Chapter 1

The Downs family had a rule, one that was as old and unyielding as their real estate empire. A wife was only officially welcomed, only added to the lucrative family trust, after she bore a son.

I had done my part.

I held my son, August, close as the car pulled up to the grand, imposing law office that handled all the Downs family affairs. Five years of marriage, and today was the day I would finally be recognized. Not just as Hudson' s wife, but as a true member of the family.

The lawyer, a man whose face was a permanent mask of polite indifference, greeted me. "Mrs. Downs. And this must be the young heir."

I smiled, a genuine, tired smile. "This is August."

He led me to a heavy oak-paneled room. "If you' ll just wait here, I'll retrieve the trust documents for you to sign. It' s just a formality."

I waited, my heart beating a little faster. This was it. The final step.

The lawyer returned, his expression unreadable. He placed a thick document on the table but didn't open it.

"There seems to be a complication, Mrs. Downs."

"A complication?" I asked, my voice steady.

"Yes. The trust documents already list a spouse for Mr. Hudson Downs."

I felt a cold knot form in my stomach. "I don't understand. We've been married for five years."

"The entry was made seven years ago," the lawyer said, his eyes avoiding mine. "The listed spouse is a Ms. Hailey Gomez."

The name hit me like a physical blow. Hailey Gomez. Hudson' s high school sweetheart. The girl who had died in a boating accident a decade ago.

"That's impossible," I said, my voice barely a whisper. "She's dead."

"The registration is legal and binding," he stated flatly, finally looking at me. "As far as the Downs Family Trust is concerned, Hailey Gomez is Hudson Downs's wife."

"But I'm his wife," I insisted, my voice rising. "We had a wedding. We have a marriage certificate."

The lawyer looked uncomfortable. "I' m aware of your marriage, of course. However, none of the Downs family attended your wedding, as you know."

He was right. Hudson had claimed his family was reclusive and disapproved of a lavish ceremony. He said they would come around once we had a child, a son. It was all part of his story, a story I had believed.

The lawyer slid a file across the table. "This is a certified copy of the trust registration."

I opened it, my hands trembling. There it was, in black and white. Hudson Downs and Hailey Gomez. Married. His signature was unmistakable.

A wave of dizziness washed over me, and I gripped the edge of the heavy table to steady myself. My baby, August, stirred in my arms, and I held him tighter, his warmth a small anchor in a world that was suddenly tilting on its axis.

Hailey Gomez. The name echoed in my mind.

I thought of the portraits of her in our home. Hudson had them commissioned after her death. He called her his greatest inspiration, his lost love. I, a gifted architect myself, had understood his artistic obsession, or so I thought.

He had told me I resembled her. "It' s the eyes," he would say, his voice soft. "You have her spirit."

At first, I found it unsettling. A constant comparison to a dead woman. But he had been so charming, so persuasive. He swore he loved me for me, that the resemblance was just a beautiful, bittersweet coincidence.

I had accepted it. I had even helped him design a private gallery in our home dedicated to her memory, a monument to his grief. I thought it was a way to help him heal, to move on with me.

Now, the truth was a cold, hard slap. He hadn't been healing. He had been waiting.

And I wasn' t a wife. I was a substitute. A stand-in for the woman he had never let go. A placeholder he used to placate his family and produce an heir.

My five-year marriage was a lie. My life with him was a lie.

I was nothing but a replacement.

My phone buzzed, pulling me from my spiraling thoughts. It was Hudson.

"Hey, beautiful," his voice was warm and intimate, the same voice he had used for five years. "How did it go with the lawyer? Is everything settled?"

I struggled to keep my own voice even. "I'm still here. There were some papers to go through."

"Don't worry about it. Just sign what they give you," he said dismissively. "I have to stay late at the office tonight, a big deal is closing. I' ll make it up to you this weekend."

He switched to a video call, his handsome face filling the screen. He was in his office, the familiar skyline of the city behind him. He was trying to show me he was working.

But my eyes, the eyes he claimed were so like hers, caught something else. On the corner of his desk, almost out of frame, was a small vase. In it was a single white gardenia.

Hailey' s favorite flower. The one he always placed on her portraits on the anniversary of her "death."

And on his wrist, a thin silver chain I had never seen before. Dangling from it was a small, intricately carved 'H'. Hailey's initial.

He wasn't at the office. He was with her.

He was hiding her. She wasn't dead.

The blood drained from my face. I felt a wave of nausea. I had to bite the inside of my cheek, hard, just to stay upright. The sharp pain was the only thing keeping me from screaming.

"Aspen? Are you okay? You look pale," he said, a flicker of what looked like concern in his eyes.

"Just tired," I managed to say. "August kept me up all night."

"My poor girl," he cooed. "Get some rest. I love you."

The words, once a source of comfort, now felt like acid. I forced a weak smile. "I love you too."

I ended the call and leaned my head back against the chair, the leather cool against my skin. The lies were a suffocating web, and I had been caught in it for five years.

But the most chilling thought came last. I heard his voice in my head, not from the phone, but from a memory. I had accidentally overheard him on the phone in his study a few nights ago, his voice low and secretive.

"Don't worry, my resurrected love," he had whispered. "I told everyone you were an android, a perfect copy to ease my grief. They' ll never suspect. I did all of this to bring you back to me."

At the time, I thought he was talking to a business associate about some strange new tech venture. I dismissed it as one of his eccentricities.

Now I knew. He wasn't talking about an android. He was talking to Hailey. A living, breathing Hailey.

I was the substitute. I was the placeholder. I was the fool who gave him a son so he could finally secure his inheritance and bring his real wife out of the shadows.

My entire life was a joke. A cruel, elaborate joke.

The pain didn't make me want to cry. It made me cold. It made me clear.

I stood up, my movements precise. I left August with the lawyer' s assistant, who cooed over him, oblivious to the storm raging inside me. I went back into the oak-paneled room.

I didn't take the trust documents. Instead, I took a blank power of attorney form from a stack on a side table. Then I went to my car and retrieved a set of architectural transfer deeds I had prepared for a property we were supposed to be developing together. I had designed the entire project. He trusted my work implicitly.

I clipped the documents together, the power of attorney hidden cleverly between the blueprints and the deeds.

He would sign them without looking. He always did. He trusted me that much. Or rather, he dismissed my work as unimportant enough to require his full attention.

Today, that arrogance would be his downfall.