The Stand-In Bride For The Billionaire
I married a dying billionaire under another woman's name. On our wedding night, he opened his eyes.
My name is Lily Carter, and I had thirty days to find $300,000, or my little brother would die in a hospital bed. So when a rich woman offered to pay for his surgery, I said yes before I asked enough questions. All I had to do was wear her daughter's face.
Vanessa Sinclair was engaged to Ethan Blackwood, the most powerful man in the city. But Ethan was lying in a coma after a crash that was no accident, and Vanessa wouldn't waste her beauty on a man who might never wake up. I look exactly like her. So I put on the white dress, signed her name, and became the wife of a sleeping stranger.
Then Ethan woke up.
He is cold, dangerous, and far too clever. He knew the woman in his bed was not the woman he proposed to. He also knew someone in his own house was poisoning him. Now the liar he married is the only person he can trust.
His touch is a warning. His kiss is a threat. And every night, the line between our deal and our desire burns thinner.
But the real Vanessa wants her life back. Ethan's uncle wants him dead. And the deeper I fall into the Blackwood world, the closer I come to a secret buried on the night I was born.
They hired me to be a fake bride. What if I was the real one all along?
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Chapter: Flowers for NoahLily's POVMarcus drove faster than I had ever seen anyone drive.I sat in the back with my phone pressed to my ear, calling Noah's room again and again. Nobody answered. Every red light felt like an hour. Every car in front of us felt like it was trying to kill me.Ethan sat beside me. He wasn't supposed to be there. Eleanor had told him that if anyone saw him walking into a hospital on his own two feet, the whole plan would fall apart. Ethan had looked at her and said, "Then nobody will see," and put on a baseball cap and a pair of dark glasses and got in the car anyway."He's fine," Ethan kept saying. "Carla said he's fine. Breathe, Lily.""She sat with him," I said. "She sat with my brother and asked about his medicine. The same woman who put poison in your glass last night."He didn't answer that, because there was nothing to say. He just held my hand so tight it almost hurt, and I held his back.I thought about the night Noah's heart stopped, the alarms and the nurses running pa
Last Updated: 2026-11-02
Chapter: Margaret Says HelloLily's POVI don't remember walking back down the east hall. One moment I was sitting in Eleanor's study, and the next I was standing outside Ethan's door with the photo of Rose still in my hand.Eleanor had told me to keep it. "Show him," she said. "He should hear it from you."When I opened the door, Ethan was standing by the window. He was dressed, with his hair still wet from the shower, and Duke was sitting at his feet. He turned around fast when he heard me."What did she say?" he asked. Then he saw my face, and his voice changed. "Lily. What happened?""She knows," I said. "She's known since the wedding. I told her everything."He crossed the room in four steps. He was still slow, but he didn't use the cane. He took my face in both hands and looked at me like he was checking for wounds."Did she threaten you?" he asked. "Did she say she would call the police?""No," I said. "She's on our side."He let out a breath. "My grandmother is never on anyone's side.""She is now," I sai
Last Updated: 2026-11-02
Chapter: The Truth in the StudyLily's POVI stared at the photo until my eyes burned.The young woman in the garden was smiling at whoever held the camera. She looked happy and a little shy, the way I looked in the only good picture my mother ever took of me. I touched the small mark below my own ear without meaning to."How long have you known?" I whispered.Eleanor leaned back in her chair. "Since the day you married my grandson."I looked up at her, and she almost smiled."Do you remember what I said to you at the wedding?" she asked. "I told you that you hated hospitals. Vanessa did hate them. She visited Ethan twice after his accident, and both times she left in under ten minutes. But you sat by his bed and held his hand like you'd been doing it your whole life. And when I said it, you didn't even know what I was talking about. I saw it in your face.""You never said anything," I said."I wanted to see what you would do," she said. "So I watched. Duke growled at Vanessa every time she came to this house, and o
Last Updated: 2026-11-02
Chapter: What the Old Woman KnewLily's POVNobody in the front hall said a word.Vanessa's mouth opened and closed. The tears on her face were still wet, but she had stopped crying. Margaret's hand was frozen on her chest, and Richard was looking at the floor like he had dropped something there.Eleanor held the necklace up again and let it swing in the light."Rose Sinclair was my friend for forty years," she said. "I sat in the front row at her funeral. Her son asked for this necklace to stay with her, and I watched him put it around her neck myself." She turned to Mr. Sinclair. "Isn't that right, Thomas?"Mr. Sinclair's face had gone gray. "Yes," he said quietly. "That's right.""So either someone dug up your mother," Eleanor said, "or this is a copy."She dropped the necklace into Margaret's hand like it was something dirty."It's a copy," Eleanor said. "A cheap one. The real stones had a pink color in them. These are glass." Then she looked at Vanessa, and her voice turned as cold as ice. "You put a fake neckla
Last Updated: 2026-11-02
Chapter: The Necklace in My PurseLily's POVEthan lifted the glass toward his mouth, and my body moved before my mind did.I turned to him fast, like I wanted to kiss his cheek, and my elbow hit the glass. It flew out of his hand and broke on the marble floor. White wine splashed across Margaret's blue dress and all over the rug.Everyone in the room jumped."Oh my God," I said, and I put both hands over my mouth. "Ethan, I'm so sorry. I'm so clumsy tonight.""It's fine," Ethan said. He looked at the broken glass, then at me, and I saw in his eyes that he understood. "It's only wine."Margaret's smile looked like it was made of glass too. "Of course, darling. Accidents happen." But her hands were shaking as she wiped her dress, and she wouldn't look at me.A maid ran in with towels. Before she could touch anything, Marcus stepped in from the hallway, where he had been waiting all night."Let me help," Marcus said, and he knelt down and picked up the biggest piece of glass with a napkin. Then he folded the wet napkin
Last Updated: 2026-11-02
Chapter: Dinner with the EnemyLily's POVI had spent four long days inside the Sinclair house while Margaret taught me how to be her daughter, and I never thought I would have to walk back through its doors. Tonight every window was lit, and there were white flowers on every table, like the house was dressed up for a party instead of a lie. A man in a black suit opened the car door for us before the engine had even stopped.Ethan took my hand as I stepped out. He was walking with a cane tonight, and he leaned on me just enough that anyone watching would believe he needed it."Breathe," he said into my ear. "You look like you're walking into a fire.""I am," I said."Then smile while you do it."Eleanor and Richard got out of the second car behind us. Richard was already smiling, but Eleanor's face gave away nothing. She looked at the house the way a buyer looks at something she isn't sure she wants.Margaret Sinclair was waiting in the doorway in a long blue dress. The moment she saw me, she opened her arms."My d
Last Updated: 2026-11-02
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