Chapter 1

The smell of cheap hotdogs and burnt sugar filled the air.

A familiar, sickening smell.

I stood frozen, watching the volunteer fire department' s training exercise.

Jake Henderson was on the old wooden tower, playing to the small crowd.

My heart hammered against my ribs.

This was it. The day my life shattered.

Last time, he fell.

Last time, I reacted without thinking, a human shield.

He got up, almost unscathed. I got a ruined hand, a lost arts scholarship, and a life sentence of misery with him.

He married me out of a supposed debt, then spent years making me pay for "trapping" him.

He' d point to me, telling our children, "She' s why I couldn't have Tiffany."

Tiffany Evans, his "white moonlight," who somehow ended up with my scholarship, my future.

I died alone, full of regret, in a sterile room at a rundown care facility.

But now, I was back.

The same day, the same scene.

Jake was showing off, one hand on the ladder, waving.

He was about to slip.

The crowd would gasp. I would run.

No.

A cold wave washed over me. Not again.

The memories flooded in, sharp and bitter.

His constant complaints. His affairs. The way he poisoned our children against me.

"You owe me, Sarah," he' d sneer, even as he flirted openly with Tiffany.

The loneliness. The endless nights I cried myself to sleep.

My hand throbbed with a phantom pain, the ghost of crushed bones and severed tendons.

The art supplies gathering dust. My dreams, turned to ash.

This time, I would choose myself.

He was starting his descent. The wood groaned under his weight.

My feet felt nailed to the dusty ground.

I wouldn' t move an inch.

Let him fall. Let him face the consequences of his own recklessness.

It was a harsh thought, but the alternative, that life of quiet desperation, was a horror I wouldn' t relive.

This was my chance. My only chance.

To get my scholarship. To build a life.

A life without Jake. Without Tiffany.

I watched him. He took another step. The tower swayed.

He looked down, not with fear, but with arrogance.

Then his foot missed the rung.