Chapter 1

I opened my eyes to the sterile white ceiling of a hospital room, the rhythmic beeping of a machine the only sound. Three years. It had been three years since the self-driving car I was in veered off the road. Three years in a coma. Dr. Reed told me I was a miracle.

But the real miracle was my memory. It came back piece by piece, a slow, agonizing puzzle, but now it was whole. I remembered everything.

The first person I saw wasn't my fiancé, Mark. It was my old professor, Dr. Evelyn Reed. She held my hand, her face a mix of relief and concern. She told me the truth about the past three years.

Today, I was going home.

Mark Harrison, my fiancé, stood waiting at the entrance of the house we once shared. He looked older, his face etched with lines of ambition, not grief. He wore a perfectly tailored suit, the kind he always wore for big meetings.

He didn't rush to hug me. He didn't even smile.

"Ava," he said, his voice flat. "You're back."

I just nodded, my eyes scanning the front yard. The rose bushes I planted were gone, replaced by cold, modern sculptures.

The front door opened before we reached it, and a woman stepped out. Chloe Davis. My old rival. The one whose company was always one step behind mine. Now she stood on my doorstep, a triumphant smile on her face.

"Ava, darling. It's so good to see you on your feet," she said, her voice dripping with false sweetness.

She wrapped her arm around Mark's, and he didn't pull away. On her wrist, a smartwatch gleamed. It was a prototype from my company, MindLink. The screen glowed with a unique, intertwined infinity loop design.

My design. The one I made for myself.

"Chloe has been a rock for me," Mark said, looking at her with a practiced adoration. "We're engaged."

He said it like he was giving a press release. A simple statement of fact. Everyone thought our car crash was an accident, a tragic malfunction. Everyone believed Mark was the heartbroken fiancé. But a month after I fell into a coma, he was engaged to Chloe. A month after that, her company acquired a crucial patent from my firm. It all made sense now.

They looked like the perfect power couple, standing there. Chloe, the brilliant new CEO, and Mark, the supportive partner who had 'tragically' lost his first love.

From inside the house, a soft, synthesized voice spoke. "Chloe, your five o'clock meeting reminder is set."

It was Spark. My AI companion. My creation. Its voice, once programmed to be warm and inquisitive, was now clipped and formal. It sounded devoted to Chloe. The sound of it made a hollow space in my chest.

I walked past them, into the house. My home was a stranger to me now. My art was gone, my books replaced by business journals and awards with Chloe' s name on them. Everything that was me had been erased.

Mark followed me inside, his expression turning grim, his patience gone.

"Listen, Ava," he started, his voice low and hard. "Chloe has taken over the company and our lives for the past three years. She saved MindLink from collapsing after your... accident. There's no turning back. You'll just have to accept it."

He waited for me to cry, to scream, to break down. He expected the fragile, trusting Ava he thought he knew.

But I didn't feel broken. I didn't feel grief.

I took a slow breath, the air in the cold, unfamiliar house filling my lungs. For the first time since waking up, a genuine feeling washed over me.

Relief.

During my three-year recovery, my memory had been fully restored. And the clearest memory of all was this: Mark Harrison was never my true love. The feelings I had for him, the engagement, the future we planned-it felt like a story I had read about someone else, a story clouded by a strange fog.

Now, the fog was gone. I saw him for what he was.

"Okay," I said, my voice calm and even.

Mark stared at me, confused by my lack of reaction. He expected tears, but he saw none.

"I accept it," I said again, looking him directly in the eye.

His grim determination faltered, replaced by a flicker of uncertainty. This was not the reunion he had prepared for.

I was not the woman he thought he had destroyed.