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Chapter 1: The Perfect Illusion

In the elite echelons of Manhattan high society, Elias Thorne was known as the “King of Hell.” He was a ruthless venture capitalist, an apex predator in the boardroom who decimated legacy corporations without a second thought.

He was also eight years my senior, and my older brother Julian’s closest confidant.

When I turned eighteen, Elias threw me a coming-of-age gala that rivaled a royal coronation. He personally designed and forged a custom diamond pendant for me. When the clasp pinched my neck and I winced in pain, the famously cold-blooded billionaire dropped to his knees, his eyes wide with panic, and gently soothed me for hours.

We loved each other in secret, hiding our romance from the Sterling family for years. For four entire years, Elias pampered me to a degree that defied logic. If I casually mentioned I missed the rain, he would fly us to London. If I looked tired, he would clear his schedule to hold me. I was his fragile, invaluable treasure.

I truly, naively believed we were going to be happy forever.

That delusion shattered the day a security camera video leaked onto the internet.

I was sitting in our penthouse, rubbing my slightly rounded stomach—we were expecting, and Elias didn’t know yet—when the news alert flashed across my iPad.

Billionaire Elias Thorne Stabbed in Downtown Altercation.

My heart stopped. I clicked the video. It showed Elias and a woman walking out of an upscale restaurant. Suddenly, an erratic, deranged man lunged from the shadows with a hunting knife. Elias didn’t flinch. He didn’t call for his security detail. He threw his own body violently in front of the woman, taking the six-inch blade directly into his shoulder and upper chest.

As he collapsed to the pavement, the camera caught his face.

It was the first time I had ever seen genuine, unfiltered terror in Elias Thorne’s eyes. He wasn’t afraid of dying. He was terrified of losing the woman screaming beneath him.

Her name was Seraphina Vance.

She was his childhood sweetheart. His first love. And when I paused the grainy video and looked at her face, my blood turned to absolute ice.

She looked exactly like me. The same dark, cascading hair. The same almond-shaped hazel eyes. The same bone structure.

Everything began to click into a horrifying, sickening sequence of realizations. Elias’s private holding company was named Sera’s Light. My middle name was Sera. I had always blushed, assuming he had named his empire after me. Now, staring at the screen, I realized the truth. The light he was chasing, the woman he wanted to shine upon, had never been me.

I was just an identical replica. A flawless stand-in chosen to fill a void because she had left him years ago.

I touched my stomach. The baby that had brought me to tears of joy just three days ago suddenly felt like an anchor tying me to a man who was using my face to love a ghost.

Chapter 2: The Awakening

Knowing the truth, I didn’t scream. I didn’t break the expensive vases in the penthouse. The betrayal was so absolute, so fundamentally soul-crushing, that it bypassed anger and settled into a cold, sterile numbness.

I picked up my phone and called my mother in Geneva.

“Mom,” I said, my voice steady. “I’ve decided to accept the offer to enter the European executive training program and take over the overseas branch.”

“Aurelia! Darling, that’s wonderful,” my mother beamed through the phone. “When can you start?”

I looked at the designer calendar on Elias’s desk. There was exactly half a month left until my university graduation. “I’ll be there in fifteen days.”

I hung up, opened my airline app, and booked a one-way, first-class ticket to Switzerland for the afternoon of my graduation. I picked up a red lipstick from my vanity and drew a thick, bold circle around the date on the calendar.

My next call was to Sotheby’s.

Over the past four years, Elias had buried me in luxury. My walk-in closet housed an entire wall of Hermès Birkin bags. The velvet display cases held limited-edition Cartier and Van Cleef jewelry.

I didn’t want a single piece of it. But I certainly wasn’t going to leave it for Seraphina to play dress-up with.

When the senior appraiser arrived at the penthouse, he looked at the sprawling fortune with wide eyes. “Ms. Sterling, this is a breathtaking collection. Are you certain you wish to liquidate it all? Perhaps you should discuss this with Mr. Thorne first?”

“That won’t be necessary,” I said, my voice devoid of emotion. “They were gifted to me, which means they are my legal property. Auction every single item. Expedite the sale.”

After the appraisers boxed up the illusion of my romance and hauled it out the door, I sat down on the empty velvet ottoman. I rested my hand on my stomach.

I pulled out my laptop and scheduled a medical termination at an elite, discreet private clinic for the following morning.

The child that had once represented the culmination of our love… I had decided to give it up. I refused to let my child be a secondary consolation prize to a man whose heart belonged to someone else.

Before the surgery, I took a black car to the private hospital where Elias was recovering from his knife wound. I told myself I just needed to see him one last time to ensure my resolve was absolute.

I stood in the doorway of his VIP suite.

Elias was sitting up, his chest bare and wrapped in thick white bandages. Seraphina was sitting on the edge of his bed, leaning intimately against his chest, her fingers lightly tracing the gauze right above his heart.

For years, I had painstakingly monitored his health, meticulously managing his diet and stress, terrified of him suffering even a minor cold. Yet here he was, risking his life for her without a microsecond of hesitation.

Seraphina looked up and saw me standing in the doorway. A mocking, triumphant smirk spread across her face.

“Oh, Elias,” Seraphina laughed softly, her voice dripping with venomous pity. “Your little college girlfriend chased you all the way to the trauma ward.”

Elias flinched. He looked up, his eyes widening in guilt and panic. He immediately tried to subtly shift away from Seraphina, extending his uninjured arm toward me.

“Aurelia,” Elias said, his voice raspy. “Why is your face so pale? Are you feeling ill? Is the baby being fussy?”

If it had been a month ago, I would have sprinted across the room, thrown myself into his arms, and wept over his injuries. Now, looking at him sitting beside the woman he bled for, a wave of pure, physical nausea washed over me.

I took a slow step backward into the hallway. I gently shook my head, my eyes locking onto his for the last time.

“The baby isn’t fussy, Elias,” I whispered, my voice echoing coldly in the sterile room. “She’s very, very well-behaved.”

I turned and walked away. I didn’t look back when he called my name.

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