r/AnyNovelRequest

Chapter 1
Three weeks before the wedding, Kade said it over pasta. Not even good pasta. The kind from that overpriced midtown place he always picked because the lighting made him look distinguished. He twirled his fork, took a sip of wine, and said it like he was suggesting we try a new brunch spot. "I think Isla should be your maid of honor." I set down my fork. Not because I was about to cry. Not because I was shocked into silence. I set it down because something inside my chest went very, very quiet—the way a room goes quiet right before a fire alarm screams. "She never got to have that experience," he continued. His voice was smooth. Practiced. "Her first wedding was so small. It would mean the world to her. And honestly, Eva, it would show everyone how mature we are. How secure." I looked at him across the candlelight. His jaw was relaxed. His eyes were steady. He actually believed this was a reasonable sentence to say out loud to his pregnant fiancée three weeks before their wedding. "Sure," I said. "Let me think about it." He smiled and reached over to squeeze my hand. "That's my girl." I smiled back. Inside, every suppressed suspicion I'd carried for two years detonated, one by one, like charges set along a foundation wall. --- I didn't sleep that night. Kade was out before eleven, one arm thrown over his face, breathing slow and even. I lay beside him for exactly twenty-two minutes. Then I picked up his phone from the nightstand. His passcode was my birthday. He'd made a point of telling me that once, like it was romantic. I found the wire transfers in under four minutes. Monthly. Consistent. Two years of them. I pulled up the spreadsheet app on my own phone and started logging numbers. When I hit $180,000, I stopped and just stared at the ceiling for a moment. Then I opened his Venmo. There it was. A masterpiece of petty, meticulous accounting. A request for $2.13—*half of afternoon coffee, 3/14.* A request for $47.50—*calligraphy deposit, your half.* A request for $18.00—*wedding stamp book, split evenly.* I had paid every single one. Same day, usually. Because I loved him and I thought his frugality was just how he was wired. I sat in the dark bathroom on the cold tile floor and pulled up his archived hospital email on the shared cloud account he'd forgotten I had access to. I wasn't even looking for it. I was looking for anything. A receipt. A text chain. Proof that I wasn't losing my mind. I found the Mount Sinai incident report instead. Date: fourteen months ago. The night of my mother's emergency cardiac surgery. The night I sat alone in that waiting room for four hours because Kade had been called in as lead surgeon and I trusted him completely. The report was clinical. Bureaucratic. It didn't know how to be cruel. *Attending surgeon exited OR at 21:47 during critical phase of procedure. Junior surgeon Dr. Marcus Reeves assumed lead. Patient stabilized.* I scrolled to the attached voicemail transcript. Isla's voice, rendered in plain text. *Mochi got hit by a car. I need you NOW. Please, Kade. Please.* Timestamp: 21:44. Three minutes. He'd waited three minutes before walking out of my mother's open chest. I read it twice. Then I set my phone face-down on the tile. I pressed both palms flat against the cold floor. I breathed. My mother almost died on that table. And I had spent fourteen months being grateful to Kade for "being there" that night. I didn't cry. I made a list. --- By seven the next morning, I had called two people. First was Petra Voss, my attorney. Petra had the kind of mind that treated loopholes like personal enemies. She'd drafted our prenuptial agreement six months ago, and I'd let her be aggressive with the liability clauses because I thought we'd never need them. When I laid out what I'd found, she was quiet for exactly four seconds. "The clauses hold," she said. "Every one of them. Don't change a single thing before the wedding." "I won't," I said. "I just need you to confirm the cancellation penalty structure one more time." She confirmed it. Two point five million dollars, sole liability, non-negotiable, fully executable upon breach of contract or unilateral dissolution. Kade had signed it without reading past page three. I remembered watching him flip through it. He'd been on his phone half the time. The second call was to Simone Hartley, my closest colleague at Sotheby's. Simone had been auctioneering for eleven years. She had steady hands and a very short list of people she actually liked. I was on it. "I need the livestream contract locked in my name only," I told her. "Two million viewers minimum. Not a single clause changes hands." A pause. "Eva. What are you planning?" "The best auction of my career," I said. She laughed, low and sharp. "Tell me what you need." I told her everything. An hour later, I walked back into our apartment. Kade was in the kitchen in his robe, making coffee. He looked up and smiled. "Morning, beautiful. You sleep okay?" I crossed the room and kissed him on the cheek. His skin was warm. He smelled like expensive soap. "Like a baby," I said. "Have you eaten?" He hadn't. I made him eggs. I stood at that stove and I flipped them perfectly, and I thought about $2.13 and a voicemail and an operating room at 9:47 PM, and I smiled the whole time. Three weeks was plenty.

Please help me find this! Thank you!

Serena Blackwell married to Dominic with daughter Lily. Her best fried and his mistress was Vanessa. Dominic tricked Serena into signing a medical release to give Lily’s heart to Vanessa.

Natalie Shaw suddenly blacked out while being intimate with her boyfriend, Felix Harrison.

In a haze, she overheard him talking to Steven Keller, his friend who was a doctor.

Steven gave her a quick check and asked solemnly, "Felix, did you drug Natalie so you could secretly take her bone marrow for Mabel?"

Felix gently brushed some hair from Natalie's face. "Yeah. The poison I used is mild. If it reacts more during intimacy, it causes less harm overall."

Steven sighed deeply as he adjusted the medical tools.

"I truly don't get what's going through your head. Sure, Mabel tricked you back then. You chased her to the airport, crashed your car, went into a coma, and ended up blind. Has she ever shown up since? It was Natalie who stayed by your side.

"Let's be honest. If she hadn't cared for you, you might've been long gone because of Mabel.

"Now that Mabel's sick and dumped, she suddenly tells you the child is yours, and you just believe her? You even got married to her, and now you're stealing Natalie's bone marrow to save her. How can you be this heartless?"

Natalie's fingers twitched slightly, but no one noticed.

The sound of tools clinking filled the ward, along with Felix's weary voice.

"Mabel showed me a DNA test. I only got the marriage certificate so her kid would have a legal father. I've made sure all the news is sealed off so Natalie won't find out.

"Seventeen years ago, there was a fire at an art exhibition. My mom was trapped inside and had an asthma attack. Mabel found her medicine and helped her get out first.

"Even if we didn't have a child, I'd still give her everything."

Steven slammed the device down furiously.

"What about Natalie? She's been nothing but genuine with you. Don't tell me you never felt anything."

Felix didn't answer right away. After a few seconds of silence, he said hoarsely, "I only got with Natalie to make Mabel jealous. I didn't know things would turn out like this.

"But the wedding plans won't change. I'll just fake a marriage certificate with Natalie.

"I'll make it up to her. Get ready and send her to the operating room..."

Natalie had no idea how long she'd been unconscious. When she came to, her head was foggy, and her mind couldn't focus.

But the conversation she heard while unconscious kept echoing in her mind.

The fire had always haunted her.

Seventeen years ago, she was only nine and was caught in a terrible fire. After countless surgeries, she finally managed to live normally again. Even now, she hated thinking about it.

At 16, she met Felix at an art contest. Both he and his painting left a lasting impression on her.

She kept her feelings hidden for five years because he already had a childhood sweetheart—Mabel Jefferson.

But Mabel didn't like him. Two days after agreeing to date him, she got involved with someone else.

When Felix confessed to Natalie, she felt surprised and nervous, but she couldn't help falling for his tenderness and love.

Then came the accident. On their college graduation day, he crashed his car and fell into a coma. Mabel disappeared.

Natalie gave up a chance to study overseas to stay by Felix's side. Her father was so angry that he threatened to break off relations with her. He even moved the family to New York, forbidding her mother and brother from sharing the address.

When Felix woke up, he was like a wounded animal, hurting anyone who approached him.

Except for Natalie. No matter how crazy he got, she stayed.

One day, Felix slashed his wrist. Natalie tried to stop him and ended up with cuts.

They collapsed into the bloody tub, and somehow, they started doing intimate things crazily.

"Natalie, don't leave me!"

After that, everything spiraled out of control.

For over six years, Natalie had stayed by his side, shared everything with him, and tried to bring light into his dark world.

But now, she finally saw the truth. What she thought was love had been a lie from the beginning.

Felix poisoned her and slept with her on the night he proposed, just to take her bone marrow and save Mabel.

They even had a child.

Natalie grabbed her phone to call her family, but the first thing she saw was a friend request.

It was from Mabel.

After she accepted it, a message came right away.

"You're finally awake? Felix was worried I might relapse and need your bone marrow again, so he kept you unconscious for over six months. My apologies."

She also sent a copy of her and Felix's marriage certificate.

Natalie searched the current date online and was stunned to learn she had been kept in a drugged coma for half a year.

With trembling lips, she dialed her elder brother's number.

"Liam, I want to go home. If I agree to the arranged marriage, do you think Mom and Dad will forgive me?"

The day before school starts, Mom posted a screenshot of a money transfer in the family group chat.

I’d just gotten a thousand dollars, my heart leaping with hope, when Mom tagged me directly in the thread.

[Wallace, send that money over to your sister.]

I blinked, typing back: [Didn’t you send that to me?]

A voice note popped up immediately, sharp and clipped. “That money goes into both of Nana’s bank accounts so she won’t run short. How dare you think you deserve cash when your grades are garbage? Send it right back, or you’ll regret it.”

Tears stung my eyes, but I sent the full thousand back.

My account balance dropped to three dollars. I was about to ask if she could spare two hundred, only to find I’d been kicked out of the group.

Dad pulled me aside to comfort me. “Your mom’s just harsh but well-meaning, she means well. Take these three hundred. Don’t take it to heart. Pack your things; we’ll drive you two over to Duke University tomorrow.”

I wiped my eyes and loaded my luggage into the car that night. Yet when dawn broke, my suitcase lay discarded out on the driveway.

The heavy black hard-shell suitcase hit the ground, sliding across the concrete, its old lock cracking clean open.

Mom blocked the car door with one arm, her tone flat. “Nana’s got way too much luggage. There isn’t room. You’ll have to get there on your own.”

Dad tried to speak up for me, but one cold look from Mom shut him down instantly.

“I told you not to apply to Duke. We can’t drop two kids off there. This is what you get for not listening.”

I stared at the wide-open backseat, throat burning.

The trunk was stuffed full of Nadia’s belongings, plus gift bags for professors and new classmates. There was simply no spot left for my twenty-four-inch suitcase.

I should have known. Their perfect little family of three had never had space for an extra like me.

Duke, though, was never my real destination. A bird with no home belonged farther north.

***

Frayed, faded hand-me-down clothes spilled halfway out of my broken suitcase—castoffs Nadia no longer wanted.

I stood out in the open, summer sunlight burning hot against my skin.

Inside the car, Nadia was curled across Mom’s lap in a brand-new designer sundress. The AC was cranked so high she shivered.

Mom reached over to turn it down without a second thought, then frowned when she noticed I hadn’t left. “What are you still doing standing there?”

In the old days, I would have bowed my head and mumbled, “Okay, I get it.”

Growing up, our schools had sat on opposite ends of town.

Nadia went to the fancy private school five minutes from home. I commuted two hours each way across the city to an underfunded public school. Mom and Dad always drove Nadia.

From age seven onward, I got up at five every morning, trudging through the freezing dawn to catch the bus. My overstuffed backpack weighed me down until one shoulder hung lower than the other.

Nadia wouldn’t get up until seven, hair done up in perfect princess braids. She had time for a leisurely breakfast on the ride. Her Elsa-printed backpack never touched the ground; either Mom or Dad carried it for her.

I’d begged them to drive me once. All I got was, “It’s too far. We have work.”

If I pushed further, I got snapped at. “Why don’t you get grades half as good as your sister, then?”

Twelve years of this back-and-forth. I ought to have grown used to it.

But watching my pale, polished sister in the cool car, then looking down at my sunburned arms, my feet rooted to the pavement.

“There’s an empty seat back there,” Dad said, glancing over his shoulder from the driver’s seat, his brow furrowed. “Wallace’s thin, she won’t take up much room. Let her ride with us.”

Mom was smoothing sunscreen across Nadia’s arms and rolled her eyes. “Jude, come on. Nana’s going to be gone for six whole months. We still need to run errands for her supplies on the drive. We promised her, we can’t back out now.”

“Three of you squish in the back, or one of you sit up front,” Dad insisted.

“Not a chance,” Mom huffed. “I’m not riding shotgun in this blazing heat, and neither is Nana.”

Sweat soaked through the back of my shirt. I opened my mouth to say I’d happily take the front seat.

Nadia cut me off, pouting slightly. “Mom, isn’t this kind of unfair to Wally? You’ve never once driven her to school. I really don’t need a ride, y’know. I’m strong enough to haul my own bags.”

She flexed her delicate arms beneath her puff-sleeve dress for show. “See? I’ve got muscles!”

Mom and Dad laughed, the heavy tension dissolving in an instant. Once again, I was the awkward one ruining everyone’s good mood.

Dad coughed quietly. “Don’t be silly. You’re way too little, we’d never feel safe letting you go alone.”

“Unfair?” Mom scoffed. “This is her own fault! I told her not to apply to the same school as Nana. She refused to listen. She needs to learn a lesson.”

Dad caved. “Wally, you’ll have to take the train.”

I twisted the hem of my shirt, words stuck tight in my throat. I said nothing.

Car doors slammed shut. A two-hundred-dollar Venmo transfer popped up on my phone screen. I stared at it for a long time, then tapped accept.

Late that night, Dad texted me: [I’m sorry this happened. I’ll help you move your stuff when you get to Duke.]

I glanced at my phone, where a shipping alert popped up.

I typed back: [I’m not coming to Duke.]

My parents had no clue. Duke was never where I intended to go.

I’d applied to Cornell, far up north. No short flights there, only endless train rides.