I watched the tender scene from a distance.

Millicent sucked in a breath, lowered her voice, and leaned in close.

"Mrs. Stephens, does your husband really bring you along every time he visits his late wife's grave? You must have nerves of steel."

I looked down with a quiet smile.

"Well, everyone has a past, don't they?"

"I had an ex-boyfriend once. We were deeply in love. We came this close to getting married."

Jackson lifted his head at that, his gaze drifting toward me with a flicker of scrutiny.

Millicent's eyes went wide.

"Really? If you two were so in love, why did you split up? What happened?"

I glanced up at Jackson.

And let out a soft, derisive laugh.

"He couldn't resist the temptation of my best friend. Ended up in her bed."

The moment the words left my mouth, the air went dead still.

Jackson and Millicent stared at each other, the color draining from both their faces in an instant.

A layer of indescribable embarrassment settled over Millicent's expression.

"Mrs. Stephens."

Jackson cut me off with a frown. "We have somewhere to be. We should get going."

He took Millicent by the arm and turned to say goodbye.

"Next time we're free, I'll bring Millie over to visit you and Mr. Stephens at home."

I watched with my own eyes as the two of them disappeared from the cemetery.

Only then did I light a cigarette, dragging on it with idle disinterest.

My gaze drifted back to the gravestone that bore my name.

Mrs. Stephens?

Even now, hearing that title gave me a split second of disorientation.

They didn't know.

Sophia Simmons was a fake name.

No one knew that beneath this borrowed face, the soul hiding underneath belonged to Lucille Harding.

A hand plucked the cigarette from my lips without warning.

Arthur frowned.

"Smoking is bad for you."

"And I've told you before. Sophia Simmons never smoked."

Oh.

Right. I'd almost forgotten.

I wasn't Lucille Harding anymore, the girl who could do whatever she pleased.

I was just a stand-in.

And a stand-in was supposed to behave. To look the part.

I didn't argue. I simply slipped my arm through Arthur's. "Let's go."

After we left the cemetery, Arthur wasted no time.

"The couple just now, Jackson Gilbert and his wife. They're the boyfriend and the best friend who betrayed you seven years ago, aren't they?"

Nothing ever escaped Arthur's notice.

"Yes."

He looped his arm around my waist with casual ease, his voice gentle.

"You've never told me your story."

"There's nothing worth telling."

I had no interest in revisiting it.

Arthur didn't press. He just looked at me quietly, a faint smile resting on his lips.

That was who he was. A gentleman to the core.

He would never say anything to pressure or force someone.

I let out a sigh and began, piece by piece.

Once upon a time, Lucille Harding had been a golden girl.

Born into wealth, bright and vivacious, never having worried about money a day in her life.

And to top it all off, she'd had a brilliant, handsome childhood sweetheart right next door: Jackson Gilbert.

Everyone assumed the two of them were a perfect match, destined for each other.

The year they both got into Crestwood University, they started dating, just as everyone expected. The plan was to get engaged right after graduation.

But the thing about life is, just when everything seems close to perfect, something goes wrong.

And Millicent was that something.

The first time we met, we were eight years old.

Her father had died young. Her mother had run off with another man. She was about to be sent to a group home.

I was the one who begged my parents to take her in, to raise her like a second daughter.

I never imagined that behind the warmth she showed me, behind calling me her sister, she had been consumed by jealousy all along.

The year I turned eighteen, someone leaked confidential information from my father's company, plunging it into crisis.

My parents' marriage shattered too, torn apart by the other woman. They divorced.

I was devastated. All I wanted was to find my boyfriend, Jackson, and cry on his shoulder.

I pushed open the door to his apartment.

And found him tangled in bed with Millicent, my best friend, both of them naked under the sheets.

I found out later that it had started three months earlier, on the very night I'd had that fight with Arthur. She'd climbed into Jackson's bed of her own accord.

Twenty years of a sheltered, privileged life had left me hopelessly naive. I truly believed that sincerity would always be met with sincerity. That the people closest to me were as honest and open-hearted as I was.

So when I saw them, I broke.

I screamed. I lost control. I demanded answers like a woman possessed.

"How could you do this to me?"

"I treated you both like family! I would've ripped my own heart out and laid it bare for you. How could you betray me like this?"

Jackson scrambled for the sheets, yanking them over his body. The color drained from his face in an instant.

"You... why are you here? I thought you were helping your father with the company today."

Millicent shrank behind him, eyes rimmed with red, looking fragile and pitiful.

"I'm sorry, Lucille. I didn't mean for this to happen. Jackson and I are truly in love. Please don't blame him..."

Truly in love?

I laughed like I'd just heard the most absurd joke in the world. Laughed until tears spilled down my cheeks and blurred my vision so badly I couldn't even make out the faces of the two people in front of me.

"Millicent, how dare you say something like that?"

"Have you no shame? If you wanted a man, any man, I would've set you up. Why did you have to steal mine?"

I lunged at her and slapped her across the face, but Jackson shoved me away.

He pulled Millicent behind him, brow furrowed, his voice dripping with impatience and cold indifference.

"Are you done?"

"What's done is done. You can scream yourself hoarse and it won't change a thing!"

In that moment, I laughed and cried at the same time, sinking to the floor in utter despair.

"Jackson, my family is falling apart. My parents are getting divorced. My father's company is on the verge of collapse. I had nowhere else to turn, so I came to you. I thought you were the one person I could still rely on... and this is what you do to me?"

I turned to look at Millicent. The girl I'd considered my closest friend. My sister.

The one who'd taken a knife and driven it straight into the most tender part of my heart.

"Millicent, what did I ever do to you?"

"When you needed money, I gave it to you. When someone bullied you, I stood up for you. I loved you like my own little sister. And this is how you repay me? The night I was at my lowest, heartbroken after that fight with Arthur, you turned around and crawled into my boyfriend's bed?"

Her face flushed, then went white, then flushed again. Tears pooled in her eyes, and she shook her head at me.

"I didn't want to betray you, Lucille. I just... I couldn't help myself."

Jackson pulled her closer, shielding her more tightly. The look he gave me held nothing but disgust and ice.

"Since it's come to this, I won't hide it anymore."

"Millicent and I have been together for a long time. You and your princess temper, spoiled and high-maintenance, always living in your own little world. You never once understood what I actually needed."

"Being with you exhausted me."

Exhausted.

What a pathetic excuse.

Their double betrayal was the final straw.

I stormed out in a frenzy, but my mind was in pieces. I didn't see the truck that had lost control until it was too late.

The accident destroyed my face.

It nearly took my life.

The hospital even issued a critical condition notice. Everyone believed I was dead.

What no one knew was that, right at that moment, I was lucky enough to cross paths with Arthur Stephens, a man who had just lost his wife.

He said, "I can save you."

"But on one condition: you live the rest of your life under a new identity. Are you willing?"

I nodded.

"You know the rest."

I shrugged and glanced at Arthur.

After that, Arthur arranged the best plastic surgery money could buy.

Two months later, when I finally opened my eyes and saw the face staring back at me in the mirror, a face that wasn't mine, I knew I had survived.

I was alive again.

Even if it meant living as a stand-in for Arthur Stephens' late wife.

It was enough.

Enough to uncover the truth about what had happened all those years ago.

Enough to get my revenge.

Arthur smiled and ruffled my hair.

"When I first found you, you looked like a stray cat dragged through a storm."

"Hard to believe it's already been seven years."

"Well, now that you're back in Seaview City, do whatever you need to do. Don't hold back."

He raised his glass to me, calm and unhurried, every inch the gentleman.

"I'll have your back."

I nodded again and raised my glass in return.

"Some debts can never be repaid."

My gaze drifted to the photograph of Lucille Harding hanging on the wall, and the warmth bled from my eyes.

Maybe they were right.

Lucille Harding should have died seven years ago.

What crawled out of that wreckage was something else entirely. A vengeful ghost, risen from hell with one purpose.

A few days after returning, I hosted a gala under the name Mrs. Stephens, inviting every person of influence in Seaview City.

Jackson Gilbert and Millicent were on the guest list.

They were delighted.

Seven years as Mrs. Gilbert had transformed Millicent. She was no longer the penniless girl she'd once been. Wealth had draped her in gold and diamonds and given her the polished air of old money.

But standing in the glittering ballroom, she still couldn't help glancing around, wide-eyed and curious, like a child at her first black-tie event.

"Jackson, who exactly is this Arthur Stephens?"

Jackson chuckled.

"You've never heard of him?"

"Arthur Stephens. Sole heir to the Stephens Group. He controls development rights to half of Southgate. Even the Gilbert family has to stay on his good side if we want contracts in Seaview City."

Jackson glanced down at the woman beside him, whose expression had shifted.

The smile on his lips cooled.

"And that's just the surface. The Stephens family runs deeper than you can imagine."

"Point is, don't cross him."

Millicent stopped walking. Her gaze locked onto me across the room, where I stood chatting with a circle of guests.

"What about his wife, Sophia Simmons? First time meeting her and she's already so cold. She doesn't exactly seem approachable. And I keep feeling like..."

"Like what?"

"Like she reminds me of someone. Lucille Harding."

Jackson's face darkened instantly.

"Don't ever say that again."

"Lucille is dead. She's been dead for years."

The air between them turned heavy. No matter how much Millicent hated to admit it, there was one truth she couldn't escape.

Jackson had never forgotten Lucille Harding.

Not even after all this time.

The realization burned through Millicent like acid. Jealousy coiled in her chest, white-hot and suffocating.

She stared in my direction, a flicker of venom crossing her eyes, so brief it was nearly invisible.

She wanted to grind Lucille Harding's bones to dust.

But Lucille Harding was already dead.

Now, Millicent was the only Mrs. Gilbert. The only wife at Jackson's side.

...

I was in the middle of a lively conversation with a group of businessmen, trading pleasantries and clinking glasses.

But the entire time, I felt a gaze clinging to me like a shadow.