After five grueling years working overseas with my fiancé, our long-awaited payday never arrived. Instead, we were greeted by the deafening roar of artillery shells from the neighboring border. While I was stressing over the extortionate, million-dollar black-market flight tickets, the company accountant looked at me with pure envy. “Maya, you are so lucky. Carter just withdrew your combined two-million-dollar salary to buy flight tickets. Even if it means draining every cent of your hard-earned savings, he’s determined to get you back to the States safely. It’s so romantic!” My heart swelled with warmth, and I immediately rushed back to our quarters to pack my bags. But after dozens of unanswered phone calls, I stayed up until midnight, only to receive a single, freezing text message. “Maya, you’ve made a lot of friends over here, you know how to survive. Elena is a widow with no man to protect her, and she’s too soft for this environment. She’d get eaten alive. I’m sending her back to the States first, and then I’ll figure out a way to come back and get you!” As the sky lit up with anti-aircraft fire, I silently blocked his number. What Carter didn’t know was that I had just received a classified call from the US Embassy. Due to my status as a top-tier technological asset, I had been granted immediate access to a military extraction flight—and I was allowed to bring my family for free. Furthermore, the local airport had just been entirely commandeered by the US Armed Forces. Their commercial flight wasn’t going anywhere. …… When my armored transport arrived at the airport, thousands of desperate expats were already pacing anxiously on the cracked tarmac. The vehicle crawled slowly through the chaotic crowd. Outside my tinted window, right in front of the Embassy’s emergency registration desk, I spotted them. Carter was holding Elena tightly against his chest, shielding her. The sight of them was blindingly repulsive. Sitting in the passenger seat, Agent Sterling, the embassy liaison sent to extract me, was diligently filling out a clipboard. “Dr. Vance, do you have any other family members currently in-country? Given your High-Value clearance, we have the authority to extract them with you right now.” I looked at the intimately entangled pair outside the window and let out a soft sigh. Years ago, when my parents died in a tragic accident, it was Carter’s mother, Mama Hayes, who constantly invited me over for dinner and kept me company. If it weren’t for her, I might have succumbed to my depression and joined my parents. For the sake of Mama Hayes’s memory, and knowing full well that Carter and Elena wouldn’t be able to escape tonight, my heart wavered for a fraction of a second. I was just about to raise my hand and point to them when the embassy worker outside spoke to Carter in a hurried, anxious voice. “Sir, do you have any other family members in the country? The geopolitical situation is deteriorating by the second. Every minute they stay behind is a lethal risk. Even if you have to borrow money, you need to leave together!” Carter froze. His knuckles turned white as he gripped the black-market tickets in his hand. We both knew the truth. Our combined salary was two million, but as a middle-management executive at the multinational firm, he could easily request an emergency cash advance. Corporate wouldn’t just leave an employee to die. Elena looked up at him nervously and whispered, “Carter, if we contact Maya right now, knowing her temper, she’ll definitely throw a massive fit. We might end up missing our window to leave entirely…” The hesitation in Carter’s eyes instantly vanished, replaced by a cold resolve. He closed his eyes and shook his head. “No. It’s just us.” Those words pierced right through the bulletproof glass and slammed ruthlessly into my heart. Amidst the smoke and distant gunfire, the two of them clung to each other, looking like a pair of tragic, star-crossed lovers. Seeing Elena’s satisfied smile, Carter lowered his voice to comfort her. “Maya is tough. She acts like a total tomboy anyway. Even if she stays behind, no one would dare mess with her. Unlike you—you’re too fragile and delicate. You’d be bullied in a heartbeat.” Caught up in the emotion of his own twisted heroism, he gently kissed her forehead. “Don’t be afraid. As long as I’m here, I will keep you safe!” The bitter irony was that he had said those exact same words to me when he proposed. Now, he was perfectly fine abandoning me in a literal warzone, acting as if my “toughness” was a bulletproof vest that could magically deflect mortar shells. But he conveniently forgot something. Before I followed him to this desert wasteland, I was a quiet, soft-spoken academic who spent all her time in a sterile physics lab. Growing up, whenever I visited the Hayes house, Carter was always the one who looked after me. Naturally, he became the sole protagonist of my teenage daydreams. So, after Mama Hayes passed away, I threw away my brilliant career as a young, tenured physics professor back in the States to follow him overseas to strike it rich. To support his ambitions, I—one of the youngest genius physicists of my generation—worked alongside the rugged construction crews, grinding my way up from a manual laborer to a lead draftsman, all just to hear him say: “Once I save up two million dollars, I’m taking you back to the States to give you the grandest wedding imaginable! I’ll make sure your parents can rest in peace!” Last year, when our salaries finally got bumped up to the executive tier, I thought I could finally catch my breath. Instead, he flew his newly widowed sister-in-law over, claiming she was sweet, docile, and was getting bullied by her extended family back home. He told me to “take good care of her.” Elena hadn’t worked a day in her life. One minute she was complaining that the desert dust made it hard to breathe, the next she was whining about the heat making her dizzy. From that day on, I—the woman who wasn’t even legally married into the family yet—had to bake in the scorching sun at the construction site, only to come back to the barracks and play maid for my future sister-in-law. When the rough local contractors disrespected her for being overly dramatic, I was the one who stood in the doorway, hands on my hips, screaming back at them in their native language to protect her. I thought my sacrifices would earn Carter’s gratitude and devotion. Instead, I got nothing but disgust and betrayal. I let out a bitter, self-deprecating laugh, lowered my hand, and turned to Agent Sterling, who was still waiting for my answer. Mimicking Carter’s exact tone, I said: “No. It’s just me.” Sterling nodded sympathetically. The armored SUV finally broke through the crowds and pulled up right in front of the main terminal. While Sterling went inside to expedite my clearance, I grabbed my bags from the trunk. Before I could take a step, two furious figures blocked my path. Carter’s eyes were ice-cold. “Didn’t I text you? You’re already used to living out here, waiting a little longer won’t kill you. Why are you shamelessly stalking us? Are you trying to guilt-trip me and force me into a difficult choice?” I glanced at the visibly nervous Elena and let out a dry, exasperated laugh. “I never thought you were torn about your choice for a single second.” Carter’s face stiffened, and he guiltily looked away. Elena hurriedly jumped in. “Maya, please don’t misunderstand! Carter only did this because he knows my health is terrible, and I’m not as thick-skinned and resilient as you are. That’s why he decided to take me first. But I completely understand why you’re angry. After all, I’m just a widow—I don’t deserve to have a million dollars spent to save my life. Just let Carter take you. I’ll stay here and wait to join my late husband…” Her performance was flawless—weeping like a fragile flower, acting as if I had inflicted some massive, unbearable injustice upon her. The guilt on Carter’s face instantly evaporated, replaced by blazing anger as he glared at me. “You know perfectly well that Elena is physically weak and can’t handle emotional stress! Did you specifically follow us here just to throw a tantrum and make her cry?!” He spoke as if I were somehow immune to bullets and emotional trauma. Hearing the artillery fire creeping closer, I had zero desire to entangle myself with them any further. I grabbed my suitcase and said coldly: “Since you don’t want to see me, get out of my way. From now on, whether I live or die has absolutely nothing to do with you!” Seeing me turn and walk straight toward the embassy staff who had just registered them, Carter panicked. He grabbed my arm, his eyes filled with utter contempt. “Maya Vance, I never thought five years in this country would turn you into such a toxic, vicious bitch! You’re actually going to the Embassy to report us? Is this because you’re mad I used your half of the salary to buy Elena a ticket?! In your eyes, is money seriously more important than family?!” It hit me then. He was terrified I was going to expose his embezzlement, which could stop them from boarding their flight. Elena instantly caught on to his panic and amplified her performance. Her eyes red, she took off the luxury watch David had given her for their wedding and tried to shove it into my hand. “Maya, I don’t have your luck. I don’t have an amazing man like Carter to protect me. This is the only valuable thing I own—the last thing my husband left me. I’ll use it to pay you back right now. Please, just don’t make things difficult for Carter, okay?” Absolutely disgusted, I slapped her hand away. “If you like spending other people’s blood money, be my guest. But I won’t take yours!” I barely even brushed her arm, but Elena dramatically threw herself onto the tarmac, bursting into pathetic tears. “Maya, please don’t hit me! I know everyone on the construction site calls you the crazy psycho lady! I’m scared!” Hearing the commotion, the surrounding passengers crowded in. A few American expats who recognized us looked at me with blatant disgust. “Isn’t that the notorious shrew from the Sector 4 site? Now she’s assaulting people in public? She’s an embarrassment to Americans everywhere!” “That’s her own sister-in-law, and she actually hit her! People like her deserve to be left behind to let the bombs teach them a lesson!” “Hanging around groups of sweaty male laborers all day, she’s either a complete slut or totally uncultured. How does trash like this even have the nerve to show up at the airport and mingle with people of our class? Just looking at her makes me feel dirty!” I recognized them instantly. They were the same entitled managers from our project site who used to bully Elena, the ones I had screamed at to protect her. But Elena pretended she didn’t know them. She pathetically tugged at Carter’s sleeve. “My future sister-in-law has offended so many people, and with the way she usually treats me… I’m so scared!” Feeling his ego bruised, Carter shoved me violently to the ground. “Look at your own reputation! This just proves that whenever I wasn’t looking, you were bullying Elena! I was completely blind when it came to you! You love money so much? Fine, here! Take it and get the hell back to the barracks! Stop making us sick!” He pulled a few crumpled bills from his pocket and threw them at my face like he was tossing change to a beggar. The sharp edges of the paper sliced across my cheek, leaving several bleeding paper cuts. I never expected that my first physical injury in an active warzone wouldn’t come from enemy shrapnel, but from my own fiancé. I was just about to snap back when an artillery shell slammed into a building just a few miles away. The massive shockwave forced everyone to hit the deck and cover their heads. The embassy staff sprinted off to assess the perimeter breach. In the distance, I saw Agent Sterling waving at me, signaling that my clearance was ready. I didn’t have time to waste on this toxic pair. I stood up, my expression icy. “Don’t worry. I have zero expectations of you taking me anywhere, and I don’t give a damn about your filthy money.” Seeing me nod in Sterling’s direction, Carter’s face turned pitch black. “So this is what it’s all about! To save your own pathetic life, you actually seduced another man?! Did you forget that you’re engaged to ME?!” The crowd around us suddenly looked at me with dawn realization and deep revulsion. “No wonder she had the nerve to show up here. She sold her body for a plane ticket! How is she any different from the cheap hookers in the red-light district?” “Don’t let dirty trash like her onto our commercial flight! It’s disgusting!” “She acted so high and mighty at the construction site, but the second she needs to flee, she throws her dignity in the trash!” Seeing them swarm around to block my path, I raised my voice to defend myself. “I didn’t! I am a Defense Specialist! I have the security clearance to board—” “Stop lying through your teeth!” A resounding, vicious slap trapped the rest of my words in my throat. Carter grabbed me aggressively by the collar. “High-level executives like us had to spend a million dollars on the black market just to secure a civilian seat! You think the United States Government is going to dispatch a dedicated flight to save a construction draftsman?! Do you think we’re all fucking idiots?!” Elena couldn’t hide the smug smirk playing on her lips, but she put on a mask of deep pity. “Maya, even I have my dignity. As weak as I am, I would never stoop to doing something so filthy just to survive. Grabbing a random man to sleep with just to escape? Don’t you think that’s a bit reckless? You haven’t even officially married into our family yet, and you’ve already dragged the Hayes name through the mud. If Mama Hayes knew about this, she’d be rolling in her grave!” Seeing me cornered by the mob from afar, Agent Sterling assumed I was saying goodbye to friends. To help me leave faster, he shouted across the tarmac. “I’m going to finalize the aircraft coordinates! Grab your gear, I’ll come pick you up in a minute!” He jogged off before I could even shout his name. Carter erupted in absolute rage. “The guy you’re fucking just admitted it! What else is there to deny?! Selling yourself to elope, and you have the audacity to call yourself an ‘expert’?! How could you betray everything I’ve done to take care of you over here?!” In his eyes, my face—tanned, weathered, and covered in dust from the harsh desert winds—no longer resembled the soft-spoken, easily blushing scientist he once knew. But if it weren’t for a grown man dropping to his knees, sobbing and begging me because he was terrified a long-distance relationship would cause another man to steal me away… If he hadn’t relentlessly begged me to come to this desolate, arid wasteland… how could I have ever ended up looking like this? I was burning with an uncontrollable fury. I pointed at the scar on my forehead from a falling brick, the burn marks on my hands from cooking for Elena, and the jagged knife scar on my leg from defending her from local thugs. My eyes were bloodshot as I screamed: “THIS is how you took care of me?!” I pulled out my phone and pulled up the urgent email he had sent to corporate that very morning. “Is this how you take care of me?! Leaving me to die in a warzone and dragging another woman to safety?!” His eyes darted nervously, and he turned his face away. “Whatever. Our flight is about to board, and I don’t want to argue anymore. You’re on your own…” Sensing his hesitation, Elena instantly fired up her toxic, tearful routine. “It’s all my fault. Because my husband died early, and my health is so poor, it made Carter pity me. I’ll just die right here! I won’t get in the way of you two reconciling…” She turned and acted like she was going to sprint directly toward the active mortar fire. Carter panicked, yanking her back and pulling her tightly into his arms. When he looked back at me, all the guilt was completely gone. “Elena, the person who deserves to be blown up by artillery fire is this cheating slut!” Holding the trembling, sobbing Elena in his arms, his face turned dark and sinister as he glared at me. “Get on your knees and apologize to Elena right now! If she doesn’t feel emotionally stable, you and your new lover aren’t getting on any plane today!” I was shaking with rage. I grabbed him by the collar of his shirt—which, I noticed, had a faint lipstick stain on it. “She is the one who needs to apologize! Last night, the moment the bombing started, you instantly grabbed her and ran straight for the underground bunker! But you forced ME to run to the office building to salvage the critical project blueprints! Spending the whole night alone together in that bunker listening to the bombs… I’m sure you two found ways to keep yourselves entertained, didn’t you?!” Exposed and humiliated, Carter snapped. He violently shoved me back, knocking me to the ground. “Slandering me is one thing, but how dare you ruin Elena’s innocence?! I sent you to get the blueprints to give you a chance to earn credit! In the end, weren’t you the one commended for it?!” “Really?” I let out a bitter, heartbroken laugh. I pulled up the corporate report he had submitted this morning after seeing me run into the bunker, covered in soot, clutching the crucial documents. At the bottom of the report, under the section detailing the “heroes” who secured the critical assets, the primary name listed was Elena Hayes. “In your eyes… I have to act as her personal maid at home, I have to pave the way for her career at work, and I even have to hand over my fiancé on a silver platter! Who are the ones actually acting without an ounce of shame, sleeping together behind my back?!” Seeing the surrounding crowd begin to look at him with suspicion, cold sweat beaded on Carter’s forehead. He knew that if his illicit affair with his sister-in-law reached corporate HR, even if he survived and made it back to the States, he would be fired and blacklisted. He crouched down, his face twisting into an ugly sneer, and gripped my jaw fiercely. “I’ll say this one last time. Stay here and be a good girl! Stop fighting with Elena! Once I get back to the States and get hailed as a corporate hero, I will personally arrange to bring you home. If you keep making a scene and we all go down together, you won’t survive this either!” “Who the hell needs you to bring me anywhere?” Having finalized the flight coordinates, Agent Sterling rushed back over, furious. He violently shoved Carter away. “We are here on classified orders to extract a top-tier US asset! If you disrespect her again, you’re going to end up in a federal black site!” Seeing Sterling, Carter’s rage exploded. He sneered at him. “Still trying to use these pathetic excuses to cover up your affair?! Do I really need to remind everyone what kind of cheap trash she actually is?” The crowd, finally shifting their attention to Sterling, chimed in with relentless mockery. “Everyone here knows she’s just a construction site draftsman. Did she suddenly become a ‘top-tier asset’ in your bed?” “This so-called ‘expert’ probably bought her plane ticket while she was on her back!” “With the war raging outside, how many nights did she have to service you for a single seat?” Sterling was left utterly speechless by their vile ignorance. He quickly pulled out his federal credentials. “Are you people insane? I represent the US State Department, and I am here to extract Dr. Vance! How dare you slander a federal operation?!” The next second, an angry mob member snatched his badge without even looking at it and tore it to shreds. “Trying to impersonate a federal agent to protect this whore?! You’re an embarrassment to our country!” Furious, Sterling reached for his satellite phone to call for tactical support, but Carter slapped it out of his hand, smashing it against the concrete. “Degenerate scum like you two don’t deserve to sit on our civilian evacuation flight!” Suddenly, another mortar shell shrieked through the air, detonating incredibly close to our position. Carter instantly shoved me—the person closest to him—aside, throwing his body over Elena to shield her. Caught completely off guard by his violent shove, I had no time to find cover. I was hit by the blast wave and thrown heavily onto the jagged asphalt. As the dust settled and people began scrambling frantically toward the commercial airliners, Carter staggered to his feet, pulling Elena up with him. As he walked past me—bleeding profusely from the impact—he hesitated for a split second, before finally crouching down next to me. I thought his conscience had finally kicked in. I reached out and grabbed the hem of his pants. “Get a medic… hurry…” But instead of helping me, he pried my bleeding fingers off his leg, one by one. He picked up my scattered passport and ID from the ground and tossed them directly into a nearby debris fire ignited by the mortar shell. He let out a heavy sigh. “Maya, I’m sorry. If you keep these documents today, you will forever be a threat to Elena’s safety. I’ve already taken care of you enough since we were kids, but Elena was never as lucky as you. As for the wedding… I’ll make it up to you in the next life.” Agent Sterling, who had only suffered minor scrapes from the blast, saw the horrific state I was in. His eyes went red with sheer fury. He lunged forward and grabbed Carter, who was about to run away. “Help me carry her to our plane! Right now! If you save her, I guarantee you can fly out with us! Otherwise, once the military lockdown initiates, none of you are leaving this airport!” Carter violently shook him off. “Still trying to scam me?! Spit! We paid a million dollars for commercial tickets! I’d like to see who’s going to stop us from leaving!”

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My Best Friend Reported My Reselling Business for Tax Evasion; After the Customs Audit, Her Store Was Shut Down First. When the agents from Customs and Border Protection knocked on my door, I was in the middle of packing a box of SK-II Facial Treatment Essence for a client. Eight people. Six in uniform, two in plain clothes holding folders. The lead agent took one look at my hundred-square-foot warehouse and frowned. “Maya Brooks? We received a report alleging that you are evading import duties and taxes on your personal shopping business. Please cooperate with our investigation.” I froze. In my three years of running this import reselling business, I hadn’t missed a single invoice or declaration. Every order’s import record, duty payment certificate, and bank statement was filed away monthly, stacked neatly into fourteen distinct binders. It took me half an hour to haul every single binder out. The lead agent flipped through a few pages, his expression shifting subtly. He glanced at me and lowered his voice. “The information in the tip-off report was incredibly detailed. It even listed your exact flight numbers for your weekly sourcing trips to the airport.” A cold shiver ran down my spine. Whoever could write a report like that had to know me inside and out. And my specific sourcing routes, supply channels, and client lists had only ever been shared with one person. My best friend of ten years, Stella Montgomery. The agents began to inventory the goods in my warehouse, documenting them piece by piece. Six cases of Japanese and Korean skincare, four cases of supplements, two cases of premium baby products. For every single item, I produced a corresponding purchase receipt, an entry declaration form, and proof of duty payment. I leaned against the wall, watching them rummage through my life. My heart was beating so fast it felt like it would leap out of my throat. But I knew my books were perfectly clean. Three years ago, when I first got into this industry, I paid $500 for a cross-border e-commerce tax compliance course. I still remember the first thing the instructor said: “As a reseller, you shouldn’t fear running out of clients. You should fear an audit your books can’t survive.” From that day on, I bought a small fireproof safe specifically to store my duty payment certificates. Every payment, every customs document—I photographed them for digital archives, and locked the hard copies in the safe. Other resellers in my circle laughed at me. “You’re not running a massive corporation, why are you being so dramatic and official?” I never bothered explaining. I just kept doing my thing. “What was the total declared value for this specific shipment?” the lead agent asked. “$12,342.60. The corresponding tax documents are in the seventh binder, under the blue tab.” He opened it, cross-referenced the numbers, and stayed silent. A younger agent next to him couldn’t help but shoot me a look. I read his expression clearly—making a mountain out of a molehill. But a federal report was a report. The protocol had to be followed. “Have you received any inventory from unknown sources within the last month?” “No. I only source and sell my own inventory. I don’t drop-ship or handle other people’s goods.” I paused. “However…” “However what?” “Last month, my best friend borrowed my corporate courier account to ship three batches of goods. She said her own account had hit its volume limit.” I unlocked my phone, pulled up the direct messages, and handed it over. “This is the conversation when she asked to borrow my account. I explicitly told her she had to generate her own labels and fill out the customs declarations herself. I didn’t handle the shipments.” The lead agent took the phone and scrutinized the messages. “What is your best friend’s name?” “Stella Montgomery.” Saying her name made my throat tighten. Ten years. High school seatmates, college roommates, and after graduation, we both fell into this reselling industry together. She ran a much bigger operation than I did. I stuck to the legal, tedious channels. My profit margins were thin, my client base small but stable. She played fast and loose. Just last month, she was flaunting a brand-new BMW X3 on her Ins feed. I had never asked questions. The agent took photos of my chat logs and spent another half hour flipping through the binders. Right before leaving, the lead agent turned back to look at me. “Maya, let me give you a heads-up. There are details in that tip-off letter that a random outsider wouldn’t know. Your exact landed costs, your profit margins, and even the exact location of your safe.” “Think about it. Who possesses that information?” After the door closed, I stood alone in the warehouse. The SK-II was still sitting on the packing table, the shipping bag unsealed. The location of my safe. I had only ever brought one person to this warehouse. The day Stella came over to help me move boxes, I had personally made her a cup of fresh-ground coffee right here. I didn’t sleep that night. I tossed and turned, desperately trying to convince myself there was a mistake. Maybe it was someone else? Maybe it was a jealous competitor? But flight numbers, landed costs, and the safe’s location—the only intersection of those three data points was Stella. At 2:00 AM, I opened her Ins profile. Her latest story was posted six hours ago: eating an omakase dinner at a high-end sushi bar, with the caption, “Treating myself after a long day of grinding.” In the photo, her makeup was flawless. Across from her sat a man, only his cuff visible. I recognized that navy blue Hugo Boss shirt. It was her boyfriend’s. I scrolled further down her feed. Three days ago: “Ladies, clearing out top-tier Japanese beauty brands! SK-II Miracle Water marked down by $60! DM me ASAP!” The accompanying photo grid showed a table completely overflowing with high-end skincare. I stared at that image and zoomed all the way in. In the bottom right corner of the fifth photo, a tiny corner of a cardboard box was visible. Pasted on that box was a label bearing my corporate courier account details. I recognized the tracking number format. It was the batch she had borrowed my account to ship last month. I put my phone down and stared at the ceiling. My mind was chaotic, but one thing suddenly became terrifyingly clear: The goods she shipped through my account and the goods I declared myself went through the exact same customs audit channel. If there was an issue with her shipment, the one who would get audited and penalized was me. This was no coincidence. At 9:00 AM the next morning, Stella called me. “Maya! I heard you got raided by Customs? What’s going on?!” Her voice was thick with surprise and concern. If I hadn’t made those discoveries last night, I would have believed her completely. “It’s no big deal. Just a routine check.” “I knew it! You’re so meticulous, how could there be an issue? Do you want me to ask around for you? I know a guy at a customs brokerage—” “No need.” “Hey, don’t just tough it out. A Customs audit is no joke. If your inventory gets seized, what about your clients? If you need, I can cover your urgent orders from my stock for now.” I gripped my phone, my nails digging hard into my palm. I had only told my mother about the audit. “Stella, how did you know I was being audited?” The line went silent for two seconds. “Ah… didn’t you post a story on Ins yesterday? Saying the warehouse was temporarily closed for shipping—” “I put that story on a Close Friends list. Only my clients could see it.” Another two seconds of silence. “Maybe… a client screenshotted it and sent it to me? I don’t really remember.” “Oh. Okay then.” I hung up the phone. My palm was slick with sweat. She was lying. And it wasn’t the first time. I opened my laptop and pulled up every record of our cooperation over the last three years—how many times she borrowed my account, which goods she handled, the declared amounts, and whether there were customs forms. Customs wasn’t the only one who needed to conduct an audit. For the next week, I did absolutely nothing on the surface. I replied to client messages as usual, and met Stella for boba tea as usual. But every night when I got home, I started organizing. Over the last three years, she had borrowed my account to ship seven batches of goods. The first four batches had records; the amounts weren’t large, the biggest being maybe $1,800. But the last three were different. Those three were shipped in a concentrated burst between last October and this January. I couldn’t find the declared amounts for those batches. Because at the time, she had told me, “I’ll fill out the customs declaration forms myself, I don’t want to trouble you with the paperwork.” Back then, I thought she was being considerate. Now, I knew she was being deliberate. Wednesday lunch. I asked her to meet me at the mall for food. She was wearing a camel-hair Max Mara coat. I recognized it—it retails for about $3,800 on the official website, and she had flaunted it on her Ins last month. “Maya, why have you lost so much weight? Is the Customs stuff crushing you?” “I’m managing. My books are clean, anyway.” “That’s a relief.” She picked up a piece of sashimi with her chopsticks. “By the way, your client, Mrs. Thornton—the one who buys three sets of Sulwhasoo every month—has she contacted you lately?” My heart sank. “How do you know that?” “She came to me last week and bought them. Said she heard you were under investigation and was too scared to get stock from you.” Stella bit her chopstick and smiled. “Don’t worry, once your situation blows over, I’ll give her back to you.” Give her back. As if my clients were property she had just borrowed. “Besides Mrs. Thornton, who else has contacted you?” “Just… a few. Some people are just terrified of being implicated, it’s normal.” She was looking down, scrolling on her phone, and didn’t see my hand trembling around my chopsticks. When I got home, I went through my client list and messaged them to confirm their status, one by one. The results turned my entire body to ice. Out of the sixty-seven stable clients I had accumulated over three years, twenty-three were gone. Nineteen of them had transitioned to Stella. It wasn’t because they were afraid of my audit. It was because Stella had proactively contacted them, saying, “I don’t think Maya is going to clear this Customs hurdle, you shouldn’t wait around. Come over to me, my prices are lower anyway.” A client named Jenna sent me a screenshot of their direct messages. The last line Stella sent her was: “Rest assured, just stick with me. She’ll never know.” I put my phone down. There was no anger, just an unspeakable, numbing chill that spread from my spine all the way to the top of my head. Ten years. A ten-year friendship was apparently worth exactly nineteen clients. No, maybe it was worth more. Maybe from the very beginning, every step of this friendship was just her maneuvering closer to my client list. I started rewinding the tape in my head. Every event that had seemed completely normal back then now had a different flavor. Freshman year of college, she said her family was struggling financially. I helped her get a side gig running errands for an import business. Junior year summer, she said she wanted to learn the reselling ropes. I gave her my entire six-month archive of Japanese pharmacy lists, trending item price sheets, and shipping company comparisons. After graduation, I took her to Tokyo three times, personally introducing her to all my supply channels. I even fronted the money for her first solo buying trip to Japan. $500. She said she’d pay me back next month, but she never did. And I never chased her for it. Later, she scaled up. She rented proper office space to use as a warehouse, hired two girls to help with packing and shipping, and incorporated her business. I was genuinely happy for her. Sometimes when we video-chatted at night, she’d be working overtime in her fancy office, backed by a literal wall of inventory shelves. Meanwhile, I’d be on the balcony of my small apartment, slapping shipping labels onto six cardboard boxes. She would say, “Maya, why are you still playing so small? Come join my company, I’ll help you scale up.” Every time, I’d smile and politely decline. I was used to doing things my way. My books were clear, and my conscience was peaceful. But while her mouth said “help me scale up,” her hands were busy poaching my clients. I drafted a timeline. Last July: I tell her Mrs. Thornton orders three sets of Sulwhasoo religiously every month. Last August: Mrs. Thornton makes her first purchase from Stella. Last September: Stella borrows my corporate courier account to ship her first batch of goods. Last October to this January: Concentrated borrowing of my account to ship three massive batches. This February: Someone files a federal report alleging I am evading taxes. The timeline was entirely too perfect. She first poached my clients to build a baseline, then used my account to funnel goods that were likely illegal, and finally delivered the kill shot with a tip-off letter. If Customs found issues with the goods shipped through my account, they would hold me accountable. If my business was destroyed by the investigation, my remaining clients would have no choice but to go to her. Three birds, one stone. I sat in front of my computer, hands resting on the keyboard, not moving for a very long time. Outside the window, the sky was dreary and grey. It was about to rain. I didn’t cry. I just felt tired. The kind of exhaustion that seeps out from the marrow of your bones. The Customs investigation continued. I was required to remain available to provide supplementary materials, but they hadn’t seized my inventory. When Agent Miller called to inform me of this, his tone was entirely flat.

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Before I translated this story, I knew it needed to breathe the air of a different place. The heart of the narrative—a toxic family dynamic, the crushing weight of a parent’s addiction, and the struggle for self-preservation—is universal. However, the textures, the settings, and the expressions had to become authentically American. My goal was to maintain the original emotional arc and the specific structure of the short story while making it feel as though it were written here, for us. Names have been changed. Cultural markers, like the specific mechanisms of gambling debt or social pressure, have been localized. But the raw pain, and ultimate hope, remain. Chapter 1 I didn’t cry when my mother asked me for money for the first time. I didn’t cry when she showed up at my workplace, causing a scene and making sure everyone from HR to the mailroom knew my father was a gambling addict. I didn’t cry when she stole my debit card and drained five years of my savings—every penny I had—to pay off my father’s latest debts to some shadowy bookie. I didn’t cry when she secretly went behind my back to ask my boyfriend for cash, leading to weeks of his family bombarding my phone with angry, accusatory texts and calls. But when she told me she was finally planning to get a divorce, I cried. I laughed until I cried. “Elena,” I said, using her first name because ‘Mom’ felt like a lie, “that is hands-down the funniest joke I’ve heard all year.” … Before terms like “codependent” or “toxic enabler” became common, I just thought my mom was the most devoted wife on the planet. It didn’t matter how badly my dad yelled at her or belittled her the night before; the next morning, she’d be up at six, making him coffee just the way he liked it, smoothing out the collar of his shirt before he left for work. Then, the moment the front door clicked shut, she’d lean against the kitchen counter, wiping her eyes, whispering to no one about how miserable her life was. When I was little, my dad ran an import business that kept him on the road, hardly ever home. Our house was always quiet, except for the sound of my mother’s muffled sobbing. She’d say he was heartless for abandoning us, that she’d moved all this way to be with him and had never known a day of happiness. My tiny heart ached for her. I decided my dad was the villain, the boogeyman. Whenever he actually came home, I’d hide in my room, ignoring him no matter how loud he called my name. The consequence? My mother would spank me, screaming that I was an “ungrateful brat.” She’d tell me my father worked so hard for us, and if I couldn’t say anything nice, I should at least be respectful. “Useless child,” she’d hiss, cutting me a glare while pouring him a glass of water. Later, when the import business went under, he came home and got a regular job at a local warehouse. But my mother’s complaints didn’t stop. The house was always full of his friends and relatives. My mom ran herself ragged cooking and cleaning for them, while my dad just sat, drank beer, and bragged. Everyone praised her. “What a great wife,” they’d say. “So capable, so hardworking.” The praise only made my father more arrogant. He’d drink more heavily, food and beer spilling onto the carpet. After the guests finally left, my mom would clean up the mess, cursing under her breath the whole time, her hands never stopping. My dad, meanwhile, would be passed out on the living room recliner. I asked her once, “Why doesn’t Dad just take everyone out to a restaurant? This is too hard on you.” She snapped back that money didn’t grow on trees, and asked if I was the one who wanted to go out, accusing me of not caring about the family’s budget. “I’m worried about you!” I shot back, furious. But she just looked annoyed. “You’re just like your father. All talk. Who knows what you’re really thinking.” I tried to help her clean, but she shoved me away, saying I’d only get in the way. Later, when my dad woke up from his nap, I heard her telling him, “Your daughter says you’re cheap. Thinks you’re too stingy to take people out to dinner.” My father erupted, roaring at my bedroom door. “You disrespectful little shit! My business is none of your concern!” By the time I was in high school, the fighting was constant. Often it would last past midnight, only stopping when the neighbors threatened to call the cops. I couldn’t sleep through it. I was always exhausted in class, leading to a humiliating public reprimand from a teacher during a parent-teacher conference. When we got home, they started fighting about that. I finally yelled, “Can’t you two just get a divorce? It would be better for everyone!” My dad slapped me, hard across the face. My mother just wept. “If it wasn’t for you, we would have divorced a long time ago.” “You ungrateful child,” my father added. “We’ve sacrificed everything for you, and now you want to break up this family?” A few days later, they were back to acting like newlyweds. And I was the villain who had tried to tear them apart. Growing up, it didn’t matter how much my mom complained about my dad to me; she could never leave him. And whenever I tried to take her side, to pointing out what my dad was doing wrong, she’d immediately turn on me. “Apologize to your father. He’s still your father!” “How can you speak to him like that? He’s your father!” “This is between us, you stay out of it.” I heard it so many times I became numb to it. The words formed a callous over my heart. My mother didn’t love me. She only loved my father. That’s why she willingly walked into the fire, knowing it was a trap. That’s why, no matter how much she suffered or complained, she’d never let anyone speak a bad word about him. That’s why she didn’t care about anything I did for her, easily stealing my life savings. That’s why she was willing to embarrass me in front of my colleagues and my boyfriend, just to get money for his gambling debts. Chapter 2 The summer after high school graduation, my dad vanished. He took every dime the family had saved and drove south, starting a new life with his mistress. My mom tried to throw herself out a window several times; I had to drag her back inside. She beat me with her fists, screaming and crying that it was all my fault. She blamed me for everything. If I had been more obedient, if I had been more successful… Their marriage wouldn’t have ended. It was like I was the villain in a movie, the one who broke up the star-crossed lovers. My grandparents took over caring for my broken mother, and I dragged my suitcase alone onto a Greyhound bus, heading north for college. There was no money for tuition or housing. Every spare moment I had was spent working. I got a job tutoring a middle school kid. One night, the family asked me to stay for dinner. Watching the three of them at the table, talking and laughing, I had to force the delicious food down my throat past the bitterness. I felt like a sewer rat, spying on other people’s happiness. When I went home for winter break my freshman year, I discovered my dad had been back for six months. He’d developed a serious gambling problem down south, been swindled out of all his money by the mistress, and only made it back home after a sympathetic old friend gave him a ride. My mom told me this as if it were nothing, completely ignoring the way my face was turning purple with rage. “So, you’re just going to take this piece of trash back? He didn’t want you! He only came back because he had nowhere else to go!” “How dare you talk about your father like that? He’s turning over a new leaf! He made a mistake! Not like you, still standing there with your cold, heartless attitude.” She felt that as long as he came home, it meant he still loved her. She even said, “All men are like this. Your father isn’t so bad compared to some. The guy you find will probably be worse.” “Children don’t stay forever. Your father is the only one who will be with me until the end.” I never asked her why she never sent me money. She never asked me how I was paying for college. It was like we both just accepted it as the natural order of things. I accepted that she would never give me money. She accepted that I was an adult now, and responsible for myself. After I went back to school, I rarely visited. My life was consumed by part-time jobs and studying. There was no time for the fun, carefree college experience I was supposed to be having. When I went back for Thanksgiving senior year, she accused me of being cold-blooded in front of all the relatives. “He gets out into the world and completely forgets his parents. Doesn’t even call. Then he comes back here and just eats, eats, eats. He’s like a bill collector coming to collect a debt.” My aunts and cousins chimed in. “You’re an adult now, you need to grow up. Family comes first. Your parents worked hard to raise you; you need to show some gratitude.” I listened to their accusations in silence, the rare holiday break already ruined. A fleeting, regretful thought crossed my mind: I should have stayed at school and worked the holiday shift. Triple pay. After graduation, I stayed up north, found a job, worked myself to the bone, pulling shifts until 2 AM, hoping to get hired permanently. Apartments near the city were too expensive. To save money, I rented a damp garden-level studio. Sleeping in that cold, dark room, I made a silent vow to work even harder, to someday have a real home of my own in this city. Not long after, my mother called. She was beat around the bush, asking about my salary, saying she wanted to come visit. Under my repeated questioning, she finally admitted the truth. Dad was gambling again. He’d lost all the money and came home drunk and beat her. “My sweet daughter, send your mother some money. I think my arm is broken. The pain is so bad I can’t even make dinner.” Chapter 3 I took two days off and caught the next flight home. In the taxi on the way from the airport, I called 911. When I knocked on the door, my mother’s left eye was bloodshot, a massive bruise forming on her cheek. Her arm was twisted at a grotesque, broken angle. The moment she saw me, she burst into tears and begged me to take her to the hospital. I said, “Not yet. We’re waiting for the police.” I saw the look in her eyes shift from fear to panic, then anger. “Who told you to call the police? Do you want to send your own father to jail?” She flailed her good arm, hitting her own leg. “Oh, what have I done to deserve this? I should never have called you.” “Get on the phone. Right now. Call the police back. Tell them everything is fine, you made a mistake, that we don’t need them. Do it now!” Before she could finish, there was a knock on the door. Despite my mother’s repeated insistence that she had fallen, based on my explanation and the clear evidence, the police took my father away. They found him in a back room of a local bar, sitting at a poker table. The whole place was shut down. While we were at the hospital getting her arm set, my mother didn’t care who was listening. She screamed at me, calling me heartless. I didn’t argue. Those words still felt like needles pricking my chest, but I decided she was just in shock. She’d relied on this man her entire life, obsessed with the idea of a complete family unit. For the sake of that complete family, she could forgive his laziness, even his affair. But when his fist actually connected with her body… I honestly didn’t believe she could forgive that. But I still underestimated my mother’s toxic enmeshment. Even with her arm in a cast, she dragged herself out to bring him a blanket and home-cooked meals while he was in holding, terrified he was cold and hungry. She said everything she could to the police, begging them to release him early. The police were fed up with her, too. They held him for three days and then let him go. I didn’t see him. I only had two days off. Once I got my mother from the hospital, I left. The day he was released, my mother called. She spewed the most vile, hateful insults at me. I knew she was doing it for him, right in front of him. She felt her husband had been wronged, and she needed a visible way to get revenge for him. Before hanging up, I said softly, “Mom, don’t ask me for money again.” She paused, then her voice became even sharper. “We raised you for nothing. Other kids start working and know they need to send money home to their parents. And you?” “Giving your own parents a little money is like pulling teeth for you. You don’t care if your mother lives or dies. And you called the police! You embarrassed us so badly, how are we supposed to show our faces around here? All your life, all you’ve ever done is cause trouble…” I couldn’t listen anymore. I hung up. It was true, I had never sent money home. But when I was in college, no one sent me money, either. I did care if she lived or dies, but since she didn’t seem to care about her own life, I had to respect her choice. But what I never expected was that, for his sake, for that illusion of love she’d conjured, she would actually destroy her own daughter. Chapter 4 Back at work, I blocked my mother’s number. Two months later, I saw her standing outside my office building. Ignoring the rush of morning commuters, she burst into tears and lunged for me, begging for money. “Daughter, you have to help us. Your father… he went gambling again… and this time he owes some very dangerous people. They showed up at the house!” “They said we have one week to pay it all back, or they’re going to… they’re going to chop off your father’s fingers!” This was the day of my final review, the one that would determine if I got hired permanently. My Sun exploded with shame as colleagues gave me strange looks. I dragged my mother to a secluded corner, pleading with her that she needed to get a divorce, not keep paying off a gambler’s debts. “Mom, I just started this job. I don’t have that kind of money. What kind of life is this? We can’t keep doing this with a gambler. When are you going to wake up?” She wiped her eyes. “But he’s still your father. I’ll go home and talk to him, try to talk some sense into him. You can’t just stand by and watch him… watch him get his fingers chopped off!” Seeing her still only worried about him, the rage boiling inside me erupted. I screamed that she was delusional, that dad only got this far because she had enabled him every step of the way. But looking at the wrinkles on her face and the worn-out patches on her coat, I ultimately couldn’t do it. I ordered her a Lyft, told her to go to my apartment and wait, and that we’d figure something out when I got off work. I never imagined that by the time I got off work, having bought groceries to make her some soup, she would be gone. And she’d stolen my debit card. That card held every penny I had saved, from my student jobs to my current position. Six thousand dollars. My entire life savings. I sprinted to the nearest ATM. The money was gone. My PIN was my birthday. I wanted to ask her, so badly: when she had me, was it to build a warm family, or just to have someone she could push all her problems onto? When I was little, I was her emotional garbage can, a tool to manage her relationship with her husband. And now that I was an adult, I was just her ATM. I slumped down in front of the ATM, useless. My phone buzzed. It was a text from my mother, using someone else’s phone. “Your father’s fingers are safe. You were good for something after all.” I could only offer a bitter laugh. Given the choice between me and my father, she would always choose him. My work app chimed. My manager had seen the scene that morning. Despite a perfect final presentation, I wasn’t getting hired permanently. In a single day, I lost my savings, my job, and my will to live. Dragging my heavy feet, staring at the endless stream of city traffic, I wondered if I could just let go. Could I finally escape this toxic family, never be used again? I closed my eyes and started to step out into the middle of the street, my Sun full of despair, wanting only an end. Just before a speeding car could hit me, someone grabbed my arm. Looking at him, sweating and panting, I realized someone had run three blocks just to save my life. His name was Ethan. We were in college together; I later found out he’d had a crush on me back then. Like a lost ship spotting a lighthouse in the dark, we fell together. His parents had retired to Arizona, his sister was a successful local entrepreneur, and he’d landed a job at a major tech company. I often felt like I didn’t deserve him. But he always said that when he saw me that day, huddled in a little ball, his heart had physically wrenched in his chest. Surrounded by his love, I couldn’t help but start to fantasize about the warm home we would build, a family that was completely different from the one I had known. But that beautiful dream bubble burst with a single phone call from his sister. I heard her say, “You need to handle your girlfriend. Tell her mother to stop asking my brother for money. One more time, and I am calling the police and reporting them for fraud! Don’t you dare think you can marry into our family by using my brother’s feelings. We aren’t trash like your family. Get out!” A bone-chilling cold invaded my core. For the first time, I felt an overpowering, towering hatred for my parents. I hated them for endlessly draining me, for being like ghosts that never left, and for even going behind my back to ask Ethan for money. If this was my fate, fine. I’d accept it. But Ethan was too good. He was like warm sunshine, shining light on my cold, gray corpse. He hadn’t even mentioned that my mother was asking him for money. I couldn’t drag him down with me. His sister was right. A trash family like mine didn’t deserve them. I packed my things and moved out of Ethan’s apartment. I sent him a text breaking up with him and blocked his number. But he found me almost immediately. With tears streaming down my face, I said I could write him an IOU, that I would pay back whatever money my mother owed him, and to please just give me some time. While I was saying I was sorry, he pulled me into a crushing hug. I could feel his hands trembling through my clothes. “Don’t apologize,” his voice came, muffled against my shoulder. “You didn’t do anything wrong.” “Ethan, my family situation… I don’t want to drag you down. We aren’t right for each other.” “Trust me to help you handle this. Please, just let me help you. Okay?” “I don’t want to see you suffer anymore. You’ve had it so hard. You deserve a happy life.” Do I deserve that? I choked, unable to speak. No one had ever said that to me before. All my life, I had been blamed. My mom always said that if it wasn’t for me, dad wouldn’t have been like that, that she would have been happier. Having heard it enough, I truly believed I was the family’s curse. Now that I was an adult, the weight of this toxic family had crushed me. A peaceful life was a far-off dream, and I didn’t dare ask for happiness, or for someone to help me. It turns out I didn’t do anything wrong. They did. Ethan helped me pack my things that day. I left the cramped, moldy studio I had rented and moved back to our little home. In that dry, comfortable bed, in Ethan’s warm, broad embrace, I had the deepest sleep of my entire life. The next time my mother called Ethan for money, I took the phone. When she heard my voice, my mother paused, her tone sounding guilty. “Daughter, you have better luck than your mother. You found a good man. Help your mother one more time. I promise, your father won’t gamble again! I… I’m getting a divorce from him right away.” When I heard that, I gave a soft chuckle. “Mom, Ethan isn’t giving you another dime. You and dad are on your own. Believing a gambler like you… I’d have better luck believing a stop sign could talk.”

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On the live trivia game show, the host asked my mom: “What is one plus one?” Without a second of hesitation, my mom answered: “Three.” Everyone in the studio froze. To scrape together the astronomical cost of my life-saving surgery, my family had gone on this show. As long as they answered ten questions correctly, they would win a five-million-dollar grand prize. After agonizingly fighting their way through nine difficult questions, the host, acting out of sheer pity, tossed them an absolute softball. This prize money was my only lifeline. But my mother, a woman with a PhD in Mathematics, deliberately answered it wrong. …… I lurched upward in my hospital bed, a dull, suffocating pain blooming in my chest. On the screen, the host recovered instantly, snapping on a professional smile: “Dr. Lillian Evans is a math PhD. Perhaps in some advanced, theoretical realm of mathematics we haven’t discovered yet, one plus one can equal three.” “However, the question I just asked is incredibly simple. You only need to use the logic of a first-grader!” But my mom just blinked, her voice unyielding: “One plus one equals three.” The host’s smile began to crack. My older brother, Caleb, thrust two fingers into the air, waving them frantically in front of my mom’s face. “Mom! We just need to get this last question right, and we’ll get the money for Chloe’s surgery!” “This is not the time to make jokes!” My dad was sweating bullets. “Honey, did you mishear the question? Did it just come out wrong by accident?” But no matter how hard my dad and brother pleaded, my mom held her ground, insisting—”One plus one is three.” The live audience erupted. “Is this mother insane?” “This has to be scripted! What kind of real mother wants her own kid to die?” Each question had a ten-minute time limit. Seeing the countdown ticking away, I begged the nurse to help me make a video call to the show’s production team. They connected me immediately. My pale, wasted face was projected onto the giant screen inside the studio. A collective gasp went through the crowd. The host’s eyes brimmed with genuine sorrow. At sixteen, I had suddenly been diagnosed with a malignant cardiac tumor. I was in mortal danger every single second of the day. The only hope I had left to live was that prize money. The host was vibrating with anxiety, looking like an ant on a hot pan: “There are only three minutes left on the clock.” “If you answer incorrectly, all of your family’s hard work will be for nothing!” To get on this show, my entire family had stayed up all night for three months, memorizing endless trivia databases. They had done the impossible and gotten nine questions right, only for my mom to start spouting nonsense on the tenth. I spoke into the camera, my voice trembling: “Mom, the prize is five million. My treatment only costs three million.” “I won’t take a single cent of the rest of the money!” “And as soon as I recover, I promise I’ll work so hard to make money, and I’ll give you my entire paycheck to take care of you!” The audience was weeping. Even Mom’s eyes welled up with tears. With ten seconds left on the clock, Mom raised her hand to indicate she wanted to change her answer. I finally let out a breath of relief. Maybe she was just playing a cruel joke on everyone. “I’m sorry, I misspoke earlier.” “One plus one… should equal…” I held my breath. Mom scanned the room, and suddenly, a small smile played on her lips. “One plus one equals one!” The countdown hit zero. The $5,000,000 on the giant screen instantly reset to zero! Chapter 2 Right then, Mom said in a slow, casual voice: “Oh, I’m sorry. I was careless. I meant to say two.” But the timer was done. My surgery money was gone. A violent throb of pain ripped through my chest. The world in front of me started to go black. Caleb lost control, screaming at the top of his lungs: “Mom! What the hell are you doing?!” “Chloe is going to die!” Mom just calmly pointed a finger at the giant screen: “Look. See how much pain Chloe is in?” “You know she’s in pain and you still got it wrong on purpose?!” Caleb’s eyes were bloodshot. “You knew if you answered it right, she would live!” “This is all your fault…” My mom’s voice suddenly spiked: “My fault? I didn’t do it on purpose!” “Of course I know one plus one is two, I was just careless with my answer!” Careless? My eyes widened in shock. How could anyone be careless about one plus one? Mom knew perfectly well that if we didn’t get that money, I would die immediately. Why would she… Amidst the crowd’s shock and fury, my mother cocked her head, turning to look at Caleb. “Caleb, do you remember your prep school entrance exam? You lost five whole points because you wrote down that one plus one equals three.” “Because of those five points, you didn’t get into the elite middle school.” “When I disciplined you, you had the nerve to talk back. You said you were just being ‘careless,’ and that you’d just pay more attention next time.” “Well, today, I’m showing you exactly what the consequences of a moment of ‘carelessness’ can be!” Mom pointed back at the big screen: “Look closely. Burn Chloe’s sweating, agonizing face into your memory.” “This is the consequence of being careless!” “Today, I am using your sister’s suffering to teach you a lesson!” The entire studio went nuclear. I stared at the screen, utterly dumbfounded. Caleb is a junior in college now! She had held onto that grudge from his middle school exams all this time just to do this?! Dad went berserk: “Do you realize Chloe is about to die?!” “If you want to teach Caleb a lesson, couldn’t you pick literally any other time or place?!” My mom just huffed, looking annoyed: “Doctors always exaggerate. Chloe is young; she can hold on much longer than other people.” “Caleb’s sloppy, careless habits needed to be cured a long time ago! Gentle lecturing didn’t work, so I am giving him a lesson carved into his very bones so he’ll never forget it!” I could barely breathe. The nurse gripped my hands tightly, her eyes filled with profound pity. Dad roared, lunging forward like he was going to tackle Mom. My mom just raised a hand to stop him. “What’s the rush?” “Doesn’t the show have a Bonus Lightning Round?” “As long as we get the next question right, we might not get the five million, but we still get a guaranteed three million dollars!” “That’s more than enough for Chloe’s surgery!” Under the host’s frantic mediation, Dad and Caleb finally managed to calm down. Mom looked at the screen, her gaze softening artificially. “Chloe, just hang on a little longer.” “Mommy just wanted to take this opportunity to educate your brother.” “The next question, Mommy will definitely get right!” I bit down on my lip so hard I tasted blood, fighting back tears. “Mom… I know you love me… but for this next question… can Dad or Caleb answer it, please?” Mom’s expression froze. Dad and Caleb, terrified that Mom would pull another stunt, immediately agreed with my suggestion. But it was too late. In the previous rounds, they had already used up all their personal answering slots. Mom was the only one allowed to take the stage. This final question held my life in the balance. The studio was dead silent. Sweat poured down the host’s face. He flipped frantically through the database, finally settling on the absolute easiest question he could find. “Lillian Evans, what date is your birthday?” “You can just say the month and day.” I let out a breath of relief, looking at the host with eyes full of immense gratitude. Mom didn’t hesitate to press the buzzer. But she said: “Host, I would like to use my ‘Phone a Friend’ lifeline!” Chapter 3 The audience gasped. How could anyone not remember their own birthday? A sickening panic settled in my stomach. Since I got sick, Mom’s hair had gotten grayer and grayer. I had heard that if middle-aged people were under chronic stress for too long, it could trigger early-onset dementia. Was Mom’s health actually failing her this badly? Tears blurred my vision. My hands were shaking. Mom chose Dad as her lifeline. Dad looked completely exhausted and exasperated: “Your birthday is January 8th.” Mom nodded and hovered her hand over the buzzer again. But she was suddenly stopped by a visibly tense Caleb. “Mom, did you hear him clearly?” “What date is it? Repeat it back to me!” Under Caleb’s intense insistence, Mom repeated “January 8th” three times before she was allowed to press the button. But Mom didn’t speak. I could see her tension. Fighting through the agonizing pain in my heart, I forced myself to comfort her: “Don’t be scared, Mom. Just answer this one last question, and it’s all over.” Mom smiled at me. But the answer that came out of her mouth plunged me into an abyss of ice. “My birthday is… January 9th!” The air instantly solidified. The host tried to save it immediately: “Your husband stated your birthday is January 8th.” “Lillian, you must have misspoken. Please, say it one more time!” But Mom’s gaze was unyielding: “I didn’t misspeak. I said it wrong on purpose.” The audience exploded into chaos. My heart ached so badly I couldn’t sit up straight. The nurse reached out to cut the video feed, but I stopped her. “Mom… why did you get it wrong on purpose again?” I choked out, my voice shivering. Mom’s eyes were full of tears, but her tone was that of a deeply aggrieved victim: “It’s all your father’s fault!” Not just my dad, but everyone in the studio was utterly bewildered. My dad had literally just given her the correct answer. What had he done wrong? Under the host’s pressing questioning, Mom wiped her tears and revealed the “truth.” “A few weeks ago was our twentieth wedding anniversary. It was also my birthday.” “But my husband, Robert Hayes, forgot the date!” “Robert! Didn’t you swear to me that my birthday was January 9th? Well, now I’m making your wish come true!” Veins popped out on my dad’s forehead. He was shaking with rage. “I admit, I accidentally got the date wrong.” “But during those days, I was working back-to-back double shifts for three days straight just to make enough money for Chloe’s medical bills! I was exhausted and delirious, so I mixed it up!” “I apologized to you afterward! I drove Uber Eats every night for three weeks straight to save up enough to buy you a gold bracelet to make up for it! Are you still not satisfied?!” Mom didn’t say a word. She just lowered her head and kept wiping her tears. The countdown was rapidly decreasing. The pain in my chest had transformed into a searing, fiery agony. Cold sweat soaked through my hospital gown. Dad begged her, pleading with her to just say the correct answer, get the money, and send me into surgery. But Mom remained entirely unmoved. My heart finally died. It turned out my life was nothing but a tool for my mother to discipline her family. The countdown had three minutes left. Using every last ounce of strength in my body, I reached out and shut off the live stream. The doctors and nurses in the room all had red, tear-filled eyes. My voice was a barely audible whisper, but it was absolute: “Doctor, I want to sign an organ donation agreement.” “And, after I die, I require that my mother be forced to watch the entire organ procurement process from start to finish!” Mom, you love teaching people lessons, don’t you? Well today, I am going to teach you a lesson! The exact second I finished signing my name, a catastrophic surge of pain ripped through my entire body. Everything went black. In the final second before my consciousness vanished entirely, I heard my mother’s voice screaming through the TV broadcast in the background: “Why are you all panicking?!” “Chloe has had this condition for months! She isn’t just going to drop dead in a single second!” Driven by sheer desperation, my father actually knelt on the floor in front of the entire nation, begging her for forgiveness, swearing he would never forget another important date again. Mom finally gave the correct answer in the absolute last second before the countdown hit zero. But, it was already too late. Chapter 4 In the resuscitation room, the doctors were desperately doing chest compressions. But my heartbeat was fading fast. My lead surgeon shouted: “We have to operate right now!” But the prize money hadn’t hit my account yet. I only had a few hundred dollars to my name. Per hospital protocol, they could only provide standard life-saving measures, not the massive experimental surgery. As my consciousness drifted, I thought I saw my mother. Mom, you knew perfectly well that I was in mortal danger every single second. Why did you keep getting it wrong on purpose to waste time? Mom, do you really not love me? The doctor’s compressions were getting harder and harder. I could almost hear the sickening crack of my own ribs. Mom, I really can’t hold on much longer… If you could just come see me one last time, I wouldn’t blame you anymore. But I waited and waited. Shot after shot of epinephrine was injected into my veins, but my breathing continued to fail. The heart monitors blared their warning alarms. According to the rules, if the funds didn’t clear, they couldn’t perform the surgery. The surgeon was furious and called the production team directly: “Didn’t she get the answer right?! Why hasn’t the money hit the hospital account yet?!” The production team was helpless. “We originally wanted to wire the money directly to the hospital, but her mother insisted on physical cash!” “They are probably driving to the hospital with the cash right now.” That final, fragile breath I was holding onto completely snapped. The EKG flatlined into a solid, silent line. In that moment, I heard my family arguing in the hallway. “Chloe is hanging by a thread! Why did you insist on cash?!” Mom sounded completely self-righteous: “Three years ago, you got scammed out of $200 online!” “Digital payments are too dangerous. Haven’t you learned your lesson?” “Cash is the only safe way! Today I am finally teaching you a lesson about financial security!” Dad sounded like he was losing his mind, his footsteps frantic. “Fine! Fine! Cash is safe!” “But what about Chloe?! Every second Chloe waits, she is closer to death!” Mom sounded incredibly annoyed: “Will you stop talking?!” “If Chloe is in danger, it’s because you cursed her with your negative attitude!” “Chloe was perfectly fine this morning! How could anything happen to her this afternoon?” Inside the resuscitation room, the doctor was slowly pulling a white sheet over my face. Utterly oblivious, my mother pushed open the door to my empty hospital room. “Chloe! Mommy brought the money!”

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Chloe sat on the hard plastic chair in the hospital corridor, her fingers white-knuckling a diagnostic report. A few cold, clinical words jumped off the page, piercing her eyes like needles. “Primary Infertility.” The doctor’s voice still echoed in her ears. “With your specific condition, natural conception is highly unlikely. Essentially… you cannot have children.” Her boyfriend of five years, Mark Jenkins, sat right beside her. He hadn’t said a word. From the moment she was handed the report, he had been completely silent. Chloe’s heart sank, inch by inch, as if she were plunging into a frozen lake. She reached out, wanting to hold his hand. Mark recoiled violently, snatching his hand away as if she had burned him. His eyes darted away, refusing to look at her. “Mark…” Chloe’s voice was dry and raspy. “I… I need some space.” Mark stood up, dropped those words, and walked away without looking back. Watching his retreating figure, Chloe felt every ounce of strength drain from her body. For the next three days, Mark didn’t call. He didn’t text. Chloe locked herself in her apartment, feeling like a ghost abandoned by the entire world. Five years. From their college campus to entering the workforce, they had survived being broke together and built dreams for their future together. They had even put a deposit down on a wedding dress and were planning to go to the courthouse to get their marriage license next month. But a single piece of paper had shattered everything. On the fourth day, the doorbell rang. Chloe thought it was Mark. She forced her exhausted body up to open the door. Standing on the porch was Mark’s mother, Susan Jenkins. Her face was made of ice. The way she looked at Chloe was like inspecting a defective piece of merchandise. “Mrs. Jenkins,” Chloe said, her voice barely a whisper. Susan ignored her, marched straight into the living room, and slapped a cashier’s check down on the coffee table. “There’s ten thousand dollars here.” “My Mark cannot marry a hen that won’t lay eggs.” A loud ringing filled Chloe’s head. Everything went blank. “Mrs. Jenkins, Mark and I have been together for five years…” “Can five years of feelings put food on the table? Can feelings give the Jenkins family a grandson?” Susan’s voice was shrill and biting. “Chloe, I suggest you look in the mirror and know your place. Stop holding my son back.” “The Jenkins family line has been passed down from father to son for three generations. It is not ending with him!” Looking at Susan’s face, twisted with agitation, the last sliver of hope in Chloe’s heart died. She smiled, but it looked worse than crying. “So, this is what Mark wants?” Susan let out a huff, essentially confirming it. “He’s a man, he feels bad saying it to your face. As his mother, I have to be the bad guy.” “The engagement is off.” “Don’t ever contact Mark again.” Having completed her mission, Susan turned on her heel to leave. At the door, she paused and looked back at Chloe. Her eyes were filled with a sickening mix of pity and absolute disdain. “Oh, by the way. My son is getting married next month. The bride is the daughter of the City Planning Director. She’s already pregnant.” The door slammed shut. Chloe stood rooted to the spot, paralyzed. So, he didn’t “need some space.” He was using his silence to force her to let go. He was using her diagnosis as a convenient, righteous excuse to seamlessly transition to his new, wealthy, pregnant fiancée. Five years. It was all just a sick joke. Chloe slowly sank to the floor, buried her face in her knees, and finally broke down, sobbing uncontrollably. Six months is enough time for a city to change its skyline. It’s also enough time for a person’s heart to turn to ash. Chloe chopped off her long hair, transferred to a different department at work, and tried her hardest to look nothing like her past self. But the gaping hole in her chest refused to close. She still heard about Mark’s wedding through office gossip. Word was, it was an incredibly lavish affair. The bride had a visible baby bump and looked radiant. When Chloe heard this, she just kept typing at her keyboard, expressionless, as if listening to a story about strangers. Only she knew that she drank an entire bottle of Cabernet that night. Life became stagnant, like a dead pool of water—no ripples, no expectations. Until the newly appointed Department Director, Barbara Hayes, sought her out. Barbara was a woman in her late fifties, sharp, capable, and rarely smiled. Yet, that afternoon, she did something unprecedented. She called Chloe into her office and personally poured her a cup of coffee. “Chloe, you’ve been in this department for almost six months now. How are you settling in?” “It’s going well. Thank you for asking, Director,” Chloe replied respectfully. Barbara nodded, her eyes assessing Chloe, calculating something. “And… your personal life? Have you given that any thought?” Chloe’s chest tightened. Why was she suddenly asking about this? “I… haven’t really thought about it.” Barbara smiled, her tone suddenly turning conspiratorial. “I’ve heard about your situation.” All the color drained from Chloe’s face. Her infertility was a brand of shame. She never spoke of it to anyone. “Director…” “Don’t panic.” Barbara waved a hand, leaning forward slightly, lowering her voice. “Actually, the reason I called you in is because I want to set you up with someone.” Chloe was stunned. “My son, Arthur.” For the first time, a look of helplessness and embarrassment crossed Barbara’s usually stoic face. “He… he’s a great guy, really. It’s just… physically, he has a minor issue.” She paused, seemingly weighing her words. “Just like you, he can’t have children.” Chloe felt like a sledgehammer had slammed into her chest. She stared at Barbara, completely unsure how to react. “I know this reality is cruel for you young folks.” “But life has to go on, doesn’t it?” “You two are in the same unique boat. You understand each other’s pain. Neither of you has any right to judge the other.” “Just make do. Partner up and build a life together. It’s better than growing old alone.” Make do. Partner up. Those words stung Chloe’s nerves like needles. Had her life really been reduced to a state where she just had to “make do”? She wanted to refuse. But looking at Barbara’s eyes, filled with expectation and a hint of pleading, the word “no” got stuck in her throat. Maybe Barbara was right. What right did a barren woman have to demand romance or look forward to the future? Finding another defective person, forming a broken family, keeping each other warm, and licking each other’s wounds. Perhaps, this was the best ending she could hope for. “Director,” Chloe looked up, her eyes dead. “I… I’m willing to meet him.” Barbara let out a long sigh of relief, a heavy weight lifting from her shoulders. “Good, good girl. I knew you were sensible.” A week later, Chloe and Arthur met at a local coffee shop. He was taller and leaner than in his photo, wearing a crisp white button-down and jeans. He had a clean, sharp look. But there was an unshakable melancholy between his brows. Throughout the meeting, he barely spoke. Chloe did most of the talking; he just listened. At the very end, he looked at Chloe and asked one serious question. “Are you absolutely sure about this?” Chloe offered a self-deprecating smile. “Do people like us really have a choice?” Arthur fell silent. After a long moment, he nodded. “Alright. Then let’s… get married.” No proposal. No ring. Not even an “I like you.” From the very beginning, their union was nothing more than an unspoken agreement to “make do.” A month later, they went to the courthouse. The reception was painfully simple—just a dinner at a restaurant with close relatives from both sides. At the dinner table, Chloe spotted Susan Jenkins. Susan had tagged along with a distant relative of Arthur’s, staring at Chloe with undisguised schadenfreude. “Well, if it isn’t Chloe! Married again so soon? I hear this one… is firing blanks too? Oh my, you two really are a match made in heaven!” Her shrill, vicious words plunged the entire table into a suffocating, awkward silence. Chloe’s hand, gripping her fork, trembled violently. Just then, a large, warm hand covered hers. It was Arthur. He looked calmly at Susan, his tone flat. “Whether we can have kids or not is none of your concern.” “Instead of worrying about us, you should spend that energy figuring out if the baby in your daughter-in-law’s belly actually belongs to the Jenkins family.” Susan’s face instantly turned the color of bruised plum. Married life was as placid as still water. Arthur was a quiet man. When he was home, he was either reading or tending to his houseplants. He didn’t say much, but he was incredibly considerate. He remembered that Chloe hated cilantro. He quietly handled all the household chores. When she worked late, he always left a porch light on and a bowl of hot soup on the stove. They lived like polite roommates—respectful, courteous, but emotionally distant. Neither dared to touch the other’s deepest scar. The word “child” was never spoken. Barbara, however, visited frequently, always bringing expensive vitamins and supplements. “Chloe, you need to take care of your health. It’s pitiful enough that you can’t have kids; you can’t let your body break down on top of it.” She muttered variations of this every time. Chloe just listened silently, her emotions a tangled mess. Sometimes, she thought this life wasn’t so bad. No arguments, no expectations, which meant no crushing disappointments. Until that day. For several weeks, she had been feeling nauseous, incredibly lethargic, and completely drained of energy. At first, she thought she was just overworked and had caught a stomach bug. But when the smell of Arthur’s cooking made her sprint to the bathroom to dry heave, an absurd, impossible thought popped into her head. Trembling, she drove to Walgreens and bought a pregnancy test. When she saw those two distinct pink lines, Chloe felt her entire world collapse. She didn’t believe it. She drove to the hospital like a madwoman, demanded a walk-in appointment, and underwent a battery of tests. When the OB-GYN looked at the ultrasound and smiled, saying, “Congratulations, it’s twins. Looks like a boy and a girl,” Chloe only heard a deafening roar in her ears. How was this possible? Wasn’t she diagnosed with “Primary Infertility”? Wasn’t she told she would never be a mother? Clutching the ultrasound printout, she stumbled back home in a daze. Arthur wasn’t home from work yet. Barbara wasn’t there either. The living room was empty. She was entirely alone. She sat on the sofa, her hands shaking violently. That thin piece of photo paper felt like it weighed a thousand pounds. Twins. A boy and a girl. For any normal family, this would be the greatest news in the world. But for her, it was the ultimate mockery. A massive, suffocating lie had trapped her in its net. The doctor told her she couldn’t conceive. Barbara told her Arthur couldn’t conceive. That was the only reason they had “made do” and gotten married. But now, she was pregnant. With Arthur’s children. So, who exactly was lying? Did the original doctor misdiagnose her? Or was it… Barbara? Did she invent a lie about her son to make her “defective” daughter-in-law feel secure in the marriage? Or maybe… A far more terrifying thought slithered into Chloe’s mind like a venomous snake. Mark and Susan! Was it them? To cleanly break the engagement and latch onto the City Planner’s wealthy daughter, did they bribe the doctor to forge that diagnostic report?! Once the thought surfaced, she couldn’t suppress it. A bone-chilling cold started in Chloe’s fingertips and crept straight to her heart. If that were true… Then what was the point of the agony, humiliation, and despair she had suffered for the past six months? She had been discarded like garbage, treated as a running joke. Her entire life trajectory had been maliciously rewritten. Just then, the front door clicked open. Arthur was home. He saw Chloe sitting on the sofa, pale as a ghost, staring blankly ahead with a piece of paper clutched in her hand. “What’s wrong?” he asked, walking over with genuine concern. Chloe slowly looked up and handed the ultrasound to him. “I’m pregnant.” Her voice was as light as a feather, but in the quiet living room, it hit like a tidal wave. Arthur’s pupils contracted sharply. He stared at the ultrasound, his expression an incredibly complex mix of emotions. Shock. Confusion. And a tiny, barely perceptible flash of… joy. He was silent for a long time before he finally looked up at Chloe. “Is this real?” Chloe nodded, her eyes swimming in confusion and pain. “Arthur, tell me the truth. Did you know all along that you… that you could have kids?” That was the least horrifying scenario she could think of right now. Arthur looked at her, his gaze deep and searching. He shook his head. “I didn’t know.” His voice was quiet, but firm. “My mother always told me that a severe fever when I was a toddler caused permanent damage, making me sterile.” “All these years, I believed her.” Chloe’s heart plummeted again. If Arthur was telling the truth, there was only one possibility left. That original diagnostic report was a fake. “Where… which hospital did you get tested at originally?” Arthur asked, his tone turning analytical. “City General. The Head of Obstetrics, Dr. Wallace.” Chloe spat out the name she would never forget as long as she lived. Arthur frowned. “Dr. Wallace?” “You know him?” Chloe asked instantly. Arthur nodded. “He was the mentor to a senior colleague of mine at the law firm. He has a stellar reputation in the medical community. It doesn’t seem like something he would do.” “But the proof is right here!” Chloe’s voice rose, bordering on hysterical. “If it wasn’t him, who else could it be?” Arthur walked over and gently placed his hands on her shoulders. “Don’t panic yet. Something isn’t right here.” “We can’t just guess.” His hands were steady. His voice was steady. It carried a grounding, reassuring power. Chloe slowly forced herself to breathe.

After seven years of caring for my severely paralyzed mother, she finally passed away, a look of peace on her face. But three days after her death, my brother—who had vanished for seven years—suddenly appeared, clutching a will. “Mom’s will makes it perfectly clear. As her son, I inherit everything she owned.” The relatives were quick to react, immediately taking his side. “The money belonged to your mother. She can leave it to whoever she wants. As her children, you just have to respect her wishes.” “You’re the older sister; it’s your duty to step aside for your brother. If it were me, I’d be too ashamed to fight my own flesh and blood over an inheritance.” I covered my face with my hands, my shoulders shaking uncontrollably. Everyone thought I was sobbing in absolute devastation. But only I knew the truth: my idiot brother was completely, utterly screwed. … When Kyle showed up, I was just about to lower my mother’s urn into the freshly dug grave. He ran out of the crowd, crying hysterically, forcefully shoved me aside, and threw his arms around the urn, wailing like a banshee. “Mom! How could you just leave us like this?! I didn’t even get to see you one last time!” “Chloe, you heartless bitch! Mom was perfectly fine when I left! It’s only been a few years, and you actually managed to kill her!” “Give me my mother back!” The relatives began whispering and murmuring among themselves. Even I felt a bit dazed for a second. The last time I had seen Kyle was seven years ago. I had just graduated from college and landed a fantastic job at a Fortune 500 company. My life was finally on an upward trajectory when I suddenly got a call from Kyle. “Chloe, you need to come home right now! Mom was in a terrible car accident, she’s in the ICU!” My head spun. I bought a red-eye flight and rushed home. Our dad died when we were young. My mom raised Kyle and me all by herself. She hadn’t enjoyed a single day of comfort in her life, and now this happened. But what I couldn’t accept was what happened next. While I was distracted speaking with the surgeons about her emergency procedures, Kyle secretly grabbed my mom’s phone, her ID, and her debit cards, ran back to our house, and drained every single cent of our family’s savings. I didn’t have any money of my own back then. To scrape together enough to cover Mom’s immediate medical bills, I borrowed from everyone I possibly could. The crushing debt almost drove me to jump off a bridge. After that, I personally cared for her, spoon-feeding and bathing her for seven grueling years, until the day she died. Seeing Kyle now, I wanted nothing more than to flay him alive. “You son of a bitch. How do you even have the nerve to show your face?” “When Mom was fighting for her life in the hospital, you stole all her money and ran! When she was paralyzed in bed, unable to move, where the hell were you?!” “Now that she’s dead, you pop up playing the devoted son?! I’ll beat you to death, you shameless piece of trash!” Kyle yelled at the top of his lungs: “Stop bringing up irrelevant garbage! Mom only has one son! If I wasn’t here to handle her funeral rites, her soul would never rest in peace!” “If I didn’t show up, who knows? You probably would have secretly hoarded all of Mom’s inheritance for yourself!” “What inheritance?” While I was momentarily stunned, Kyle pulled a piece of standard printer paper from his jacket. He held it up high for the entire crowd to see. “Aunt Brenda, Uncle Dave, Aunt Susan—look closely! This is a will, written and signed by my mother’s own hand.” “It states very clearly: upon her death, her entire estate goes exclusively to her son, Kyle.” “Bullshit! Mom couldn’t even read or write!” I fired back. “She was paralyzed for seven years! I handled all her meals, her bathing, everything! Where exactly did she go to draft a will?!” Kyle smirked smugly. “Mom knew this day would come. She set everything up seven years ago. Uncle Dave can back me up.” I looked at my uncle in absolute disbelief. Just this morning, he had patted my shoulder, tears in his eyes. “Your mother had a hard life, Chloe. Thank god she had a daughter like you to take care of her so well. You didn’t let her suffer.” Uncle Dave avoided my gaze, looking shifty. “Yeah… that did happen. When your mom was first brought to the hospital, she was still lucid. She drafted the will right in front of me. I helped her sit up so she could sign it.” “Chloe, you’re a good kid. We all see that.” “But the money was your mother’s. She can give it to whoever she wants. As her children, you just have to respect her wishes.” It was easy for him to say. My uncle hadn’t worked a single honest day in his life; he survived entirely by leeching off his sisters. That old parasite was obviously going to take the side of the younger parasite, Kyle. Aunt Brenda immediately chimed in. “I’m an older sister too. It’s an older sister’s duty to step aside and provide for her younger brother. If I were you, I’d be too ashamed to fight my own flesh and blood over an inheritance.” She even forced a few fake sobs. “These past few years, your mom cried to me so often because she missed her son. Well, it’s finally over. You came back, Kyle. She can rest in peace now.” “You’re the only male heir left in the family line, Kyle. Don’t worry, your aunt is 100% on your side.” I stood frozen in place, utterly paralyzed. When the hospital was threatening to cut off her care because I couldn’t pay the bills, I didn’t cry. When my friends were landing amazing careers, while I could only take odd temp jobs so I had time to rush home and change my mom’s adult diapers, I didn’t cry. When I was sick and in agonizing pain, rolling around in bed but refusing to go to the doctor to save money, I didn’t cry. When I was drowning in debt and loan sharks threw red paint on our front door, I didn’t cry. Seven years. Seven full, grueling years. I took care of my mother for seven years. I spoon-fed her every meal, cleaned up her waste, and starved myself just to buy her medication. And yet, behind my back, she left absolutely everything to my brother. I doubled over in pain, my entire body shaking. The tears finally broke free, pouring out uncontrollably. Kyle clicked his tongue in annoyance, tossing his hair. “Alright, enough! Who are you crying for?!” “A son inheriting the property is the natural order of things. Hurry up and hand over the house keys. I have real estate agents waiting to view the property.” Aunt Brenda was startled. “You’re selling the house?!” “Then where is your sister going to live?” Kyle scoffed. “Why the hell should I care where she lives? It’s my house, I can sell it if I want.” “She lived there rent-free for seven years. I’m already doing her a massive favor by not charging her back-rent.” “My girlfriend is pregnant, and her family is pushing us to get married. If I don’t sell the house, how am I supposed to afford a new one for us?” “Unless… you guys are volunteering to lend me some cash?” The moment they heard the word “lend,” every single relative started waving their hands frantically. “I don’t have any money! Your cousin’s wedding wiped out our savings.” “All my cash is tied up in the stock market. If I had it, I’d definitely lend it to you.” … Hearing this, I slowly raised my head and wiped away my tears. “You want the estate, right? Fine. You can have it all.” Kyle grinned broadly. “Now that’s more like it.” I laid out my condition: “If you want me to formally waive my right to contest the inheritance, you have to sign an agreement with me right now. From this moment on, absolutely everything belonging to this family is yours, and it has absolutely nothing to do with me.” “And whether you live or die in the future, you are strictly forbidden from coming to me for help.” Kyle looked me up and down with pure disdain. “Look at you. You don’t even have a real job. Once I sell the house, you’ll literally be sleeping on the streets. I’m the one who should be worried about you clinging to me for cash!” “I’ll sign it. Hurry up and get the papers!” I borrowed a pen and paper from the funeral home staff and quickly drafted the document. Aunt Brenda leaned in close and whispered, “Silly girl, that’s your own biological brother. If you cut him off completely, aren’t you afraid your dad’s ghost will come back to haunt you?” I looked at her with a dead, icy smile. “When Mom’s spirit visits me on the seventh day after her death, I’ll be sure to ask her whose ghost is going to haunt the person who ripped the gold wedding band off my grandmother’s finger the second she stopped breathing. Let’s see who should be afraid of karma.” Aunt Brenda’s face drained of color. She grabbed her hand and scurried away. After Kyle signed the paper, I folded the agreement carefully and put it in my purse. I couldn’t help it—I covered my face, my shoulders shaking violently. He clicked his tongue impatiently. “Crying is useless. The agreement is signed. From now on, this family has nothing to do with you, and you won’t get a single red cent.” “Hurry up and pack your trash. I’m coming to claim the house tomorrow.” With that, he rallied all the relatives to go grab lunch at a nearby restaurant. It wasn’t until they were completely out of sight that I finally dared to laugh out loud. Chapter 2 Oh, my sweet, idiotic brother. What “estate” did he think was left? He hadn’t been home in seven years; he had no idea. Anything of value in that house had been sold years ago to pay for Mom’s medical bills. The house itself had a massive second mortgage on it, and I was drowning in an ocean of external debt, constantly stressing over how to survive. And now, he timed his return perfectly to catch the falling anvil. I was absolutely thrilled. I left the funeral home and took a cab straight to a nice hotel. The old house was filled with memories of my mother, and honestly, I couldn’t stomach looking at it right now. After taking a long, hot bath, I wrapped myself tightly in the thick hotel comforter. For the first time in seven years, I didn’t have to jolt awake at 3:00 AM to change my mom’s diaper or sponge-bathe her. I slept so deeply it felt like a coma. When I finally woke up, my phone was blowing up like a ticking time bomb. On the other end of the line, Kyle’s voice was a chaotic mix of uncontrollable smugness and desperate impatience. “Chloe, where the hell are you?!” “Get back to the old house right now and hand over the keys! Don’t you dare touch any of Mom’s stuff! I’m coming over to take inventory immediately.” “I’m warning you, if you try to hide anything, and I find out, I will make your life a living hell.” I gripped my phone, staring at the pristine hotel ceiling, and suddenly broke into a huge smile. “Alright.” “I’ll wait for you. I’ll even bring some people over to help you with the inventory.” I hung up the phone and immediately dialed the number of my biggest creditor. “If you want your money, bring your guys to my house right now. If you’re late, the opportunity is gone.” I heard heavy breathing on the other end, mixed with a few muffled curses and people scrambling in the background. “Fuck yeah. Wait right there, we’re on our way! If you’re trying to play us…” “Bring all the promissory notes and loan contracts,” I added, then hung up. I checked out of the hotel, hailed a cab, and headed back to the old house—the house where I had struggled and suffocated for seven years, the house I currently wanted to burn to the ground. Just as I pulled up, a dirty, beat-up black van slammed on its brakes, arriving at the exact same moment. Three men stepped out of the van. The leader was a massive guy with a shaved head, eyes sharp as knives, and aggressive tattoos crawling up his neck. We exchanged a single glance. No words were spoken. With a silent, mutual understanding, we walked up the stairs together. The front door of the old house was slightly ajar. The lock had been smashed. Kyle’s voice drifted out from inside. “This place is a bit old, but if I clean it up, I can rent it out for a decent chunk of change.” “Just wait here, I’ll have her clear out her garbage right now.” I pushed the door open. Kyle was standing in the center of the living room, a small notepad in his hand, jotting things down. When he turned and saw the three terrifying bruisers standing behind me, he froze for a second. Then, a look of profound, arrogant mockery spread across his face. “I knew you wouldn’t just hand it over peacefully. Yesterday was all just an act, huh?” “You didn’t dare say a word in front of the family, and now you bring a bunch of thugs here to play tough?” He waved the photocopied will in his hand. “Read it and weep. This is notarized! It’s a legally binding document! Everything in this house now belongs to me, Kyle! Who do you think you’re scaring with a few street punks? Get the hell out of my house!” I smiled. This really was my wonderful brother. I was worried he might try to deny it! What more was there to say? “The law is the ultimate authority.” I said, stepping aside. “You guys heard him, right? He is the legal owner of this house. Everything belongs to him. Whatever business you have, take it up with him.” The bald guy completely ignored Kyle’s yelling. He pulled a thick stack of loan contracts from his leather bag. “Kid, you’ve got a big mouth. Since you own everything here, I assume that means you’re ready to settle the debts attached to it?” Kyle stumbled back half a step, terrified, but tried to maintain his tough guy act. “What debts?” “You’ve got the wrong guy. I don’t owe you anything.” “Get out of here right now! You’re trespassing on private property! I’ll call the cops!” The bald guy let out a menacing, predatory laugh. “Be my guest. Call ’em right now. I’d love to see if the cops arrest me, or arrest you.” “Paying debts is the law of the land! I brought the signed contracts right here. You dare try to deny it?!” He suddenly raised his voice, booming like thunder. “Seven years ago, your mother used this house as collateral to borrow $20,000 from me. With interest compounding over the years, the total balance today is exactly $720,000.” “It’s all right here in black and white, stamped with her red thumbprint. The contract clearly states that if she can’t pay the cash, the house is forfeited to cover the debt. And now you’re jumping up and down claiming you’re the sole heir to her estate?” The bald guy stepped forward, his spit practically hitting Kyle’s deathly pale face. “Well then, shouldn’t you be inheriting this debt too?” The color drained entirely from Kyle’s face, leaving him as white as a sheet. His eyes bulged out of his head. He looked at the terrifying stack of loan contracts, then at the bald guy, and finally, he whipped his head around to glare at me. His eyes were filled with absolute, terrified disbelief and fury. “No! This is impossible!” “This is the debt her mother owes! It has nothing to do with me! Go after her!” he screamed hysterically, his trembling finger pointing directly at me. I laughed and pulled out the agreement we had signed in front of our mother’s urn yesterday. “Didn’t we agree yesterday? Everything in this family is inherited by you, and it has absolutely nothing to do with me.” “We are blood siblings, after all! My mom is your mom! A son inheriting the estate is the natural order of things. All our relatives can testify to that.” “My dear, sweet brother, if you hadn’t come back waving that will around, I honestly wouldn’t have known where to find you to give you all of this.” I picked up the will that had fallen to the floor and gently placed it on the coffee table. I tapped the words: “…shall be inherited entirely by my son, Kyle.” “As children, we have to respect Mom’s wishes. She said you inherit everything, so it’s all yours.” “This old house, the few pieces of cheap furniture she left behind, and of course… all the outstanding debts.” “NOOOOO!!!” Kyle let out an inhuman, guttural howl. The bald guy was already out of patience. He waved his hand. The two massive thugs behind him lunged forward like they were grabbing a helpless chicken. They instantly pinned Kyle’s arms behind his back and slammed his face into the wall. “Chloe! You set me up! You set a fucking trap for me!” He struggled uselessly, cursing and screaming, his voice cracking with tears and absolute despair. I looked at the bald guy. “We are completely settled. Whatever happens next is between you and him.” Then, I turned and walked out of the apartment. Taking a deep breath of the outside air, the crushing burden I had carried on my shoulders for seven years finally fell away. The news of Kyle being cornered and beaten by loan sharks in the old house sprouted wings and flew instantly across the family group chat. Aunt Brenda was absolutely heartbroken. She rallied all the relatives to go “save” him. She also launched a vicious attack on me in the group chat. “Chloe, how could you be so evil?!” “Kyle is your biological brother! He’s the only male bloodline your father left behind! How could you just stand by and watch him get beaten like that?!” “If your parents knew about this, they’d be rolling in their graves!” I casually typed a reply: “If my dad knew his own sister just stood by and watched her nephew get beaten, he’d be rolling in his grave.” “Why don’t you do a good deed and pay off the debt for him?” Kyle immediately seized the opportunity, spamming the chat with “Thank you, Aunt Brenda!” and “Aunt Brenda, you’re the best!” He expertly hoisted Aunt Brenda onto a pedestal she couldn’t climb down from. Her son instantly chimed in: “If you dare pay a single cent of his debt, I am disowning you! You can just adopt him and let him be your son!” Seeing this, Aunt Brenda quickly backpedaled, stating that she couldn’t make financial decisions for her household and couldn’t help with the money. However, she was more than willing to discipline me, the “ungrateful daughter,” on behalf of my dead parents. “Regardless of everything, blood is thicker than water! You are the older sister! Now that your mom is gone, the eldest sister is like a mother! You have to take care of him! Look at the suffering he’s going through right now!” “As his aunt, watching this feels like a knife twisting in my heart!” I watched her performance with an emotionless expression. Aunt Brenda finally revealed her true objective. “Chloe, your aunt knows things haven’t been easy for you either. But right now, saving Kyle is the priority. I actually have a solution, it just depends on whether you’re willing to make a sacrifice for this family.” “The Director of my agency, Director Miller, has a son. He’s a very honest, well-behaved guy. It’s just that he had a severe fever when he was a kid, so his brain works a little slower than normal people. But he absolutely never causes trouble.” “The Miller family is loaded! They live in a massive mansion! They don’t mind your current financial situation at all. As long as you agree to marry him, you can name your price for the bridal price.” “You’d be marrying into a wealthy family, you’d save your brother, and you’d secure your own future! It’s a win-win-win situation!” The group chat exploded. Everyone started chiming in to support her. “Chloe, your aunt really found a great way out for you!” “Chloe, if you marry into high society, don’t forget about us poor relatives!” “Kyle, you better remember your sister’s sacrifice for the rest of your life.” I almost laughed out loud. His brain works a little slower? I bet if they “cured” him, he’d still be drooling on himself. This wasn’t setting me up on a date. This was blatantly trying to sell me off as a commodity so she could curry favor with her boss! I quickly shut down her beautiful fantasy. “Since the conditions are so amazing, please don’t waste it on an outsider like me. You should have your own daughter marry him! I wouldn’t dream of stealing such a prime opportunity from her.” “Or, even better, just have Kyle marry him! He marries into a rich family, pays off his debt—it’s the perfect solution! Just tell Director Miller not to be too strict on the gender requirement.” Kyle was absolutely furious. “Chloe, don’t be a stuck-up bitch!” “What the hell do you think you are right now?! No parents, drowning in debt! Who besides the Millers would even look twice at you?!”

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My husband gave me two snakes as pets. The eerie part? Whenever they realize I’m watching, they start mating—ferociously, shamelessly. It’s enough to make me turn away in a flush of heat. Then, out of nowhere, the Feed flickers into my vision like a digital hallucination. [Wow, the female lead is a genius. Getting the System to turn them into snakes so they can flaunt their “love” right under the wife’s nose? Iconic.] [LOL, they’re going at it like it’s a honeymoon, and the poor side-character wife is just standing there playing house. She has no idea he’s going to use that snake tail to strangle her tonight.] [Once she’s out of the picture, he inherits her millions and marries the “real” lead. A classic move.] A chill raced down my spine. I didn’t hesitate. I pulled out my phone and dialed the number of a local game processor—a man known for his lack of mercy toward reptiles. “Hey, Silas? I’ve got two fat ones for you. I hear the meat is great for a winter stew.” 1 I was jolted awake by a wet, rhythmic slithering sound—the sound of scales grinding against scales. I opened my eyes to find two six-foot, iridescent “spicy noodles” dangling from my crystal chandelier. They were entwined in a tight, DNA-like spiral, their heads swaying with a sickening sort of ecstasy, tongues flicking against one another. Their eyes looked… drunken. Almost human. Almost as if they were smiling. A few drops of murky, white fluid dripped from their tails, landing right on the silk of my nightgown. Again. This was the eighteenth time they’d pulled this stunt in my bedroom. I sat up, frustrated, and called my husband. No answer. I left a voice memo, my voice tight with irritation. “Mark, where did you even find these things? They’re shameless. They’re doing it in my room every single day.” “Seriously, I don’t think they’re even snakes. They don’t act like them. They don’t even care about the cold.” Suddenly, the air in front of me distorted. Neon text bled into my retinas. [Hahaha… Congrats, you guessed it! They aren’t snakes, honey. That’s your husband and your best friend. Surprise!] [They’re hitting the high notes while you’re playing pet-owner. They aren’t your pets—they’re your executioners!] [My girl Bridget is a mastermind. Before she cut ties with the System, she used her last points to get two transformation pills. Pure brilliance!] [They’re literally doing it on the wife’s clothes for the thrill of it, then making her “clean” them afterward. It’s so twisted, I love it!] [Bridget is already pregnant. It’s time to get rid of the wife. Can’t have a baby bump showing in the wedding dress, right?] [Don’t worry, the kill happens tonight. Mark strangles her, shifts back to human form, inherits the estate, and takes Bridget home. Happily ever after!] The words left me paralyzed with a bone-deep cold. I looked up at the female snake. She was staring at me with a look of triumphant malice, and for a split second, I saw the shadow of Bridget—my “soul sister,” my bridesmaid—in those slit pupils. According to the Feed, Bridget was the “Protagonist” of this world. She was supposed to be building some grand empire with a supernatural System, but she’d decided she wanted Mark instead. She wanted my life. The System had abandoned her, but not before giving her the means to replace me. The ice in my veins turned to fire. I swear I could hear Bridget’s voice whispering in my mind: “Look at her, Mark. Look at how stupid she is, just watching us. It’s so hot.” Then, the male snake’s tail tightened around her, and I heard Mark’s low, familiar rumble: “Let her watch. That’s the point. I’m going to fill you with so many legacies while she watches her world burn.” I bit my lip until it bled, using the pain to anchor myself. I picked up the phone again. “Silas? You said these two were big enough for a feast? They’re yours. Come get them.” 2 Silas was silent for a long beat. Everyone in our gated community knew we were rivals. I was the “animal lover” who rescued strays; he was the man who ate anything that crawled, often tormenting the creature before he butchered it. When Mark first brought the snakes home, Silas had smelled them from across the street. He’d offered me two thousand bucks on the spot. I’d told him to go to hell. “Cassidy?” Silas finally rasped. “What kind of game are you playing? Is this a trap?” “You want them or not? If you don’t show up in ten minutes, I’m calling the guy in the next county over.” “Wait, wait! Don’t you dare give those beauties to anyone else. I’m coming. Keep them locked up. I’m on my way!” The moment I hung up, the snakes tumbled from the chandelier. They began to slither across the bed in a frantic, panicked mess. Bridget’s shrill voice echoed in the room: “Is she crazy? Why is she selling us?!” Mark’s voice was more hesitant, analytical: “Relax. We know how much she loves animals. She’s spent two months nursing us like babies. That doesn’t just change.” “Then what is she doing?!” “It’s a play. She hates Silas. She’s probably setting him up. She’s told me a dozen times she wanted to take that man down.” “Right. She told me the same thing.” Bridget seemed to exhale. Her tail brushed against him again. They started up again, right in front of me. The female snake arched her neck like a concubine seeking favor in an old period drama. “Baby, the antidote from the System arrives today. We need to hurry up and finish her off before we shift back, right?” Mark’s yellow eyes drifted toward me. His black tongue flicked out, tasting the air near my face. He didn’t speak. Bridget hissed at him. “Why aren’t you saying anything? Are you getting soft? You still love her, don’t you? I knew it! You’re just using me!” The female snake slithered over to my dresser, her coils wrapping around a silver-framed document. She looked back at Mark, her eyes welling with a strange, reptilian moisture. “You kept your ‘anniversary’ souvenir. You can’t bring yourself to kill her!” Before she could finish, Mark’s tail whipped out like a thunderbolt, shattering the glass. The shards pierced the paper. It felt like they were piercing my heart, too. Everyone knew the story. Mark was the high school dropout who cleaned up his act to impress me. He studied until his eyes bled just to get into the same university. We’d kept our acceptance letters framed together for years—a symbol of his “devotion.” Now, his tail slammed into my letter with a pure, unadulterated venom. His voice was a ghostly growl: “She’s terrified of water. I’m going to coil around her throat with this body she loves so much, and I’m going to hold her under until the light leaves her eyes.” I stood there, stunned by the sheer depth of his cold-bloodedness. I had been nothing but a savior to him. When his business failed, I bankrolled his lifestyle. When he was depressed, I gave him space and luxury. I had treated him better than I treated myself. Why did he hate me so much? I looked at the Feed. [I knew he hated her! The more she helped him, the more he loathed her. No ‘Alpha’ male can handle his wife being the breadwinner and the brains.] [That acceptance letter? It’s a reminder that she’s better than him. Every cent of her money he spends feels like a slap to his ego. Love died a long time ago; only resentment remains.] [Hahaha, she deserves it. What’s the point of having money if you don’t know how to act like a submissive wife? Bridget is smarter—she knows how to stroke a man’s ego to get what she wants.] I let out a dry, self-deprecating laugh. My kindness was his cage. My generosity was his insult. I walked straight toward the snakes. They thought I was going to stroke them, to apologize. They were motionless as I grabbed them and shoved them into a heavy burlap sack. But as I went to pull the drawstring, Mark’s head shot out. He moved with lightning speed, coiling his cold, muscular body around my neck. 3 The icy pressure tightened around my throat. His head rose, his eyes fixed on mine, his tongue lashing against the tip of my nose. His tail tightened around my wrist like a handcuff. I was ready to fight, ready for everything to end right here. But then, his eyes shifted. “Mark, what are you waiting for? Do it!” Bridget screamed from inside the bag. Mark didn’t tighten his grip. Instead, he slid his coils down to my abdomen, hovering there as if protecting a kill. “She’s pregnant.” The words hit me like a physical blow. I looked down at my flat stomach. Impossible. Mark had been “traveling” for months. We hadn’t been together in ages. Bridget hissed, her voice dripping with fury. “I knew it! She’s been playing the loyal wife while sleeping around with some loser!” “The child is mine.” Shock after shock. My mind raced back to a dream I’d had two months ago. A dream of a massive serpent coiling around me in the dark, the weight of it crushing the breath from my lungs. I’d woken up drenched in sweat. It wasn’t a dream. It was him. “Oh, I see.” Bridget’s voice turned small, wounded. “If she’s carrying your baby, I’ll just go. I know you won’t hurt your own blood. I’ll leave you three to your happy family. Everything we had was just a dream.” Mark immediately hooked his tail around the bag to comfort her. “Don’t do that. When did I say I’d choose her? I only want children from you. Her baby? It’s just an ant I haven’t stepped on yet.” He looked back at me, his eyes dead. “We’ll send them both to the afterlife together. They can keep each other company on the long walk down.” I clenched my fists. At that moment, the doorbell rang. Silas’s rough voice boomed through the door: “Cassidy! Open up! I’m here for my meat!” 4 The two snakes froze. With a coordinated movement, they slithered out of the bag and back up to the high rafters of the living room, coiling out of reach. I opened the door and let Silas in. “They’re inside,” I said, my voice hollow. “Catch them yourself. Do whatever you want with them. I don’t want to know.” I turned and walked toward the kitchen, closing the door behind me. The Feed went into a frenzy. [Wait, is she really leaving? Is she actually selling the protagonists? No way.] [Mark and Bridget are panicking. They were going to kill her the second Silas left, but if she leaves the room, they can’t get to her!] [Oh no! Silas has a machete!] [Wait! The antidote just arrived! Bridget, quick—eat it!] [If they turn human now, Silas can’t touch them!] [Eat it! There are only two pills. If you miss this window, you stay snakes forever!] Antidote? My nerves caught fire. If they shifted back now, I was a dead woman. I spun around and threw the door open.

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On the morning of the state finals—the exams that would determine our college admissions and our futures—my brother handed me a bottle of milk. I took it, my chest tightening with a rare, sweet rush of gratitude, until a glowing string of text suddenly began scrolling across my vision, like a phantom live-chat projected directly into my mind. [Don’t drink it, babygirl! If she drinks that, the charity case gets x-ray vision to copy her answers!] [And she’ll slowly lose her mind. In seven days, her brain will turn to mush and her body will shut down.] My hand trembled. The bottle suddenly felt heavy, slick with condensation. Right beside us, my childhood best friend smiled softly and held out a braided luck-charm bracelet. The glowing text flared violently in my field of vision again: [The childhood bestie is trash too! If she wears that, the charity case gets an automatic twenty-point bump over her.] [The charity case will breeze into an Ivy League, while our girl gets locked in a psych ward with no memory, abused until she dies!] I blinked, the neon letters burning behind my eyelids. I looked up. Both of them were staring at me. It wasn’t the look of a loving older brother, nor the tender gaze of the boy I had secretly loved since we were ten. It was the calculated, breathless stare of hunters watching their prey step into a snare. … I didn’t say a word. I just took the milk and the bracelet, turned on my heel, and walked straight over to Raquel, the reigning queen of the school’s mean girls, who currently sat dead last in our class rankings. Fine, I thought, the ice spreading through my veins. If this is the game we are playing, then it’s my own fault if I don’t play it to the bitter end. “What are you standing around for? Drink the milk and review your flashcards. Every second counts.” Tristan had followed me. He twisted the cap off the bottle and shoved it toward me. The look in his eyes wasn’t protective; it was suffocatingly annoyed. For years, I had excused Tristan’s sharp edges, convincing myself that beneath his biting words was a fiercely loyal older brother who just didn’t know how to show he cared. Only now, staring at the poison in his hand, did I realize the truth. Every bottle of milk he had ever given me before an exam was a trap, meticulously laid for the sake of the girl he had placed on an untouchable pedestal. “I don’t have an appetite,” I said, my voice shockingly level. “Keep it for yourself. I’m going inside.” I turned away, but a hand violently seized a fistful of my hair from behind. My knees buckled, and I hit the pavement hard. “You dare talk back to me? Have you lost your damn mind?” Tristan roared, his face twisting into something ugly. “Don’t think I’m going to coddle you just because it’s finals week! Who the hell do you think you are?” “Throwing a tantrum and giving me attitude? I’ll teach you a lesson right here in front of everyone!” Heated whispers broke out around us as parents and test-takers turned to watch. Tristan, emboldened by the audience, snatched my backpack, raising it as if to smash it across my face. A hand caught his arm. It was Miles, rushing over, playing the peacemaker. “Tristan, man, come on! It’s exam day. If you scare Blair half to death, how is she going to test?” Miles knelt beside me, his face a perfect mask of concern. He gently brushed the dirt from my cheek, his touch as soft and familiar as it had always been. “Don’t take it to heart, Blair. He’s just stressed. He wants you to have enough energy for the exam,” Miles murmured. “Look, I went out of my way to get this luck bracelet blessed just for you. Put it on. I promise it’ll bring you the highest score.” He reached for my wrist to tie it on, but I snatched it from his fingers, burying it in my palm. These two men. One was my adopted brother, the person I had viewed as my closest family. The other was the boy who owned my heart. They had used my family’s American Express Black Cards to parade around the city’s elite circles as untouchable trust-fund gods. Yet, they had both fallen obsessively in love with the impoverished scholarship student I had personally sponsored, to the point where they were willing to join hands to destroy me. “Thank you both for your beautiful wishes. I will absolutely do my best.” I stared dead into their eyes, forcing the words through clenched teeth. “And when these exams are over, I promise I will repay you both. Thoroughly.” Tristan glared at me, his jaw tight, looking as though my very existence was an endurance test for him. Miles’s eyes glinted with the dark, hidden thrill of a successful setup. Feeling a scorching gaze from the periphery, I quickened my pace and passed through the school gates. Sure enough, I hadn’t made it far down the walkway before heavy footsteps rushed up behind me. A hand spun me around, and a stinging slap cracked across my cheek. “Didn’t I warn you to stay the hell away from Miles? Why are you always throwing yourself at him? Are you that desperate?” Raquel. The school’s ultimate bully. Just like always, she resorted to physical violence and sheer humiliation the second she felt threatened. I looked at her face, contorted with jealousy, and calmly extended the milk and the bracelet. “Don’t be mad,” I said, my voice dripping with earnest submission. “Look, everything Miles gives me, I save for you. I listened to what you told me.” I widened my eyes, playing the pathetic victim to perfection. “I promise, I’ll help you get him. Once finals are over, I’ll set up a date for you guys.” The hostility on Raquel’s face faltered, smoothing into a cruel, satisfied smirk. She snatched the items from my hands. “At least you know your place. Remember, a boring little nerd like you doesn’t deserve to breathe the same air as him. Stay out of his sight.” She shoved her shoulder hard into mine as she walked past. My cheek burned with a fiery ache. If being a minor was the umbrella that protected monsters like her from the consequences of their actions… then I would gladly use their own dark, twisted methods to carve out my revenge. … When the morning Literature and Composition exam ended, the hallways were choked with exhausted students. “Oh my god, what do we do? That essay prompt was insane. The reading comprehension made no sense,” someone whined. “I know, right? The multiple choice felt like every single answer was correct. I’m dreading Math this afternoon.” Amidst the chorus of despair, a soft, musical laugh rose from the center of the crowd. “It wasn’t that bad, guys,” the girl said, her voice a soothing balm of false modesty. “I thought it was actually pretty straightforward.” I looked up and met her eyes. Harper had been the school’s most famous charity case until I stepped in. Meeting me had completely altered the trajectory of her life. My gaze dropped to the Cartier Love bracelet gleaming on her wrist. It was the birthday present I had received last month, worth over twenty thousand dollars. It had mysteriously vanished from my vanity a few weeks ago. Sensing my stare, Harper smoothly slipped her hand back into the cuff of her sweater. “Harper is practically a genius,” a girl next to her sighed enviously. “Of course a test like that was easy for you.” I almost laughed out loud. Straightforward? Was it straightforward because Raquel had spent the entire exam tossing her an eraser with the multiple-choice answers written on it? Perhaps stung by the quiet disdain in my eyes, Harper’s fingers curled into fists. She stared me down, raising her voice so it echoed down the hall. “I’m securing the Valedictorian spot this year. I’m going to make everyone who ever looked down on me open their eyes and realize they have to kneel just to look at me!” After the morning session, I stopped by a local boutique and bought a cheap braided bracelet that perfectly mirrored the one Miles had given me. To save time, I ducked into a cramped, greasy diner across the street from campus. I was eating a cheap bowl of soup, my eyes glued to a calculus prep book, when a shadow fell over my table. “Wow, Blair. You really are just trash. It’s the biggest week of our lives and you’re eating at a dump like this.” I looked up. Harper and her entourage were standing over me. The girl who had spoken was sneering, her eyes raking over the peeling linoleum and sticky tables. “The bacteria in here is probably enough to kill a person. Then again, if you die, your family would probably be thrilled to sue this place for a payout.” Because my family had once dealt with a horrific extortion attempt after an uncle flaunted his wealth, I had been strictly forbidden from showing off our money. Aside from Harper, everyone at school genuinely believed I was poor. At this age, where vanity and cruelty were worn like badges of honor, they spoke to me with zero restraint. I let out a low, cold laugh and looked directly at the ringleader. “Harper. How do you feel about what your friend just said?” Her eyes darted away for a fraction of a second before a sickeningly sweet smile stretched across her face. “We’re all classmates, Blair. Don’t be so sensitive.” She patted the table. “Anyway, keep studying. Look over your mistakes. We’re going to head next door for lunch.” Next door was a Michelin-starred bistro where lunch ran about five hundred dollars a head. Harper really had no shame. I didn’t have the energy to argue with ghosts. I put my head back down, maximizing every second to review my formulas. When the afternoon Math exam finished, the hallways erupted into the exact wailing I expected. One boy literally punched a locker, his knuckles turning red. “What the actual hell! Did the state board write that test just to drive us to suicide?!” Harper was once again flanked by a crying, panicked crowd, all lamenting their mental breakdowns during the multiple-choice section. “Oh, guys, it’s okay. It’s just math,” Harper said, the triumphant gleam in her eyes impossible to hide. “Tell you what. I’ll treat you all to an amazing dinner tonight. To make up for the trauma.” “Harper, you’re the best! Ugh, hopefully a good meal will help me bounce back tomorrow!” “You are so generous! Honestly, if I couldn’t do it, I’m sure my competitors couldn’t either!” As Harper led her entourage down the hall like a conquering queen, I hung back. I watched Raquel step out of the girls’ restroom. She was coughing around a vape pen, awkwardly adjusting the braided bracelet on her wrist. Her eyes were glazed with a bizarre, feverish joy. I almost had to hand it to Raquel. Even when she had no idea what she was doing, she had managed to fill out her entire scantron, giving Harper the illusion of a perfect cheat sheet. Someone walking by asked, “Hey Raquel, you filled out every bubble today. Think you pulled off a miracle?” Raquel didn’t even look up, her speech slightly slurred. “Whatever. I just bubbled random crap. Realized at the end I messed up the numbering on the free response anyway. Let’s see how much partial credit they give me.” Standing in the shadows, I had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from laughing out loud. That night, the classroom was mostly empty. I finally had a moment of quiet to study. I was just finishing my review of my mistake log, preparing to tackle a few high-level practice problems, when the doors banged open and the crowd surged back in. “Harper is so rich! She ordered literally every signature dish on the menu. I am so stuffed!” “I never thought I’d get to eat a three-hundred-dollar slice of cake. I’m going to brag about this forever!” They knew Harper hated me. Seeing me sitting quietly, studying, was an invitation. One of them stormed over and snatched the prep book right out from under my pen. “Look at Blair, working so hard. Too bad no matter how much you kill yourself studying, our Harper will always score higher than you.” “Harper is a natural genius. Not like this dumb pig who just memorizes textbooks. Harper could sleep through the year and still get into Harvard.” They started tossing my prep book back and forth like a football. One of them deliberately dropped it and stepped on it, leaving a dirty footprint across the cover. “Harper. Call off your dogs.” I set my pen down on the desk with a sharp clack. My voice dropped an octave, cutting through the noise. “If you keep this up, I’m going home right now. I won’t show up for the exams tomorrow, and none of you will have anyone left to push around.” The room erupted into laughter. They slammed their hands on the desks. “Then don’t show up! Who cares?” “Please, drop out! One less person means my class rank goes up. Go home, loser!” But Harper’s smile vanished. Her face went rigid. If I didn’t test, who was she going to copy from? She immediately stepped forward, her voice sharp. “Enough! Stop messing around. It’s a good thing Blair works so hard. You have to let the students who don’t have natural talent try their best.” She glared at her followers. “I’m actually getting mad. Whoever bothers Blair while she’s studying is uninvited from the post-exam victory party.” It worked like magic. Someone even wiped the footprint off my book and slammed it back onto my desk with an eye roll. Harper then pulled out a brand-new, expensive set of final mock exams. She slid them onto my desk, an unspoken command. I smiled coldly, accepting the gift. Thanks to her warning, the rest of exam week went perfectly smoothly. No one dared to breathe in my direction. When the final bell rang on the last day, I capped my pen. A tidal wave of cheers and screams erupted from the halls, shaking the very walls of the school. The sky outside was burning with a brilliant, fiery sunset. The school gates were mobbed with local news reporters and parents clutching massive bouquets. I walked out slowly. Through the crowd, I spotted Tristan. He was handing a massive arrangement of imported roses to Harper. “Congratulations on surviving, Harper,” he said, his voice carrying. “Hidden in the flowers is that necklace from the auction you loved. I had it flown in from overseas just for you.” He smiled, a perfect picture of devotion. “I hope this is the start of an incredible summer.” Gasps rippled through the crowd. Phones were whipped out to record the fairy-tale moment. Even the local reporters swarmed in, cameras flashing. Through the sea of people, both of them made eye contact with me. They didn’t flinch. They didn’t try to hide. Of course they didn’t. As far as they were concerned, my usefulness had been entirely drained. All they had to do now was wait seven days for my brain to rot and my body to die. I turned away, only to catch sight of Miles standing near the edge of the crowd. He looked sullen, a dark cloud hanging over him. He was like a completely different person. He looked right through me, pretending I didn’t exist. “Move. You’re in my way,” he snarled, shoving past me to push his way toward Harper’s side. Standing there beneath the heavy shade of the oak trees, I felt like the entire world had abandoned me. And yet, I felt like I held the entire world in the palm of my hand. Even if I was entirely isolated, as long as my mind belonged to me, I could walk through fire alone and feel like an army. Before, I had been too focused on my future to deal with them. But now? Now it was my turn to systematically dismantle them. The moment I got in the car, I made the calls. I canceled their supplementary Black Cards. I called the estate manager and had the security codes to the mansion changed, revoking all guest access. “From today on, Tristan is no longer my brother. He is an adopted ward who has continuously crossed the line, and his time under our roof is over,” I ordered coldly over the phone. “Seize every asset currently in his name. Freeze his accounts. If anyone on staff so much as opens a door for him, they’re fired.” That evening, I ate a quiet meal prepared by our private French chef. I drew a bath with rose petals, soaking until the tension melted from my muscles, and then sank into my sprawling bed. When I finally checked my phone, my feed was choked with Harper’s posts. A drone light show. A private yacht party. Photos of absurdly expensive, rare gifts casually tossed on velvet cushions. Her caption read: [Graduation & Adulthood gifts. A magical night.] It really was quite the production. The class group chat was losing its collective mind: [Omg Harper, you kept saying you weren’t a billionaire heiress! This is literally out of a movie.] [I told you guys Harper was different. She’s old money, she just stays humble.] [So jealous. Beautiful, a genius, AND loaded. Did God even give you a flaw?] [Please don’t forget us little people, Harper! Let me work for you someday!] And of course, they couldn’t praise her without dragging me down. [Where is Blair? Didn’t she always hate Harper for taking first place? Why so quiet now?] [Lmao, she probably bombed the exams and is too ashamed to show her face. People who just grind textbooks can never beat real talent.] [That broke loser is probably scrubbing dishes at some diner right now to pay for community college tuition.] I scrolled past the malice without a flicker of emotion. My attention was solely focused on a text message I had received half an hour ago from the manager of the Four Seasons. [Miss Prescott, the young master arrived with a young lady and requested the Presidential Suite along with our highest-tier service package. However, his cards are declining. He asked us to put it on your tab. Do you authorize this?] I almost threw up. You want to sleep with her, and you want me to pay for the room? The sheer audacity. I held down the microphone button and replied. “What young master? There is only one heir to the Prescott family, and that is me. If this stranger wants to play pretend billionaire but doesn’t have the cash, tell him to take out a payday loan.”

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On the night of my birthday, my husband—who worked as a contractor for a highly classified defense intelligence agency—sent me a Zelle transfer for $5,000. [Baby, an emergency came up at the agency. I’m stuck working late. I am so sorry I can’t be there to celebrate with you.] The notification glowed on my screen. And in that exact moment, I was standing in the shadowed alcove of my own corporate building’s lobby, watching him walk through the revolving glass doors. His arm was wrapped tightly around his adopted sister. “This is the last time I’m giving in to you,” I heard him murmur, his voice echoing faintly against the marble walls. “Next year, no matter what, I’m spending her birthday with her.” Madison, his adopted sister, leaned into his side with a breathy, saccharine laugh, holding up a sleek, silver box of ultra-thin condoms. “Our very first time was in your company’s executive boardroom,” she whispered, tracing his jawline. “It’s only poetic that our last time happens in the exact same place.” My fingers tightened around my paper coffee cup until the cardboard buckled. The iced latte inside suddenly felt like battery acid in my veins. Pulling out my phone, I drafted an emergency email to my executive team, excluding only Madison, who officially worked in our marketing department. [Urgent: The client has moved up the contract signing. All department heads, meet in the main executive boardroom in twenty minutes.] If they wanted a thrill, I thought, my heart beating a slow, hollow rhythm against my ribs. If they wanted a show. I was about to give them a finale they would never, ever forget. … [Hey, Dave? Can you remotely access the dome camera in the main executive boardroom from the backend?] [Yes, exactly. I want to make sure we capture this historic signing on tape. Great, just route the live feed to my phone, please.] Hanging up, I opened the security application on my phone, my fingers trembling so badly I almost dropped the device. The live feed buffered, then snapped into crisp, high-definition color. The exact spot where Harry and Madison were currently writhing against each other was dead center of the massive mahogany conference table. Right beneath the unblinking eye of the camera. “Harry,” Madison purred, her voice tinny but clear through the audio feed. “What do you think Caroline would do if she knew… that every single year, the birthday lingerie you buy her is something I’ve already broken in for you?” She arched her back, and the camera caught the unmistakable scalloped edges of a black La Perla set. “Do you think she’d thank me for test-driving it?” Recognizing the delicate lace—the exact brand and style Harry gifted me every single birthday—a scalding heat flooded my eyes. My stomach pitched violently, the world tilting on its axis as bile rose hot and sharp in the back of my throat. I had to brace my hand against the cold plaster wall just to stay upright. We had been married for six years. And for six years, on every single birthday, he had found an excuse to be absent. I had always given him the benefit of the doubt. His work in defense intelligence was strictly confidential; he couldn’t control his hours. Or so I thought. I couldn’t have imagined, even in my darkest nightmares, that every time I sat alone in our dimly lit dining room, blowing out my candles and wishing for a long, happy life with my husband… he was locked inside my company’s boardroom with his adopted sister, desecrating every vow we had ever made. A frigid draft swept through the corridor, making me shiver uncontrollably. “Ms. Brooks?” I jumped, turning to see my executive assistant standing a few feet away, accompanied by a small camera crew. “The PR team and the corporate videographer are here,” she said, oblivious to the earthquake happening inside my chest. “With this live stream, our shareholders and the public will see us finalize the strategic partnership with Carmichael Industries in real time. It’s going to be a massive PR win for our stock.” I forced the corners of my mouth up into a smile, taking the bottle of water she offered to wash the bitter taste from my mouth. “Keep the camera discrete for now,” I instructed, my voice eerily calm. “We go live in fifteen seconds. And no matter what happens in that room, the stream does not cut. Understood?” With the stage set, I led my team toward the private executive elevators to wait for our VIPs: Harry’s father, Arthur Cole (a major shareholder); my own father, Richard Brooks; and our billionaire client, Victor Carmichael. When the elevator doors chimed and slid open, I plastered on my best professional warmth. “Dad, Victor. Right this way.” But as we stepped off the elevator and approached the boardroom wing, the pristine hallway told a different story. A pale blue women’s blazer lay crumpled on the carpet. Without missing a beat, I bent down, picking it up and draping it over my arm. A few steps later, two five-inch Louboutin stilettos lay violently discarded near the wall. And hanging off the heavy brass handle of the boardroom door? A single, sheer black stocking. As I feigned shock, clumsily trying to gather the trail of discarded clothes, the three older men stopped dead in their tracks. They looked at the messy bundle in my arms, then at me—dressed impeccably in my tailored trousers and silk blouse. Victor Carmichael cleared his throat, an uncomfortable, amused smile playing on his lips. “Well. Making your employees work on a Friday night is a bit draconian, Caroline. I hope us old men aren’t interrupting some young executives blowing off steam?” By now, the rest of my staff had arrived via the main elevators, congregating behind us in the corridor. I forced a tight, embarrassed laugh, shaking my head. I pressed my hand flat against the heavy double doors of the boardroom and pushed with all my might. “Let’s see what kind of scandal we’re walking into, shall we?” But before the door could swing fully open, someone shoved it back from the inside. Harry slipped through the narrow gap, his tie entirely gone, his dress shirt misbuttoned and untucked. His face, flushed a deep, feverish red, drained of all color the second he saw the crowd. “Dad? M-Mr. Brooks?” he stammered, his eyes darting wildly. “Isn’t it… isn’t today Friday? What are you all doing here?” Then, his gaze dropped to the shredded black stocking in my hand. He looked past me, realizing there were nearly fifty employees standing in the hallway, phones buzzing, whispers erupting. In a display of sheer, unadulterated audacity, Harry stepped forward and pulled me into a tight embrace, his hands gripping my waist like a vice. “Caroline, honey,” he said, his voice dripping with forced affection. “Why didn’t you tell me you had a meeting?” He ducked his head, pressing his mouth so close to my ear I could smell the sweat and sex on his skin. “Everyone is looking,” he hissed, his tone desperate. “Play along. It’s not what you think. I will explain everything later.” Feeling the frantic thud of his heart against my chest, a wave of profound physical revulsion washed over me. I shoved hard against his chest, breaking the embrace. “I apologize, gentlemen. How unprofessional of us,” I said loudly, projecting my voice. “Dad, Arthur, why don’t you take Victor to the VIP lounge for a few minutes? I’ll have maintenance clear the room, and we will begin the signing in five minutes.” Harry let out a breath he’d been holding, his shoulders dropping in relief. But the relief made him cocky. Instantly, his tone shifted from pleading to patronizing. “Caroline, what has gotten into you?” he scolded, playing the role of the rational husband. “You can’t make Victor wait. Doesn’t this floor have that smaller conference room down the hall? Let’s just use that one for tonight.” He shot a panicked, meaningful look at his father. Arthur Cole, a man who had built his fortune on reading between the lines and burying bodies, caught the look immediately. “Yes, exactly,” Arthur chimed in smoothly, stepping forward. “Harry is right. The small room will do just fine.” He practically bowed as he reached out to shake Victor’s hand. “My apologies, Victor. You know how disorganized the younger generation can be. Let’s head this way.” He was trying to herd everyone away. He wanted to clear the hallway so Madison—who was undoubtedly still trapped inside the main boardroom, naked and terrified—could make her escape. Not a chance in hell. “Arthur,” I said, my voice sharp enough to cut glass. “I can forgive Harry for not knowing the layout of our office, considering he doesn’t work here. But surely you know better.” I gestured to the sea of employees behind me. “The small boardroom holds twenty people. There are over fifty department heads and staff members here. Are we supposed to have them stand in the hallway during a multi-million-dollar merger?” I turned to Harry, a sweet, poisoned smile on my face. “Honestly, Harry. I work a late shift, change into something comfortable, and ask you to put my clothes away when you drop by to visit… and you just leave them scattered in the hall? You’re giving everyone the wrong idea.” I linked my arm through Victor Carmichael’s. “Victor, let’s head inside. I promised my team triple overtime for this sudden Friday night pivot. If I delay them any longer, I’m going to have a mutiny on my hands.” As the crowd surged forward toward the main doors, Harry threw his body in front of the handle, his eyes wild with terror. “Caroline, please,” he begged, his voice cracking. “Just listen to me. Use the other room. Please.” My father, Richard, wasn’t an idiot. Watching my sudden, icy demeanor and Harry’s manic desperation, the pieces clicked together in his mind. His face darkened into a thundercloud. “Arthur,” my father barked, looking at Harry’s dad. “What the hell is going on in that room that your boy is so terrified of us seeing?” Without waiting for an answer, my father grabbed Harry by the shoulder, shoved him aside, and threw open the boardroom doors. He marched inside, the lights automatically flickering on. “All this sneaking around,” my father boomed. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say the boy had a woman hidden in—” His voice died in his throat. Right in the center of the polished mahogany table lay a crumpled bra and a torn pair of lace panties. My father didn’t hesitate. He spun around, grabbed Harry by the lapels, and drove his fist straight into Harry’s jaw. The crack echoed through the room as Harry hit the floor. “You son of a bitch!” my dad roared, kicking Harry hard in the ribs. “You actually dared to cheat on my daughter? Who is it? Who’s the whore you’ve got in here?” My dad pointed a shaking finger at the pile of clothes I had collected. “I knew the second the elevator doors opened. That blazer, those heels—Caroline wouldn’t be caught dead in that trashy garbage!” He reached for his jacket buttons, ready to drop down and beat Harry into a pulp, but Arthur grabbed him, pulling him back. “Richard, wait! Don’t do this here!” Arthur pleaded. Harry scrambled backward, blood dripping from his lip. He grabbed the underwear off the table and blindly reached under a nearby chair, pulling out a pink Victoria’s Secret shopping bag. “Dad! Mr. Brooks, you’ve got it all wrong!” Harry cried, his voice shrill. “It’s a gift! I bought it for Caroline for her birthday! It just… it fell out of the bag, and I hadn’t picked it up yet!” He looked up at me, his eyes begging me to throw him a lifeline. “Tell them, Caroline. Tell them! Haven’t I bought you a set just like this every year for the past six years?” The sheer, breathtaking cowardice of the man I married made my skin crawl. I swallowed the bile rising in my throat. I calmly walked over, took the crumpled lace from his shaking hands, and dropped it into the nearest trash can, along with the heels and the blazer. “Dad, stop. He’s telling the truth,” I lied smoothly. I instructed the bewildered staff to take their seats. As they filed in, I let my eyes sweep the massive room. I was hunting. Madison had to be completely naked right now. The room was sleek, modern, minimal. The only place big enough to hide a human body was under the massive oak table. But when Harry had dropped to the floor to grab the bag, I had already checked the sightlines beneath the chairs. Nothing. There was only one other place. In the far corner of the room sat our industrial-grade architectural plotter and printer—a machine the size of a small car, with a massive hollow storage chassis at the bottom meant for spare toner and oversized paper rolls. To test my theory, I casually walked toward the corner, pretending to examine the thermostat on the wall near the printer. Instantly, a cold sweat broke out on Harry’s forehead. He lunged out of his chair, grabbing my elbow with a bruising grip. “Caroline,” he said rapidly, his eyes dilated. “Did you get the Venmo I sent you? The five thousand dollars?” “What money?” I asked, playing dumb and reaching for my phone. He snatched my hand away. “Never mind. Just… look at it later. Let’s get through this meeting, and then I’m taking you out. You wanted to go to that rooftop restaurant to see the fireworks, right? We’ll go tonight. Just the two of us.” I forced a smile, looking deeply into his panicked eyes. “Okay.” I was certain now. Madison was curled up inside the belly of that printer. I turned back to the table and signaled for my assistant to pause. “Victor, I am so sorry,” I announced loudly. “There is a glaring typo on page four of the financial disclosures. It’s an unacceptable oversight by my team, and it will be dealt with.” I looked at my assistant. “I need ten minutes. Have someone print a fresh, corrected copy of the contract right now. Use the machine in the corner.” “No!” The shout came from both Harry and his father simultaneously. No? I thought, a cold, dead calm settling over my heart. I don’t think you get a say in this anymore. I knew Arthur. I knew he had recognized Madison’s blazer in the hallway. I knew he had put the pieces together. The only reason he was playing along, pretending this was just a misunderstanding, was because he assumed I would protect the family’s reputation. He assumed I was a good, compliant wife who would rather swallow glass than cause a public scandal. What neither of them understood was that beneath my polished exterior, I was uncompromising. If you crossed my bottom line, I would burn the earth to ash to make you pay. I shot a subtle, loaded look at my father. He read my face instantly. “Victor, don’t worry,” my dad stepped in, his voice booming with authority. “We will have the corrected documents in your hands in less than ten minutes.” Arthur stepped forward, his face pale and sweating. “Is that the only printer in the building?” he snapped at my assistant. “Go use the one in marketing! You’re going to disturb Victor with that loud machine in here.” Arthur frantically poured a glass of water, offering it to Victor with a shaky hand. “Kids these days, Victor. No sense of decorum. Forgive them.” My assistant froze, looking at me for direction. My father leaned back in his leather chair, crossing his arms. He looked at Arthur with a predatory smirk. “Arthur, why are you sweating? It’s just a printer.” I tilted my head, adopting a look of innocent confusion. “Honestly, Harry, you and your dad are acting so bizarrely tonight. Is there something you’re hiding from me?” I crossed my arms, subtly angling my body so the videographer’s camera had a clear, unobstructed shot of the machine. “Are you really hiding a woman in here, like my dad said?” I teased, walking in a slow circle around the room. “But where would she be? The room is practically empty.” I stopped directly in front of the massive printer, staring at the ventilation grates on the lower housing. “It’s not like she could fit inside the paper tray, right?” Arthur’s face turned a sickly shade of gray. Harry held his hands up, his voice cracking with hysteria. “I swear to God, Caroline, I haven’t betrayed you! You’re taking this joke too far! Victor is our most important client, you’re being incredibly disrespectful!” He was still trying to gaslight me. He was still banking on my obedience. If Arthur and Harry were so determined to bury their heads in the sand, I was going to force their hand. Madison had two choices. One: She could push the hatch open, crawl out completely naked in front of fifty people and a live-streaming camera, and admit to the world that she had been sleeping with her adoptive brother. Two: She could stay inside the machine. And when the massive industrial gears and rollers fired up, she could see how much pressure human bone could take. I stared into Arthur’s eyes, entirely deadpan. “Three minutes have passed,” I said coldly. “Victor has a nine o’clock flight back to New York.”

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Ever since the Kensingtons’ biological daughter returned to the estate, she made it her mission to orchestrate my downfall. First, it was the jewelry her parents bought her—mysteriously lost, then miraculously discovered in my bedroom. Then, it was the severe allergic reaction to the luxury skincare I had given her. She would stand there, her face inflamed, whispering that she had no intention of stealing my boyfriends, begging me to stop trying to ruin her face. And finally, it culminated in this: she deliberately sliced her own arm with a letter opener, sank to her knees, pale and trembling, and accused me of trying to kill her. She demanded that our parents make a choice. Only one daughter could stay. I was exhausted by the relentless, chaotic noise of it all. If my adoptive parents were too paralyzed by optics to handle this toxic girl, then fine. I would simply get new parents. After all, the mayor of my biological family’s hometown had already promised that the second I came home, they would commission a bronze plaque in the town square just for me. 1 “Mom, Dad, why are you always taking her side? I’m your actual flesh and blood!” Mia clutched the bleeding cut on her forearm, her face a mask of absolute tragedy. The accusation in her eyes was heavy, suffocating. Richard and Caroline Kensington stared at the blood seeping through Mia’s fingers. Deep creases formed between my adoptive parents’ brows, but their lips remained pressed in a tight, helpless line. I was the one who finally broke the silence. I calmly bent down, picked up the silver letter opener from the Persian rug, and held it out to her. Mia instantly scrambled backward, her eyes widening in manufactured terror. “Blair, what are you doing?! Are you trying to stab me again? Do you think just because Mom and Dad favor you, you can get away with murder?” I looked at her the way one might look at a piece of gum stuck to the bottom of a shoe. “Obviously,” I said, a slow, provocative smile spreading across my face. “If they didn’t favor the daughter they actually raised, why would they favor a latecomer like you?” The hatred in Mia’s eyes darkened, turning venomous. I just smiled. Go ahead and hate me, I thought. There was a distinct, sharp pleasure in watching her seethe—despising me, yet entirely powerless to defeat me. Mia had hated me from the moment she discovered she was the true Kensington heiress. She had taken a Greyhound bus straight to our gated driveway in Connecticut, demanded a DNA test, and shattered the reality I had known for eighteen years. It happened on the exact same day I had brought home the first-place trophy for the National Math Olympiad. Richard and Caroline had initially dismissed her as a con artist. It took police intervention for them to finally agree to the test. The results confirmed it. She was the real Kensington. I, of course, was the imposter. But they didn’t send me away. The investigation revealed it was a hospital clerical error—a exhausted nurse, two swapped bassinets in the dead of night. No malice, no kidnapping. I was innocent. More importantly, I was exceptional. I was the masterpiece Richard and Caroline had meticulously curated for eighteen years. I was their pride, their flawless investment. They were entirely unwilling to give me up. Especially not when I had just secured an early-admission full ride to MIT. If they sent me packing, my future glory would no longer belong to the Kensington name. From that moment on, Mia’s hatred for me solidified into an obsession. My parents, to their credit, were drowning in guilt. They felt they had failed Mia, horrified that they hadn’t even possessed the parental instinct to recognize their own child. In the beginning, they desperately tried to overcompensate. Their logic was simple: if a girl with absolutely no Kensington blood could be molded into a genius under their roof, then their actualbiological daughter would surely be extraordinary. But the longer they lived with Mia, the more they had to swallow a bitter pill. Mia possessed a certain cunning, a street-level manipulative streak, but absolutely no vision. Even her attempts to frame me were painfully amateurish. High society was already whispering about the return of the lost Kensington heiress. Expectations were sky-high. My parents were living in a constant state of low-grade panic, practically hiding Mia from the country club circuit. It was like holding a worthless, plunging stock while everyone around you congratulated you on a windfall; they couldn’t explain the truth without dying of embarrassment. So, they begged me to keep the peace. To tolerate her. To ensure no humiliating scandals leaked out of the estate. But my patience had officially expired. 2 Mia’s first attempt to frame me involved a custom gold Cartier Love bracelet. Caroline had taken her shopping and bought it as a welcome gift. Mia treated it like the Holy Grail. She had clearly never owned anything of real value before. Consequently, she made a point of casually dragging her wrist across my line of sight at every conceivable opportunity. She had noticed I rarely wore jewelry around the house, and in her mind, that equated to my parents neglecting me. When I completely ignored her glittering wrist, my message was clear: I don’t care about your jewelry, get out of my space. But Mia misread the room. She thought I was masking my crushing jealousy. She had no idea that I had an entire velvet-lined vault of similar pieces—birthday and Christmas gifts accumulated over eighteen years from my parents and grandparents. So, when she rushed down the mahogany staircase the next morning, sobbing that her bracelet had vanished, Richard and Caroline froze. “Mom, Dad,” Mia wept, her eyes shimmering with perfectly timed tears. “That bracelet was the first real gift you ever gave me. I—I can’t bear that it’s gone. Could you please help me find it?” My parents exchanged a grim look. I simply leaned against the marble kitchen island, crossing my arms, ready for the show. After they had torn through Mia’s bedroom and found nothing, she quietly suggested they search Marta’s quarters. Marta, our housekeeper, was visibly stunned. “Mr. and Mrs. Kensington,” she stammered, her hands trembling against her apron. “I have worked in this house for fifteen years. I practically raised Blair. I would never steal from this family!” Besides the sheer insult of the accusation, Marta wore a thick, solid gold bangle of her own on her wrist. My parents paid her an exorbitant salary, and her family had just sold a massive plot of real estate in Queens. She didn’t need to steal Mia’s trinket. I stepped up, my voice cutting through the tension like glass. “Mia, Marta wouldn’t touch your bracelet. You were practically shoving it in my face all day yesterday. I highly suggest you trace your own steps before you start accusing the people who keep this house running.” Mia’s lower lip quivered. “Blair, why are you so defensive? Is it because Mom and Dad bought me gold and didn’t buy you anything? I just want my bracelet back. It doesn’t mean they love me more than you. You really don’t need to be so insecure.” I stared at her. Insecure? Where on earth was she getting this script? Marta, refusing to let me take the heat, swallowed her pride. Though her face was tight with humiliation, she agreed to let Mia search her room. I rested a hand on Marta’s shoulder, my voice softening. “Don’t let it get to you, Marta. When summer break hits, I’m taking you on a vacation to Europe. Just you and me.” Marta let out a breathless, appreciative laugh. “Thank you, sweetheart.” Mia’s jaw clenched. She had likely never heard of an employer taking a housekeeper on a luxury vacation. But in our world, loyalty was rewarded. Predictably, Mia found nothing in Marta’s quarters. But she accomplished one thing: Marta would never look at her with an ounce of warmth again. “Did you find what you were looking for, miss?” Marta asked, her voice entirely devoid of emotion. Mia rubbed her red eyes. “I guess it isn’t in here…” “Apologize to Marta,” Richard ordered, his voice echoing like a whip crack down the hallway. Mia bit her lip, looking at my father as if he had just slapped her. Marta, despising Mia but refusing to let my father lose face, started to wave it off. Before she could, I spoke up. “Marta, on behalf of my little sister, I apologize. When we go abroad, you can pick out whatever you want. My treat.” Marta smiled warmly. “You’re too good to me, Blair.” Mia looked like she was choking on ash. Her entire goal had been to assert dominance, to remind Marta who the realblood of the house was. But Marta gave me everything she possessed, and gave Mia nothing. In Mia’s mind, because she was the biological daughter, the staff should instinctively bow to her. She just couldn’t comprehend why the world wasn’t rearranging itself to fit her narrative. “Blair, why do you constantly undermine me?” Mia asked later, catching me in the hall. “I just wanted to check her room. You didn’t need to buy her affection just to humiliate me. I know Marta favors you, and she hates me. But like I said, I’m just here to join the family. I never wanted to steal Mom and Dad’s love from you. Why don’t you just give the bracelet back?” I blinked. Oh. So that was the endgame. Smear the housekeeper, and when that failed, pivot the accusation to me. I almost admired the sheer audacity of it. I couldn’t wait to see how she planned to pull this off. 3 Marta had been present for Mia’s accusation. She immediately turned to my parents, appalled. “Mr. Kensington, Mrs. Kensington, I swear to you, I treat both girls exactly the same! The only difference in this house is that Mrs. Kensington designed a highly specific, nutrient-dense meal plan for Blair to support her late-night studying. Those supplements aren’t suited for Mia’s dietary needs, so I cook for them separately. That is all!” Caroline closed her eyes, rubbing her temples. “Marta is right. That was my doing. Marta treats you both fairly. Mia, please stop this nonsense. I’ll have a nutritionist draft a new menu for you tomorrow.” I raised an eyebrow. Given Mia’s absolute reliance on processed junk food and heavy meats, a Kensington-approved organic nutritional plan was going to be her own personal hell. A tear slipped down Mia’s cheek, splashing onto the floor. “Mom, I know you don’t believe me. Marta wouldn’t know any better, maybe she just doesn’t know Blair’s true character. Blair, I know you stared at my bracelet all day. It means the world to me. Please, just give it back.” I let out a harsh, incredulous laugh. “It might mean the world to you, but it’s utterly useless to me. What would I even do with it?” My private academy strictly prohibited flashy jewelry. All my pieces were locked in the velvet display cases in my walk-in. Mia’s crying escalated into a theatrical, breathless sob. Out of everything she had brought into this house, her weeping was what I despised most. She cried as if the universe owed her a cosmic debt. “Blair, please! Just let me look in your room. Mom, Dad, I’m begging you. That bracelet is everything to me.” But this time, Richard didn’t indulge her. “It is a piece of metal, Mia,” he snapped, his voice hard. “Your mother will take you to Fifth Avenue tomorrow and buy you two more. The Kensingtons do not tear each other apart over pocket change.” But Mia was relentless. “Dad, to you it’s just money. To me, it’s a symbol of your love! I can’t just replace it. And I don’t want to waste your money when I haven’t earned it. Please, let me check. If it’s not in Blair’s room, I will get on my knees and apologize, and I’ll never bring it up again.” Richard’s frown deepened. He had raised me. He knew the architecture of my character. Furthermore, he deeply despised people who fixated on trivial amounts of money. To him, Mia’s hyper-fixation on a single bracelet was aggressively lower-class. I stood off to the side, enjoying the theater. I wanted to see how far she would push it. She turned her tear-streaked face to me. “Blair, I know Mom and Dad adore you. You shouldn’t disappoint them like this. Or… are you refusing to let me search because the bracelet is already in there?” I almost laughed out loud. “What are you afraid of, Blair? Why won’t you let me look? Are you guilty?” Mia pushed, stepping closer. I let a lazy smile touch my lips. I was one hundred percent certain she had already planted the bracelet in my room. “Fine,” I said smoothly. “Mom, Dad, since she’s so desperate to see my room, let her.” I pushed open my bedroom door and gestured inside, playing the gracious host. My parents looked sick with stress, but Mia was entirely oblivious. She had been dying to get inside my bedroom since she arrived. The moment she had moved in, she had demanded the primary suite, but my parents had firmly placed her in a guest wing. She stepped inside, her eyes darting over the silk drapes and original artwork. Then, she spotted the discreet paneled door leading to my walk-in closet. She pushed it open, and I watched the color drain completely from her face. The closet was practically a boutique. Rows of current-season designer garments, handbags that cost more than a luxury car, and an illuminated glass display island in the center. Every single item in that room could have bought her precious bracelet ten times over. And as for the bracelet itself? She stared through the glass case and saw an identical Cartier Love bracelet resting on a velvet pillow. Except, she knew the one she had planted was hidden somewhere else entirely.

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