LOGINShe died believing her sister's lies. She won't make that mistake twice. Seraphina Peterson spent five years learning exactly how far her adoptive sister would go. she was cuffed to a hospital bed in a psychiatric ward and listened to Evelyn confess every lie with a smile, while the fiancé who was supposed to love her stood by and let it happen. By the time her heart finally gave out, she'd spent those years clawing together everything she needed to burn them both to the ground: medical training, hard-won financial instincts, a folder of evidence no one ever let her use. She never got the chance to use any of it. Now she opens her eyes at her own 22nd birthday gala, five years in the past, a champagne flute in her hand and Evelyn's toast still ringing in her ears which was the same toast, the same smile, the same poison waiting in the glass. Nothing about this night has changed. Armed with a memory no one else shares and skills she paid for in blood the first time around, she sets out to dismantle her sister's carefully built house of lies one card at a time. Her only real gamble is Lucian Sterling, the untouchable head of the Sterling empire, who has no reason to believe a stranger's wild claims until she starts being right about all of them.
View MoreSeraphina POV
I could hear the beeping of my heart rate monitor as I laid down on the hospital bed. I knew I wasn't crazy but with every second I spent inhaling the bleach used in cleaning my environment and watching the pure white walls of my hospital room, I felt my sanity slipping. How long I've been in this hospital wasn't really important. I had stopped counting the days after the second year. Earlier on, I had hoped that I'd leave this place so I counted the days by scratching the underside of the nightstand drawer with a bent hairpin. One line for every morning I woke up still inside Ashgrove Behavioral Wellness Center. Before this room, there had been three years where I was free. Three years spent rebuilding everything from nothing after Evelyn took my name, my fiancé, and my father's company right out from under me. I had a physician who was indebted to me, a boy with a computer who owed me his freedom, and a folder thick that contained every incriminating information Evelyn thought she'd buried. All of it sat in a safety deposit box under a name that wasn't mine anymore, waiting for a lawyer I trusted to open it if anything ever happened to me. Something had happened to me. As I was deep in thought, the door opened without a knock and I knew the person coming in wasn't a nurse. "You look like something the devil chewed on." Evelyn said as she walked in. She wore clothes that probably cost more than the monthly salary of every worker on this floor combined. In her hand was a cheap and artificial white flower bouquet that she definitely picked from some store which she placed on the window where I couldn't reach without coming down from my bed. "Hello sister." I said, my voice hoarse. I had screamed desperately the night prior trying to get people to believe me when I said I wasn't crazy. I got injected with a sedative for my troubles and had just woken up. "Have you come to check if your schemes are still in motion?" I said through gritted teeth. Evelyn's face changed into an expression that if I wasn't aware of the kind of person she was, it would've made me think it was pity. "I'm just here to see how you're doing." she replied. "Dr Marvel told the family that you've been agitated this month and you keep on insisting on the same story. "It isn't a story." I replied, tears gathering in my eyes. Evelyn sighed before coming to sit down by the chair. "Look here sister," she began. "I and Julian are married, mum and Dad have accepted it so why can't you do the same?" "That's because you ruined me and took the one guy I loved away from me." I tried shouting at her but my voice failed me. "oh, come one." she replied with an eye roll. "I never ruined you. You just thought too highly of yourself which was why this was too easy." "that's not..." I made to reply only for her to hold up her hand in response. "Spare me your theatrics Sister." she said. "Everything I have are things I worked for. It was quite easy really since all I had to do was make people think you were crazy while I took everything from you including that stupid fiancé of yours." "You deceived him into falling in love with you right?" I asked. Evelyn looked at me in mock surprise. "Hold on, you think he wasn't on board with everything I did?" At that, she laughed loudly. "You're so unbearably naive." she said, still laughing. "That simp you call Julian worships me like a goddess and will do absolutely anything I tell him to. In fact, he wanted to come here and reveal to you that he never loved you and was only interested in your inheritance but I told him not to since I'm such a good sister." "You should be thanking me." I glared at her before lunging at her. "Help! someone help, she wants to kill me!" Evelyn screamed, tears in her eyes as she scrambled for the door with a pitiable look on her face. At that moment, the door burst open and three huge men walked in, putting a halt to my action. "What is going on here?" one of them who had a huge scar running down the side of his face asked. "I don't know." Evelyn responded, tears running down her face while she cleaned them up with the back of her hands. "I was trying to tell her how much I loved her only for her to attack me." Hearing that, the man's face changed into a frown as he turned to me, causing a feeling of dread to pool in my stomach. "You have been causing us a lot of trouble lately." he said before gesturing to the men with him. They came to me before pinning me to the bed and cuffing my hands and legs to the bed frame. Once he saw that I was secure he turned to leave. "No! don't go. listen to me. My sister is evil! she ruined me." I said quietly despite trying my best to shout but he ignored me and turned to Evelyn. "If you need anything ma'am, you can use the phone on the table." "You're too kind." she replied with her saccharine smile. Once they had left, she turned back to me, her fake tears already gone. "You have to applaud me for my performance, don't you think?" she asked. "Rot in hell!" I said, hatred in my chest. Evelyn feigned a sad expression before laughing. "Anyway, I came here to tell you that I am now in charge of the family's entire fortune and I won't be wasting money on a waste such as yourself." she said, standing up. "You've been cut off from the family entirely." I felt my heart beat too hard against my chest as my vision darkened around the edges. "goodbye." she said. I could hear my monitor beeping rapidly as I struggled to stay awake but it was of no use and before long, the beeping had changed into a long continuous sound just as everything faded into nothingnessSeraphina POV I didn't see the need to confront him because there was a chance he would deny everything and once he knew I was onto him, he'd do his best to cover his tracks. Holloway's little confession was worth something, but it would take Mr. Sterling's people weeks to quietly confirm it through the right channels, and weeks weren't fast enough for what my sister was already building against me. I knew exactly what she was building. I'd lived through where it ended. By the time we got home, the party had winded down and at that point, only the family stayed behind to pretend the night hadn't been a disaster. I excused myself to my room, sat on the edge of my bed before pulling out my phone. I already knew the footage existed before I asked anyone to find it. Years from now, in my last life, it was one of the only real things my lawyer ever managed to pull for me. I had watched it dozen times back then but at that point, it was too late to change anything and since i
Seraphina POV He looked at me with renewed interest as he weighed my words in his mind. "Do you really understand what you're asking of me?" He asked. "I do." "I'm not sure you do." He said flatly. "You are asking me to co-sign your finances on the same night your sister allegedly tried to poison you. Is that right?" "Yes." I replied. "I want a legal wall between my accounts and anyone in my family who might decide to 'help manage my affairs' after tonight and this is where you come in." "Me?!" He asked, surprised. "Yes, you have a name that's known by everyone so lawyers can't push you around so if my parents try to freeze my trust, or install a conservator, or sign away my shares while I'm 'recovering' from tonight's incident, they'll see your name and it'll scare them off." My parents, despite how much I love them, are not very attentive when it comes to matters concerning their children and this is obvious by how they handled Evelyn's treatment of me so if I am to turn th
Seraphina POV Evelyn looked down at the stain on her bodice and for a moment, her expression cracked and revealed pure rage only for her to school her expression into one of sadness just as tears arrived on cue. "Sera—" Evelyn's voice broke beautifully. "It's — it's fine, it's just wine, I'm not upset—" I'd seen that exact flicker before, five years from now, in a hospital room, right before she remembered to perform grief again. I knew that she was pretending but I acted like I was clueless. I pressed both hands to my mouth with my eyes wide, "oh my god, I'm so sorry. I don't know what happened. I just tripped." Turning to look at the guests around us; "someone get her a towel please. I'll pay for the dry cleaning, I'll pay for the dress." The guests were already murmuring around us with most of them already recording us with their phones no doubt with the intention of posting it on their social media platforms. My mother walked towards us with napkins in her hand while
Seraphina POV One second I felt myself dying, the next I saw myself standing in a venue. There was the sound of violins being played around me and for a split second, I thought I was in heaven but once I looked around me, I realised that wasn't the case. I was in one of those events where people that pretend to like each other attend to mingle but something about my surroundings felt and looked familiar. Looking down at my right hand, I saw that my fingers were wrapped around the stem of a champagne flute and it was at that moment I realised that I had been reborn five years into the past. There were no restraints on me, I was no longer perceiving the smell of bleach I had gotten used to back at the hospital and for a second I almost shed a tear but then, I saw my sister looking younger and more radiant lifting her own glass across from me with a smile I now knew was a lie. "To my dearest sister and Best friend, Seraphina." She said, I had heard those words before and I ha






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