Aileen finished her second cup of coffee and left the suffocating atmosphere of the dining room. She walked straight to her private study.

She walked in, shut the heavy mahogany door, and twisted the lock. She walked over to the massive desk and flipped open the silver laptop.

She opened a browser and typed her full name into the search bar.

Thousands of results populated instantly. The headlines were brutal. They called her a gold-digger, a washed-up crazy woman, a disgrace.

She clicked on a long-form investigative article about her sudden fall from grace in Hollywood.

The article detailed how the original Aileen had been a desperate, untalented actress who relied entirely on her face to secure minor roles. Any mention of her early indie film work was buried under mountains of scandalous clickbait and suppressed by powerful PR firms.

Aileen stared at the photo attached to the article. The girl in the picture was standing on a low-budget red carpet, clutching a cheap promotional prop. She was smiling, her eyes bright and full of life, like California sunshine.

Aileen reached up and touched her own cheek. The physical difference between the girl in the photo and the hollow, dead-eyed woman in the mirror was staggering.

She opened a new tab and started digging into the Riggs family's business dealings around the time of the wedding.

She found the financial reports. The original owner's family business had been on the verge of total bankruptcy.

Aileen leaned back in her leather chair. The picture was clear now. This marriage was just a business transaction for Archer, but for the original Aileen, it was a forced sale of her freedom.

She needed more leverage. She minimized the browser and clicked on an encrypted cloud drive icon on the desktop.

A fragmented memory surfaced in her mind. She typed a long, complex string of numbers and letters into the password field.

The drive unlocked.

Aileen's breath hitched. The screen was filled with thousands of thumbnail images. They were all pictures of Jadyn. From the day he was born to a few weeks ago.

She clicked on the first folder.

The photos were taken from bizarre angles. Through a cracked door. From behind a curtain. From a second-story window looking down at the garden.

In every single picture, Jadyn was alone. He was playing by himself on the massive lawn, his small back looking incredibly lonely.

Aileen scrolled through the images. She could physically feel the original owner's emotions bleeding into her chest. It was a twisted, agonizing mix of desperate, suffocating love and paralyzing fear. She wanted to hold him, but she was terrified of her own hands.

A sharp ache bloomed in Aileen's throat. Her vision blurred.

A hot tear spilled over her eyelashes and tracked down her cheek.

She grabbed a tissue from the box on the desk and wiped the moisture away roughly.

A faint clinking sound reached her ears. It was the sound of glass tapping against something hard, coming from right outside the study door. Then, a maid's hushed, trembling voice filtered through the wood. "Young master, please take this water to Madam. I... I don't want to go in there."

"Okay," a tiny voice whispered back.

Aileen's muscles tensed. She reached out and slammed the laptop shut.

She stood up, her bare feet making no sound on the rug. She walked toward the door, moving with the cautious grace of a predator.

She grabbed the handle and yanked the heavy door open.

Jadyn was standing in the middle of the hallway carpet. He was holding a glass of water in both hands.

When the door flew open, the boy jumped. His small shoulders jerked up, and he instinctively took a large step backward.

Aileen looked down at him. She saw the raw, unfiltered terror flash in his dark eyes.

Her chest tightened. It felt like someone had driven a needle straight into her ribs.

She wanted to drop to her knees and pull into a hug. Her arms twitched at her sides, but she forced her hands to curl into tight fists.

She couldn't break character. Not yet.

Aileen smoothed her features into a mask of cold annoyance.

She narrowed her eyes, looking down at the boy with a gaze full of critical disgust, preparing to speak.

Jadyn gripped the glass of water. His knuckles were bone white.

He tilted his chin up, staring at Aileen with eyes full of defensive hostility and deep-seated fear.

Aileen took a tiny, hesitant step forward.

Jadyn flinched. He scrambled backward, putting more distance between them like a frightened animal trying to escape a trap.

Seeing him shrink away from her sent a wave of physical pain through Aileen's stomach. It was a heavy, sickening ache.

She opened her mouth, intending to soften her voice just a fraction.

Warning! Critical OOC risk detected! Oracle's red alarm flashed across her vision, the sound shrill and painful in her head.

Aileen bit down hard on her tongue. She swallowed the gentle words, tasting the bitter reality of her situation.

She forced her brow to furrow. She twisted her lips into a sneer of pure disgust.

Aileen raised her hand and swiped it through the air toward Jadyn.

Her fingers clipped the side of the heavy glass in his hands.

The glass slipped from his small fingers. It hit the thick Persian rug with a dull, heavy thud.

It didn't shatter, but the water splashed out violently, soaking the toes of Jadyn's dinosaur slippers.

Jadyn's head snapped up. The fear in his eyes was instantly swallowed by a fierce, humiliating hatred.

Aileen crossed her arms tightly over her chest. "Can't you even hold a glass of water properly?" she snapped, her voice dripping with venom. "Watch where you're walking."

Jadyn bit his lower lip. He bit it so hard the skin turned white, then red. His eyes were shining with unshed tears, but he refused to let them fall.

Seeing him swallow his pride and hold back his tears almost broke Aileen's resolve. Her throat felt like it was closing up.

She forced herself to look away from his face. She stared at the wet spot on the rug.

"Clean it up," she ordered, her tone freezing cold. "Now."

Jadyn didn't say a word. He dropped to his knees on the carpet.

He didn't go look for a towel. He pulled the sleeve of his cotton pajama shirt down over his hand and started scrubbing at the wet spot on the rug.

Aileen stopped breathing. Watching him use his own clothes to clean up a mess, doing it with the practiced efficiency of a child who had been punished for taking too long before, made her physically sick.

Character maintenance successful. Warning lifted, Oracle chimed.

Aileen couldn't stand there for another second. She spun around on her heel.

She walked back into the study and slammed the door shut behind her.

The moment the lock clicked, her legs gave out. She slid down the solid wood paneling until she hit the floor.

She slapped both hands over her mouth, pressing hard against her lips to muffle the sob tearing up her throat.

She sat there, holding her breath, listening intently.

A minute later, she heard the soft, shuffling footsteps of Jadyn walking away down the hall.

Aileen dropped her hands. She wiped the tears off her face with the back of her hand, the movement rough and angry. She grabbed the doorframe and pulled herself up.

She walked over to the window, letting the cold draft hit her face. She was done playing by the system's rules. She was going to find a way out of this.

Aileen turned away from the window and walked toward the attached en-suite bathroom. She needed cold water. She needed to wash the disgust off her skin.

Aileen walked into the massive, marble-tiled bathroom.

She turned the gold-plated faucet on full blast. The water rushed out, freezing cold.

She cupped her hands, catching the icy water, and splashed it violently against her pale face.

The shock of the cold temperature hit her skin, clearing the heavy fog of guilt from her brain.

Aileen stood up straight. Water dripped from her chin onto her silk dress. She grabbed a thick white towel from the rack and pressed it against her face.

As she lowered the towel, her eyes caught the edge of the walnut vanity cabinet under the sink.

A hazy, fragmented memory flickered in her mind. The original Aileen kneeling on the cold tiles in the middle of the night, hiding something in the dark.

Aileen dropped the towel on the counter. She crouched down and pulled open the heavy wooden doors of the cabinet.

The shelves were lined with rows of expensive, unopened skincare bottles and bath salts. Everything looked perfectly normal.

Aileen didn't stop. She reached her arm in and shoved the heavy glass bottles aside, pushing them to the edges of the cabinet.

She reached her hand all the way to the back, feeling around the dark, dusty corner behind the plumbing pipe.

Her fingertips brushed against smooth, cold plastic.

Aileen grabbed the object and pulled it out into the light.

It was a standard, white, medical-grade plastic pill bottle. There was no prescription label on it. The surface was completely blank.

She stood up and held the bottle under the bright vanity lights. She pressed down on the safety cap and twisted it open.

She tipped the bottle over her palm. Three small, round, white pills tumbled out.

Aileen brought her hand closer to her face. She squinted, reading the tiny alphanumeric code stamped into the chalky surface of the pill.

Her modern medical knowledge supplied the answer instantly. It was a high-dose, heavy-duty antipsychotic. A prescription medication used to treat severe schizophrenia and dissociative identity disorder.

A cold chill crawled up Aileen's spine, settling in the back of her neck.

The original owner wasn't just suffering from depression. She was heavily medicated for a severe split personality disorder. The illness was infinitely worse than the system had let on.

Aileen carefully tipped the pills back into the bottle and screwed the cap on tight.

She knelt down and shoved the bottle back into the dark corner behind the pipe, rearranging the skincare bottles to hide it perfectly.

She stood up and planted both hands flat on the marble countertop. She stared at her reflection in the mirror.

She took a deep breath. Her mind was sharp. Her logic was flawless. She was completely sane.

A crazy, dangerous plan started forming in her head.

Everyone in this house already thought she was an unpredictable lunatic. Why not give them exactly what they expected?

If she staged a massive, undeniable psychological breakdown, she could use the "insanity" as a shield. She could treat Jadyn well while in a "manic state," and the system wouldn't be able to flag it as OOC because crazy people don't have a baseline character.

A slow, cold smile spread across Aileen's face. She turned and walked out of the bathroom.

She went to the walk-in closet and started pulling open the drawers of her vanity. She dug through her designer bags.

Inside the zippered pocket of a Birkin bag, her fingers brushed against a heavy piece of metal.

She pulled it out. It was a Centurion Card. An exclusive, no-limit black card with Archer's name embossed on the front.

Aileen held the heavy metal card between her index and middle finger, letting it catch the light.

She walked back to her desk, flipped the laptop open, and sat down. It was time to start the show.