinks I have zero leverage.” “This termination notice was a theatrical performance.” The clack of high heels interrupted me. Sophie sauntered over, her voice dripping with artificial sweetness. “Do you need some help with that, Harper?” She pointed a manicured finger at my master project binder. “Those files are highly confidential. Richard told me to take over your accounts, so you can just hand that over to me.” Her eyes sparkled with naked ambition and petty triumph. I looked at her the way one might look at a clown performing a cheap trick. I picked up the heavy binder and shoved it into her chest. “Good luck.” She hugged the binder like she had just won the lottery. “Thanks! I will definitely work super hard so I don’t disappoint Richard.” Richard stepped out of the glass conference room and clapped his hands loudly to get the floor’s attention. “Everyone, stop what you are doing for a second. I have an announcement.” “Effective immediately, Harper is leaving us due to personal reasons. Sophie will be taking over all her active accounts.” “Also, let us congratulate Sophie. She has officially passed her probation and is being promoted to Project Lead.” The title he had promised me was handed to a twenty-two-year-old intern who had been here for three months. You could hear a pin drop in the office. I picked up my cardboard box and walked toward the exit, feeling the weight of a dozen stares burning into my back. As I walked past Richard, he did not even bother to look in my direction. He was already leaning in, whispering softly to Sophie. “Where do you want to go for your celebration dinner tonight?” 2. I carried my box out the revolving glass doors. The glaring afternoon sun made my eyes water. Instead of going home, I hailed a cab and gave the driver the address to the corporate headquarters downtown. Greg called me again. This time, I answered. “Harper! Are you seriously just walking away? How can you swallow this?” His voice was shaking with pure outrage. “I am furious! Richard and that little intern are treating you like absolute dirt!” I leaned against the cool metal wall of the elevator, my initial shock having completely crystallized into cold clarity. “Greg, he fired me because I know too much. He wants me gone.” “If I throw a tantrum in the lobby, he will just have security drag me out.” “He planned this perfectly.” Greg was practically growling into the receiver. “So what? You made this company millions! Now he throws a bucket of dirty water on your head and kicks you to the curb?” I watched the digital floor numbers climbing higher and higher. “Of course I am not letting it go, Greg.” “Then what are you going to do? Tell me!” I hung up the phone. I opened the PDF of my termination notice that HR had just emailed me. I took a clean screenshot. Then, I logged into a hidden corporate email portal on my phone. An administrative account I had never used before. The recipient was Bennett, the Secretary of the Board of Directors. I attached the screenshot, along with a massive encrypted zip file containing every single piece of raw data from Project Apex. I also attached a crystal-clear audio recording of Richard begging me to be his fall guy in his office. In the body of the email, I typed a single, simple sentence. “My name is Harper. I am officially activating my Corporate Auditor protocol.” I hit send and powered off my phone. A year ago, Richard was managing a failing branch. They had bled money for three consecutive quarters. Headquarters had issued an ultimatum. One more quarter in the red, and the entire branch would be liquidated. I was the one who stepped up. I led a skeleton crew, worked through the holidays, and secured the Southside Development, landing the biggest contract in the branch’s history. I practically spoon-fed Richard. I taught him how to analyze the market data, how to forecast trends, and how to write the executive presentations he gave to the Board. Thanks to me, our branch became the crown jewel of the enterprise. His throne was finally secure. And suddenly, the architect who built his throne became a threat. I knew all his weak spots, so I had to be eliminated. My phone buzzed as I turned it back on. Greg was spamming me with screenshots. “Harper! Look at the company Slack! It is a warzone!” “Richard just posted a company-wide announcement saying you were fired for gross negligence. He is actively implying you were embezzling funds!” I did not even bother opening the app. I knew exactly what was happening. Sophie, lacking any actual brain cells, had probably whispered poison in his ear. She wanted to be the new right-hand woman, which meant she needed to bury the predecessor six feet under. They were a match made in heaven. Two absolute fools. Richard’s days of playing king were officially over. I walked into a pristine office on the top floor and slowly wiped a speck of dust off the mahogany desk. 3. At two o’clock the following afternoon, I returned to the branch office. This time, I wore the title of Corporate Auditor. I did not give anyone a heads-up. When I pushed through the double glass doors, the receptionist dropped her pen, her jaw practically hitting the desk. She stared at the unfamiliar solid gold corporate badge clipped to my lapel, entirely unsure if she was supposed to call security. I walked right past her without breaking stride. Richard was standing outside his office, looking incredibly smug as he explained something to Sophie. When he saw me, he froze. His smug smile warped into a deep, ugly scowl. “Harper? What the hell are you doing here? You don’t work here anymore.” He stepped forward to block my path, his tone dripping with the arrogant authority of a man protecting his territory. I kept my face completely blank and walked right past him. I could hear him barking orders behind my back. “Who let her in? Get security up here now! Throw her out!” “You got fired for being dead last in performance, and you still have the nerve to show your face?” The new hires who didn’t know me watched the scene unfold with wide, fearful eyes, clearly intimidated by Richard’s rage. I turned the corner and stopped in front of the door directly opposite his office. It was a room that had been locked for years. The frosted glass read “Exclusive Corporate Auditor.” I lifted my new gold badge and tapped it against the security scanner. A soft beep echoed through the dead silent office floor. The heavy magnetic lock clicked open. I pushed the door open, stepped inside, and closed it firmly behind me, making sure everyone got a good look. The entire bullpen plunged into absolute, suffocating silence. I could hear someone gasp in the cubicles. Richard’s aggressive shouting was instantly choked off, as if someone had wrapped a hand around his throat. I could only imagine the spectacular color of his face at that exact moment. My laptop chimed. Greg was messaging me on the encrypted internal server. “Holy shit! Harper! Are you a Corporate Auditor?” “I just saw you walk in! The entire floor is losing their minds!” Greg followed up seconds later. “I bet Richard’s little stunt yesterday triggered some alarms at HQ!” “He thought he was invincible once he kicked you out. He is so dead!” I allowed a small smirk to touch my lips. I booted up the desktop and logged directly into the enterprise’s highest-clearance administrative portal. Outside, the whispers were spreading like wildfire. Every single person in the building had witnessed me unlocking that door. Chaos was beginning to brew inside Richard’s office. Greg’s live updates kept rolling in. “Richard locked himself in his office. He has been on the phone for thirty minutes.” “He just bolted out of his room looking like a ghost. He was screaming at HR Davis, asking where your personnel file was.” “Davis is sweating bullets. He told Richard that corporate HQ confiscated your physical file yesterday afternoon.” Within thirty minutes, a parade of nervous department heads began scurrying in and out of Richard’s office. The panic was finally setting in. 4. Desperate for damage control, Richard made Sophie post an announcement in the main Slack channel. “Tagging everyone. Please focus on your deliverables and do not listen to office gossip.” “Just because certain individuals use shady tactics to sneak back into the building does not change the fact that they were fired for dead-last performance.” “Management will strictly penalize anyone caught disrupting the workplace environment.” He actually believed that if he lied aggressively enough, people would blindly accept it. Greg messaged me again. “Harper, this bastard is still doubling down!” “He is such a moron!” “He is definitely panicking now, though. I just caught him ordering Davis to permanently delete your PIP evaluation records from the server.” Richard was completely losing his grip on reality. He started making frantic, loud phone calls with his office door wide open. “Hello? Secretary Bennett? Yes, this is Richard. I just wanted to inquire about the new Corporate Auditor situation…” “What? You are in a meeting? No, wait, I just need a second to ask about Harper…” I couldn’t hear the response, but Richard’s voice instantly shrank to a pathetic squeak. “Yes, sir. Understood, sir. I apologize for interrupting.” He hung up the phone. His face had gone from pale to a sickly shade of gray. Finally, one of the newly promoted team leads couldn’t take the suspense anymore. He knocked tentatively on Richard’s door. “Richard, what exactly is Harper’s status here?” “The whole floor is freaking out. We need some clarity.” That question was the spark that lit the powder keg. Richard pretended he didn’t hear him. Instead, he frantically typed out a bonus announcement in the general chat. “Thanks to our heroic efforts on Project Apex, everyone involved is getting a double bonus this month!” The team lead standing in his doorway asked again. “Richard? Are you listening? Everyone is waiting for an explanation!” Richard’s pathetic attempt to play dumb finally pushed Greg over the edge. Greg couldn’t hold back anymore. He stood up in the middle of the bullpen and shouted at the top of his lungs. “Stop acting like an idiot, Richard! Harper is the Corporate Auditor sent by the Board to investigate you! What are you playing at?” Those words hit the office like a bomb. The floor erupted. “Wait, what? Corporate Auditor?” “No way! Didn’t he say she was fired for incompetence?” “Oh my god! That means everything Richard said yesterday was a complete lie!” A few of the veteran analysts I had personally mentored immediately caught on. “Exactly! I knew there was no way Harper was at the bottom of the metrics!” “Tagging Richard. Say something! You can’t just burn bridges and expect us to stay quiet!” “Keep your dirty bonus money! I don’t want a dime of it! Tagging Richard.” Dozens of eyes were currently drilling holes into Richard’s glass office. He was still trying to play dead. Greg let out a loud scoff. He pulled up the email screenshot I had sent to the Board Secretary and posted it anonymously into the massive company-wide channel. “Hard evidence! What is your excuse now, Richard?” With the undeniable proof glaring on their screens, the employees finally snapped. The notifications pinged relentlessly as a tidal wave of outrage forced Richard out of hiding.

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1 The night I accepted his proposal, a message flashed from an unknown number. The sender’s name chilled me: “Samuel, from the future.” I brushed it off as a joke, texting back, asking with a laugh if he’d finally married me, and whether we’d had a cute baby. There was a long pause before the reply came. He said we did marry, becoming the envy of everyone. Then the messages turned dark. He admitted to cheating—with my own sister, Victoria. On the night of our engagement, they’d gotten drunk, and he confused her for me. It became an “unforgettable night.” He described her wild passion, so unlike my reserve. He claimed his heart was mine, but he craved her body. They continued the affair in secret—until Victoria became pregnant. The day I went into labor, he bribed the doctor to swap my stillborn baby with Victoria’s healthy one. My mind said it was a prank, but my heart felt pierced by ice. As I tried to close the chat, a new link appeared: If you don’t believe me, click to see the truth. … Some unseen force guided my thumb, and I clicked. My world plunged into darkness. When I opened my eyes again, I was in a hospital. A flood of unfamiliar memories was forced into my mind. I was in labor. The baby was coming. Samuel was holding my hand, his grip tight. He leaned in and whispered, his words a venomous secret meant only for me. “Victoria’s child is mine. I promised her I’d give the baby my name.” “Be a good girl, Amelia. Our next baby, I’ll let you keep that one.” I thought the pain was making me hallucinate. Then, the doctor pulled a lifeless bundle of flesh from between my legs and shook his head. “What a shame, it was a boy. If we try to resuscitate now… there might still be a chance.” Samuel’s voice was as cold as a morgue slab. “Don’t. Just save my wife.” And then, I passed out. I fumbled for my phone. The screen displayed the date: October 11th, 2029. Had I really traveled three years into the future? The deep, aching soreness in my body confirmed it. This was no dream. Suddenly, an address materialized in my thoughts. It was the house Samuel and I would share in this future. The dream home we’d always talked about, now a physical reality. A pathetic flicker of joy ignited within me, and I hailed a cab. The moment I pushed open the front door, that flicker was extinguished, and my world shattered. A pair of scarlet stilettos. A rumpled dress shirt. A creased tie. A trail of debauchery led from the foyer, through the living room, and up the stairs to the master bedroom. Through the slightly ajar door, every sound was a new twist of the knife in my heart. “Vicky, I swear, you’re even better after giving birth…” “You’re so soft… God, I just want to hold you like this every single day.” Victoria’s voice was a sugary purr. “Oh, stop. Aren’t you afraid Amelia will find out and lose her mind?” “Baby, can you please focus on me? Don’t mention other people…” My hand shook as I pushed the door open. The scene inside was even more heated than I’d imagined. They were a tangle of limbs, moving from the bed to the floor and back again, completely lost in each other. They hadn’t noticed me. Bile rose in my throat. I grabbed a picture frame from the nightstand and hurled it at them. The sound of shattering glass sliced through the air. A sharp fragment flew back and cut my cheek. Samuel instinctively pulled Victoria into his arms, shielding her. He looked at me, a flash of surprise in his eyes, before he quickened his pace, finished, and then gently laid the now-sleeping Victoria on the bed. He lit a cigarette, his expression indifferent as he watched the blood trickle down my face. “Vicky’s exhausted. If you’re going to have a meltdown, get the hell out and do it somewhere else.” He kicked at a piece of broken glass on the floor, his eyes filled with contempt. “And take this trash with you. I don’t want her to get hurt.” My gaze fell to the debris on the floor. A shattered photograph of us glinted up at me. It was the only picture of the two of us in the entire house. On the day of our wedding photoshoot, I had been in the hospital, trying to prevent a miscarriage. So Victoria had stood in for me, wearing my gown, for the entire session. “AI is so advanced now, we’ll just swap her face with yours later,” he’d said. “Besides, Vicky has a better figure. The dress looks better on her anyway.” On our wedding night, not only had the photos not been changed, but Victoria had also taken my place in the marriage bed. My vision blurred as tears streamed silently down my face. Seeing me cry, Samuel seemed to soften for a moment. He offered me a tissue. “Don’t cry. After all these years, I still can’t stand to see you cry.” I flinched away from his hand. “Samuel,” I said, my voice quiet but firm, “I want a divorce.” He froze. His expression shifted from shock to disbelief, then to something close to horror. “So… you really are the Amelia from three years ago?” he whispered. “You actually clicked that link?” I was just as stunned. “How did you know?” He let out a low, bitter laugh, the mockery in his eyes undisguised. “Because the Amelia of this time would never look at me like that,” he said. “And she would never, ever ask for a divorce.” He was right. The Amelia of this time had her heart ground to dust by years of betrayal. She had chosen to let her marriage fester into a toxic swamp, determined to drag him down into the muck with her. She wanted Victoria forever branded as a home-wrecker. She wanted the cheating husband to be reviled by the world until the day he died. But the Amelia from three years ago… she just wanted out. More memories flooded in, connecting to that night on the beach, three years ago. Under a sky full of stars, Samuel knelt and proposed. But halfway through, his phone rang. He took the call and vanished for the entire night. I later found out it was Victoria who had called. He’d told me, “Wait for me, I’ll be right back.” I waited all night, the cold sea breeze chilling me to the bone. By morning, I was sick. When I woke up, both Samuel and Victoria were by my bedside, their eyes red-rimmed. Victoria’s lips were slightly swollen, her neck covered in angry, red marks. Samuel’s hair was a mess, his arms crisscrossed with scratches. The evidence was everywhere, screaming at me. But then Victoria burst into tears, claiming she’d been tricked and beaten by a scumbag boyfriend, and that Samuel had saved her life. And because of that, I let my suspicions go. To make up for abandoning me, Samuel bought me a one-of-a-kind wedding gown, a breathtaking creation covered entirely in diamonds. It was a fairy tale. But as I was basking in my happiness, I got the call. My father had died of a sudden heart attack. I collapsed. After my mother passed, my father was all I had. His condition had been stable for years. Something must have triggered it. I searched every inch of our security footage but found nothing. Then, in a box of his old things, I found his camera. He’d taken up photography after he retired. A sixth sense made my hands tremble as I turned it on and pressed play. The scene that unfolded on the small screen shattered my soul. Samuel was pinning Victoria to the living room sofa, both of them naked. Victoria’s red bra was hanging from Samuel’s neck, swinging back and forth like a triumphant flag. The camera shook violently. Then came the sound of my father hitting the floor. A sharp pain lanced through my chest, and the world spun. I coughed up a mouthful of blood and collapsed. When I woke up, the doctor told me I was pregnant. I was only two months along, but I was already showing signs of a miscarriage. Samuel knelt by my bed, slapping himself across the face, over and over. “I’m so sorry. Vicky was in a bad place and asked me to stay with her.” “We both had too much to drink, and we… we crossed a line.” “But we didn’t… we didn’t go all the way before…” Before my father caught you. I started laughing, a wild, unhinged sound, and began to beat my own stomach. “You killed my father, Samuel! Now I’m going to kill your child!” He just held me, letting my fists and nails rain down on his face and chest. It was only when Victoria came in to “apologize” that he reacted. I lunged at her, ready to tear her apart, but Samuel shoved me. Hard. My stomach slammed into the corner of a table. I crumpled to the ground as blood poured down my thighs. “Vicky’s pregnant,” he said, his voice flat. “I can’t let you hurt her.” I laughed, the sound cold and broken. So Victoria’s child was precious. But mine was disposable. The doctors rushed in and gave me a sedative. As my consciousness faded, I saw him lift Victoria into his arms and walk away without a backward glance. After that, Samuel kept me in a private VIP hospital room. A prisoner, force-fed medications, subjected to endless treatments to save a pregnancy he never wanted. He refused to let me lose the baby, but not because he loved it. He needed my child as a cover, a way to legitimize the one Victoria was carrying. He married me, giving me a title and a ring, but our marriage was a sham. Then he turned around and gave Victoria the wedding of the century. Everyone thought she was Mrs. Price. I was just the crazy woman locked away in a hospital, dependent on drugs to survive. The agonizing memories flashed through my mind, one after another. Samuel leaned down and gently kissed the tears from my eyes. “Amelia, I’m so sorry you have to remember all of that.” “But it’s in the past. We can start over now. Okay?” Just then, Victoria stirred. She saw Samuel holding me, and a flash of hatred crossed her face. Then, she threw herself at my feet, sobbing. “Sister, please, for the sake of our childhood, you have to forgive me!” “Samuel and I talked. This was the last time. We’re done.” “You two can be happy together. Don’t worry about me. Just… just pretend I’m dead!” I sneered. “Then why don’t you go die?” Samuel pulled her to her feet and roared at me. “That’s enough! Vicky has been through hell with her own husband. I was just comforting her. Don’t you dare push your luck!” “If it weren’t for her, you would have died years ago! What’s the big deal about giving her one child?” He was right. When I was five, I was diagnosed with a rare blood disease. My father found Victoria in an orphanage and adopted her so she could be my bone marrow donor. She saved my life. A debt of life should be repaid. But our family raised her for eighteen years. My father treated her like his own flesh and blood, showering her with affection and even giving her half of the family inheritance. But she knew about my father’s weak heart. She knew any shock could kill him. And she brought Samuel into our home and had sex with him anyway. She was my mortal enemy. I wanted to see her suffer. Victoria grabbed my hand again. “Amelia, I’m sorry. I’ll do anything, just please forgive me.” A wave of pure hatred washed over me. I seized her by the hair and slammed her head against the wall. “Then die,” I hissed. “Die, and then I’ll forgive you.” Samuel rushed over and threw me to the ground. “Amelia, are you insane? That’s your sister!” Victoria continued her act, weeping pitifully. She took the baby from the nanny and held him out to me. “Sister, this is my son with Samuel.” “I’m putting him under your name on the birth certificate. Consider it my apology.” She leaned in close, her voice a venomous whisper only I could hear. “Oh, and I forgot to tell you. Samuel was worried you might have another child of your own one day and mistreat my precious baby.” “So while you were unconscious, he had you sterilized.” “You’ll never be a mother, Amelia. Everything you have now will belong to my son. Doesn’t that just eat you alive?” “Get away from me!” I screamed, shoving her away. The baby let out a piercing wail. Victoria immediately started crying. “Sister, I know you’re angry, but take it out on me! The baby is so small, why would you pinch him?!” Before she even finished the sentence, a hand cracked across my face. “You venomous bitch,” Samuel spat, his eyes blazing. “You’d even harm a newborn?” “If I had known you were this vile, I would have locked you in that hospital and thrown away the key!” He gathered Victoria and the baby into his arms and delivered his cold command. “Drag her to the basement. Don’t let her out until I say so.” He knew. He knew I’d had severe claustrophobia since I was a child, that I was terrified of the dark. But he let them drag me away, ignoring my desperate, broken sobs as he locked the door, sealing me in the darkness. That night, I cried until I had no tears left. I watched the video my father had left behind, over and over again. And a plan, a seed of pure vengeance, began to grow in my mind. At dawn, Samuel came down with a bowl of porridge. He looked exhausted. “I was wrong yesterday,” he said. “But you shouldn’t have hit Vicky.” “She did nothing wrong. It was all my fault.” “Tomorrow is the baby’s christening. I want you to be there.” “I’ve broken things off with her. From now on, things will be good between us. Please, stop fighting, okay?” I clutched my phone. Tomorrow? Good. At the christening, I will give you and Victoria a surprise you’ll never forget.

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1. Lately, I’ve been dealing with an absolute nightmare. It started when my neighbor realized our morning commutes aligned. From then on, she hitched a ride with me every single day. I found it annoying, but since it was on my way, I was too polite to complain. With Labor Day weekend approaching, I was planning a getaway with my best friend. Out of nowhere, my neighbor sent me a massive PDF file. I opened it—it was a detailed itinerary for her family’s holiday trip. Attached was a text: “Olivia, here’s our schedule. Make sure you know the driving routes.” Another message popped up instantly: “Holiday traffic will be a nightmare. We’re leaving a day early, so make sure you request time off work.” I stared at my phone, caught between fury and disbelief. Was she really treating me like her unpaid chauffeur? I took a deep breath, about to shut her down, when another text appeared: “I saw a notification on your phone about those concert tickets you got. I canceled them for you.” Then the kicker: “You really shouldn’t waste money chasing pop stars at your age.” Before I could process that, she made an even crazier demand: “If you’ve got that much money to burn, our family vacation will cost around eighteen grand. You can just cover it for us.” I felt my blood literally boiling. That was the farewell tour of an artist I had worshipped for ten straight years. I had pulled every string imaginable and stayed up until dawn just to secure those VIP tickets. This morning, Martha had knocked on my door claiming her phone was completely dead and she desperately needed to call her relatives out of state. Like a fool, I lent her my phone. I never imagined she would maliciously snoop through my apps and cancel my once-in-a-lifetime tickets just to force me into being her family driver. My hands were shaking so badly I had to jab the screen three times before I finally managed to dial her number. It rang forever before she picked up with a sickeningly sweet drawl. “Well hey there Olivia! Did you read through the itinerary? Don’t you think my family planned a fabulous trip?” I swallowed the absolute rage clawing at my throat and yelled into the receiver. “Who gave you the right to touch my phone and cancel my tickets without my permission!” Martha’s voice floated back, completely and utterly unbothered. “Oh honey, why are you being so ungrateful? I was looking out for you!” “You are young. You will need that money for important things down the road. Blowing a thousand bucks to watch someone sing? Have you lost your mind?” “I figured I would do you a huge favor and save you some cash, so I just hit the refund button.” “Besides, you are going to be driving us to the coast for the holiday anyway. You wouldn’t have time for a concert. You can just put those refunded dollars toward our vacation expenses instead.” I was genuinely speechless. Cancel my tickets, then expect me to foot the bill for their eighteen thousand dollar family vacation? The sheer delusion was astronomical! “It is my money, and I will spend it however I damn well please! I do not need you making financial decisions for me!” “And for the record, I never agreed to go anywhere with your trashy family. I am not paying a single dime of that eighteen grand!” Martha’s tone shifted instantly, her voice turning shrill and defensive. “Excuse me, little girl? Is that how you speak to your elders!” “I see you going to work and coming home all alone every single day. I was doing you a favor by taking pity on you! I didn’t want you sitting alone in your apartment like a loser for the holiday, so I was generous enough to let you tag along and show you a good time.” “Since you are coming with us, it is only right that you cover the expenses. We are basically babysitting you!” I laughed out loud, a harsh and bitter sound. Suddenly, all the disgusting things she had done while hitching free rides flashed through my mind. If we agreed to leave at seven, she would always drag her feet until half past. The moment I rushed her, she would roll her eyes and guilt trip me about having to cook breakfast for her husband and son. Once inside my pristine car, she would always bring the most pungent and offensive foods. Greasy garlic kebabs or stinky tuna salads that left a lingering stench in the cabin for days. She would stuff her greasy wrappers into my door compartments, smearing my expensive leather seats without a single word of apology. If I had to brake a little too hard during rush hour, she would make snide, passive-aggressive remarks about my terrible driving making her carsick. I had kept my mouth shut all this time simply to keep the peace. But my silence had only bred her monstrous entitlement. I took a massive breath, forcing my heart rate down. “Listen to me very carefully Martha. I have absolutely zero interest in your pathetic family vacation, and I am not giving you a single cent!” “As for you messing with my phone and refunding my tickets, I am gathering the evidence and I will hold you legally responsible.” “And starting today, do not even think about getting near my car again!” Without giving her a single second to respond, I hung up. 2. The second the call ended, Martha’s texts started flooding in. [What is that supposed to mean? You aren’t coming?] [If you weren’t coming, why didn’t you say so earlier! Our itinerary is totally locked in and the hotels are booked. Backing out now is just sick and twisted!] [Because you ghosted us, all the budget flights are sold out! Now my family has to buy last-minute premium tickets!] [You are going to cover this loss! The flights plus the vacation packages come out to twenty-five grand. Wire me the money right now!] I did not even have the energy to entertain her lunacy. I blocked her number immediately. Half an hour later, my phone started buzzing relentlessly. It was the community HOA WhatsApp group. I was being tagged endlessly. I opened the app and saw Martha aggressively playing the victim, typing out massive paragraphs for everyone to see. [Neighbors, I need you all to weigh in on this! I was generous enough to invite Olivia from downstairs to join my family on our Labor Day vacation.] [I paid out of pocket to book the hotels and plan the routes. But right before the holiday, she completely ghosts us!] [Because of her, the cheap flights are gone and we are forced to buy expensive tickets. When I asked her to cover the damages she caused, she had the nerve to block me!] [Young women these days are so unbelievably selfish. Zero integrity!] Right on cue, the nosy neighborhood gossips leaped into the fray. [Oh my goodness, young people are just so unreliable lately.] [If you made a promise to someone, you have to follow through. Making them lose all that money is awful.] [Olivia honey, you really messed up here. You should just pay them back.] [Exactly. We all have to live next to each other. Don’t make the living situation toxic over some money.] I stared at the screen, physically nauseated by the barrage of holier-than-thou comments. My fingers flew across the keyboard. [Martha, are you completely out of your mind?] [When did I ever agree to go anywhere with you? You sent me an itinerary completely unsolicited, demanded I be your unpaid chauffeur, and told me to foot your eighteen thousand dollar bill!] [You bum rides in my car every day, trash my interior without apologizing, and this morning you stole my phone to cancel the concert tickets I fought tooth and nail to get!] [And now you want to extort me for twenty-five grand? Keep dreaming!] The group chat went dead silent for a long moment. But soon enough, the fence-sitters who usually played cards with Martha started typing again. [Even if Martha was a bit pushy, she was just worried you would be lonely!] [Right! Since your tickets are gone anyway and you have nowhere to go, you might as well just join them on their trip.] [Everyone looks out for each other here. It’s totally fine for you to pitch in some money since they are bringing you along.] [Olivia, be the bigger person. Just apologize and let it go.] Reading these ridiculously tone-deaf comments made my stomach churn. It is always so easy to be generous when it is not your money on the line, isn’t it? I scoffed, typing out one final message. [Since you all love charity and helping neighbors so much, why don’t you guys pool together twenty-five grand and pay her yourselves!] I hit send and immediately permanently exited the group chat. 3. After leaving the chat, my stomach let out a loud rumble. Thanks to Martha’s psychotic behavior, I had completely forgotten to eat dinner. I grabbed my car keys, deciding to treat myself to some takeout from my favorite upscale bistro to blow off some steam. Walking down into the underground parking garage, I clicked my key fob. The headlights flashed in the dim lighting. But as I got closer, my heart dropped. There was a massive, heavy-duty metal boot locked tightly around my front left tire. My blood pressure spiked instantly. I immediately called the HOA security desk to send someone down with bolt cutters. Ten minutes later, a security guard hurried over accompanied by a local locksmith. The locksmith had just pulled out his tools when Martha suddenly came sprinting out from behind a concrete pillar, violently shoving the poor guy away. “Don’t you dare unlock that! Leave it alone!” I glared at her, my voice turning to ice. “Martha, did you put that boot on my car?” Martha crossed her arms over her chest, tilting her chin up with a smug, defiant smirk. “I sure did. What are you going to do about it?” “My family needs to use this vehicle tomorrow morning for our trip. You are not moving it!” I let out a dry, disbelieving laugh. “Are you completely insane? This is my personal property. What gives you the right to hold my car hostage?” Martha spat on the ground near my shoes. “Who cares whose car it is? If you refuse to pay us the money you owe us, then we are taking the car as collateral!” “My husband can drive perfectly fine anyway. We don’t need a spoiled brat like you behind the wheel.” I whipped my head around to look at the security guard. “Is this how building management handles things? You just let random people boot the residents’ cars?” The guard coughed awkwardly, refusing to meet my eyes, and actually had the nerve to try and mediate. “Miss Olivia, we are all neighbors here. Let’s just talk this out calmly.” “Martha here says she desperately needs a vehicle. Why don’t you just let them borrow it for the weekend? It’s good to help out the community.” My eyes widened in pure shock. “Help out? She is literally hijacking my vehicle in broad daylight, and you call that borrowing?” “Is this how you protect the residents?” The guard flushed red, looking incredibly guilty as he mumbled. “Look, you guys need to sort this out yourselves. I can’t get involved.” Seeing the guard back down only fueled Martha’s ego. She practically glowed with triumph. “You better listen to reason and hand over those keys right now, Olivia. Otherwise, this car is never leaving this garage again!” I took a deep breath, pulling my phone from my pocket. “Fine. If we cannot communicate like civilized adults, I am calling 911. Grand theft auto and extortion. I am pretty sure the dollar amount involved will get you a cozy cell for a few years.” I dialed the numbers, my thumb hovering over the call button. Martha’s face drained of color. The threat of actual police clearly terrified her. “What are you doing! Don’t call the cops! It’s not even a big deal!” She lunged forward, trying to snatch my phone from my hand, but I easily sidestepped her. “If you do not want to be arrested tonight, you will take that boot off my car right now!” Martha glared at me, her teeth grinding together so loudly I could hear it. We stood in a tense standoff for a few agonizing seconds before she finally reached into her pocket. She pulled out a rusty key and angrily unlocked the heavy metal clamp. “You better watch your back, Olivia! This isn’t over!” She delivered a hard kick to my tire before stomping away, muttering curses under her breath. I looked down at the fresh scratches on my rims, a wave of deep exhaustion washing over me. I made a mental note to drive the car to the official dealership first thing in the morning. Leaving it at the shop for a few days seemed like the safest way to keep it out of her psycho clutches. 4. The next morning, I got dressed and headed downstairs. The moment I stepped out of the elevator into the garage, I saw Martha standing right next to my parking spot. She was beaming, looking prouder than a peacock. A heavy pit formed in my stomach. I broke into a run. What I saw made my vision go entirely red. My windshield was completely shattered, a spiderweb of violently bashed-in glass. The entire body of the car was covered in deep, jagged scratches that dug all the way down to the primer. And scrawled across the side doors in dripping, blood-red spray paint were three massive words: “PAY UP BITCH!” The adrenaline rushed straight to my head, and my hands began to tremble uncontrollably. “Aww, does that hurt your feelings?” Martha’s lips curled into a vicious, malicious grin. Her eyes danced with provocation. “I told you this wasn’t over.” “You think you are so special just because you have a fancy car?” “Since you refused to pay us the cash, and you refused to let us take the car, then nobody gets to drive it.” I turned my head slowly to look at her. “You did this?” Martha jutted her chin out, entirely fearless. “So what if I did?” “Let me make something very clear to you, Olivia. You better wire me that twenty-five grand right now. Otherwise, next time, it won’t just be the car getting smashed!” I stared directly into her eyes, my voice deadly calm. “This is felony vandalism and destruction of private property.” “You will pay for every single cent of this damage. I will make sure you rot for this.” Martha let out a loud, mocking cackle. “Pay you? Keep dreaming!” “Do you have any actual proof I did this?” “In case you forgot, my husband is the property manager for this entire complex. I already had him shut off the security cameras down here.” I did not even waste my breath arguing with her. I pulled out my phone and immediately dialed 911. “Hello, police? I am at the underground garage of the Riverfront complex. Someone has maliciously vandalized my vehicle. The monetary damage is extreme. Please send officers immediately.” Hearing me actually call the cops, Martha’s confident smirk faltered for a second, but she quickly masked it with renewed arrogance. “Go ahead! Call them! Let’s see what the cops can actually do to me!” Less than ten minutes later, a cruiser roared down the concrete ramp, lights flashing. Two uniformed officers stepped out quickly. Almost simultaneously, Gary, Martha’s husband and the building manager, arrived at the scene with three security guards trailing behind him. The moment Martha saw her husband and the cops, her entire demeanor flipped like a light switch. Her eyes welled up with dramatic tears, and she threw herself violently into Gary’s arms. “Gary! Thank God you’re here! This woman is terrorizing me!” “Officers, please, you have to help me!” “I was just walking to my car, and I saw her vehicle was damaged. I kindly walked over to ask if she needed any help.” “And out of absolutely nowhere, this psychotic woman grabbed me and started accusing me of smashing it! She is trying to extort me for money!” “She is an awful person who causes trouble with everyone in the building. Someone else obviously wanted revenge on her, and now she’s trying to pin the blame on an innocent mother!” Gary wrapped his arms protectively around his wife, shooting me a disgustingly hostile glare. “Miss Olivia, you need to have some decency. I understand you are upset about your car, but you cannot just throw wild accusations and slander my wife!” The lead officer frowned deeply, taking in the absolutely brutalized state of the vehicle before turning to Gary. “You are the building manager? Pull up the surveillance footage for this sector immediately.” Gary let out a heavy, theatrical sigh, spreading his hands in a gesture of fake helplessness. “I am so sorry, Officer. But we had a terrible thunderstorm last night. The wiring for the cameras in this specific zone shorted out. They are completely fried.” Martha peeked out from Gary’s chest, shooting me a triumphant, venomous look. “Did you hear that? You have zero proof. How dare you accuse me! I should sue you for defamation!” I looked at the two of them, putting on the performance of a lifetime, and I simply smiled. I walked calmly over to the wreckage of my car and pointed to the tiny, seamlessly integrated camera hidden near the side mirror. “The building’s security cameras are broken, huh?” “That is perfectly fine. My car’s twenty-four-hour Sentry Mode camera has been recording everything.”

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Ever since I was little, I’ve been called a human ledger. I never let anyone take a dime of advantage. When the neighbor’s kid ruined my new sundress with a firecracker, I made sure his family couldn’t cook a peaceful meal for a week — they had to eat the overpriced delivery food I sent, complete with an “emotional distress” bill. When a college group project fell apart, I calmly showed the receipts, pinning the blame so precisely on our slacking team leader that he ended up begging the professor not to fail him. My parents called me a cold-blooded shark, worried I’d never find a husband. We fought badly. I moved out and didn’t look back for eight years. Then, as a senior corporate mediator, I got a call from my mother, sobbing hysterically. “Tiana, come home! Your sister’s going to prison! Her boss is making her take the fall for three million in missing funds, and he and his mistress are suing her for harassment!” Reading through my sister’s messy documents, a cold smile spread on my face. The next morning, I slipped into their company conference room, stood before her bosses and colleagues, and opened my phone’s calculator with a bright smile. “Hold on, everyone. Let’s settle the tab first — starting with the first artisanal latte my sister ever bought you.” 1 When I kicked the conference room door wide open, I saw my sister surrounded by a pack of wolves. Sophie had her head bowed. Her shoulders were trembling uncontrollably, looking like a little bird left out in a freezing storm. A slicked-back, greasy looking man in a tailored suit was pointing a finger right in her face, spitting venom with every word. “Sophie! You tanked this project yourself, and now you want to cry about it? This company isn’t a charity! Nobody here is going to baby you!” This charming guy was my sister’s department manager, Marcus. He caught sight of me and furrowed his brow. For a split second, he froze, clearly thrown off by how identical my face was to Sophie’s. Then, he waved his hand with sheer disgust. “You her family or something? Grab her and get out. Stop making a scene in my office.” I did not even look at him. I walked straight past the executives, grabbed Sophie by the arm, and pulled her safely behind my back. Then, under the glaring eyes of the entire room, I pulled out my phone and slowly tapped open my calculator app. “Let’s crunch some numbers, shall we?” My voice was not loud, but it carried a razor sharp edge that instantly silenced the chaotic room. I turned the screen toward Marcus, letting a mocking smirk play on my lips. “Manager Marcus. Let’s start with you.” “Last month, you complained about wrist pain and ‘borrowed’ a forty dollar ergonomic mousepad from my sister. You said you’d return it in two days.” “Assuming eight hours of heavy daily use with a standard depreciation rate, across twenty two working days, that comes out to exactly fifty cents in wear and tear.” “Oh, and you also hijacked the premium Costa Rican coffee beans my sister brought back from her vacation, claiming you just wanted a ‘quick taste’.” “At thirty grams of beans per cup, factoring in the specialty filter paper and the Evian water you insisted on using, that is three bucks a cup.” “You drank it every single morning for three months. Sixty six working days. That brings your coffee tab to one hundred and ninety eight dollars.” “Right, almost forgot. When your girl had her birthday last month, you swiped a bottle of Baccarat Rouge 540 from my sister’s desk. A bottle she hadn’t even dared to open for herself. You called it a ‘workplace emergency’.” “That perfume runs three hundred and twenty dollars at Saks Fifth Avenue. I’ll be generous and waive the interest.” The room was dead silent. Marcus’s face morphed from cherry red to a sickly gray, and finally to a furious purple. It was a spectacular color show. He let out a low, guttural growl. “Why the hell are you calculating all this! It is just petty office stuff. Are you insane!” “Oh, it matters.” My smile grew blindingly sweet. “Even the best of friends need clear ledgers.” I dismissed him entirely and shifted my gaze to a female colleague who had been snickering in the corner just moments ago. “Jessica, right?” “Last week, my sister fronted the bill for the department’s afternoon pastry run. You specifically requested the artisanal matcha crepe cake. Twelve bucks.” “When my sister dropped her Venmo link in the group chat, did your finger ‘accidentally’ slip? Because you only sent her two dollars.” Jessica’s smug smile froze on her perfectly contoured face. She stammered, unable to form a single word. “You owe her ten bucks. Are you Venmoing her right now, or should I call the cops and report petty fraud?” Under the amused and judging eyes of the entire room, Jessica’s face burned crimson. She frantically pulled out her phone and sent the remaining ten dollars. A crisp notification chime echoed in the room. Like a queen inspecting her conquered territory, I paraded around the conference table with my phone raised high. “Dave, my sister printed your quarterly report. Over three hundred pages. She used her own premium copy paper. Paper and ink costs come to five bucks. Pay up.” “And you, Sarah. My sister picked up your sweetgreen salads for six straight months. You covered the food cost occasionally, but the wear and tear on her insulated delivery bags is about twenty cents a day. Thirty six dollars total. Not unreasonable, right?” Within ten minutes, my sister’s phone was pinging like a slot machine hitting the jackpot. Over a dozen transactions flowed in, ranging from a few bucks to a couple hundred. The entire department, aside from Sophie, had their heads glued to the floor. Nobody dared to meet my eyes, and nobody dared to look at Marcus, who was now utterly isolated in the center of the room, shaking with pure rage. Just then, Jessica suddenly stepped forward. She gently touched my arm, her face painting a picture of pure, heartfelt concern. “Oh honey, you must be Sophie’s sister. Please don’t be so angry. We are all a work family here. We see each other every single day. Let’s not ruin our lovely dynamic over some silly little pennies.” 2 Jessica had a flawless face full of expensive makeup. Her big doe eyes shimmered with unshed tears, and her voice was so sickly sweet it could cause a cavity. She looked like the absolute textbook definition of a supportive, empathetic work bestie. This was exactly the mask that had fooled my sister into sharing all her deepest insecurities with her. I glanced at her manicured hand on my arm and let out a short laugh. “Of course you don’t want to ruin the dynamic.” “After all, your dynamic with Manager Marcus is so lovely it practically melted the hotel bedsheets, didn’t it?” You could hear a pin drop in that conference room. Every single pair of eyes aggressively ping-ponged between Marcus and Jessica. The drama was intoxicating. “You psychotic bitch!” Marcus was the first to explode, pointing a shaking finger right between my eyes. Jessica, however, was a far superior actress. Her eyes instantly flooded with genuine tears. She swayed slightly on her high heels, looking like a fragile flower about to wilt under a harsh winter wind. “Sophie… she is your sister. How can she say such vile things about me… We are best friends…” “Best friends? You mean the kind of best friend who steals her client roster, sleeps with her boss, and then helps frame her for a multi million dollar fraud?” I ignored her Oscar worthy performance. I simply grabbed the HDMI cable from the table and plugged it straight into my phone. A second later, a massive, ultra high definition photo splashed across the projector screen. It was a beach photo Marcus had posted on his Instagram last week. The caption read, “Team building retreat. Grinding for the next quarter.” “What the hell is wrong with that picture!” Marcus bellowed, though his voice cracked with a terrifying hint of panic. “Patience is a virtue, Marcus.” I tapped my screen, zooming in on the image. Deeper, closer, until the reflection in his mirrored aviator sunglasses took up the entire wall. In the reflection, Jessica was wearing a tiny, string bikini. She was clinging to Marcus’s bare arm, laughing like a woman deeply in love. And right behind them, clearly visible in the background, was the glowing neon logo of the Eros Boutique Hotel, the city’s most notorious adult playground. I spoke with a slow, agonizing drawl. “Manager Marcus. You took your ‘team’ to a love hotel last Friday. And you expensed it under the corporate account, didn’t you?” “You categorized it as ‘Client Entertainment’. The bill was quite hefty. Eight hundred and fifty dollars.” “I am just dying to know. Which high-profile client required that level of specialized entertainment?” My voice bounced off the soundproof walls, dripping with icy sarcasm. “Did this client require the velvet handcuffs from the bedside drawer? Or was the french maid lingerie absolutely vital to closing the deal?” The room erupted. The executives and colleagues were looking at the two of them with naked disgust. Their so-called corporate retreat was just a dirty weekend getaway funded by company money. “Ahhh!” Jessica snapped. She shrieked like a banshee and lunged at me, clawing wildly to rip the phone out of my hands. Marcus completely lost his mind as well. His face twisted into a demonic snarl as he charged forward, raising his heavy hand to slap the life out of me. I was more than ready. The second he entered my strike zone, I casually sidestepped his swinging palm. I planted my stiletto firmly into the carpet, raised my knee, and drove the pointed toe of my designer heel directly into his groin with everything I had. “Oooogh!” Marcus let out a sound that resembled a dying walrus. He clutched his crotch and dropped straight to his knees, his face scrunching up like a dried walnut. Right at that beautiful moment, the heavy double doors swung open again. The Director of HR, flanked by three burly security guards, stormed into the room. Seeing the absolute carnage, the Director’s face turned the color of week old concrete. 3 The immediate aftermath was entirely predictable. Marcus was suspended on the spot pending a full investigation for “misappropriation of company funds” and “attempted workplace violence.” Jessica was strongly advised to clear out her desk by the end of the day due to “complicity in financial misconduct” and “blatant ethical violations.” I thought the battle was won. I packed up my shell shocked sister and drove her home. I had no idea the real war was just beginning. The very next morning, a massive thread blew up on the company’s internal Blind forum, quickly spilling over to local Reddit pages and industry networking groups. Title: The Truth About My Social Climbing Coworker and Her Psychotic Sister. It was posted anonymously. But the pathetic, victim blaming tone practically had Jessica’s signature stamped all over it. In the post, she tearfully claimed that Sophie was desperate to land a massive tech client and had set her sights on their male executive. She accused my sister of encouraging and even initiating inappropriate sexual banter with the client to secure the contract. She painted Marcus as a tragic hero. He was just a good man who couldn’t stand seeing Jessica bullied by Sophie. He tried to protect her, only to be violently assaulted and framed by the manipulative sisters. The most venomous part of the post was aimed directly at me. “…her mediator sister is even worse. To help Sophie secure her promotion, she actually sent Manager Marcus explicit photos of herself to seduce him! When he firmly rejected her advances, she completely lost her mind and photoshopped those fake reflections to ruin his life out of pure spite…” Attached at the bottom of the post was a heavily blurred, highly suggestive photograph of a woman. The woman in the picture was wearing completely sheer lingerie, posed provocatively on a bed. The face was completely pixelated, but the body type and hair color were an exact match to mine. The smear campaign was ruthless and brutally effective. It perfectly weaponized society’s deep rooted misogyny, twisting a clear cut case of corporate corruption into a trashy soap opera about two aggressive tramps framing an honest, hardworking man. Overnight, the post went viral across multiple platforms. The comment sections were absolute toxic waste. “Takes two to tango. Good girls don’t end up in these situations.” “That sister looked like a total homewrecker anyway. Look at the way she dresses.” “Anyone got the unblurred pics? Asking for a friend.” “Found the sister’s phone number! Let’s ruin these bitches!” Sophie’s phone didn’t stop ringing. Every call was a barrage of disgusting, violent threats. Someone actually drove by her apartment and threw a garbage bag at her front door, writing “Whore” on her mailbox with a sharpie. It took exactly forty eight hours for my sister to completely break down. She locked herself in her bedroom, sobbing into her pillow, refusing to eat or speak. I realized then that Marcus and Jessica were burning the house down with them. Even if they were going down for embezzlement, they were determined to drag our reputations through the mud so we could never show our faces in this city again. They knew the game too well. For a woman, slut shaming is the deadliest weapon in the arsenal. It is the one accusation that is almost impossible to wash off. 4 Under immense pressure from the online fallout, the company executives called an emergency internal disciplinary hearing. Inside the sterile boardroom, Marcus and Jessica had completely dropped their previous arrogance. They were dressed in cheap, drab clothing, looking exhausted and deeply traumatized. “Every word we said is the god’s honest truth!” Marcus pounded his chest, looking pleadingly at the HR Director and the rest of the board. “I have bled for this company for eight years! Why would I throw away my career for a cheap thrill?” “It was Sophie! She wanted the commission so badly she tried to force Jessica to sleep with the client! When I stepped in, she swore she would destroy me!” Jessica immediately provided the backup vocals, sobbing violently and pointing a trembling finger at my sister. “Sophie… I loved you like a sister. How could you feed me to the wolves like that…” “And your sister sending those disgusting photos to my Marcus… Have you no shame at all!” Our legal counsel calmly interjected, stating that the opposition had presented zero factual evidence and was relying entirely on defamation. The opposing lawyer scoffed and fired back immediately. “Evidence? Public opinion is the evidence!” “Your client, Tiana, physically assaulted my client in front of dozens of witnesses. She then produced heavily manipulated, digitally altered images to destroy his career!” “My clients are seeking psychiatric help for severe emotional trauma. What more do you people want?” The senior executives shifted uncomfortably in their expensive leather chairs, exchanging tired glances. I knew exactly what they were thinking. They did not care about the truth. They just wanted the PR nightmare to vanish. Throwing a mid level employee like Sophie under the bus was the cheapest, cleanest way to make the headlines disappear. Sophie sat next to me, her face pale as a ghost. She looked at me with total despair, her lips trembling so violently she couldn’t make a sound. Marcus and Jessica shared a fleeting, triumphant look. The entire room thought I was out of ammo. Marcus even had the audacity to stand up and walk over to my side of the table. He stared down at me, his face twisted in an arrogant, victorious sneer. “What’s wrong, Madam Mediator? Cat got your tongue?” He leaned in close, whispering so only the two of us could hear his toxic gloating. “Let me teach you a lesson, sweetheart. Once the mud is on you, you can never wash it off.” “You and your sister are going to stink for the rest of your pathetic lives.” I didn’t flinch at his threat. I didn’t even look at the pitying eyes of the lawyers around me. I simply stood up, smooth and slow. I reached over and gently tucked a stray strand of hair behind my sister’s ear. Then, I tilted my head up, looked right into Marcus’s smug little eyes, and smiled. “Are you quite done performing, Marcus?” “Because if you’re done, it’s my turn.” Before he could react, I looked him dead in the eye and silently mouthed two words. Every single drop of blood drained from Marcus and Jessica’s faces in a fraction of a second.

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Kristen’s funeral wasn’t even over yet. The scent of white roses and burning wax still hung heavy in the chapel. But I simply reached out, took her best friend Sarah’s hand, and walked right to the front of the grieving crowd. “I am going to marry Sarah,” I announced. I pulled out the diamond ring I had originally bought for Kristen years ago and slid it onto Sarah’s finger. Kristen’s older brother, Carter, charged at me with bloodshot eyes. “Doug Blake! Are you even human?!” My bodyguards immediately intercepted him, pinning him back. He thrashed against them, his voice tearing through the chapel. “My sister is lying right there in that casket!” “You are proposing to this slut right in front of her?!” “Have you two been sleeping together this whole time?!” I calmly shifted my gaze to Kristen’s black-and-white portrait resting on the altar. “This was Kristen’s dying wish.” “She wanted the two people she loved most to support each other and walk the rest of this life together.” The crowd erupted. The entire chapel was filled with gasps, curses, and people calling me a twisted liar. But nobody understood what I really meant. 1 “Doug, you have lost your damn mind!” Kristen’s mother clutched her chest, gasping for air before collapsing straight toward the floor. Relatives rushed to catch her, chaotic shouts echoing as they fanned her and rubbed her back. Her cloudy, tear-filled eyes locked onto me with pure venom. “My daughter just passed away! Her body isn’t even cold yet!” “And you couldn’t wait to parade this woman in front of everyone? You want to give everything my daughter owned to this homewrecker?!” “How can you face Kristen in the afterlife?!” Sarah’s hand was trembling violently inside my grip. I just squeezed it tighter, raising my eyes to scan the room full of furious faces. “Like I said, the wedding will be scheduled soon.” “Everything under Kristen’s name, the mansion in the East End, her company shares, and all the cash in her personal accounts, will go entirely to Sarah.” “You animal! You are a literal animal!” Carter broke free from the bodyguards for a split second, the veins bulging on his forehead. His eyes were so red they looked ready to bleed. “Do you remember how my sister treated you?!” “When your first startup failed, she pawned her wedding jewelry to help you pay off your debts.” “When you were hospitalized, she sat by your bed for three days and three nights without closing her eyes!” “Now that she is gone, this is how you repay her?!” “Stealing her inheritance, marrying her best friend… do you even have a heart?!” He lunged forward again, but the guards quickly wrapped their arms around his waist, dragging him back. Carter thrashed wildly. His roars were so loud they made the white floral arrangements shudder. “Sarah! You filthy bitch!” “My sister treated you like her own flesh and blood! She shared everything with you, and this is how you pay her back?!” “Stealing her man and swallowing her fortune the second she is gone? Aren’t you afraid of going to hell?!” Sarah’s face drained of all color. Her lips parted as she tried to say something, but her voice was instantly drowned out by the tidal wave of insults. “You ungrateful piece of trash!” An elderly uncle, shaking with rage, pointed his cane right at my nose. “If Kristen is watching from heaven, she will crawl back down just to rip the faces off you two!” “They definitely hooked up ages ago!” Someone whispered the accusation loudly. It wasn’t a scream, but it acted like gasoline on an open fire. “Exactly! They probably killed Kristen so they could be together!” “Otherwise, why would they be so brazen about it?!” Someone accidentally knocked over the memorial candle stand. Hot wax and ashes spilled across the floor, mixing with scattered funeral programs, making the scene look incredibly pathetic. A relative grabbed a handful of white carnations from the altar and hurled them violently at us. The petals shattered, landing in Sarah’s hair and on the shoulders of my tailored black suit, like a silent, mocking judgment. And in that moment, the absolute chaos of the chapel was already being recorded. Several people had their phones up, lenses zoomed in perfectly. They captured Carter’s roars, the elders’ curses, and the cold silence of Sarah and me. Within minutes, those clips were edited, slapped with the title “Trashing the Dead: Husband Marries Mistress at Wife’s Funeral,” and uploaded across every major social media platform. It took less than half an hour. #FuneralProposal #DougBlakeGivesMillionsToMistress #JusticeForKristen The three hashtags skyrocketed like rockets, dominating the top trending spots on Twitter and TikTok, glowing with that blinding red “Viral” tag. 2 The comment sections were a total warzone. The sheer volume of rage practically melted the servers. [What kind of absolute garbage human being is Doug Blake?] [His wife is literally lying in a casket in the same room, and he couldn’t wait to marry her bestie and split her money? He is a psychopath!] [Sarah is disgusting. Stealing your best friend’s man and her money? This had to be premeditated.] [My heart breaks for Kristen. She loved the wrong man and trusted the wrong friend.] [Hold on… is it possible Kristen didn’t die of natural causes?] [They are way too eager. It’s almost like they couldn’t wait for her to die!] [The police need to investigate! Scum like this deserves to be ruined and locked up forever!] My phone buzzed relentlessly against my chest. Texts, calls, and emails flooded in, packed with curses and interrogations. Random unknown numbers started ringing, and the second I answered, people would just scream death threats into my ear. My company’s PR department was having a collective meltdown. They sent me dozens of urgent messages begging for a crisis management strategy. Our stock price had already started to plummet off a cliff. But I ignored all of it. I casually turned off my phone and slipped it back into my suit’s breast pocket. I looked down and gently brushed a crushed white petal out of Sarah’s hair. My fingertips brushed against her ice-cold skin. She looked up at me, her eyes brimming with panic and dread. “Doug, maybe we should just leave?” I shook my head and reached out to smooth her wrinkled collar. “Don’t be afraid.” Then I turned back to face the crowd, meeting their furious, murderous glares. My voice wasn’t loud, but it cut through the deafening noise. “I have said what I needed to say.” “The wedding will be held when the time is right.” “I have already decided where the inheritance goes.” “My lawyers will expedite the legal paperwork.” “Whether you believe me, or how much you want to curse me, that is entirely up to you.” My eyes drifted to Kristen’s black-and-white portrait. She was smiling so gently in that picture. “When the time comes, I will give everyone, including Kristen, a complete explanation.” “An explanation?! What kind of sick explanation could you possibly give?!” Carter was trembling with rage, still pinned down by the security team. “You murdered her! I am calling the cops! I am going to make you and this bitch pay!” I let out a relaxed, easy smile. “Call the cops?” “Go ahead. I am more than happy to cooperate.” The second the circus at the funeral ended, I booked the earliest flight out. I took Sarah straight to a luxury tropical island. Sunshine, white sandy beaches, crystal clear water. I held Sarah’s hand, posing for a picture under a palm tree. She was wearing a flowing white sundress, smiling softly, with Kristen’s diamond ring sparkling on her finger. The caption read: “To the rest of our lives. Please take care of me.” I posted it directly to my personal accounts. No privacy settings, entirely public. The internet exploded all over again. The backlash was ten times more violent than the day of the funeral. [Doug Blake, are you even a human being?!] [Going on a honeymoon right after your wife’s funeral? And you have the nerve to post pictures showing off?!] [Looking at Sarah’s face makes me sick. Wearing a dead woman’s ring.] [Living in a dead woman’s house and she can still smile like that?] [Do these two even have a conscience?!] [The grass hasn’t even grown over Kristen’s grave yet!] [Cancel his company! Society needs to permanently blacklist this piece of trash!] My direct messages were flooded with the most vile threats imaginable. People photoshopped my face onto crime scene photos. Internet sleuths tracked down our resort location, threatening to fly out and “teach us a lesson.” But I didn’t care. In fact, I kept posting daily updates. A photo of Sarah’s silhouette by the ocean. A close-up of us sharing an expensive gelato. Our hands intertwined under a golden sunset. Every single post was like pouring aviation fuel straight onto the internet’s raging fire. 3 Ten days later, the honeymoon was over. I brought Sarah back to the corporate headquarters. When I pushed open the double doors to my executive office suite, it looked like a disaster zone. More than half the cubicles were completely empty. Files were scattered across the floor. Several department heads were actively leading their teams in packing up their desks. “Mr. Blake, we are resigning.” The Marketing Director spoke first, his tone dripping with absolute disgust. “We fundamentally disagree with the kind of person you are, and we refuse to work for you a second longer.” “Exactly, we are walking out too!” “Protecting a mistress and stealing your dead wife’s money? We don’t serve bosses like that!” “Either you step down, or we walk. We choose the latter!” The employees chimed in one after another, their eyes filled with a mix of contempt and bitter disappointment. The massive office was practically hollowed out. Only a few veteran employees stood awkwardly in the corners, hesitating. I leaned casually against my mahogany desk, drumming my fingers lightly against the surface. I kept my voice perfectly level. “That is perfectly fine. Anyone who wants to leave is free to go.” I turned to my secretary and told her to bring out the severance packages I had drafted beforehand. “For those who have been here for over three years, you will receive an extra three months of severance pay. For those over five years, six months.” “All unused PTO and sick days will be cashed out fully and added to your final check.” The second those words left my mouth, the entire floor went dead silent. Even the people who were carrying their cardboard boxes toward the elevators froze in their tracks. The news of my massive payout leaked to the internet almost instantly. The netizens lost their minds even more. [Is Doug Blake actually insane?] [He betrays his wife, gives her parents a heart attack, but acts like a saint to his employees?!] [This is wild. Doing the most villainous things in his personal life, but throwing around cash to buy loyalty at work? Terrifying!] [Is he trying to use money to shut everyone up?] [Too bad we aren’t buying it!] [Treating his staff so well but being so ruthless to his dead wife. What is this guy’s brain made of?] [Hypocrite!] [Fake saint!] [He is a psychopath!] Negative labels washed over me like a tsunami. I scrolled through the brutal comments on my phone, then looked up at the employees slowly filtering out of the office with their generous checks. A faint, subtle smile curled the corner of my mouth. Sarah stood next to me, her face deathly pale. “Doug, if this keeps up, the entire company is going to collapse…” I reached out and patted her shoulder, my voice smooth and unbothered. “If it collapses, I will just build another one.” They didn’t understand. I never cared about saving this company, nor did I care about public approval. What I wanted was to make the rats hiding in the dark panic. And this entire circus? It was only just the beginning. The heavy glass doors to my office were suddenly shoved open. I was in the middle of signing the very last severance agreement. A squad of federal financial investigators walked in wearing dark suits, their expressions stone-cold. “Doug Blake, we received a highly detailed anonymous tip. Your company is suspected of massive financial fraud and severe tax evasion. We are here to conduct an official investigation.” Stacks of ledgers and banking documents were slapped onto my desk. Every single highlighted number was shocking. When they presented the final calculation, even I was genuinely taken aback for a second. “The back taxes and federal penalties owed total exactly fifteen million dollars.” The news grew wings and flew across the internet in seconds. #DougBlakeCompanyRaided #FifteenMillionDollarFine The hashtags hit number one instantly. The internet threw a massive party. The comment sections were filled with people cheering and popping digital champagne. [Karma never misses! The trash finally got what he deserved!] [This is what you get for betraying your wife! The money is gone, the company is dead. Serves him right!] [Just throw him in a federal prison already. Let him rot in a cell for the rest of his life!] Hearing the blood in the water, Kristen’s family rushed over. 4 Carter showed up at the corporate lobby leading a pack of angry relatives. He wore a twisted smile of pure vindication, his voice echoing off the marble walls. “Doug Blake, this is exactly what you deserve!” “But before the government seizes your assets, you are going to spit out my sister’s inheritance! And you are going to pay the Collins family extra for emotional damages!” “Otherwise, Kristen will never rest in peace down there!” The netizens watching the live streams enthusiastically backed him up. [He is absolutely right! The family should squeeze every penny out of him. Don’t let this scumbag off easy!] [The money was Kristen’s to begin with. He needs to use it to pay for his sins!] [Support the Collins family! Drain Doug Blake until he has absolutely nothing left!] Right at that moment, the wail of police sirens approached the building. Two uniformed detectives walked straight into my office and flashed their badges. “Mr. Blake, the sheer amount of money involved in your company’s fraud elevates this to a major criminal offense. Please come with us to the precinct.” Carter and his relatives immediately started cheering. The live chat on the streams scrolled so fast it was just a blur of text. But I calmly raised my hand, stopping the detectives in their tracks. My face didn’t show a hint of panic. “Hold on.” “This fraud is not my responsibility.” Carter let out a sharp, mocking laugh. “Not your responsibility? What, did a ghost do it?!” “Doug, have some damn shame! You are backed into a corner and you are still trying to pass the buck?!” I ignored his taunts. My gaze swept slowly across the room, making eye contact with everyone present. “It is my wife, Kristen’s responsibility.” “She knows the details of this fraud much better than I do.” The whispers in the room and the raging comments online erupted simultaneously. “He is insane! He has officially lost his mind!” “Blaming a dead woman?! This man truly has no bottom line!” “Throwing dirty water on Kristen when she is already in the ground… Doug Blake is going to burn in hell!” The lead detective frowned deeply. “Mr. Blake, please cooperate with the investigation. Do not spout nonsense.” I didn’t argue. I pulled out my phone and dialed a heavily encrypted international number. I tapped the call button and put the phone on speaker, resting it on my mahogany desk. Carter’s voice was dripping with pure disdain. The millions of people watching the live streams were practically eating popcorn, waiting for my final, pathetic joke to play out. “Is he actually dialing a number? Who is he calling? A ghost?!” “What a clown! Let’s see how he tries to spin this lie!” The ringing tone echoed through the speaker. One ring. Two rings. Three rings… Just when everyone was convinced it would go to voicemail. A clear, female voice suddenly came through the speaker. It even carried a hint of lazy, husky arrogance. “Hello? Who is this?”

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By the hospital window, I stared down at the street below with a single, liberating thought: If I just jumped, it would all be over. This was my 28th hospital stay in three years, all thanks to him. The evidence was written across my body—three cracked ribs, a patchwork of angry burns, and a constellation of deep bruises—a brutal testament to a nightmare that had no end. It wasn’t that I hadn’t fought back. He’d torn up my divorce filings. Every escape attempt ended with me being dragged back to a beating more savage than the last. Hope had been beaten out of me, leaving only a hollow, desolate ache. Then, just as I was about to give in, a package arrived from a friend overseas. Inside were two dolls, one crafted to look like me, the other like him. Tucked beside them was a thin sheet of paper titled, “Instructions for the Shared Pain Dolls.” 1 That single sheet of paper held just a few simple rules. “Pathetic,” I muttered to myself. “Thinking a couple of dolls could save me.” I tossed them aside and started for the door, my mind set on the hospital roof. Then my phone buzzed. A text from an unknown number. [You’ll never know if you don’t try.] [Besides, things can’t get any worse, can they?] It was from my friend, the one who sent the package. We hadn’t spoken in years. I’d changed my number a dozen times since then. Yet, she knew exactly which hospital, which room I was in. A flicker of something I hadn’t felt in a long time—hope—ignited in my chest. “Maybe,” I whispered, “maybe this could actually work.” I snatched the instructions and read them again. 1. The dolls require a binding of blood, hair, and nail clippings from the intended subjects. 2. The first doll bound becomes the Primary. The second becomes the Secondary. 3. Once bound, the Secondary will experience all pain inflicted upon the Primary. The dolls require a binding. My hands moved with a sudden urgency. I plucked a strand of hair from my head and clipped a sliver from my fingernail. For the blood, I just had to press my thumb against a wound that hadn’t quite healed. The moment the three items touched the doll that looked like me, they vanished, absorbed into the fabric. The doll’s posture seemed to shift, its vacant expression mirroring my own exhaustion. I could feel it—a faint, thrumming connection between us. It was real. It actually worked. My mind, once a barren wasteland of despair, was now racing with possibilities. But first things first: I had to bind my husband, Victor, to the other doll. Ignoring the doctor’s protests, I checked myself out and went home. The house was just as I’d left it—a sprawling, modern mansion decorated entirely to Victor’s taste. A cold, sterile palette of black, white, and grey that suffocated the air and pressed down on my soul. Victor’s family was obscenely wealthy. It was their money and influence that made divorce impossible, escape a fantasy. I was a prisoner in a gilded cage. But now, I had the dolls. I had a chance to tear this cage apart. Victor was already home from work. He looked up, a flicker of surprise in his eyes when he saw me. “I thought you’d stay in the hospital until you were fully recovered.” A cruel smirk played on his lips. “You know, I love it when you’re broken. It’s so beautiful.” At thirty-five, he was the picture of a successful executive, impeccably dressed in a tailored suit. But beneath that polished veneer was a monster. A sadist. “Come here,” he purred. “Be a good girl.” I fought the tremor that ran through me, a Pavlovian response to his voice, and walked toward him. His fingers were like ice as they traced the line of my jaw, raising a carpet of goosebumps on my skin. I didn’t dare move. “See? If you were always this obedient, why would I ever have to hurt you?” His grip tightened, his fingers digging into my cheeks, squeezing my face. A phantom pain, a memory of a thousand other moments just like this, shot through my entire body. “Honey, would you like some fruit?” I blinked, forcing tears to well in my eyes and spill down my cheeks, dripping onto his hand. My tears always pleased him. He released me and sat on the sofa, a silent assent. I went to the kitchen, my movements stiff and sore. The fruit was already washed and sliced, just the way he liked it. My barely-healed injuries screamed in protest, but I pushed through, carrying the platter to him. “Your nails are getting long. Should I trim them for you?” “Hm,” he grunted, spearing a piece of watermelon with a fork. He popped it into his mouth, the bright red flesh a stark contrast to his pale skin. It looked like a piece of my own heart. Fighting the urge to shrink away, I knelt at his feet and gently took his hand, the nail clippers cold in my other palm. “Ava, why are you so tense?” His voice was a low murmur, laced with amusement. “Look at you, sweating already.” He leaned in closer. “Are you hiding something from me?” His voice was a snake coiling around my neck. My breath hitched. I froze. 2 I struggled to keep my voice even. “I’m just… not fully recovered yet.” It was his favorite game, a relentless campaign of questions and accusations designed to break me down, to make me so terrified of him that my body betrayed me with shakes and stutters. It didn’t matter if I’d done anything or not; his suspicion was its own conviction. “Are you blaming me, then? Did I hit you too hard?” he asked, his voice deceptively soft. “It was just a little punishment for your disobedience.” A little punishment? Three cracked ribs were the mark of his foot. The tapestry of bruises was the art of his fists and open palms. The burns covering my back were the answer to his question of whether I was faking unconsciousness, tested with a full kettle of boiling water. I wanted to scream. To fight back. To make him feel every ounce of the agony he’d inflicted on me. Instead, I let my trembling hand guide the clippers, intentionally cutting a fraction too deep, drawing a speck of blood from under his nail. “I’m so sorry, I…” I started to apologize, instinctively clenching the nail clipping in my fist. The slap came so fast I didn’t see it. The force of it sent me sprawling to the floor. Before I could recover, he grabbed a fistful of my hair and hauled me up, his other hand striking my face again and again. The warm, metallic tang of blood filled my mouth, a taste I knew better than any other. He dragged me closer by my hair, forcing me to look at him, a predator admiring his broken prey. “Don’t think I don’t know what you’re doing,” he hissed, his face inches from mine. “This is your pathetic little revenge, isn’t it?” I squeezed my hand tighter, protecting the precious clipping. Does he know about the dolls? How could he? How do I get out of this? Do I have another chance? Should I run? A storm of panic raged in my mind. He stared into my wide, terrified eyes, and then a horrible, slow smile spread across his face. “This is your grand rebellion? Nicking my finger with a nail clipper?” He let out a sharp, ugly laugh. “You’re like a kitten, Ava. So adorable.” He tugged on my hair, sending a fresh spike of pain through my scalp. “This is what I love. This is what makes it fun.” He straightened up, releasing me. I crumpled to the floor in a heap. “The more you fight, the more interesting it gets,” he said, his voice a low growl. “So go on. Run. Fight back. Let’s have some fun, Kitten.” He turned and strolled out of the room, humming a cheerful tune, completely unconcerned by the blood welling on his fingertip. This was my chance. After a particularly bad beating, he always gave me time to recover. He wouldn’t kill me outright; he preferred the game of cat and mouse, of breaking me, letting me heal, and then breaking me all over again. The slaps were the end of it, for now. I scrambled back to the bedroom, half-crawling, and slammed the door shut. I pulled the dolls from my bag. I found one of his hairs on the bedsheet. Then, with shaking hands, I placed the hair and the bloodied nail clipping onto the second doll. A crimson light flashed, and a new connection sparked to life, linking me to this second doll, to him. Finally. The binding is complete. I sagged against the floor, my body limp with relief. Knock. Knock. Knock. The sound made me jump. It was Victor. “Ava, I seem to recall telling you not to lock your door.” His voice was dangerously calm. “Are you being disobedient again?” 3 My hands fumbled, trying to hide the dolls behind my back. But before I could, I heard the click of a key in the lock. The door swung open. Victor stepped inside, his eyes immediately landing on the dolls I was so clumsily trying to conceal. He strode over and snatched the one that looked like me. He held it up, examining it with a critical eye. “Not bad. The resemblance is uncanny.” His gaze flicked to me. “What are you up to? Why so jumpy? Don’t tell me you’re playing with voodoo dolls.” He roared with laughter, carelessly swinging my doll by its leg. “I have to admit, it even captures your current, broken-down state. Who knew you had such a talent for crafts?” His fingers tightened around the doll, twisting its limbs, crushing its fabric body. A jolt of pain, faint but real, shot through me from the doll. An idea, brilliant and terrifying, sparked in my mind. If I feel what happens to the doll… does that mean the damage works both ways? I glanced at the doll in my hand—his doll. It was already beginning to reflect the state of the Primary. It would work. I flicked the switch. Instruction #4: The Primary can turn the pain-sharing connection on or off at will. A strangled scream ripped through the room. Victor collapsed, his body hitting the floor with a heavy thud. The sudden, alien agony that flooded his system was so overwhelming he couldn’t even process it. “Call an ambulance! Call a damn ambulance!” he shrieked. The intense pain forced his hand open, and my doll dropped to the carpet. He curled into a tight ball, his towering 6’2” frame crumpled in a desperate attempt to lessen the torment. “So this is what you look like when you’re in pain,” I murmured, a strange sense of calm washing over me. For the first time, he didn’t seem like an invincible monster. I ignored his pleas and picked up my doll, the Primary. I needed to know: was the pain he felt just a reflection of my own injuries, or could I inflict new pain through the doll itself? The doll was mangled from his abuse. I looked at its face, so much like my own, and without a shred of pity, I bent its leg backward until it snapped. A sickening crack echoed in the quiet room. “Aaargh!” Victor clutched his knee, letting out another piercing, agonized howl. “It works,” I whispered. “What works? What the hell are you talking about?” he gasped between screams. “Ava, I told you to call an ambulance! Did you hear me? Do you want another beating?” His voice, usually a tool of terror, was now music to my ears. No wonder he loved to hear me scream and beg. It was a beautiful sound. “You want me to call an ambulance?” I stepped closer, looking down at him. “Then beg me, Victor. Beg me, and maybe I’ll make the call.” My face was still swollen, the burn dressing on my back a constant, throbbing reminder of his cruelty. But in this moment, I held all the power. I held his pain in the palm of my hand. “You bitch! You’re dead—AGHH!” He didn’t finish his threat. I pressed down hard on the doll’s chest, and Victor immediately began to choke, his breath catching in his throat. “Ava… please,” he wheezed, his voice cracking. “Call an ambulance. I’m begging you.” The pain had broken him. Tears and snot streamed down his face, painting a pathetic picture. I pulled out my phone and dialed for an ambulance. Just like Victor said, the game is only fun when there’s resistance. Besides, I needed to know if a hospital could find any physical cause for his injuries. The paramedics arrived quickly, loading the still-screaming Victor onto a stretcher. The staff at the local hospital knew me by sight; they must have assumed I was the patient again. They were in for a surprise. From now on, the ambulance would only be for Victor. 4 After they wheeled Victor away, I slept. For the first time in three years, I slept through the entire night without waking up in a cold sweat. The wounds on my body still ached, but for once, my mind was at peace. I woke the next morning to a strange sensation. The connection to the dolls felt stronger. They had leveled up. Instruction #5: When the Secondary’s pain reaches a certain threshold, the Primary may upgrade. An upgraded Primary can amplify the pain felt by the Secondary. The sustained agony from the night before must have triggered it. My control over the dolls felt sharper, more intuitive. The hospital, predictably, had found nothing wrong with Victor. Painkillers hadn’t touched the phantom agony. He came home that afternoon. The moment he walked through the door, he roared my name. He sounded unhinged. I stood at the top of the stairs, looking down on him. “Was this you?” he snarled, his face contorted with rage. “Some kind of trick? It’s those dolls, isn’t it?” “They ran every test imaginable and found nothing. Nothing! The doctors think I’m having a psychotic break.” He pointed a shaking finger at me. “Ava, I underestimated you.” I said nothing, letting him burn himself out with his impotent fury. Constant, unexplained pain can shatter a man’s composure. He was already losing his mind. But this was the pain I had lived with for three years. “Does it hurt?” My voice was as cold as the marble beneath his feet. “Good. So do I.” “And the painkillers don’t work, do they?” Instruction #6: The shared pain cannot be mitigated by external means, such as medication. “So it was you,” he seethed, his teeth grinding together. “Fine. If it hurts, it hurts. But now, I’m not just going to make you hurt. I’m going to kill you.” The calm, controlled mask he always wore was gone, replaced by a terrifying, wild-eyed madness. I activated the upgrade. A 130% pain amplification surged through the connection. He gasped, his strength instantly draining away, and staggered against the wall. But even through the agony, he lunged for me, his hand closing around my wrist like a vice. A corresponding jolt of pain shot through his own wrist. “What the hell did you do?” he growled through gritted teeth. I just stared back at him, my silence a wall he couldn’t break. “Go on then,” I challenged him. “Kill me. Let’s see who dies first. You from the pain, or me from the beating.” He let go, his mind racing. Then, a look of realization. “The dolls! It’s the dolls. Where did you hide them?” he yelled, tearing the house apart. “You tried to hide them yesterday, I knew it!” I tried to stop him, but even in agony, he was stronger than my injured body. My attempts to create new pain by digging my nails into my own skin only seemed to fuel his desperation. He was willing to endure anything to find the source. Finally, he found them, tucked away in my closet. He snatched up his doll, the Secondary, and a triumphant, cruel smile returned to his face. “I have to admit, Ava, that was a clever little trick. You taught me a lesson.” He held the doll up. “But now that I have this, let’s see how you fight back!” He stormed into the kitchen, turned on the gas stove, and without a moment’s hesitation, tossed the doll into the open flame. The fire roared to life, engulfing the small figure. Victor turned to me, a look of pure, malevolent victory on his face. He cracked his knuckles, already planning his retribution. But in the next instant, his triumphant expression twisted into a mask of pure horror. The searing, blistering agony of being burned alive consumed him. The doll, made of what looked like simple cloth, was completely unharmed by the flames. He collapsed, screaming, his face turning a blotchy red as the phantom burns spread across his body. I started to laugh. It was a beautiful thing, wasn’t it? To give someone a flicker of hope, only to snatch it away and plunge them into absolute despair. It was the exact same feeling I had every time I thought I’d escaped, only to see his car pull up in front of me. Instruction #7: The bond can only be broken by death.

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1 I knew my family was struggling financially from a very young age. Being sick cost money. So, I was never allowed to get sick. When I was four years old and running a terrible fever, my mother picked me up by the collar and shoved me into the refrigerator. I was still conscious when she finally dragged me out. I just stared at her, blinking slowly. My face was freezing. My tears had frozen into tiny, icy rivers on my cheeks. I couldn’t even cry anymore. Mom glared at me, her voice dripping with annoyance. “I know you are just faking it to skip school. Look at you, you are not dead, are you?” After that day, I kept every single ache and pain completely to myself. I figured Mom was right. I must be faking it. If I wasn’t, how could my body naturally recover without a single pill or shot every time I felt unwell? That was until the mandatory health screening before middle school. I ran all the way home, clutching the official cancer diagnosis in my hand, my heart soaring with a strange, nervous joy. “Mom! I have cancer!” This time, with a real doctor’s note, Mom would definitely not think I was faking it. Mom, I am not lying to you this time. … I ran home with the medical paper, my heart pounding with a mix of excitement and anxiety. The doctor told me I only had three months left to live. Even though I didn’t want to die yet, I couldn’t help but look forward to the next three months. I was finally going to get some care and attention from my parents. Whenever my little brother got sick, the entire family would hover over him, waiting on him hand and foot. I wasn’t greedy. I would be completely satisfied if someone just held my hand and took me to the hospital. Pushing the front door open, I held the white diagnostic report high in the air, terrified my parents might miss it. “Mom! Dad! I got cancer!” The air went dead silent for two seconds. Then, hurried footsteps approached, accompanied by the familiar scent of Mom’s vanilla perfume. I lowered the paper and opened my arms wide, fully prepared to be swept into my mother’s warm embrace. Riiiip! With a sharp tear, the diagnosis was snatched from my hand and ripped to shreds. Before my brain could even process what had just happened, a burning pain exploded across my cheek. “Did you forget your brother is sleeping?! How dare you make up such a ridiculous lie!” Dad put down his newspaper and walked over. “Maite, you are a big girl now. You need to start acting your age. Everyone knows you have the constitution of an ox.” “You haven’t even caught a cold since you were a toddler. If you are going to lie, at least make it believable.” Cupping my stinging cheek, I pointed a trembling finger at the trash can. “But the doctor said it…” My parents had already turned their backs on me. They were busy discussing Noah’s premium meal plan. “Noah has lost a little weight recently. It seems the two-thousand-dollar monthly catering plan still isn’t nutritious enough for him.” Dad sighed, his face etched with deep worry. “But upgrading to the premium tier costs four thousand a month. We simply cannot afford that.” Mom suddenly shifted her gaze back to me. “My hospital is recruiting volunteers for a new clinical drug trial. They specifically need healthy individuals. The payout is fifteen thousand dollars per person.” “I was going to do it myself, but we are both way too busy with work.” Hearing the underlying meaning in her words, a spark of hope reignited in my chest. If volunteering required a clean bill of health, then the medical checkup would prove to my parents that I wasn’t lying. “Mom, let me be the volunteer.” Dad immediately scooped me up into his arms. “Our big girl is finally looking out for her baby brother. You know Noah has been frail since he was born. As his older sister, you need to be more understanding.” Mom let out a cold scoff. “Trying to take credit now that you know you messed up, huh? Fine, I will give you this chance.” She pulled a round, dark red pill out of her pocket and gestured for me to swallow it. “Good thing I am on the hospital staff. I bypassed all that tedious paperwork.” I didn’t take it. I stared at the pill nervously. “Mom… aren’t I supposed to get a physical exam first?” Mom’s eyebrows knitted together in sheer frustration. “What physical exam? You just want to waste our money! If your body isn’t healthy, then there isn’t a single healthy person left on this planet.” Hearing my sturdy little brother let out a soft cough from the living room, Dad grabbed the pill from Mom’s hand. He snatched a glass of water from the table. Ignoring my panicked struggles, he forced the pill directly down my throat. “Stop wasting time arguing with a kid. Noah just coughed. Go check if he is catching a cold.” I choked violently, unable to formulate a single word. Mom grabbed me by the arm, dragged me into my bedroom, and locked the door from the outside. “I already disinfected your room. You stay in there and behave.” “The observation period is three days. Once you pass, I will take you to the hospital to get the money. If you show a good attitude, Mom will treat you to McDonald’s.” My head began to throb violently. I wanted to tell Mom I felt incredibly sick, but my vocal cords refused to make a sound. 2 I pounded on the bedroom door with all my might, forcing a tiny whimper through my clenched teeth. “Mom… Dad… please come save me.” Bang! The door violently shuddered as Dad kicked it from the outside, his last shred of patience entirely gone. “The only reason your brother is so weak is because you absorbed all the nutrients in your mother’s womb! And you still have the nerve to complain? You clearly haven’t learned your lesson!” Mom suddenly let out a sharp gasp. For a fleeting second, I thought they had fished my diagnosis out of the trash and realized it was real. “Honey! Noah’s temperature is 99 degrees! He is almost running a fever!” “Hurry, get him to the ER!” Dad didn’t even bother listening to the muffled, agonizing sounds I was making against the wood. A cluster of keys jingled frantically. I heard the heavy thud of the front door slamming shut. Reaching up to touch my face, I realized two trails of thick blood were leaking out of my eye sockets. Mom. Dad. It hurts so much. My consciousness slowly faded into the dark, and the piercing, bone-deep agony eventually melted away. When I woke up again, I was floating mid-air. I easily drifted right through the solid bedroom door. That was wonderful. Mom and Dad had finally let me out. I sat down politely at the dining table. I promised myself I would apologize to them and explain everything properly the moment they returned. I didn’t know how much time had passed before the front door clicked open. Mom and Dad walked in holding a pink Hello Kitty cake. It smelled amazing. I couldn’t help but swallow hard. Usually, I only ever got to taste cake on Noah’s birthday. I didn’t expect that getting cancer meant I would get my very own cake today. Mom stared impatiently at my closed bedroom door. “Maite! Come out and eat your cake!” “You are lucky your little stunt didn’t scare your brother into a worse sickness. Otherwise, you would be getting the belt.” I looked at them in complete bewilderment. “Mom, Dad, I am right in front of you. I am sitting right here on the chair.” I stood up and walked over, wanting to hug them, but my arms passed straight through their bodies. They kept staring at the door. Ten seconds later, Mom banged her fist against the wood. “Throwing a tantrum and giving us the silent treatment now? I didn’t even punish you for putting your brother in the hospital, and you dare throw a fit?!” I was completely stunned. I phased back and forth around them, shouting directly into their ears. “Mom! Dad! I am right here! I am not throwing a tantrum!” But neither of them reacted. Dad took my beautiful cake and dumped it straight into the garbage can. “This is what happens when you spoil her too much. Let this be a lesson. Starving for three days won’t kill her.” A horrifying realization dawned on me. I drifted back through my bedroom door. A shriveled, grotesque figure was curled up tightly against the base of the door. Deep, bloody scratch marks from my fingernails scarred the wood. I looked so ugly. No wonder Mom and Dad never liked me. I was already dead. I couldn’t quite describe the feeling in my chest. Was I sad? I didn’t actually feel that heartbroken. It was just a shame. I thought I was going to get three months of love and care, but I didn’t even get a single day. But maybe this was for the best. At least now I could stay by my parents’ side forever without worrying about being a burden. Mom noticed the torn diagnosis paper in the trash, now smeared with frosting. Frowning, she pinched it with two fingers and picked it up. “Honey, this medical report actually looks real…” Dad glanced at it and scoffed loudly. “Susan, you work at a hospital. How can you fall for this?” “AI is incredibly advanced these days. It can easily fake a document like this. Watch, I will ask her right now.” He marched up to my bedroom door and delivered a few heavy kicks. “You forged this, didn’t you? Tell the truth, and I will let you eat tomorrow.” Floating in the air, fighting the stinging sensation in my ghostly eyes, I shook my head over and over again. Dad, I didn’t forge it. That is a real paper from a real doctor. The only response he got was the dramatic groaning coming from Noah’s bedroom. “See? She is too scared to answer. That means she admits it.” “I can’t believe this little brat learned to be a pathological liar at such a young age. If only she was half as sensible as her brother.” I wasn’t scared to answer. I simply couldn’t. I rushed back into the room and tightly hugged my stiff, decaying corpse. It was so cold. Maybe it was because I had never once ignored my parents in my entire life. After tending to Noah for a while, they returned to my door. “Maite, it is time to log your physical condition for the trial. Stop playing dead!” I am not playing dead, Mom. I am actually dead. Dad took a deep, angry breath. “You are really pushing your luck.” I watched him march out toward the balcony where the cat bed was. A dreadful premonition seized my heart. “Dad, no, please…” The tall man roughly grabbed Snowball out of the little cardboard house I had built for her. He carried the struggling cat straight to my door. “If you don’t make a sound right now, I am going to teach your cat a lesson!” I lunged forward, desperately trying to snatch my kitten back. Snowball was the only one in this house who ever listened to me. But my ghostly hands passed right through her fur. Dad! I am talking! Please put Snowball down! I don’t have cancer! I was lying! I made it all up! 3 Mom was growing impatient. She pinched the back of Snowball’s neck hard. The usually gentle kitten puffed up instantly, letting out a series of frantic, bloodcurdling screeches. I opened my mouth as wide as I could. Souls couldn’t shed tears, so I could only tremble violently. I screamed until my invisible throat felt like it was tearing apart. “No!” But it was utterly useless. Seeing the cat scratching so fiercely, Dad lost his temper and hurled it away. But he had forgotten that my bedroom door opened right next to the balcony. My mind went entirely blank. A heavy thud echoed from the street below. Mom tried to reach out and stop him, but it was too late. Seeing the neighbors gathering downstairs, she clicked her tongue in annoyance. “Someone is definitely going to ask us how the cat died. We can’t let this ruin our family’s reputation.” “We will just say Maite accidentally dropped it. We will make her go down and apologize.” The moment the words left her mouth, Dad snapped out of his shock. He grabbed my doorknob and rattled it furiously. “This is all your fault for throwing a tantrum! You got your own cat killed! You brought this upon yourself!” Staring down at Snowball’s lifeless body, I was so numb I couldn’t even form a thought. But heaven seemed to take pity on me. Snowball’s little soul floated up and rubbed against my leg. Only then did I pull myself together enough to keep my spirit from completely shattering. Her fluffy ghostly fur felt exactly the same. I carried her back into the apartment. Were Mom and Dad finally going to check on me? What would their reaction be? Ring! Ring! Ring! Dad’s phone suddenly blared. It was a police officer on the other end of the line. “We caught Marcus! Are you coming down to the station to press charges?” Hearing that name, my sorrow was instantly swallowed by sheer terror. That man hiding in the alley had asked me for directions to the bus stop. When I wasn’t looking, he dragged me into the shadows. He pinned me against the cold brick wall, his filthy hands grabbing at my clothes, whispering the most sickening, terrifying threats into my ear as I struggled. When I finally escaped and ran home, I scrubbed my skin in the shower until it bled. When Mom found out, she took me to the police station that very night to file a report. Since then, she had been walking me to and from school. But predators were hard to catch. It took them until today to finally arrest him. Dad and Mom exchanged a loaded look, before a look of absolute resolve settled over their faces. “Did you know? That boy’s wealthy father tracked me down. He said he would give us fifty thousand dollars if we just let this go.” Mom glanced at my tightly shut bedroom door. “That money could cover Noah’s premium meal plan for the whole year. The damage done to Maite cannot be undone anyway. As long as that boy knows he was wrong…” “Besides, look at the terrible attitude Maite is giving us right now. A little harsh reality might be exactly the lesson she needs.” Holding my kitten, I sat in the backseat of their car as they drove to the police station. The face that haunted my darkest nightmares was sitting in the lobby, casually crossing his legs. He looked at my parents with absolute disdain. His overweight father grabbed my dad’s hand warmly. “My good friend, let’s step outside and have a little chat.” I listened to my dad eagerly agreeing to the fifty-thousand-dollar hush money. Every syllable sounded exactly like the sound of my heart shattering into pieces. The monster swaggered out of the police station a free man. I wanted to lunge at him, tear his flesh, and drink his blood. But my own parents had just sold me out. I could never get my justice now. The car ride back was suffocatingly silent. What were they thinking about? “Robert, I still feel like taking this money is wrong…” Dad’s grip on the steering wheel tightened, as if he was terrified he might change his mind. “I know you are worried it will break Maite’s heart. So we just won’t tell her.” “Maite has been perfectly healthy her whole life. Noah is so sickly it breaks my heart. Let’s just consider this the ultimate sacrifice Maite is making for her little brother.” “When we get home, we will let her out and take her somewhere fun to relax. We won’t make her do the drug trial anymore.” Sitting in the backseat, my soul was reduced to ashes. Dad, you don’t have to bother. I am already dead. I can’t go anywhere fun. Mom’s phone suddenly rang. It was my homeroom teacher, Mrs. Bennett. “Mrs. Bennett, how can I help you? We already called in sick for Maite for the past few days.” “I know this must be an incredibly agonizing time for you as parents. But you have to stay strong and not show your despair in front of the child…” Mom cut her off, thoroughly confused. “Mrs. Bennett, what do you mean? Agonizing time?” “Wait. Didn’t Maite show you her cancer diagnosis? Haven’t you been taking her to the hospital for tests these past few days?”

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “443065”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

1 My husband was keeping a mistress behind my back. And this mistress happened to be a somewhat famous food influencer on the internet. Every day, she showed off on her social media, flaunting the lovingly prepared lunches she had made for her boyfriend. Those exquisite meals packed in delicate wooden boxes earned her countless gasps of admiration from her followers. But those crazy fans hitting the like button had no idea about the truth. Every single bite of that food was meticulously chosen and prepared by me. I dragged myself out of bed at five in the morning, standing in the kitchen until my eyes were completely bloodshot. I sacrificed everything for my husband. And this betrayal was my only reward. … A few weeks later, right during her most popular live stream, I put on a delivery uniform and knocked on the door of her luxury apartment. In front of hundreds of thousands of viewers, I held up a long delivery receipt directly to the camera. “Miss, this is the twenty-third premium private chef meal you ordered from our store this month. If you are satisfied with the taste, please leave a five-star review on the app.” The live chat, which had been flooded with hearts and praises just a second ago, was instantly drowned in a massive wave of question marks. She had no idea this was only the first step of dragging them straight to hell. The whole thing started on a perfectly normal afternoon. I was leaning against the couch scrolling through short videos when the algorithm pushed a food influencer’s update to my feed. The cover of the video showed a young girl with immaculate makeup wearing a silk slip dress. Sitting right in front of her was a very familiar handmade walnut wood bento box. Immediately after, a sickly sweet and overly rehearsed voice drifted out of my phone speaker. “Hello babies! Today I am sharing a brand new recipe I developed called Black Truffle Angel Hair Pasta. This dish requires extremely strict knife skills and temperature control. But for him, all the hard work is totally worth it.” The camera cut to a close-up of the dish. The hand-kneaded pasta was sliced as thin as strands of hair, topped with expensive caviar and micro-herbs. I frowned. My heart skipped a heavy beat. Everything from the plating to the ingredients was exactly identical to the lunch I had packed for my husband early this morning. But the thing that truly made my scalp tingle was that walnut wood box. It was an exact replica of the one my husband used. There was a very faint scratch right next to the brass latch. That was a flaw I accidentally left behind with my carving knife when I polished the wood myself years ago. I held my breath and clicked into the profile named “LexiBites.” Six hundred thousand followers. The influencer’s real name was Lexi. I scrolled through her posts from the past month. There were fifteen heavily edited lunch videos, and every single one felt like a heavy hammer smashing against my nerves. French butter-baked lobster. I had stayed up for several nights researching Michelin recipes just to recreate that dish for our fifth wedding anniversary. Twelve-hour slow-simmered Wagyu consomme. Just last week, my husband Henry complained about feeling under the weather. I stood by the stove for half a day and night just to nourish his body. Every single dish was infused with my blood, sweat, and tears. They were the result of me standing in a freezing kitchen at five in the morning, fighting off exhaustion just to provide for my husband. And now, all my love and devotion had been framed as Lexi’s proud masterpieces. They became the stepping stones for her perfect girlfriend persona. They became the chips she used to flaunt her fake romance to hundreds of thousands of strangers. My trembling fingers opened the comment section. It was entirely filled with overwhelming envy. “Oh my god, she is the absolute perfect girlfriend! I am so jealous. Guys, I want to marry her!” “Her knife skills are insane. This is literally Michelin level!” The phone screen went dark, reflecting my pale and haggard face. The light in my eyes slowly died out, but a fire deep within started burning brighter than ever. For the past five years, I completely abandoned my dream of opening a high-end private restaurant just to be the woman behind Henry. I willingly trapped myself between the grease and the stove. In the end, my sacrifices became nothing but a massive joke in someone else’s eyes. I did not know how long I sat frozen on that couch. By the time I snapped out of it, I had already dialed my former assistant Sarah. “Sarah, look someone up for me right now. An influencer named LexiBites. Real name Lexi. I want a deep dive into her entire background. Most importantly, I need to know exactly what kind of dirty business is going on between her and my husband Henry.” Less than half an hour later, an encrypted file quietly landed in my inbox. Lexi was twenty-five years old. She was a micro-influencer recently signed to the exact marketing agency where Henry worked. And Henry, coincidentally enough, was her direct talent manager. Attached at the bottom of the email were several high-resolution candid photos taken in a dimly lit underground parking garage. In the photos, Henry and Lexi were standing incredibly close to each other. His hand was naturally raised, affectionately tucking a strand of blonde hair behind her ear. Looking at that gesture full of possessiveness and tenderness, I felt a suffocating pang in my chest. Good. This was just perfect. Henry and Lexi. One was the thief, the other fenced the stolen goods. They were truly a match made in heaven. Since they loved acting in front of the camera so much, I did not mind getting my hands dirty to build them a world-class stage. I was going to let the entire internet enjoy a front-row seat to their sickening, picture-perfect romance. 2 The next evening, Henry came home from work right on time. At the dinner table, I served him a bowl of soup as usual and spoke in a very casual tone. “Honey, my old private chef studio just landed a groundbreaking catering gig. A massive tech company in Silicon Valley specifically requested me to be the executive chef for their annual gala.” He paused his steak knife, his eyes lighting up immediately. “Really? That is amazing, baby! This is an opportunity of a lifetime.” I pursed my lips, offering a perfectly timed, guilty smile. “It is a great opportunity. But for the next entire month, I will probably be buried in the studio developing the new menu. I doubt I will even have time to sleep.” I paused for a second, looking straight into his eyes. “So I really won’t have the time to prep your lunch boxes every morning.” Just as I expected, the smile on his face froze instantly. A brief flash of panic crossed his eyes. But his cover-up was flawless. He simply took a sip of red wine without changing his expression. “That is totally fine. Work comes first. I can just order some delivery or eat at the restaurant downstairs. Please do not stress over it.” I sneered in my heart. Totally fine? If his lunch supply was cut off, Lexi’s daily video content would dry up completely. How could he not be panicking? I could bet my life that within three days, he would be beating around the bush begging me for help. When that time came, I would personally hand this cheating couple a gift they would never forget. Over the next two days, I set my plan into motion with ruthless efficiency. The first step was registering a private kitchen on an elite delivery app designed specifically for wealthy neighborhoods. I spent an entire afternoon perfecting the visual aesthetics of the storefront. The shop was named “Velvet Spoon.” The avatar was a minimalist black and gold logo. The bio consisted of a single, cold line: Providing only the ultimate customized private dining experience. Every meal is an unrepeatable piece of art. Serious inquiries only. Everything was ready. I just needed to wait for the rats to walk into the trap. Sure enough, on the third night, Henry furiously poked at the salad on his plate and let out a very deliberate, heavy sigh. “Man, eating those mass-produced diet meals at work for the past few days has completely ruined my appetite. I am so used to your god-tier cooking. Outside food is basically inedible.” I put down my fork. Frowning, I put on a highly distressed act. “Henry, it is not that I want to be cruel and ignore you. This project is at its most critical stage right now. I am working around the clock.” Seeing the growing frustration in his eyes, I quickly pivoted. “However…” I pulled out my phone and pushed the screen toward him. It was the ordering page for Velvet Spoon. “A friend in the catering circle recommended this place to me. They specialize in ultra-luxury private meals and only take a limited number of orders every day. I reviewed their menu with a very critical eye. Their ingredients and techniques are honestly even more meticulous than mine. You can order from them for now to treat your stomach.” Henry stared at the exquisite food photos on the screen, raising his eyebrows in disbelief. “Are you serious? Can it really be as good as your cooking?” “Absolutely.” My tone was firm, carrying the authority of a professional. “The head chef has incredible skills, and many of their rare ingredients are flown in daily. You can trust me on this. It will definitely hit the spot.” His eyes darted around. He probably figured that a place recommended by an executive chef like me could not possibly be bad. Passing it off to Lexi for her videos would definitely work. He immediately put on a grateful smile. “Alright. As long as you recommend it, I will place an order tomorrow.” 3 Early the next morning, my phone screen lit up with a crisp notification chime. Client Lexi placed a six-hundred-dollar order for a “Chef’s Exclusive Blind Box Meal.” The delivery address was a highly secured luxury apartment building downtown, a place I had never set foot in. I stared at the name on the order, a cold smirk curling on my lips. Turning around to enter the kitchen, I tied on my dark black apron and began prepping the ingredients methodically. It was the same premium Wagyu beef. The same tedious cooking process. But this time, to make the evidence completely airtight, I had set up high-definition cameras in every blind spot of the kitchen. From trimming the meat to julienning the vegetables, and all the way to the precise final plating, every single movement was recorded in crystal clarity. A red timestamp accurate to the second flashed in the bottom right corner of the footage. Not only that, but when adding the final garnishes to each dish, I used a special edible pigment that only glowed under UV light. I painted a tiny, exclusive watermark at the bottom of an inconspicuous side dish. At exactly seven-thirty in the morning, Lexi’s video went live on her social platforms. In the footage, she smiled at the camera like an innocent angel, carefully opening that terribly familiar walnut wood box. “Good morning babies! Look at how breathtaking today’s bento is! To get this perfect color, I was busy in the kitchen since five AM. Honestly, I am so exhausted. But whenever I think about the look of surprise on his face when he opens it for lunch, I feel like all the hard work is worth it.” She babbled on about her so-called cooking tips, completely omitting the fact that this was a six-hundred-dollar takeout order. Of course she couldn’t mention it. Her meticulously crafted label was the perfect girlfriend who cooked with love. If she admitted these art-like meals were bought with money, her fragile tower of lies would instantly collapse. Just like that, an absurd and sickening cycle was officially established. For every single delivery and pickup that followed, I hired private investigators to record the entire handoff process from start to finish. Every exorbitant meal payment was processed through corporate bank accounts, leaving behind undeniable transfer records in the banking system. A full month passed. Day after day. During this month, I acted like an emotionless machine, personally serving twenty-three exquisite meals to my own rival. And Lexi, feeding off my blood and sweat, crazily pumped out fifteen viral videos with millions of views. Her follower count skyrocketed from six hundred thousand to eight hundred thousand. Moreover, she signed five endorsement deals with high-end kitchenware and food brands in one breath. The total endorsement fees amounted to millions of dollars. The massive profit completely blinded her. She even started dropping bold hints in her core fan group, claiming that she and her mysterious, wealthy boyfriend were about to walk down the aisle. As for Henry, his status at the agency rose alongside his cash cow’s soaring popularity. His attitude toward me became unprecedentedly gentle and considerate. A few days ago, he even bought me a limited-edition Hermes bag, claiming it was a fat bonus he got for leading a highly successful project. I sat on the couch holding that expensive leather bag against my chest. Looking into his eyes full of deep affection and deceit, I felt a violent wave of nausea churn in my stomach. Using dirty money earned by draining my lifeblood to buy me a pacifying gift? This was truly the most vicious dark comedy in the world. Swallowing the disgust, I gently looped my arm through his, blooming with an incredibly gentle smile. “Thank you, honey. You are so good to me.” I was waiting. Like a hunter holding her breath in the dark, waiting for the exact moment the prey let its guard down completely. I wanted to wait until she climbed to the clouds, to the absolute peak where everyone was looking up at her. And then, I would personally and ruthlessly kick away the ladder I had built for her. I wanted to watch her fall from the sky, shattering into pieces, never to recover. And that perfect moment was fast approaching. 4 To permanently solidify Lexi’s genius chef title, her management agency poured massive funds into planning a huge live stream event to pamper her fans. They bombarded every social media platform with teaser ads. They claimed Lexi would flawlessly recreate her hardest signature dish live in front of hundreds of thousands of fans this Saturday at eight PM. It was meant to be a vicious slap in the face to all the haters who accused her of using a ghost chef. The moment this bombshell dropped, her eight hundred thousand followers completely lost their minds. They flooded the comments, swearing to camp in the live stream to witness their goddess’s moment of glory. I stared at the provocative promo poster on my phone screen. The blood in my veins began to boil. I knew the time to close the net had finally arrived. At seven PM on Saturday, I pushed open my walk-in closet and pulled out a grey delivery uniform I had prepared long ago. I put on a black baseball cap and a thick medical mask, hiding my features flawlessly. Finally, I personally packed the freshly cooked, steaming ultimate love bento into a massive black thermal delivery bag. At seven fifty-five PM, my car parked precisely outside Lexi’s luxury apartment building. At eight PM sharp, Lexi’s live stream kicked off amidst a frenzy of comments. On screen, she was wearing a pure white silk French dress that hugged her curves perfectly. The open kitchen behind her glowed with warm ambient lighting. The marble countertops were spotless, looking as if they had never seen a drop of real grease. “Hello babies, I am right on time! Seeing the chat going so crazy makes me want to cry! To thank you all for your love, tonight I will show you step by step how to make the highly requested French butter-baked lobster right here on camera!” The screen was instantly buried in colorful comments screaming about how beautiful she looked and how perfect she was. She turned around and began pretending to prep the lobster on the cutting board. Her knife skills were incredibly clumsy. Even her grip on the handle was wrong. Anyone with eyes could tell she was an absolute amateur who never cooked. But she was very cunning. She knew exactly how to use camera angles to hide her guilt. Most of the time, she just let the camera zoom in on her innocent, makeup-perfected face. Whenever she needed to show precise knife work, the producer would instantly cut to a pre-recorded close-up video. Halfway through the stream, she put down her knife and picked up tweezers to prepare for plating. She elegantly wiped her fingers with a paper towel while giving the camera her signature sweet smile. “Actually, the ultimate secret to making top-tier food isn’t having master-level skills. It is about whether you cook with love. As long as your heart is full of that special someone, every bite of food you make will have the power to conquer the world.” Standing outside the door of her apartment, I looked at her hypocritical face on my phone screen. A cruel smirk curled on my lips. Now was the time. I took a deep breath and pressed the doorbell hard. Inside the live stream, Lexi, who was just about to brush butter on the lobster, clearly got spooked. Her hand froze in mid-air. But she quickly adjusted her expression, winking playfully at the camera. “Give me half a minute, babies. It might be my clumsy assistant who forgot her keys again, dropping something off for me.” To maintain the illusion of an unscripted, natural vibe, she did not mute her microphone or turn off the camera as she walked out of the frame. Along with the sound of the deadbolt turning, the heavy door swung open. When she saw a person dressed in a baggy delivery uniform, completely bundled up from head to toe, her delicate face instantly dropped. Her eyebrows twisted in pure disgust. “I didn’t order any takeout. You are on the wrong floor. Get lost!” I completely ignored her demands. Lowering my voice on purpose, I used the exhausted, robotic tone of a delivery driver and asked loudly, “Good evening, are you Miss Lexi?” “Yes, what exactly do you want…” I did not give her a chance to finish her sentence. Capitalizing on her moment of confusion, I forced my shoulder forward and aggressively squeezed into the entryway. My half-body, clad in the shabby uniform, was fully exposed to the high-definition camera pointing right at the door. I lifted the massive delivery box with both hands. My voice was not overly loud, but thanks to the highly sensitive microphone clipped to her collar, every single word exploded clearly across the entire live stream. “Miss Lexi, this is your twenty-fourth premium Velvet Spoon meal this month. Please open the box to verify your items. If the quality is to your liking, the platform requires a five-star review.” The chat, which had been scrolling at lightning speed a second ago, suddenly froze as if someone hit the pause button. A bizarre, three-second dead silence followed. Immediately after, the entire screen was devoured by a dense swarm of massive question marks that nearly crashed the servers. “Wait, am I blind? What delivery?” “Hold up! Did I hear that right? Isn’t the streamer cooking this herself? Why is food being delivered right now?!” “Velvet Spoon? Isn’t that the most expensive private delivery kitchen in the city? The one that costs hundreds of dollars a meal?!” Within a fraction of a second, all the color drained from Lexi’s face. She looked paler than the white dress she was wearing. Like a cat getting its tail stepped on, she spun around in sheer terror. Flailing her arms, she lunged forward, trying to cover my mouth and push me out the door. But my legs were planted to the ground like lead weights. No matter how hard she shoved, I did not budge an inch. Ignoring her hysterical panic, I continued in the same dead, emotionless tone, delivering the fatal blow. “Also, our head chef found out that you have been using our restaurant’s meals to shoot your fifteen viral videos, gaining two hundred thousand followers in the process. To thank you for your incredibly dedicated free promotion, the chef specifically instructed that VIP clients like you will get a ten percent discount on all future orders.” As soon as the words left my mouth, I cleanly flipped open the lid of the black thermal bag right in front of hundreds of thousands of watching eyes. I respectfully pulled out that walnut wood bento box she knew so well. With a soft click, I popped open the brass latch. Resting quietly inside the box was a French butter-baked lobster. It was exactly identical to the half-finished mess sitting on the kitchen island behind me, but infinitely more perfect. The rich color of the sauce, the artistic plating, and the top-tier aroma radiating from the ingredients completely destroyed her pathetic, half-baked attempt. “Miss Lexi, your food has arrived. Please enjoy.” The live chat detonated like a nuclear bomb. “Holy shit! The biggest tea of the year! All her viral meals were bought with money!” “Ordering takeout twenty-three times a month? Girl, you don’t even turn on your stove once a year!” “Lmao she is so busted! One second she is preaching about cooking with love, and the next second the delivery guy drops off the original dish! The second-hand embarrassment is killing me!” Lexi let out a bloodcurdling scream. She scrambled toward the kitchen counter like a madwoman, trying to rip the power cord out of the broadcasting equipment. But it was way too late. 5 The five-minute screen recording of the live stream spread like a winged plague across all social platforms at an unbelievable speed. #LexiBitesFake #DeliveryChef #FakePersonaDestroyed These three explosive hashtags acted like sharp knives, pinning themselves firmly to the top three spots on the trending charts. The internet’s rage and thirst for gossip were fully ignited. Netizens turned into microscopic detectives, comparing every single frame of my dramatic entrance with all of Lexi’s past videos. Eventually, the entire internet reached one united, ironclad conclusion: Not a single stunning dish on the LexiBites account was actually cooked by her. Lexi’s follower count suffered an avalanche. She lost two hundred thousand followers overnight, and the red downward curve was still plunging at a terrifying speed. Terrified, she frantically disabled comments across all her platforms. But the fans who felt lied to and manipulated flooded her direct messages with vicious, vulgar insults. A much more lethal blow followed closely behind. Out of the five brands that had just signed massive contracts with her, three reacted with ruthless speed. They teamed up with PR firms to issue severe termination statements. They mercilessly accused Lexi of malicious false advertising and fraudulent behavior, stating she severely violated their brand values and committed a fundamental breach of contract. The statements clearly warned that if Lexi failed to clarify the truth and restore their brand reputation within twenty-four hours, they would not hesitate to take legal action. They would demand a full refund of the endorsement fees, plus a penalty three times that amount. The total damages demanded by the three brands reached a number that would bankrupt her completely: 2.8 million dollars. Meanwhile, the other mastermind behind this storm, my dear husband Henry, was currently standing in his boss’s spacious corner office, getting chewed out like a stray dog with its tail between its legs. How did I know the details so clearly? Because half a month ago, while he was taking a shower, I had planted an ultra-micro listening device inside the Montblanc pen he always carried with him. “Henry! Open your damn eyes and look at the massive mess you created! You were the one who pushed so hard to make Lexi our cash cow. Now she has caused this apocalyptic scandal, and the entire agency’s reputation is being dragged through the mud! I am giving you until the end of the day to bury this, no matter the cost! If you can’t, pack your bags and get the hell out!” “Boss, please let me explain… I am already contacting the crisis PR team. I will handle it immediately!” “Get out! I want a mitigation plan on my desk in five minutes!” Following a loud slam, the phone call was brutally disconnected. Through the bug, I heard Henry angrily kicking a trash can, followed by a vicious curse. A few seconds later, he dialed Lexi’s number. “Lexi, is your brain full of water?! Who the hell was that delivery driver? Who did you piss off to make them want to destroy you like this?!” Lexi’s mental breakdown immediately echoed through the phone, accompanied by violent sobbing. “How am I supposed to know who that lunatic is! Henry, I am completely finished. The brands’ lawyers already sent the letters to my email. 2.8 million dollars in damages! Even if you sold my organs, I couldn’t pay that! You have to help me, I am begging you, please help me!” “How am I supposed to help you? I can barely keep my own job right now!” There was not a single trace of pity in Henry’s voice, only the explosive irritability and disgust of a man backed into a corner. “I warned you from the very beginning to actually learn some basic knife skills so you could fake it properly for the camera! But you insisted it would ruin your manicure! Now you got caught red-handed. Are you happy now?!” “What is the point of saying all this in hindsight?! Henry, stop acting like the good guy! You were the one who personally suggested it! You said using the meals your ugly wife made for you would be free and foolproof! What, now that everything blew up, you want to throw me under the bus and make me take the fall?!” Oh? Sitting on the couch, I raised an eyebrow. So the root of all this evil, this utterly shameless scheme, was actually proposed by my gentle, sophisticated husband. I let out an incredibly delighted sneer. With a flick of my finger, I packed this brilliant audio recording, along with all the surveillance footage, bank statements, and photos I had gathered over the past month, into a hidden encrypted folder. Henry, since you love playing with fire so much, your time is finally up.

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