Just seconds after texting me a sweet, teasing emoji to beg for attention, Chelsea posted a TikTok. In the video, she was sitting on the back of a tricked-out electric scooter, her arms wrapped tightly around some bleach-blonde punk’s waist, laughing with a wild, unfiltered abandonment I’d never seen from her before. “Is this ride custom, babe? What’s the zero-to-sixty?” she asked, her voice breathless over the wind. “A little over three seconds. Wild, right?” the punk replied, looking back with a cocky grin. I stared at the screen, a dry, hollow laugh escaping my throat. I had spent millions on her over the past three years, trying to win her heart. And yet, on our third anniversary, she was out street-racing with a kid she’d probably met yesterday. Without a second thought, I picked up the office phone, dialed my assistant, and instructed her to cancel the deed transfer for the townhouse in the hills. “I run a multi-billion-dollar company,” I murmured to myself, leaning back in my chair. “Women in this city would kill to be in her position. Why am I begging for scraps?” … “I’ll handle it right away,” my assistant said. Once she closed the door, I leaned back in my leather chair and closed my eyes, letting the quiet of the office wash over me. Three years ago, Chelsea was a senior in college, interning at my friend David’s tech firm. I was there to discuss a merger that afternoon. Walking past the glass conference room, I saw her kneeling on the carpet, frantically picking up loose papers. They were scattered everywhere. Her face was flushed a deep, panicked red, her ears burning. When someone walked past, she scrambled to get out of the way, only to knock the neat stack right back onto the floor. I stood there for a moment, then walked in and knelt down, silently gathering a few pages for her. She looked up, her eyes wide, and whispered a soft, fragile “thank you.” Her voice was quiet, but it had a rare, untainted quality to it. There was a raw innocence in her eyes that made something quiet in my chest stir. Later, I asked David about her. Just a new intern, he told me. Middle-class family, great GPA, quiet girl. “She’s beautiful,” I had said. “Get me her contact details.” David laughed. “Nick, is the eternal bachelor finally looking to settle down?” I didn’t answer. But out of a sudden, protective instinct—and perhaps a bit of weariness of people wanting me only for my money—I decided to hide who I was. Our first real date was at a cramped, noisy little Thai joint downtown. She ordered the cheapest pad thai on the menu. When I added a plate of crispy pork belly, she kept waving her hands, insisting it was too much, that we’d never finish it. When the bill came, she sneaked a quick glance at the total, then quietly asked the waiter for a box to pack up the leftovers. In a world of social climbers, she felt like a breath of fresh air. I was incredibly careful during our courtship. I drove my driver’s old, dented Audi A4. I wore plain, unbranded cashmere sweaters with the labels carefully snipped off. The first gift I gave her was a scarf—no flashy brand name, but woven from the finest cashmere, costing thousands. She turned it over in her hands, asking if it was expensive. “Ten bucks at a street market,” I lied. She believed me and wore it every single day that winter. Our dates were simple: cheap diners, indie movies, long walks through the park. She always said she liked the simple things in life. I thought it was her genuine soul. But over our three years together, even after she accepted my proposal to be her boyfriend, there was always a distance. She never texted first, never asked about my day, never held my hand unless I reached for hers. If I went out of town for business, my phone would remain silent for days. I made excuses for her. She’s just independent, I told myself. She doesn’t need to be clingy. But in that TikTok, she was holding that blonde kid like her life depended on it, her face flushed with a thrill she’d never shown me, calling him “babe.” I opened my eyes, picked up my phone, and rewatched it. The punk wore a backward baseball cap. When he revved the modified electric motor, the bike jolted forward, throwing her back. She squealed, laughing, and locked her arms tighter around his waist. I tapped on his profile. Just a dozen videos, all of them street-racing, popping wheelies, and doing illegal stunts on modified bikes. The latest one, posted this afternoon, was captioned: “Taking the new girl out. She says this beats riding in the four rings any day.” They had known each other for less than seventy-two hours. Someone commented: “That toy cost $3k max. That’s loose change compared to a real Audi.” The kid replied: “Does an Audi turn heads like this? Didn’t think so.” I flipped the phone screen-down on my desk. Three years ago, I quietly had David raise her intern stipend from $500 to $2,500 a month, paying the difference out of my own pocket. When she got hired full-time, I had it bumped to $8,000. She had no idea. She just thought she was exceptionally good at her job and that the firm was incredibly generous. Two years ago, when she complained about her long commute, I pulled strings to find her a gorgeous, fully furnished two-bedroom apartment near her office. I paid the landlord $5,000 a month but had my real estate agent tell her the owner was a sweet old lady renting it out for $400 just to keep the place clean. For her birthday last year, I gave her a pair of delicate bracelets. She assumed they were cheap silver and wore them carelessly, almost dropping them down the bathroom drain once. I never told her they were custom platinum, designed by a master jeweler in Paris, worth eighty thousand dollars. To her, I was Nick, a mid-level manager making a comfortable eighty grand a year, driving a sensible used sedan. Middle-class. Boring. She didn’t know the parent company belonged to me. She didn’t know the scale of my portfolio. She didn’t know that my “boring meetings” were with senators and international board members. She didn’t even know her boss answered to me. I had planned to tell her everything tonight. The papers for a beautiful brownstone in Brooklyn were sitting in my bag, fully paid for, just waiting for her signature. I had a flawless, three-carat diamond ring tucked away. And a letter, handwritten. In it, I explained why I’d kept my identity secret, my deepest feelings for her, and the life I wanted to build with her. I had practiced the words in the mirror: “Chelsea, I’m sorry I kept this from you for so long. But starting today, no more secrets. I want to give you the world.” The letter was still resting in my top drawer. I pulled it out, read it over once, and tore it down the middle. I threw the scraps into the wastebasket just as my phone buzzed on the desk. “Nick, did you make the reservation?” Her voice was the same as always—light, soft, slightly detached. “Yeah,” I said, my voice perfectly level. “The usual place.” “Great. I’ll head over right after work.” I arrived at our little Thai joint early. I ordered a pot of green tea and sipped it slowly, watching the city lights flicker to life outside. It was completely dark by the time Chelsea finally pushed open the door. “God, work was brutal today,” she sighed, sliding into the booth opposite me. “David was breathing down our necks for the new proposal. The whole team had to stay late.” David was my friend. Ten minutes before she arrived, I had called him. He confirmed Chelsea had taken the entire day off. I didn’t call her out. “Sounds rough,” I said. “It’s fine,” she said, offering a weak smile. “Not the first time.” When the food arrived, she picked up her chopsticks and grabbed a piece of the crispy pork belly. “Still the best in town. I never get sick of this place.” I didn’t reply, just chewing slowly on a piece of bok choy. Halfway through the meal, her phone vibrated. She glanced at the screen, a sudden flash of nervousness crossing her face. “Oh, it’s David. I should probably take this outside.” She slid out of the booth, clutch purse in hand. “Is it David,” I said quietly, “or the kid with the custom e-bike?” She froze. “What?” “I asked if the call is from the blonde kid on the modified bike.” She stared at me, her face pale, a forced laugh slipping from her lips. “What are you talking about? What blonde kid? Nick, you’re making no sense.” I unlocked my phone, pulled up the TikTok video, and slid the screen across the worn wooden table. She looked down. On the glowing screen, she was clinging to the blonde kid’s waist, laughing with a radiant, carefree joy. A waiter walked past us, murmuring an apology as he squeezed through. Chelsea took a step back to let him pass, and then she let out a breathy, genuine laugh. It wasn’t the polite, guarded smile she usually gave me. It was real. Cold, sharp, and laced with the relief of someone who was finally tired of pretending. She sat back down, sliding my phone back to my side of the table. “Fine. Since you saw it, I won’t lie.” “I didn’t work today. I went riding down by the harbor with him and we posted a video. So what? Is that a crime?” Her voice was low, but the words spilled out fast, defensive. “Nick, I’ve been with you for three years. Do you have any idea what these three years have been like for me?” “You wear the same boring clothes—flannel shirts, dark jackets, looking like you’re pushing fifty. I asked you to change it up, and you just said you like being comfortable. You drive that beaten-up Audi that can barely accelerate past a stoplight.” “You make decent money, but you live like you’re on minimum wage. We can’t eat out without you looking at the prices first, you park blocks away to avoid paying for parking, and we only go to the movies on discount Tuesdays.” “Do you know what my friends say about you? They say you’re boring. They say you have no taste, that you’re holding me back.” “I always defended you. I told them you were sweet, that you were stable. But I’m tired of defending you, Nick.” She paused, her chest rising and falling as she caught her breath. “That kid? He doesn’t have your stable job, and he definitely doesn’t have your savings. But he actually knows how to live. He takes me out to bars, he rides with the wind in my hair, he introduces me to his friends, we make videos. I feel alive when I’m with him.” “But with you? I feel like I’m retired. We are living in two completely different worlds, Nick.” I stared into her eyes. The quiet, untouched innocence from three years ago was entirely gone, replaced by a cheap, bitter ambition. “Are you done?” I asked. “I am,” she said, leaning back in her seat, crossing her arms. “So, what are you going to do about it?” I nodded slowly. “Then let’s break up.” She blinked, caught off guard by how effortlessly the words left my mouth. Then a smirk crept back onto her face, cold and dismissive. “Fine with me. Honestly, I’ve been waiting for this. If I didn’t feel a little bad because you’ve been so loyal, I would have ended it last month.” She swiped her phone and dialed a number. The second it picked up, her tone shifted into a sweet, high-pitched purr. “Hey, babe, where are you? … Yeah, I’m done eating. It’s over between us. Can you come pick me up?” I picked up my teacup and took a sip. The tea had gone cold. It tasted incredibly bitter. About ten minutes later, the door to the diner swung open. The blonde kid swaggered in. Black leather jacket, ripped jeans, heavy boots, and his cap askew. A cigarette was tucked behind his ear. He scanned the room, spotted Chelsea, and walked straight over. As he passed my side of the table, he paused, sizing me up with a smirk. He let out a quiet, mocking scoff, then wrapped his arm around Chelsea’s shoulders. “Let’s go, babe.” Chelsea nodded, then began unzipping her bag and taking off her jewelry. First, she slipped the “silver” bracelets off her left wrist and slid them across the table. “Here. You bought these. Take them back.” Then came the necklace. To her, it was just a cheap silver chain. But the pendant was a custom piece I’d had designed by an artisan—completely one of a kind. The clasp caught on her hair for a second before she ripped it free and dropped it next to the bracelets. “This too.” She rummaged through her purse and pulled out a sleek black fountain pen. I had given it to her for her birthday, claiming it was a vintage find from a local antique shop. In reality, it was a bespoke Montblanc, engraved with her initials. Finally, she unzipped a small leather keychain from her bag. A designer leather piece I’d bought in Paris on a whim for over two thousand dollars. “That’s everything,” she said. She took a deep, theatrical breath and looked down at me. “We’re even now. Don’t owe you a thing.” I looked at the small pile on the table. The bracelets, the necklace, the pen, the keychain. Three years of my life, summarized in a handful of items she thought were worthless trash. Without a word, I gathered them up and tossed them into the plastic trash bin next to our booth. The jewelry hit the bottom of the bin with a sharp, hollow clang. Next went the pen, and then the keychain. My movements were slow, deliberate, as if I were simply clearing away used napkins. Chelsea’s eyes flickered, her expression faltering for a fraction of a second. Her lips parted, but no sound came out. It was the blonde kid who laughed. “Oh, look at him. Big man.” He put the cigarette in his mouth, tilting his head with a mocking grin. “Throwing away fifty bucks of junk to act tough? You trying to flex on me, bro?” I ignored him, lifting the teapot to pour myself another cup of lukewarm tea. My silence only fueled his ego. He took a step closer, towering over the edge of the booth, looking down at me. “I know your type,” he sneered. “Driving a beat-up sedan, spending every dime of your pathetic paycheck trying to keep a girl, and then acting like a cool guy when she dumps you. You look like a loser who buys one drink at a bar and sits there all night just to pretend he’s someone. You’ve got nothing, man.” He blew a stream of smoke directly toward my face. “Chelsea wasted three years on you because she felt sorry for you. Now she’s smartened up, so stop acting like the brokenhearted hero. Throwing stuff away? Please. The second we walk out that door, you’re going to dig right back into that trash can.” I lifted my gaze, meeting his eyes with a cold, flat stare. “Are you finished?” “Not even close.” The kid crushed his glowing cigarette butt directly into our wooden table, leaving a charred, black scar on the wood. “I want to talk about that piece-of-shit Audi. My custom bike can lap you before you even hit the gas. You actually thought you could pull a girl like Chelsea with that?” “My bike has over ten grand in modifications. Zero-to-sixty in three seconds flat. What’s your Audi do? Eight seconds? Nine? It’s embarrassing. You couldn’t even get trade-in value for that junk.” He looked back at Chelsea, laughing loudly. “Am I right, babe?” Chelsea didn’t answer. She was staring at me, a strange, uneasy flicker in her eyes. I set my teacup down, keeping my eyes locked on him. “Watch your mouth,” I said. My voice was quiet, completely devoid of anger. The kid blinked, then let out a sharp laugh. “Watch my mouth? What, you gonna sue me, old man?” He leaned down, his face inches from mine. “I’ll say whatever I want. Loser. Cheapskate. Chump. Which one fits best? Or do you want them all?” A few patrons at nearby tables were staring now. The waiter hovered near the counter, debating whether to step in. Chelsea frowned, pulling lightly on the sleeve of his leather jacket. “Come on, let’s just go. He’s not worth it.” He shook her off. “Don’t worry about it. I want to see what this tough guy is actually gonna do.” He turned back to me, wagging his finger in my face. “Let me tell you something, buddy. You’re always going to be exactly where you are right now. Find yourself some boring, average girl and settle down. Leave Chelsea alone. You’re out of your league, got it?” I looked at him, saying nothing. He took my silence as fear. With a smug grin, he spun around and threw his arm back around Chelsea. “Let’s go, babe. Forget this clown. Let’s go ride.” Chelsea let him lead her away, but after a few steps, she stopped. She didn’t turn around. Keeping her back to me, her voice was quiet but deliberate. “Nick, I hope you don’t call me. I don’t want to see you again.” Then they pushed through the glass door and disappeared into the night. The diner held its breath for a few seconds before the low hum of conversation resumed. A few people glanced my way with pity, then returned to their meals. As I was paying the bill, my childhood friend Zach called. “Hey, Nick. The guys are hosting a supercar meet tonight under the riverfront bridge. You coming?” Normally, I avoided those noisy, high-profile club meets. But tonight, I needed a distraction. “Sure,” I said. “I’ll be there.” I went back to my penthouse, took a long shower, and changed into a clean black shirt. I handed the keys of the Audi back to my driver and took my own car out of the private garage. It was a limited-edition, V12 Lamborghini Aventador SVJ in matte gray. It had been delivered just last week, and the temporary plates were still fresh. By the time I reached the riverfront, the dark underpass was already lined with exotic cars. Zach was leaning against his Porsche, smoking a cigarette. He waved when he saw my headlights. “Nick! Finally. We were waiting for you. Let’s take them out for a spin.” As our convoy neared the bridge, Zach’s voice crackled over the radio, laced with annoyance. “What the hell is this?” I looked ahead. The space beneath the massive concrete bridge was packed with a sea of modified electric scooters and mopeds—at least thirty or forty of them. A few teenagers were popping wheelies, showing off. Their bikes were wrapped in neon LED strips, and portable speakers blasted heavy music. A crowd of street kids stood around in circles, laughing and cheering. Zach slammed his hand on his steering wheel over the radio. “You’ve got to be kidding me. Our flyer said ‘Super Car Meet’ and these kids thought it was a ride-out for Super73 e-bikes?” The other drivers in our group started chiming in. Some laughed; some just shook their heads. A guy wearing a green-bezel Rolex Submariner joked over the comms, “They probably saw ‘Super Meet’ on social media and rushed over. Didn’t bother reading the fine print. Wrong kind of ‘Super’, kids.” The kids under the bridge noticed us then. A few heads turned, then more, until the loud chatter and music began to die down. Someone hastily shut off their speaker. Hundreds of eyes stared in absolute silence as a dozen roaring supercars rolled slowly toward them. We pulled up and brought the convoy to a halt. My V12 engine let out a deep, gutteral rumble that echoed off the concrete walls before I shut it off. As I stepped out of the car, I saw him in the crowd. The blonde kid was standing right at the front of the pack. Same leather jacket, same stupid cap. He had a cigarette in his hand, the ash growing long and crumbling onto his shoes. He was staring at my car, paralyzed, before his eyes slowly drifted up to my face. Chelsea was standing right next to him, leaning against his custom bike, her phone held up to record a video. Her camera was pointed directly at me, but her hand had frozen. Her eyes were wide with sheer, suffocating disbelief.

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My wife’s boyfriend came to my studio to pick out a design for their baby’s nursery. He spent the entire day shooting down my ideas, from morning until the sun began to dip below the city skyline. Finally, his eyes landed on the blueprint I had drawn for my own future child. “This is the one,” he said, running a finger over the rendering. “It’s spacious. Perfect for you to slip in and help out.” Naomi’s entourage of guy friends watched me, practically begging for me to lose my mind. But I kept my face entirely blank, treating him like any other paying client as I noted down the measurements. “Are you kidding me?” one of them whispered loudly. “He’s letting the husband babysit the side-chick’s kid? How does he stomach this?” Naomi listened to their mock-pity, her face cool and unbothered as she reached over and snatched a black Amex from her friend’s hand. “Cut it out. You lost the bet,” she said smoothly. “Pay up. I still need to buy Chase that watch.” Then, she looked directly at me. “He has no money, no social standing, and he can’t even give me a child. Do you really think he’s in any position to say no to my people?” She tilted her chin up slightly, ensuring I caught her gaze. “Letting him raise my son is a privilege.” I kept my professional smile locked in place. I packed up the design portfolio and handed it to her. She took it, thoroughly satisfied, and gestured for her assistant to settle the bill. “Oh, by the way,” she added, almost as an afterthought. “My firstborn needs to be legitimate. Go ahead and file the divorce papers tomorrow. But you can stay in the house as a live-in nanny.” I didn’t blink. I simply said, “Okay.” A second later, the card reader beeped, flashing a red error message: Declined. Insufficient Funds. Under the sudden, suffocating silence of the room, I looked up. Meeting their bewildered stares, I offered a polite, apologetic smile. “If we’re divorcing, Naomi, you’ll need to pay me my share of the marital assets first. According to the prenuptial division, that comes out to exactly three hundred and seventy-seven million, five hundred and eighty thousand dollars.” … The air in the room froze instantly. Naomi’s eyes locked onto mine, a storm of dark, unreadable emotions churning in her gaze. Trent let out a sharp, mocking laugh. “Honestly, the charity cases always think they’re worth more than they are. Do you honestly think you deserve a single dime of her money?” Naomi’s expression hardened. She took a few steps toward me, her designer stilettos clicking sharply against the polished concrete floor. She stood close enough that I could smell her expensive perfume—the scent of cold wealth. “Jude,” she said, her voice dropping to a dangerous whisper. “Stop playing these pathetic hard-to-get games with me. I paid for your mother’s funeral. You don’t have the right to ask for a damn thing.” I didn’t flinch. I kept the same empty, practiced smile on my face. “It’s what you owe me for the last ten years, Naomi. If you don’t pay, your son will be nothing but a bastard forever.” A vein throbbed violently in her temple. She spun around, scanning the room. “Tear this place apart,” she barked. Her bodyguards didn’t hesitate. They lunged forward with metal batons. Within seconds, five years of my life’s work was reduced to absolute ruin. Dozens of physical architectural models—painstakingly assembled by hand—were smashed into kindling. Blueprints and sketches were ripped from the walls and torn into confetti, fluttering through the air like a mock snowstorm. Lamps were shattered. Desks and chairs were splintered in half. The glass doors of my office shattered with a deafening crash. Naomi stood in the center of the wreckage, her breathing shallow as she glared at me. “Did you think these few years of comfort made you my equal? Today, I’m going to make sure you remember exactly where you belong.” Her eyes scanned the room and landed on the heavy metal safe in the corner. She grabbed a steel rod from one of the guards and swung it against the lock. Once. Twice. She kept going until her arms trembled with exhaustion and the metal door finally buckled under the force. She kicked it open, swearing under her breath. “Let’s see what precious little secrets you’re hiding in here. Smash it all!” Inside was a single, yellowed blueprint. Years ago, when we were so poor we could barely afford rent, Naomi had looked at this very sketch and promised me that one day, she would build it for us to live in. Her hand went limp. The steel rod slipped from her fingers, clattering loudly against the debris. One of the guards stepped forward, flicking a lighter to set the paper ablaze. Just as the flame was about to touch the edge, Naomi suddenly kicked him back. “Are you out of your mind? Do you want to burn the whole building down?” While the guard apologized, she quickly shoved the blueprint back into the safe. She signaled the guards to stand down, then picked up the steel rod and forced it into my hands. “If you don’t want your entire life ruined, you’ll cooperate,” she said, her grip tightening over mine until my knuckles turned white. “Record a video. Say you were jealous of Chase’s baby because of your infertility, and that you trashed your own studio in a fit of rage.” Beneath my feet lay the ruins of my dream project. Naomi had once promised me she’d build a hundred-story tower in the heart of the city—a monument to our love. Now, more than half of her real estate empire was populated by her mistresses and their children. And here she was, standing on the ashes of my career, forcing me to destroy myself to protect her lover. I didn’t argue. I simply smiled, raised the rod, and swung it full-force into her shin. “I hope you two trashy bastards deserve each other,” I spat. With a sickening crack, Naomi screamed in pain, her phone flying out of her hand. The guards immediately tackled me, pinning my face hard against the cold floor. Trent scooped up the phone, a cruel grin spreading across his face as he aimed it at us. “Well, look at that. Forget a civil settlement—you can send him straight to prison for assault now! What should the headline be? ‘CEO Abused by Husband Before Marrying Her Lover’? Or maybe…” “Enough!” Naomi hissed, her face pale with agony. She clutched her leg, leaning heavily on her assistant as they limped toward the exit. “Don’t let him leave this room until I get back.” The door shut, leaving me alone with the guards. I dragged myself up, picked up the dented safe, and retreated into my private office. There was a hidden compartment behind the bookshelf containing my passport, ID, and the final, top-secret draft of my international competition entry. I packed them into my coat, then checked the security feed on my laptop to see where the guards were positioned outside my door. As I adjusted the mouse, my hand brushed against something soft hidden in the crevice of my desk chair. I pulled it out—a used condom wrapper. A wave of nausea washed over me. I threw it aside. In doing so, my sleeve caught a wire, and the secondary monitor flickered to life. I must have triggered a hidden playback folder on the local drive. A video popped up on the screen. It was recorded in this very office. Chase was sitting in Naomi’s lap, wearing nothing but an unbuttoned shirt. His voice was dripping with calculated petulance. “Naomi, I hate this studio. I hate feeling like I’m always standing in his shadow.” Naomi kissed his forehead softly. “Then I’ll burn it down for you. Or trash it. His entry for the international competition is bound to be exposed in the chaos. When it is, I’ll put your name on it. Think of it as a gift for our baby.” “And him?” Chase purred. “He’ll ghostwrite for you,” Naomi said, her voice filled with a sickening, tender warmth. “While you shine on stage.” My chest felt hollow, cold as ice. Just to the left of the monitor sat our first joint trophy. Ten years ago, the media had called us the golden couple of architecture. At twenty-two, Naomi’s eyes had shone with a brilliant, honest light when she swore she would build every single dream of mine. But six months after she reached the summit, Chase entered her life. I picked up the heavy crystal trophy and hurled it onto the concrete floor. It shattered into a thousand jagged pieces. Among the debris, a folded slip of paper fluttered out—the medical report from last week. Early-stage stomach cancer. I let out a quiet, breathless laugh. I slipped my thirty-thousand-dollar wedding band off my finger and tossed it into the trash can alongside the diagnosis. Anything I couldn’t carry was left behind. I was discarding ten years of filth. I took one last look at the empty, ruined office. The memories of decorating this space together now felt like a cruel joke. I slipped on my coat, feeling the thick stack of my competition blueprint secured in the inner pocket. I pulled out my phone and checked the digital boarding pass sent by the committee. Before walking out, I pulled up the audio of Chase’s moans from the video file and routed it to the studio’s external speakers. While the guards scrambled in confusion at the sudden blast of sound, I slipped out the back door and ran into the rainy evening. I hailed a cab, tossed a hundred-dollar bill to the driver, and told him to drive. We took a dozen winding turns through the city, successfully throwing off the black SUV that had started tailing us. At the airport, I printed my physical ticket and watched the hands of the clock tick down. Once I landed in London, all of this would be behind me. “Final boarding call for Flight 88 to London,” the PA system chimed. I stood up, but before I could take a step, several suit-clad bodyguards blocked my path. “Well, look who it is,” Trent said, stepping forward with his hands casually tucked into his pockets, a smirk plastered on his face. “Trying to run away, nanny? Naomi is at the hospital with a hairline fracture, and instead of taking care of your wife, you’re trying to sneak off to England?” “Get out of my way,” I said, my chest tightening. “You’re coming back with me to apologize,” Trent sneered, “or I’ll have the police arrest you for domestic abuse right here.” The clock was ticking. I looked around the crowded terminal and screamed at the top of my lungs. “Help! Security! I don’t know this man! He’s threatening me!” Two airport security officers immediately marched toward us. But before I could breathe a sigh of relief, a warm, firm hand clamped onto my wrist. Naomi stepped forward, pale but resolute, holding up our marriage certificate. “He’s my husband,” she told the officers smoothly. “We’re just having a domestic dispute. He’s offline.” The crowd dispersed, losing interest. Naomi glared at me, her eyes burning with quiet fury. “Take him,” she commanded. The car stopped in front of the ruined studio again. I was dragged back to my wrecked office. Naomi sat on the leather sofa, her gaze sharp and predatory. “Are you going to give me the blueprints yourself, or do I have my men strip you?” I clutched my coat tightly. “You have no right to steal my work.” She scoffed. “We’re still legally married, Jude. Everything you create is marital property.” She nodded to the guards. They lunged at me, tearing at my clothes. “Get off of me! Naomi, you’re sick!” I screamed, fighting with everything I had. She watched with cold indifference. “I gave you a chance. You brought this on yourself.” With a loud rip, my coat was torn open. The thick roll of draft paper fell to the floor. I had spent a year drafting those pages. I hadn’t slept a full night in months. Thousands of discarded sketches had been burned to produce these final, perfect ten pages. Naomi picked them up, inspecting them with a pleased smile. She limped over and patted my cheek. “See? Was that so hard? Now go back home and prepare for the baby’s arrival. I’ll make sure you’re taken care of.” The door opened, and Chase entered, leaning on a nurse. He rushed into Naomi’s arms, whimpering. “Naomi, you shouldn’t be walking on that leg! I was so worried about you!” Then, his eyes caught the blueprints in her hand. “Is this for me? Oh, Naomi, you’re the best! I love you so much!” A flicker of guilt crossed Naomi’s face, but she quickly masked it, urging him to go home and rest. But Chase was already scanning the pages, pouting. “I think the aesthetic is a bit too rigid. I want to change some of the lines.” Naomi immediately sat him down at my drawing table, bringing him my professional drafting pens. She stood beside him, whispering words of encouragement—just like she used to do for me in our damp basement apartment years ago. But Chase had no talent. Within minutes, my precise, elegant lines were butchered. When he reached for the second page, I couldn’t take it anymore. I thrashed against the guards holding me. “Stop! Don’t touch that! You don’t know what you’re doing!” Naomi glared at me. “An architectural design should be simple enough for the public to understand. If your design is too complicated, it’s because your work is flawed. You should be grateful Chase is fixing it.” In her frustration, she snatched the paper away, but her grip was too heavy. A loud rip echoed through the room. The master draft was torn in half. She froze for a fraction of a second, her fingers hovering over the custom signature stamp I had embossed on the corner. “Oh, look what you did,” Chase complained, whining. “Now we have to tape it back together. That’s so tedious.” Naomi’s face hardened. She crumpled the torn draft and tossed it into the trash can. “It’s just garbage anyway. We don’t need it.” Something inside my brain snapped. She had once promised to buy me an entire island to celebrate if I won this competition. She had cried seeing how hard I worked. Now, she called it garbage. She turned to her laptop to look for my digital backups. With a surge of adrenaline, I bit the guard’s hand, broke free, and threw myself at her. “Get away from my things!” I screamed. I slammed my fist into the laptop screen, cracking the LCD into pitch-black static. Naomi gasped, her eyes turning bloodshot. She grabbed the heavy mechanical keyboard from the desk and swung it at my head. “Are you insane?” I dodged, losing my balance. I fell backward, crashing straight into the pile of shattered crystal from our old trophy. A sharp, agonizing pain pierced my abdomen. I looked down. Crimson blood was rapidly blooming through my shirt. Naomi froze, her gaze falling to my bleeding stomach. Her hand twitched, instinctively reaching out to help me up. As she did, the bloodstained medical report slipped out from under my coat. I had received the diagnosis last week. But she was always with Chase, and I could never find the right moment to tell her. I had planned to get treated after the competition. Now, she saw it. Her fingers trembled as she stared at the paper. Chase quickly stepped in, catching on. Before Naomi could speak, he clutched his own stomach and let out a loud groan. “Oh my god, Naomi, my stomach hurts so bad… I think the stress is getting to the baby!” Naomi’s maternal instinct flared. She immediately let go of my arm and gathered Chase into her embrace. I slumped back onto the floor, the pain in my stomach radiating through my entire body. Looking at my agony, Naomi’s expression curdled back into disgust. “You’ve really stooped to a new low, Jude,” she spat. “A fake cancer report? Did you plan this entire fall just to make me feel guilty?” She kicked a pile of broken glass toward me. “Keep faking it. Let’s see how long you can last.” Ignoring her injured leg, she lifted Chase and carried him out of the room. “Keep him locked in here,” she ordered the guards at the door. “No one helps him without my permission.” The elevator doors slid shut, carrying Chase’s smug smile away. The guard outside took my phone, threw it on the floor, and smashed it with his boot before walking down the hall to smoke. We were on the twelfth floor. I couldn’t jump. The pain in my stomach was a roaring fire, and hot iron tasted thick in my throat as I coughed up blood. My vision began to dim. But then my hand brushed against my passport and ID inside my inner pocket. No. My new life was waiting for me. I couldn’t die in this garbage pile. I bit my tongue hard. The sharp burst of pain cleared the fog in my mind. I had designed this building. Every unit was equipped with an emergency fire pull-station. Dragging my useless lower body across the shattered glass, leaving a thick trail of blood behind me, I crawled toward the red box on the wall. With my final ounce of strength, I pulled the lever. The building’s alarms wailed, a deafening screech that echoed through the halls. I heard shouts outside, people demanding to know what was happening. I reached up and hit the studio’s intercom microphone, broadcasting my shallow, ragged breathing to the lobby. The door was kicked open. Dozens of feet rushed toward me. “Hey! Stay with us! Don’t close your eyes!” “Call an ambulance! He’s bleeding out!” I let go, letting the darkness take me. Meanwhile, at the hospital, Naomi received a call from her head guard. Still convinced I was playing games, she snapped: “Are you all useless? You can’t even keep watch over one man? Get lost!” She hung up and dialed her assistant, her voice trembling with rage. “Find Jude’s location. Right now.” But before she could finish her sentence, the emergency room doors burst open. A team of paramedics rushed a gurney past her. “Get the family on the phone!” a doctor shouted. “Early-stage gastric cancer, severe internal hemorrhaging. We need to operate immediately!” Naomi turned. On the gurney lay my bloodless, pale face.

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In my previous life, I took a blade for my stepsister, Cassie, three times. The first time, she was kidnapped by one of her father’s ruthless business rivals. I traded my own safety to give her a window to escape, earning a jagged, permanent scar that stretched across my shoulder blades. She didn’t even look at the bandages when I got home. She just shrugged and said, “You got lucky.” The second time, her hot-tempered fiancé threw a heavy crystal decanter at her during a public argument. I lunged in front of her, my cheek and neck shredded by flying shards. She looked at the blood on my shirt, frowned, and muttered, “Stop interfering in my life.” The third time, when her startup faced a sudden liquidity crisis, I secretly sold the plot of land my late biological mother had left me, scraping together ten million dollars to deposit anonymously into her corporate account. When she finally tracked down the source of the funds, she slapped me hard in front of her entire board of directors. “Are you pathetic, Dylan? Do you think I need your charity?” That night, I drank myself into a stupor in my car in the basement garage. I never saw the out-of-control SUV that crashed through the concrete barrier, crushing my car and killing me instantly. When I opened my eyes again, I was back to the year Cassie was first brought into the Wilder estate. This time, when I saw her cornered by street thugs in an alley, I simply put my headphones on and took the long way home. When she collapsed from a high fever at her desk in the study, I walked right past the door, acting like I saw nothing. Now, her eyes are rimmed with red as she corners me in the hallway, asking, “Dylan, why did you stop caring about me?” I tilt my head, my smile polite, distant, and utterly hollow. “Well, Cassie… didn’t you tell me to stay away from you?” 1 The moment the words leave my mouth, Cassie freezes. She struggles to maintain her composure, leaning back against the leather sofa in the hall. Those cold, domineering eyes of hers stare at me, and then a tight, humorless laugh escapes her lips. “What are you even throwing a tantrum about?” she asks, her voice tight. “Is this because I invited Jared to my birthday party? I know you two don’t get along, but is it really worth making a scene like this?” Jared Westbrook. Just hearing his name makes a wave of physical revulsion crash over me. He was the golden boy of our social circle—charming, polite, and completely harmless in the eyes of our parents. But behind closed doors, he was a sociopath who spent years systematically isolating and tormenting me. I will never forget that rainy autumn afternoon during our sophomore year of high school. He pretended to walk with me under his umbrella, only to steer me toward an unbolted storm drain cover hidden under a pile of wet leaves. I plunged straight into the freezing, flooded concrete shaft. I fell feet-first into the dark, my knees scraping against the jagged iron edges until they bled. The foul, stagnant water rose to my chin, filling my throat every time I gasped for air, leaving me with a visceral terror of drowning that still makes my chest tighten on rainy days. Jared stood above the grate, looking down at me with a lazy smile. “Your mind is filthy, Dylan. Let the rainwater wash it clean.” He only hauled me out when he got scared I’d actually drown and get him caught. Then, sobbing hysterically to my parents, he said, “It’s all my fault. I should have held his hand tighter… I didn’t see him slip.” Everyone believed his tears. They thought I was just clumsy and dramatic. The more I tried to explain what happened, the more they accused me of being ungrateful to the boy who “saved” me. Even Cassie chimed in back then, looking at me with deep disappointment. “Jared scraped his arm trying to pull you out of that sewer, and you’re pointing fingers? Show some respect.” The suffocating chill of those old memories creeps back into my chest, but I swallow the rising tide of bitterness. I keep my face perfectly smooth, devoid of anger or defensiveness. “I’m not angry,” I say quietly. “Mr. Westbrook is your fiancé. Going to his party is your business. It has nothing to do with me.” The boundary is drawn, sharp and clean. Cassie’s face darkens, the confusion in her eyes hardening into a sullen glare. She cannot accept this absolute detachment. But I don’t care to watch her play-act her emotions anymore. I remember tonight’s party all too well. In my last life, this was the night I ruined myself. Desperate, young, and foolishly in love, I gathered all my courage to confess my feelings to Cassie in front of all our guests. The result was a public scandal. My parents were furious, calling me shameless and a disgrace to the family name. That was the day my living nightmare truly began. Cassie grew to despise me, and the mockery from our peers, combined with my family’s relentless scorn, crushed my pride into dust. But this time? My only goal is to protect my parents, protect myself, and live a quiet, decent life. As for the past, my only lingering obsession is finding out who caused that fatal “accident” in the garage and making them pay. I turn and walk away without looking back. That night, the Wilder mansion is ablaze with light, filled with the city’s elite celebrating Cassie’s birthday in grand, ostentatious style. Jared, her classmate and golden-boy suitor, arrived early. He glides through the crowd, charming the elders, a picture of effortless grace. I watch him from a quiet corner, my blood running cold. Last time, I was the clown of the evening. I had spent a month folding nine hundred and ninety-nine paper cranes, writing Cassie’s name on every single wing, pouring my silent, agonizing crush into a massive glass jar. I wanted to give it to her tonight. Instead, Jared intercepted me, smiling warmly as he took the jar from my hands. “Dylan, this is so sweet. Such a beautiful gift for your sister.” Then, pretending to lose his grip, he flipped it upside down. The paper cranes scattered across the marble floor. White paper wings everywhere, each one bearing her name in my unmistakable handwriting. The room went dead silent. Whispers and looks of disgust pinned me to the spot. My parents’ faces twisted in shame and anger. And Cassie, standing in the center of the room, looked as if she had swallowed glass. But Jared delivered the killing blow, gasping in mock horror: “Dylan… how could you harbor those kinds of feelings for your own sister?” That single word—sister—sealed my fate. I was branded a degenerate. 2 Standing in the familiar grand ballroom this time around, the glittering lights and false laughter only leave me feeling hollow. Jared strolls over, champagne flute in hand, his eyes locking onto the glass jar in my arms. “A gift for your sister? How thoughtful. All handmade, I assume?” He reaches out, his fingers clawing for the glass. It is the exact same play as before. I pull the jar back, my voice flat and sharp. “Yes. And only my sister touches it. Keep your hands to yourself, Jared.” His smile falters, a flash of pure malice crossing his eyes. Right on cue, a server carrying a tray of champagne walks past. Jared nudges her hard, sending her crashing straight into me. The collision is violent and sudden. The glass jar slips from my grip, shattering against the polished marble floor. The jar bursts, and instead of cranes, hundreds of colorful, tightly rolled scrolls of paper spill across the floor, scattering among the shards. The entire room goes quiet. In my past life, this floor was covered in my shame. This time, guests instinctively kneel down to help sweep up the mess, picking up the small scrolls. Naturally, they read the neat, elegant ink on the pages: ‘May my parents find peace, health, and happiness in all things.’ ‘May our family remain united and free of worry.’ ‘May my sister find joy on her birthday, and may her path ahead be bright and safe.’ Line after wish. Clean, honest, and entirely appropriate. There is no forbidden longing here. No desperate confession. Just a brother’s quiet, genuine blessings for his family. The atmosphere in the room shifts instantly. The disgust in the guests’ eyes turns into warm, approving smiles. “He made these for the whole family? What a sweet, thoughtful boy.” “To write so many by hand, wishing them safety… he’s so devoted.” “Where did those awful rumors even come from? He’s clearly a good kid.” My parents stand in the crowd, their expressions softening into relief and quiet pride. Only Jared looks like he’s about to explode. While everyone is distracted, he leans in close, whispering in my ear: “Don’t play cute with me, Dylan. I know exactly how obsessed you are with Cassie. You better hide it well, because you won’t get this lucky next time.” I offer him a faint, mocking smile. My heart doesn’t even skip a beat. Obsessed? My love for her rotted in the dirt of that freezing garage a long time ago. I don’t bother wasting my breath on him. I look past his shoulder, my eyes finding Cassie. She is kneeling on the floor, her fingers trembling as she holds one of the stray paper slips. She stares at the words written in my steady, clean handwriting: ‘May my sister find joy on her birthday, and may her path ahead be bright.’ Her thick eyelashes cast long shadows over her face, hiding her eyes, but her entire posture screams devastation. I don’t care to watch her self-inflicted misery. I turn my back on the noise and step out onto the terrace. The night breeze is cool, sweeping away the stifling heat of the ballroom and calming the ghosts of my past. Soft footsteps click behind me. Cassie. She stops a half-step away, close enough to block my escape but far enough to respect my space. “Dylan… you’re back.” My spine goes rigid. My heart drops into my stomach, my blood turning to ice. You’re back. Two simple words, but heavy with an impossible truth. She isn’t talking about the terrace. She’s talking about the rebirth. I force my face to remain a mask of calm. “What do you mean, back? I’ve been here the whole time.” I try to play dumb. But Cassie knows me too well. Two lifetimes of codependency mean she reads my every micro-expression. She looks up, her eyes desperate. “You came back too, didn’t you?” So, I wasn’t the only one given a second chance. I let the feigned ignorance drop. My eyes turn to flint as I face her, done with the charade. “Yes,” I say, my voice dead. “I’m back.” “But I didn’t come back for you, Cassie.” “In our last life, I was foolish enough, tired enough, broken enough. I bled for you, ruined myself financially for you, endured every humiliation, and died alone in a dark garage. This time, I only want to protect my parents and live my own life.” “You and I are done. No more ties. No more us.” The color drains from her face. Panic flares in her eyes, and she reaches out to grab my hand. “Dylan, no… please, let me explain—” I don’t want her regret. I don’t want her dynamic, useless amends. I raise my hand and slap her across the face with every ounce of strength I have left. Her head snaps back, a bright red mark blooming on her pale cheek. I look at her, my gaze frozen. “That’s for the slap you gave me in our last life. Now, we’re even.” I turn to leave, but before I can take a step, she throws herself forward, wrapping her arms tightly around my waist, burying her face into my chest. Her body is shaking violently as she sobs. “No, we can’t be even,” she weeps, her voice muffled against my shirt. “Dylan, I can’t watch you die again… I can’t let you leave me. I’ve always loved you. I won’t let go this time. I’ll prove it to you. I’ll show you I mean it.” I stand frozen in her embrace, my heart a flat, silent line. 3 Of course, I remember. After I died in that garage, my spirit lingered for a while, floating above my cold body. I saw her break down. I saw the untouchable, ruthless Cassandra Wilder collapse on the concrete beside my corpse, weeping until she couldn’t breathe. I heard her desperate, empty confessions. But so what? Late affection is cheaper than dirt. I firmly push her off me, my voice devoid of warmth. “I can’t afford your love, Cassie. And I don’t want it.” Without waiting for her to wipe her tears, I turn and walk back into the bright, noisy ballroom. The moment I step inside, Jared is waiting for me. He must have been stewing in his own frustration. Seeing me alone, he corners me, his voice a quiet, venomous hiss. “You think changing a few paper slips makes you a saint, Dylan? You and your mother are nothing but parasites. She sold her body to Charles Wilder to get you a seat at this table. Don’t act like your hands are clean.” That is the line he shouldn’t have crossed. I can tolerate people dragging my name through the mud, but I will never let anyone insult my mother. My fist connects with his jaw before he can finish the sentence. “Keep her name out of your filthy mouth,” I spit. Jared stumbles back, clutching his face, his eyes instantly welling with theatrical tears as he prepares to play the victim. The guests gasp, crowding around us to watch the drama unfold. Everyone expects Cassie to step in, to scold me for being violent and unhinged, just like she always did. But instead, a slender figure steps in front of me, shielding me from the crowd. Cassie glares at Jared, her voice sharp enough to draw blood. “If you can’t control your tongue, you deserve to be taught a lesson.” The room falls into a stunned silence. Before anyone can process her defense of me, Cassie raises her chin, her voice echoing clearly across the ballroom. “I would like to make an announcement. Effective immediately, my engagement to Jared Westbrook is off.” The room explodes. The Wilder-Westbrook alliance was a massive corporate merger masquerading as a marriage. It was a done deal, tying billions of dollars together. Jared turns pale, staring at her in sheer disbelief as tears stream down his face. “Cassie! Do you have any idea what you’re saying?!” “Enough!” An authoritative, booming voice cuts through the chaos from the top of the stairs. Thomas Wilder, my step-grandfather, stands there, leaning heavily on his gold-headed cane. His presence instantly suffocates the room. He glares down at Cassie. “A child’s temper tantrum is nothing to take seriously. The alliance stands. No one speaks of canceling the engagement again.” He waves his hand dismissively to the security detail. “Take her upstairs. She is confined to her quarters until she reflects on her behavior.” The guards step forward, ignoring Cassie’s stiff resistance, and lead her away. Before she disappears, she throws one last, desperate look at me, her eyes burning with stubborn possessiveness. After the party, I return to the family estate. Unsurprisingly, the patriarch orders me confined as well—no leaving the grounds, no outside contact. I accept it without a fight. A few days later, Helen, my mother, slips into my room late at night. She sits on the edge of my bed, her eyes searching mine with a mix of guilt and hesitation. “Dylan… would you like to go study in London?” I look at her, my mind clear. This isn’t a question; it’s an ultimatum from Thomas Wilder. He wants me gone. He wants to eliminate the variable, separate me from Cassie, and force the Westbrook alliance back on track. I nod slowly. “Sure. I’ll go.” In the days leading up to my departure, Cassie tries everything to reach me. Her actions are frantic, borderline obsessive. She floods me with quiet, desperate gestures of affection, trying to undo a lifetime of neglect. It’s as if she wants to lay the world at my feet to make up for the past. But my heart remains a block of ice. The day of my flight is bright and cloudless. It is also the day of Cassie and Jared’s rescheduled wedding. On one side of the city, the cathedral doors are open, the red carpet rolled out, guests arriving for a grand ceremony. On the other side, I sit in the back of a black town car, quietly heading toward the airport, chasing a new life. The silence in the car is heavy, almost suffocating. Just as the car climbs onto the suspension bridge overlooking the bay, the driver, who hasn’t spoken a word the entire trip, says quietly: “I’m sorry, Mr. Wilder.” 4 Before I can even process his words, the driver yanks the steering wheel to the side, slamming his foot on the gas. The car swerves violently, crashing straight through the concrete guardrails! The wind roars through the shattered glass as we go airborne, gravity disappearing for one terrifying second. Then, we plunge. The car slams into the freezing, dark waters of the bay. The sea swallows the light instantly, pressing against the windows, filling the cabin, choking the breath right out of my throat. I can’t even struggle. A deep, bitter sorrow fills my chest. Even with a second chance, I couldn’t escape my fate. In my last life, it was an “accident” in a garage. This life, a plunge off a bridge. It was never an accident. Someone wanted me dead, wanted me erased from this family completely. As my consciousness fades, I don’t think of Cassie’s late love, or the messy entanglements of our past lives. I think of my mother’s warm smile, and the quiet life I never got to live. A fierce, desperate anger grips my soul, refusing to let me close my eyes. I refuse to die like this, leaving my killer to walk free. Suddenly, a blinding beam of light pierces through the dark water.

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It was 8:00 PM, and I was about to authorize the final installment on a limited-edition timepiece in my virtual cart, only for the transaction to flash red: “Declined.” Before I could even process what was happening, my phone buzzed with an incoming call from Connor, the newly appointed Chief Financial Officer—hired by my wife, Meredith. “Hey, Wesley. Just letting you know I suspended your corporate card,” Connor said, his voice dripping with condescension. “Meredith asked me to tighten the leash on all personal expenditures.” “Honestly, you’re at home doing chores. You don’t have clients to impress or deals to close. Why on earth do you need a fifty-thousand-dollar watch?” “I actually just ordered you a kids’ smartwatch on Amazon. Fifteen bucks. It’s got a step counter and everything. Perfect for you.” He hung up. A second later, a text popped up with a screenshot of the order confirmation. The delivery note read: “Moisturizer for Wesley.” It was so absurd it was almost funny. Then came another text: “Make sure to clear any future purchases with me first!” The sheer audacity. I was spending my own money, and I was expected to clear it with an outsider? He was using my wealth to lecture me on frugality. Without a word, I forwarded the screenshot straight to Meredith. “Fire this Connor guy before the end of the day. Or tomorrow, I’ll have you packed up and sent back to shoveling manure in Idaho.” … “Wow, Wesley. Going straight to the boss to complain? Really?” When my phone rang again, it was Connor, his voice carrying a cold, mocking chuckle. “Why do you have Meredith’s phone?” I asked, keeping my voice steady despite the heat rising in my chest. “Put her on.” “Meredith is in a closed-door meeting,” Connor said, his tone thick with unearned superiority. “She’s currently working her tail off to secure our next eight-figure deal. She doesn’t have time for your tantrums.” “She’s out there earning the millions while you’re at home living the dream. Aren’t you satisfied?” “Unfreeze my card, Connor. Now.” “Sorry, pal. Can’t do that.” Connor scoffed. “Meredith’s personal accounts, corporate accounts—they’re all under my management now. Oh, by the way? I canceled your golf club membership and your private gym pass. Refunded them right back into the company’s operating capital. And that housekeeper you have? Fifteen grand a month is absurdly lavish. She’s been let go.” I froze. I could hear the blood rushing in my ears. Who the hell did Connor think he was, coming into my life and dictating terms? “Who gave you the authority to interfere in my private life?” “Meredith did, obviously.” Connor sounded entirely self-righteous. “The company is in a hyper-growth phase. Every dollar counts. Your extravagant spending habits have to go. I’m not just monitoring the corporate accounts; I’m supervising you. From now on, any grocery runs require physical receipts brought directly to my office. Anything over a hundred bucks won’t be approved.” He didn’t even give me a chance to respond. “Wesley, Meredith is a self-made, brilliant CEO. She’s worth nine figures. There are plenty of young, highly educated, ambitious men waiting in line for a shot at her. The only reason you’re still holding onto the title of her husband is because she’s a sentimental woman.” He hung up. When I tried calling back, it went straight to voicemail. Blocked. My hands were shaking. I was about to call my driver to head to the office when the front door swung open. Martha, our housekeeper, was standing in the foyer. Her eyes were red, and she was clutching a single suitcase. “Mr. Pendleton,” Martha said, her voice trembling. “That new CFO called. He told me to pack my things and get out immediately. He said if I stayed, he’d have me arrested for trespassing. Did… did I do something wrong?” Seeing Martha cry broke something inside me. “You did nothing wrong, Martha. Put your bag down. No one is kicking you out of this house.” I dialed Meredith’s personal cell. Turned off. Perfect. Beautifully done, Meredith. You’re so desperate to play the role of the ruthless female tech tycoon that you’ve handed over the keys to a complete stranger. Suddenly, my phone vibrated. It was the Presbyterian Hospital downtown. “Mr. Pendleton? We’re calling regarding your father’s VIP oncology suite. The automated payment failed today. If the balance isn’t settled by tomorrow morning, we’ll have to suspend his targeted therapy. Please come down and resolve this as soon as possible.” My heart dropped. My dad was diagnosed with early-stage lung cancer two weeks ago and was scheduled for surgery. His medical bills were tied directly to our family trust account. How could it possibly fail? “I’ll be right there.” I sped all the way to the hospital’s private wing. As I approached my dad’s VIP suite, I saw nurses wheeling his bed out into the hallway. Connor was standing there, arms crossed, barking orders at the orderly team. “Hurry it up. A VIP suite costs thousands a day. It’s a complete waste of company resources. Move him to a standard six-person ward. He won’t die from sharing a room.” The blood in my veins turned to ice. I charged forward and shoved Connor backward. “What the hell do you think you’re doing? Who gave you permission to touch my father?” Connor stumbled, catching himself against the wall. He glared at me with pure disgust. “Wesley, I just did a deep dive into the company books. Do you know how much cash is being funneled to this hospital every month? Your father is occupying a luxury VIP suite and using top-tier imported experimental drugs. You’re literally bleeding Meredith dry!” My fists clenched so hard my knuckles turned white. “Connor, that is a private family account specifically set up for my father’s care!” “You don’t earn a single penny. It’s all Meredith’s money anyway,” Connor sneered, rolling his eyes. “I’ve frozen that account. Meredith said the company is launching a new project and liquidity is tight. All non-essential expenses are cut. Period.” The head nurse looked at me apologetically. “Mr. Pendleton, if the account isn’t funded, our hands are tied…” “If you don’t have the money, go to the general ward!” Connor raised his voice, making sure everyone in the corridor could hear. “You’re taking Meredith’s hard-earned cash and throwing it away on luxury healthcare? For an old man, basic insurance-covered medicine is fine. Spending tens of thousands on imported shots is just pure selfishness!” “I’ve already downgraded him. A bed in a six-room ward is only fifty bucks a night. Much more appropriate for his station.” My father was trembling with anger, clutching my hand. “Wes…” “Dad, don’t say a word. I’ve got this.” I squeezed his hand, then turned a murderous gaze onto Connor. “Connor, you’re playing with my father’s life.” “Oh, come on, Wesley. Don’t play the victim card with me. If your family can’t afford treatment, that’s your problem. Don’t try to guilt-trip Meredith.” Connor pulled out a crumpled wad of cash from his designer briefcase and tosses it at my feet. “Here’s five hundred bucks from my own pocket. Go buy the old man some vitamins. Stop leeching off your wife. A parasite should know its place.” Whispers broke out among the onlookers in the hallway. “So he’s just a trophy husband spending her cash…” “How shameless. His wife works so hard, and he’s out here demanding VIP rooms.” “That executive is so responsible. Saving the company money.” Connor basked in the murmurs, a smug grin plastered across his face. He pulled out his phone and started recording a video of my dad and me. “I’m going to send this to Meredith. Let her see how entitled you really are. Once she realizes what a drag you are on her life, she’ll kick you to the curb where you belong.” I looked at him, my voice dangerously calm. “Remember this moment, Connor. Remember every single word you just said.” I turned to the head nurse. “Put my father back in the VIP suite. The bills will be paid in full tomorrow morning.” I instructed the orderlies to wheel my dad back. Connor, seeing himself ignored, stomped his foot in frustration. “Wesley Pendleton! You just wait!” The next morning, I took a cab straight to the Aegis Group headquarters. The moment the elevator doors opened on the penthouse floor, two burly security guards blocked my path. “This is the executive wing. No visitors without an appointment.” I looked at them. Fresh faces. “I’m Wesley Pendleton. Step aside.” “Mr. Connor gave strict orders. We have an important board meeting today. No unauthorized personnel allowed.” Just then, the sound of footsteps echoed down the hallway. Connor emerged, surrounded by an entourage of department managers. He spotted me, and a sarcastic smirk spread across his face. “Well, well. Look who it is. Our resident house-husband who only knows how to swipe credit cards.” The managers chuckled in unison. “Mr. Connor, who is this?” a newly hired receptionist asked mockingly. “This is Meredith’s useless husband,” Connor announced loudly. “The guy who tried to blow fifty grand on a luxury watch two nights ago. A total deadweight.” He walked over to me, looking down his nose. “Wesley, if you came here to beg Meredith to unfreeze your cards, save your breath. The company’s financial reins are entirely in my hands now. In this building, what I say goes.” “What you say goes?” I let out a dry, humorless laugh, looking around at the spectators. “Do all of you believe he’s the one in charge here?” “Obviously,” the receptionist scoffed, rolling her eyes. “Mr. Connor is Mrs. Pendleton’s right-hand man. He’s saved this company millions. Who do you think you are, coming in here and causing a scene?” Connor smugly adjusted his tie and turned to the guards. “What are you waiting for? Meredith is about to arrive with our major clients for an inspection. Throw this trash out of here. Don’t let him ruin the company’s image.” The two guards grabbed my shoulders, aggressively dragging me toward the elevator. “Get your hands off me!” I struggled, but my physical strength was no match for two trained security guards. “Face reality, Wesley,” Connor called out behind me, his voice dripping with malice. “Meredith is sick of you. You’re completely useless. You think you’re still the powerful husband of a high-flying CEO? In this company, Meredith is god. And I am her prophet.” The staff watched me get manhandled, murmuring and snickering under their breath. “Look at him, the spoiled husband. How pathetic.” “Meredith is so brilliant. How did she end up with a loser like this?” “Mr. Connor is so capable. Honestly, they look like a much better match.” Suddenly, the chime of the private executive elevator rang out. A group of men in bespoke suits stepped out. Leading them was Meredith, who had been missing in action for thirty-six hours. “What is going on here? Why is there so much noise?” Meredith demanded, her voice sharp and authoritative. Connor’s arrogant demeanor instantly vanished. He put on a victimized, trembling expression and ran to Meredith’s side. “Meredith, thank goodness you’re here!” Connor’s eyes welled up with fake tears. “Wesley… he came here to make a scene. All I did was try to save the company some money by canceling his luxury cards, and he came barging in, screaming, threatening me, and trying to lay hands on me.” “I was worried he’d ruin the meeting with your VIP clients, so I had security escort him out.” Meredith’s face darkened. She stepped through the crowd and stood in front of me. Looking at my disheveled state, there was no sympathy in her eyes. Only cold, deep-seated embarrassment and disdain. “Wesley, have you lost your mind?” she snapped. “It’s one thing to throw tantrums at home, but bringing your drama to my office? Connor is a highly sought-after CFO whom I personally recruited. He froze your accounts under my direct authorization!” I looked at the woman I’ve shared a bed with for five years. A wave of nausea washed over me. “Meredith, is this really how you want to play this?” I ask quietly. “He cut off my father’s cancer treatment. He fired Martha. Were you aware of that?” Meredith didn’t even flinch. “The company is at a critical juncture! We need every ounce of liquidity we can get! Connor is doing his job. He’s trimmed millions in waste!” “Instead of reflecting on your own uselessness, you come here to bully my CFO? Apologize to Connor. Now!” Connor stood behind Meredith, a victorious, sneering smirk playing on his lips. His eyes were filled with smug triumph. Seeing their boss take a stand, the surrounding employees immediately chimed in. “The husband is so incredibly selfish. He has no idea how hard Meredith works.” “Exactly. He needs to apologize to Mr. Connor and stop embarrassing himself.” Meredith assumed my silence was fear. She scoffed. “Wesley, I’m warning you. Apologize to Connor right now and go home. Otherwise, don’t expect another dime of allowance from me.” I felt a laugh bubbling up from my chest. It started as a chuckle and turned into a full laugh. I shook off the guards’ grip and stood tall. “Meredith, have you sat in that throne for so long that you actually believe it belongs to you?” Meredith blinked, momentarily taken aback. “What nonsense are you spouting? Have you gone mad?” “Who’s mad? You’re about to find out.” I pulled out my phone and dialed a direct line. “Mr. Adler. Bring the legal and audit teams up to the penthouse floor. Now.” I hung up. Within thirty seconds, the doors to the private express elevator slid open with a heavy thud. Mr. Adler, the company’s second-largest shareholder, stepped out, flanked by a team of stone-faced corporate lawyers and forensic auditors. Meredith’s expression shifted. “Mr. Adler? What is the meaning of this? I didn’t call a board meeting today.” Mr. Adler completely ignored her. He walked straight past her, stopped in front of me, and bowed deeply. “The entire team is here, Mr. Pendleton. We await your instructions.” The entire floor fell into a suffocating, dead silence. Every jaw in the room dropped in sheer, unadulterated shock.

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First stop of our first road trip together. I went into the rest stop to grab a bottle of water. When I walked back out to the parking lot, his car was gone. I called Wright ten times. He declined every single one. An hour later, the call finally went through, but the voice on the other end belonged to my best friend, Serena. “I’m so sorry, Gwen. Wright turned back to pick me up. We just got on the interstate. We’ll be at your rest stop in an hour, tops.” After she hung up, I opened Instagram. Before we left, I had logged into Wright’s account on my phone. His latest post was flooded with comments. Under a sea of “couple goals” and “finally!” comments, there was one from Serena, complete with a pouty emoji: “Secretly going on a trip without me? I’m mad!” Wright had replied: “Come downstairs. I’m coming back to get you.” I wanted to laugh. For the last year and a half, Wright had been too lazy to grab me a bottle of water when he went to the store. He was too lazy to pull over and pick me up from work, even when it was on his way. Because of his constant lethargy, it had taken eighteen months of begging, pleading, and compromising just to get him to agree to this pre-marital road trip. He’d even planned the itinerary himself—a sudden burst of effort that had kept me awake for nights, giddy with excitement. Now, staring at my phone in the sterile light of the rest stop lobby, I realized that the change I had fought so hard for was something someone else could extract from him without even trying. … By the time Wright’s SUV finally pulled into the parking lot, the crowd around me had cycled through three times. Serena stepped out of the passenger side, clutching a vibrant iced drink from a local café, her smile radiant. “My queen!” she called out, walking toward me. “I know I kept you waiting. I brought a peace offering!” She pulled a straw out of the bag, stabbed it through the lid, and gently pressed the cup against my lips. Instinctively, I took a sip. The moment the sweet, heavy taste of mango hit my tongue, I recoiled, turning away to cough violently. My throat began to itch, a tight, suffocating burn spreading down my windpipe. I leaned against the brick wall of the rest stop, coughing until tears blurred my vision. “Oh my god!” Serena gasped, turning back to glare at the car. “Wright, what is wrong with you? I told you to buy her a drink, and you got mango? Gwen is severely allergic!” Wright leaned out of the driver’s side window, his face a mask of mild annoyance. “I didn’t know what to get. I just grabbed two of those mango matcha lattes because you liked them.” “You idiot,” Serena sighed, though her voice lacked any real bite. “You were supposed to get what Gwen likes. Just because you saw me order it once, you thought that’s the only thing on the menu?” I wiped the tears from my eyes. Wright finally got out of the car, walking over to hand me a cheap bottle of water. I took it in silence. I had heard his excuse a thousand times before: “If it’s Gwen, plain water is fine. She’s not like you, Serena. You always make me remember all those complicated, ridiculous orders. It’s exhausting.” But no matter how exhausting it was, he had remembered hers, hadn’t he? The thought settled heavily in my chest. I loved iced lattes too. I used to tease him, asking him to pick one up for me on his way home. But he was always too tired. Too lazy to open the app, too lazy to check the ingredients to make sure there was no cross-contamination with mango. He would promise to remember, and then immediately forget. He’d sit on the couch, staring at his phone, already mid-game in a match, without looking up. “Water is healthier anyway,” he’d say. “Who actually memorizes those complicated drink orders?” I had ordered the exact same drink in front of him dozens of times. Yet, it couldn’t compete with a casual glance he’d given Serena’s cup when he picked us up from a movie theater two years ago. Wright and Serena walked ahead of me toward the car. I lingered a step behind, digging through my purse for my medicine. When I looked up, Serena was already buckled into the passenger seat. Our eyes met through the glass. She tapped her forehead, looking sheepish. “Oh, look at my brain. Gwen, come take the front. I’ll hop in the back.” “No, it’s fine,” I said. “Don’t worry about it,” Wright said at the same exact time. He looked at me in the rearview mirror, a flicker of surprise in his eyes. He was used to me making a fuss. Usually, whenever Serena “accidentally” took the passenger seat, I would quietly but firmly ask her to move. But today, it felt entirely pointless. I pulled open the backdoor and slid into the rear seat. Serena turned around in her seat, her eyes sparkling with excitement. “Are we telepathic or something? The ski resort you guys picked is literally the exact place I’ve been dying to go. I didn’t even know you wanted to go there, Gwen, since you don’t even know how to ski.” Wright caught my eye in the mirror again as he steered the car onto the highway. “We were originally going to San Diego,” he said casually. “But Gwen was worried about getting sunburned, so I switched the booking to Aspen. She said she wanted to learn.” Serena listened intently, reaching into the center console to pull out her favorite hand cream, applying it with practiced ease. “San Diego would have been amazing, too. You know how much I love the beach.” “Alright, can we get some quiet?” Wright muttered, reaching over to turn on the music. The melody that filled the car was a soft acoustic track—Wright’s morning alarm. My mind drifted back to a year ago, the morning after he had finally agreed to this trip. I had woken up early, filled with a jittery, childlike excitement. After turning off his alarm so he could sleep in, a strange, quiet impulse had driven me to open his phone. Serena had sent him a barrage of texts the night before, complaining about her job. I scrolled through them, my fingers freezing on the screen. “I need a vacation so bad. I want to go to the beach. Pleeease.” “Wright, if you guys go to the coast, you have to bring me along!” Wright’s reply had been instant: “Sure.” I had stared at those messages for ten minutes, my eyes burning, before locking the phone and putting it back. When Wright finally woke up and wrapped his arms around me from behind, I had kept my voice light, pretending it was a passing thought. “Hey, let’s not go to the beach for our trip. You always say I burn too easily anyway.” At the time, I told myself I didn’t mind Serena coming along. We had all known each other for over a decade. But why did the destination have to be the exact one she had begged him for? Wright hadn’t hesitated. He kissed my cheek. “Sure. Let’s go skiing instead. I’ll teach you.” Sitting in the backseat now, the memory made me laugh out loud. Wright glanced back. “What’s funny?” “Nothing,” I said, shaking my head. I was just laughing at how naive I had been a year ago. I had genuinely believed he was changing for me. I had ignored the fact that I didn’t care for the cold, and that I had absolutely no interest in skiing. I unlocked my phone, opened my airline app, and booked a one-way ticket to a completely different city. This time, I was going somewhere I actually wanted to go. We checked into a cozy mountain lodge. We were supposed to hit the slopes tomorrow, but I had already decided I wasn’t going up. I only took my personal duffel bag out of the trunk, leaving my rented ski gear untouched in the back of the SUV. Wright stopped, his brow furrowing with a rare moment of perception. “Why are you leaving your ski gear?” “Just forgot it,” I said dismissively. I didn’t turn back to grab it, breaking the years of habit where I would have rushed to correct my mistake. I keyed into the suite. A moment later, Wright walked in, carrying my bag. He watched me crouch down to unzip my suitcase. “Are you mad?” he asked, stepping closer. I didn’t look up. “No.” He reached down, pulling me up by my wrists and folding me into his arms. Wright’s chest was always warm. He had a way of hugging me that made all my anger feel foolish, dissolving my defenses before I could even voice them. When we were kids, I had only ever seen him as an older brother figure. But then, the summer after freshman year of college, he had chased off a guy who was stalking me. He had held me in his arms afterward, whispering that I was safe, and my heart had beaten so hard I thought it would burst. Now, pressed against his chest, my pulse was entirely, chillingly flat. Wright chuckled softly. “You’re jealous, aren’t you? Because I brought Serena along?” “I only brought her because she’s your best friend, Gwen. Otherwise, I wouldn’t even look her way.” He cupped my face, leaning down to press a few light kisses on my forehead. “Serena told me you were getting sensitive about things lately. I didn’t believe her, but I guess she was right.” His laugh felt like a dull needle pricking at my chest. Before I could pull away, his phone buzzed in his pocket. He pulled it out, read the screen, and sighed with mild exasperation. “Serena forgot her hand warmers. I’m going to drop some off for her.” He bent down, unzipped my suitcase, grabbed the large bulk pack of HotHands I had packed, and walked out the door to the room next door. I looked down at the empty corner of my suitcase, where only two stray packets remained. A sudden chill settled over me. I remembered a night a few months ago when I was in the shower and realized I had forgotten my towel. Wright was sitting right outside the bathroom door, but when I called out to him, he told me he was too comfortable on the couch to get up. Now, walking ten steps down the hallway to Serena’s room didn’t even warrant a second thought. He didn’t come back for two hours. By the time the door clicked open, I had already turned my back to his side of the bed, pretending to be fast asleep. When I opened my eyes the next morning, Wright was already dressed in his winter gear. He was standing by the vanity, carefully zipping up Serena’s jacket. “Keep it zipped to the top,” he was saying softly. “The wind is brutal today.” Serena giggled, sticking her tongue out at him. I sat up in bed, taking in the scene. “You guys go ahead,” I said, my voice dry. “I’m staying here today.” Looking at the easy, quiet intimacy between them, I knew my presence would only be an anchor. “Gwen, you’re awake!” Serena said, blinking innocently. She nudged Wright’s arm. “Gwen’s talking to you. Say something.” Wright smiled, his eyes lingering on Serena. “She’s not like you. She doesn’t need to be coddled to get out of bed.” He turned to me, his tone shifting to a casual, business-like note. “I wanted to let you sleep in, but I forgot to set an alarm to wake you. Go wash up quickly, we’re about to head out.” He grabbed his gloves. “Serena and I will go start the car. We’ll wait for you downstairs.” I stood up and walked to the window. Down in the parking lot, Serena was walking ahead of him, turning back every few steps to laugh at something he said. Wright was replying, his face animated—a stark contrast to the quiet, monosyllabic hums he usually gave me. They had always had so much to talk about. I didn’t care for video games, and I despised extreme sports. I couldn’t join him when he went cave diving, skiing, or skydiving. But for the ten years we had been together, I hadn’t thought that was a death sentence for us. I believed couples didn’t need to be identical to survive. But watching him laugh through the glass, I realized he was happy. A hundred times happier than he ever was sitting on our couch on a Friday night, politely choking down the experimental cocktails I made for him. My phone buzzed. It was a text from Wright asking if I was coming down. I opened our chat. I wanted to type “It’s over,” but my fingers felt incredibly stiff in the chilly room. Instead, I sent two voice notes. The first: “You guys go ahead. I’m not going.” The second: “Wright, we aren’t right for each other. Let’s break up.” He replied with a text: “Okay.” And then sent a voice note of his own: “Okay, just hurry up and catch up. We’ll wait for you at the lift.” He was being lazy again. Out of the two voice notes I sent, he had only tapped the first one to convert it to text. He hadn’t even bothered to listen to the second one. He probably assumed the second note was just me telling them to wait for me. He had always been like this. I set the phone down on the nightstand, staring at the ceiling in the quiet room. The hotel phone rang. I picked it up. “Yes, that’s correct. I booked a shuttle to the airport.” The mountain air was getting to me, and I could feel a low-grade fever starting to burn in my temples. By the time I gathered my things, my head was heavy and swimming. I must have drifted off on the lobby sofa because when I opened my eyes, my phone was lit up with dozens of missed calls. Before I could even process the screen, a shadow fell over me. “Gwen! Why the hell didn’t you come up?” Wright stood over me, his face dark with fury. When his eyes landed on the suitcase beside me, his voice rose to a harsh bark. “What kind of stunt are you pulling now?” “Do you have any idea how worried Serena was when she couldn’t reach you? She went looking for you, took a bad spill down the slope, and we still haven’t found her!” I rubbed my temples, my head throbbing. I looked down at the missed calls. “She never called me—” Before I could finish, Wright slapped the phone out of my hand. It skittered across the tiled floor and slid into the snow just outside the automatic doors. His eyes were like ice. “Gwen, you’re throwing a tantrum just because I brought Serena along. And now she’s hurt because of your petty jealousy. How can you act so innocent?” “I never realized you were the kind of person who could let her best friend freeze on a mountain just to make a point.” My head was pounding so hard I could hear my pulse in my ears. I slowly stood up, walked outside, and retrieved my cold, wet phone from the snow. “If that’s what you want to believe,” I whispered, “then go ahead.” I gripped the handle of my suitcase to leave, but his hand clamped around my wrist like a vice. “You think you’re just going to walk away after this? You’re coming up the mountain to help find her.” Wright was stronger than me, and the fever had sapped whatever strength I had left. I didn’t even have a chance to grab my heavy coat before he dragged me out into the biting wind. The search and rescue team was already at the mid-station, but the wind was picking up, turning the afternoon into a blinding whiteout. Wright dragged me along the trail. The only sound was our heavy breathing. He frowned, glancing back at me. “How many of those hand warmers did you use? Why are your hands so hot?” My lips were dry and cracked. “None.” He let out a sharp, mocking laugh. “Still playing the victim.” We walked another hundred yards. The wind howled, reducing visibility to less than a foot. Suddenly, a faint, muffled cry pierced through the roar of the wind. Before I could even register the sound, Wright let go of my hand with a violent shove. “Serena! I’m here!” The snow beneath my boots was fresh and unstable. Lacking any support, I stumbled backward, losing my footing entirely. I slid ten yards down the steep embankment, my back slamming violently against a jagged rock before I stopped. Through the swirling white curtain, I watched Wright lift Serena onto his back. Their figures merged into a single silhouette against the snow. “Where’s Gwen?” Serena cried out, her voice muffled by his collar. “Is she okay?” Wright looked back toward the path, but my fallen figure was swallowed by the storm. “Don’t worry about her,” he shouted over the wind. “You’re the one who matters right now.” When I woke up, I was lying in a cramped room in the local clinic at the base of the mountain. Serena was sitting by my bedside, her eyes red and swollen as she clutched my hand. “You’re finally awake! You scared me to death!” “It’s all my fault. There was no service on the mountain, so I couldn’t get through to you, and then I slipped. But Wright shouldn’t have dragged you up there in that weather!” I stared at the ceiling, letting her voice wash over me until she finally ran out of words. “Gwen? Why aren’t you saying anything? Is your throat okay?” “She has nothing to say because she knows she’s in the wrong,” Wright’s cold voice cut in. He walked into the room carrying a paper bag. “I got you some chicken chowder from the diner downstairs. Gwen, if you had a fever, you could have just stayed at the hotel. Why didn’t you just tell us?” “You’re an adult. Can you stop acting so childish?” I stared at the paper cup of soup. I didn’t have the energy to argue. I took the plastic spoon and stirred the thick liquid. The smell of onions and celery made my stomach turn. Wright let out an irritated sigh. He snatched the spoon from my hand, scooped up a portion, and shoved it toward my mouth. I whipped my head away. “I don’t want it. I hate celery.” “What are you talking about? You always—” Serena reached out quickly to defuse the tension. “Hey, let me take it—” But her hand clipped the hot cup. The soup spilled, splashing hot liquid across my lap and the white sheets. Wright’s face went pale with panic. “Serena! Are you okay?” Serena welled up with tears, quickly pulling off her soiled jacket and dabbing her hands with a napkin. “I’m fine… it’s my fault. I shouldn’t have come on this trip.” “If I just leave, you guys will stop fighting.” She bowed her head slightly to apologize. And that was when I saw it. Deep on the side of her neck, partially hidden by her collar, was a fresh, dark hickey. For a brief second, our eyes met. She didn’t look away. The fever in my brain flared into a hot, blinding rage. I lunged forward and slapped her across the face with every ounce of strength I had left. “Gwen!” Before I could even blink, Wright’s hand swung out. A sharp crack echoed through the room as his palm struck my cheek. My head whipped to the side. A high-pitched ringing filled my ears, drowning out everything else. Wright gathered Serena in his arms, heading for the door. Before he left, he threw one last look over his shoulder. “You’ve lost your mind. She’s your best friend.” I let out a quiet, trembling laugh. My hand pressed against my burning cheek, feeling the dampness of my own tears. My phone buzzed on the bedside table. A notification appeared: “Your train departs in three hours.” I closed my eyes. It was time to go.

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During our team dinner, my boyfriend went out of his way to run down the street and grab two specialized iced teas. He handed one to my best friend across the table, and set the other in front of me. Sadie smiled warmly, offering a quick thank-you. “You’re always so thoughtful, Zachary. You remembered my stomach can’t handle ice.” I looked down at the mango-coconut smoothie sitting in front of me. Without a word, I pushed it away. “What’s wrong?” Zachary asked, barely looking up from his phone. “I have a severe mango allergy, Zachary. Did you forget? Again?” He paused, a brief flicker of hesitation crossing his face before he brushed it off with a light, dismissive laugh. “It’s just a little bit of mango. Can’t you just scoop it out?” Yet, he had no trouble remembering that Sadie hated cilantro, despised green onions, and only ever drank her tea half-sweet with no ice. But for me, a girl whose throat would constrict at the mere touch of mango, his only solution was to “scoop it out.” I realized then that when someone’s heart has shifted, even your survival becomes a minor detail, easily brushed aside. On the drive home, I sat in the backseat. Watching the silhouette of their shoulders sitting so close together in the front, I felt a sudden, unexpected wave of relief. A relationship where even my life-threatening allergies couldn’t find a place in his memory was a relationship I no longer wanted. … By the time the SUV pulled into our apartment complex, the two of them were still deep in conversation about a movie that had opened over the weekend. It was the same movie Zachary had promised to take me to last Friday, before he canceled at the last minute, claiming he had to work late. They bounced from the tragic fate of the main characters to the subtle nuances of female solidarity. I couldn’t tell you how many times I had been left out of their inside jokes, sitting in the back like an uninvited guest. Eventually, their laughter began to taper off. Zachary glanced at the rearview mirror, his brow furrowing in mild surprise. “Why haven’t you gotten out yet?” I looked up, my voice entirely flat. “You didn’t unlock the doors.” A heavy silence fell over the car. Sadie immediately jumped in to smooth things over. “Oh, my gosh, that’s on me! I get so carried away when we start talking.” She leaned forward, familiarly reaching over the center console to press the unlock button. This car was bought with the first major bonus Zachary made at the firm. I still remembered him smiling, telling me I’d never have to squeeze onto the crowded morning subways again. Then Sadie moved to Boston to seek our help. Our quiet morning commutes quickly went from a party of two to three. And because Sadie suffered from severe motion sickness, I was the one who voluntarily moved from the passenger seat to the back. Three years in the back had made me forget where the dashboard controls even were. Sadie, however, knew them all by heart. She handled the console with the easy familiarity of someone who owned the place. “Lauren, don’t be mad at him,” Sadie said, turning back with a sympathetic pout. “I’ll make sure to give him a piece of my mind on the drive to my apartment.” Zachary let out a soft, amused chuckle, offering no defense. Having lived with him for so long, I could easily detect the sheer fondness laced in that laugh. When we first started dating, if I so much as mentioned that I didn’t like the smell of cigarette smoke, Zachary would freeze me out for days, calling me controlling and demanding to know why I couldn’t just let him have his one outlet for stress. But now, the man who detested being critiqued had grown entirely accustomed to Sadie’s playful nagging. Outside, a sudden gust of wind blew rain through the half-open window, sending a chill straight down my spine. I pushed the door open and practically fled into the night. Of course, the downpour chose that exact moment to turn violent. I ran to the shelter of the building’s awning, completely drenched. When I turned back to look at the driveway, I saw Zachary reaching over, gently wiping a stray drop of rain from Sadie’s cheek. I reached up and wiped the water off my own face. But no matter how hard I rubbed, the dampness remained. Back in the apartment, I took a long, steaming shower. By the time I walked out, drying my hair with a towel, my department manager was calling my phone. “Lauren, are you absolutely sure about this resignation?” he asked, his voice tinged with regret. “You just brought in our biggest account of the quarter. I was actually planning to speak with Zachary about putting you up for a promotion and a salary bump.” In my six years at this company, I had applied for a promotion twelve times. And without fail, every single request had been vetoed by Zachary. When my colleagues praised my campaign strategies, he called it “just doing her basic job.” When the department head recommended me for a prestigious overseas training program, he claimed my “core capabilities were still lacking.” Even when the entire team collectively signed a petition to elevate my title, he rejected it. I had been hurt, but I kept quiet, trying to be the supportive partner. Meanwhile, Sadie, whom I had personally referred to the HR department, had climbed three ranks in less than three years. Her salary had tripled. When I finally lost my temper and demanded an explanation, Zachary had looked at me with disappointment. He told me that because of our relationship, we had to maintain strict boundaries to avoid any appearance of nepotism. He told me to be mature, to be generous. Sadie was new to the industry, he said. She needed guidance, protection, and patience. But I was done being patient. I took a slow, deep breath. “There’s no need to speak with him, Mr. Winston. I’ve made up my mind. I’m leaving.” Hearing the finality in my voice, the manager sighed and didn’t press further. Just then, the front door clicked open. Zachary walked in, catching the tail end of my conversation. “Made up your mind about what?” he asked, kicking off his shoes. “Nothing.” Zachary didn’t push. He was holding a small cardboard package he’d picked up from the mailroom. He walked over to the couch, slicing it open with his pocket knife. Inside was a signature green box. He pulled out a red Carnelian Van Cleef Alhambra bracelet. He looked up at me, holding it up to the light. “Is it pretty?” That exact bracelet had been sitting in my online shopping cart for over a year. Every time I showed it to him, he would scoff, calling it a waste of money and a textbook example of corporate marketing. He told me those delicate, flashy pieces didn’t suit my style anyway. For a split second, a stupid, foolish hope flared up in my chest. I thought he had remembered. Then, his next words shattered the illusion. “You and Sadie are best friends. Do you think she’ll like it?” My breath caught. I swallowed the lump in my throat and managed a small nod. “She’ll love it.” Sensing the sudden shift in my mood, Zachary offered a rare, defensive explanation. “Tomorrow is her three-year anniversary at the firm. I wanted to get her something special. After all, she moved all this way to Boston to be near us. We don’t want her to feel like we’re neglecting her.” He paused, his eyes falling briefly on my bare wrist. “If you really like it, I’ll get you one for your birthday.” I was his actual girlfriend, yet I was being asked to wait for some vague, distant promise of a consolation prize. But the old Zachary didn’t make empty promises. He used to show his love through immediate, quiet actions. If I shared a post about a new restaurant, he would drive me there the very next weekend. If I casually mentioned a craving for dim sum, he would wake up early on a Saturday to buy it before I even opened my eyes. When I turned down a lucrative six-figure offer in New York to end our year of long-distance, he didn’t say much. He simply worked grueling eighty-hour weeks to close deals. Then, he had handed me a deed to our apartment with both of our names printed on it. “Lauren,” he had whispered, pulling me close. “We finally have a home.” I looked away from the red bracelet. “No need. I don’t even like red.” Zachary’s brow furrowed. “Suit yourself.” He loosened his tie and headed toward the bathroom. “I’m going to shower. Don’t say anything to Sadie tonight. I want it to be a surprise tomorrow.” The sound of rushing water soon filled the apartment, drowning out the ambient noise of the city. On the coffee table, Zachary’s phone vibrated. I glanced down. A preview banner popped up on the lock screen. Home yet? The sender’s name was saved simply as a blue whale emoji. It was Sadie. Just last year, Zachary and I had a screaming match over this exact issue. I had discovered that while Sadie was saved under a cute, affectionate whale emoji, my contact name had been changed from “My Sweet Gardenia” to a cold, clinical “7.14 Lauren”—our anniversary date followed by my first name. I had cried, packed my bags, and walked out. Terrified of losing me, Zachary had begged for forgiveness. He promised to quit smoking, promised to change my contact name back, and swore he would keep his distance from Sadie. For a while, it felt like we were in the honeymoon phase again. I would wake up to breakfast on the table. He would wait for me by the elevators so we could walk out together at the end of the day. But deep down, I knew an invisible, hairline fracture had formed between us. Then, three months ago, Sadie was hospitalized after drinking on my behalf at a client dinner. Just like that, she insinuated herself back into the center of our lives. I had spent months waiting for a definitive line to be crossed, some smoking gun of a physical affair. But they were always careful. They never technically crossed the line. Instead, they simply built a world of shared jokes and industry gossip that slowly, systematically locked me out. Like tonight, at the end of the dinner. I had only bent down for fifteen seconds to tie my shoe. They couldn’t even wait that long. When I stood up, they were already gone, vanishing around the street corner together. The next morning, I went straight to the HR department and left my signed resignation letter and transition files on the director’s desk. As I walked back to my desk, Sadie ran up and threw her arm around my shoulder. “I still can’t believe Zachary forgot you were allergic to mangoes!” she chirped, throwing a playful punch into the air. “Don’t worry, I gave him a massive guilt trip about it on the ride home last night.” But he remembered that your stomach can’t handle ice. The words rose to the tip of my tongue, but I swallowed them down. It felt too pathetic, too desperate. I gently slipped my shoulder out of her grip. “We didn’t fight. I’m just tired.” Sadie didn’t seem to notice my coldness. She kept her bright, sunny smile locked on me. “Then you need to rest! Let me buy you a massive dinner tonight to make up for it.” Looking at her flawless, unbothered expression, I felt a sharp pang of exhaustion. When Sadie first arrived in Boston, she was entirely alone. I had made it my mission to shield her, taking on extra work so she wouldn’t feel overwhelmed, letting myself be pushed aside if it made her happy. But I had been alone once, too. When I first arrived in this city, I had no one but Zachary. At least when Sadie arrived, she had me to hold her hand. And eventually, she had Zachary to cherish her. “I can’t tonight. I have plans,” I said quietly, turning back to my computer screen. A moment later, a notification popped up in the department group chat. It was from Zachary. Celebrating Sadie’s 3rd year with the team today. Afternoon tea is on me! Beneath it was a screenshot of a receipt from an upscale French patisserie downtown—the kind of place where reservations had to be made weeks in advance. Last weekend, I had brought home a single pastry from that shop. Zachary had looked at it and asked, “Do all girls like stuff from there?” I had assumed he was trying to learn my tastes, and excitedly rambled about their signature raspberry tarts. Now I realized he was just doing market research for Sadie’s celebration. In the middle of the office, Sadie was surrounded by a crowd of adoring colleagues, her face flushed with happiness. Zachary stood just outside the circle, watching her with a soft, steady gaze. For a fleeting second, they looked like the perfect couple. And I was just an intruder who had accidentally stumbled into their frame. Sadie walked over to my desk, holding a beautifully plated piece of cake. She gave me a conspiratorial wink. “I saved you the most expensive one.” But no matter how expensive the slice was, it didn’t compare to the price of Zachary buying pastries for the entire office just to make her smile. Still, I didn’t want to cause a scene. “Thank you,” I said. Sadie clasped her hands together, shifting into her familiar, pleading routine. “Lauren, I have this major campaign pitch due by Friday and I’m completely swamped. You’re the absolute best, can you please, please help me finish it?” She dropped a thick stack of folders onto my desk before I could even answer. She assumed I would do what I had always done—silently absorb her workload, stay up all night pulling the data together, and let her put her name on the cover page. The new Van Cleef bracelet caught the fluorescent lights of the office, gleaming on her wrist. The red was blinding. I shook my head. “I’m sorry, Sadie. I have my own work to wrap up. I don’t have time.” Her eyes instantly welled with tears. “Lauren… are you mad at me? You’ve never said no to me before.” Zachary appeared out of nowhere, stepping in front of Sadie like a shield. “Lauren, what the hell is your problem now?” I calmly explained the situation, half-hoping—with a bitter streak of malice—that he would reprimand her. Zachary prided himself on professional integrity; he hated when people slacked off or stole credit, having suffered through plenty of that early in his career. Instead, he looked at me with cold disgust. “Sadie is your superior. When she assigns you work, you don’t have the luxury of refusing.” He leaned in closer, his voice dropping to a harsh whisper. “You’ve been at this company for six years and you’re still sitting at a junior desk. Have you ever stopped to wonder why? It’s because of this petty, calculative attitude. You throw a tantrum the moment you’re asked to do a little extra work!” I almost wanted to laugh. The people who had started at the same time as me—even those with half my billable hours—had all been promoted to team leads. Only I had been kept in place. The newer employees might not have known why, but did Zachary really think I was blind to the truth? Sadie gently tugged at Zachary’s sleeve, her voice dripping with sweet martyrdom. “It’s okay, Zachary. If Lauren doesn’t want to help, I’ll just stay up and do it myself.” Zachary’s glare hardened. “Lauren, if you keep bringing this toxic attitude to the office, I’ll have no choice but to recommend HR terminate your—” “Let’s break up,” I interrupted. The entire corner of the office went dead silent. The color drained from Zachary’s face, his eyes widening in shock. “What did you just say?” I looked him dead in the eye, speaking clearly. “I said, we are over.” Sadie gasped, her hand flying to her mouth. “Lauren! Why are you doing this over nothing? Zachary has been so good to you…” Ignoring her completely, I began packing my personal belongings into my bag. Zachary grabbed my wrist, his grip so tight my bones ached. “Lauren, is this another one of your pathetic stunts?” “What are you talking about?” He let out a harsh, bitter laugh. “Threatening to break up in front of the entire office just to force me to take our relationship public? Haven’t I told you a thousand times? It’s unprofessional. It creates gossip!” I looked down at his white knuckles squeezing my red skin. The exhaustion finally settled deep into my bones. It was always the same. If I showed even a sliver of hurt, I was being dramatic, petty, or crazy. But if Sadie so much as sighed, he would move heaven and earth to fix it. I pulled my arm back with everything I had, breaking his grip. “Now that we’re broken up,” I said, stepping back, “you won’t have to worry about anyone accusing you of favoring your girlfriend.” The minute the clock struck five, I went back to our apartment and packed my bags. I had lived in this space for five years. The worn velvet sofa was something I had dragged home from a flea market when we were still sharing a cramped studio. When we moved here, I couldn’t bring myself to throw it away. It felt like a monument to the hard years we had survived together. I had spent weekends comparing fabric swatches just to find the perfect curtains. On the wall, a framed photo from moving day still hung. Zachary had paint splatters on his nose; I was holding a dusty broom. We looked exhausted, dirty, and utterly radiant. We had built a home in a city that felt so hostile. I took the frame off the wall, took out the photo, tore it into pieces, and dropped it into the kitchen trash can. My resignation required a one-week transition period, so I checked into a boutique hotel near the office. But by the next morning, the atmosphere at work had shifted. The rumors of our breakup had spread, and the team’s attitude toward me turned cold. Some assumed I had tried to use a relationship with the creative director to get ahead and failed. Suddenly, I was the one tasked with printing thick decks, running down to get coffee, and doing menial data entry. Mr. Winston knew the truth about my resignation and tried to intervene when he saw me being mistreated, but it only made the office gossip worse. Within days, a rumor started that I had broken up with Zachary because I was sleeping with Mr. Winston—a married man in his late forties who was simply a decent human being. The isolation was absolute. And through it all, Zachary never said a single word in my defense. Perhaps he didn’t know, or perhaps he believed I deserved it. On the third afternoon, Zachary stormed over to my desk and slammed a thick marketing deck in front of me. “Lauren, is this the absolute garbage you’re turning in now? It’s a complete disaster!” I stared at the cover page. The credit line read: Lead Strategist: Lauren. But I hadn’t touched a new campaign in weeks. I was on my way out the door. Before I could speak, Sadie hurried over, grabbing Zachary’s arm with tears streaming down her face. “Zachary, please don’t yell at Lauren. It’s my fault, I should have checked her work closer…” Zachary’s expression remained frozen as he looked at me. “Don’t think because Sadie is willing to take the blame for you that you’re off the hook.” “The client is furious with this draft. Your commission for this entire quarter is forfeited.” I hadn’t spent a single second on this project, yet I was being publicly dragged through the mud for its failure. Around us, my coworkers whispered and smirked, enjoying the fall of the girl who had “tried to play the system.” I stood up, holding my ground. “I didn’t write this pitch.” Zachary leaned down, his voice dropping to a low, urgent whisper. “Lauren, you’re leaving the company anyway. A black mark on your record here won’t matter once you’re gone.” “But Sadie is different. I just submitted her name for the director promotion. If the executive board finds out she botched a major client pitch right now, her career is over.” “Just take the fall for her. Do it as a favor to me. One last time.” Looking into his pleading eyes, the very last thread of affection I had held for him snapped. Beside him, Sadie offered me a look of profound, silent guilt, but she didn’t open her mouth to correct him. A quiet laugh escaped my lips. “Okay.” Consider it my final payment for the night she spent in the hospital. Because of the “gross negligence” on the pitch, HR was instructed to terminate me immediately. At three o’clock, Mr. Winston called me into his office. “Lauren, you’ve been severely let down by this place,” he said softly. He had personally gone to HR and had my voluntary resignation converted into an involuntary termination with full severance benefits. I signed the paperwork and thanked him from the bottom of my heart. When the workday ended, I was the last one to leave. I emptied my desk, dumping every remaining pen and notepad into the trash can. Back at the hotel, my phone lit up with near-simultaneous messages from Zachary and Sadie. They wanted to take me out to a high-end restaurant downtown to “make things up to me.” It was a trendy, romantic spot where they had gone together dozens of times, always ordering the couple’s tasting menu. Each time, they had explained it was just a practical, cost-effective choice. But Zachary had never once taken me there. I had only ever seen the dining room through Sadie’s Instagram stories. I didn’t bother replying. I packed my suitcase and took a cab to Logan Airport. Before boarding, I saw their texts still pouring in, telling me they had a “huge surprise” waiting for me at the restaurant. I blocked both of their numbers. Six years ago, I had packed a single suitcase and flown to this city, ready to conquer the world by Zachary’s side. Six years later, his world was filled with Sadie, and there was no room left for me. It was time to go home.

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “522960”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

I had barely made it back from the clinic, my body still numb from the anesthesia, when I found the manila envelope sitting on my welcome mat. Inside, there was only a single medical report. On the back, written in a hand that looked frighteningly identical to my own, was a jagged note: “Do not keep this baby. He will be born with a severe heart defect. He will tear you and Wright apart until there is nothing left but hatred.” The next morning, my hand trembling, I signed the consent form to terminate the pregnancy. When Wright finally stormed into the hospital lobby, the nurse was handing me my discharge papers. He snatched the sheet from my hand, his knuckles turning white, his eyes wild as he demanded to know if I had lost my mind. I didn’t say a word. I didn’t explain. Three days later, at the afterparty celebrating Lacey’s opening night, I stood in the shadows of the restaurant restroom and heard her laugh. “She actually fell for it,” she boasted to one of her friends. “I told you, Naomi looks smart, but she’s the easiest person in the world to fool.” “Aren’t you afraid she’ll trace it back to you?” her friend whispered. Lacey’s voice dropped, thick with a smugness she couldn’t hide. “Why would I be? I hired someone to forge her handwriting, and the medical lab report was aged to look real. Even if Wright finds out, he’ll just think of it as one of my silly little pranks.” Then Wright’s deep voice drifted in from the hallway outside. “Don’t let there be a next time.” He wasn’t angry. He was scolding her the way one might scold a petulant child. Lacey immediately squealed with delight. “See? I told you Wright would never actually stay mad at me.” Standing inside the bathroom stall, I stared down at the small square of surgical tape on the inside of my wrist and let out a quiet, hollow laugh. Of course I knew the envelope was a setup. And I knew my baby was perfectly healthy. I signed those papers because I was a ghost. I had died, and by some cruel miracle, I had just woken up ten years in the past. … In the private dining room, Lacey was perched on the arm of Wright’s chair, spearing a strawberry from her cake and holding it to his lips. Around the table, their friends laughed and egged them on. Wright looked up, his eyes catching mine as I walked in. His glass froze halfway to his mouth. “Naomi? I told you to stay home and rest.” Someone muted the overhead music. Lacey stood up, breezing past the awkward silence to catch my arm like a concerned sister. “Oh my god, Naomi, you look so pale. You just had surgery—you shouldn’t be on your feet. Here, take my seat.” I didn’t take the seat. I raised my hand and slapped her across the face. The sharp, echoing crack instantly killed whatever warmth was left in the room. Lacey clutched her cheek, tears welling in her eyes with practiced ease. “Naomi… what did I do wrong this time?” Wright moved instantly, pulling her behind him, his voice low and vibrating with fury. “Apologize, Naomi. Now.” I threw the manila envelope onto the center of the table. “She forged a lab report to trick me into getting an abortion. Wright, she killed our baby.” Lacey shook her head violently, sobbing. “I didn’t mean it like that! It was just a joke… a stupid prank. I didn’t think you’d actually go through with it.” At the far end of the table, someone murmured under their breath, “Who the hell pranks someone about a pregnancy?” Wright shot a warning glare across the room, and the table fell dead silent again. When he turned back to me, there wasn’t a trace of sympathy in his eyes. “Lacey was acting childish, yes. But you’re an adult, Naomi. You mean to tell me you didn’t think to get a second opinion before signing those papers?” I looked at him, my voice flat. “So it’s my fault?” Wright looked away, his jaw tight. “I’m hurting too. We lost a child. But you can’t just dump all the blame on Lacey.” I reached down, picked up a glass of cranberry juice from the table, and poured it directly over the front of Lacey’s white silk dress. “Then let me take responsibility for this first,” I said. Lacey shrieked, backing away as the red liquid seeped into the fabric like blood. My gaze locked onto the silver magnolia brooch pinned to her collar, and the last traces of my smile faded. Wright had given me that brooch for my eighteenth birthday. He had whispered in my ear that the magnolia was a symbol meant only for me. But in my previous life, during the ten years that followed, Lacey wore it in every family photo we ever took. Wright’s hand struck my face before I could react. My cheek went numb, and within seconds, the copper taste of blood filled my mouth. He gathered Lacey into his arms, shielding her. “You’re a disappointment, Naomi. You’ve lost your mind.” I bent down, picked up the scattered pieces of the fake lab report, and folded them neatly, one by one. “Wright,” I said, looking him dead in the eye. “From this moment on, we are even. I owe you nothing.” He frowned, a flicker of unease crossing his face. “What is that supposed to mean?” I didn’t give him an answer. I left the venue and drove straight to the studio of the Evergreen Dance Company. Lacey was scheduled to headline their national showcase next month as a rising star. Her official bio was painted in glowing, tragic strokes: “The daughter of a fallen firefighter, raised with Gill and resilience by her late father’s close friends, the Carter family.” I took out a folder of printouts. There was a photo of her sitting intimately on Wright’s lap, a screenshot of the texts she sent to get the forged lab report, and the original receipt for the silver magnolia brooch. I pinned them all directly onto the dance company’s central bulletin board. Lacey came rushing out of the rehearsal room, her ballet flats slapping against the hardwood floor. “Naomi! Are you trying to destroy my life?” I pressed the final pin into the corner of Wright’s receipt, smoothing the paper down. “You weren’t afraid of destroying an unborn child. Why are you so terrified of a piece of paper?” Other dancers began to gather around, whispering as they read the papers. Lacey fell to her knees, gasping for air between her sobs. “I’m not a homewrecker! Wright and I… it’s not what you think!” One of the male leads crossed his arms, frowning at the photo. “Then why are you sitting on her husband’s lap, Lacey?” Lacey bit her lip so hard it nearly bled. When she saw Wright push through the studio doors, she threw herself into his arms. “Wright! She’s trying to ruin me!” Wright immediately pulled her behind his back, his face hard as he pulled out his phone to call the police. “This is public defamation, Naomi. She is the daughter of a fallen hero, and you are spreading malicious, fabricated lies. You used to work for the District Attorney’s office—you of all people should know the legal consequences of this.” I nodded slowly. “I do.” I spent that night in an interrogation room at the local precinct. By the next morning, both of our families had arrived. My mother threw a folded document onto the table in front of me—a formal notice of my termination from the law firm where I had been working. “They let you go, Naomi,” she said, her voice shaking with shame. “Are you happy now?” My father slammed his hand on the table. “Lacey is our daughter too! She grew up without her biological parents, and you choose to rip open her old wounds like this? What is wrong with you?” Wright sat across from me, his cuffs still smudged with Lacey’s foundation. “If you issue a public apology,” he said quietly, “I won’t press charges.” I looked at the three of them. “And what about my baby?” No one spoke. My mother waved her hand dismissively. “You can have other children, Naomi. But Lacey only gets one shot at this showcase.” I picked up my termination letter, folded it carefully, and slid it into my purse. “Then let’s hope she doesn’t slip on stage.” My father pointed toward the exit. “Go home and think about what you’ve done. Don’t bother coming back until you’re ready to get on your knees and beg Lacey for forgiveness.” As I walked to the door, I heard Lacey’s soft whimpers behind me. “Dad, Mom, please don’t be mad at Naomi. I’ve already lost my real parents… I don’t want to lose my sister too.” Wright rubbed her shoulder, his voice soothing. “She’ll regret this, Lacey.” I opened the door and walked out into the cold morning air. I “had” regretted it—in that other life. I had regretted keeping quiet to protect the family name. I had regretted letting Wright hold his old sacrifices over my head. I had regretted cleaning up Lacey’s messes, year after year, until there was nothing left of me. In that life, I had ended up as a detective in a bleak border town. On a freezing, rainy night, I had responded to a security call at a luxury resort, only to find Wright, Lacey, and their three beautiful children vacationing there. Lacey had looked at my silver police badge and laughed. “Still playing cop, Naomi?” she had said, loud enough for the hotel staff to hear. “Sounds exhausting. If I were you, I’d have settled down a long time ago.” Later that same night, I managed to rescue a kidnapped young girl from an abandoned warehouse. But I got trapped inside when the place was set ablaze. As the smoke filled my lungs and the fire closed in, I stared at the last text message on my phone. It was from Wright. “Lacey says she wants to see you. Can we just put the past behind us?” We couldn’t. Some debts could never be settled with a text. If the universe had dragged me back to this moment, it wasn’t so I could suffer in silence all over again. When Wright returned to our apartment that evening, Lacey was right behind him, dragging a pastel-pink suitcase. She stood at the threshold, looking up at me with wide, innocent eyes. “Naomi… the company asked me to take a temporary leave. I didn’t have anywhere else to go, and Wright said I could stay here for a few days.” I didn’t answer. I was busy packing away the things I had bought for the nursery—the tiny onesies, the little socks, and the wooden rattle Wright had picked out himself. I tossed the rattle into a black garbage bag. Wright reached out, stopping my hand. “What are you doing?” “Throwing it out.” “I bought that for our baby.” I looked up at him, my eyes cold. “Oh. You remember?” His grip loosened, and his hand fell away. Lacey stood by his side, her voice barely a whisper. “Naomi, please don’t be angry with Wright. He hasn’t slept in days.” I pulled the drawstring tight on the trash bag. “As long as you’re sleeping fine, Lacey, that’s all that matters.” Her face went pale. Wright scowled. “Naomi, is it really necessary to be this hostile?” I pointed toward the guest bedroom. “She can stay there. But the lock has been changed, and there is nothing of hers left in that room.” Lacey blinked, startled. “What do you mean? Where are my old trophies? My high school yearbooks?” “Donated.” Refusing to believe me, she pushed past me and threw open the guest room closet. It was completely empty. Nothing remained but a bare mattress on the bed frame. Wright’s face darkened. “Those were her childhood memories, Naomi.” I tossed a set of keys onto the coffee table. “Why should her childhood memories occupy space in my marital home?” Lacey leaned against the doorframe, tears spilling onto the hardwood floor. “I know you hate me, Naomi. You can yell at me, you can hit me, but how could you throw away the photos of my parents?” I looked at her, unblinking. “I didn’t throw away the photos of your biological parents.” She froze. “I threw away the fake scrapbook my parents made to help you play house,” I continued. “Naomi!” Wright snapped. I unlocked my phone and held the screen up to his face. “Here is the number for the local recycling center. If you want them back, you can go dig through the bins yourself.” Lacey screamed, lunging forward to grab my phone. I stepped aside. She lost her footing, crashing hard onto the floor, her knees hitting the wood with a sickening thud. Wright dropped to his knees to pull her up. “Naomi! What the hell is wrong with you?” I squatted down to retie the garbage bag. “I learned from the best.” The doorbell rang. The building manager was standing in the hallway, flanked by two security guards. “Excuse me, Mrs. Carter, but we received a noise complaint from the neighbors downstairs. They reported shouting and glass breaking.” Lacey scrambled toward them like they were her savior. “Oh, thank God. Please, you have to help us. My sister is having a nervous breakdown. She just had major surgery, and she’s not in her right mind.” The manager glanced at me, then turned to Wright. “Mr. Carter, do we need to call an ambulance? Or perhaps her doctor?” Wright stayed silent, letting the implication hang in the air. That was always his favorite weapon. He loved painting my anger as hysteria, and my retaliation as sickness. I walked over to the coffee table and picked up my medical records. “We don’t need a hospital. But you might want to call the police.” The building manager blinked. “Excuse me?” I handed him the folder. “I was coerced into a medical procedure using forged documents. Mr. Carter and Miss Carter here just admitted to their involvement inside my apartment. I believe you heard them.” One of the younger guards looked up, his eyes widening. Wright’s face went pale. “I didn’t admit to anything!” Lacey cried out, her voice cracking. “I didn’t say a word!” I pointed to the small, blinking light of a newly installed security camera in the corner of the ceiling. “The camera records audio.” Lacey spun around to look at Wright, panic rising in her eyes. Wright stared at me as if he were looking at a stranger. “You put cameras in our home to spy on us?” I dragged the heavy black trash bag to the front door. “To catch thieves.” Lacey sobbed hysterically. “Wright, I can’t stay here. Let’s go.” Wright helped her up, guiding her past the security guards. Before he walked out, he turned back to me, his voice dripping with venom. “You’re going to beg her to come back, Naomi.” I slammed the door in his face. The second the latch clicked, my phone buzzed in my pocket. It was an unknown number. “Ms. Carter, the files for the cold case have been secured. Are we starting tonight?” I deleted the message. Not yet. It wasn’t time. The next afternoon, my mother brought Lacey back to my parents’ house. The living room was packed with relatives when I walked in. Before I could even take off my coat, my aunt slammed her teacup onto the saucer. “Naomi, look at your sister! She’s practically skin and bones, and you’re still carrying on with this ridiculous feud?” Lacey was wearing a high-collared knit sweater. The slap mark on her cheek had faded, but a fresh piece of sterile gauze was taped to her neck. She tilted her head, making sure everyone saw the bandage. “I’m fine, Auntie. Really.” My mother clutched Lacey’s hand, tears spilling instantly. “Lacey was so distraught last night she almost did something reckless. Naomi, are you trying to drive her to the edge?” My father slid a printed document across the coffee table toward me. “Sign this. We’re going to post it online. It says you suffered a temporary emotional breakdown due to the miscarriage and misconstrued the situation between Lacey and Wright.” I scanned the page. It was beautifully drafted. It painted Lacey as an innocent victim of a grieving sister’s paranoia, and Wright as a devoted, long-suffering husband standing by his troubled wife. “Who wrote this?” I asked. Lacey looked up, her eyes wide and pleading. “Wright had his legal team draft it. Naomi, if you just post this, the dance company will let me back into the showcase.” “Your sister’s entire career shouldn’t be ruined because of your temper,” my father grunted. I picked up the pen. A collective sigh of relief swept through the room. But instead of signing, I wrote three words across the signature line in thick, black ink: “Go to hell.” My aunt threw her hands up. “What is wrong with this girl? Why are you so stubborn?” I ignored her, locking eyes with my father. “Dad, when you adopted Lacey, you told everyone it was because her father saved your life. Right?” My father’s face hardened. “Why are you bringing up the past now?” “I want to hear her say it,” I replied, turning to Lacey. Lacey lowered her head, sniffing. “My father died in the line of duty to save Uncle Thomas.” I nodded slowly. “And you claim he was a firefighter?” My mother stood up abruptly. “Naomi! That is enough. Shut your mouth.” Lacey clutched a crumpled tissue in her fist. “Are you really going to insult my dead father now, Naomi?” I didn’t push it further. In my previous life, I had spent years digging into her background. Her “heroic” father was never a firefighter. He was a low-level smuggler, a middleman in a child-trafficking ring who had died fleeing from the police. The Carter family had adopted Lacey because my mother was soft-hearted, and because my father needed to cover up a critical, career-ending mistake he had made during that investigation. But if I exposed them now without hard evidence, they would only use it to lock me away in a psych ward. I tore the apology letter in half. “If you want me to apologize, fine. Have Wright hand over his phone records from the day of my surgery. And have Lacey bring the man who forged my medical report to this house.” The color drained from Lacey’s face. My father roared, “You’re going to cross-examine your own family now?” I stood up, brushing off my coat. “Real family doesn’t murder my baby.” The front door opened, and Wright stepped in. He was holding a printed sheet of paper—an appointment confirmation for a psychiatric evaluation. “Naomi, you need to go get tested,” he said, his voice flat. I stared at the paper. In my previous life, he had used this exact same tactic. He used a forced psychiatric evaluation to prove I was suffering from postpartum psychosis, rendering all my accusations legally useless. Even after I was reassigned to the department in Charleston, that red flag had followed me in my files. Every promotion, every transfer, there was always someone asking: “Is it true you were mentally unstable back then?” I took the paper from his hand and ripped it to shreds right in front of them. “I’m not getting evaluated, Wright.” Wright’s voice dropped to a dangerous whisper. “Don’t force my hand, Naomi.” Lacey reached out to grab his arm. “Wright, stop. She’s just grieving. She’s in so much pain.” I picked up a cup of cold tea from the table and poured it directly over Wright’s expensive leather shoes. “Stop pretending to care,” I spat. He grabbed my wrist, his grip like iron. Ignoring the pain, I turned my gaze to Lacey. “You love to cry, don’t you? Let’s hear it. Cry louder for everyone.” Lacey shrank back under my stare, and the room erupted into angry shouts from my aunts and uncles. Wright dragged me toward the front door. “You are moving out of our apartment. Tonight.” I let out a sharp laugh. “I bought that apartment before we even got engaged, Wright.” He froze. I pulled a copy of the deed from my purse and slapped it against the wall by the door. “From today on, if anyone catches Lacey inside my apartment, I’m filing breaking-and-entering charges.” My father raised his hand to slap me, but before he could swing, there was a sharp knock at the door. A middle-aged woman wearing a worn gray trench coat stood on the porch. She looked past me into the living room, her eyes locking onto Lacey. She paused. “Are you Lacey Carter?” Lacey stepped back, instantly on guard. “Who are you?” The woman reached into her canvas bag and pulled out a faded photograph. “Your father owes my family a life. I’ve been looking for you for seventeen years.” Every eye in the room turned to Lacey. The crumpled tissue slipped from her hand and fell to the floor.

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When the layoff list went up on the intranet, my name was sitting on the third line. Devin Shaw. Finance Department. Senior Analyst, Level 4. The HR director handed over the severance agreement with a smile so bright you’d think she’d just closed a multi-million-dollar escrow. “Just sign here, Devin. Three months’ severance plus transition. Honestly, the company is being incredibly generous.” I glanced at the total payout. It was less than the pocket money my wife had wired me the previous month. I signed. I packed. I walked out. The entire process took exactly seven minutes. My colleagues watched me leave with the kind of blank, pitying stares you reserve for a dead goldfish being flushed down the drain. No one tried to stop me. No one thought there was any reason to. A month later, the books for our three most critical projects completely imploded. The phones at reception were ringing off the hook with furious vendors demanding payment, eventually driving the receptionist to quit in tears. My wife walked down from her office on the twenty-eight floor, flipped open the personnel directory, and stared at the pages. Her expression was darker than her custom black Maybach. “Who approved this layoff list?” she asked, her voice dangerously quiet. “Who—the hell—fired my husband?” Meanwhile, I was stretched out on our living room sofa, a bag of chips in one hand and the TV remote in the other. My phone screen lit up, buzzed, went dark, and lit up again. Thirty-ninth missed call. I took a slow sip of my soda. Freedom tasted incredibly good. 1 It was a rainy Wednesday. I remember it clearly because Wednesdays were always gourmet smash burger days at the office cafeteria. I had planned to head down early to grab a window seat, but just past nine-thirty, Rhonda Kelly, the HR director, drifted over to my cubicle. “Devin, do you have a quick minute?” She wore her signature corporate smile—exactly thirty degrees of upward lip curve, exposing exactly eight teeth. The HR special. I had seen it too many times before. She had given that exact same smile to our old colleague when she escorted him out last month. I set down my spreadsheet and followed her into the small, glass-walled conference room. On the mahogany table sat two copies of a document and a glass of lukewarm water. The classic execution setup. Rhonda sat down and cleared her throat. “So, Devin, as you know, the company has been looking at ways to optimize our organizational structure…” Optimize. They really were getting creative with the vocabulary. Last year it was “strategic rightsizing,” and the year before that it was “talent realignment.” At the end of the day, it all meant the same thing: you’re fired. “…and after a thorough evaluation, your position has been identified for optimization.” She slid a sheet of paper across the table. Separation and Release Agreement. The severance package: twelve weeks of pay. I scanned the numbers. It was enough to cover my takeout and craft beer habit for a few months, though it wouldn’t even cover the cost of a single bottle of wine my wife, Victoria Mercer, ordered at her corporate dinners. “Do you have any questions, Devin?” Rhonda asked, tilting her head with a subtle, condescending pity. I knew that look. It was the look you gave to someone you assumed had no leverage, no safety net, and no way to fight back. And to be fair, she wasn’t entirely wrong to assume that. During my three years at Mercer Enterprises, I had been a ghost. I came in at nine, left at five. I didn’t steal credit, I didn’t play politics, and I never sat at the main table during corporate events. I was the guy who drank punch in the corner and kept his head down. My employee badge photo was taken with my eyes half-shut because I’d been nursing a hangover that morning. I was the perfect, invisible candidate to help HR hit their layoff quota. I picked up the pen. “Wait,” Rhonda said, startled by my lack of hesitation. “Don’t you want to think about it?” “Think about what?” “Well… don’t you want to talk to your manager? Or perhaps…” I looked at her. Rhonda was wearing a crisp new silk blouse with silver cufflinks. They bore the initials R.C.—a gift from Regina Cross. Regina Cross, our Executive VP. She was also the person who had personally put my name on the chopping block. Three months ago, Regina had too much to drink at the annual charity gala. She cornered me in a dim hallway near the restrooms. “Devin, a guy with your looks and brain is wasted in Finance,” she’d whispered, stepping close enough for me to smell the expensive gin on her breath. “Come work directly under me. I’ll fast-track you to Director of Operations.” She reached out, her fingers brushing toward my shoulder. I took a deliberate step back. “Ms. Cross, I think you’ve had too much to drink.” “I’m perfectly sober,” she said, her eyes narrowing. “Do you have any idea how many people in this building would kill for an opportunity like this?” “Ms. Cross,” I said, my back pressing against the cold glass of a fire extinguisher cabinet. “I’m married.” She stared at me for a few seconds, then let out a sharp, mocking laugh. “Married? To whom? Your emergency contact in the system is your father, and your HR file lists you as single.” I had been too lazy to update my forms when we got married. Who knew people actually dug through personnel files for leverage? “Married or not,” I said, looking her straight in the eyes, “I’m not interested.” The hallway went dead silent for three long seconds. Regina eventually stepped back, her expression souring as if she’d just swallowed a wasp. And now, here I was on the layoff list. The narrative arc was perfectly logical. I signed the agreement. My handwriting was steady, the lines clean and straight. Rhonda quickly pulled the documents back, letting out a visible sigh of relief. She had probably prepared herself for tears, anger, or a threatened lawsuit. Sorry to disappoint. I stood up, my chair legs scraping softly against the hardwood floor. “Oh, Rhonda?” She looked up. “Yes?” “They’re serving those shaved prime rib sandwiches in the cafeteria today. Do me a favor and grab one? My badge is still active, and I’ve got eighty bucks left on my dining account.” “What?” I didn’t wait for her to answer. I walked back to my desk to pack up. I didn’t have much. A ceramic mug that read World’s Laziest Husband—a five-dollar flea market find Victoria had bought me as a joke—a small potted cactus that had survived three years of neglect, and a stack of colorful sticky notes covered in complex project reconciliation formulas and vendor payment cycles. I swept the mug and the cactus into a canvas tote bag. Then I looked at the sticky notes. After a second of thought, I tossed them into the bag too. They wouldn’t know what to do with them anyway. As I walked past the breakroom, I caught snatches of whispered gossip. “Devin got laid off? The analyst in Finance?” “Which one? Oh, the guy who’s always the first to arrive and the last to leave?” “Yeah, him. Honestly, it was bound to happen. He never really made a name for himself.” “I heard VP Cross personally requested his name be on the list.” “Yikes. Pissing off Regina Cross is a career death sentence…” I kept walking, my pace steady. Near the elevator bank, I ran into Toby. He was an associate in Admin, a few years younger than me, and my only real friend at the office. When he saw the canvas bag in my hand, his eyes turned instantly red. “Devin! Tell me it’s not true. They didn’t—” “Yeah,” I said softly. “Why didn’t you fight it? The amount of work you do for this department, they don’t even—” “Toby,” I interrupted, clapping a hand on his shoulder. “I’m fine. Really.” “But—” “I’ll see you around.” The elevator doors slid open. I stepped inside and turned around. Toby stood in the hallway, his face twisted in a mix of anger and grief. I gave him a quick “call me” gesture. Just as the doors began to close, I heard him yell, “Don’t worry, man! If things get bad, I’ll cover your rent!” The elevator glided downward. In the lobby, the security guard, Bill, looked up from his desk, surprised to see me carrying a bag. “Leaving early today, Devin?” “Yeah, Bill. Got let go.” “What? You?” “Take care, Bill.” The heavy glass doors closed behind me. Outside, a light mist was falling. I took a deep breath. The air smelled of wet asphalt and the sweet, buttery scent of the bakery down the block. It was beautiful. I wouldn’t have to wake up at six-thirty tomorrow to squeeze onto a crowded subway train. I pulled out my phone and dialed a familiar number. It rang twice before she picked up. “Devin? Why are you calling at this hour? Is everything okay?” Victoria’s voice carried a hint of tension. She was on a business trip in Tokyo. With the thirteen-hour time difference, it was in the middle of the night for her. “Nothing major,” I said, walking toward the subway station. “My company just laid me off.” The line went completely dead for five seconds. “What did you say?” “I was optimized. Got my severance, signed the papers, and I’m walking to the train.” Another long silence. Then, I heard the rustle of sheets and the sound of a chair being pushed back. She was throwing off the covers. “Who approved the list? Which department made the decision? Who put your name on it?” Her voice was low, vibrating with a quiet, lethal anger. I had known Victoria for seven years, from our college days to our marriage. When she was truly furious, she didn’t scream. Her voice simply dropped an octave, delivering each word like a slow, deliberate strike. “Victoria,” I said gently. “Yes?” “Don’t do anything.” “Devin—” “I mean it,” I said, my tone flat. “I spent three years at this company without using a single bit of your influence. Nobody knows who I am. Now that I’m gone, I don’t want a massive scene just because of your title.” There was a quiet pause on the line. Then, she let out a long, heavy sigh. “Fine,” she murmured, clearly fighting to keep her temper in check. “I won’t interfere. Not yet. But I’m flying back next week, and when I get there—” “We’ll talk then.” “Get some rest.” “I can’t sleep now.” “Go hit the gym, then.” She let out a soft, dry laugh. “Fine. You win.” After we hung up, my phone buzzed with a text message from her. I’m so sorry, sweetheart. I’ll make you braised short ribs when I get home. I replied with two words: Make them spicy. 2 Day one of unemployment. I slept in until my body decided it was done sleeping. Ten-thirty. A thin sliver of golden sunlight filtered through the gap in the curtains, warming my face. I rolled over and drifted off for another half hour. By eleven, my stomach grumbled, finally forcing me out of bed. I padded into the kitchen in my sweatpants, boiled some gourmet ramen, added two soft-boiled eggs, and threw in some leftover bacon. I took the steaming bowl to the sofa, turned on the TV, and found a cheesy reality show. I took a bite. It was absolute heaven. My phone was filled with notifications. Toby had sent seventeen frantic voice memos. I didn’t need to listen to know what they were about: Are you okay? This is so unfair. I’m going to lose my mind. I sent him a meme of a cat face-planted on a pillow with the caption: The world is exhausting, but ramen is reliable. He replied instantly: How can you be sending memes right now?! Because I have time, I typed back. Are you seriously not angry? You practically ran that department! For three years! All those reports, the month-end reconciliations, the— Toby, relax. The water is deeper than you think. What does that mean? Just sit back and watch. Day two. I drove over to the local market and bought three bags of gourmet snacks, two cases of soda, and a ridiculously comfortable cashmere lounge set. Once I got home, I opened a job board, scrolling through the listings without any real urgency. I was mostly just curious to see what my market value was. By the third page, my phone rang. An unrecognized local number. “Hello, is this Devin Shaw? My name is Elena with Madison Executive Search…” A headhunter. “We noticed your status recently updated on LinkedIn. We have an opening for a Vice President of Finance that we think would be a perfect fit. The base salary is…” She named a figure. I almost dropped my chip. The salary she quoted was exactly eight times what I had been making at Victoria’s subsidiary. “Devin? Are you still there?” “Yes. Please go on.” “The position is with Vertex Group…” Vertex. Mercer Enterprises’ fiercest competitor in the market. I chewed my chip slowly, enjoying the satisfying crunch. “Send the job description to my email. I’ll review it.” “Of course! We look forward to—” I hung up and opened my notes app, creating a new entry. Devin’s Fun Unemployment Journal. Line 1: Day 2. Competitor headhunter called. Offered 8x my old salary. Officially winning at life. Line 2: Expenses: Chips $6.50, soda $4.00. Total $10.50. Line 3: Mental state: Exceptionally stable. Day three. I spent the afternoon cooking a massive four-course meal: slow-roasted garlic herb ribs, roasted asparagus, creamy potatoes, and a rich corn chowder. As I ate, I scrolled through social media. My former colleagues were posting their usual content. Some posted photos of late-night office views with captions about “the hustle.” Others shared company PR articles with generic motivational quotes. Everything seemed peaceful. Business as usual. It was almost funny how quickly a corporate machine could make you feel like you never existed. I scrolled further and found Rhonda’s latest post. It was a photo of her and Regina Cross standing on a sunny golf course, captioned: So grateful for incredible mentors who inspire us to reach higher. I set my phone down and sipped my tea. My heart rate didn’t spike. My anger didn’t flare. Because I knew the real show hadn’t even started yet. They genuinely believed that firing a mid-level analyst would have zero consequences. But what they didn’t realize was that the financial models for our three core projects—the algorithms, the formulas, the hidden dependencies, and the manual reconciliation logic—existed solely inside my head. Handover? I had left a beautifully formatted three-page document on the shared drive. But content-wise, it was the equivalent of handing a non-swimmer a pamphlet on fluid dynamics and throwing them into the Mariana Trench. You can’t blame me. They didn’t give me the time to transition my work, nor did they bother to assign anyone to shadow me. 3 Day five of unemployment. The cracks were beginning to show. Toby’s updates went from three texts a day to thirty. “Devin! The Finance department is in absolute chaos!” “Ashley was assigned to take over your accounts. She tried to reconcile the accounts payable for the A3 project. She’s been at it for two days and she’s off by three point seven million dollars!” “Exactly 3.7 million! She’s literally crying at her desk!” I listened to his frantic voice notes while relaxing with a charcoal sheet mask on my face. Ashley was the kind of colleague who excelled at shifting blame and leaving the office at precisely five-to-five every evening. The 3.7-million-dollar variance. I knew exactly where it was. It was a prepayment to Valero Corp processed through a non-standard clearing channel, parked under a tertiary ledger in “Other Receivables.” It required manual reconciliation based on a side-letter milestone schedule. That logic wasn’t programmed into our automated ERP system. It was in my brain. “Did she ask Linda, the Finance Director?” I texted back. “Yes! Linda said she had no idea how you structured it and told Ashley to figure it out herself!” I smiled under my mask. Linda. My direct supervisor. A twenty-year corporate climber whose primary skills involved scheduling meetings, drinking tea, and signing off on expense reports. For three years, ninety percent of the complex reports she signed had been built entirely by me. Did she ever actually review them? Sure. Did she understand them? Not even close. “Devin, tell me you aren’t secretly laughing at this,” Toby messaged. “I would never,” I replied, though the grin on my face almost peeled the mask off my skin. Day seven. The B7 project went sideways. It was Mercer Enterprises’ largest initiative of the fiscal year—a two-hundred-million-dollar contract. With month-end approaching, they needed to deliver a comprehensive cash flow utilization report to our partner, Summit Holdings. The report required consolidating twelve sub-accounts, calculating exchange rate conversions for three cross-border payments, and amortizing milestone costs. Normally, I compiled this report with my eyes closed. But for anyone else… “Devin!!!” Toby’s voice memo was practically vibrating with panic. “Summit is threatening to pull out! They said if the financial report isn’t on their desk in forty-eight hours, they’re triggering the material breach clause!” “What’s the penalty?” I asked. “Five percent of the total contract value!” Five percent of two hundred million. Ten million dollars. I picked up my mug, gently blowing on my hot tea. The rich aroma of Earl Grey filled the room. “Let’s wait and see what happens next,” I murmured. Day nine. The suppliers for the C12 project halted deliveries. I had personally structured the payment schedule for that project, mapping out six installment phases to perfectly align with our monthly cash flow. The issue was that the priority rankings, supplier account updates, and the joint-authorization memos with Procurement were all saved in my encrypted local work folder. When I left, IT had performed a standard factory reset on my laptop. It was company protocol to wipe all departing employees’ hard drives immediately. You can’t blame me for that. As for the physical copies of those memos? They had been tucked away in the very bottom drawer of my desk. Since they looked like my personal working notes, I had simply packed them into my canvas bag when I cleared out my cubicle. An honest mistake, really. Without those payment releases, the suppliers’ payment systems began flagging the accounts as delinquent. Furious vendors called the front desk from eight in the morning until eight at night. Tyler, the young guy working reception, handled over a hundred screaming calls a day. By day two, he was thoroughly traumatized. By day three, he handed in his resignation.

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My buddy knew how hopelessly in love I was with Serena Cross. He spent an entire week cornering her around campus, badgering her until she finally gave him her number so he could pass it to me. To show my gratitude for helping me make that first terrifying leap, I emptied my entire savings account to buy him a designer watch. Immediately after, I began agonizing over what to text Serena. During the day, I’d send her little snapshots of my life; at night, we’d stay up late, whispering our deepest secrets through blue text bubbles. Within a year, we had become inseparable, sharing a connection that felt deeper than anything I’d ever known. Finally, I gathered every ounce of courage I had and sent her a text: [The weather’s supposed to be nice tomorrow. Want to get coffee?] Serena replied almost instantly: [Babe, we literally just said goodbye?] While I sat there staring at my phone, completely baffled, my buddy pushed open our dorm room door. He was holding a gift box, looking sheepish and red-faced. “Hey, Jude,” he said, sounding terribly apologetic. “So, when I got her number last year… I think I forgot to mention it was for you. She’s been under the impression that the person texting her this whole time was… well, me.” 1 The entire dorm room went dead silent. The only sound was the sharp, repeated chime of my phone vibrating against the desk. Serena’s messages were flooding in, one after another: [Did I scare you by confessing so suddenly?] [Actually, I’ve been building up to this for a long time.] [This past year of texting you… I could feel how sweet and genuine you are.] [At first, I thought I just saw you as a close friend. But then, whenever I didn’t hear from you, my chest would ache. That’s when I knew. I’ve fallen for you.] [I’m sorry to spring this on you out of nowhere and just confess like this—] But before the next sentence could load, every single one of those messages vanished. [Message unsent.] [Message unsent.] “I’m so sorry, Jude,” Zachary said, offering a soft, sympathetic smile. He set the gift box on his desk and pulled out a sleek velvet case. He opened it, admired the designer tie clip inside, and kept it. Then, he tossed the matching cufflinks over to me. “I actually just said yes to Serena. She asked me out. So, obviously, I can’t let her keep texting you anymore.” He knelt beside my chair, resting his chin on his hands as he looked up at me with bright, innocent eyes. “I gave her my actual number and told her my old account got hacked. So…” A cold sweat broke out across my forehead. A sickening, impossible realization began to take shape in my mind. With trembling fingers, I opened our chat, typed a single question mark, and hit send. A second later, a harsh red error circle flared onto the screen. [Message failed to deliver.] My heart dropped into a bottomless, icy pit. Three hundred and sixty-five days. Just like that, Serena had erased me. We had literally stayed up talking until four in the morning. Seeing me frozen, Zachary shoved the silver cufflinks into my palm and chuckled. “Oh, come on. Honestly, if she hadn’t thought she was talking to me from the start, she probably wouldn’t have even given you the time of day. You know how cold and untouchable Serena is. Half the guys on campus have tried and failed. Just think of these cufflinks as a little—” “Zachary,” I interrupted, my voice flat and hollow. I turned my head away, unable to bear the sight of him. “We’re not friends anymore. Don’t call me your brother.” Before he could say anything, I pushed past him, climbed up to my bunk bed, and drew the curtains shut, clinging to the last shred of my dignity. Huddled in the dark, I scrolled back through a year’s worth of messages with Serena. At the beginning, the screen had been a wall of my blue bubbles, with her replying in polite, brief sentences. But slowly, her tone had shifted. If I went silent for a few hours, she’d send a tentative [Hey, you there?] For the past three months, our roles had completely reversed. She was the one who was constantly reaching out, eager to share every mundane detail of her day. I had been so full of hope. My heart had felt light, buoyed by the belief that all my quiet courage hadn’t been in vain. But now, it was all shattered. I buried my face in my pillow and cried until sleep finally claimed me. The next morning, someone yelled from the doorway. “Jude! There’s a really gorgeous girl downstairs looking for you. She said her name is Serena.” 2 My eyes snapped open, every trace of sleep instantly vanishing. I glanced over at Zachary’s empty mattress, threw off my blankets, and scrambled out of bed. Part of me wanted to run to the mirror and make myself presentable, but the panic of keeping her waiting won out. I grabbed a black face mask, threw on a heavy winter coat to hide my rumpled clothes, and hurried down the stairs. During that brief descent, a dozen desperate hopes raced through my mind. Maybe she had realized that Zachary’s personality didn’t match the texts at all. Maybe she had figured out the truth, and she was here to apologize… “Jude.” A cool, beautiful voice called out. I tried to steady my breathing, keeping my eyes downcast. I looked at the silver bracelet on her wrist—the one we had spent three hours choosing together over text. I gave a quiet, muffled, “Yeah?” “What is it that you want?” Serena asked. I jerked my head up, staring at her through my glasses. Serena was completely expressionless, her gaze distant and cold. “Zachary was crying last night. Because of you. I don’t know when you first noticed me, or when you decided you had a crush on me—” She took a slow, deep breath, her brow furrowed in a tight line of irritation. She looked at me with a cold, impatient disdain she’d never once shown in her messages. “But let me make one thing entirely clear: Zachary is my boyfriend. That is my choice, and it isn’t going to change. Not now, not ever. So I don’t want you taking your frustrations out on him. Do you understand?” Tears stung the backs of my eyes, blurring her cold silhouette. I dug my fingernails into my palms and forced the words past the lump in my throat. “The person you talked to every night… that was me, Serena. It was always me.” A harsh, mocking laugh cut through the cold morning air. “Zachary warned me about you. He said you were desperate enough to try this. He said you’d lie and claim his words as your own just to get to me.” Serena’s gaze turned to pure disgust, sharp and unyielding. “So let me tell you this, Jude: even if it [had[ been you behind those messages, I still wouldn’t want you. I want Zachary.” The words felt like a physical blow. I stood there, feeling incredibly small, and let out a quiet, self-deprecating laugh. I reached down, unclasped the matching silver bracelet from my own wrist, and let it slip through my fingers. It hit the pavement with a dull, hollow clink. As I turned my back on her, I heard her voice soften with a sudden, tense hesitation. “Jude—” 3 Like a fool, I stopped. I couldn’t help it. I had spent two years secretly admiring her from afar, and an entire year pouring my heart out to her through a screen. You don’t just switch that off. I told myself that if she asked, if she showed even a shred of doubt, I would pull out my phone and show her every single message. “Jude?” Serena’s tone turned gentle, almost coaxing. She stepped closer behind me and whispered, “Zachary’s ulcer is flaring up again. I bought him some medicine, but I forgot to give it to the guy who came down earlier. Could you take it up to him?” “Sure,” I said. I grabbed the white paper bag from her hand and walked back toward the dorm entrance without looking back. The very last ember of warmth in my chest went cold. Maybe Zachary had been right all along. If it hadn’t been for his face, Serena never would have spared me a single glance. 4 I tossed the medicine onto Zachary’s unmade bed. A few minutes later, the door swung open, and Zachary walked in, flanked by a couple of guys from down the hall. “Hey, Jude,” Zachary said, his voice bright. “My girl is treating us all to dinner tomorrow night. You should come with.” I kept my back to him, staring blankly at my desk. “I’m good.” Behind me, one of the guys let out a quiet, mocking snicker. “Told you so, Zachary. He’s still crying over Serena. As if she’d ever look at him. If you hadn’t cornered her to get her number, a guy like him would be completely invisible to her.” “Hey, cut it out,” Zachary scolded gently, though there was a smug undercurrent to his voice. He walked over to my desk, leaning in. “Jude’s not like that. He just needs a little time to process everything. Right, buddy?” He blinked his wide, watery eyes, adopting that familiar, wounded-puppy look he always used when he wanted something. “Look, after my ex broke my heart, Serena just fell into my life. It feels like fate, Jude. You’re my best friend. I just really want your blessing.” As he gestured, his sleeve slipped back, exposing the jagged, pale scar on his forearm. The scar he’d gotten three years ago when he pulled me out of the way of a falling metal rack at a university exhibition. My chest tightened. The guilt, heavy and familiar, washed over me. I looked away, swallowing the bitterness. “Fine,” I muttered. 5 I spent the next twenty-four hours forcing myself to swallow the bitter pill of reality. By the time evening rolled around, I splashed some cold water on my face, didn’t bother styling my hair, and headed out to the restaurant. When I walked into the private dining room, Zachary and the other guys were still in the restroom. Serena was sitting alone at the large round table. She looked up, her gaze scanning my plain t-shirt and tired face. She gave a curt nod, then defensively pulled her hands off the table, leaning back into her chair as if to establish a boundary. My heart gave a painful twitch. Sitting across from her cold, guarded form, my mind flashed back to the warmth of her texts: [I think I found that stray cat you were feeding yesterday. Is this him?] [Thank you for listening to me vent tonight. Are you ever going to tell me your name?] [Don’t cry over people who don’t deserve you. They only target you because you’re too kind.] The door opened, and Zachary returned, surrounded by his laughing entourage. The moment his eyes landed on me, his smile stiffened, a flicker of panic crossing his features. “Jude! Hey, man… I didn’t know you were already here. You should’ve texted, I would’ve met you at the lobby…” Serena reached over, wrapping her fingers gently around his. “He’s a grown man, Zachary,” she said, her voice softening into an affectionate coo. “He doesn’t need an escort. You need to focus on your own health.” She reached into her bag and placed a sage-green thermos in front of him. “Here. Warm water, just like you like.” Amid the appreciative teasing of the other guys, Zachary took the thermos. A brief flash of confusion crossed his face before he smiled. “Is this green one yours?” Then, he picked up a slice of fresh pineapple from the fruit platter with his fork and held it up to her lips. “Serena, you’re seriously the best.” Serena didn’t open her mouth. She just stared at the yellow fruit. Zachary’s smile faltered, looking slightly embarrassed as he nudged the fork closer to her lips. “Come on, take a bite.” She’s deathly allergic to pineapple.[ The warning practically leaped to the tip of my tongue, but I forced myself to choke it down. I watched as Serena’s eyes went dark for a fraction of a second. But then, she smoothed her expression, leaned forward, and ate the pineapple. She smiled warmly at him. “Thanks, babe.” 6 Serena watched Zachary as he went back to laughing and talking with his friends. She leaned back against her chair, her index finger tapping a slow, rhythmic beat against the dark wood of the table. Her eyes were clouded and intense. I knew exactly what she was thinking. She was wondering why the boy who had allegedly spent three days texting her about the “perfect sage-green thermos” he’d bought for her would look at it and ask if it was hers. “Excuse me, I’m going to run to the restroom,” Serena said, standing up with a tight, polite smile. As she pulled her hand away, I caught a glimpse of what she was clutching in her palm: a blister pack of allergy medicine. Zachary paid her departure no mind. He turned to me, his voice dripping with magnanimity. “Jude, did you order anything yet? Seriously, don’t be shy. Serena wanted to treat everyone to thank you guys for looking out for me in the dorm.” I looked at the menu, feeling a dull ache in my stomach. “Whatever is fine.” “Alright,” Zachary said, turning to the waiter. “We’ll go with these. Oh, and make sure there’s absolutely no cilantro in any of the dishes. My buddy here gets physically sick if he eats it.” He looked around the table, wearing a proud, self-satisfied grin that practically screamed, [See what a thoughtful friend I am? 7 With Serena out of the room, Zachary leaned in and whispered to the guys, his chest puffed out. “We went out last night, and she kissed me. We were lying on the grass looking at the stars, and she just stared at me for the longest time before leaning in. She told me I’m perfect just the way I am, and that I need to be more confident…” Amid the low, excited jeers of the guys, Zachary reached into his pocket and pulled out the designer watch I had gifted him a year ago. He slid it across the table toward me. “I wanted to tell her the truth, Jude. I really did. But you saw how she looks at me… she’s in love with me. I can’t just hand her over. This is the watch you gave me to say thanks. I’m returning it. We’re even now.” The screech of my chair legs scraping against the hardwood floor cut through the room’s chatter. I couldn’t do this for another second. “I have to go,” I said, my voice thick. I practically bolted for the exit. In my haste, I didn’t see the door opening and collided straight into someone, burying my face into a soft, fragrant shoulder. “I’m sorry,” I choked out, a tear finally slipping down my cheek as I pushed past her and ran. 8 After that night, Zachary and Serena’s relationship became the talk of the campus. It seemed everyone knew that the untouchable Serena Cross had finally been tamed. Around Zachary, she was softer, sweeter than anyone had ever seen her. Zachary, entirely swept up in the thrill of his sudden romance, completely stopped trying to mend things with me. I threw myself into every extracurricular activity I could find, filling my schedule to the brim just to keep my mind from wandering back to those blue text bubbles. It worked, for the most part, until a warm evening a few weeks later. I was walking back to the dorm late when I noticed two figures arguing quietly in the shadow of the oak trees near the courtyard. “Babe, please stop being like this. How could you think I have feelings for Jude?” Serena sounded utterly exasperated. “I keep my distance from everyone. I don’t even have other guy friends. You—” “I just can’t stand the way he looks at you,” Zachary grumbled, pulling his arm away from her. “We share a room, Serena. Every time you come over to see me, he’s right there. Maybe… maybe I should just move out. We could get an apartment together.” “That’s not a good idea,” Serena said, her voice tightening with a subtle note of scrutiny. “For an entire year, you were too shy to even tell me your name over text. Why are you suddenly in such a rush to move in together?” She let out a slow, measured breath, her tone shifting to something more clinical. “I want us to do this right. We have our whole lives after graduation. We don’t need to rush this, do we?” The leaves rustled in the dry breeze. Then, Serena spoke again, her voice cool and calculated. “Actually, I have a friend who’s single. She’s gorgeous, though her temper is… a bit much. I wonder if we could set them up. I doubt a guy like Jude could ever catch her attention, but it would keep him occupied.” Zachary let out an awkward, nervous chuckle. “Yeah. Yeah, that’s a great idea. I’ll pitch it to him when I get back. He’ll probably be thrilled.” 9 With graduation looming, I had already signed a lease on a small apartment off-campus. To keep the peace and avoid any more awkward confrontations, I didn’t object when Zachary brought up the blind date. I just nodded and agreed. A couple of days later, Zachary was on a FaceTime call with Serena in our room. He grabbed my shoulder and yanked me in front of the screen. “See, Serena? I told him. Jude, seriously, her friend is a total knockout. She’s got a bit of a wild side—she actually got arrested once—but she’s harmless. Mostly.” On Serena’s end of the screen, a girl’s voice was ranting in the background, sharp and dripping with annoyance. “Are you kidding me, Serena? Why are you trying to set me up? Who said you could give out my number? I’ve said it a thousand times, I am not looking for a boyfriend! I would literally rather jump off a bridge than go on a—” The girl leaned into the frame to grab her phone, and our eyes met through the screen. She froze mid-sentence.

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Lately, after my late-night video chats with my online boyfriend, his demands had been escalating, his kinks twisting into something darker and increasingly bizarre. I was just starting to worry about the toll it was taking on him when a strange, translucent text began scrolling across my field of vision like a live-feed comment section. [LMAO, the tragic side-bitch is so ugly and clueless. She has no idea she’s dealing with triplets! All three of them are sharing one account and using her as their personal Pornhub~] [It’s her own fault for stealing the heroine’s photos to date the male lead. Kellan’s a proud guy. When he figured out the truth, he decided to play along and let his two virgin older brothers use her to practice their bedroom skills!] [Hahaha, this is a top-tier reverse-harem dark college romance. All three Carmichael brothers are campus gods. Six-foot-two, eight inches, and can go all night. The heroine is going to feast later on! It’s just a shame this cheap knock-off gets to enjoy them first :(] [Who cares? Once Kellan leaks her explicit videos online, the cyberbullying will push her to jump off a building. So satisfying~] Ah. So that was it. The thing is, I never stole anyone’s photos to date online. But I had no desire to explain myself. If they wanted to play me, they couldn’t blame me when I decided to treat them like dogs and play them right back. I made the first move by tracking down the middle brother, Hudson—the one who fronted as innocent but harbored the darkest, most voracious appetite of them all. Looking into his clean, detached eyes, I wrapped my arms tightly around his waist, tilted my head back, and offered him a blinding smile. “Take me to bed tonight. Okay?” 01 The moment the words left my mouth, Hudson recoiled as if a lunatic had just latched onto him. He grabbed my arms, shoving me back. But then his eyes focused on my face. He froze. The look in his eyes morphed from repulsion into utter, mesmerized shock. The floating text in my vision went wild. [WHAT THE FUCK! Nobody mentioned the side character was this gorgeous!] [If I’m reading this right, it’s not that the side character stole the heroine’s pics. The heroine stole HER pics to catfish the male lead!] [Oh, calm down, what’s the big deal? Kellan loves the heroine for her inner beauty, not just a face.] [Exactly. The side chick is so stupid, she hasn’t even realized this isn’t Kellan, it’s his brother Hudson.] … It was only today, reading these surreal, floating comments, that I finally understood the reality of my existence. I was living inside a steamy BookTok sensation. I was the impoverished, disposable collateral damage. The heroine was my trust-fund roommate, Camille. The male lead was Kellan Carmichael, the scion of a top-tier billionaire dynasty. The supporting male leads were his older brothers: Declan, the eldest, and Hudson, the middle child. Kellan and I met through an online game. He fell hard, spending the last three years absolutely spoiling me, funding my life from afar. That was, until things got spicy, and I refused to show my face on camera. Camille, who had her sights set on Kellan, saw an opportunity. She used an AI deepfake of my face to video-chat him. Kellan, assuming I was the fraud who had stolen Camille’s photos, decided to punish me. He handed over the login to his brothers, letting them take turns using me as a digital plaything. Eventually, when the truth came out, the Carmichael brothers would decide that my poverty made me a gold-digger, inherently cheap and undeserving, while Camille remained pure, elegant, and high-class. To wash their hands of me and appease Camille, they would leak my private videos. The resulting cyberbullying would drive me off the roof of a building. These filthy, entitled men. When they wanted to get off, they’d give their lives for my body. But once they were satisfied, they wanted me dead. So, while they were still inexperienced, arrogant virgins, I was going to sleep with all of them. I was going to make them tear each other apart. And then, I was going to walk away without looking back. I blinked up at Hudson, batting my eyelashes. “Why are you looking at me like that? Do you not recognize me?” Hudson snapped out of his trance. His voice was a magnetic, crisp baritone. “I recognize you.” “You’re Camille.” I shook my head, my smile widening. “Nope.” “I’m Faye.” Confusion and shock warred on his handsome features. Without breaking eye contact, I pulled out my phone and dialed Kellan’s number via FaceTime. A second later, the phone in Hudson’s pocket began to buzz. He looked down, then brought his gaze back to me, disbelief written in every line of his face. “You… you’re really Sweet Cream?” Sweet Cream was my online handle. I grinned at him. “Yeah.” “Didn’t you say you missed me?” “Well, here I am. I came all this way so we can do all those dirty things we talked about.” Hudson swallowed hard. His pale, aristocratic face flushed so deeply it looked like it might bleed. “This… this isn’t right.” “…It’s too fast.” A strange thrill fluttered in my chest. He was even more repressed and bashful than I had observed. Yet, according to the script, he was the one with the most insatiable libido. I kept my tone light, teasing. “We’ve been dating online for three years. I wouldn’t call this fast.” “Besides, I’ve helped you out on video so many times.” I paused, letting my smile slip just a fraction. “Or… are you disappointed with how I look in person?” Hudson opened his mouth, but the words died in his throat. The text scrolled by: [Hudson is obsessed with her body, but he knows she belongs to his precious baby brother. Kellan misunderstood her, and Hudson knows he’s just an imposter. He can’t sleep with her.] Oh. Now we care about brotherly love and moral boundaries? Where was that morality when you were conspiring to humiliate me? I reached up, hooked my arms around Hudson’s neck, and pulled his mouth down to mine. 02 The second our lips met, Hudson’s eyes flew wide open. His breath hitched, a sharp intake of air that vibrated against my mouth. But his heartbeat was deafening. And his physical reaction was undeniable. The moment my body pressed flush against his, the hard evidence of his arousal pressed back… making me even more excited. I kissed him with reckless abandon. But after a moment, Hudson awkwardly pushed me away, stumbling two steps backward. His voice was raspy, frantic. “Sweet Cream, don’t do this.” I let my lower lip tremble. I looked at him, forcing tears to well up in my eyes until they were rimmed with red. “Kellan… you don’t actually like me, do you? All those times you said you loved me online, you were just lying.” “No!” Hudson denied instantly. “Then why are you pushing me away?” I choked out, a perfect picture of heartbreak. “I’m offering myself to you.” Hudson just stared at me, his Adam’s apple bobbing silently. I lowered my eyes. I let my voice crack. “I get it.” “You think I’m poor. You think I’m not good enough for you.” “But it’s not like you just found out about my background.” “You’re a liar.” “We’re done. Let’s break up.” “I’m blocking you, and you’ll never hear from me again.” I pulled up his profile on my phone, my thumb hovering over the Delete Contact button. Suddenly, Hudson lunged forward and clamped his hand over my wrist. I looked up. Two perfect, crystalline tears slid slowly down my flushed cheeks. Hudson’s eyelashes fluttered. For a long, suspended moment, we just looked at each other in the heavy silence. Then, as if a dam had burst within him, his hot palm cupped the back of my neck, and he crashed his mouth down on mine with the force of a hurricane. It was like he couldn’t get enough, couldn’t breathe enough of me in. He scooped me up into his arms, kissing me blindly as he carried me toward Kellan’s bedroom. My pleated skirt, the crisp white button-down, the black lace… they formed a trail from the doorway to the edge of the bed. The room filled with the heavy, tangled sounds of our breathing. The comment section was losing its mind: [AHHH! Wasn’t Hudson supposed to save himself for the heroine? Why is he giving it to the side chick?] [It’s all this bitch’s fault for threatening to break up! Hudson is just trying to save his brother’s relationship, so he has to commit to the bit!] [NGL, healthy relationships are great, but toxic, forbidden lust is so much hotter!] [LMAO I know right?! The taboo vibes are insane! Hudson’s V-line and that stamina are making me weak in the knees!] I hissed in a sharp breath, a physiological tear leaking from the corner of my eye. Hudson froze instantly. He looked down, his eyes wide with disbelief. “You… you’re a virgin?” I gave a shy, breathless “Mhm.” The hands gripping my waist tightened possessively. Kellan had sworn that Sweet Cream was a cheap cam-girl who would sleep with anyone for cash, that she was used goods. But her eyes, her reactions, her very body told him the absolute truth: she was untouched. She was clean. She was worthy of being loved. A wave of intense guilt washed over Hudson. But when he remembered that his idiot brother Kellan had gone out to find Camille tonight, that guilt rapidly morphed into a twisted sense of relief. Thank god Kellan had gone to Camille. Thank god this perfect, sweet girl was his now. Hudson tenderly kissed the tear from the corner of my eye. His voice was a dark, gravelly murmur, thick with adoration. “Baby, I’m going to take such good care of you.” I sneered internally. Yeah, right. Once I had my fun with all three of them, they’d be nothing but a bad memory. But on the outside, I played the part of the profoundly moved lover. “I’ll take good care of you, too.” I initiated the next kiss. And the man—who had always been slave to his own repressed desires—kissed me back harder, faster, more desperate than before. I lost track of how many times we went at it. Until, suddenly, the bedroom door swung open. Hudson and I, along with the figure standing in the doorway, all froze. In the dead, suffocating silence, I peeked over Hudson’s shoulder. It was a tall, imposing man. But before I could even make out his features, Hudson snapped back to reality and yanked the heavy duvet completely over my head. Plunged into darkness, I felt him slip out of the bed. He leaned close to the blanket, whispering frantically. “I have to step out.” “Stay in bed. Don’t come out.” “Wait for me to come back for you.” 03 Hudson shut the door tightly behind him. But thanks to the floating comments, I had a front-row seat to the drama unfolding in the living room. Out there, Declan was staring at the red scratch marks raked down Hudson’s arms. His eyes were dark, his voice low and dangerous. “What the hell is wrong with you?” “Bringing some girl back to fool around in Kellan’s bed.” Hudson didn’t flinch. His tone was eerily calm. “That girl is Sweet Cream. She thinks I’m Kellan.” Declan stiffened. Then a harsh, mocking laugh escaped him. “You really are pathetic.” “A girl who’s been around the block with god knows how many guys, and you’re treating her like some delicacy?” Hudson’s expression turned ice-cold. “She was a virgin. She’s completely pure.” “And she never lied to Kellan. She looks exactly like her photos. Camille was the one who stole her face and manipulated him.” Declan was stunned into silence. It took him a long time to find his voice. “Then you definitely shouldn’t have touched her.” “You know how obsessed Kellan is with her.” Meeting his older brother’s disappointed glare, Hudson didn’t back down. “I’m obsessed with her, too.” “Besides, Kellan is basically with Camille now.” “I need you to cover for me. Don’t tell Kellan, and don’t tell Sweet Cream. Let me keep being Kellan to her.” “I don’t want to break her heart. When the time is right, I’ll explain everything to her myself.” Declan’s face was stormy. “I’m not helping you with this sick game.” Hudson stared at him for a long beat. “…Is it because you want her for yourself?” Declan looked as if he’d been slapped. He swore under his breath. “I’m not as depraved as you. I wouldn’t touch my own brother’s girlfriend.” A cruel, knowing smile touched Hudson’s lips. “Really? Because you certainly didn’t mind jerking off to her videos.” Declan choked on his next words. It was true. He had only let me “help” him out once on video. But once was still a fact. Hudson’s voice hardened into steel. “I’m not logging into Kellan’s account for you tomorrow.” “She’s mine. I’m going to marry her.” “Neither of you gets to take her from me.” Declan let out a cold scoff, his gaze sharpening into blades. “Did you forget she is currently Kellan’s girlfriend?” “You’re not even the other man, you’re just a cheap knock-off, and you’re planning a wedding?” “You need to get her out of here right now, and put Kellan’s room back exactly the way you found it.” “Unless you want Kellan coming at you with a knife when he finds out!” Declan was immovable. But Hudson refused to yield. “Kellan went to see Camille. He won’t be back for days.” “As long as you keep your mouth shut, no one has to get hurt.” Declan opened his mouth to argue, but Hudson cut him off. “I took her virginity. Are you telling me I should act like some deadbeat and not take responsibility?” Declan aggressively rubbed his temples, utterly exasperated by his useless brother. He tried to find a compromise. “I can keep quiet for now.” “But if Kellan decides it’s her he really wants, you have to back off.” “Why?” “Because he’s the youngest. As his older brother, it’s your job to step aside for him.” Hudson let out a soft, hollow laugh. “I’m your younger brother, too. Why don’t you ever step aside for me?” “Why do you always trample over my feelings and force me to do things I hate?” Declan’s lips parted, but whatever argument he had died on his tongue, weighed down by guilt. Hudson threw a final, “Remember to call me Kellan in front of her,” over his shoulder before coming back into the room. But the mood was broken. He just climbed into bed and held me silently against his chest. Which was fine by me. My body was aching from the sheer intensity of what we’d just done. I needed the rest. The comments, however, were absolutely seething. 04 [This side character is a literal plague! Declan and Hudson have NEVER fought, and now they’re at each other’s throats over her!] [Hudson was already obsessed with her voice and body on screen. Now that he’s actually held her and tasted her, there’s no way in hell he’s letting go.] [I can’t wait to see who Declan sides with when Hudson and Kellan inevitably try to kill each other over her.] Who would he side with? Hahaha. I was going to make sure Declan was throwing punches right alongside them. With me in the picture, this “brotherly bond” was going to burn to the ground. The next morning. Alerted by the comments that Declan was up and working out, I slipped out of bed to find him. In the faint, hazy morning light, I found Declan on the balcony. He was shirtless, wearing only a pair of grey sweatpants, holding a perfect plank. The lines of his shoulders were sharp and fluid. Veins popped along his forearms. His fiercely defined abs tightened and relaxed with every controlled exhale. It was like a silent, primal invitation. The raw testosterone rolling off him was intoxicating. I swallowed lightly. I finally understood the phrase: He was just breathing; I was seducing. I slid the glass door open. “Kellan?” I murmured. Declan stiffened. He immediately broke his form and stood up, looking down at me. I quietly took him in. Though the triplets shared the same face, their auras couldn’t be more different. Kellan was arrogant and spoiled. Hudson was repressed and elegant. Declan had a rugged, untamed danger to him. His voice was a block of ice. “I’m not Kellan. I’m Declan.” I let out a soft, breathy laugh. “Declan, Kellan, whatever… aren’t you just my boyfriend?” I stepped right into his space and wrapped my arms around him, pressing my cheek against his warm, sweat-slicked chest. Damn. He felt like a brick wall. Declan frowned deeply and shoved me off. His tone dropped another ten degrees. “We are triplets. I am the oldest. My name is Declan.” I feigned utter embarrassment, letting my cheeks flush red. “Oh! Oh my god, Kellan never mentioned… um, I’ll just… go back to the room.” Glancing one last time at the faint pink smudge I had intentionally left on his chest, I jogged back to the bedroom, immensely satisfied. I hadn’t been under the covers for more than a few minutes before Hudson stirred. Seeing me awake, he hauled me flush against his chest, burying his face in the crook of my neck. He pressed a few groggy kisses to my skin before murmuring, his voice rough with sleep, “Baby, I want you again.” I widened my eyes in mock shock. “Didn’t you just have me out there? You’re still not satisfied?” Hudson froze. His sleepy eyes snapped into sharp, terrified focus.

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “522956”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel