LOGINLyra was never supposed to be the heroine. In the novel she read in her past life, Lyra was just a placeholder—the adopted daughter of a high-society family who dropped her the second their real daughter returned. Then came the humiliation. The neglect. The death that barely registered in the plot. But this Lyra? She’s not following the script. Reincarnated into the story, Lyra remembers everything. She knows where the plot is headed—and she plans to derail it. Step one: make herself indispensable. Step two: change the fate of Ethan, the second male lead who disappeared without resolution. He was brilliant, guarded, and completely overlooked by the original heroine. Lyra—who adored him as a reader—isn’t about to let history repeat itself. She starts small: a business deal, market predictions, power moves. Somewhere in the chaos, they become something more. And when the real daughter returns, sweet on the surface and toxic underneath, Lyra proposes a marriage contract to survive. No feelings. No strings. Just strategy. But love doesn’t follow rules, and neither does fate. As alliances fracture and danger rises, Lyra must fight to stay in a story that was never meant to keep her. She won’t be discarded. She won’t be erased. This time, the side character is writing her own ending.
View MoreThe Carringtons usually don't invite me places.So when Julian knocks on my door mid-morning holding two takeaway coffees and wearing an expression that could best be described as mildly human, I assume I’ve either hallucinated him or he’s about to ask me to help bury a body.“Don’t look so suspicious,” he says, stepping in like he owns the place. Which, to be fair, he kind of does.I sit up slowly, tucking my laptop under a throw pillow. “Are you here to mock my work ethic or confess a felony?”He hands me one of the cups and flops into the armchair by the window. “Neither. I was bored. You looked like you could use caffeine.”I squint at the cup. “You bought me coffee?”Julian shrugs. “I also considered doing shots at ten in the morning, but this seemed marginally less self-destructive.”I take a cautious sip.It’s exactly what I like. Down to the oat milk and the stupid sprinkle of cinnamon I always pretend I don’t want but secretly require like air.“You guessed this?”“Lyra, I’ve
Okay.So.I didn’t die.I just had coffee with Ethan Quan and didn’t choke, faint, or confess my love while crying into a napkin.That alone is worth a trophy. Or a plaque. Or a full-blown Netflix miniseries titled Girl, Calm Down.As soon as I get back to the Carrington estate, I power-walk to my room like I’ve just shoplifted God and slam the door shut behind me.Ten seconds later, I scream into my pillow.It’s fine. I’m fine.It was just a coffee meeting.But it wasn’t.Because I know what comes next. I’ve read what comes next.In exactly twelve days, Anastasia Carrington returns from her dazzling European tour with her accent, her cello, and her tragic backstory about falling through a frozen lake or something. Everyone adores her immediately. Photographers show up at the gates. The tabloids do a glow-up montage.And me?I get quietly erased.No dramatic showdown. No screaming. Just: “Lyra, darling, you’ve grown so independent—we think it’s time you found your own way.”Translatio
Chapter Five: The Calm, the Crush, and the CEO in a WheelchairI was going to die.Not dramatically. Just... quietly combust from sheer secondhand embarrassment while sitting in a too-fancy café waiting for Ethan Quan, real-life CEO and fictional heartbreak machine, to show up for coffee.With me.What was I thinking? No, seriously. What kind of deranged logic led me to believe I could sit across from the man I used to sob over in my dorm room and not lose every single brain cell?“Hi, it’s Lyra Carrington,” I had texted, like a normal person. “I know this is unexpected—hope I’m not intruding. I just wanted to say I’ve been thinking about something you said at the gala. Would love to talk more, if you’re open to it.”Why. Did. I. Do. That.The door opened.I didn’t have to look to know it was him. The whole place shifted. Not in a loud way—just a subtle drop in volume, a stillness in the air, like people were suddenly more aware of themselves.Then I looked up.And yeah, there he was.
There’s a special kind of awkward that comes from trying to emotionally detach from people who barely notice you exist.That’s where I’m at now.Sitting in the Carrington sunroom—because apparently, rich people need a separate room just for sun—sipping a tea I didn’t ask for and nodding politely at a conversation I’m not part of.Julian’s draped across a chaise lounge scrolling through sports news. Evelyn is flipping through fabric swatches for an upcoming gala like world peace depends on finding the right shade of “champagne blush.” And me?I’m just here. Decorative. Like a houseplant that occasionally clears its throat.I told myself I’d use this time to start distancing myself. Slowly. Strategically. Less dinners. Fewer family events. Stop performing the well-behaved “adopted daughter” role.But it turns out, I don’t have to put in the effort.They’re already doing it for me.“Lyra,” Evelyn says, not looking up from her swatches. “Are you still attending the Ambrose benefit next Fr












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