Chapter 1 - Stop the divorce!

SUMMER.

"Why?!...Why do you get the perfect man while I have to marry a fool?!"

Brielle shrieked, slamming me down onto the cold stone floor.

Her fingers locked around my neck like iron cuffs, her eyes wild with manic rage. Dressed in the exact wedding gown I wore years ago, she looked like a distorted, twisted mirror of my past.

"Three good years I gave him! I played the perfect woman, and he abandoned me at the altar! Over a dead woman!"

As air left my lungs, her voice cracked into a bitter, sobbing laugh.

"He looked me dead in the face and said he'd rather bury himself beside your grave than marry me. Even after I made you disappear, you still took him from me!"

She leaned in closer, her grip choking the last bits of oxygen from my chest.

"Look at me... I now have blue eyes too, blonde hair, but yet... he still didn't want me!" Her voice broke into a hysterical sob before twisting into pure venom.

And in that suffocating moment, as my vision blurred, her words echoed in my mind...

He never stopped loving me.

He chose my grave over another woman.

He chose me.

Brielle released my neck, her hands trembling as she reached into her bag and pulled out a blowtorch.

“It's that pretty face, isn't it?" she hissed. "Let's ruin it.”

She clicked it on. A sharp blue flame lit out.

I shook my head, trying to pull away, but she gripped my jaw hard and held me still. She pressed the burning flame against my cheek. The fire ate into my skin.

I screamed in agony—a raw, broken sound as my whole body seized from the pain.

By the time she finally pulled away, I collapsed onto the floor, sobbing uncontrollably. My hands shook over my face. My skin was severely burnt, destroyed, and disfigured. Brielle stood over me, smiling down at what she had done.

Steps echoed outside in the hallway. Distant, frantic footsteps.

Brielle's smile faded, her eyes snapping toward the door. She reached down and lifted a heavy shotgun, clicking the safety off.

"He's coming," she whispered, her voice dropping into an eerie, calm madness. "I'd rather kill us both than watch you marry him."

Without hesitation, she pulled the trigger. A shot rang out.

I went still. The light left my eyes. For a second, there was only silence.

Then the doors burst open. Warm arms pulled my broken body off the cold floor.

"Don't leave me... Summer, don't leave me!"

That voice. I would recognize it anywhere. Those hands that had once held me so gently. *Levi.* He had come... but wasn't it too late?

With the last strength I had left, blood on my lips, I looked up at him and whispered my final vow. "Levi... if I have a next life... I won't divorce you. I will take you back... and I will drag Brielle into the deepest ends of hell."

---

My eyes fluttered open. I was staring at a white hospital ceiling, lying pale on a bed, connected to a drip.

The first thing I did was reach for my face, my hands shaking. In my last life, I didn't have a face left. It had melted while Brielle watched me burn and smiled. Surprisingly, it felt smooth. I froze. I wasn't burnt. I was back. God gave me back my face.

"You're finally awake."

I turned and saw my mother sitting beside the bed, sniffing slightly. At the bedside stood a man holding fruit and roses, looking worried.

"Mom..." I called out, my voice cracking like I was a helpless girl.

"How could you do this?" Miley snapped. "To cut your wrist over a tantrum? Have you completely lost your mind, Summer? I know how this marriage has been, but Levi has been so patient with you. Turning your marriage into a bloody circus—is this his reward?"

Only then did I realize when I had been reborn: back to the day Brielle advised me to cut my wrist to corner Levi into divorcing me. I deserved every word. In my past life, I tormented Levi until he hated me because I stupidly believed Brielle.

Panic hit me. I became desperate, ignoring the stranger at the bedside. I wasn't going to divorce Levi. Over my dead body. Never again.

"Mom, where is Levi? Where is he right now?" My voice broke, my chest tightening. The heart monitor beside me started beeping faster. I was terrified he had already signed.

Miley sneered. "He's doing exactly what you wanted. He's gone to get the divorce papers from court. Aren't you satisfied now?"

The words dropped like a stone in my stomach. Brielle was a monster. She had pushed me into doing this, promising to call a doctor, but then left me to bleed out in my own pool of blood.

"Mom, I didn't mean to! Where is he? Please!" I tried to sit up, but the tubes pulled me back.

My eyes dropped to the roses on the bed. My lip trembled. In my past life, Brielle had arranged this exact meeting to frame me, and I had foolishly flaunted the gifts right in front of Levi.

I looked at the man holding the flowers. "I'm sorry, I really appreciate the effort, but—"

The door swung open. Levi stood at the entrance.

My throat closed. I wanted to say his name, but no sound came out.

My Levi.

His face was breathtaking, but icy cold. His dark eyes settled on the roses scattered across my bed, drifted to the stranger, and finally rested on my pale face.

"I see I'm interrupting something," he said softly, his gaze devastatingly cold.

"No, no, it's not what you think!" I stuttered, reaching my hand toward him.

He ignored it completely. He squeezed the leather folder in his hand and tossed it coldly. It sprawled across my lap onto my legs.

Divorce papers.