Reborn Bride, Deadly Betrayal

The silk sheets felt too soft, the air too clean. I sat up quickly, my hands flying to my stomach. It was flat, but not with the emptiness of starvation. It was the familiar flatness of the night before my wedding. My past life wasn\'t a nightmare. It was a memory. And today was my wedding day. Again.

A sharp cramp seized my stomach, and cold sweat broke out across my forehead. That feeling was horribly familiar. It was happening again. In the grand hall of the Stone family estate, filled with the city\'s most powerful, the air was thick with fear that kept them silent. No one wanted to upset the Stones. Next to me, Brittany whimpered softly. We were both on our knees, captives in the middle of my wedding reception.

Whispers started to ripple through the crowd, quiet but sharp. "Who will Liam choose?" "Chloe is probably done for. Liam never wanted this arranged marriage anyway. Maybe he' ll use this to get rid of her for good..."

Liam stood before us, his handsome face a mask of stone. His eyes never left Brittany. "I want both," he said, his voice level. A cruel joke.

The blade pressed deeper into my back. Brittany cried, "Liam, save me!" Without hesitation, Liam said, "Chloe, Brittany is different. She only has me. So I have to save her." He paused. "If something happens to you today, I' ll take care of your parents. I' ll repay you in the next life."

My heart stopped. He was offering my family' s company as compensation for my life.

I stared right back at him, the man who had killed me. "Why do you think the Kingston Corporation would still partner with the Stone family if you don' t choose me today? Liam, you overestimate yourself. And who the hell wants a next life with you?"

His face darkened. "Chloe, are you pushing me?" he asked, his voice dropping to a dangerous whisper.

The old Chloe would have fallen silent. That Chloe died in a cold basement, her baby dead inside her. I was awake now. "I wouldn' t dare push you, Mr. Stone," I said. "But today is our wedding. The security is extremely tight. If Brittany' s presence here was your doing, then tell me, how did this kidnapper get in with a knife?"

The last thing I remembered was the cold, dusty floor of the basement.

The hunger had stopped hurting days ago.

It was just a dull emptiness now, a hollow space where my baby used to be.

Liam' s face floated in my memory, his eyes cold as he watched me starve, his voice a cruel whisper blaming me for Brittany' s death.

He knew I was pregnant. He knew, and he let our child die inside me as I knelt before a shrine to his mistress for three days and three nights.

Then I woke up.

The silk sheets felt too soft, the air too clean. I sat up, my hands flying to my stomach. It was flat, but not with the emptiness of starvation. It was the familiar flatness of the night before my wedding.

My past life wasn't a nightmare. It was a memory.

And today was my wedding day. Again.

A sharp cramp seized my stomach, and a cold sweat broke out across my forehead. The feeling was horribly familiar. It was happening again. The grand hall of the Stone family estate was filled with the most powerful people in the city, but the air was thick with a fear that kept them silent. No one wanted to upset the Stones.

I felt the cold, hard press of a blade against my back.

Next to me, Brittany, Liam' s mistress, whimpered softly. We were both on our knees, captives in the middle of my wedding reception.

Whispers started to ripple through the crowd, quiet but sharp.

"Who will Liam choose?"

"I heard he' s obsessed with his mistress. He named that new shopping mall after her, you know."

"Chloe is probably done for. Liam never wanted this arranged marriage anyway. Maybe he' ll use this to get rid of her for good..."

The gossip was a familiar tune, one I had danced to for years.

Liam stood before us, his handsome face a mask of stone. His expression was impossible to read, but his eyes, they never left Brittany.

"I want both," he said, his voice level.

The words were a cruel joke, a performance for the crowd. I was used to it. Everyone knew about Brittany. She was the woman he loved, the one he flaunted despite his family' s disapproval. Our engagement was a deal made between our families when we were children, a pact revived when I returned to the country.

Liam had fought it. But I had said "I do" to the arrangement, sealing my own fate.

He had hated me for it ever since.

He left me at dinners, "forgot" to pick me up from events, and answered her calls in the middle of our conversations. A single text from her, a tear she shed, a smile she gave him-any little thing involving Brittany made me disposable. I was a constant, walking joke.

The kidnapper holding the knife to my back laughed, a rough, grating sound.

"Greedy people usually don' t end well. One hundred million dollars each. You can only keep one. Empire or beauty, Liam, your call!"

The blade pressed deeper into my back. It was a sharp, grounding pain.

Brittany let out a faint cry. "Liam... save me..."

That was all it took.

Liam' s composure cracked. Panic flashed across his face, and his eyes turned red at the edges. He looked at me then, for the first time in what felt like half an hour. There was no worry in his gaze. Not for me. Only cold scrutiny.

"Chloe," he began, his voice low and steady, as if he were explaining a simple business decision. "Brittany is different. She only has me. So I have to save her."

He paused, letting the words hang in the air.

"If something happens to you today, I' ll take care of your parents. I' ll make sure the Kingston Corporation is looked after. This is what I owe you. I' ll repay you in the next life."

His words were casual, almost apologetic, but underneath them was a chilling sense of entitlement. He was offering my family' s own company back to them as compensation for my life.

A laugh escaped my lips, cold and empty. I stared right back at him, the man I had loved, the man who had killed me.

"Why do you think the Kingston Corporation would still partner with the Stone family if you don' t choose me today?" I asked, my voice clear and steady. "Liam, you overestimate yourself. And who the hell wants a next life with you?"

My last words hit him like a physical blow. His face darkened.

"Chloe, are you pushing me?" he asked, his voice dropping to a dangerous whisper.

It was a chilling question.

The old Chloe would have fallen silent. The old Chloe' s lifelong dream was to marry Liam, even knowing he loved someone else. She would have accepted this fate, hoping for a sliver of his affection.

But that Chloe died in a cold basement, her baby dead inside her.

I was awake now.

This man' s heart was a block of ice. It could not be warmed. The boy I thought I was going to marry, the childhood friend I remembered, was not this man.

"I wouldn' t dare push you, Mr. Stone," I said, a bitter smile on my lips. "But today is our wedding. The security is extremely tight. If Brittany' s presence here was your doing, then tell me, how did this kidnapper get in with a knife?"

The Stone-Kingston wedding was the event of the year. The security was a fortress. Not even a fly was supposed to get in without an invitation. Yet here we were, with two unexpected, and one very armed, guests.

Liam' s face stiffened. His eyes, which had been full of fake concern for Brittany, now turned wary and fierce. He was looking at me, really looking at me, and he didn' t like what he saw.

The whispers in the crowd shifted.

"How did they get in without an invitation?"

"Wait... could Brittany have planned this? To force Liam to choose her?"

"Maybe..."

"Silence!" a powerful voice boomed from the side. "Mr. Stone Sr. is here!"

The wedding venue was split into two sections. One for the older generation, the elders and family heads, and one for us, the younger peers. The kidnapping had happened in our section. I remembered it clearly now.

I had been in the dressing room, touching up my makeup. Brittany had found me there.

"Please, don' t marry Liam," she had pleaded, tears in her eyes. "You' re a Kingston. You have everything. But I' m different. I only have Liam."

It was the same plea I had made to her in our past life, begging her to leave him alone. The irony was suffocating.

Before I could refuse, a dull pain exploded in the back of my head. Then darkness.

I woke up here, on my knees, a knife to my back.

A series of heavy thumps broke through my thoughts.

Mr. Stone Sr., Liam' s grandfather and the true patriarch of the family, was hitting Liam with his heavy wooden cane. Thump. Thump. Thump.

Liam stood there and took it, his jaw tight, not moving an inch.

"Is there even a choice here?" Mr. Stone Sr. roared, his voice shaking with fury. "You have an engagement with Chloe! Are you going to choose this nameless girl from the outside? Liam, I' m telling you, you have no choice today!"

Liam' s breathing was heavy, his anger cooling into a dead, silent resolve.

"Grandpa, I must choose Brittany," he said, his voice ringing with finality. "In this life, I will only marry her!"

A collective gasp went through the hall. No one in our circle defied their family like this. Not for a woman. Family, alliances, and business always came first.

Mr. Stone Sr. stamped his foot, his face purple with rage. He called Liam a disgrace to the family name.

"Liam, have you forgotten why this alliance exists?" he shouted, his voice cracking. "No one has ever broken this century-old pact between our families! Are you going to be the sinner who destroys the Stone family?!"

He was talking about the history, the real reason for this marriage. Generations ago, the Kingston family had saved the Stone family from a financial crisis that would have destroyed them. A fortune teller at the time had read their fates and prophesied that a union between the two families would guarantee a century of prosperity. The Stone-Kingston alliance had never been broken since.

Liam was the first to try.

"What can a woman like her give you?" Mr. Stone Sr. continued, his voice dripping with disdain as he gestured towards Brittany. "If you insist on choosing her, the Stone family will not pay a single cent of that one-hundred-million-dollar ransom!"

His words were brutal, but they were the truth of our world. They said lovebirds came from wealthy families, but those from wealthy families often had no choice in love at all.

Brittany, seeing her chance, began to cry softly.

"Liam, I' m sorry," she whispered, her voice choked with fake emotion. "It' s all my fault. I' ve dragged you into this. I don' t want to make things difficult for you..."

In my past life, after I revealed my pregnancy, Brittany had used these exact words to secure her place in Liam' s heart, making her sacrifice seem noble.

This time, even without the pregnancy card to play, she used the same script.

It was my turn to speak.

"Liam, choose Brittany," I said.

My voice was calm and resolute, but the words dropped like a bomb in the silent hall.

"Is Chloe crazy?"

"Is she trying to get herself killed?"

The whispers erupted again, louder this time.

Liam stared at me, his eyes wide with disbelief. He couldn't process it. Even the kidnapper behind me seemed speechless for a moment.

I took a deep, steadying breath, and I leaned back slightly, letting the blade press more firmly against my skin.

"Kingston Corp. will pay the ransom for her," I declared.

Then, I looked straight at Liam, and with all the strength I had, I called out her name.

"Brittany!"

It was the signal.

Liam moved so fast he was a blur. He rushed forward, throwing himself around Brittany, pulling her into a protective embrace.

He chose her. Without a moment's hesitation.

The kidnapper reacted to the sudden movement. A sharp, searing pain exploded in my lower back as the blade pierced my skin.

The world tilted.

Chaos erupted around me. People were screaming, running.

But through the blur, one thing was clear.

Liam remained exactly where he was, shielding Brittany, his back to me. He never took a single step in my direction. He never even looked back.

In a scenario with two choices, Chloe Kingston always loses.

Before my eyes closed and the world went black, that was my last, bitter thought.