“My daughter will be back next month.” Mrs. Linwood's voice crackled over the phone line, smooth and cold. “Until then, keep pretending to be her. Don’t mess this up. Once everything’s settled, I’ll send you a hundred million. That should be enough for you to live however you want.”
“Okay.”
When I hung up, my eyes drifted toward the massive wedding portrait hanging over the fireplace.
Benedict stood tall in his black tuxedo, one hand in his pocket, expression unreadable. Cold. Powerful. Dangerous. And me? I wore a white gown I didn’t choose, smiling a smile that never reached my eyes. I looked so... obedient.
“It’s finally ending,” I whispered. “Six years… it’s almost over.”
Six years ago, the Linwood and Karsov families arranged a marriage that dominated headlines. Their daughter, Alodia Linwood, was to become Benedict Karsov’s bride. She was highborn, polished, bred for palaces. A real blueblood doll. The match was power and legacy sealed in diamonds.
But then Alodia vanished. Days before the wedding, she left nothing but a note.
“Mom. Dad. I know this marriage is my duty, but I can’t do it. I’ll come back after six years. Please… give me time to be free.”
She left, and the Linwoods found me while I was picking through trash to sell that day. Their car almost hit me.
Because I had Alodia’s face. Same build. Same hair, same voice if I softened it… they took me. I wasn’t their daughter, just a girl living with a sick grandmother who couldn’t afford another hospital stay.
So they offered me a deal. Put on the dress. Say the vows. Stay quiet for six years. Pretend to be her, and I’d walk away with more money than I could ever dream of. Enough to save my grandmother. Enough to never be powerless again.
I remember her mother’s words the night before the wedding:
“He doesn’t love Alodia. He’s still stuck on that orphan girl his family helped years ago. A student named Maeve. You won’t have a happy life in that house. But if you behave, if you survive the next six years, it’ll be over. Endure. For all our sakes.”
So I did. Like a good girl.
But I knew who Benedict Karsov was.
The media called him a philanthropist. A businessman. A leader in global development. But in the shadows, they called him the Butcher of Saint-Lorenz. The man who wiped out Six entire families in a single winter. A man who signed contracts in blood and owned every judge who ever dared to say his name.
And Maeve? She was the ghost that haunted him.
An orphan his family sponsored. The girl he loved. The one he tried to keep, but who chose freedom instead. She ran to London. Left him behind. Left scars deeper than anyone knew.
So the Karsovs gave him Alodia.
And when Alodia ran, they gave him me.
The marriage was nothing like I expected.
The mansion? Beautiful. Cold. Too quiet.
His study? Lined with photos of her. Maeve laughing. Maeve on a boat. Maeve in winter.
He said he traveled to London for business. I knew better.
I slept in the guest room. The one at the end of the hall where the window whistled all night and the heater barely worked. I’ve never seen the master bedroom. Not once. Not even on our wedding night.
He didn’t look at me unless he had to. But I stayed. Because I had no choice. I turned myself off. Piece by piece. He liked silence, so I stopped speaking. He came home late, so I waited with the lights on. He had ulcers, so I taught myself to cook porridge with ginger and no onions.
I bent myself backwards to survive him.
I wore the name like armor. I memorized Alodia’s life until I couldn’t remember my own.
And then... something changed.
Small things. A rumor. A whisper. That Mr. Karsov had fallen for his wife. ME.
He stopped flying to London.
Maeve’s photo vanished from his desk.
He remembered my birthday.
He came home early when I was sick.
He even smiled once at dinner. At me.
For a moment, I believed the illusion. That maybe, somehow, I had become enough. That maybe I wasn’t just Alodia’s shadow.
But then Maeve came back. And just like that, I was invisible again.
He disappeared for nights.
The study was flooded with her photos.
I passed the hallway and heard her name fall from his lips like a prayer.
People started laughing at me. Whispering when I passed. A fake wife. A ghost in someone else’s life. A girl stupid enough to fall for a man who never saw her.
But I didn’t argue. I didn’t cry.
One more month. That’s all that’s left. One more month of pretending to be a woman I’ve never even met. One more month of playing wife to a man who would burn the world for another woman’s smile.
I was just starting to smile when my phone lit up.
Benedict.
I inhaled slowly and answered. “Yes?”
“Hexagon Club. Bring the stuff Maeve needs.”
His voice was ice. Brutal. Dismissive. “NOW.”
