Carolina POV

Back at the Fitzgerald mansion, Estrella was ensconced in luxury. She reclined on a silk chaise lounge in her opulent bedroom, scrolling through her phone, a picture of pampered serenity.

Victoria, humming a soft tune, brought in a tray laden with Estrella' s favorite herbal tea and delicate shortbread cookies. "I even learned your new recipe, darling," she cooed, placing the tray gently on a side table. "Just for you." Victoria, who rarely cooked anything more complicated than toast, had clearly gone to great lengths.

Carleton entered, a small, velvet box in his hand. He presented it to Estrella with a flourish. Inside nestled a dazzling diamond pendant. "A little something to cheer you up, my sweet girl."

Hulda, meanwhile, was rearranging a vase of fresh peonies on Estrella' s bedside table, ensuring the room was a perfect sanctuary. Estrella merely smiled, a faint, almost imperceptible tilt of her lips, acknowledging their adoration as her birthright.

I followed them, a silent wraith in my own family home. The familiar grandeur of the house felt alien, cold. It was their home, not mine. The warmth, the genuine affection, it had never extended to me. I want to leave. So badly. But I couldn't. I was a prisoner to this unfinished life.

Suddenly, the doorbell chimed, a bright, intrusive sound in the quiet opulence.

A moment later, Estrella' s boyfriend, Marcus, appeared at the living room archway. He was handsome, charming, and exactly the type my parents approved of. His eyes immediately sought Estrella, his face etched with concern.

"Estrella, my love, are you alright?" he rushed to her side, gently taking her hand. He' d brought a bouquet of her favorite white roses, their pristine petals a stark contrast to the dark suit he wore.

Estrella looked up at him, her eyes wide and slightly shy, a picture of vulnerability. "Marcus! I' m fine, really. Just a little shaken."

Marcus leaned in, kissing her forehead. His touch was tender, his voice laced with genuine affection. "I was so worried. I heard about the accident…"

A strange, sharp ache, something I hadn' t felt in this disembodied state, twisted in my ethereal chest. It was jealousy, raw and ugly, for a love I had never known. Marcus' s touch, his concern, they were meant for me.

Then, Marcus turned to my parents. "Where' s Carolina? Is she okay? I tried calling her, but she didn' t pick up."

Hulda waved a dismissive hand. "Oh, don' t worry about her. She' s probably off sulking somewhere. You know how she is. Always seeking attention." She rolled her eyes, a clear signal that Carolina was not worth discussing.

Marcus nodded, accepting her judgment without question. "Right. Of course." He turned his full attention back to Estrella.

Victoria, ever the helpful one, chimed in. "Maybe you should just break up with Carolina, Marcus. She' s clearly not good for you. Estrella, on the other hand, is loyal and kind." Her words were sharp, a thinly veiled push towards a new relationship.

Marcus' s cheeks flushed slightly. He glanced at Estrella, who offered him a delicate, encouraging smile. "I… I was planning on talking to Estrella about that," he mumbled, his gaze lingering on her.

Another wave of bitter, self-deprecating laughter rippled through my spirit. Of course. Of course, you were. He had been mine, once. But in this family, nothing was truly mine.

I couldn't watch anymore. I floated away, away from the sickening sweetness of their collective affection, away from the sting of betrayal. It was just another wound, another familiar ache in a lifetime of them.

Later that evening, the carefully constructed facade of peace began to crack. After dinner, Hulda paced the study, her face tight with irritation. "I still can' t reach Carolina! What is wrong with that girl? Does she have any idea how much trouble she' s caused? Estrella is still shaken, and she needs her sister' s support, not this… disappearance!"

My spirit hovered near her, a silent observer. I' m right here, Mother. Or rather, I' m not. And that' s the problem, isn' t it?

Hulda snatched up the phone again, this time dialing the hospital. Her voice, when she spoke, was imperious. "I want to speak to the nurse in charge of my daughter, Carolina Fitzgerald. Tell her to put Carolina on the phone immediately. She has some explaining to do."

There was a pause, a series of muffled questions from the other end. Hulda' s face tightened further. "What do you mean, she' s not available? I demand to speak to her!"

Then, the nurse' s voice, clear and concise, came through the phone, even to my spirit. "Mrs. Fitzgerald, I' m very sorry to inform you, but your daughter, Carolina Fitzgerald, passed away from her injuries shortly after admission."

The words hung in the air, cold and definitive.

Carolina POV

Hulda' s face, usually composed and imperious, crumpled into a mask of disbelief. Her eyes widened, her mouth agape, as if she couldn' t quite process the sounds reaching her ears. "Passed away?" she repeated, the words thin and reedy. "That' s… that' s impossible."

She shook her head, a frantic denial flickering in her gaze. "No. No, you' re mistaken. Carolina was fine. A few scratches, perhaps a bruise or two, but nothing serious. You must be confusing her with another patient."

She clutched the phone tighter, her knuckles white. "I' m a doctor myself. I saw her. She was conscious, talking. She' s just being dramatic, trying to get attention. Don' t you dare try to lie to me, Nurse. I' ll have your license!" Her voice rose, shrill with a frantic edge I had rarely heard.

A weary sigh came from the other end of the line. The nurse, Kandy, I recognized her voice now, sounded resigned. "Mrs. Fitzgerald, with all due respect, I was there. Her injuries were severe, internal. It' s a miracle she even made it to the ER."

"Internal what?!" Hulda shrieked. "She had a few superficial cuts! My Estrella was the one who was truly injured!" She paused, catching herself. "You… you better be mistaken. You' re telling me my daughter… my daughter is dead?" The final word was a hollow whisper, fragile and disbelieving.

Kandy' s voice was firm but gentle. "I understand this is shocking, Mrs. Fitzgerald. If you wish to confirm, you can come to the hospital. Her body is currently in the morgue."

Hulda gasped, dropping the phone onto the plush carpet. It bounced once, the dial tone a faint, mournful hum. She began to pace, her movements jerky and agitated. Her denial warred with a dawning, terrible realization. Her brow furrowed, her lips moving in a silent, desperate argument with herself.

My spirit watched her, a strange, profound calm settling over me. Her anger, her disbelief, her frantic pacing – none of it touched me. It was like watching a play unfold, a drama I was no longer a part of. For the first time, I felt truly free of her influence, of her constant need to diminish and dismiss me. The yearning for her approval, a lifelong tether, had finally snapped.

The pain, the grief, the bitterness of my earthly existence, they receded like a distant tide. A vast, echoing emptiness opened up around me, pulling me in. This was it, then. The true end. And in a strange way, it felt like a release.

But then, a powerful, violent force seized me. It wasn't gentle, like a whisper of peace. It was a wrenching, brutal grip, pulling me through swirling darkness, through sensations that felt like being squeezed through a needle' s eye, like tearing through the fabric of reality itself.

Light exploded, harsh and blinding. Sounds rushed in – muffled voices, the distant clang of metal, the rhythmic beep of a machine. My spirit, disoriented and reeling, was forcefully compressed, slammed back into a body. A different body.

Memories, fragmented and overwhelming, flooded my mind. Not my own. A woman named Claire Tillman. Heiress. Fashion empire. Cheating fiancé. Betrayal. Despair. Suicide attempt. The weight of an unbearable existence.

The sheer desperation of this new life, the crushing loneliness, the betrayal – it was all too familiar. But there was also a fierce spark, a flicker of defiance I hadn't possessed in my original life. I had been given a second chance. A chance to not just survive, but to fight.

Meanwhile, Hulda spent a restless night. The nurse' s words, though denied, had planted a seed of doubt, a chilling possibility that gnawed at her carefully constructed reality. She tossed and turned, arguing with phantom voices, convincing herself it was a mistake, a cruel joke. But the fear, cold and insidious, had taken root.

By dawn, unable to quell the terrible uncertainty, Hulda rose. She had to see for herself. She had to prove them wrong.

Carolina POV

The grey light of dawn was just breaking as Hulda rushed out the door, her face etched with a desperate, frantic energy. Carleton, roused by her agitated movements, followed close behind, his own expression a mixture of worry for his wife and quiet annoyance. "This is ridiculous, Hulda," he grumbled, pulling on his jacket. "A waste of time. I told you, that girl is just trying to get a rise out of us."

Hulda didn' t respond, her mind consumed by a terrible dread she refused to acknowledge. "They' re lying," she muttered, more to herself than to him. "They have to be."

But the moment she entered the sterile, cold morgue, the truth hit her like a physical blow. My body lay there, still and lifeless, covered by a white sheet. A single, small tag identified me: Carolina Fitzgerald.

Hulda stumbled back, a choked sob escaping her lips. "No! It can' t be! She… she was fine! Just a few scrapes!" She reached out, her hand trembling, to pull back the sheet.

My face, though pale and still, bore indeed only minor external injuries. There was a faint bruise on my temple, a small cut on my cheek, but nothing that suggested a fatal accident. Her mind raced, grappling with the impossible contradiction. How could this be? She had seen me, hours before, walking away from the crash, looking mostly intact.

What she hadn' t seen, what her biased eyes had refused to register, was the violent impact my body had sustained as I shielded Estrella. The force had collapsed my lung, ruptured my spleen, and caused massive internal hemorrhaging. The outward appearance was deceptive. My golden child, Estrella, had emerged with a fractured wrist and some superficial cuts, while I had absorbed the full, brutal force of the collision. The medical staff had explained, patiently, that the absence of external wounds often masked the most devastating internal trauma.

But Hulda, a medical professional herself, had focused solely on Estrella, dismissing my condition as an attention-seeking stunt. Her gaze had never lingered on me long enough to notice the subtle signs, the faint pallor, the shallow breathing, the fear in my eyes. Her attention had been, as always, entirely consumed by her favored daughter.

My former life, Carolina Fitzgerald, was truly over.

My spirit, now firmly anchored in Claire Tillman' s body, felt a profound, almost dizzying sense of release. The grief for my old self was a dull ache, distant and manageable. The past was a closed book.

The memories of Claire Tillman were a raw, open wound in my mind, fresh and burning. Claire, the timid heiress to Tillman Beauty, a global cosmetics empire built by her visionary parents. Parents who had died tragically in a plane crash a year ago, leaving her, an only child, to inherit everything.

But Claire was a pushover, easily swayed, utterly unequipped for the cutthroat world of corporate power. Her fiancé, Bradford Nielsen, a handsome but utterly useless man with a predatory gleam in his eyes, had swiftly taken advantage. He' d charmed his way into her company, positioned himself as her protector, and slowly, systematically, began to embezzle funds. He had betrayed her trust, his lavish affair with a junior executive an open secret within the company.

Claire had discovered his treachery only days ago-his plans to fully seize control of Tillman Beauty, to strip her of everything. The shock, the humiliation, the utter sense of helplessness had been too much. She had taken a bottle of sleeping pills, wanting only to escape the suffocating weight of betrayal.

But I was no longer Claire. I was Carolina. And I refused to be a victim again. Never again. The cold fury that had simmered in my spirit for a lifetime ignited into a roaring fire within Claire' s resurrected body.

Bradford Nielsen, my new target, would regret the day he ever underestimated Claire Tillman.

I rose from the hospital bed, the IV still in my arm, and felt a surge of cold, focused determination. The first thing I did was demand access to Tillman Beauty's financial records from my hospital bed. I didn't care that the nurses looked at me like I was insane. I didn't care that my body ached. I poured over spreadsheets, expense reports, and internal audits. It didn't take long. Bradford's tracks were sloppy, his arrogance blinding. I found the shell companies, the inflated invoices, the unauthorized transfers to offshore accounts. I built a case, meticulously, ruthlessly.

A week later, while still recovering in the hospital, my new body twitched as I saw a news headline flash across the screen of the hospital TV: "Fitzgerald Family Mourns Daughter Carolina." A small, grainy photo of my old self appeared beside it. A pang, sharp and fleeting, pierced through me. Not for the life I' d lost, but for the utter absurdity of it all. Hulda and Carleton, finally forced to acknowledge my existence, were planning a funeral.