After I nearly bled to death giving birth, my fiancé Giles Simmons came back from the dead.

He bounced the baby in his arms, his tone breezy, almost amused.

“Surprise, babe. Happy anniversary. Like your gift?”

“The car accident was fake, by the way. The whole thing was staged.”

I held myself upright by sheer will, my body still wrecked from labor, and thought of the ten months of agony I'd survived alone. My voice shook when I spoke：

“Why? Why would you do this?”

Giles didn't even glance up：

“You were a nightmare while you were pregnant. Complaining nonstop, demanding a huge wedding settlement before you'd marry me. I had to teach you a lesson somehow.”

“So here's the deal. Two options. Either we go to the courthouse with no settlement, or we break up. You've got a history of mental illness. Any judge would give me full custody.”

The grief nearly split me in half, but I couldn't bring myself to throw away eight years and my own child. So I stayed.

I had no idea that was only the beginning.

After the wedding, I worked five jobs a day to pay off his gambling debts while his parents found new ways to torment me every waking hour. I was diagnosed with breast cancer before I turned thirty. I didn't survive it.

When I opened my eyes again, I was back on the day Giles faked his death. This time, I turned around and walked straight into the OB-GYN clinic.

“Hi. I'd like to terminate my pregnancy.”

——

“Scarlett Perez, sweetheart, that baby is the only piece of Giles we have left. It's the only hope his father and I have in this world. Please, we're begging you, carry the baby to term.”

That familiar wailing hit my ears like a shockwave, and a chill crawled up from the pit of my stomach.

Not grief. Recognition. The cold, sick clarity of knowing you've been played.

This was the same day as last time.

In my previous life, Giles had been on his way to meet me and discuss wedding details when the accident happened. The car was totaled, the driver pronounced dead at the scene.

I'd just found out I was one week pregnant. When I got the news, I blacked out.

I woke up in the hospital to find his parents, Evan Simmons and Tracey Simmons, sobbing at my bedside.

“There was a fire at the crash site. The police said the body had already been burned beyond recognition.”

Two gray-haired old people dropped to their knees right in front of me, pleading：

“Giles was our only son. We poured everything we had into raising that boy, and now he's gone. The baby you're carrying is the last of our family line.”

They clasped my hands and promised me, word by word.

“We know pregnancy is hard. We will never let you go through this alone. After the baby's born, if you truly don't want to raise it, we'll take full responsibility, even if it kills us.”

Hearing that, something inside me ached in a way I couldn't name.

Giles and I had been together for five years. None of it had come easy.

Just the night before, he'd pressed his ear to my belly, listening for the baby.

“Thank you for carrying our child. I swear I'm going to be a husband and father worth having.”

Looking at those two devastated old people, I couldn't harden my heart. I agreed to keep the baby.

Over the next ten months, morning sickness left me unable to eat. I lost over twenty pounds. Most nights I lay awake crying until dawn, my body and mind worn down to nothing.

Whenever I felt like I couldn't go on, I'd pull out the photo album Giles and I had made together and turn through it page by page, holding on to every memory.

The day I went into labor, I hemorrhaged. Even then, I grabbed the doctor's hand and wouldn't let go.

“Save my baby. No matter what, save my baby.”

I spent three days in the ICU afterward. When Giles appeared at my bedside, I thought the grief had finally broken my mind.

But he was holding our baby, smiling, and he asked me：

“Happy anniversary, babe. Like your gift?”

He confessed everything. The car accident was a lie. He'd gotten sick of me being difficult during the pregnancy, sick of me insisting on a proper wedding settlement, so he'd staged the whole thing to break me into submission.

And his parents had known from the very beginning. Every tear, every kneel, every desperate plea had been part of the act.

Just like that, ten months of suffering collapsed into a punchline.

I grabbed the pillow like a woman possessed and hurled it at Giles, hating him for every lie, every calculated move.

He didn't even flinch. Just gave me two options.

“Marry me with no wedding settlement, or the baby stays with me. Your choice.”

The rage sent me into hemorrhagic shock. Before I blacked out, the last thing I saw was the three of them fussing over the baby, cooing and coddling. Not one of them spared me a glance.

The memory dissolved. I looked at the two people kneeling in front of me now, performing their grief, and felt nothing.

When I didn't speak, Tracey cried harder.

“I couldn't protect my boy, and now I can't even protect his flesh and blood. I don't deserve to be alive. I'd rather just end it all.”

She lunged toward the wall, but Evan caught her and locked his arms around her.

The onlookers in the hallway whispered and pointed.

I lowered my eyes, buried the hatred where no one could see it, and forced a look of anguish onto my face.

“I'll keep it.”

The words barely left my mouth before a flash of triumph cut through both their eyes. They grabbed my hands, all smiles.

“Good girl. That's all we needed to hear. You just focus on resting and taking care of the baby. We'll handle everything for Giles's funeral. Don't you worry about a thing.”

They left with light, bouncing steps, glancing back every few paces. Not a trace of grief for a dead son. Just the giddiness of a con that had landed.

I stood by the window and watched until they were out of sight. Then I turned and walked straight to the OB-GYN.

“Hi. I'd like to terminate my pregnancy.

The cold instruments entered my body, and the shackles that had bound me in my last life cracked apart, piece by piece.

I'd thought about confronting them outright. But that would have been too easy.

Back in my room, I took out my phone and contacted a private investigator. I sent him a photo of Giles.

“I need you on him twenty-four seven. Every move he makes, I want it on video.”

That same night, over a dozen clips came through.

Dark lighting. Pounding music. A nightclub.

Giles had a woman on each arm, looking like he owned the world.

“Whoever keeps me happy tonight gets a fat bonus.”

He slapped a thick stack of cash on the table with a flourish. The bills were so crisp and red they stung my eyes.

In my previous life, I'd been pregnant and alone. I quit my job, stayed home with my swollen belly, and counted every dollar for checkups and delivery.

While he was out burning through money like it was nothing. And he'd had the nerve to resent me for wanting a wedding settlement.

My chest seized. I swallowed back the nausea and kept watching.

A handful of his usual buddies crowded around him, ribbing him, laughing.

“Gotta hand it to you, man. Faking your own death? That takes balls.”

“Can you blame him? That girl was so high-maintenance. Gets knocked up and suddenly it's quit smoking, quit drinking, run here, fetch that. A man's hands are meant for making money, not running errands. She needed to be put in her place.”

“But seriously, bro, how were you so sure Scarlett would keep the baby?”

Giles snorted. He tilted his head and bit the grape a girl held out to him.

“She's an orphan. Desperate for love. Got bullied in middle school, too. Something's a little off up here.”

“I hired some guys to corner her back then, swooped in to play the hero, and she was mine. Five years together after that. A little sweet talk, a few gifts, and she treated me like I was God himself.”

“That's what you call spending small to save big.”

The whole group doubled over laughing.

I sat frozen, my heart split open, the pain so sharp I couldn't breathe.

I thought about the first time we met.

I was being harassed. Giles stepped in front of me, shielded me with his body. A knife caught his arm and the blood ran down in a steady stream.

Right before he passed out, his face white with pain, he reached up and wiped the tears off my cheeks.

“Scarlett, don't cry. The truth is, I've liked you for a long time. Protecting you was my choice. Don't feel like you owe me anything.”

In over twenty years of being unwanted and pushed around, that was the first time I ever felt warmth from another person.

We kept running into each other after that, and gradually grew close.

The day he confessed his feelings, I came clean about my family first, fully expecting Giles to be put off.

But he just smiled, so gently, and pulled me into his arms like I was something precious.

“From now on, I'm your family. I'll protect you forever.”

Five years together. He remembered every birthday, always had a gift ready. He tracked my cycle and had hot cocoa waiting when cramps hit. When I got sick, he stayed by my side around the clock.

Every friend I had envied me for landing such a good boyfriend.

When the truth came out in my last life, I racked my brain trying to understand how a man who loved me that much could just change overnight.

Now I understood. He hadn't changed. He'd just been that good at pretending.

A message popped up on my phone：

“They went to The Grand Royale Casino. Can't get video or photos in there.”

I replied with a quick "got it," then turned around and dialed another number.

“I need you to do something for me.”

Over the next few months, Tracey would text me now and then to check in. All talk, no action.

Meanwhile, I built a carefully curated pregnant-mom persona on social media, visible only to the three of them.

【Can't skip meals no matter how bad I feel.】

【My clothes are two sizes too big now.】

Paired with pregnancy-tip articles shared from parenting blogs, the illusion was airtight.

And of course, late at night every so often, I'd post a few melancholy lines dripping with grief.

Seeing me drowning in the pain of losing my husband, devoted to nothing but protecting my unborn child, the three of them dropped their guard completely.

At the five-month mark, Evan and Tracey showed up at my door again.

I spotted them through the peephole, pulled the pre-made fake baby bump from the closet and strapped it on, then did my makeup to look drawn and exhausted.

“Oh, Mr. and Mrs. Simmons, what brings you here?”

The two of them settled onto the couch, weariness and sorrow etched across their faces.

“Sweetheart, we know pregnancy's been hard on you, and the last thing we wanted was to bother you. But we've got nowhere else to turn.”

Tracey's eyes went red, her voice catching.

“After Giles passed, the whole household just collapsed. His father and I have been dealing with our own health problems. The reason we haven't visited is we've been in and out of the hospital, and we didn't want you catching anything.”

Evan let out a long, heavy sigh before speaking：

“There's still a debt hanging over us. The collectors have been hounding us so bad we've been hiding from place to place. It weighs on us something awful. We just came today to talk, that's all.”

Neither of them said the word "money" once, yet they kept the grievances coming, every inch the suffering elders.

They'd pulled this exact routine in my last life, and every single time I'd caved, handing over my savings down to the last dollar, terrified of letting them suffer even a little.

By the time they finally showed their true colors, I couldn't even afford a lawyer.

Not this time.

“Mr. and Mrs. Simmons, I understand things are tough. But I'm pregnant right now. Between checkups, supplements, and the delivery itself, everything costs money. I really don't have anything to spare.”

“Why don't you sell the house you're living in? Get through this rough patch first.”

The words barely left my mouth before Tracey shot to her feet：

“We can't sell it! Otherwise when Giles comes back he'll need somewhere to—”

The second she realized what she'd said, she clapped a hand over her eyes and scrambled to cover：

“It's a tradition where we're from. They say the dead remember where home is. If we move, Giles's spirit won't be able to find his way back.”

Evan jumped in right behind her：

“We're saving that house for the baby in your belly. A child needs a roof over their head to stand on solid ground. It'll make things easier for you down the line, too.”

They wore their best "thinking of you" faces. All I felt was the urge to laugh.