Chapter 4

"Shut up!" Rosalie snapped, totally losing it.

Just like I'd thought, Burke Group was already on its last legs, and now the only person who could still save it was the fake Burke heiress, Janet Burke.

After all, I'd gone up against her for Rosalie's sake in my past life. I knew better than anyone that Janet had what it took.

With that in mind, I decided to give Rosalie a heads-up. "For old times' sake, listen to me. Quit trying to drive Janet out. She's the only one who can still save Burke Group."

To my surprise, Rosalie only got angrier. "A fake heiress like her has no business staying at Burke Group!"

Before I could get another word out, she hung up.

Whatever. She'd dug her own grave.

Even so, I was honestly excited to see what Janet would do in this life. She was, after all, an opponent worth taking seriously.

…

By the next day, news that I'd temporarily taken over Swain Group was already trending online.

Someone had filmed what happened at the office yesterday and uploaded it. I knew instantly who'd done it.

Before long, the Internet was piling on.

"Ten years is more than enough to leave someone in the dust. Mark seriously thinks he can beat Jerome? The same guy he personally shipped overseas to study? What a joke."

Then one comment caught my attention.

"Is it just me, or is he actually the guy who used to simp for the Burkes' long-lost daughter they just found?"

"Nah, you've got it wrong. That's the Swain heir. Why would he be simping for her?"

I tuned out the online noise and focused on Swain Group.

Rosalie even posted a bunch of photos of herself tagging along behind Jerome at the construction site.

The two of them started rubbing their relationship in everyone's face, hinting over and over that I was only targeting Jerome because I couldn't have her.

Not long after that, news broke that Janet had been ousted from Burke Group. It looked like Rosalie was hell-bent on self-destructing, and there was no stopping her.

Janet was done with the whole mess and decided to look out for herself instead.

With Jerome backing her up, Rosalie took over Burke Group from Edward and immediately started talking big online.

"Burke Group may be struggling right now, but I'm confident I can turn things around. The man I love is standing right behind me, and I know he'll always have my back."

While all that was going on, I focused on visiting reliable factories around the country to talk business.

I also had the digital media company bring in the diligent, up-and-coming bloggers I remembered from my past life, and I even went out to rural areas to check out agricultural products.

All the running around had left me a lot more tan. Before long, I was landing one good contract after another and signing on to renewable energy and nursing home projects.

Everything I was working on belonged to industries that were fading.

Meanwhile, Jerome and Rosalie were busy building a fancy coffee franchise and pouring ridiculous amounts of money into real estate. She trusted him blindly.

She threw in what little her family had left and even put Burke Group up as collateral so they could take out more loans. Edward collapsed on the spot in rage, and after that, there was no stopping her.

One year later, my short-video platform had cleared the 100-million-user mark, so I rode the wave and rolled out livestream shopping.

Capital rushed in the second they saw the potential, everyone scrambling for a slice. The factories and agricultural lines I worked with started booming on live streams.

Even tourism changed as short videos took off. People stopped packing into big cities and started chasing trips out in nature instead.

Around then, the vacation real estate project Jerome and Rosalie were running together blew up in their faces.