It started after my husband hired a couple of thugs to trash the flower stall I’d set up outside the university gates. So I took a bouquet of roses to the graduation ceremony of the student he was sponsoring. My husband, a tenured professor at the college, was on stage, adjusting the tassel on her mortarboard. As he smiled and posed with her for a photograph, I switched on my portable megaphone. “Two for the price of one, folks! The professor and his protégée, sharing a bed and a diploma! Roses are three for a dollar today—my wedding gift to the happy couple!” A sea of stunned, naïve faces turned to stare. And up on that stage, Professor Arthur Pierce—my calm, composed husband—panicked for the second time in his life. 1. The first time was the day I found out he was cheating. It was a perfectly ordinary Friday. He came home after his weekly graduate seminar, just like always, but this time he collapsed with stomach pain so severe he nearly passed out. His tweed jacket smelled of cayenne and fried chicken. Arthur has a sensitive stomach. He never eats spicy food. I called his teaching assistant, and that’s when I learned there was a new student in his seminar. Arthur had taken her out for Nashville hot chicken, just because she wanted to try it. “It’s not a big deal,” I told the TA, my voice steady. “Just, your professor’s stomach can’t handle things like that. In the future, could you please make sure he avoids it?” The voice on the other end hesitated. “Ma’am… honestly, Sadie… she doesn’t even meet the qualifications to be in the seminar.” A strange, sharp thought exploded in my mind. Arthur was resting in bed, his brow furrowed in discomfort even in his sleep. After two decades together, we were an open book to each other. I unlocked his phone without any trouble. The group chat for the seminar looked normal. At first. [Arthur Pierce: Next time, try to stay awake during the discussion.] [Sadie: But it’s so boring. What if I just look at you instead? I know I won’t get sleepy if I’m looking at you.] [Arthur Pierce: Fine.] [Sadie: Calling you ‘Professor Pierce’ feels so old-fashioned. Can I call you ‘Professor A’? Or maybe just Arthur? Pretty please?] [Arthur Pierce: Whatever you want.] [Sadie: xoxo! (heart_emoji.gif)] I pulled out my own phone, checked the profile picture, and confirmed that this Sadie was the girl I knew. A knot of pressure formed in my chest, tight and suffocating. Arthur woke as the daylight began to fade. I handed him a glass of water. Next to it, I placed his phone, open to their chat. In the time he’d been asleep, Sadie had sent him a dozen more messages. “Professor A, can we get hot chicken again tomorrow?” “Professor A, I’m so stuck on this paper. Can I get my handsome professor to ghostwrite it for me? I’ll let you be the second author!” She was a senior, an undergraduate not even on the graduate track. There was absolutely no reason, academic or otherwise, for her to be in Arthur’s master’s level seminar. “Get her out of the group,” I said, my voice quiet. “She doesn’t belong there. She’ll drag down the rest of the students.” I took a breath. “We can pretend this never happened.” Twenty years. I was trying to give him an ounce of dignity. Arthur’s gaze landed on the glowing screen. He squinted at me. “Nora.” “If I hadn’t married you, you’d still be just a girl selling flowers on a street corner.” 2. I’ve always been a supportive wife. I listen to my husband. So, the very next day, I put my hair up, went to the entrance of Blackwood University, and set up a flower stall. On the wrapping paper for each bouquet, I thoughtfully printed screenshots of Arthur and Sadie’s text messages. Over the years, I had become a familiar face on campus. Faculty and students knew me. As soon as I set up, one of Arthur’s former students wandered over. “Mrs. Pierce? What are you doing out here? Is everything okay with you and the professor?” I handed him a freshly wrapped bouquet. “Everything’s fine. Your professor just has another family to support now.” My voice was light, conspiratorial. “You know how it is. Younger women, they have expensive tastes. I’m just worried he’s going to run himself into the ground trying to keep up.” I let the venom seep out, my words deliberately cruel and suggestive. Within a day, the rumors about Professor Pierce and his young new protégée were tearing across campus. The second time I set up my stall, a couple of thugs showed up and kicked it to pieces, stomping my flowers into the pavement. “Lady,” one of them sneered, “someone sent us with a message. Know when to quit.” Of course, I didn’t listen. That same afternoon, I went from the campus security office to the Dean’s office, and finally, I filed a formal complaint with the university’s ethics board. I cried at every stop. Arthur was summoned for a meeting. He came home early that evening, not lingering at the university. “Nora, that’s enough.” I just snorted. “We’re just getting started. You did the disgusting deed, Arthur. Don’t tell me you’re getting scared now.” He sighed heavily, tossing his briefcase onto the sofa, his expression a mask of frustration. “None of this had to happen, Nora. We could have talked this through.” He looked at me with pure disappointment. “If our marriage is over, it’s because you pushed it there.” He was blaming me. He was blaming me for my hysteria, for shattering the perfect facade of our ugly marriage. He was the one who had been unfaithful, who had betrayed twenty years of history, yet here he stood on the moral high ground, accusing me of being the crazy one, the one whose unhinged behavior was driving him away. “Did I make you cheat on me, Arthur?” He laughed, a cold, bitter sound. “Have you forgotten who brought Sadie into our home in the first place, Nora?” My stomach dropped. A wave of nausea, so profound it was suffocating, washed over me. That girl. I had sponsored her. Adopted her, in everything but name. I brought her into our home. For nearly ten years, I had cherished her like a daughter. “You make me sick, Arthur.” For the first time, we looked at each other and saw a stranger. That night, Arthur moved out. And Sadie went with him.

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The day before I was supposed to walk down the aisle, my best friend Sophia and I were kidnapped by a cartel and dragged to a remote island off the coast of Colombia. My fiancé, Ethan Cole, a former Navy EOD specialist, planned a secret mercenary rescue. But the plan went to hell. The cartel leader strapped a vest of explosives to my chest. And as the rescue chopper’s blades beat the humid air, Ethan looked at Sophia, her body wracked with tremors, and then he looked at me, a human time bomb. To calm her, he didn’t hesitate. He swept Sophia into his arms and carried her onto the helicopter. Leaving me behind to wait for a rescue that never came. For six years, I was the cartel kingpin’s property. I carried four of his children. None of them survived. Then came the fifth pregnancy. An ultrasound confirmed it was a boy, and the monster holding me captive finally loosened his grip, allowing me to be moved to a mainland hospital to ensure the heir’s survival. It was the only chance I’d ever had. I made contact with an undercover DEA agent, feeding him everything I knew. Together, we brought the entire network down. I came home, my body a wreck, my belly swollen, only to find Ethan at that same hospital, his arm wrapped gently around Sophia as she got her own prenatal check-up. His face turned to stone when he saw me. “Why couldn’t you have just stayed gone?” he asked, his voice a low growl. My own voice was a trembling whisper. “But Ethan… you said you’d never give up on me.” 1 I stumbled after him, my fingers just grazing the sleeve of his jacket. He turned, and the look in his eyes was so cold it burned, a frost that seeped straight into my bones. My whole body shuddered. My legs gave out, and I collapsed in a heap against the cold tile of the hallway wall. “Why?” I tilted my head back, looking up at Ethan and Sophia, who stood over me like twin statues carved from ice. The question that had been buried in my heart for six years finally clawed its way out. Six years I had scraped by, surviving moment to moment on a forgotten island, and I come home to find my fiancé cradling another woman’s baby bump, planning the lavish wedding that was supposed to have been ours. Ethan pulled Sophia closer, shielding her behind him. His brow was knitted, a flicker of something—pity? memory?—in his eyes. For a second, I thought he might reach down for me. But then his gaze dropped to the gentle swell of Sophia’s stomach, and that flicker of warmth vanished. “Just let it go, Evelyn,” he said, his voice devoid of any emotion. “I’ve done more than enough for you.” His eyes, full of contempt, swept over my own pregnant belly. I forced a smile that felt more like a grimace, a desperate, pleading thing. My voice shook uncontrollably. “Ethan, please, let me explain… The baby… none of this is what you think. I wrote to you, didn’t you get my letters? You have to know…” I was naive enough to think it was just my “unholy” child he couldn’t stand. My words only made his frown deepen. Before he could speak, Sophia cut in with a soft, mournful sigh. “Evie, don’t do this to yourself,” she said, her hand resting protectively on her stomach. Her face was a mask of profound sorrow. “Six years ago, when the Cole family’s company was on the verge of bankruptcy, you staged your own kidnapping with criminals to try and get your hands on Ethan’s shares.” “He nearly bankrupted himself trying to raise the money to save you,” she continued, her voice breaking with theatrical pain. “And you… you chose to stay with that man, all for money and a life of luxury.” She paused, letting the poison sink in before delivering the final, unthinkable blow. “The scandal… the shock of it killed his grandmother.” A roar filled my ears, and the world went white. Staged it myself? For his shares? Killed his grandmother? Sophia kept talking, her gentle voice a swarm of needles piercing my heart. In her version of the story, I was a monster, a manipulative, black-hearted villain. When she finished, she put on an air of magnanimous grace. “But don’t you worry. What’s past is past. If you’ll let us, Ethan and I will give you a generous sum. Enough to make sure you’re comfortable for the rest of your life.” “Hah.” A humorless, disgusted sound escaped Ethan’s lips. He took a step back, pulling Sophia with him. He took her hand, his voice softening as he spoke to her. “You’re too kind, Soph. Always have been. If you hadn’t been there for me… I don’t know what I would have become.” He looked back at me, his face hard again. “Let’s go. Don’t waste another breath on a woman like her. It’s not worth it.” I was frozen, my lips sealed shut as if by glue. I couldn’t form a single word. “But you were the one who took her!” The words burst out of me in a desperate, wounded shout, tears finally streaming down my face. “You put Sophia on the helicopter and left me on that island to work as an informant!” Ethan just laughed, a bitter, self-mocking sound. He said I was always the same, always shifting blame, always painting myself as a hero. He was tired of it. I tried to speak again, to force the story of those six years of humiliation and struggle past my lips. But a sharp, twisting pain erupted in my abdomen, stealing my breath and draining all the strength from my body. My hand flew to my belly, trembling. I felt a sticky warmth spreading through my clothes. The pain intensified, a heavy, pulling sensation deep inside. I looked down. A bright, crimson river was trickling down my inner thigh, dripping, drop by drop, onto the pristine white floor. “Doctor! Somebody get a doctor!” The sight of the blood shattered Ethan’s composure. His shout was raw, instinctive. But Sophia leaned in close, whispering something urgent in his ear, words only for him. The last trace of panic on Ethan’s face evaporated. He retracted every ounce of concern, turned his back on me, and walked away without a second glance. I watched him go, the air growing thin in my lungs. The world began to spin, and my consciousness sank into a deep, welcoming darkness. As they wheeled me into the operating room, I vaguely heard a nurse’s anxious voice. “What do we do? The next of kin outside says she’s allergic to anesthesia!” “But she’s this far along… a D&C without anesthesia? The pain will kill her!”

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This was the third time I’d sued my husband’s mistress. And this time, he was finally angry. He didn’t come home to plead with me to drop the lawsuit, not like the first two times. Instead, my phone buzzed with the full force of his fury. “Three years, Bianca. A new lawsuit every year. Don’t you think you’ve made your point?” His voice was a low growl, stripped of any warmth it once held for me. “You have no idea what I’m capable of. If it weren’t for you, for what we were, I have a million ways to make life hell for anyone who messes with Jaz. I’m warning you. This is the last time.” The implication was clear: his restraint was a gift. My last gift. Any more trouble, and that restraint would vanish. A cold laugh escaped my lips. “Is that a threat, Ethan? Go on. Try and ruin me.” He wanted a quiet life with his little lover, a neat little happily-ever-after. I would give him a war instead. He hung up, the silence on the line as violent as his words. In turn, I called my lawyer and filed an injunction to freeze all our marital assets. 01 We were married for five years. For three of them, Ethan had treated me like a ghost. We met in college, the kind of couple everyone pointed to as proof that true love existed. We were the campus sweethearts, the ones destined to make it. It took us five years to get from that campus to the altar. It took him two years to cheat on me. She was his new assistant. Jasmine. I found them. Not in a motel, not in some sordid apartment, but in our home. He had her tucked under his arm, shielding her as if I were the threat. “Bianca, don’t blame her,” he said, his voice firm. “This is on me. I started it.” “Why?” The word was a shard of glass in my throat. Seven years of my life, undone by a girl who couldn’t have been more than twenty-two. “We were out with clients. Someone slipped something in my drink. If Jaz hadn’t been there… I could have lost everything.” His eyes softened as he looked down at her, a wave of tenderness washing over his face. “She’s just a kid, Bianca. An innocent girl. She’s with me now. I have to protect her. I can’t let her get hurt.” His words hit me like a physical blow. Ethan was a self-made man, his success built on a mountain of networking events and schmoozing dinners. I was there for all of it. To help him secure funding, I’d sat through countless dinners with lecherous investors, their hands lingering too long on my arm, their eyes crawling over my skin. I’d smiled through it all, for him. For us. An innocent girl. Can’t let her get hurt. Was that it? Was I no longer clean in his eyes? Was I tainted by the very world I’d helped him conquer? Was that his excuse to find solace in the arms of his wide-eyed assistant? Then what were all my sacrifices for? What was I? 02 Ethan didn’t show up for the deposition. But his mistress did. “Bianca. Name your price. What will it take to make this go away?” She was dressed head-to-toe in runway-fresh Dior, dripping in jewels that I knew for a fact were not family heirlooms. The timid girl I’d first seen clinging to my husband was gone. In her place stood a woman sculpted by Ethan’s money. He had polished her well over the last three years. “I want to speak with Ethan,” I said, my voice flat. A smug smile played on her lips. “Me being here is his statement. He’s sick of you, Bianca. He can’t even stand to look at you anymore.” Her eyes, cold and dismissive, swept over me. “This has always been about money, right?” She slid a document across the polished table. A divorce settlement. “Sign it. I talked to E, and he agreed to be generous. An extra ten million.” It was our money. Money I had helped him earn. Yet here she was, framing it as a handout, a gift she had magnanimously convinced him to bestow upon me. I met her gaze, my own eyes turning to ice. “I said, I’ll speak with Ethan.” “About what? The divorce?” She let out a light, tinkling laugh. “You’ve sued me for three years. And what have you gotten out of it? Nothing. In fact, every time you file a suit, Ethan feels so guilty about what I have to go through. He spoils me even more.” She leaned forward, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. “He’s bought me cars, condos… a portfolio. Honestly, I should be thanking you. These last three years have been very, very profitable. Two hundred million, all in my name.” Her gaze was pure condescension. “Why do you have to be so pathetic? Fifty million is more than fair. Don’t be that woman. Take the deal while I’m in a good mood. Sign the papers and walk away.” Her smile tightened. “Because if you don’t, I promise you, what he offers next will be far less.” He was giving his mistress assets worth hundreds of millions, and offering me fifty million to disappear. I clung to the last shred of my dignity. “I’m not signing anything. As long as I’m his wife, you’ll always be the other woman.” “You—” Jasmine’s face contorted with rage, and her hand flew towards my face. I caught her wrist, my grip like steel. “And as long as I am legally his wife, every single dollar he gave you is marital property. You think you’re going to keep that two hundred million? Enjoy it while it lasts.” “Bianca! Let her go.” Ethan. He stormed in, his face a thundercloud, and roughly wrenched my arm away, shoving me back. I stumbled, my knee cracking hard against the leg of a chair. A bolt of sharp, searing pain shot up my leg. He didn’t even glance at me. His attention was solely on Jasmine, his hands framing her face, his eyes frantic with a worry he never showed me anymore. “Are you okay? Did she hurt you?” The arrogant woman from moments before vanished. Jasmine buried her face in his chest, her shoulders shaking with silent, theatrical sobs. Ethan’s gaze finally found me, and it was utterly devoid of warmth. “Bianca, what did I tell you? You want to fight, you fight with me. You don’t touch her. Haven’t you learned anything in the last three years?” 03 That was the incident that changed everything. For slapping his mistress, Ethan didn’t just fire me from the executive position I held at our company; he moved out of our home and into hers. I screamed. I cried. I pleaded. I fell apart. In response, he blocked my number, blocked my email, and vanished from my life completely. That was my “lesson.” The only way to see him, the only way to force him to face me, was to drag his new life into the harsh light of a courtroom. So I filed suit against Jasmine, for misappropriation of marital assets. It was the one thing he couldn’t ignore. He couldn’t stand the thought of her name being dragged through legal proceedings. So he would appear. He would finally see me. And each time, it was the same. He would demand to know when I was going to stop. He would warn me that next time, he wouldn’t be so lenient. He would slide a divorce settlement across the table, his only goal to make her an honest woman. I stared at him now, the pain in my knee a dull throb. “What other lessons do you have for me, Ethan? Bring them on. Do you really think there’s anything left for me to be afraid of?” His jaw tightened, a flicker of something unreadable in his eyes. Jasmine, nestled in his arms, chose that moment to look up, her eyes shimmering with perfectly formed tears. “E, it’s all my fault… I shouldn’t have come to see her. I was just so worried about your reputation, about the company you worked so hard to build…” She pressed her cheek against his chest, her voice choked with emotion. “I don’t care about any of it. The cars, the condos, everything… I’ll give it all to her. If she’ll just leave you in peace, I’ll give up everything…” It was a masterful performance. “Bianca, it’s been three years,” Ethan said, his voice heavy with exhaustion. “Haven’t you had enough?” He looked at me, his eyes dark and clouded. “You’ve tortured us for three years. Isn’t it time to let go of your anger?” He had ignored me for three years. Frozen me out for three years. Flaunted his love for another woman for three years. Ground my dignity into dust for three years. And now he was accusing me of torturing him. 04 A laugh, sharp and brittle, broke from my lips. “Enough? It’s not nearly enough. You want peace, Ethan? You should have thought of that before you destroyed mine. I’m not done. I want everyone to know what you are: a man who betrays his vows. And I want everyone to know what she is: a homewrecker who knew exactly what she was doing.” “I am going to nail you both to the cross of public opinion.” Ethan’s expression was one of pure disdain. “Look at you, Bianca. Listen to yourself. You sound like some unhinged woman screaming on a street corner. What happened to you?” He shook his head, a cruel smirk on his face. “And for the record, Jaz is not a homewrecker. In love, Bianca, the one who isn’t loved is the other woman.” So that’s what I was to him now. The other woman. Tears welled, hot and furious, but I refused to let them fall. My hand shot out, grabbing the heavy ceramic coffee mug from the table. With a guttural cry, I hurled it at his head. “Ah—!” Jasmine shrieked. The dark brown liquid mixed with the bright red of his blood, dripping down his temple. Ethan stared at me, his eyes wide with shock. Three years. We had argued, we had iced each other out, we had lived in a state of cold war for three excruciating years. But this was the first time I had ever laid a hand on him. He wiped the blood from his brow with the back of his hand and, with a chilling calmness, slapped the divorce papers down on the table once more. “There. You’ve hit me, you’ve had your tantrum. You should feel better now. Sign the papers.” 05 Jasmine stepped toward me, her face a mask of patronizing pity. “Bianca, please… don’t do this to Ethan anymore. Do you really want me to get on my knees and beg you—” Before she could finish her sentence, I slapped her. Hard. The crack echoed in the silent room. “A mistress doesn’t get a speaking part in this conversation,” I spat. As I raised my hand for a second time, Ethan lunged, his fingers clamping around my wrist like a vice. He yanked me back, flinging me away from her. I lost my balance, my head slamming against the sharp corner of the conference table. A warm, wet sensation instantly flooded my hairline. But he wasn’t looking at me. “Did you forget my warning, Bianca?” His voice was dangerously low. “You forced my hand.” He pulled out his phone and dialed. “Get all of Bianca’s things out of the house. Now. Pack them in a box and leave it on the curb. And change the locks. She is not to set foot on that property again.” I pressed a hand to my bleeding forehead, staring at him in disbelief. “Ethan… you told me that was our forever home.” For a split second, seeing the blood, his brow furrowed. Just a flicker. Then it was gone. He turned his back on me, wrapping a protective arm around Jasmine. “You brought this on yourself, Bianca. I told you. Come after me, but you leave Jaz out of it.” He scooped her up into his arms. “This is the last time I’m going easy on you. You’d be wise to remember that.” His gaze softened as he looked down at the woman in his arms. “Jaz, I’m so sorry you had to go through that. Let’s get you to a doctor.” A single slap, and she needed a doctor. I was bleeding freely from my head, and he saw right through me. Jasmine wrapped her arms around his neck, but her triumphant gaze was locked on me. “E, what about Bianca? She’s hurt, too. Shouldn’t you—” Ethan’s voice was like a blade. “She’s an irrelevant person. Not worth my time.” Ten years of love, erased. I was irrelevant. Not worth his time. 06 I drove home in a daze. Home. The housekeeper, a woman who had worked for us for years, blocked the doorway. “Ma’am, Mr. Scott said you’re not allowed inside anymore.” She pointed to a single, small cardboard box sitting on the porch steps. “He said you could take your personal clothing, but nothing else from the house.” That small box. Sitting there like a piece of trash. A low, hysterical laugh bubbled up from my chest. So this was it. This was the grand finale. This was the future I had chosen when I ignored every warning, burned every bridge, and threw my entire life behind one man. Tears finally blurred my vision. Ethan was a man of his word, after all. One slap was all it took. He was so cruel. He knew. He knew I had no other family to turn to. He had been my only family. This house was the only anchor I had left. Why was he doing this? What had I done to deserve this bottomless cruelty? I don’t know how long I stood there, frozen on the sidewalk. Eventually, a car pulled up, and Olivia got out. My best friend. In this entire city, she was the one person I still had. She took one look at my face, at the box, and her own face hardened. She practically forced me into the passenger seat of her car. “That son of a bitch,” she seethed. “Ethan is a goddamn monster.” She glanced at me, her eyes full of pain. “Bianca, why are you still holding on to this? You’re miserable, and you’re making him miserable.” I stared out the window at the blurry city lights. “He’s not miserable, Liv,” I rasped. “He’s got his perfect little doll to comfort him.” Olivia was silent for a long time. “He’s never gone this far before, no matter how bad your fights were. What happened today?” The tears started again, hot tracks down my cold cheeks. “I slapped her. His precious Jasmine. Just once.” Olivia slammed her fist on the steering wheel. “Bia, don’t you think you deserve better? Does it really have to be him?” I wiped my eyes, a hollow feeling echoing inside me. “It’s not about him anymore, Liv. It’s the sheer injustice of it all. The boy who promised me forever under the autumn leaves on the main quad… how did he become this… this cold, cruel stranger? I just want an answer. What does she have that I don’t?” Olivia’s voice was laced with a helpless frustration. “Bia, you’re a hundred times the woman she’ll ever be. Ethan is blind. He’s an idiot.” She paused, trying to find some logic. “Look, maybe this lawsuit just hit a nerve, maybe he lost a lot of money and he’s lashing out. He’ll cool down… maybe he’ll…” She trailed off, then tried again. “He can’t feel nothing for you. If he was truly indifferent, why would he let you torment him for three years without ever really fighting back? He never used his real power against you until now…” “Feelings? Indifferent?” My laugh was a broken, trembling thing. “He knows I cut off my family for him. He knows I have nowhere else to go. He promised me that house would always be my home… and today, he threw me out like garbage.” Olivia’s own eyes welled up. “All those years… from college kids to this… How did it ever come to this?” That’s right. How? I wanted an answer, too. 07 I spent days in a fog at Olivia’s apartment. Finally, she dragged me out of bed. “Where are we going?” I asked, my voice listless. “To get you some justice,” she replied. I instinctively recoiled. “Liv, please. This is between Ethan and me. Don’t get involved.” “I’ve invited a few of our old friends from college.” She took my cold hand in hers. “With us there, maybe Ethan will be reminded of the woman you are. The woman he fell in love with.” “This is a chance for you two to actually talk.” Her voice was soft, full of hope. “I don’t believe that two people who loved each other that fiercely can just… stop. There has to be something left.” I stood there, stunned. Three years. Over a thousand days. And in every single encounter, every single confrontation, he had said nothing. He would just watch me with those cold eyes, push the divorce papers toward me, and utter the same five brutal words in the same flat tone: “Just sign it, Bianca.” Could we really talk? Olivia’s desperate hope on my behalf made my nose sting. The private room she’d booked was at the same restaurant where Ethan had proposed. Standing outside the door, I felt a dizzying wave of vertigo, as if the past ten years were collapsing in on me. I could almost hear his voice from that night, thick with emotion: “Bianca, be my girlfriend. I’ll love you for the rest of my life.” Through the door, I could hear the muffled voices of our friends. “Ethan, has it really come to this? Is divorce the only option?” “Yeah, man. A woman on the side is one thing, but you don’t throw away a marriage like yours.” “You and Bianca have been through so much. Whatever it is, just work it out. Get it out of your system and go home.” Then, Ethan’s voice, calm and resolute. “This isn’t just a fling. I’m serious about her.” The room went quiet for a moment. Then someone else spoke. “I just don’t get it, Ethan. I’ve met your new girlfriend. She’s… fine. But in terms of looks, intelligence, capability… she’s not in the same league as Bianca. How can you be so obsessed with her?” Outside the door, my fingers curled into fists. Yes. That was the question. The question that had haunted me for three years. Where did I fall short? What made her so much better? “You’re right. Bianca is superior to Jaz in every way,” Ethan’s voice was unnervingly calm. “Then why…?” “That’s exactly why,” Ethan cut in. “She’s too superior. She’s independent, strong… she makes it seem like she doesn’t need anyone. From household chores to business negotiations, she handles everything perfectly.” His tone shifted, softening into something almost tender. “But Jaz is different. She’s… clumsy. She burns herself making instant ramen. She gets lost every time she leaves the house. She can never find her phone. If I’m not around, she’s a walking disaster—” He paused, and I could picture the fond smile on his face. “She needs me. And that feeling, being needed… it fills a space inside me I didn’t even know was empty.” I leaned against the cold wall, a hollow laugh escaping my lips. So that was it. I hadn’t lost to another woman. I had lost to my own damned competence. I had lost to every storm I had weathered on my own. All those late nights I stayed up with him while he was building his company from scratch. All those client dinners where I drank until my stomach burned to help him land a deal. All those days and nights I managed our lives, our home, our world, so he could focus on his dream without a single worry. Everything I thought was a testament to my love and support… was actually the reason he left. The irony was so thick it choked me. I had forged myself into a fortress to protect him, only for him to leave and become the guardian of a delicate, clinging vine. And in that moment, I finally understood. It wasn’t that I wasn’t good enough. It was that I was too good. Too good for a man like him.

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I spent three years in a coma saving my brother and his three best friends. When I woke up, my parents, my brother, and those three boys were crowded around my bed, their faces a mask of frantic relief. I felt nothing. I knew the truth. I knew that after the hospital called to tell them I was awake, they first finished celebrating their adopted daughter’s birthday before gracing me with their presence. In the three years I was gone, another girl had taken my place. A voice in the back of my mind warned me what would happen next. I was destined to become the villain, a girl so twisted by jealousy that I would fight to win back the affection of my family. I would lose, of course. Despised by everyone, I would end my own life. A cold smile touched my lips. Fight for them? No, thank you. A family like that isn’t worth keeping. 1 On the television mounted in the corner of my hospital room, a local news channel was gushing over the lavish birthday party of Hailey Prescott. The heirs to the city’s most powerful families—the Hudsons, the Graysons, and the Wests—were all in attendance. The camera panned across the handsome young men flanking a beautiful girl, laughing as she blew out the candles on a towering cake. She was the picture of a princess. I stared at the familiar faces on the screen. My father. My mother. My brother, Ethan. And his three best friends—Liam, Noah, and Owen. They already knew I was awake. The nurse had called them from my bedside, and my father had answered. But there they were, their smiles serene and undisturbed, celebrating until the party reached its perfect, glittering conclusion. By the time the frantic footsteps echoed down the hall, the nurse had already finished a round of physical therapy with me, and I was settling back into my pillows, exhausted. The door flew open, shattering the quiet. “Audrey!” “Oh my God, Audrey, you’re finally awake!” Their voices were a tidal wave of emotion, their faces etched with a desperate joy, as if my return was the single most important event in the world. It was a convincing performance. But I had seen the television. I had seen the soft, adoring way they looked at another girl. And I knew how long it had taken them to get here. I might have believed them, otherwise. I might have believed they were still the same parents, the same brother, the same boys who had been my entire world. My expression remained flat. I let my gaze drift past them to the girl standing hesitantly in the doorway, still wearing the beautiful white dress from the party. My mother followed my line of sight and immediately beckoned her forward with a warm, gentle smile. “Audrey, this is your sister, Hailey. She’s the daughter of your father’s dear friend who passed away. We adopted her three years ago.” She pulled the girl into a one-armed hug. “These last three years… they’ve been unbearable. Having Hailey with us has been a godsend. I don’t know how I would have survived otherwise.” “She’s right,” my father added, his voice thick with emotion. “Hailey was a gift from heaven, sent to us in our darkest hour.” “And now you have a sister, Hailey,” Ethan said, his voice softer than I’d ever heard it. “Go on, say hello to your big sister.” Hailey looked at me, her eyes shining with what looked like unshed tears. “Audrey,” she breathed, her voice trembling. “I’m so glad you’re awake. Mom, Dad, and Ethan have been so worried. I always said… I always told them I would leave this family in a heartbeat if it meant you’d come back to us.” “Hailey, don’t say such silly things,” my mother scolded gently, pulling her into a full embrace. “Don’t you ever talk about leaving us, do you hear me? You are a part of this family. Now you just have a sister to share it with.” “That’s right, sweetheart. No one is ever letting you leave,” my father added, his tone full of affection. “You’re our little sister now,” Ethan said, feigning a wounded look. “Are you trying to break our hearts? You wouldn’t leave your big brother, would you?” Hailey blushed, stamping her foot playfully. “Ethan, stop! Of course not.” The display of affection made them all chuckle. “And if anyone at home gives you a hard time,” said Liam Hudson, one of the three boys I’d grown up with, “you can always come stay with me. I’ll make sure you’re treated like the princess you are.” “Hey, what about me?” Noah Grayson cut in with a mock-offended huff. “My house is way more fun.” “Please, she likes me best,” Owen West chimed in. “In your dreams, West!” the others shot back. “Don’t even think about it, you guys,” Ethan declared, stepping forward possessively. “Hailey is a Prescott princess. No one is ever going to give her a hard time.” My parents just shook their heads, smiling fondly. Hailey, her cheeks flushed a pretty pink, leaned against my mother. And just like that, the center of the universe in my hospital room shifted, orbiting entirely around the girl in the white dress. I, the patient in the bed, was an afterthought. Bored, I turned my head on the pillow, and for a split second, my eyes met Hailey’s. Her expression was unguarded. It was pure, unadulterated triumph. 2 I used to be the Prescott princess. Ethan and his friends were my self-appointed royal guard. I was their little sister, their mascot, the one they swore to protect forever. They promised that if anyone ever hurt me, they would make them pay. I grew up cocooned in their love and devotion. That’s why, three years ago, I did what I did. The car crash was a nightmare of twisted metal and shattered glass. My brother and his three best friends were thrown around the cabin like rag dolls, a collage of broken bones and blood. I was the only one who had been wearing a seatbelt, the only one with minor injuries. I smelled the gasoline first, a sharp, sickening scent. Then I saw the flicker of flames near the engine. I knew what was coming. Tears streamed down my face as I screamed their names, pulling them one by one from the wreckage. But they were dead weight, and I couldn’t drag them far enough away. The fire was growing. I looked at their unconscious forms—the boys who had protected me my whole life—and made a decision. My body shook with terror, but my resolve was absolute. I climbed into the driver’s seat of the mangled SUV. It was a wreck, practically begging to fall apart, but it had to move. I had to get it away from them. My foot found the accelerator. I drove the burning car as far as I could, my hands trembling on the wheel. When I finally slammed on the brakes, I scrambled out, trying to run, but it was too late. The explosion threw me into the air, and my world went black. For three years, I was lost in a long, dark dream. In that dream, my family adopted a girl my age. At first, my brother would scold her for touching my things. “That’s my sister’s,” he’d say. “Don’t touch it.” The three boys ignored her completely, telling everyone their only little sister was Audrey Prescott. But slowly, things changed. The new girl was a master of a certain kind of vulnerability—a quiet, helpless fragility that wormed its way into their hearts. Their weekly visits to my bedside became monthly, then quarterly. The last time they came, six months had passed without a word. They were too busy. Busy taking the new girl to theme parks, to see the northern lights. Busy helping her with homework, celebrating her birthday… Then, in the dream, I woke up. They arrived late, the new girl in tow. Raised on their affection, I was furious when I saw how they fawned over her at my bedside. I demanded she leave my room. But no one cared about my feelings anymore. Gently, patiently, they told me I had to accept my new sister. After that, the dream turned into a waking nightmare. Hailey framed me for one thing after another, and they never believed me. They only saw her tears, her trembling fear. They called me selfish, spoiled, a disappointment. The very same people who had nurtured my spirit, who had celebrated my every whim, now looked at me with disgust when I fought back. The last thing I remember from that dream is running out of the house, unable to bear their cold eyes another second. I ran right into the street, and my short, ridiculous life ended under the wheels of a car. When I woke up for real this time, I found the dream had been a prophecy. They had adopted a girl named Hailey. When they heard I was awake, they didn’t drop everything and rush to my side. They finished her birthday party. And standing in my hospital room, they had already forgotten I was there. The dream wasn’t a dream. It was a memory. Or maybe, it was my first life. This time, things would be different. My father finally seemed to remember I was in the room. “Audrey,” he said, his voice soft. “Are you in any pain? Do you need anything?” All eyes turned back to me. I looked at each of them, a faint smile on my lips. “I just have one question. I saved my brother and his three friends three years ago, right?” 3 My question hung in the air, met with a stunned silence. It was as if I’d broken some unspoken rule. This wasn’t something I was supposed to bring up; it was a debt they understood, the very reason they had rushed—belatedly—to the hospital. “Of course, Audrey,” Ethan said, his voice regaining its gentle warmth. “You were so brave that day. We’re all so incredibly grateful to you. We owe you everything.” Liam, Noah, and Owen nodded in solemn agreement. “Audrey, thank you,” Hailey said, rushing to my side and grabbing my hand. Her grip was tight, her voice passionate. “Thank you for saving Ethan, and Liam, and Noah, and Owen. Because of you, I got to know them. I don’t know how I could ever repay you. If you wanted my life in exchange for yours, I would give it, right now.” As she named each of them, their expressions softened into pure adoration. You could practically see the affection pouring out of them. My smile turned wry. I gently pulled my hand from her grasp. “Don’t worry. I just woke up. Your life is of no use to me.” Their brows furrowed slightly, a flicker of displeasure crossing their faces. I ignored it and looked directly at the four of them. “So… could you turn that gratitude into cash? A million dollars from each of you would be enough. Is that possible?” Another wave of shock rolled through the room. “Audrey, what are you talking about?” my mother said, her brow creased with disapproval. “You’re a Prescott. You don’t need to worry about money.” “She’s right, sweetheart,” my father added, his tone placating. “The most important thing right now is for you to get better. When you come home, you’ll be the same young lady of the house you always were, with everything you could ever want.” The irony was so thick I could taste it. In my dream-life, I never cared about money. I never would have dreamed of mentioning what I did, of turning my sacrifice into a transaction. It would have felt cheap, insulting to our bond. But then, back at the house, they had used money to control me. Every time I “bullied” Hailey, every time I “acted out,” they cut off my allowance, froze my accounts. I couldn’t even pay for school activities. They punished me with poverty, and my life was miserable. If I didn’t secure my own funds now, my heroic act would be slowly erased, negated by every fabricated transgression against Saint Hailey. In my dream, a voice had offered to help me, to help me win back their love. I had refused it then, and I refused it now. I had no interest in fighting for scraps of affection. “I was in a coma for three years,” I said calmly. “I’m eighteen now. I’d like to have some money of my own. To buy whatever I want, whenever I want. To be a little reckless. Can’t I do that?” My reasoning seemed to soothe their discomfort. The tension in the room eased. “Audrey, Mom and Dad gave me some spending money,” Hailey chimed in, her expression bright and earnest. “It’s almost a million. You can have all of it! I’m so happy I can finally do something for the boys!” Ethan chuckled, shaking his head. “Hailey, you don’t need to give her your allowance.” “You’re such a sweetheart,” Noah cooed, gently tapping her on the head. They all smiled, shaking their heads at her adorable generosity. “I just wanted to help…” Hailey mumbled, sticking her tongue out playfully. My mother wrapped her in another loving hug. In the end, of course, they each transferred a million dollars to my account. Four million dollars. I would make it last. This time, I wouldn’t be helpless. This time, there would be no tragic ending. As they were leaving, Liam Hudson glanced back at me, his eyes narrowed in thought. He looked at me as if he was seeing a stranger, as if something was fundamentally, irrevocably wrong. 4 After two weeks in the hospital, my body had recovered enough for me to go home. “Audrey, look at this room,” my mother said, leading me down the familiar hallway. “Hailey insisted you have it. She even put her favorite stuffed rabbit on your pillow.” Insisted. The word was absurd. This had been my room since I was born. After three years in a coma, I now needed someone else’s permission to live in it. I smiled sweetly. “That’s so thoughtful of Hailey. But if she’s already settled in, I wouldn’t want to displace her. I can take another room.” My mother looked taken aback, as if my politeness was a foreign language. “It’s no problem, Audrey,” Hailey said, stepping forward. “This is the biggest and brightest room. It should be yours.” My parents and Ethan gazed at her, their expressions melting with love for her selfless, considerate nature. This was clearly nothing new. I shook my head again. “You’ve already made it your own. It wouldn’t be right for me to kick you out just because I’m back. Dad, Mom, and Ethan would think I was being terribly selfish.” I remembered this scene from my dream-life. Ethan had yelled at me, saying Hailey was having trouble sleeping in her new, smaller room, all because she’d given me the better one, and yet I still found ways to torment her. Pathetic. “I’ll take another room,” I continued, my voice firm but pleasant. “Or I can stay in the maid’s quarters. We can’t have Hailey feeling slighted, now can we?” I pre-empted the very accusation they would have leveled against me. They all paused, a flicker of confusion in their eyes. They knew something was off about what I said, but they couldn’t quite put their finger on it. “Audrey, I wouldn’t feel slighted at all, I—” “Then it’s settled. You stay right where you are,” I interrupted smoothly. “You’re the little sister everyone adores, after all.” And so, I was given another room. … I was at my desk, studying, when my door opened without a knock. Hailey waltzed in, carrying a small platter of fruit. “Audrey, you’ve been cooped up in here all day. I brought you a snack.” She smiled, walking toward me. I glanced up. “Thanks. Just leave it on the table.” “Okay,” she chirped, but instead of going to the table, she walked directly toward my desk. Then, as if in slow motion, her hands “slipped.” The platter tilted, and fruit tumbled to the floor. “Ah!” she shrieked, stumbling backward and collapsing dramatically onto the carpet. “What’s going on?” My father, mother, and Ethan rushed in, drawn by the scream. “Hailey!” They hurried to her side, helping her up. “Mom…” Hailey whimpered, burying her face in my mother’s shoulder. She was trembling. “I… I was just worried Audrey was working too hard… I only wanted to bring her some fruit…” Their eyes moved from the scattered fruit on the floor to my impassive face. They didn’t need any more explanation; the story wrote itself in their minds. “Audrey, Hailey was being thoughtful,” Ethan said, his brow furrowed in sharp disapproval. “If you didn’t want the fruit, you could have just said so. Why did you have to push her?” “You can’t treat your sister this way,” my mother scolded, her arm wrapped protectively around Hailey. “What has gotten into you?” “Audrey, you will apologize to your sister right now,” my father commanded. From the safety of my mother’s embrace, Hailey shot me a look of pure, triumphant malice. 5 Without a word, I turned to my laptop and clicked a file. The screen came to life, showing a live feed from the small security camera I had placed on my bookshelf. Their heads snapped toward the screen. The video showed the entire scene, clear as day. Hailey walking in, deliberately tipping the platter, and throwing herself to the ground. My hands had never left my desk. Hailey’s face went pale. She had never imagined I’d be recording. “As you can see, I didn’t lay a finger on her,” I said calmly. “So, I don’t believe an apology is in order.” I turned my gaze to Hailey. “You should really be more careful, Hailey. You wouldn’t want to trip and hurt yourself again.” Her expression flickered. Then, her eyes filled with tears. “I… I was just so nervous,” she stammered, her voice breaking. “I know you’ve been so cold to me, Audrey. I know you blame me for being here, for not being the only daughter anymore.” She buried her face in my mother’s shoulder again, her body wracked with sobs. “I know you resent that Ethan and the boys are close to me. I was so scared of making you angry that I… I panicked and lost my balance. I’m so sorry…” she wailed. “Mom, I’m so scared she hates me, that she thinks I’ve stolen everything that was hers…” My mother immediately began stroking her hair. “Oh, sweetie, don’t think like that. You haven’t stolen anything. You’re our daughter, too. My love for you and Audrey is equal.” “You have such a wild imagination, silly girl,” Ethan said, shaking his head with a fond sigh. He then looked at me. “But Audrey, you need to understand why she feels this way. You have been incredibly cold to her. We all love you just the same.” “Audrey, Hailey is a good girl,” my father added, his voice laced with disappointment. “You can’t keep being so difficult.” And just like that, even with video evidence, the narrative shifted. As it always did in my dream-life, every road led back to my supposed cruelty. The fact that I had just been falsely accused was already forgotten. The anger and frustration that once would have consumed me were gone, replaced by a chilling calm. I smiled at them. “I’m not sure why Hailey would think that. I don’t feel like anything has been stolen from me. Or does she feel like she’s stolen something from me? The truth is, I’m still adjusting after being unconscious for three years. I suppose I’m a bit distant with everyone right now.” Hailey froze, her eyes darting nervously. Then the waterworks started again. “I… I’m just so afraid you don’t like me. I know I’m not a real Prescott, not like you…” And with that, the ridiculous farce concluded as it always did: with the entire family comforting a weeping Hailey. 6 My aunt and uncle came to visit. They suggested to my parents that since I had recovered, we should have a party to celebrate. My parents, as if the thought had never occurred to them, eagerly agreed. On the morning of my welcome home party, Hailey appeared at the breakfast table dressed in a plain, simple dress. My parents and Ethan gasped. “Hailey, what are you wearing?” my mother asked, rushing to her side. Hailey bit her lip, glancing at me as I calmly ate my toast. “Today is Audrey’s party. She’s the guest of honor. I don’t want to steal her spotlight, so I thought I’d dress down.” “Oh, you silly girl,” my mother said, hugging her tightly. “Yes, it’s a party for your sister, but it’s a celebration for the whole family. You should look just as beautiful as her.” “That’s right,” Ethan added with a smile. “Go change into something gorgeous. Let everyone see the beautiful Prescott sisters, side by side.” Hailey continued to bite her lip, her gaze fixed on me. “But… I’m worried Audrey will mind. I don’t want to cause any friction in the family…” Ethan’s brow creased as he looked at me. “Audrey, Hailey is your sister. You shouldn’t be petty about something like this. There’s no such thing as ‘stealing the spotlight’ between sisters.” “Your brother is right,” my father chimed in sternly. “As the older sister, you need to be more gracious. A family stands together.” I took a slow sip of milk. “Excuse me,” I said, looking at them. “Did I say I minded?” They all fell silent. “Audrey, I really don’t want to outshine you,” Hailey said, her voice laced with false urgency. “Please don’t be mad…” Ethan’s expression soured again. I offered a placid smile. “Hailey, you’re overthinking it. I’ve just come out of a three-year coma. My brain is still rebooting. Honestly, I don’t have the energy to mind much of anything.” Hailey paused, looking momentarily thrown. It was as if my refusal to take her bait was a move she hadn’t prepared for. “Well, as long as Audrey doesn’t mind,” my mother said cheerfully. “Come on, Hailey. Let’s go upstairs and find you a beautiful dress and some jewelry to match.” She led her darling, misunderstood daughter away. Later, at the hotel, I stood in the dressing room, studying my reflection. My body was thin and pale, a testament to three years of atrophy. Thankfully, I’d already been nearly 5’3” before the accident, so my height hadn’t suffered too much. As I stepped out, I heard voices from a nearby sitting area. Hailey was there with Liam, Noah, and Owen. “I really didn’t want to wear this dress,” she was saying, her voice a soft, troubled murmur. “I think Audrey’s a little upset about it, but Mom, Dad, and Ethan insisted…” “Why would Audrey be upset?” “Hailey, you can’t always be the one to back down, you know?” “Wear what you want to wear. Don’t let anyone else dictate that for you.” They were all cooing, comforting her. “It’s okay,” Hailey continued with a sigh. “Audrey saved your lives. She was in a coma for three years because of you. She probably resents how close I’ve gotten to you all. She thinks I’ve taken her place. So, for tonight, I want her to know I’m not competing with her. I’ll just be here to support her. Tonight, Audrey will be the star, and I’ll be perfectly happy to be the green leaf to her beautiful flower…” Her voice was so full of tragic grace it was nauseating. “Hailey! Don’t say things like that,” Liam said firmly. “We care about you because you deserve it. Audrey… she’s been asleep for three years. Her mindset is probably still stuck at fifteen. She was always headstrong. You’ve probably had a terrible time at home with her.” “She saved us, it’s true,” Owen added coolly. “But she also demanded payment the second she woke up, as if she was afraid we wouldn’t be grateful. So you don’t need to bend over backwards for her.” “Even though this is her party, and she’ll be the center of attention tonight,” Noah said, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper, “you’ll always be the center of ours.” I heard their words, and a bitter laugh escaped my lips. I turned and walked away. 7 The ballroom was filled with guests. Hailey moved through the crowd like a seasoned socialite, a symphony of perfectly timed smiles and charming greetings. “Uncle, Auntie, it’s so good to see you.” She was a natural. I, on the other hand, was a ghost. After three years away, I was a stranger to these people, and they kept their distance, watching me with cautious curiosity. This, of course, was exactly what Hailey wanted. She kept repeating how she didn’t want to steal my spotlight, which was her way of ensuring she stole all of it. Liam, Noah, and Owen hovered around her, a protective shield. It was as if they were afraid she might feel neglected at my party, that she might actually have to cede the stage to me for a single evening. Soon enough, the room was filled with the sound of Hailey’s laughter, her graceful form the center of every conversation. The praise for her was endless. From across the room, she shot me another triumphant look. When it was time to cut the cake, my father smiled broadly and pointed toward the boys. “Audrey, this cake is huge! Why don’t you ask one of your old friends to help you cut it?” Liam, Noah, and Owen all exchanged a quick, uncomfortable glance with Hailey. They avoided my eyes, a clear reluctance on their faces. They didn’t want to be seen standing next to me, to give anyone the wrong idea. I remembered this moment from my first life. I had happily called out for Ethan and Liam to join me. In my mind, they were my closest allies, my family. We had a bond forged in love and sealed in sacrifice. I thought it was unbreakable. But they had hesitated. It was only when Ethan had called Hailey over to join them that they’d finally moved, intending to come as a group. I had refused. I told them I didn’t consider her my sister and I didn’t want her touching my cake. Why should I accept this stranger who had suddenly appeared in my life? They all called me selfish. My parents were furious. Hailey had burst into tears, claiming she didn’t belong, and ran out of the ballroom. And without a second’s hesitation, my father, my mother, my brother, Liam, Noah, and Owen had all chased after her, screaming her name. They left me alone in a room full of strangers, their whispers and judgmental stares burning into my back. I was so heartbroken, so confused, I had shoved the entire cake onto the floor. I couldn’t understand how three years could erase everything. My thoughts snapped back to the present. I looked past the three boys. “Daniel.” Liam, Noah, and Owen seemed to let out a collective, relieved sigh. Ethan frowned, but his tone remained gentle. “Ask Hailey to join you, too.” I shook my head. Hailey’s face fell, a mask of perfect, wounded innocence. The boys’ expressions immediately hardened, their eyes flashing with disapproval. They thought I was doing exactly what Hailey had warned them I would do: icing her out, bullying her. Ethan’s jaw tightened. “Audrey, I—” “I was asking my cousin, Daniel Prescott, to help me cut the cake,” I said, my voice clear and firm. I looked past Ethan to my uncle’s adopted son, who was standing quietly behind him.

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “385423”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

The night before our wedding, my fiancée slept with her childhood best friend. I found out from an Instagram post. She thought she was waking up to a wedding day. Instead, she woke up to a single text from me: “We’re done.” 1. The day before my wedding. That was the day Sophie’s childhood friend took her to a club for her “final night of freedom.” The last text I got from her was around dinnertime. “Ethan, grabbing a bite with the girls. Dylan’s planned a surprise party for me later.” That single sentence left me pacing the floor of our apartment until the dead of night. It wasn’t until I was scrolling through my phone, just to feel some connection to the world outside my own head, that I saw Dylan’s Instagram story. And then I understood why she hadn’t had a free hand to text me back. I stared at the photo for a long time, the two of them so close the image seemed to radiate a shared heat. A block of ice formed in my chest. I had never, not in a million scenarios, imagined this happening to me—my fiancée, sleeping with another man the night before we were supposed to get married. My mind, a traitor, started filling in the details. Sophie, snuggled into his arms, the way she sometimes did with me, her voice soft and playful. The thought was a physical blow, a vicious current dragging me back through our shared memories, tainting every single one. And through it all, as my world fractured, there was only silence from her. No explanation. A bitter question echoed in the quiet of our apartment: What was I to her? Really? The pain in my chest was so sharp it was hard to breathe. I got up and walked through the rooms we were supposed to fill with a life, looking at the festive decorations we’d put up, the little touches meant to celebrate our beginning. Next to the photo glowing on my phone, it was all a sick, cruel joke. I caught my reflection in the hallway mirror and saw a grief on my face I didn’t recognize. My own tears, tracking down my cheeks, seemed to belong to a stranger. Steeling myself against the ache, I typed out a message. “Sophie, we’re done. The wedding’s off.” A long time passed. Still no reply. I knew she’d see it eventually. But I no longer cared what her response might be. Numbly, I started putting everything back into its box—the suit I was supposed to wear tomorrow, the gifts, the carefully chosen favors. Unpacking them had filled me with an almost unbearable excitement. Packing them back up was like performing surgery on my own hopes. Sophie was brilliant, beautiful, the kind of woman who seemed destined for greatness. She’d been the campus queen in college, president of the student government. A Fortune 500 company had recruited her right out of her internship, and in just a few years, she’d climbed to an executive position. Everyone said she was a prodigy, that her future was limitless. And everyone said I was punching way above my weight. I’d tried to answer their doubts and their whispers not with words, but with action. With my devotion. I worked hard, I pushed myself, I was supportive and understanding. I had tried, with every fiber of my being, to be the perfect partner for her. And she had betrayed me. There are some things in this world that happen zero times, or they happen a thousand times. There’s no in-between. I refused to spend the rest of my life wondering, looking over my shoulder, living in a world colored green with envy and suspicion. This was the only way. The best way. I sent a text to my mom, telling her the wedding was off. I expected a text back, but my phone rang almost immediately. Her voice was thick with concern, asking what had happened. I didn’t want to ruin her night, but she deserved the truth. I told her. The silence on the other end of the line stretched on. When she finally spoke, her voice was raw. “You do what you need to do, honey. I support you.” My mom had been dreaming of this day for so long. Tomorrow, she was supposed to watch her son get married. I imagine her heartbreak was only a shade less than my own. After we hung up, I moved through the apartment like a ghost, taking down every sign of the celebration that would never happen. Now that it was over, none of it meant anything. Finally, as the first hint of dawn greyed the windows, I packed away the last of it, turned off my phone, and collapsed into bed. 2. I woke to the sound of frantic knocking. It was already past noon. They couldn’t reach me, my phone was off, so of course, they had come to my door. I ignored it, letting the sound echo until it finally faded away. They gave up. If Sophie’s parents hadn’t been so incredibly kind to me over the years, if our own history didn’t mean something, I would have blown everything up. I would have played that photo on a projector at the ceremony for everyone to see. But all I wanted now was a clean break. I wanted nothing more to do with her. The thought of her… it repulsed me. But in the end, she found me anyway. She was wearing a full face of makeup, but it couldn’t hide the raw exhaustion in her eyes. She stared at me for a long moment, her expression hardening into disapproval. “Ethan, do you have any idea how much of a joke you made of me today? Leaving the groom missing on our wedding day!” Her voice trembled, as if she’d been crying. I looked at her, my face a blank mask. “Before you came here to attack me, Sophie,” I said, my voice flat, “did you ever stop to think why?” Her gaze flickered. Her tone softened. “Ethan, don’t be childish.” “I have so much on my plate, I’m so tired. Can’t you just be understanding for once?” On the surface, it sounded like she was conceding, trying to find common ground. But it was just another form of evasion. She never once mentioned the hotel. Or the picture. Of course she had a lot on her plate, busy as she was checking into hotels with other men. And I’m sure she was tired. Juggling two men must be exhausting. “Oh, you’re busy? Then you should go take care of your business. It has nothing to do with me.” I didn’t want to waste another breath on her. I turned to leave. She grabbed my arm. The moment her fingers touched my skin, I recoiled like I’d been burned. “Get off me!” I snapped. She stumbled back two steps, her eyes wide with disbelief. She had never seen me like this. Her eyes immediately welled up, shimmering with tears that threatened to spill over. “Sophie, I’m not in the mood to fight. If you don’t want to make this uglier than it already is, accept that we’re broken up and leave me alone.” When I moved to walk away again, she blocked my path. “Ethan, what is this about? You owe me an explanation for the wedding!” she insisted, biting her lip, her eyes full of a bewildering sense of victimhood. “You know how many people my parents invited. All of our friends. You left me standing there alone, Ethan. Do you know what they’re all saying about me? How they’re all laughing at me?” “I had to face every single one of them, apologize over and over again. I’m just so, so tired,” she finished, her voice cracking. “Couldn’t you have just talked to me?” I looked her straight in the eye. “You deserved it.” “What?” she whispered, frowning. “You heard me. I said you deserved it. Did you think about any of this when you were checking into a hotel room with him?” Her face fell, the mask of victimhood crumbling away. Her jaw tightened. “Your mind is a filthy place, Ethan,” she spat. I couldn’t help but laugh, a bitter, hollow sound. Was she really going to claim they just lay there, innocently? As if sharing a hotel bed was somehow different? “You’re right,” I said, my voice dripping with sarcasm. “How could a piece of trash like me ever hope to understand a pristine angel like you?” “We’re done now. You’re free to go find someone more suitable.” Her body tensed, her eyes practically shooting sparks. After a long moment, the anger on her face softened into something more calculated. “Ethan, I didn’t come here to fight with you. But you at least owe my parents an explanation, don’t you think?” 3. I fell silent. She was right about that. I could treat her with the contempt she deserved, but I couldn’t disrespect her parents. Robert and Carol were kind, reasonable people. The complete opposite of their daughter. While everyone else whispered that I was lucky to have Sophie, they had never once looked down on me. They treated me like their own son. My weakness has always been that I assume the best in people. Because her parents were good to me, I poured all of that gratitude back into my relationship with her. I bent over backward for her. I never said no. She was laser-focused on her career, so I made sure to leave work on time to have dinner ready for her. While she ate, I’d draw her a bath, doing everything I could to create a sanctuary where she could unwind from her stressful days. I loved her. And I thought she loved me, too. But for her to do what she did… it meant she never cared about my feelings at all. I let out a heavy sigh and agreed to go to their house for dinner. Not for her. For them. I needed to tell them the truth, face to face. She rushed to open the passenger door of her car for me, but I just glanced at it and walked to my own. In my rearview mirror, I saw her face darken. When I parked outside their house, the familiar smell of a home-cooked meal drifted out. Every time I came over, they’d prepare a feast. I had imagined a future filled with many more of their dinners. I never thought this would be the last one. Before Sophie could even get her key in the door, it swung open. Robert’s face lit up when he saw me. “Ethan! You’re here! Come on in, have a seat. I’m just running out to grab some fruit.” Every time I visited, he made sure the house was stocked with my favorites. Sophie never ate fruit, so they never kept it around otherwise. I opened my mouth to say something, to stop him, but my words felt clumsy and awkward. He was already halfway down the driveway. After leaving their family humiliated at the wedding, I had come prepared for their anger, their disappointment. But here they were, treating me just the same as always. Usually, seeing them filled me with warmth, and I’d greet them enthusiastically. Now, I couldn’t even manage the words to address them. I walked to the dining table just as Carol came out of the kitchen with a steaming platter. “Ethan, you made it!” she said with a bright smile. “Don’t worry about a thing, you just sit down and relax. I’ve got one more dish and we’ll be ready!” They were both so genuinely happy to see me, as if the whole disastrous wedding fiasco had never happened. Their warmth made a bitter lump form in my throat. If only. If only we could have actually been a family. But Sophie had done the one thing I could never forgive. I sat stiffly on the sofa, staring blankly at some mindless show on TV. Sophie poured me a glass of juice and sat down next to me. A little too close. “You’ve never been this formal here before,” she said quietly. I shifted away slightly. “Things are different now. A little distance is appropriate.” Sophie flinched. “Is this how it’s going to be from now on?” she asked, her voice low. “No.” I shook my head. “This is the last time I’ll be here.” She bit her lip, staring at me with a complex expression, saying nothing. The air grew thick with unspoken things. Then, mercifully, the doorbell rang. 4. A cheerful voice called from outside. “Soph! It’s me, open up!” Sophie and I locked eyes. We both knew it was Dylan. After a moment’s hesitation, she got up and opened the door. Dylan breezed in, his voice booming. “Soph, what is Carol cooking? I could smell it from the street!” He walked over to the shoe cabinet and pulled out a pair of slippers identical to Sophie’s, just in a different color. Standing next to each other, they looked like a matched set. A couple. He was carrying two gift bags and started toward the kitchen to greet Carol, but he stopped halfway, his eyes landing on me. “Oh. Ethan,” he said, the word catching in his throat. “You’re here too.” I stared at him, my expression cold, and didn’t bother to reply. My eyes, however, caught the glint of the watch on his wrist. It looked exactly like the one Sophie had been so excited about finding a few weeks ago. The one I’d assumed was a wedding gift for me. A bitter, self-mocking smile touched my lips. As Sophie’s childhood friend, Dylan was a fixture here. He treated their house like his own. At the dinner table, Carol, sensing my discomfort, kept a warm smile fixed on her face. She ladled soup into my bowl and then turned to Sophie. “Honey, put some food on Ethan’s plate.” I quickly interjected. “It’s okay, Carol, really. I can get it myself.” Sophie’s hand, which had been reaching for the serving utensils, froze mid-air. I remembered other dinners, when Carol had made the same request. Sophie had always bristled at it, complaining that sharing utensils was unhygienic. I could still hear her sharp, impatient voice in my head. “It’s gross, all that saliva. Can’t he get it himself?” The memory was a fresh sting. Carol’s smile faltered for a second before she recovered, simply telling me to eat more. Dylan shot me a look, then casually picked up a chicken wing and dropped it into Sophie’s bowl. She didn’t show the slightest hint of displeasure, just picked it up and started eating. So, I was disgusting, but Dylan was acceptable. The double standard was breathtaking. In any other setting, I would have slapped them both. Robert saw the exchange and frowned at his daughter. “Sophie, can you please try to have some manners?” he said, giving her a pointed look. I kept quiet. Sophie glanced at me, then resentfully placed a piece of fish on my plate. This time, both of her parents’ faces fell. They both knew I was allergic to seafood. But Sophie, apparently, had forgotten. Still, I finished the rice in my bowl, leaving only that large, conspicuous piece of fish. I had shared one last meal with them. Now it was time to say what I came to say. “Robert, Carol, thank you so much for dinner.” I took a deep breath. “There are a few things I need to say. First, about the wedding, I want to apologize. I’m truly sorry for embarrassing you.” “Second, Sophie and I have broken up. I won’t be coming around anymore. I’m sorry to have disappointed you both.” They looked at me, stunned, at a loss for words. “Ethan, you…” Sophie started, but Dylan cut her off, his voice rising with indignation. “Ethan, that’s not right! First, you ditch the wedding, and now you’re talking about breaking up? What do you think Sophie is to you?” He puffed out his chest. “I thought I could trust you with her, but it turns out you’re just going to treat her like this. Unbelievable.” 5. The hypocrisy was nauseating. I shot him a look, a cold smile playing on my lips. “My treating her like this… isn’t that exactly what you wanted?” “What are you talking about?” Dylan blustered, putting on a show of cluelessness that only made me feel sicker. “Ethan, that’s enough!” Sophie’s voice was sharp, her face a thundercloud. “How many times do I have to explain it to you? Dylan is like a brother to me! We’re not what you think!” At her words, Dylan’s face darkened, but I just laughed. Like a brother? A brother who tells you it’s better to sleep in his arms? I had no energy left to argue with them. It was pointless. Their little outburst had made things painfully awkward for her parents. I stood up, softening my tone as I addressed them. “Robert, Carol, I have to get going. Thank you again for everything.” “If the opportunity arises, I’d love to take you both out to dinner sometime, just us.” They knew the situation was unsalvageable. They stood up, their faces etched with regret. “Ethan,” Carol said, her voice soft, “please, come and visit us anytime. You’ll always be welcome here.” I knew she meant it. But I also knew I could never come back. After leaving their house, I called my best man, Ben. He’d handled the wedding car, the photographers, everything. After the mess I’d made, I owed him an apology. “So,” he said, sliding into the booth across from me at the bar, a shit-eating grin on his face. “The wedding of your dreams ends with the bride standing solo at the altar?” “Come on, man. I’m going through it. The least you can do is not rub it in.” Seeing the genuine pain on my face, Ben’s teasing expression softened. “You pulling a runaway groom act like that… it had to be something big. Don’t tell me, the night before the wedding…” I didn’t answer. I just downed my whiskey in one go. He shook his head, clicking his tongue. “Damn. You only read about this stuff online. Didn’t think it happened in real life.” “I told you before, man,” he continued, his voice serious now. “I never thought Sophie loved you as much as you loved her. Looks like she was just stringing you along.” Ben had said things like that before, but I’d been too deep in love to listen. Now, with the clarity of a breakup, I could see it. All the little details I had ignored, the small dismissals, the casual inconsiderations. They were all signs. She didn’t love me. “If she doesn’t love me,” I said, my voice rough, “then I’m setting her free.” Ben filled my glass and clinked it with his. “You know what they say. Sometimes you have to lose someone to meet the right one.” He grinned. “Look ahead, man. Better things are waiting for you.” I rolled my eyes at him, and we both broke into a laugh. This whole thing had shattered my heart, but I wasn’t going to drown my sorrows in booze. Just having someone to vent to, someone who got it, was enough to take the edge off. Ben was right. No one is indispensable. No point in wasting my life on someone who didn’t want it. Sophie was an amazing woman, but I wasn’t so bad myself. When it came down to it, all I had lost was someone who didn’t love me. That wasn’t a tragedy worth mourning for long. It happened faster than I expected. My mindset shifted. When I walked back into the office, I felt like myself again. Sharp, focused, ready to go. People who didn’t know any better assumed I was glowing from post-wedding bliss. They offered their congratulations, and I accepted them with a tight smile, the irony a bitter taste in my mouth. Just a few days ago, I’d been the one handing out wedding candy, some of which was still sitting in bowls on people’s desks. In that short time, I had lived through betrayal, a non-wedding, and a breakup. 6. “Ethan, congratulations! You finally did it, man!” a colleague I was friendly with said, clapping me on the shoulder. “Next step, baby prep, right? Get ready for fatherhood.” He lowered his voice. “But you know, that VP position is basically yours. A paternity leave right after the promotion, though… that could be tricky.” I knew he meant well. It was something I had thought about, too. I had worked for years for this promotion; it was the opportunity of a lifetime. Before, I had honestly considered passing it up for my family, to be there for Sophie and a baby. Now, that was no longer a concern. “Like you said, it’s mine for the taking,” I replied, my voice firm. “And right now, my career is the only thing I want to focus on.” My colleague nodded, though he looked a little confused. “Your family’s not pressuring you for kids?” I gazed out the window. “From now on,” I said with a small smile, “I’m just going to live life on my own terms.” He looked at me, a flicker of understanding in his eyes, and finally nodded in agreement. “You’re right. You gotta live for yourself sometimes. Be a little selfish.” I hoped it was really that simple. In the days that followed, I poured every ounce of my being into my work. I’ve always been ambitious, but for Sophie, I had always held a part of myself back, saving my energy for our life at home. Now, with the VP title within reach, I was holding nothing back. And I discovered something strange. When I was completely immersed in my work, I didn’t think about Sophie at all. A full week went by, and I hadn’t seen or heard from her. I started to believe it was really over, that we had finally, cleanly, drawn a line under our story. I was wrong. We were going to see each other again.

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The sky wept sheets of rain on the day my husband decided to play God. He was at the port with Sophia, my petulant stepsister, who had thrown another one of her signature tantrums and run away from home. He, of course, had dutifully followed to coax her back. Standing amidst the storm-lashed shipping containers, Sophia pointed a dramatic finger at a stacked row. A wild idea sparked in her eyes. “Ethan, I dare you,” she said, her voice a childish challenge against the wind. “Like in the movies. Bet you can’t make the car fly over them.” A reckless grin spread across Ethan’s face. Instead of talking sense into her, he floored the accelerator, aiming his BMW for a makeshift ramp of wooden pallets. The tires screeched, lost traction on the rain-slicked wood, and the car slammed sideways into a towering stack of containers that was already groaning under the assault of the wind. The metal giant swayed, then fell. Ethan ignored the small car crushed beneath it. His first and only instinct was to cup Sophia’s face in his hands, his voice a low murmur meant only for her. “Are you scared? God, this weather… It’s okay, Soph. You’re safe.” Only when the car was flattened into a tin pancake, dark liquid seeping out to mix with the rain, did Ethan finally pull out his phone. “Yeah, 911? My wife, Olivia… I think she’s been in an accident.” My brother, Noah, and I had just grabbed lattes when we saw the flashing lights drawing a crowd at the port. Through the downpour, we could see firefighters working frantically, prying at the window of a crushed car. “Ma’am! Can you hear me? Ma’am, wake up!” Who was that, flattened in the driver’s seat, blood streaming from her face? 1 I grabbed my brother’s wrist and pulled him back, melting into the chaos of the crowd. The scene was a nightmare of twisted metal and flashing lights. The rain washed the blood away almost as soon as it pooled, turning the mud at our feet a sickening shade of pink. Huddled behind a few dockworkers, I listened to their hushed, angry conversation. “Damn shame. If that guy had called for help sooner, she might’ve had a chance.” “You’re telling me. When the container first fell, the car wasn’t totally crushed. But he just stood there, holding that other girl, comforting her. Wasted a good fifteen minutes.” “And her! What a piece of work. Crying about how scared she was. Does she think the Port of Baltimore is her personal playground? Driving around like a maniac.” An arctic chill shot up my spine. Ethan. My husband. He had treated a human life as a prop in his little drama of comforting another woman. Just then, Ethan emerged from behind the police tape, his arm wrapped protectively around a still-trembling Sophia. He spotted my mother in the crowd, and his face went pale. He quickly pulled her aside. “Diane! What are you doing here? It’s not safe!” My mom had just gotten his call. She was crying so hard she could barely stand, her fingers digging into his arm. “Ethan! Where is Liv? What happened to my Olivia?!” A flicker of panic crossed Ethan’s eyes, instantly masked by a practiced, somber expression. “Diane, you need to stay calm. It all happened so fast. The containers… I couldn’t get to her in time.” He then added, as if it were the most reasonable thing in the world, “And Sophia was in shock. I had to take care of her first. You understand, right?” The sheer audacity of his twisted logic made my mother tremble with rage. “Understand? Your wife is under that wreckage, and you thought comforting your stepsister was the priority? Ethan, have you lost your soul?” His jaw tightened, a flash of indignation in his eyes as if he were the one being wronged. “It was Olivia who was being unstable! She’s the one who drove out to the middle of nowhere and parked in a hazardous zone. Sophia was just worried about her! That’s the only reason I followed them out here!” My nails dug into my palms. Lies. All of it. He was here to entertain Sophia. Sophia lifted her tear-stained face from Ethan’s shoulder, her voice a fragile whisper. “Diane, it’s all my fault… I shouldn’t have run away. Then Liv wouldn’t have gotten so jealous and done something so reckless…” She paused, letting the poison sink in. “I’m leaving for my program in Paris soon. Please… don’t blame Ethan anymore, okay?” Her words, cloaked in guilt, were daggers, each one painting me as a jealous, unhinged wife who had brought this on herself. Ethan seized the narrative she’d spun for him, his expression shifting to one of profound sorrow. “Diane, what’s done is done. Making a scene won’t do anyone’s reputation any good.” His voice dropped. “I’ll handle Liv’s arrangements. It will be beautiful. It’s the last thing I can do for her.” Nausea churned in my stomach. To protect Sophia, he had already convicted me, sentenced me, and was now planning my funeral. This man wasn’t just flawed; he was rotten to the core, lost in a pathetic fantasy of his own noble suffering and his bottomless devotion to her. My mother raised her hand and slapped him. The sound was a sharp crack that cut through the drone of the rain. Ethan clutched his cheek, stunned. Sophia shrieked, jumping in front of him like a loyal guard dog. “Diane! How could you hit him? He’s a victim in this, too!” Ignoring her, my mother pointed a trembling finger at Ethan’s face. “That,” she said, her voice dangerously low, “was for my daughter. For your rotten, ungrateful heart.” A police officer, drawn by the commotion, walked over. “What’s going on here? Ma’am, please, you need to remain calm. Let us do our work.” My mother turned to him, her voice raw but steady. “Officer, I’m the… victim’s mother. My daughter would never have parked her car in a dangerous area for no reason. I want to see all the security footage from this port.” I needed to know exactly what they had “done” to me. “Ma’am, I’ve already given the police my statement,” Ethan interjected, his face a mask of fury. “Are you trying to make this even harder for Olivia? Don’t you think she deserves to rest in peace?!”

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The moment my sister Olivia’s cerebral aneurysm ruptured, they were rushing her into emergency surgery. I was in my office, calmly practicing a basic suture on a surgical simulator. On the screen, the robotic arms guided the needle and thread with a fluid grace, a perfect, sterile dance. A work of art. Minutes later, my boyfriend, Ethan, burst through the office door. “Audrey!” he yelled, his voice raw. “Olivia’s critical, and you’re the only one who can perform the micro-dissection. The entire department is waiting for you! Her surgical window is less than an hour!” His eyes were wide with a desperate hope. I was the only surgeon in the country capable of performing a procedure at this level. My hands had been called “the hands of God.” But I just gave a soft “hmm,” my attention still fixed on the simulator. My parents stormed in right behind him. My mother grabbed my arm, her voice cracking with sobs. “Audrey! That’s your sister! Can you really just stand by and watch her die?” I gently pulled my arm away and held out my right hand for them to see. This hand, the one that had performed countless medical miracles, was trembling. It was a slight tremor, almost imperceptible, but it was there. “A shame. I started showing symptoms of an idiopathic tremor yesterday,” I said, my voice even. “Dad. Mom. This hand is useless now.” 1 The air in the room froze. The expressions on their three faces morphed into sheer, unadulterated shock. They stared at my right hand, at the slight but fatal tremor that, for a top surgeon, was a career death sentence. My mother’s lips trembled. “How… how could this happen? You were fine yesterday! Have you been working too hard?” “The cause is unknown.” I pulled my hand back, tucking it into the pocket of my white coat. “Perhaps it’s fate.” “Fate?” My father’s brow furrowed, his tone laced with reprimand. “Audrey, don’t be ridiculous! Are you… are you still holding a grudge against us?” I didn’t answer, turning my gaze back to the simulator. The year I turned eighteen, they found me living in a small town upstate and brought me to the Sloane family home. It turned out that Olivia Sloane, the treasured daughter they had raised for eighteen years, was not their biological child. I was. My adoptive parents had passed away when I was young, and life had been a struggle. When I first arrived at the Sloane mansion, I was sensitive and insecure, a wildflower transplanted into a manicured garden. It was Olivia who offered me the most warmth. She taught me etiquette, bought me beautiful clothes, and defended me at every turn. She insisted we were real sisters and told me to feel at home. My parents said the same, that Olivia was their daughter too, and that they couldn’t possibly love one more than the other. Because Olivia’s birth family was destitute, they couldn’t bear to send her away, so they decided to raise us both. I was grateful to them, and grateful to Olivia. I studied relentlessly, desperate to become their pride and joy, vowing to protect our perfect family of four. Until now. Seeing my silence, my mother’s tears started to fall freely. She screamed at me, her voice ragged. “Audrey! Is this resentment? Just because we showed Olivia a little more affection, you’re holding a grudge, and now you’ll let her die?” “Have you forgotten how much she loves you?! When you were pulling all-nighters in med school, who was it that always brought you food to keep you going?!” For a fleeting moment, her words still stung my heart. Ethan rushed to my mother’s side, trying to steady her. “Mrs. Sloane, please, calm down. Audrey isn’t that kind of person!” He then turned to me, his eyes filled with a deep, aching disappointment. “Audrey, I know you’ve been hurt, but Olivia is innocent in all of this! You can’t let your personal feelings cloud your duty as a doctor!” My father, normally a composed university professor, had red-rimmed eyes. His voice was hoarse. “Audrey, even if your hand is injured, you could at least go in and supervise! Olivia is your sister. You can’t just watch her die!” But I remained unmoved, my focus on the instruments before me. My mother finally broke. She collapsed to her knees, her wails echoing in the hallway. “How could I have raised such a cold, heartless daughter?! Olivia is so kind, she gave up so much for you, and now… now you’re going to kill her?” Her cries were so piercing that they drew the attention of other staff members, who peered in from the hallway. Their gazes, a mixture of confusion and contempt, fell on me. I simply offered a small, cold smile. “I suppose it’s her time to go. There’s nothing I can do.” With that, I sat back down and picked up the controls for the simulator. On the screen, the robotic arms began to move again. I was completely absorbed, as if the world outside my office had ceased to exist. Seeing this display of utter indifference, my father swayed on his feet. Ethan stared at me, his expression hardening with finality. He took a deep breath, as if making a monumental decision. “Mr. and Mrs. Sloane, please, don’t beg her anymore.” He turned to my parents, his voice firm. “Let me do it.” Ethan’s declaration was a lifeline, and my parents grasped it immediately. “Ethan! You… are you sure you can do it?” my mother asked, clutching his hand. Ethan glanced at my parents kneeling on the floor, then back at me. His face was a mask of profound empathy and sorrow. “Audrey won’t do it, and I understand,” he said, his voice heavy with meaning. “She carries the burden of being ‘the hands of God.’ She can’t afford to fail. But I can’t stand by and watch Olivia die!” His words were a masterstroke. On the surface, he was defending me, but in reality, he was crucifying me, painting me as a coward who would sacrifice her sister for her own reputation. The whispers from my colleagues in the hall grew louder, their disdain for me thickening the air. Ethan addressed my parents again, his voice ringing with conviction. “Mr. and Mrs. Sloane, please, trust me! I’ve assisted Audrey on every single one of her micro-dissections. I know the theory, I know the principles by heart. Please, allow me to combine her technique with traditional methods. Let me take this risk for Olivia!” “Yes! Yes, my boy!” My father was weeping with gratitude. “Ethan, if you save Olivia, our family… we’ll give you half of our entire fortune!” At the mention of money, I finally looked up from my simulator. I watched my ecstatic parents and the noble, self-sacrificing Ethan, a silent calculation running through my mind. Half the Sloane family fortune. At least a hundred million dollars. But… I rose slowly from my chair and looked at Ethan, my voice dripping with sarcasm. “You’re going to use my technique? Have you been authorized?” Ethan froze, his expression turning to one of pained disbelief. “Audrey Sloane! How can you be thinking about that at a time like this? A life is on the line!” “Saving a life is one thing. Intellectual property is another.” I gave a dismissive shrug, my tone unyielding. “Without my authorization, if you so much as touch a scalpel using my methods, I will sue you into oblivion. You’ll never wear a white coat again.” “You—!” Ethan’s face went pale with rage. My father was trembling, pointing a finger at me. “Audrey Sloane! You’re being utterly unreasonable! Are you really going to let your sister die over money and patents?” I looked at him, my own father, as if he were a complete stranger. “You’d better decide quickly,” I said calmly. “The patient is running out of time.” The seconds ticked by, each one punctuated by the growing murmur of the crowd in the hall. I felt no urgency at all. “Fine! I agree!” my father finally choked out, his voice thick with defeat. “If you authorize the procedure, I’ll have my lawyers transfer half of my shares to you the moment it’s done!” I smiled and pulled a small digital recorder from my pocket, pressing the record button. “Dad, could you repeat that for me? You are voluntarily gifting me half of your shares in Sloane Industries as a licensing fee for my patented technique.” My father’s face turned a deep shade of purple, but he repeated the words, each one laced with humiliation. Satisfied, I put the recorder away and nodded at Ethan. “Go on, then. I hope your hands are steadier than mine.” Then, under the weight of my parents’ loathing and Ethan’s bitter disappointment, I walked out of the office. I didn’t go home. I went to the coffee shop across from the hospital and ordered the blackest, most bitter coffee they had. Through the large window, I could see the lights of the surgical floor shining brightly against the night sky. They got what they wanted. And so did I. For the next few days, I took a leave of absence. The hashtags trended nationally: #HeiressFromHell, #DoctorDearest, #TheSerpentSloane. My life story was excavated and put on public display. The internet spun a lurid tale of a “backwoods girl returns to the manor, torments her kind-hearted sister out of jealousy.” Olivia’s old social media accounts were unearthed, each post a carefully curated testament to how wonderful she had been to me, her gentle words painting me as an even more hideous monster. I didn’t look at my phone. I stayed in my apartment, polishing an old picture frame over and over. Inside was a photo of a kind, scholarly-looking middle-aged man: my mentor, Professor Marcus Cole. Three days later, the news broke. “Devoted Boyfriend’s Heroic Gamble Pays Off, Saves Fiancée’s Sister.” “A New God is Born! Dr. Ethan Cole Completes Impossible Brain Surgery!” The reports lionized Ethan. Facing the cameras, he spoke with deep emotion. “I only did what anyone would do. Audrey is the love of my life. Her sister is my sister.” His words only served to cast my own actions in a colder, more monstrous light. The online vitriol against me reached a fever pitch. And then, an even bigger story dropped. Veridian Medical Technologies, a giant in the medical device industry, announced a major strategic partnership with Dr. Ethan Cole to develop and promote an improved version of the micro-dissection technique and its associated surgical tools. A week later, I received a call from the hospital’s chief administrator. His tone was not an invitation, but a summons. “Audrey, tomorrow morning at nine, the hospital is hosting a city-wide neurosurgery conference. It will be live-streamed. As the patent holder for the original technique, your attendance is mandatory.” I knew what it was. A public execution. They wanted me there to witness Ethan’s coronation. The next day, I arrived at the hospital’s international conference center on time. The hall was packed. The city’s top neurosurgeons, reporters from every major news outlet—the room was a galaxy of flashing camera lights. As I walked in, my eyes were drawn to a scene in the center of the room that felt like a physical blow. Ethan and Olivia, who was seated in a wheelchair, were surrounded by a throng of journalists. My parents stood beside them, beaming. A perfect family of four. Suddenly, just a moment before the conference was set to begin, Olivia turned to the cameras and began to sob. “Everyone, I’m so sorry to take up your valuable time,” she began, her pale face streaked with tears, looking fragile and beautiful. She had everyone’s undivided attention. “But I have to reveal the truth today!” “My aneurysm… it wasn’t an accident! It… it was caused by long-term poisoning… by my sister, Audrey Sloane!” The announcement was a bombshell. The room erupted. Every camera, every phone, every pair of eyes swiveled to face me. Olivia’s sobs grew louder as she clutched our parents’ hands. “From the day she came to our home, she bullied me, she tried to push me out! I endured it all for the sake of our parents, for the peace of our family! But I never thought… I never thought she would be so cruel as to try and take my life!” Ethan placed a comforting hand on her shoulder, as if giving her the strength to speak her truth. He then produced several lab reports. “I didn’t want to say anything before, for fear of ruining Audrey’s reputation. But after the surgery, I obtained conclusive evidence. Olivia has been systematically poisoned with a chronic neurotoxin! I cannot stand by and let her hurt Olivia anymore!” The live-stream chat exploded. The hashtag #HeiressPoisonsSister shot to number one trending worldwide. I stood at the entrance of the hall, trapped in the crossfire of a thousand hateful stares. Reporters surged toward me, shoving microphones in my face. “Dr. Sloane, did you poison your sister?” “Why would you do something like that? Was it jealousy?” “Do you have any right to call yourself a doctor?” I ignored them all and walked toward my biological parents. I looked at them, my voice trembling just slightly. “Dad. Mom.” “Do you also believe that I am that kind of person?” My question hung in the air, creating a moment of dead silence. “Audrey, we gave you a chance…” my mother wept. “Olivia has proof… We… we are so disappointed in you!” My father, his face a mask of sorrow, turned away, unable to even look at me. “See? A true monster, even her own parents can’t stand by her!” “She’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing! The Sloanes should never have taken her in!” “They need to revoke her medical license, permanently!” The venomous whispers washed over me. I stood there, in the spotlight, utterly alone, a criminal already convicted by the court of public opinion. Just then, several uniformed police officers entered the hall. Their faces were grim, their voices loud and clear. “We received a call about an intentional poisoning. Who made the report?” Every head turned back to me. I could see the faint, triumphant smiles on Ethan and Olivia’s faces. Under the sharp gaze of the officers and in the suffocating silence of the room, I calmly raised my hand. “Officer,” I said. “I’m the one who called.”

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My name was written on a card and dropped into a box. And just like that, I, Sloane Richmond, a scholarship student at the prestigious Blackwood University, became the new prey in the latest round of a hunting game played by the school’s untouchable elite. The one tasked with my taming was the student body president himself, Landon Cole. He pursued me like something out of a romance movie: gentle, attentive, and obscenely generous. Everyone on campus whispered that I was about to hit the jackpot, to become his pampered little thing. They placed bets behind my back, wagering on how hard I’d be crying on the final day of the one-month deadline. But none of them knew. The most dangerous predators are the ones who appear as prey. I came to this university with a single purpose: to evaluate the character of my potential fiancé. And now, the evaluation was over. 1 My name is Sloane Richmond. In the Blackwood University archives, I am, for all intents and purposes, a charity case. On the first day of school, my roommate, Nina, pulled me aside to give me a hushed, conspiratorial rundown of the Blackwood survival guide. “Sloane, you have to remember, there are two kinds of people at this school.” She lowered her voice, nodding toward a red Ferrari peeling away from the curb outside our window. “There are people like us, who fought tooth and nail just to get in.” “And then there are them,” she said. “The heirs, who show up to class in supercars.” “And that circle, the one led by student president Landon Cole… you have to stay as far away from them as you possibly can.” Nina’s expression was dead serious. “They’re monsters, Sloane. Actual monsters.” “They love this disgusting game they call the ‘Kingfisher Draw.’” My hand, holding a glass of water, froze mid-air. I looked at her. “What kind of game?” Seeing my casual curiosity, Nina’s voice trembled with urgency. “They collect the names of pretty, normal girls on campus—girls without money. They write them on cards and put them in a box.” “Whichever girl one of the rich guys draws, he has one month to make her fall completely and hopelessly in love with him.” Nina’s face was a mask of disgust and fear. “And on the last day, in front of everyone, he dumps her in the most humiliating way he can think of.” “They call it ‘taming the prey.’ The winner is the one whose prey cries the hardest during the breakup.” She gripped my arm, her knuckles white. “Last semester, a junior from our department was chosen. A month later, she found out she was pregnant.” “The guy’s fiancée showed up and slapped her in front of a crowd, called her a whore.” “The junior… she couldn’t take it. She jumped from the top of the humanities building. She and the baby… both gone.” “So, Sloane, you’re so beautiful. Please, just be careful. Don’t let them notice you.” I reached out and patted her tense shoulder. “Don’t worry,” I said, offering a placid smile. “I’m just here to study.” Nina looked into my eyes and, for some reason, shivered. That night, in a private suite at the exclusive Aurelian club. Isabelle Beaumont giggled, shaking a polished wooden box. “Landon, darling, it’s your turn! Let’s see which lucky girl gets to be graced by your attention.” Landon Cole was draped across a velvet sofa, swirling a glass of red wine, the picture of lazy, aristocratic boredom. He glanced at the box without a flicker of interest. Undeterred, Isabelle pushed the box right under his nose, her voice thick and sweet like honey. “Come on, Landon, just draw! I put a real prize in there for you this time.” “Scholarship student from the art department. Name’s Sloane Richmond. Looks like an absolute angel. Imagine the satisfaction of winning her over just to break her.” Hearing this, a slow smile spread across Landon’s face. He reached out and plucked a card from the box. On it, in elegant script, was the name: Sloane Richmond. He stared at the card, his smile deepening with meaning. “Alright,” he said, his voice a low purr. “This month, let’s play with her.” From that day on, my quiet university life was suddenly spectacular. Everywhere I went, I “happened” to run into the student body president. Lining up in the cafeteria, he’d appear behind me, insisting on swiping his card for me. “Come on, fate brought us together in the lunch line. It’s on me.” Studying in the library, he’d sit across from me. The moment I frowned at a textbook, a note would slide across the table with the solution neatly written out, accompanied by a bright, effortless smile. I went to the artisanal coffee shop my father had opened for me just outside campus, deciding on a whim to learn how to work the espresso machine. Landon, assuming I was a struggling barista, promptly bought out the entire day’s inventory of cold brew, handing it out to strangers just so I could get off my shift early. “Don’t work so hard,” he murmured, his voice laced with concern. “A woman’s hands aren’t meant for this.” It took every ounce of my self-control not to let my eyes roll all the way into the back of my head. Within a week, the entire campus was buzzing. The student president was relentlessly pursuing the scholarship student, Sloane Richmond. I became the target of every girl’s envy, jealousy, and hatred. Every time I went back to my dorm, Nina would look at me with the sorrowful eyes one reserves for a lamb being led to slaughter. “Sloane! I told you to stay away from him!” I threw my hands up in mock helplessness. “I don’t know how he does it! He just… appears.” “You can’t fall for it!” Nina stomped her foot. “He’s just playing with you!” I nodded, my face a perfect portrait of sincerity. “Don’t worry. I know what I’m doing.” Of course I knew. Every time Landon performed one of his grand, romantic gestures, I could see Isabelle and her little posse in the distance, phones held up, recording everything. Let them film. My good side is all 360 degrees of them. Then came the invitation to Isabelle Beaumont’s birthday party at the Aurelian. Landon texted, asking me to be his date. I deliberately played my part. That place is way too expensive. I don’t have anything to wear. Ten minutes later, he was standing outside my dorm building holding a garment bag from a ridiculously high-end designer. Inside was a starlit blue evening gown with a price tag that could cover four years of tuition. “Wear this,” he said, his voice low and intense. “Tonight, you’re the princess.” Gasps erupted from the girls watching from their windows. “Oh my god, is that a custom D’Amore? That dress costs more than a new car!” “Sloane Richmond is the luckiest girl alive!” I had to physically restrain myself from crying with laughter. The price tag was almost as much as one of my favorite pairs of silk pajamas. I changed into the dress and walked into the Aurelian on Landon’s arm. The club was my eighteenth birthday present from my father, one of the more modest properties in my portfolio. As we entered, the general manager’s eyes lit up. He recognized me instantly and started forward, about to bow. I shot him a single, sharp glance. The man was a consummate professional; he pivoted smoothly and went to greet another guest as if nothing had happened. The birthday girl, Isabelle, saw me, and the jealousy in her eyes was a tangible thing. “Sloane, you look absolutely beautiful. Landon has such exquisite taste.” She paused, then leaned in, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. “But you should be careful in a rented dress. If you damage it, you could never afford to replace it.” I just smiled and said nothing. Throughout the party, Landon was the perfect gentleman. He intercepted drinks for me, cut my filet mignon, and draped his suit jacket over my shoulders when I feigned a shiver. Every detail was flawlessly executed, a scene from a Hollywood script. He pulled me before his friends, introducing me with an air of possession. “This is my girlfriend, Sloane.” His friends cheered and offered congratulations, their eyes glinting with derision and amusement. I stood there like a well-dressed doll, playing my part in his production. Midway through, I excused myself to go to the restroom. Just as I reached the corner, I heard Isabelle’s voice drift from the hallway. “Izzy, don’t you think Landon’s going a little overboard this time? A custom D’Amore gown? Is it possible he’s actually serious?” Isabelle let out a sharp, ugly laugh. “Are you kidding? My brother bought me that dress. Landon just borrowed it.” “After he’s done with her, that little charity case is going to have to take it off and give it back to me.” “It’s like fishing, you know? The more expensive the bait, the more satisfying the catch.” Another girl chimed in obsequiously. “You’re a genius, Izzy! Letting the poor girl wear Cinderella’s glass slippers for a night, only to smash them yourself. God, that’s going to be epic.” Isabelle’s voice was dripping with venomous glee. “Just you wait. The month is almost up. When the time comes, I’m going to make her strip that dress off in front of the entire school, crying her pathetic little eyes out.” Around the corner, in the shadows, I pressed the ‘stop recording’ button on my phone. After Isabelle’s party, Landon’s romantic offensive grew even more intense. Every morning, he was waiting outside my dorm with an elaborate breakfast. He skipped his own advanced economics seminars to sit with me through my boring required art history lectures. When I dozed off, he would secretly draw a tiny cartoon pig on the palm of my hand. On the day I had casually invented as my birthday, he presented me with a diamond necklace in front of all my roommates. Nina’s jaw dropped. She dragged me onto the balcony, her face etched with worry. “Sloane, be honest with me. You’re not actually falling for him, are you?” My fingers grazed the diamonds at my throat. I gave her a reassuring smile. “Of course not.” “Then why are you accepting something so expensive?” Nina’s voice was strained with panic. “With guys like him, everything they give, they expect back with interest! How are you ever going to pay for that?” I patted her shoulder. “Don’t worry.” “He’s going to regret it.” The next day, Nina and I were having lunch in the cafeteria. Isabelle, flanked by her friends, walked past our table carrying a tray. With a flick of her wrist, a bowl of scalding hot tomato soup came tipping toward me. I dodged, but the hot liquid still splashed across my arm. “Ah!” Nina screamed, frantically grabbing napkins to dab at my skin. Isabelle looked down at me, her expression one of pure contempt. “Oops. So sorry. My hand slipped.” Her eyes scanned my simple white t-shirt. “You get that thing from a thrift store for five bucks? Here.” She pulled three hundred-dollar bills from her wallet and tossed them on the table as if feeding a stray dog. “That’s three hundred. Should be enough to buy you a whole new wardrobe.” I had to clench my fists under the table. That blind fool. This one t-shirt was worth more than her entire tacky outfit. I had specifically chosen it from my closet full of bespoke clothing as my most “understated” piece, and she had just ruined it. Oh, Dad, I thought, the things your daughter endures for the sake of the family business. Just then, a figure charged through the crowd. Landon shoved Isabelle aside with enough force to make her stumble. He rushed to my side, his face a mask of frantic concern. “Are you okay? Did it burn you? How bad is it?” He whirled on Isabelle, his voice like thunder. “Isabelle, are you insane? Apologize to Sloane. Now.” Isabelle’s eyes instantly filled with tears. “Landon, darling, it was an accident.” “I said, apologize!” Startled by his fury, she mumbled a resentful, “Sorry.” The word was barely out of her mouth before Landon swept me up into his arms, princess-style, and strode toward the campus clinic as the entire cafeteria stared. “I’m so sorry, Sloane,” he whispered, his voice tight with emotion. “I should have protected you.” I lowered my gaze, letting my shoulders tremble. “It’s not your fault,” I whimpered, my voice thick with unshed tears. He held me even tighter. “Sloane, trust me. No one will ever dare to bully you again.” I rested my head against his chest. The cloying scent of his expensive cologne mixed with the acidic smell of tomato soup was truly nauseating. If Dad knew I’d gotten hurt playing this stupid game… But it was alright. The observation period was almost over. The one-month deadline finally arrived. I received a text from Landon. Lover’s Point. Tomorrow at 7 PM. I’ll be waiting. There’s something important I need to tell you. Okay, I texted back, adding a smiley face. I’ll bring a gift for you, too. It’s a surprise I prepared just for you. 😉 Nina saw my reply and started pacing like a caged animal. “Sloane, are you crazy? You’re actually going? He’s obviously going to dump you, and you’re bringing him a gift?” “I know,” I said calmly. “That’s why I prepared such a grand one for him.” A gift he would remember for the rest of his life. The next evening, I went to Lover’s Point as planned. Landon was already there, looking like a prince straight out of a fairy tale. Beneath his familiar, gentle smile, I could see the glint of a hunter’s excitement. In the shadows of the trees, I caught the tell-tale glint of phone screens. Isabelle and the rest of the Kingfisher Draw players were already in position. “Sloane,” he began, his voice heavy with fake regret. “I’ve thought about this a lot. I think… I think we should break up.” “Our families are just from two different worlds. My mother would never approve. It breaks my heart to do this, but it’s better to make a clean break now.” “It’s for your own good. You’re a wonderful girl, and I hope you find someone who can actually marry you one day.” He delivered the lines with such heartfelt sincerity; he really had a future in low-budget soap operas. But if it was a performance he wanted, I was more than happy to oblige. “So… this whole month?” I asked, my voice trembling as I looked up at him, my eyes shimmering with tears. “Everything you did for me, all the kindness… it was all just a game, wasn’t it?” Landon’s face broke into a cruel, unconcealed smirk. “Since you’ve already figured it out, I guess I can drop the act.” “That’s right. It was a game. Sloane, did you really think I could ever fall in love with some poor little scholarship girl?” He pointed a finger at the dress I was wearing, then at the necklace on my neck, and sneered. “Do you think you’re worthy of any of this?” “Now, the game is over.” “Give back what doesn’t belong to you. Especially that diamond necklace. I was planning on giving that to Isabelle.” Isabelle and her cronies stepped out from the trees, moving behind Landon, ready to watch me get stripped of my borrowed finery. I raised my hand and unclasped the diamond necklace he’d given me. Then, in front of all of them, I drew my arm back and threw it. The necklace cut a glittering arc through the twilight air before landing in the lake with a quiet plunk. Isabelle shrieked. “My diamond necklace! Sloane, are you insane?!” The others stood with their jaws agape, too shocked to speak. “Landon was right,” I said, my voice suddenly clear and steady. “A diamond necklace of this quality really isn’t worthy.” “In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever seen diamonds of such poor clarity before.” “As for this dress…” I turned my gaze to Isabelle. “Isabelle, open your eyes and take a good, long look. Does this really look like the dress your brother gave you?” One of her more observant friends leaned in and whispered nervously, “Izzy… that doesn’t look like the D’Amore couture your brother bought. It… it looks more like the ‘Galaxy of Starlight’ gown the international master designer Julian Devereaux created for the Richmond heiress.” Isabelle shot her friend a withering glare. “Are you insane, too? Her last name is Richmond, so that makes her the Richmond heiress? Could a scholarship girl ever wear something like that?” It was getting late, and I needed my beauty sleep. It was time to wrap this up. “Landon, I have to admit, playing with you all has been… tiring.” “The observation period is over, fiancé. Congratulations.” “You’ve been disqualified.”

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The Patek Philippe in my family’s vault, the one with an eight-million-dollar valuation, has the Cole family crest engraved on the caseback. It’s our heirloom. So, I was somewhat surprised to see it on Ryan Asher’s Instagram story. He was dangling it for the camera, the light catching the platinum bezel. The caption was pure, unadulterated pride: A gift from the boss. Said it suited my style. Any experts out there know the value? My fingers were trembling when I texted Isabelle. You have thirty minutes to put that watch back where it belongs. If you don’t, I will burn your family’s entire legacy to the ground. She replied almost instantly, her tone a cloying mix of panic and flirtation. “Ethan, don’t be so harsh. Ryan was just curious, he wanted to wear it for a day…” Thirty minutes later, I made a call. The Monroe Corporation board meeting descended into chaos. Ryan Asher, wearing my family’s heirloom, was trying to schmooze his way toward the head of the table when security grabbed him by the arms. They dragged him out, but not before the watch slipped from his wrist, skittering across the mahogany conference table with a sickening crack. Some things, once broken, are just broken. But the person who breaks them? They have to be buried in the wreckage. 1 “Ethan! Are you out of your mind? You had security throw Ryan out of a board meeting?” Isabelle’s voice, sharp and furious, preceded her into my office. I tapped a finger on my desk, not bothering to look up. “I gave you thirty minutes.” “He’s my executive assistant! He just closed a three-hundred-million-dollar contract with our European partners!” She stormed up to my desk, her stilettos sinking into the plush carpet, and slammed her ludicrously expensive Hermès bag on the floor. “Those old vultures on the board are already looking for any excuse to undermine me because of my age, and you just handed them a goddamn knife, didn’t you? You just had to stick your nose into the Monroe Corporation’s business? You think we can’t survive without the Coles?” I finally lifted my gaze to meet hers, a humorless laugh escaping my lips. “You know exactly what that watch represents, Isabelle.” “It has the Cole family crest on the back. No one outside the direct line of succession is ever supposed to touch it, let alone wear it. And you just gave it to your boy toy?” Isabelle’s face went rigid. With a sweep of her arm, she sent a stack of files cascading to the floor. “I have dozens of watches sitting in my dresser at home!” “Ryan had to close that deal today! It’s a nine-figure account! I let him borrow it to make an impression, what’s the big deal?” “He’s just a kid who fought his way out of nothing in Appalachia, is it so wrong to help him?” “Make an impression?” I loosened my tie, the sound of my own cold laugh echoing in the silent office. “Anyone watching would think he was the kept man you’re hiding on the side.” “Plenty of people fight their way up from nothing. They do it one step at a time, with their own sweat.” “You’re so generous, Isabelle. Why don’t you just liquidate your Monroe shares and buy a Patek for every poor kid in the mountains?” “You’re an asshole, Ethan!” The barb hit its mark. She was trembling with rage, snatching our wedding photo from the corner of my desk and hurling it at me. The silver frame shattered at my feet. I bent down and picked up the photograph, my voice as cold and sharp as the broken glass. “On our sixth anniversary, I booked the entire private island in the Maldives where we honeymooned. I waited for you. You spent that night at a hotel celebrating Ryan’s birthday. He even posted a picture of you feeding him a slice of cake.” Isabelle’s chin jutted out. “Can you stop being such a pathetic, paranoid husband for one second?” “It was Ryan’s birthday, and the client was trying to get him drunk. He has a severe alcohol allergy; he could have ended up in the hospital if I wasn’t there to run interference.” “We have an anniversary every year, Ethan. What if Ryan had died?” I swiped open my phone’s photo gallery. There was Ryan, posing in front of a new Porsche. “For his birthday, you throw him a party and buy him a sports car.” “For my birthday, you have your assistant send a bouquet of fake flowers to my office.” “Isabelle, who is your husband? Me, or Ryan Asher?” “As if you need any of those things,” she scoffed, her eyes dripping with disdain. “Ethan, honestly. Picking on a kid just starting his career? Don’t you find that embarrassing?” “No,” I said. A smile touched my lips, but it didn’t reach my eyes. “But you might want to give your star assistant a heads-up, Isabelle.” “If he ever sets foot in a Monroe Corporation board meeting again, your family can expect the Cole Corporation to pull every last dollar of its funding.”

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My parents divorced when I was five. I chose to live with my dad. Two years later, a car accident left me paralyzed from the waist down. My father decided I was a burden he wasn’t willing to bear. He drove me to my mother’s house, left me on the doorstep, and never looked back. But my mom, Laura, she didn’t see a burden. She saw her daughter. For twenty years, she was my hands and my feet. She was my constant. To pay for my medical bills, she worked three jobs, collapsing from exhaustion more times than I can count. Her second husband, Mark, finally gave her an ultimatum. “If you don’t put that girl in a state home, we’re done.” She signed the divorce papers without a second thought. Her devotion went viral, a storybook of maternal sacrifice that captivated the nation. They called her “America’s Greatest Mom.” Everyone told me how lucky I was to have her. Then I won the lottery. Ten million dollars. And I transferred every last cent to the father who had abandoned me. The internet branded me a monster. An ungrateful viper. A reporter tracked me down, shoving a microphone in my face. “Your father didn’t spend a single day caring for you in twenty years, but your mother sacrificed everything. She’s buried in debt because of you. Why wouldn’t you give her a dime?” I looked straight into her camera, my voice even. “Install a hidden camera in our house. Livestream everything for three days. Then you’ll know why.” 1 The camera was no bigger than a screw head, tucked away on a bookshelf. The secret broadcast began. That evening, my mother came home, her body stooped with the familiar weariness of a long day. She shuffled to my bedside, her movements slow and deliberate, preparing to clean me for the night. When she pulled back the sheets, the mess beneath me was obvious. But there was no disgust in her eyes. Only a wave of guilt and heartache. “Oh, Anna,” she whispered, her voice raspy. “Did you have an upset stomach last night?” She pressed the back of her hand to my forehead, her brow furrowed with self-reproach. “I’m so sorry, sweetie. I’ve just been so tired from work, I must have slept right through. I didn’t get up to check your blankets. You must have been so uncomfortable all night…” I watched her, my expression unreadable. I said nothing. The live chat, however, was a waterfall of emotion. “OMG, this mom is an actual saint. She comes home to that, and her first thought is to blame herself?” “Right?? I’d be screaming. After a 12-hour shift? No way.” “This is why they call her America’s Greatest Mom. I’m literally crying.” Unaware of her audience, my mother began the arduous process of helping me turn, preparing to lift me into the bathroom for a bath. But she was older now, worn thin by years of this. Her arms strained, her knuckles white, but she couldn’t get the leverage to lift my dead weight from the mattress. Just then, a sharp knock echoed from the front door. Mom opened it to find my father standing there. She froze. “Rick? What are you doing here?” He held up a duffel bag, a lazy grin on his face. “If I recall, when we split, we put this apartment in Anna’s name. I’m her legal guardian, her father. Nothing wrong with a dad crashing at his kid’s place for a few days, is there?” He shouldered his way inside before she could answer. Mom was too tired to argue. She just sighed. “Fine. Then make yourself useful. Help me get Anna into the bathroom. I need to give her a bath.” My father glanced at the bed, his nose wrinkling in disgust. “Jesus. Smells like a sewer. I’m not touching her.” Mom’s jaw tightened. “She’s your daughter, Rick! She just gave you ten million dollars. You can’t even be bothered to help lift her?” He scoffed. “She gave it to me. Her choice. Don’t try to guilt-trip me now.” Mom let out a long, weary breath. “I respect Anna’s decisions. She gave you the money because she wants you to have a stable life, to get back on your feet.” Her voice pleaded with him. “She shows you that much respect. Can’t you show her a little kindness?” Rick’s eyes were cold. “What’s the point? She’s a cripple. Has been for twenty years. A useless vegetable.” He shook his head, looking at my mother as if she were insane. “I don’t know why you bother keeping her around. It would have been better for everyone if she’d just died.” The live chat exploded. “WHAT DID HE JUST SAY?? He wished his own daughter was dead? To her face??” “And this is the piece of trash she gave TEN MILLION DOLLARS to. Not a penny to her saint of a mother, but all of it to this monster.” “There’s something seriously wrong with this girl. Her mom gives up her entire life for her, goes into debt, gets divorced, and gets nothing. This daughter is sick in the head.” “She didn’t just paralyze her legs, she paralyzed her brain.” 2 In the end, my father didn’t help. It took my mother over an hour to get me cleaned up and settled. She was sweating, her hair plastered to her forehead, but she carefully dressed me in fresh pajamas and transferred me to my wheelchair. “You must be starving, Anna,” she said, her voice soft. “Let me go make you some dinner.” She almost fainted as she stood up, her body swaying from the effort. She steadied herself against the wall for a moment, took a deep breath, and walked into the kitchen. A short while later, she emerged with a tray. Roast chicken, mashed potatoes, steamed green beans, and a bowl of chicken noodle soup that smelled like home. She set the tray on the table in front of me, then spooned some of the soup, blowing on it gently before lifting it to my lips. “I went to the farmer’s market to get a fresh chicken for this soup, sweetie. Just like you used to love when you were little. Try some.” I turned my head away. “I don’t want it,” I said, my voice flat. Worry clouded her face. “Anna, honey, you need to eat something. Especially after being sick last night. You’ll waste away.” I met her gaze, my own eyes cold. “I’m not hungry.” My gaze drifted over to my father, who was slouched on the sofa, scrolling through his phone. My voice softened. “Dad, can I have that slice of pizza on the coffee table?” He didn’t even look up. “That’s mine. You want pizza, wheel yourself down to the corner and buy some.” My mother shot him a furious look before turning back to me, her voice gentle again. “Anna, please, just eat your dinner. I’ll go out and get you a fresh pizza as soon as you’re done, okay?” I shook my head stubbornly, refusing to even look at the meal she’d prepared. The internet was having a meltdown. “Is this girl for real? Her mom makes a home-cooked meal and she wants the cold, greasy pizza her deadbeat dad is eating?” “I thought she was just confused before, but this is just… cruel. Her dad treats her like garbage and she’s still begging for scraps from him?” “That poor woman. All that work for nothing. She made a whole feast and her daughter won’t even look at it.” “This is disgusting. The more I watch, the more I hate this daughter. She’s the real monster here.” 3 The first day of the livestream ended with a torrent of abuse aimed squarely at me. The next day, my mother came home a little earlier than usual. She was holding a warm paper bag. “Anna, I remembered you wanted pizza,” she said, her voice bright with forced cheerfulness. “I picked one up on my way home from work. Pepperoni, your favorite. Here, have a slice while it’s hot.” She held it out to me, her eyes searching my face for a flicker of approval. I glanced at the pizza box, then back at her. My voice was monotone. “I don’t want it anymore.” A shadow of hurt and disappointment passed over her face, but she quickly masked it with a smile. “Okay, sweetie. Well, what would you like? I can make you anything.” I gave her a long, cold look. “I don’t want anything you make.” With that, I turned my wheelchair toward the balcony, needing some air. As I exited my room, I ran directly into my father, who was staggering out of his, a half-empty bottle of whiskey in his hand. The bottle slipped from his grasp and shattered on the floor. His face contorted with rage. “Goddammit, are you blind? That was a brand-new bottle of Jack!” He snatched the neck of the broken bottle from the floor and, in a fit of fury, kicked my wheelchair with all his strength. The chair bucked violently, tipping sideways. “Anna!” My mother screamed, diving toward me. She threw her body between me and the floor, her arms wrapping around me as the full weight of the chair and my body crashed down on top of her. A jagged piece of metal on the wheelchair’s frame sliced her arm open, a deep, horrifying gash that bled instantly. But she didn’t even seem to feel the pain. Her only concern was me. She scrambled to right the chair, her hands shaking as she checked me over, her voice frantic. “Are you okay? Did you hit your head?” Once she was sure I was unharmed, she rounded on my father, her voice trembling with fury. “Rick, you could have killed her!” My father just stared at me. “She’s a paralytic. It’s not like she can feel anything anyway. What’s the big deal?” He kicked at a piece of broken glass. “Such a waste of good whiskey.” He stormed back into his room, slamming the door. My mother, still breathing heavily, ignored the blood pouring from her arm. Her focus was entirely on the wheelchair. She noticed a clasp had been knocked loose by the kick. Immediately, she went to find the toolbox. She spent the rest of the night on the floor, carefully tightening screws and reinforcing the frame, long after I had gone to bed. In the live chat, the fury was incandescent. “I’m dead. This woman is a living angel. Her arm is ripped open and all she cares about is her daughter.” “And for what? So her heartless, dead-eyed daughter can keep treating her like dirt?” “Is this girl’s heart made of stone? How can she see what her mother does for her and feel nothing? How can she be so cold?” “They say you reap what you sow, but this mother sowed love and harvested a monster. That girl deserves to be paralyzed.” “Just leave her, Laura! My God, just walk away! This child isn’t worth it!” The vitriol was so intense that the reporter called me again, her voice strained. “Is this what you wanted? This three-day secret livestream? Do you have any idea what people are saying about you?” she asked, exasperated. “Your mother is a saint. This is just making you look like the most evil person on the planet.” I glanced into the living room, where my mother was sitting alone, clumsily trying to bandage her own wound. “There’s still one day left,” I said quietly. “Tomorrow, you’ll understand everything.” 4 On the morning of the third day, my mother came into my room as she always did. “Morning, Anna. How are you feeling today? Is your appetite any better?” she asked softly, her hands expertly checking my circulation and looking for pressure sores. I didn’t answer, but my eyes flickered to the thick gauze wrapped around her arm. Fresh blood had already started to seep through. Ignoring my silence, she began my daily physical therapy, gently massaging my legs and flexing my joints to prevent muscle atrophy. Her touch was tender, as if she were handling the most precious treasure in the world. “Look, Anna, it’s a beautiful day out,” she said, trying to fill the silence. “After breakfast, I’ll take you outside for some fresh air. The doctor said it would be good for you.” I just stared out the window. “I don’t want to.” Her hands faltered for a second, but she said nothing, resuming the massage. When she was done, she brought a bowl of warm water and carefully washed my face and hands, then went to make breakfast. The live chat was still simmering with yesterday’s rage. “Same dead fish expression on her face today. I can’t stand looking at her.” “Her mom’s arm is literally bleeding through the bandage and this girl can’t even ask if she’s okay?” “I’m convinced. Some people don’t deserve kindness.” My mother didn’t go to work that day. She said she wanted to spend some quality time with me. After cleaning up from breakfast, she wheeled me out onto the small balcony to sit in the sun. She brushed my hair, clipped my fingernails, and cleaned my ears. She tended to every part of me until I was pristine. Then, she pulled up a small stool and sat beside me, taking my hand in hers. Her grip was tight. “Do you remember this, Anna?” she began, her voice low and thick with memory. “When you were a little girl, you loved sitting on the porch with me in the sun. You’d say the sunshine made all the sad feelings go away.” She squeezed my hand. “We didn’t have much money back then, but you always said that as long as you had your mom and dad, you were the happiest girl in the world.” A sad smile touched her lips. “You said when you grew up, you were going to take me on a trip around the world…” Her eyes grew misty. Just then, her phone buzzed. She glanced at the screen, then looked back at me, a deep, unreadable expression in her eyes. She silenced the call. She stood up, looking down at me. “Well, Anna,” she said, her voice strangely calm. “It’s about time.” A small smile touched my lips. Finally. The moment was here. My mother turned and walked back into the house, leaving me on the balcony. She went into my room and did something that made every single person watching the livestream gasp. 5 Under the silent watch of thousands, my mother opened my closet. She began taking my clothes, my personal items, and carefully folding them, placing them one by one into a worn, old suitcase. Her movements were slow, weighted with a sense of finality. The live chat erupted with question marks. “What is she doing? Where are they going?” “Is she finally leaving him? Taking the daughter and running? GOOD FOR HER.” “Wait, she’s packing Anna’s things. Is she… sending her away?” “No way. Not after all this. She loves her daughter too much to put her in a home.” “Maybe the daughter pushed her too far. She finally broke.” Just as the speculation reached a fever pitch, my father emerged from his bedroom, yawning. He saw my mother packing the suitcase, and a smirk spread across his face. “So, Laura,” he said, leaning against the doorframe. “You finally came to your senses? You’re really going through with it?” My mother didn’t turn around. She just kept packing. “Yes,” she said, her voice a low hum. My father chuckled and walked over to my wheelchair. He bent down, his face close to mine, and his voice was laced with mock pity. “You know, Anna, you’re one lucky girl. Paralyzed for twenty years, and you get a sucker like your mom who just won’t quit.” He shook his head. “Even after everything you’ve put her through, she still couldn’t bring herself to dump you in a state facility.” He paused, his grin widening. “Oh, by the way. That ten million you gave me? It’s gone. Had a bad run in Vegas. Not only is it gone, but I’m another hundred grand in the hole.” He said it like he was telling me the weather. “Good news for me is, I’m still your legal guardian. So I sold this apartment to cover my debts. The new owners will be here in a few days to take possession.” He patted my shoulder. “I was going to have you sent to a nursing home, but your mom here threw a fit. Cried and screamed about how they wouldn’t take proper care of you. Can you believe that?” I glanced at my mother. Her face was a mask, showing nothing. But the internet had seen enough. The dam of outrage broke. “TEN MILLION DOLLARS?! GONE?! And he sold their home out from under them?!” “This man is not human. He’s a demon. He’s going to leave his ex-wife and disabled daughter homeless.” “Well, daughter dearest, are you happy now? Your precious ten million fed a monster.” “This is karma. She was blind and stupid and now she’s paying the price.” “The mother is the only victim here! She worked for 20 years to care for that girl, and now she has nothing. No money, no home, nothing!” “And she’s STILL taking the daughter with her? Is she crazy? Run, woman! Run for your life!” The livestream was a raging inferno of hate for me and my father. As my mother finished packing and my father went to the kitchen for a beer, my phone rang. It was the reporter again. “Anna, is this the father you emptied your bank account for?” her voice crackled with disbelief. “Ten million dollars, and he didn’t say thank you, didn’t lift a finger for you, and pissed it all away before selling your home! Meanwhile, your mother, who has no legal obligation to you, has devoted her life to you. She has nothing, and she’s still choosing you.” She took a sharp breath. “After today, the entire world thinks you’re a monster. Don’t you have anything to say? Why are you being so cruel to your mother?” 6 The reporter’s voice was a frantic buzz in my ear. My eyes found my mother’s back as she zipped the suitcase closed. Twenty years had turned her dark, glossy hair to a dry, brittle gray. Her once straight posture was now permanently bent, as if under an invisible weight. I remember how much she used to care about her appearance. A single gray hair would send her into a spiral for a whole afternoon. Now, for me, she had aged into a little old woman before her time. Such a good mother. What a shame. I sighed, my voice calm as I spoke into the phone. “It’s not time yet.” I hung up. My mother had finished packing. She grabbed the handle of the suitcase with one hand and the back of my wheelchair with the other. “Let’s go, Anna,” she said, her voice steady. “Don’t you worry. No matter what happens, Mom will take care of you.” My father leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed, a mocking sneer on his face. “Don’t be a martyr, Laura. You’re not young anymore. How are you going to find a job, pay the rent, all while dragging this anchor around?” He gestured at me. “It’s not too late. Just drop her at the county home. You’ve done more than enough. You don’t owe her anything else.” My mother looked up at him, her eyes blazing with a sudden fire. “As long as I am breathing, I will never abandon Anna,” she said, her voice ringing with conviction. “I carried her for nine months. She is a part of my own body. She is my heart.” Without another glance at my father, she pushed my wheelchair out of the apartment we had called home for so long. The livestream from inside the apartment cut out, but the reporter wasn’t giving up. The story was too big. Within minutes, she was on the street behind us, her camera operator filming from a distance as she provided live commentary. My mother took the last few thousand dollars she had to her name and rented a tiny, dilapidated studio apartment in a rough part of town. Once she had me settled, she threw herself back into work, harder than ever. I spent most of my days lying in bed. The reporter’s feed, now followed by millions, focused primarily on my mother. Her drone camera hovered discreetly outside the grimy windows of our new apartment. Through that lens, the world watched my mother’s struggle. With the added expense of rent, she was working herself to death. She cleaned houses during the day, washed dishes in a greasy diner at night, and came home late to assemble cheap electronics for pennies apiece. The camera captured it all. It watched her drag her nearly lifeless body home each night, only to begin the second shift of caring for me: cleaning my body, massaging my limbs, cooking my meals, and feeding me. And I remained a stone wall. I often refused the food she so carefully prepared. I met her every act of sacrifice with cold indifference. The livestream continued. The hatred for me never waned; it only intensified. “Is that girl made of wood? Her mother is literally killing herself for her, and she’s still acting like a zombie.” “Does she just think this is normal? That this is what she’s owed?” “If I were her mother, I would have walked away so long ago. I’d be on a beach in Mexico.” “I can’t take this anymore. That woman is a saint, and she’s wasting her life on an ungrateful monster! Your kindness is worthless if you give it to someone who doesn’t deserve it!” “Seriously, what did this horrible girl ever do to deserve a mother like that?!” The abuse was constant. My mother’s labor was endless. On the third day in our new apartment, after working for nearly twenty hours straight, my mother came home and started to prepare my dinner. She took two steps into the tiny kitchen, her eyes rolled back in her head, and she collapsed onto the linoleum floor. She was unconscious. I did not move. I did not call for help. A small, satisfied smile spread across my face.

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