After a falling out with my long-distance boyfriend, I decide to secretly fly home to patch things up with him. Unexpectedly, I catch him fooling around at home with his secretary.

"Do you need to be so mad? I only got someone to act as your stand-in. Ultimately, you're still the one I love."

I listen to his preposterous lies and hide my stomach cancer diagnosis behind my back. I say, "It's not a bad idea to gather more of these fakes. You won't be too upset when I'm dead."

But after I die, he loses his mind when he looks at his secretary's face.

I went abroad for a year, telling Marcus Gray that I was going for further studies. In truth, I'd gone abroad to seek treatment for my illness.

Unfortunately, miracles were a rare commodity. A year later, the doctor gave me my final verdict—that I wouldn't make it past the next three months.

I sat on a sidewalk in Dorwen and calmly accepted reality. I'd always been decisive—since I couldn't change the fact that I was going to die, I knew I had to make things clear to Marcus. I wanted us to spend whatever time I had left together.

I believed he would feel the same. However, I had to sit in the chilly outdoors and call him five times before he answered. He sounded angry on the other end of the line.

"Haven't you had enough of this? Are you there to study or have fun? Do you have that much free time on your hands?"

With that, he hung up on me. The sound of the dial tone pierced my eardrums, and I stiffened.

This wasn't the first time Marcus had spoken to me like that. We'd already been giving each other the silent treatment for three months, after all.

Long-distance relationships were hard to maintain, especially when there were differences in our time zones. I realized that along the way, something had gone wrong with us, so I immediately bought a ticket to head home.

I firmly believed this was just a simple problem. It wasn't too late to fix it. I didn't want my last three months in this world to be filled with regret.

…

I stood in a courtyard and peered through the glass window at the faint light inside. I saw two people snuggling against each other. In that instant, my heart sank into an icy abyss.

The butler noticed me and gasped. Inside the living room, Marcus heard him and turned around. Then, he stared at me in shock.

I looked past him at the woman in his arms. Her face seemed to overlap with my reflection on the glass—she looked just like me.

I smiled self-deprecatingly and turned to head toward the gates, pulling my suitcase behind me.

Marcus ran out and grabbed my arm, stopping me. "Renee, what are you doing back here?"

I sneered and broke free of his grasp. Then, I turned to look at him. "What's wrong? Have I returned at the wrong time and kept you from being lovey-dovey with your new woman, Mr. Gray?"

He frowned, and a hint of exhaustion flitted across his eyes. "Can you talk properly?"

I watched him silently and waited for him to brush me off with a half-hearted explanation or even a lie. He looked at me before snorting. "You don't need to be this angry, do you? She's just a stand-in for you. Ultimately, you're still the one I love."

He raised an eyebrow, seemingly trying to use his words to goad me.

Ah, yes. I'd almost forgotten that we were still giving each other the cold shoulder.

Marcus, on the other hand, had thoroughly forgotten what I'd once told him—that I wouldn't tolerate even the smallest offense and that certain things were best left unsaid, even in anger.

I believed that so-called "angry words" were just a person's honest feelings that they finally let slip under the guise of throwing a tantrum.

The woman who looked like me finally stepped out of the warm villa while pulling a fur coat tightly around herself. She said, "Don't be mad, Mr. Gray. I'll explain everything to Ms. Granger."

She turned to me, the look in her eyes morphing into something else. "Ms. Granger, you must have the wrong idea about us. Mr. Gray only asked me to move in here so that it'd be more convenient for us to discuss work."

Marcus pulled her behind him, but I recognized the fur coat she had on as mine. I remembered it vividly—it was a gift Marcus had given to me for my 18th birthday. Yet, his mistress now had it on.

His so-called stand-in was doing a great job, wasn't she? He'd gone to such lengths to recreate another me, too.

"Enough of this nonsense! Why didn't I ever realize how paranoid you are? Go see a doctor if there's something wrong with you!" he roared.

His voice pulled me back to reality, and I saw the tears on his mistress' face. Then, I watched as he turned to her and said gently, "You don't need to be scared of her, Janae."

I repeated her name. So, she was Marcus' new secretary, Janae Ford.

I'd dreamed of her while abroad. In my dream, I'd heard Marcus utter her name affectionately while on the phone with me.

I felt weak at the sight, and my stomach throbbed painfully. A wave of nausea washed over me.

The Marcus who stood before me was familiar yet like a stranger. In the past, I'd always been the one standing behind him whenever he acted so protectively.

As a child, my mother had always favored my brother over me. She'd told me more than once that I was just a tool for her to form a marriage alliance with another family.

At the time, Marcus stood before me defensively and said, "Renee isn't a tool. One day, I'll marry her and give her the grandest wedding in the world!"

As a student, I was skinny and frail due to malnutrition. My classmates had mocked and bullied me, throwing dirty things at me.

Marcus had shielded me. "It's not easy to get rid of this stench. Thank goodness it didn't get onto your clothes."

When I'd first gone abroad after lying to him about furthering my studies, I'd been overwhelmed by the fear of being in a new environment. I'd fallen sick.

That time, he hadn't defended me. Instead, he'd said, "I'm so lonely back home. Why are you the only one who gets to go abroad?"

I understood what he'd actually meant. He'd wanted to drop everything at work to go abroad with me, but his father and the company's board of directors had berated him over it. They'd punished him by locking him in the family chapel and making him kneel for three days.

Now, however, the tone he used with me, the person he defended, and even the way he looked at me told me the same thing—his feelings had changed.

I didn't know when it started, but Marcus always mentioned Janae in his phone conversations with me.

"You know what, Renee? The secretary I hired today looks a lot like you! I actually thought you were back when I saw her. You have no idea how much I miss you.

"Janae put salt into my coffee today instead of sugar. It seemed like something you'd do.

"Janae sprained her ankle during a team-building activity, Renee. I'm at the hospital now, so I'll talk to you later."

Later, during a video call, which we hadn't had for a long time, I vaguely heard him call my name. I subconsciously responded, but my voice overlapped with another one on the other end of the line.

In that split second, I was lost. Had he called "Renee" or "Janae?"

Then, three months ago, Marcus and I had gotten into a huge fight.

He'd snapped, "You've changed, Renee! Look at the way you are now—you're nothing like how you used to be! You never would've been this clingy in the past! Now, you make me feel like I'm suffocating!"

I'd wrapped my arms around my knees while seated in a hospital corridor. A cold draught had surrounded me, but I couldn't seem to feel it. My heart had been icier than everything else around me.

…

I snapped back to reality. I felt like I had my answer as I looked at Janae's face.

I wasn't the one who had changed—Marcus had.

The cold wind howled, and I stepped forward to yank the fur coat off Janae.

"To think you're wearing trash that I've discarded. Only beggars would want other people's leftovers, Janae," I said.

A crisp slap rang out, and my face burned.

Marcus looked at me, then at the hand he'd used to slap me. His gaze was shifty; he didn't dare meet my eyes.

Janae, who'd looked aggrieved, secretly shot me a smug look. She was showing off to me. She said, "Don't get mad at Ms. Granger because of me, Mr. Gray. I'm just a stand-in…"

Ha. She knew her place, didn't she? Honestly, I wanted to applaud her performance. She acted like she was swallowing her grievances to win Marcus' pity.

He fell for it hook, line, and sinker. His chest heaved with rage, and he glared at me, his confidence boosted by Janae's words.

Then, he pointed at me and snapped, "You've completely lost your mind, Renee! Do you realize how unbecoming your behavior is? You're like a shrew now, not a proper lady! You disgust me!"

Marcus' words were hurtful, but I took them all in without protest. I clenched my fists so tightly that my nails dug into my palms, almost drawing blood.

I was once a rose born in the mud—he was the one who'd pulled me out and washed my petals clean. He'd helped me bloom again. Yet now, I'd blossomed beyond what he could accept. So, he cut me down at the roots.

We parted on that unhappy note, and I returned to the Granger residence. The heat was turned up inside, and I shuddered from the sudden change in temperature when the warmth enveloped my cold body.

Things were still the same. Even the way Mom ignored me hadn't changed—I'd been away from home for a year, yet she merely glanced at me from her spot on the couch without saying anything.

She probably hated me to the core.

I lugged my suitcase into the house with difficulty; I didn't have much strength because of my illness. The suitcase fell to the floor with a loud bang, but Mom didn't even bat an eye.

"Renee! Why didn't you tell me you were coming back? I would've picked you up." My brother, Reuben Granger, hurried to me when he heard the noise. He helped me with my suitcase and complained about how I'd barely contacted him while abroad.

"Ha! As if she'd have the nerve to speak to you!" Mom sneered as she rebuked Reuben.

He frowned. "Mom, that's enough."

That infuriated her. She shot up and lunged toward us, grabbing my suitcase and throwing it out of the house. "She killed your father! How can you still stand up for her? Are you heartless?"

Reuben shielded me. "Mom, Renee is finally home after so long! Where do you expect her to go if you won't let her come home?"

Mom glared at me with hatred and anger. Then, she snorted and snarled, "She can stay wherever she wants as long as it's not here! Even if she dies out there, it's just the price she has to pay for killing your father!"