Lucian! Please, Don't Let Me Down.

The chapel was filled with guests on this long-awaited wedding day, every pew taken, every aisle crowded, every corner filled with whispered conversations.

The Vaughn family had extended invitations to numerous people, business contacts, influential partners, distant relatives who suddenly remembered their affection, and nearly everyone within their social circle who mattered enough to witness the spectacle they had orchestrated.

White roses, Elara's least favorite, not that anyone had asked, adorned the altar and decorated the entrance, petals forming delicate patterns that mocked the heaviness pressing down on her chest.

Although some harbored doubts about the union between the adopted sister and her adoptive brother, Elara and Aaron's marriage was a complex matter for many.

They wondered, questioned, and disapproved quietly.

Yet, since they shared no blood relation, most chose to remain silent, simply smiling and embracing the moment, enjoying the celebratory mood and pretending that everything was flawless, that nothing about this ceremony tasted of coercion, fear, or greed.

They preferred the illusion to the truth. Everything appeared flawless on the surface.

Marjorie was content, almost glowing as she moved through the room like a queen inspecting her kingdom, warmly greeting and conversing with attendees, her lips stretched into a smile.

Her laughter rang sweet and hospitable, but her eyes were sharp, always calculating, always measuring reactions, ensuring that appearances stayed intact and that no rumor threatened the carefully constructed façade.

Meanwhile, Aaron stood impatiently at the altar, adjusting the cuffs of his suit for what seemed like the tenth time, his jaw ticking, his expression tightening with every passing second.

Eager was too gentle a word. He was coiled, expectant, already imagining ownership rather than partnership, already reveling in the idea of finally binding Elara to him in a way she could never legally escape.

Several members of the Vaughn family were present as well, uncles, aunts, cousins, spouses of cousins, an entire clan draped in expensive fabrics, their eyes full of greed poorly disguised as familial joy.

They fully understood the implications of this marriage and threw their full support behind it, because they could not and would not accept that their patriarch had handed half of his fortune to an adopted child with no blood ties.

Elara was not family by blood, so why else would the patriarch leave her half of his inheritance before passing?

They asked themselves that question not out of care for her but out of burning resentment, each one of them choking on the idea that an "outsider" had been placed on equal footing with them.

Thus, the family viewed this wedding not as love, not as a blessing, but as a strategic reunion, an opportunity, a carefully calculated move to secure a share of Elara's inheritance.

They wanted to absorb what was hers. To bind her. To turn her into property that benefited them.

Elara was well aware of their ulterior motives. She always had been, even in the life before this one, when she had been softer, more naïve, more desperate to belong.

She stood now waiting quietly behind the chapel door, the towering wooden structure separating her from the crowd, a mixture of patience and anxiety woven tightly into her demeanor.

Her fingers tightened around the bouquet in her hands.

The perfume of the flowers was too sweet, nauseating rather than comforting.

But the crowd around her, the pressure, the whispers, the way her heart hammered inside her ribs, all of it was nothing compared to what she had already endured.

In her past life, she had spent nights weeping before this very day, helpless, hopeless, trembling on the edge of surrender, begging herself not to collapse but collapsing anyway.

She remembered sitting alone in the dark, hands clutching her chest, knowing what awaited her at the altar and being powerless to stop it.

Not this time!

Even now, blurred by nerves, she shifted uneasily behind the chapel doors, checking her posture, adjusting the sleeves of her gown, scanning her surroundings the way someone does when they expect danger to leap out at any moment.

Once seen as a fragile, naive girl-easy to dominate, easy to manipulate, easy to mistreat, an object instead of a person, Elara was now different.

She had been reborn through fire and betrayal.

This life was her second chance, granted by fate or by cruel mercy, and this time she intended to make her adversaries pay, to let every one of them feel even a fraction of the fear they had carved into her bones.

Yet one thing troubled her deeply, burrowing into the back of her mind and refusing to leave.

Whether Lucian would attend.

Whether the man she had begged yesterday, would come.

She had asked him to come. No, she had pleaded, with the desperation of someone clinging to the last tiny thread of hope binding her to freedom.

Stealing a glance to ensure no one was watching her, she discreetly retrieved her phone from beneath her wedding dress.

The cool glass brushed against her bruised skin. With hands trembling slightly, she pressed his name.

Lucien.

The call rang... And rang... And rang. But he didn't answer.

Her heart sank, but she refused to give up immediately, her thumb moving quickly across the screen.

She sent text messages in a rush, words spilling from her as if her heart itself was typing.

"Are you coming?"

"Please come."

"Please don't let me down."

"I'll be waiting."

"I'm about to enter the chapel. Are you here?"

"Lucien! Please!"

Despite her repeated messages, Lucian offered no reply. No read receipt. No vibration in return. Just silence, heavy and cold, settling into her chest like a stone sinking into deep water.

She sighed deeply and hid her phone once more, tucking it away beneath the layers of white fabric as if hiding her last hope somewhere no one could see it.

Her shoulders lowered slightly.

Lucian was her last hope today, and if he failed to appear, Elara didn't yet know how she would cope.

But she resolved, firmly, fiercely, that if he did not come, she would devise another plan herself, even if she had to walk through fire again to do it.