Georgia stood in front of her mirror.
The memories crashing over her carried the impossible weight of years — four years total, two timelines pressing down on her chest until she could barely breathe, until the air felt thick and suffocating.
She remembered it all. Every moment of humiliation from the life she'd already lived, every cut and bruise to her spirit.
Arlo treating her like hired help in front of his country club friends, laughing along when they made jokes about her "unfortunate background."
His mother's cutting digs about her "common upbringing" and how she'd "trapped" their precious son, how she was dragging down the family name.
The way his family would look right through her as if she were invisible, worthless, beneath their notice.
Then there was Stella moving into their home six months after the wedding, supposedly as Arlo's "personal assistant" but everyone knew what she really was. The way she'd waltzed through the front door with her designer luggage and megawatt smile, claiming she needed a place to stay while apartment hunting, knowing full well she'd never leave.
Georgia remembered every cruel word, every humiliation, every moment of torture that was coming if she let it, if she remained passive and broken.
But knowing didn't make the pain any less real. Knowing didn't stop her heart from breaking all over again, didn't stop the tears from burning behind her eyes.
Her mind drifted back to that night years ago when desperation had driven her to commit the unthinkable, when she'd crossed a line she could never uncross.
The memory still made her stomach churn with shame and self-loathing. Even after dying and coming back, she couldn't escape what she'd done, couldn't wash the stain from her soul.
Arlo had been engaged to Stella then. He was the golden boy heir to Wellington Industries, set to marry the Wayne family's perfect daughter in what everyone called the wedding of the century.
The invitations alone had cost more than Georgia's entire education, printed on handmade paper with gold leaf edging.
She was nothing more than a shadow in the Wayne household, the unwanted foster child who cleaned up after everyone else and tried to stay invisible, who ate dinner in the kitchen with the staff instead of at the family table.
She'd been twenty-two years old and had never been kissed, never been noticed by any man, never been anything more than the charity case the Waynes kept around to make themselves feel generous.
But she'd loved Arlo Wellington with every fiber of her being, with a desperate obsession that had eaten away at her sanity.
She'd loved him since she was fifteen years old and had first seen him at one of the Wayne family's elaborate dinner parties, when he'd been everything she wasn't — confident, wealthy, desired by everyone who met him.
When he'd smiled at her that night, just once, just a polite acknowledgment of her existence, she'd fallen so hard and so fast that it had knocked the breath from her lungs and changed the entire trajectory of her life.
For seven years, she'd watched from the sidelines as he dated other women and eventually got engaged to her foster sister.
Seven years of unrequited love that had eaten away at her soul until she'd been desperate enough to do something unforgivable, until she'd been willing to commit a crime just to have him.
The drugging, torn dress, mussed hair, fake blood stains on the sheets and theatrical tears… the performance she'd practiced in front of her mirror for weeks.
She'd orchestrated everything and it had worked perfectly.
Old Mrs. Wellington, Arlo's grandmother and the family matriarch, had arrived at the hotel within the hour, summoned by Stella's frantic phone call.
She'd taken one look at the scene, Arlo passed out on the bed, Georgia in her torn dress, the empty champagne bottle and made an executive decision that would seal Georgia's fate.
The wedding would proceed. But the bride would change.
Georgia had walked down the aisle in Stella's hastily altered dress, to Arlo standing at the altar with murder in his eyes and his hands fisted at his sides like he wanted to strangle her.
He'd spoken his vows in a monotone voice that made it clear he was reciting words he didn't mean, words that tasted like poison on his tongue.
When the minister had said "you may kiss the bride," Arlo had given her a brief, perfunctory peck on the cheek that felt more like a slap than a kiss.
That was years ago now. Years of living in this beautiful prison, trapped in a marriage built on lies and desperation.
Years of watching Arlo's hatred grow deeper with each passing day, seeing the contempt in his eyes every time he was forced to look at her.
The weight of both timelines crushed her spirit in ways she couldn't explain to anyone, couldn't share with anyone, couldn't escape no matter how hard she tried because the memories were burned into her soul.
A bitter laugh escaped Georgia's throat in the silence of her room.
Did she deserve this hell she'd created for herself?
The answer was unequivocally yes, without question or hesitation. She deserved every moment of the torture she'd endured.
She'd been so desperate, so pathetically obsessed that she'd committed a crime that would have landed her in prison if anyone had been able to prove it.
But Arlo had been the only thing in her entire miserable life that she couldn't let Stella have, the one thing she'd wanted with desperate, destructive intensity.
Look where that desperation had led her. To death on a hospital floor with a bullet in her chest and her newborn son stolen from her arms.
The custom Rolex watch she'd bought him for their anniversary stood glaring at her from the dresser.
The engraving on the back ('Forever Yours, G') mocked her from the gold surface, a testament to her naive hope that someday, somehow, he might actually love her back.
Twenty-five thousand dollars that should have gone to the children at St. Mary's Orphanage.
She'd given him this watch on their third anniversary in her previous life, and he'd barely glanced at it before setting it aside with cold indifference, like it was a cheap trinket instead of everything she had.
She'd cried herself to sleep that night in the guest room while he'd probably been with Stella, just like he was now, making love to her foster sister while Georgia's gift sat forgotten on his desk.
Holding it now, knowing what was happening inside the master bedroom, knowing everything that was coming, made her want to scream until her throat was raw.
Georgia grabbed her bag and stepped out, walking down the hallway.
The sounds from the master bedroom had grown louder, building toward a crescendo.
Stella's theatrical moans mixed with Arlo's deep groans of pleasure were the soundtrack to Georgia's humiliation.
They weren't even trying to be quiet, weren't bothering to hide their affair from the woman whose house they were defiling, whose marriage they were destroying, whose heart they were grinding into dust.
Georgia couldn't help it.
She pressed her forehead against the door, tears streaming down her face as she listened to her husband make love to another woman with a passion he'd never shown her.
'He called you an orphan nobody,' a voice whispered inside her. 'But you have brothers. Powerful brothers. You are not nobody.'
The thought surfaced like a lifeline thrown into dark water. She grabbed it, held it, let it steady her breathing.
She didn't know their names yet. Didn't know their faces. But they existed somewhere in this world, and she was going to find them.
And yet the grief was still there, coiling around her ribs. Because knowing the truth about her origins didn't erase the love she'd carried for eleven years. Didn't erase the girl who'd first seen Arlo Wellington at a dinner party and believed, with the reckless certainty of youth, that she'd found the person who would finally make her feel like she belonged somewhere.
That girl was still alive inside her. Still hoping even while hurting.
And that love was going to destroy her all over again if she didn't find a way to kill it, if she didn't rip it out of her chest by the roots no matter how much it hurt.
'Enough!'
Enough being the secret, useless wife while Stella and Arlo paraded around as the golden couple.
Enough pretending she didn't know what was coming, playing the naive victim.
Enough letting her pathetic, desperate love for a man who would never love her back control her decisions, dictate her actions, determine her fate.
Love couldn't be earned through suffering.
Love couldn't be won through sacrifice, no matter how much of herself she gave up. And love definitely couldn't be forced through drugging someone and trapping them in a marriage they never wanted — a lesson she'd learned far too late.
Georgia gathered every ounce of strength she had left, every fragment of dignity that hadn't been ground into dust.
Her hand was steady as she reached for the door handle. Her breathing was calm as she prepared to face the two people who'd made both her lives a living nightmare.
She pushed the door open slightly, careful not to make a sound. Fortunately, the bedroom was divided into two sections: a small sitting area near the entrance, and the bed positioned at the far end. It was partially enclosed by two walls, leaving the middle open without a door.
The scene before her was exactly as she'd imagined it would be.
Arlo and Stella's bodies were tangled together in a way that left no room for innocent interpretation.
In another life, Georgia would have stood there frozen, tears streaming down her face, unable to speak or move.
She might have even apologized for interrupting them.
But that Georgia had died on a hospital floor while her baby was stolen and her husband watched with empty eyes.
She brought out her phone and recorded the scene before her.
Georgia saved the recording and put her phone back into her bag.
She looked at the two people who would eventually murder her and didn't make a sound.
Then she stepped back silently, closing the door with barely a whisper of sound, and walked away with her head held high.
They never even knew she'd been there.
Unknown to her, Mrs. Palmer had been watching from the far end of the corridor. She'd seen enough… the raised phone, the careful retreat, the composure that had no business being on a woman who'd just witnessed what Georgia had witnessed.
The moment the main door closed behind Georgia, Mrs. Palmer stepped out of the shadows and walked slowly toward the master bedroom.