On the way to the celebration for my solo design exhibition, my husband, Harrison, received a call.

A woman's voice filled the car, piped through the Bluetooth system.

"I'm back. And I'm ready to take what's mine."

Harrison didn't respond. His jaw clenched as he wordlessly stabbed the end-call button.

I took it as a clear rejection.

Until late that night, when his lawyer delivered the divorce papers.

Staring into the impenetrable depths of his gray eyes, I calmly signed my name. "Do I need to move out tonight?" I asked.

He must have expected arguments or hysterics, because a rare flicker of surprise crossed his cold, ascetic face.

His Adam's apple bobbed. "No need," he said, his voice low. "This Manhattan penthouse will be transferred to your name tomorrow."

I offered him a brittle smile and nodded.

Harrison didn't know that for a man with his intense need for control, me walking away with his money—calmly and without a single tear—was the ultimate act of war.

————————

1

I glanced at Harrison’s chiseled profile. "It's late," I said softly. "You should get some rest. Don't you have a board meeting tomorrow? I'll take the guest room."

With that, I stood to leave.

As I passed him, he shot out a hand, his grip like an iron clamp on my wrist. The heat from his palm sent a jolt through my skin.

His brow was furrowed, his thin lips pressed into a hard line, as if he were wrestling with confusion, or perhaps suppressing a violent rage.

He demanded, "Avery, why aren't you fighting me on this?"

"And if I did? Would you call off the divorce? Or does the great CEO of the Hawthorne Group get off on watching women grovel at his feet?"

Harrison stiffened, his deep gray eyes boring into me. Finally, he said in a low voice, "I'm sorry. I'll compensate you."

I turned my head just enough to reveal the tell-tale redness in my eyes. "Okay," I whispered. "I believe you."

The living room lights stayed on all night.

The next day, when we went to the courthouse to formalize the divorce, the compensation section of the agreement had several new pages.

After the paperwork was finalized, Harrison took my hand—a first for him. His gaze dropped to my stomach. "Let's have a meal together," he said.

In the past, I would have been ecstatic.

It was so unlike him. Harrison, always so cold and detached, never initiated anything.

But now, I took a half-step back, smoothly withdrawing my hand. I looked down. "Mr. Hawthorne, that wouldn't be appropriate."

Harrison's frown deepened, clearly unaccustomed to the sudden distance between us.

"Avery," he said, a hint of irritation in his voice as his long fingers loosened his expensive silk tie, "a divorce doesn't mean we're enemies. I can still provide for you."

I paused, not answering.

After all, three years ago, he had told me I wasn't even worthy of breathing the same air as him.

Taking my silence as consent, Harrison opened the car door for me himself.

He had never done that for me before.

I lowered my eyes. "The morning sickness is awful. I can't stomach the smell of truffles and oysters at the kind of French restaurants you favor."

Harrison froze, as if the reality of my pregnancy had only just struck him. "I'm sorry," he repeated, his voice strained.

I nodded politely. "Then I won't trouble you, Mr. Hawthorne. I should be going."

Harrison's lips thinned into a hard line, his tall frame rigid with a palpable anger.

But his gaze caught the lingering puffiness around my eyes, and he visibly forced himself to rein it in.

"Get in the car. I'll take you home."

This time, I didn't refuse. A strategic retreat is one thing; making a spectacle of it is another.

Throughout the drive, Harrison seemed to be wrestling with his words, his silence filling the car with a tension so thick it felt hard to breathe.

I knew what he wanted to say.

So I spoke first. "I'll raise this child on my own. When he's born, his last name will be Clark. He won't ever get in the way of you and your... reunion."

I thought my words were considerate, but Harrison's reaction was explosive.

He slammed on the brakes, the tires screeching against the asphalt.

His face was grim, his dark eyes flashing with a fury I had never seen before.

"Avery Clark," he seethed, "are you that desperate to erase me from our child's life?"

I was stunned for a moment.

Harrison was an iceberg, always composed, rarely showing emotion.

He had never lost control, except in the heat of passion, when his hands would grip my hips, his body moving tirelessly, possessively against mine.

This was the first time I had ever seen this raw, untethered rage.

I didn't argue. I curled my fingers, twisting the hem of my shirt. "This child can't be born into a media frenzy over a Hawthorne scandal," I retorted. "If you can't give him a whole family, don't pretend to be some doting father."

After all, everyone on Wall Street knew the two things Harrison Hawthorne despised most were scandals and illegitimate children.

...

In our circle, it was an unwritten rule: no matter how many lovers a man kept on the side, he maintained a public facade of respect for his wife. Airing your dirty laundry weakened the family, so you put on a united front, no matter the cost.

Except for Harrison's father.

Old Mr. Hawthorne was the first to parade his mistress and illegitimate son through the front door.

Not long after, Harrison's mother jumped from the top of a skyscraper.

From a young age, Harrison was tormented by his stepmother and bullied by that illegitimate brother.

Everyone thought he was broken beyond repair.

Instead, he quietly endured, secretly gathering evidence. On his eighteenth birthday, he turned the files over to the FBI and personally sent his own father to prison.

Then, with the help of his maternal grandfather, he seized control of the entire Hawthorne Group.

By twenty, his position in the family was unshakeable.

At twenty-one, the illegitimate brother who had made his childhood a living hell was lost at sea, his body never recovered.

From then on, everyone understood his boundaries.

And now, Harrison's face was a grim mask. "Avery, have the baby," he said, his voice tight with suppressed emotion. "I will use every resource I have to keep you both safe."

I didn't answer.

Because in that instant, his gaze shifted past me, out the car window, and fixed on someone.

I followed his line of sight.

My husband and daughter told me there was another world beneath the abandoned swimming pool in our backyard.

They said they had a family there too.

On Thanksgiving, I spent the whole day preparing a full dinner spread. But my daughter didn't even glance back as she followed Grant into the pool.

"I'm going to spend the holiday with my real mom. She's nicer than you. She actually loves me."

Grant dug out the savings account statements, the deed to the house, every investment account under his name, and carried all of it down there.

"In the other world, everything doubles in value. What's the point of leaving it with you? You can't even get in."

Even on my birthday, the two of them pulled on their swimsuits and rushed toward the water.

"The other mom's birthday is today too. She's down there waiting for us to have a barbecue. Just order DoorDash or something."

After an accident left me unable to handle things on my own, I woke up to a house that felt completely empty.

I checked my account balance. Zero. I called Grant to ask about the medical bills. No answer.

A second later, he texted back:

[The other wife's in a bad mood. We're keeping her company. Take care of yourself. Don't bother us unless it's important.]

I stared at that message for a long time.

Our savings were gone. The house was empty. Even this marriage had been hollowed out a long time ago.

So I picked up the phone and called a pool draining company.

"I've got an abandoned swimming pool at my house. The water needs to be drained. Can you send someone out?"

---

I checked myself out of the hospital alone and stood at the front gate of my own yard.

I looked at the pool. The surface of the water reflected another world.

Grant was in there. My daughter was in there.

Another woman was waiting for them on the other side. My daughter called her Mom. Grant called her his wife. A happy family of three, picture-perfect.

They went to an amusement park together.

My daughter sat in the front row of a roller coaster, her hair whipping everywhere in the wind. She turned and buried herself into that woman's arms, gripping her with both hands, screaming:

"Mom, don't let go..."

The woman held her tight. Grant stood beside them, phone raised, snapping photos.

Watching that scene, I instantly remembered last month when I'd suggested we all go to an amusement park together.

My daughter had waved me off without a second thought. "Going with someone as old as you? Boring."

Grant had chimed right in. "Yeah, don't come and kill the vibe."

But now, there they were, having the time of their lives with another woman.

That evening, Grant and my daughter climbed out of the pool.

The smile hadn't fully faded from my daughter's face yet, but the moment she saw me, it vanished.

She tugged on Grant's sleeve, whining sweetly:

"Daddy, I want to stay with Mom a little longer."

That mom wasn't me.

They walked inside and found that I hadn't cooked dinner.

Grant's face darkened instantly. He turned to me.

"So you just sat around the house all day doing nothing? You didn't even cook?"

"I just got out of the hospital today," I said.

"And that means you can't cook?" He stared me down. "Everyone else manages just fine. Why do you have to be so dramatic about everything?"

My daughter stood off to the side, curling her lip.

"God, I can't stand being around her."

"The mom in the pool is sweet and pretty. She never tells me what I can or can't eat, never nags me about anything."

"You never let me do the things I enjoy. No candy, no snacks, no games. Do you have any idea how much of a buzzkill you are?"

I tried to explain. "That's because you're still young..."

"Okay, okay." She cut me off, flapping her hand. "Can we just stop arguing? You're exhausting."

"I wish I could stay down there every single day. Daddy, can we spend more time in there? We only need to come back to sleep."

Grant looked down at her and smiled, ruffling her hair.

I watched them shut me out, and I tried to push back.

"How have I not been good to you? The reason I don't let you eat that stuff is because your stomach has always been sensitive. You..."

My daughter cut me off immediately.

"Oh my God, you're unreal. So cringe. Come on, Dad, let's go. I don't want to be here. Let's eat out."

She grabbed Grant's arm and pulled him toward the door.

Grant stopped in front of me, paused for one step, and looked me up and down.

"Look at the way you dress. You haven't even made an effort to dress up in ages. Can you really blame the kid for saying what she says?"

"The person on the other side feels so different from the one I've been living with. Maybe try looking in the mirror and figuring out why."

He paused, then added:

"If I could stay down there forever, I wouldn't come back either."

Then he left with our daughter.

I stood there. Didn't move.

Watching their backs disappear, I thought about when we first got married.

Grant had just started his business back then. I went to the construction sites for him every day, and by the time I got home at night, there was sand in my hair.

He'd hold me and say, so gently: "Mia, trust me. I'm going to give you a better life."

And eventually, we really did move into a big house.

I thought about the first time my daughter called me Mama. She was the clingiest thing in the world back then, wouldn't fall asleep unless I was holding her.

I thought that was how it would be forever.

Then they found the other world inside the pool, and everything changed.

The first time my boyfriend, Ethan Whitmore, took me home to meet his mother, he brought my best friend with us.

The door had barely opened when Diane looked right past me and reached for Chloe Parker with a smile.

"Chloe! I found those fuzzy slippers you liked last time."

Only then did she notice me standing behind Chloe.

"And you are...?"

For two seconds, no one said a word.

Ethan smiled and slipped an arm around my shoulders.

"Mom, this is Nora. My girlfriend."

Diane's surprise gave way to awkwardness almost at once. "Oh. Ethan talks about Chloe at home all the time, so I just assumed..."

Chloe slipped her arm through mine with practiced ease, smoothing over the awkwardness for everyone.

"Diane, the three of us have known each other since high school. Nora won't mind."

Later, Diane drew Chloe into the kitchen, praising her for being sweet and thoughtful and saying she already felt like one of the family.

Ethan leaned against the doorway with a grin. "My mom loves people like her."

I sat by myself in the living room, cradling a cup of tea that had long since gone cold.

That evening, Diane brought out an antique gold bangle that had been in the Whitmore family for generations and turned to Chloe.

"Tell me something. Does this look too old-fashioned for someone your age?"

The three of them crowded around it, talking. No one paid any attention to me.

Watching how easily they fit together, I suddenly felt tired.

...

The moment the bangle slipped over Chloe's wrist, the living room went still.

Diane's eyes lit up.

"Oh, wow. It really does suit you."

Chloe glanced down and immediately waved her free hand.

"Diane, I can't wear this. Let Nora try it."

She started to pull it off.

But somehow, the bangle caught at her wrist bone.

Chloe sucked in a breath at the pain.

Ethan frowned immediately and took hold of her wrist.

"Don't yank it. You'll hurt yourself."

His voice stayed low, but the concern in it was unmistakable.

Diane panicked too. "Did I hurt you when I put it on?"

"No, no."

Chloe shook her head, yet still remembered to glance my way.

"Nora, don't get the wrong idea. I was just trying it on for Diane."

From the couch, I watched Ethan bend over her wrist and carefully work the bangle loose.

His touch was gentle.

Too gentle, almost as if he were afraid she might break.

He glanced up at Chloe, annoyed. "Quit worrying about that. If it hurts, say something."

Chloe smacked him with her free hand. "Hey. Don't snap at me."

They went back and forth, neither willing to let the other have the last word.

The tea in my hands had gone completely cold.

Before we came over, Ethan had shown me a picture of the bangle.

He told me the women in the Whitmore family had passed it down from one daughter-in-law to the next for generations.

"If Mom brings it out, it means she sees you as family."

Back then, I had actually asked him:

"What if she doesn't?"

Ethan had laughed and mussed my hair.

"She will."

"How could she not like you?"

Now the bangle was on Chloe's wrist.

They were so busy making sure Chloe was okay that no one gave me a second thought.

Eventually, Ethan brought over some hand lotion and slowly eased the bangle off.

A red ring marked Chloe's wrist.

Diane fussed over her, urging her to sit while she went to find some ointment.

Ethan crouched in front of her too, inspecting the mark.

"Still hurt?"

Chloe grinned and tucked her hand away.

"It's nothing. You're being dramatic."

That was Chloe. She had always been breezy about things like that.

Once Diane had finished rubbing ointment onto Chloe's wrist, she finally looked at me.

"Nora, I only asked Chloe to try it on. Don't take it the wrong way."

I had barely opened my mouth when Chloe came over and wrapped herself around my arm.

"Babe, you're not mad at me, right?"

She blinked up at me, coaxing me the way she had countless times before.

I looked at the red mark around her wrist. I knew I should say what I really felt, but a dull ache had already settled in my chest.

It had taken me ten years to go from secretly loving Ethan to standing beside him as he introduced me to his family.

Back in school, Ethan was the kind of guy everyone knew. He collected competition wins like trophies, and no one thought the two of us made sense together.

I was painfully ordinary by comparison. My GPA hovered near the bottom, and I came from an average family.

There had been enough gossip to make me doubt myself more times than I could count. Every time, Chloe had planted herself beside me and told me not to listen.

As insecure as I was, I had always thought I was lucky to have both Ethan and Chloe.

Now, with all of them looking at me expectantly, I still couldn't make myself say no.

I swallowed against the tightness in my throat and lied.

"I don't mind."

All of them paused.

I got to my feet and set the stone-cold tea back on the coffee table.

"You have good taste, Diane."

"The bangle really does look good on Chloe."

Ethan's brow tightened, almost too subtly to notice.

"Nora."

I shoved my feelings down and made myself sound casual. "I mean it."

Chloe threw her arms around me.

"God, Nora, you're the best!"

Ethan shot back, "She's mine."

Standing on either side of me, they each grabbed an arm and started bickering over me.

I tried to get them to stop, only to realize I couldn't get a word in.

My arms hurt from being tugged back and forth.

At our wedding ceremony, Rose Lane's assistant, Zachary Zimmer, accidentally projects the wrong photo on the screen.

The huge screen initially shows a wedding portrait of Rose and me. But suddenly, it turns into a photo featuring Rose and Zachary in wedding clothes. Both of them held hands with each other while looking into each other's eyes lovingly. It was clear that they looked very happy together.

Everyone gasps in shock.

Zachary begins sobbing quietly and asks if I can delay the wedding.

Rose remains calm and collected as she starts throwing out suggestions to me.

"The guests are already here, so it'll be embarrassing for us if we delay the wedding ceremony. Besides, it also spells ill luck for us if we do that. No one recognizes the groom's face anyway. Why don't we let Zachary replace you in this ceremony for now?"

All of our friends are stunned, to say the least. They think I'll go ballistic and get incredibly jealous because of Rose's suggestion.

Instead, I nod and claim that it's a great idea.

Noting my composed manner, Rose smugly declares that we've already registered our marriage, so she promises me that she will hold another wedding for me when she's free enough.

But she seems to have forgotten that she's signed a divorce agreement just now.

Chapter 1

I plucked the groom's boutonniere and handed it to my wife, Rose Lane, then didn't bother with the subtle looks she and the people around us were exchanging. I just walked out of the hotel.

Rose didn't come after me.

Behind me, the hall erupted in applause as Rose and Zachary Zimmer took the stage, surrounded by the celebrating crowd.

I knew this wasn't an accident. It was Zachary's way of poking at me.

Too bad Rose couldn't—or wouldn't—see it. Maybe she saw and was deliberately letting it slide.

In the past, I might've felt upset, but now, surprisingly, I felt nothing but calm.

I went home and took a much-needed nap.

Rose hated fuss, so the entire wedding had fallen on me. From start to finish, I was running around making sure nothing went wrong.

I'd been preparing nonstop after work, carefully selecting hotels and staying up late to choose invitation card designs and party favors. Yesterday, I even rehearsed until the early hours, and my chest still ached from the stress.

Looking back now, it felt hardly worth it.

I should've just gone through the motions.

Just as I was drifting in and out of sleep, Rose's call jolted me awake.

"Marcus, the wedding's over. Where are you?"

Hearing her cheerful voice on the line made me chuckle—I'd been home for hours, and she hadn't even noticed I was gone.

Or maybe she had noticed, but she didn't care enough to check.

I yawned. "At home."

For a split second, there was nothing but silence.

"Marcus, are you still upset about the wedding?" she asked, knowingly, like she always did.

This time, she was wrong. I wasn't angry, just uninterested.

"I'm not," I answered truthfully.

Rose didn't believe me. "I know you're holding some resentment, but I did it for the company's sake. Many of today's guests were business partners. If they saw us messing up even our photos, they'd doubt our competence. I just didn't want you to look like a joke.

"And Zachary was under so much pressure today—you have no idea how many drinks people piled on him. He took the hits for you. You should be thanking him."

I was amused. I started to suspect that in the chaos of the wedding, someone had slipped off with her brain.

Before I could answer, Zachary's gentle voice cut in. "Rose, don't say that. I was just doing what I was supposed to do."

"Nonsense. You handled the unexpected situation perfectly. I'll soon tell the financial department you're getting a raise."

One sentence from my adopted sister was all it took to have me locked away in a psychiatric hospital.

Five years later, my husband finally came to take me home.

The moment I got into the car, I saw my adopted sister, Beryl, sitting comfortably in the passenger seat. She looked at me with watery eyes and spoke in a trembling voice.

"Quinn's glare was so scary just now... I'm frightened."

My husband's expression darkened instantly.

"Quinn, are you having another episode—"

Before he could finish, I snatched the pen off the seat and drove it straight into my left eye.

The pen disappeared into my eye socket.

Blood and vitreous fluid streamed down my face, but I only grinned wider, as though I couldn't feel a thing.

After leaving the hospital, we returned home.

The second we stepped through the front door, Beryl deliberately threw herself onto the floor.

She curled into a ball and screamed in terror.

"I'm sorry, Quinn! I know I was wrong! Please don't kill me!"

Hearing that, my husband stormed over.

Without asking a single question, he grabbed me by the hair and slammed my head into the wall.

"Haven't you learned your lesson yet? Why can't you stop bullying Beryl?"

The wound around my left eye split open again.

Warm blood poured over half my face.

Ignoring Grant, who continued shouting at me, I turned around and walked straight toward the balcony.

Then...

I jumped.

From the fifth floor.

An exposed steel rebar shot through my kidney.

The impact shattered my leg, white bone ripping through flesh.

I lay motionless in a pool of blood and mangled flesh, staring blankly at the two figures leaning over the balcony above.

Just then, my parents came home from work.

The moment they saw my twisted body lying below, both of them rolled their eyes back and collapsed on the spot.

[Ding.]

Pain Value: 40%.

An additional 80% Pain Value is required before the host may travel to the next world.

Please keep up the good work.

...

I woke up on the morning of the third day after the doctors pulled me back from death.

The first thing I saw when I opened my eyes...

was my husband, Grant, kissing my adopted sister.

The moment Beryl noticed I was awake, she hurriedly pushed him away and put on an innocent expression.

"Quinn, don't misunderstand. Grant was only helping me check whether there was something in my eye."

I went to a concert with my boyfriend, Ethan Whitmore.

But at the VIP entrance, the scanner showed there was no pass under my name.

Ethan smacked a hand to his forehead.

"I must've entered your best friend Vanessa Reed's information on the VIP registration by mistake."

"She loves this singer too. I'll go get her. We can't let a front-row VIP pass go to waste!"

I froze, watching my boyfriend walk inside with my best friend without so much as a glance back at me,

while I stood outside alone and listened to the entire concert from beyond the gates.

Two weeks later, when we were supposed to leave for our honeymoon, I was stopped at the airport again.

Ethan wore the same sheepish look as before.

"Nat, I used Vanessa's saved traveler profile for the whole itinerary again."

"We might as well roll with it. I'll take her to Hawaii instead."

"It's not like you haven't traveled plenty already!"

The second he finished speaking, Vanessa appeared at the airport entrance.

"Nat," she said, casually handing her suitcase to Ethan,

"don't worry. I'll keep an eye on him for you."

"Maybe I'll even teach him how to be husband material."

In the seven years Ethan and I had been together, he'd somehow entered Vanessa's information instead of mine more times than I could count.

Every time, he apologized and promised he'd make it up to me, then turned around and left with her anyway.

I kept telling myself I was being too sensitive, too suspicious. What could possibly be going on between them?

But this time, as I watched them walk away side by side,

I couldn't lie to myself anymore.

***

Ethan didn't even notice my face fall.

He was too busy making sure Vanessa had everything she needed.

"Good. You've got all your documents."

"You're way better than Nat. She forgets everything. I always have to pack for her."

He complained about me as he tucked their travel documents together.

"Nat has it so easy. Someone's always taking care of her wherever she goes."

"Not like me. I've had to look after myself since I was a kid."

A bitter edge crept into Vanessa's voice.

I stayed quiet and listened.

After all, whenever the three of us were together, the two of them somehow ended up comparing notes on my flaws.

And for a long time now, Ethan had been taking better care of her than he ever took care of me.

"We're leaving, Nat! Don't miss me too much!"

"Aren't you going to wish us a good trip?"

Vanessa sounded almost giddy.

When I didn't answer, Ethan finally noticed the look on my face.

"Nat, don't turn this into a whole thing and ruin everyone's mood. I'll make it up to you when I get back."

"Besides, we've already been to Hawaii together. Going again wouldn't be anything special for you."

Five years ago, Ethan had told me he loved me in Hawaii.

This trip was supposed to take us back to where everything had begun. Instead, he was going back with someone else.

I was the only one still trying to hold on to something that no longer existed.

I gave a bitter little laugh.

"Have a good trip."

I turned, walked out of the airport, and called a rideshare home.

When I got back, traces of yesterday's wedding were still everywhere:

confetti scattered across the floor, festive decorations, my wedding dress draped over the couch...

I hadn't learned until the wedding itself that Ethan had ordered two identical bridal gowns.

Vanessa had worn the second one to my wedding.

I got upset and refused to walk down the aisle.

"Nat, you and Vanessa grew up together. You've worn matching outfits since you were kids. Why is matching wedding dresses suddenly such a big deal?"

"Didn't you two even joke about having your weddings together when you were little?"

Ethan frowned at me.

"Maybe Nat doesn't remember anymore."

"If you hate it that much, I'll take it off right now."

With that, Vanessa stripped off the wedding dress right in front of us.

Ethan immediately took off his suit jacket and wrapped it around her.

"Can we have the wedding now?"

He asked, irritation sharpening his voice.

I swallowed the hurt and nodded anyway.

I scheduled a moving service to come pack up my things.

I told them to throw the wedding dress away.

I didn't want anything that wasn't mine alone.

People included.

I called the county clerk's office to cancel our marriage-license appointment.

We'd planned to finish the legal paperwork after the honeymoon.

There was no reason to anymore.

"I'm sorry, Ms. Bennett, but I don't see an appointment under your name."

"Mr. Ethan Whitmore does have an appointment on file, though, with Ms. Vanessa Reed."

Ethan had "accidentally" used the wrong information again.

Vanessa and I shared a birthday, and our saved profiles had always appeared right next to each other in his accounts.

But a marriage-license application required the legal name and ID to match. The system wouldn't have accepted mismatched information.

I wanted to see how long Ethan planned to keep pretending this was an accident.

Late at night, Julian burst into the Fifth Avenue penthouse, the cold still clinging to him.

Chloe sat calmly leafing through a book of architectural illustrations, as if the media flashbulbs popping outside the windows had nothing to do with her.

“You saw the hotel scandal?” His voice was hoarse, his eyes bloodshot. “Why haven’t you said a word?”

This wasn’t right.

Chloe lived in those buildings, in their cold, clean lines. She’d once argued with him until dawn over a single detail. There was no way she would sit back and watch the work she’d poured her heart into become an industry joke.

At last, Chloe closed the book and looked up at him.

The eyes that had once held stars and adoration for him were now a dead, frozen wasteland.

Her voice was quiet, utterly flat.

“Julian, you seem to have forgotten.”

“My name isn’t on that project.”

…

Julian froze. His tie seemed to tighten around his throat, making it hard to breathe. He searched her face for some flicker of emotion—hurt, anger, even stubbornness—but found nothing.

The face he had kissed for ten years was now like a meticulously carved Greek statue. Perfect, and cold.

“What do you mean?” He took a step forward, his voice low with restraint. “Every project under the Sterling Group has your mark on it. We’re a unit, Chloe. A team.”

A team?

A sharp, bitter laugh caught in her throat. She thought of the prenuptial agreement locked in a bank vault, the one the Sterling family lawyers jokingly called the “Sterling Clause.” It was a poisoned chain, stipulating that if the marriage ever ended, she would have no claim to a single cent of the Sterling Group’s increased value over the past ten years. She wouldn’t even be entitled to the intellectual property registered under the Sterling name.

She was the only person on this team who could never profit.

Julian’s personal assistant poked his head through the doorway. “Sir,” he murmured, “the board’s conference call starts in five minutes… and PR needs your instructions on the Art Basel coverage.”

Art Basel.

The name was a needle, sinking straight into Chloe’s numb nerves.

Two weeks ago, on their wedding anniversary, Julian had taken their sixteen-year-old son, Mason, and fourteen-year-old daughter, Lily, to Miami with Sienna, a newly famous influencer-designer. They’d thrown parties on a yacht and posted one glossy photo after another, celebrating a piece of Sienna’s that a gallery had bought for a high price.

Meanwhile, Chloe had been left alone in New York, working through the night to revise the structural drawings for the very hotel now mired in scandal.

The memory clearly pricked at Julian too. He waved his assistant away, his tone softening. “Chloe, you know Sienna is important for the group’s expansion into the younger market. She has reach. It’s purely business.”

For the first time, a flicker of expression crossed Chloe’s face. The corner of her mouth twitched, as if she’d heard a joke that had nothing to do with her.

“I know,” she said.

“You don’t believe me.” Julian’s patience was fraying. He closed the distance between them like a cornered lion. “You’re just pretending to be cold. Chloe, don’t play these games with me.”

Before the last word had left his mouth, the study door was shoved open.

Sixteen-year-old Mason stood there, his face flushed. He was still in his expensive private school uniform, but his hair was a mess, his eyes burning with humiliation and rage.

“This is all your fault! Everyone at Dalton is laughing at me!” He rushed to the desk and pointed at the news scrolling across the television screen, his voice shrill. “Why aren’t you doing something? It’s your design! Why are you hiding like a coward?”

As he shouted, he swept the architectural model off the desk. The miniature hotel, a landscape Chloe had poured countless hours into, smashed into pieces on the floor.

Fourteen-year-old Lily stood behind her brother, eyes red and lips pressed tight, a lily battered by a storm.

Julian frowned, about to scold his son.

But Chloe spoke first, her voice terrifyingly calm.

“Then you should go find your Aunt Sienna.” Her gaze drifted over the shattered model on the floor without a flicker of emotion. “She just made the cover of *Vogue*. She understands a PR crisis better than I do.”

The air in the room froze.

Julian’s fists clenched at his sides. He stared at Chloe in disbelief, as if seeing a stranger.

“Are you serious?”

“I am.” Chloe looked at the fragments on the floor as if they were her own shattered past.

Mason went still, stunned by her response. After a moment, overwhelming anger and hurt washed over him, and he broke down sobbing, accusing her of being a selfish, cold-hearted mother.

But even as he cried himself breathless, Chloe just sat there, unmoved.

A nameless fire exploded in Julian’s chest, extinguishing any desire to reason with her. “Fine, Chloe,” he said coldly. “You brought this on yourself.”

He put an arm around the sobbing Mason and strode out of the room.

Lily didn’t follow. She stopped in the doorway and looked back at Chloe, her eyes full of reproach. “Why do you always have to make Dad angry?”

Chloe lifted her head, her gaze landing on her daughter’s face, a face that was seventy percent her own.

“You should go, too.”

Lily flinched, her voice laced with confusion and pain. “You… you were never like this before.”

No. She never was.

Chloe didn’t answer. She simply stood and, right in front of her daughter, gently closed the study door.

Outside, a car engine started. Soon, everything was silent again.

Chloe leaned back against the cold leather sofa and closed her eyes.

Memories washed over her.

The day she’d graduated at the top of her class from the Yale School of Architecture and married into the Sterling family, Julian had held her hand against the glittering Manhattan skyline. “Chloe,” he’d promised, “your talent is a gift. It’s too precious to be tainted by the dust of the business world. From now on, you just focus on creating. I’ll be your armor. The Sterling name will be the umbrella that protects all your dreams.”

She had believed him.

She became the mysterious “shadow designer” behind the Sterling Group.

The drawings she labored over through countless nights won one industry award after another for the group. She solved construction problems alone on dusty sites, while Julian, as the face of the company, gave eloquent interviews to *Architectural Digest*, presenting her design philosophy as “a burst of my own inspiration.”

Everyone envied her for marrying New York’s most handsome and charming hotel magnate, for living such a carefree life.

Only she knew about the late nights, the desks buried under coffee cups and painkillers, the body that grew thinner by the day from overwork.

The final straw had been Sienna.

By accident, she discovered that Julian was not only having an affair with the “designer”—a woman famous for flaunting her curves on social media—but that he had also leaked the core concept for a desert resort hotel she’d been developing, a concept that had not yet been released.

With that nearly plagiarized idea, Sienna had won a significant “Emerging Designer” award.

But what had plunged Chloe into an icy abyss was something Lily had said, a thoughtless aside.

That day, Chloe had confronted Julian, asking him why he would do such a thing. He’d just soothed her impatiently, saying it was “only a concept. You can come up with something better anytime.” The children, seeing them argue, had scurried away. As Lily passed by, she’d muttered with a trace of upper-class contempt that didn’t belong on a girl her age, “I heard Grandpa and Dad talking… They said your talent was the Sterling family’s most successful ‘creative asset acquisition’ in years. That ‘Sterling Clause’ was just to make sure the asset would never be lost.”

Creative asset acquisition.

So her marriage, her love, had been a transaction from the very beginning.

That night, she’d watched the livestream of Sienna’s award ceremony. The woman, draped in a sexy gown, thanked Julian for his “generous guidance” and described design ideas about light, shadow, and desert roses that had come from Chloe’s own mind.

In that moment, Chloe’s world shattered. And in the silence that followed, something new and hard began to form from the pieces.

The only thing she wanted anymore wasn’t love or answers.

It was to take back everything that belonged to her. All of it.

So she did two things.

First, through an encrypted channel, she contacted David Chen, the family lawyer in New York best known for handling high-society divorces.

Second, using a shell company, she quietly registered a new architecture studio: C.D. Atelier.

She made digital backups of all her unsigned sketches, emails, and meeting records from the past ten years. Then, anonymously, she submitted her favorite new design to a prestigious international architecture competition.

In another week, the shortlist would be announced.

Soon, she would vanish from this family, just as they wished.

But not as a loser.

A sharp ring from her phone cut through her thoughts. It was Julian.

His voice came through the line, clipped and commanding. “Chloe, I’ve decided to appoint Sienna as the group’s new Brand Creative Director. Her office in Sterling Tower needs to be renovated. You’ll need to move out of your private studio at headquarters and let her use it for now.”

Taking her studio. The only territory she had left within the Sterling Group.

“All right,” Chloe answered calmly.

The next day, as Chloe packed her personal belongings with an assistant’s help, the scent of expensive perfume and the click of high heels on marble announced an arrival.

Sienna, wearing a sharply tailored red suit and Christian Louboutin heels, leaned in the studio doorway as if she owned the place.

After the divorce, Claire Bennett slipped away to a charming little town far from home.

New name. New phone. Every thread to her old life cut clean.

Nobody knew where she'd gone.

And nobody knew she was carrying Miles Lockwood's baby.

Until a rainy night, when the little boy's fever spiked to 104.

She ran him into the ER, hands shaking, digging through her bag until her fingers closed around a card she'd forgotten she still had.

Black. Heavy. His.

Back in Oakhaven, Miles's phone lit up.

[Transaction Alert: $320 – Pediatric ER]

His blood turned to ice.

Pediatric... emergency?

Whose kid?

He called her. Once. Twice.

On the ninth ring, she picked up.

"Clairie." His voice cracked open, hoarse and shaking. "Tell me where you are. Tell me about the kid."

Nothing came back but her ragged breathing and a small, broken whimper.

"Clairie." He was already behind the wheel, flooring it, veins roping up his forearms. "Don't hang up. Please."

The man who had always been so cold was now begging humbly, over and over.

Claire looked down at the boy in her arms.

Same eyes. Same stubborn mouth. Nine-tenths his father.

Her eyes fell shut.

The memories and the heart she had buried with time began to beat once again.

***

Their second anniversary.

Miles said he had a surprise for her. Told her to wait at home.

So she wore the white dress he loved, lit the candles, cooked his favorite dinner, and waited.

She waited.

And waited.

Midnight came and went. The door never opened.

Cops didn't get to keep normal hours. She knew that. It didn't stop her stomach from knotting up.

One in the morning, her phone buzzed on the table.

Miles.

She snatched it up. Music and voices roared through the speaker.

"Did something happen?" she asked, soft.

Silence. Long enough for her chest to tighten. Then his voice, low and flat.

"Sorry. I'm not coming home tonight."

"Claire!" A woman's voice slid in. One Claire would know anywhere. "My friends threw me a welcome-back party. Come out, have some fun with us. Meet some people."

The line went dead before she could say a word.

Claire sat there gripping the phone, staring at two plates of food gone cold.

I just read a book that will be released in a month. I found this website where people can apply to read books before they are publish. They can read them for free, in exchange of a honest review when you finish it!

The fluorescent lights in the hospital buzzed like angry wasps, and I wanted to smash every one of them. I sat on the hard plastic chair outside the ICU, Emma's medical file clutched in my trembling hands. The numbers on the estimate sheet blurred together, but I had them memorized anyway.

$10,000 for the deposit. Surgery is scheduled in three days. No deposit, no surgery.

"Miss?" The nurse's voice was gentle, "The doctor wanted me to remind you that without the deposit by Wednesday, we'll have to postpone Emma's procedure."

"I know," I said without looking up 

The nurse hesitated, her eyes softening with pity that made my skin crawl. I didn’t need pity, I needed money, I needed my parents to not be dead so they could help me figure out how to save their youngest daughter.

After the nurse left, I pulled out my phone and stared at the calculator app. $847 in my checking account. My credit cards were maxed out from the previous hospital bills.

The apartment Mom and Dad left us was only partially paid off, and I couldn’t sell it fast enough to help Emma now. My baby sister with her congenital heart defect, was running out of time while insurance companies found creative ways to deny coverage.

I had called everyone, my aunt in Boston had sent $200. My old college roommate had sent $150, along with a sweet message saying she wished she could do more. A few other friends had contributed what they could. Their kindness made me want to cry and scream at the same time because it wasn't even close to enough.

My thumb hovered over a contact I had sworn I would never call again. Fredrick, my old manager at Velvet Nights.

I walked away from that club eight months ago, promising myself I was done. Done with the leering eyes, the grabbing hands that security always seemed too slow to stop, the way I felt like I needed three showers after every shift just to feel clean again. I had gotten a job as a legal secretary, something respectable, something that wouldn't make Mom's voice echo in my head with disappointment even though she was gone.

But legal secretaries made $42,000 a year, and Emma's medical bills were drowning me faster than I could bail water.

My finger pressed the call button before I could talk myself out of it.

"Bianca," Fred’s voice answered on the third ring. He sounded amused, like he had been waiting for this call. "I thought you were too good for us now."

I swallowed my pride, "I need work, Fred. Just for a few weeks."

"A few weeks." He laughed, a rough sound like gravel in a blender. "You think you can just walk back in? I have ten girls who would kill for a permanent spot. Why would I give it to someone who quit on me?"

Because I made you a lot of money, I wanted to say, because you know exactly how good I was at this job I hated. "I was one of your best earners," I said instead, hating how desperate I sounded. "You know I was."

Silence on the other end, I could picture him in his office, leaning back in that ridiculous leather chair, weighing his options. Fred was a businessman first, always. He wouldn't hire me back out of kindness, but he might do it for profit.

"Come by tomorrow at six," he finally said. "I'll see if I remember you being as good as you think you were."

He hung up before I could thank him, well.. not that I wanted to thank him anyway.

I sat there for another minute, staring at Emma through the ICU window. She was asleep, her seventeen year old face peaceful despite the tubes and monitors. She looked so small in that hospital bed, so fragile. Her dark hair was spread across the pillow, and I could see the faint scar on her chest from her last surgery three years ago.

"I'm sorry," I whispered, though she couldn't hear me. "I'm so sorry, Em. I'll fix this. I promise."

I didn't sleep that night. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Mom's disappointed face, and heard Dad's voice telling me to be strong.

The next evening, I stood outside Velvet Nights, my hands were shaking, so I shoved them in my jacket pockets. The club looked exactly the same. Red velvet ropes, a  golden sign and Mark the doorman built like a brick wall wearing an expensive suit.

Mark raised an eyebrow when he saw me. "Bianca. Heard you went legit."

"Yeah, well." I shrugged, trying to keep my voice steady. "Legit doesn't pay some bills."

He nodded slowly, and unhooked the rope for me. "Fred’s expecting you. Good luck."

I needed more than luck.

Inside, the club pulsed with bass-heavy music and dim purple lighting. It was early, so only a few customers were scattered around the main floor. The real crowd wouldn't arrive until after nine. I made my way past the bar, past the main stage and down the hallway to Fred’s office. I knocked twice.

"Come in."

Fred looked exactly the same. He was on the phone when I entered, speaking rapid Russian and he gestured for me to sit.

I sat in the chair across from his desk and waited, my heart hammering. I had learned a long time ago not to interrupt Fred's calls. 

He finished his conversation and set the phone down, studying me with an expression I couldn't understand. "You look terrible."

Heat flooded my cheeks. "Thank you."

"I'm serious. You have circles under your eyes. You're too thin. The clients here pay for fantasy, not reality. They don't want to see someone struggling."

"Give me one night. If I don't perform, you don't have to pay me."

He leaned back, steepling his fingers. "What happened to the secretary job?"

"I still have it. I need this on the side."

"How much do you need?"

I hesitated. Showing weakness to Fred was dangerous, but lying was worse. He could smell desperation like a shark smelling blood. "Ten thousand. Fast."

He whistled low. "That's a lot of dances, Bianca."

My throat tightened. "I know."

"What's it for?"

"Does it matter?"

Fred’s eyes narrowed, but he didn't push. That was the thing about him. He was ruthless in business, but he respected boundaries when it came to his girls' personal lives. As long as you showed up and made him money, he didn't care about the details.

"I don't have any open spots for now," he said finally. "Full roster right now. Girls are fighting for Friday and Saturday nights."

My heart sank straight through the floor. No, this couldn't be it. I stood up, blinking back the burning in my eyes because I refused to cry in front of him. "Right, okay. Thanks for seeing me."

I was halfway to the door, my vision blurring, when Fred's phone rang. He answered it, and something in his tone made me pause with my hand on the doorknob.

"What do you mean she called in sick?" Fred's voice was loud. "It's Tuesday. No one gets sick on Tuesday. We have the VIP room booked." He pushed to listen to the person at the other end, "I don't care if she has the plague. Find me someone else."

He looked up at me, and I saw the calculation in his eyes. "Wait," he said, holding up a finger.

I stood frozen by the door, my heart hammering so hard I thought it might break through my ribs. This was it. This was my chance.  “Oh God… Please.” 

"Brother-in-law, kiss me more..."

The heavy velvet curtains of the private salon barely muffled the sounds—low, guttural moans and the rhythmic slap of skin against skin.

I pressed my back to the wall just outside the half-open door, the silk of my mother's heirloom gown whispering against my thighs.

The annual spring banquet of the North Harbor families swirled on in the main hall, crystal chandeliers casting golden light over power brokers and their glittering wives, but here, in this shadowed wing of the Rossetti estate, my world fractured.

Matteo Rossetti—my fiancé, the man who had once tucked wildflowers into my hair and sworn I was the only woman he would ever marry—had Valentina bent over the antique mahogany desk.

Her dress, a provocative red that screamed for attention, was bunched around her waist.

His trousers were shoved down just enough, hips snapping forward with raw hunger.

Valentina's younger face, flushed and triumphant, turned slightly as she gasped his name, her nails digging into the polished wood.

She was the daughter of my father's old friend, the one he had taken in out of guilt.

Now she was the "sister" who had stolen everything.

I should have screamed. Instead, my hand moved with clinical precision. The phone slipped from my clutch, camera already recording.

The lens captured it all: Matteo's slightly disheveled tie, the fresh hickey blooming on Valentina's neck that her makeup failed to fully hide, the way she arched back into him with practiced ecstasy.

Audio caught every filthy word—"Fuck, Val, you feel so much tighter than her"—and her breathy laugh in reply.

How long has this been going on?

My inner voice was ice.

Months? Or since the first time Father brought her home?

My shoulders trembled, tears pricking my eyes as any betrayed princess would. I let a soft, broken sound escape my lips. But inside, cold resolve settled like steel in my spine.

Record it. Every second. Their smugness will be their undoing.

I stepped back silently before they finished, melting into the corridor's shadows.

The recording saved automatically to a encrypted cloud folder only I could access. Evidence. Leverage. The first thread in the web I would weave.

By the time I re-entered the main hall, my face was the perfect mask of poised grief.

The Morettis had always been the suits of the mafia on North Harbor—sharp, powerful, untouchable.

I had been their beloved little princess: my father's warm gaze my shelter, my brother Dante carrying me on his shoulders through the gardens, Matteo whispering promises under blooming trees.

Then Valentina arrived, and everything shifted. She became the favored one, the one who "deserved the Moretti name."

Father stood at the head table, raising his glass. The hall fell silent. Hundreds of eyes turned.

I'd just walked out of the hospital when an old man stopped me, staring hard at the necklace around my neck.

"Miss," he said, his voice low and serious, "you're pregnant, but you're wearing the ashes of a stillborn child. This is black magic—a life-for-death sacrifice. It's draining the life from your unborn baby and feeding it into someone else's womb."

The necklace was a gift from my best friend, Paige Mercer, after she lost her own baby. I hadn't even wanted to put it on, but she'd insisted—watched me do it with her own eyes.

And this morning, Paige had found out she was pregnant again. Meanwhile, my baby—healthy just yesterday—had suddenly stopped showing a heartbeat.

A chill ran through me. As soon as I got home, I took that ash necklace off and slipped it onto my pregnant black dog instead.

...

I stood there on the hospital steps, staring at the antique charm dangling from the chain—a hollowed pendant filled with fine, dark powder.

Ashes. That was actual ashes.

My mind went blank.

"Those are the remains of a stillborn child, turned into a sacrifice," the old man went on, his face grim.

"You're wearing a cursed charm meant to redirect life force. The ritual's already begun. Your baby will keep losing vitality, and the person who gave you that necklace? Her child will thrive. She'll carry to full term without a hitch."

My heart clenched.

Paige had given me this necklace after her miscarriage. I'd never been one for jewelry, but she'd made me put it on.

Today, she and I had come to the hospital together for our checkups.

My baby—who'd always been healthy—no longer had a heartbeat. And Paige? She was pregnant again.

She'd left early, glowing with excitement. I'd lagged behind, heavy with dread. And then this man—Mr. Kane, he said his name was—stopped me as I walked out.

My hands shaking, I yanked at the clasp, ready to throw the thing away. But Mr. Kane caught my wrist.

"The moment you put that necklace on, the ritual locked in," he said.

"Until the spell runs its course, the curse won't fade. If you toss it aside without passing it on, you can't transfer the backlash. The black magic will rebound—onto you and your baby."

I was trapped. He was all but telling me I'd have to do the same thing Paige had done to me—pass the curse along to someone else.

"Mr. Kane—is there really no other way?"

He shook his head. "You have until midnight tonight to transfer that necklace to another person. Once you do, call me."

He pressed a phone number into my palm.

"And whatever you do—don't tip them off."

Then he was gone, disappearing quickly down the street.

It was five o'clock. That gave me seven hours to save myself.

A part of me still doubted him. Paige and I had grown up together—we were closer than sisters.

When she lost her first baby, I'd been the one waddling around with my own bump to take care of her.

I couldn't believe she'd do this to me.

But what if she had?

Because the truth was, my baby really had stopped showing a heartbeat.

My thoughts churned, ragged and raw. I stumbled home in a daze, pushed open the door—and heard the low, breathless murmur of two people catching their breath after sex, drifting from the study.

Then Paige's laugh, light and cruel, "You should've seen Rowan Pierce's face when she came out of the hospital today. Completely wrecked. I almost felt bad—almost."

My husband Holden Ward's voice followed, smooth and coaxing. "The ritual's all but sealed now. That kid in her belly doesn't stand a chance. She'll be a sobbing mess soon enough—and you'll enjoy it even more."

I was struck dumb with shock.

Mr. Kane had been telling the truth!

Every instinct screamed at me to burst in there, to demand why they'd done this to me.

But Mr. Kane's warning echoed in my head: don't tip them off.

I slipped back out of the house—the house I'd shared with Holden—and went to the apartment I'd bought before we married. The one that was mine alone.

Once inside, I broke down. The tears came hot and fast.

I was wiping my face, turning away from the door, when I saw my black dog crouched by her crate, watching me from a distance.

I'd had her for seven years, but she'd never warmed up to me or my husband—she'd always been Paige's dog, wagging her tail at Paige's every command.

And right now, she was heavily pregnant.

Then it hit me.

Mr. Kane had said I had to pass the necklace on. He never said it had to go to a person.

A cold, hard resolve settled in my chest. They'd crossed me first. If they wanted to play dirty, I'd play right back.

The fluorescent lights in the hospital buzzed like angry wasps, and I wanted to smash every one of them. I sat on the hard plastic chair outside the ICU, Emma's medical file clutched in my trembling hands. The numbers on the estimate sheet blurred together, but I had them memorized anyway.

$10,000 for the deposit. Surgery is scheduled in three days. No deposit, no surgery.

"Miss?" The nurse's voice was gentle, "The doctor wanted me to remind you that without the deposit by Wednesday, we'll have to postpone Emma's procedure."

"I know," I said without looking up 

The nurse hesitated, her eyes softening with pity that made my skin crawl. I didn’t need pity, I needed money, I needed my parents to not be dead so they could help me figure out how to save their youngest daughter.

After the nurse left, I pulled out my phone and stared at the calculator app. $847 in my checking account. My credit cards were maxed out from the previous hospital bills.

The apartment Mom and Dad left us was only partially paid off, and I couldn’t sell it fast enough to help Emma now. My baby sister with her congenital heart defect, was running out of time while insurance companies found creative ways to deny coverage.

I had called everyone, my aunt in Boston had sent $200. My old college roommate had sent $150, along with a sweet message saying she wished she could do more. A few other friends had contributed what they could. Their kindness made me want to cry and scream at the same time because it wasn't even close to enough.

My thumb hovered over a contact I had sworn I would never call again. Fredrick, my old manager at Velvet Nights.

I walked away from that club eight months ago, promising myself I was done. Done with the leering eyes, the grabbing hands that security always seemed too slow to stop, the way I felt like I needed three showers after every shift just to feel clean again. I had gotten a job as a legal secretary, something respectable, something that wouldn't make Mom's voice echo in my head with disappointment even though she was gone.

But legal secretaries made $42,000 a year, and Emma's medical bills were drowning me faster than I could bail water.

My finger pressed the call button before I could talk myself out of it.

"Bianca," Fred’s voice answered on the third ring. He sounded amused, like he had been waiting for this call. "I thought you were too good for us now."

I swallowed my pride, "I need work, Fred. Just for a few weeks."

"A few weeks." He laughed, a rough sound like gravel in a blender. "You think you can just walk back in? I have ten girls who would kill for a permanent spot. Why would I give it to someone who quit on me?"

Because I made you a lot of money, I wanted to say, because you know exactly how good I was at this job I hated. "I was one of your best earners," I said instead, hating how desperate I sounded. "You know I was."

Silence on the other end, I could picture him in his office, leaning back in that ridiculous leather chair, weighing his options. Fred was a businessman first, always. He wouldn't hire me back out of kindness, but he might do it for profit.

"Come by tomorrow at six," he finally said. "I'll see if I remember you being as good as you think you were."

He hung up before I could thank him, well.. not that I wanted to thank him anyway.

I sat there for another minute, staring at Emma through the ICU window. She was asleep, her seventeen year old face peaceful despite the tubes and monitors. She looked so small in that hospital bed, so fragile. Her dark hair was spread across the pillow, and I could see the faint scar on her chest from her last surgery three years ago.

"I'm sorry," I whispered, though she couldn't hear me. "I'm so sorry, Em. I'll fix this. I promise."

I didn't sleep that night. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Mom's disappointed face, and heard Dad's voice telling me to be strong.

The next evening, I stood outside Velvet Nights, my hands were shaking, so I shoved them in my jacket pockets. The club looked exactly the same. Red velvet ropes, a  golden sign and Mark the doorman built like a brick wall wearing an expensive suit.

Mark raised an eyebrow when he saw me. "Bianca. Heard you went legit."

"Yeah, well." I shrugged, trying to keep my voice steady. "Legit doesn't pay some bills."

He nodded slowly, and unhooked the rope for me. "Fred’s expecting you. Good luck."

I needed more than luck.

Inside, the club pulsed with bass-heavy music and dim purple lighting. It was early, so only a few customers were scattered around the main floor. The real crowd wouldn't arrive until after nine. I made my way past the bar, past the main stage and down the hallway to Fred’s office. I knocked twice.

"Come in."

Fred looked exactly the same. He was on the phone when I entered, speaking rapid Russian and he gestured for me to sit.

I sat in the chair across from his desk and waited, my heart hammering. I had learned a long time ago not to interrupt Fred's calls. 

He finished his conversation and set the phone down, studying me with an expression I couldn't understand. "You look terrible."

Heat flooded my cheeks. "Thank you."

"I'm serious. You have circles under your eyes. You're too thin. The clients here pay for fantasy, not reality. They don't want to see someone struggling."

"Give me one night. If I don't perform, you don't have to pay me."

He leaned back, steepling his fingers. "What happened to the secretary job?"

"I still have it. I need this on the side."

"How much do you need?"

I hesitated. Showing weakness to Fred was dangerous, but lying was worse. He could smell desperation like a shark smelling blood. "Ten thousand. Fast."

He whistled low. "That's a lot of dances, Bianca."

My throat tightened. "I know."

"What's it for?"

"Does it matter?"

Fred’s eyes narrowed, but he didn't push. That was the thing about him. He was ruthless in business, but he respected boundaries when it came to his girls' personal lives. As long as you showed up and made him money, he didn't care about the details.

"I don't have any open spots for now," he said finally. "Full roster right now. Girls are fighting for Friday and Saturday nights."

My heart sank straight through the floor. No, this couldn't be it. I stood up, blinking back the burning in my eyes because I refused to cry in front of him. "Right, okay. Thanks for seeing me."

I was halfway to the door, my vision blurring, when Fred's phone rang. He answered it, and something in his tone made me pause with my hand on the doorknob.

"What do you mean she called in sick?" Fred's voice was loud. "It's Tuesday. No one gets sick on Tuesday. We have the VIP room booked." He pushed to listen to the person at the other end, "I don't care if she has the plague. Find me someone else."

He looked up at me, and I saw the calculation in his eyes. "Wait," he said, holding up a finger.

I stood frozen by the door, my heart hammering so hard I thought it might break through my ribs. This was it. This was my chance.  “Oh God… Please.” 

She killed me for her brother.

I came back.

Seven days before the apocalypse.

While everyone is still human—I’m already building a war machine.

A truck.

A ten-meter killing mecha.

This time…I hunt first.

"Screw you, Susan Holt!" Victor Wild's eyes were bloodshot, filled with rage.

The woman's voice echoed in his mind.

"Victor, let my brother have this advanced Source Crystal, okay? With it, his mecha will evolve to an advanced mecha. He's my brother, after all."

"Victor, the girl my brother likes really wants that beam rifle you just got. Can you let him have it? He's my only family."

"Victor, you HAVE to give this epic skill Source Crystal to my brother. With it, he'll become one of the top 100 in Riverside City.'

The more the voice resounded in Victor's mind, the redder Victor's eyes became.

His own mecha would evolve to an advanced mecha with that advanced Source Crystal too. He loved that beam rifle; he went through so much to obtain it. He needed that skill Source Crystal more than anyone because he was already one of the top 100 in Riverside.

But for her, Victor compromised again and again.

He gave her the advanced Source Crystal, the beam rifle, and countless other things. However, he could not give her the skill Source Crystal.

That lone act of defiance led to his death.

For a skill Source Crystal, the woman he cherished for eight years killed him.

But she never could have expected that Victor would be reborn, filled with rage, seven days before the machine invasion, back to his eighteen-year-old self.

-

"Hey, go daydream somewhere else."

A greasy man in a suit and gold-rimmed glasses slammed his hand on the desk.

"I want a loan!"

Victor, regaining some of his senses, slammed a property deed on the desk with even more force.

The greasy man was taken aback by Victor's sudden intensity.

In all his years, he'd never seen a borrower act so aggressively.

Everyone who came to him to borrow money was desperate.

Judging by the guy's yelling and demeanor, maybe he got dumped by a girl?

Well, none of his business!

What the greasy man didn't realize was that he was actually intimidated by Victor's killing intent.

Luckily, the greasy man had seen it all, so he quickly recovered.

"You get 90% and you pay back 130% in one month. You understand the terms, right?"

The greasy man composed himself, adjusted his glasses, and went into his routine.

"Yeah. How much can I borrow?"

Victor pushed the property deed towards the greasy man and sat down, his composure returning, the killing intent hidden.

"This yours?"

The greasy man examined the property deed. A 100-square-meter apartment in the city center, worth a good amount.

But the problem was, the young man sitting in front of him looked about eighteen or nineteen. Handsome, sure, but to own an apartment like this?

Maybe his parents gave it to him?

A rich kid? Is this idiot being scammed by a woman?

"Here's my ID. Speed up the process, I'm in a hurry." Victor handed over his ID.

The greasy man gave Victor a sidelong glance. Everyone who came to him was in a hurry.

After verifying the information, the greasy man confirmed that the apartment was indeed Victor's.

Whether Victor was being scammed or not was none of his business. He only cared about making money.

"Victor Wild, right?"

"Yeah. Victor as in a winner, and Wild as in born to be wild."

The greasy man looked up again, thinking the kid must be a bit crazy.

He probably read too many novels.

"You can borrow up to $160,000 for this apartment. How much do you want to borrow?"

"The full amount," Victor said.

"Just a reminder, you get 90% and pay back 130%. You'll only get $144,000, and you have to pay back $208,000 in a month. If you can't pay, we get the apartment."

"I know. Stop wasting time and just get it done."

"Alright."

Hearing that, the greasy man said no more. He had already said everything he needed to. Once the contract was signed, the rest was none of his concern.

These black market loans were definitely shady, but they were fast.

In less than an hour, $144,000 was credited to Victor's account.

Seeing the notification on his phone, Victor heaved a sigh of relief, finally releasing some of the complicated emotions he had been holding in since his rebirth.

"Seven days until the machine invasion. Time's a bit tight."

Leaving the loan shark company, Victor checked the time on his phone and hailed a taxi to the nearest heavy-duty truck dealership.

The machine invasion brought the mechanical civilization. Everyone can transform their vehicles into mecha.

Mecha come in all shapes and sizes: bicycles, motorcycles, tricycles, sedans, sports cars. Anything that is a vehicle can become a mecha.

Victor lived until the tenth year of the mechanical apocalypse. He had a rough start because he didn't have any mecha when the invasion began.

He didn't even own a bicycle.

After struggling for two years, he finally inherited a lightweight close-combat mecha. With plenty of hard work, he managed to do reasonably well in Riverside, but that woman...

"Susan Holt!"

Sitting in the taxi, Victor gritted his teeth. From his perspective, he had just died yesterday.

Susan stole his mecha core, preventing him from transforming. Stanley Holt plunged a saber into his gut, then mocked Victor as he took away the skill Source Crystal, revealing secrets between him and Susan as Victor died.

"Those two scumbags. It's okay, there's plenty of time. I'll settle the score with them sooner or later."

Victor took a few deep breaths to calm himself.

"Since I have a chance to start over, I want the best starter mecha possible… or at least one of the best. Yeah, it's not that a haul truck is bad, but a heavy-duty truck is more cost-effective."

The real reason was that he was poor.

Victor wasn't rich. His parents didn't give him the apartment, his grandfather left it for him. It was his only property.

While he was lost in thought, the taxi slowly came to a stop.

He had arrived at the heavy-duty truck dealership.

Victor paid and dashed into the showroom.

The receptionist hadn't even started her sales pitch when Victor cut her off.

"I want to buy a heavy-duty truck, the latest model, the biggest one you have."

"Sir, we..."

"The biggest, the best. You got it?"

The saleswoman swallowed her prepared pitch.

"Yes, sir. This way, please."

Outside, the saleswoman opened the gate to the parking lot.

The moment the gate opened, Victor saw an all-black heavy-duty truck.

It was love at first sight.

"Sir, this is our latest heavy-duty truck. Feel free to ask me anything."

The truck was a bit dusty, but that didn't diminish Victor's love for it. It was his ticket to surviving the apocalypse.

"This heavy-duty truck should look pretty badass as a mecha, right?"

"What did you say, sir?" The saleswoman didn't catch Victor's mutterings.

"Nothing. I'll take this one."

"O-oh, okay. Will you be paying with a loan or in full?" The saleswoman was stunned. She'd never seen such a decisive customer.

"Can the loan be processed today?" Victor asked.

"The base price is $98,000, but there's an $8,000. You can do a 50% down payment and the loan process will only take two hours."

"Good, loan it is."

"Alright, sir. This way, please." The saleswoman gestured.

Victor followed closely and finally relaxed when the loan process began.

Two hours later, the paperwork was done, and the vehicle was officially under Victor’s name.

"Can you have the truck delivered to this location? You can do that, right?"

"Of course, sir. Not a problem at all."

Victor could drive a car, but not a heavy-duty truck. If he tried to drive it, he would probably kill someone.

It wasn't the apocalypse yet, and running people over meant jail time.

"Have the truck delivered there. Just leave the keys in the truck."

With that, Victor turned and left.

The saleswoman stared at the keys, bewildered.

"He's just going to trust me with the keys? He's not even coming along?"

It wasn't that Victor was naive. He was simply not worried about someone stealing the truck. After the machine invasion, vehicles would transform into mecha, and the mecha would belong to whoever owned them. They could not be stolen. Victor had other important things to do and didn't want to waste time on such trivial matters.

As night fell, Victor arrived at a large welding shop.

Business was quiet, and the workers were idly chatting.

"I would like to see your boss."

"His office is over there." A young worker casually pointed the way.

"You can wait inside, he's in the bathroom."

"Thanks."

While waiting, Victor performed some mental calculations.

The heavy-duty truck's trailer was 9 meters and the cab was 3 meters, so the total length was 12 meters. After transforming into a mecha, it should be around 10 meters tall.

"10 meters... the saber should be at least 5 meters long, and I'll need a shield too."

Vehicles only transform into basic mecha forms initially. They don't have weapons until they evolve, relying only on their fists to fight.

As a reborn individual, Victor wasn't going to rely on his fists.

"First time here, buddy? What kind of work you need done?"

While Victor was lost in thought, the welding shop owner walked in.

"I need a saber, 5 meters long, 30 centimeters wide, 5 centimeters thick on the back."

"Bro, we're not a weapon shop. Huh? Wait, what did you say? How long?"

The boss, who had just grabbed a cup of water from his desk, froze, looking a bit comical as he held the cup in mid-air.

"5 meters."

"Bro, stop joking."

The boss was pretty chill as he did not blow up on the spot. Anyone would think that Victor was playing a prank on them.

"$4,000 should be enough, right? This is a $2,000 deposit. I want you to use your best alloy." Victor pulled out a stack of bills.

Nothing was more convincing than cash.

"You..." The boss was at a loss looking at the money.

The guy wasn't there to mess with him?

He was paying cash?

"Can you do it?"

"Yeah, we can, but we can't sharpen the blade."

Making an alloy blade wasn't hard, there wasn't much skill involved. He was paying too much, though.

"Great. No need to sharpen it. I also need a shield, think of it as something like a steel door. I'll also pay $4,000 for it. Here's the deposit for the steel door." Victor pulled out another $2,000…

I walked over the grass, carrying a pile of wool blankets. We were setting up for tonight's full moon celebrations. I love these monthly gatherings of the pack. We eat, laugh, tell stories of the pack's history and of the gods`. Then those that can shift will run in the woods. The rest of us, we stay behind and pretend we aren’t envious of the others. For eighteen years I have been part of the group who is left by the fire to watch the pups and make sure the fire stays in the firepit. It was getting old, I wanted my wolf to come to me, I wanted to prove I wasn’t a dud.

“Hi, pumpkin.” I turned toward the sound of my father and smiled. He had been out checking the woods together with the Alpha and Gamma in preparation for the night.

“Hi, dad,” I called as I placed the blankets down on a log and then took some of them and placed on other logs we used to sit on around the fire. They were more for coziness than for warmth, all werewolves ran hot. Even those like me who didn’t have a wolf. Yet, I added.

“Looking forward to tomorrow?” the Alpha Mark asked as he, Gamma Jonas and my father walked up to me.

“Kind of,” I said.

“What do you mean, kind of, green bean?” Gamma Jonas asked. He, my father and the Alpha were best friends, had been all of their lives. No one had been surprised when Alpha Mark had named my father his Beta and Jonas his Gamma as he took over the running of the pack from his father. That had been years before me and my brother were born. We grew up with the Alpha and Gamma families as an extension of our own. My brother, Elder, was best friends with James, the Alpha’s son. Everyone expected me to be best friends with Cindy, Gamma Jonas’ daughter. But we didn’t get along at all. We just remained on friendly terms because of our families.

“I think my pumpkin is nervous. Turning eighteen is a big step,” dad said, placing his arm around me and pulling me to his side.

“That’s right. She will be able to sense her mate and he will be able to identify her if they both are over eighteen,” the Alpha said with a big smile.

“She’s too young for that kind of thing,” my dad scowled and both of his friends burst out laughing. My dad and Alpha Mark were partly right. I was nervous about being able to sense my mate. But there was more. My wolf still hadn’t come to me, I had never been able to shift and for each full moon that came and went I looked weaker in the eyes of other werewolves. You started to be able to shift between the age of sixteen and twenty-five. Everyone knew the younger you were when your wolf came, the stronger it, and therefore you, would be. James had shifted for the first time a month after turning sixteen, my brother seven months after his sixteenth birthday. Cindy had been a little over seventeen when she shifted. I was almost eighteen and I hadn’t even felt a slight tingle during a full moon. I was afraid that if I found my mate, he would think I was too weak.

“You're not still worried about your wolf, are you, little one?” the Alpha asked. I nodded. We had had this conversation many times in the last two years. “Armeria Rose Winstone, two years is nothing. She will come to you,” he said. I flinched as he used my full name. My mother has a thing for all things growing and has named her only two children after her favorite plants. My father didn’t object because he loves her too much to not let her have her way.

“I know, Alpha,” I said.

“You are perfect, just the way you are, pumpkin,” my father said and kissed the top of my head.

“You have to say that, you’re my father,” I pointed out.

“And if some boy tells you anything else, you tell us and we will beat his ass.”

“Thank you uncle Jonas,” I said.

“Any time,” he told me and ruffled my hair. I objected and tried to get away, but my father laughed and kept me in place. I hated when people messed with my hair. It was hard to keep under control with its red curls at the best of times, but mess with it and it just became one big poof of tangles and frizz.

“Okay, enough lazing around. Move your asses. I will see you later tonight, little one, and after midnight we will celebrate your big day,” the Alpha told us.

“Fine, we’re coming,” my father sighed with pretend annoyance. Sometimes I think the three of them are stuck in a permanent teenager mode, and it scares me a little to think of them running the pack. But they are good at it. Our pack is one of the strongest and most highly thought of packs in the world. It’s a pride to all of us. As my father and his two friends continued their inspection, I got back to my tasks for the evening. Usually I would help my mother as she and some other women prepared the food. But I had been put on other duties and I’m guessing, and hoping, it’s because they are working on a surprise cake for my birthday. As I walked over to Sally, Jonas’ mate, to get information about which games she has been planning for the pups, I tried to remember that I’m lucky. I have a good family, I have good friends and a good pack. So what if I don’t have a wolf? Three out of four isn’t a bad thing, right? And if I found my mate and he loves me as mates do, then I will have four out of five. That would be fantastic. Unless he rejects you because you don’t have a wolf, a small voice in my head kept saying. It’s like the voice is a broken record, playing over and over again in my head.

Hours later, I was sitting in front of the fire, laughing along with the others as Nick, one of the oldest warriors in the pack, was telling the story about how he had defeated a swarm of vampires. The number of vampires went up for each full moon. But we all loved listening to him telling the story. Most of the pack members were running in their wolf form in the surrounding forest. I still hadn’t felt the need to shift, so as usual I volunteered to watch the pups and keep an eye on the teenagers. It was just after midnight when the pack started to return. In groups or pairs they came walking out of the woods, they were all smiling and looked relaxed. I wondered why they were heading back so early when my mother and Luna Joy came walking with a birthday cake between them. I could feel my eyes grow big as I looked at the amazing creation that was put down in front of me. It was three tiers tall with white frosting and covered in sugar flowers, it looked like a flower meadow. On top two candles burned, a one and an eight.

“Happy birthday, sweetie,” my mother said.

“Thank you, mom.” My mother hugged me, and then Luna Joy drew me into a tight hug as well.

“I hope you will find your mate soon and that he is everything you hope for and deserve,” Luna whispered to me.

“Thank you, Luna,” I said.

“Time to blow out the candles and make a wish, pumpkin,” my dad said as he joined us.

“Not yet. Elder isn’t here yet,” my mother pointed out.

“He is off with James and Cindy,” Luna Joy said as she snuggled up to the Alpha.

“I can wait,” I offered, which earned me a smile from the Alpha pair.

“Honestly, the whole pack is here and we are waiting on our son,” my mother said and I could hear the impatience in her voice. I heard my brother and our friends before I saw them. My brother came half running out of the forest, closely followed by James while Cindy took her time.

“Sorry, sorry, I didn’t realise how deep into the forest we had run. You didn’t blow out the candles yet, did you?” Elder asked.

“No, she has been waiting,” our mother told him, giving him a look that told everyone she wasn’t happy.

“Sorry,” he said again. Me? I wasn’t paying any attention to what my brother was saying. My full attention was on the scent of sandalwood and pineapple. Even without my wolf, I knew it was the scent of my mate. I turned towards it as I saw James standing at the edge of the forest, looking back at me with just as much surprise as I felt. James, the Alpha’s son, was my mate?

Three years of a sexless mate bond.

I, Charlotte Hayes, had begged Zohan Foster to f*ck me exactly 999 times. During my heat, I stripped naked, spread my slick opening, and pleaded for him to push inside. But every time we got close, his dead brother's mate Grace Nolan would call, and he'd stop cold.

On our mate bonding anniversary, he finally agreed to f*ck me.

Blushing, I straddled his waist. His c*ck was just about to enter when Grace's phone rang.

"Zohan, I accidentally stabbed my womb. I'm bleeding so much. What if I can never have cubs again...?"

He panicked instantly. He shoved me aside and scrambled for the door.

I grabbed his arm. "Let the pack healer check on her first—"

He whirled around and slapped me across the face so hard my head snapped to the side.

"Charlotte! Grace hurt her womb. How can you be so heartless?"

He threw on his jacket and ran out.

By the time I got there, Zohan—the man who'd promised to f*ck me tonight—was buried inside Grace, thrusting hard. Scratch marks raked his back. The room echoed with his ragged grunts.

When I confronted him, he didn't even pull out. He just kept moving slowly inside Grace, glancing at me like I was an inconvenience.

"Grace is in critical condition. Only my seed can heal her womb. You want me to let her die?"

"So I didn't f*ck you tonight. You that desperate? Once she's healed, I'll get to you. That good enough?"

Something inside me went cold.

Then there’s nothing left between us. We’re done—once and for all.

Zohan didn't bother keeping quiet. The wet slap of skin, Grace's breathy moans, his guttural curses—all of it carried right through the door.

The guards on patrol turned to stare. A few looked sorry for me. Most just smirked.

I dug my nails into my palms until I drew blood, forcing the shame and rage down.

Two full hours.

He finally stumbled out, drenched in sweat. His c*ck was still half-hard, slick with cum dripping down his thighs. Bite marks covered his neck.

The anniversary shirt I'd bought special for tonight had white streaks smeared across it.

His inner circle—his most trusted wolves—broke into rowdy cheers and wolf whistles.

"Alpha finally got that d*ck wet, the lucky bastard! Grace must be wild in the sack."

Then their eyes slid to me. Contempt dripped from every look.

"Charlotte's still a wolf-less failure after three years. They have been bonded for three years. Alpha won't even touch her."

My face burned. Rage coiled tighter in my chest.

Years ago, during a Rogue attack, my white wolf soul had drained itself protecting the pack and fallen into a deep sleep. My father ended up in a coma. Zohan's brother Oakley Foster died saving him.

To repay that debt and hold things together, I—as the only daughter of Blood Moon Pack—brought our clan's resources and bonded with Zohan. I helped him secure his place as Alpha of Shadow Pack.

Before the bond, he swore: never cheat, or die a miserable death.

Now he was screwing his dead brother's mate in public and humiliating me in front of everyone.

He noticed me watching. He pushed his laughing cronies aside and came toward me like he always did, arms open for a hug.

The scent of another woman hit me. I stepped back.

Zohan froze, scowling.

"Charlotte, we're bonded. So I slept with someone else a few times. You going to make this a whole thing? You kept quiet for three years. Why kick up a fuss now?"

I said nothing.

He opened his mouth to keep going, but Grace appeared in the doorway bare-legged, wearing his shirt. She slumped into his arms, weak and needy.

"Zohan... help me..."

Her hand found his c*ck through his pants. She stroked him.

"Zohan... it still hurts down there..."

His eyes went dark. He didn't push her away. Instead, he turned to me like this was perfectly normal.

"Charlotte, grab me some birth control pills. Grace's injury needs me to stretch her open and apply medicine without a condom tonight. Then we'll test if she's healing."

"There's plenty of time for us to have sex later. If you won't even get the pills, don't ever expect me to touch you again."

I felt like I'd been dropped into a frozen lake.

He actually said that. Right in front of everyone.

Laughter rippled around us—low, dirty, knowing.

Zohan didn't look back. He let Grace keep stroking him while he groped her breasts, then shut the door.

Through it came the thumping, the gasping, Grace's breathy pleas.

My stomach churned.

I couldn't stay. I braced myself against the wall and stumbled out of that place.