All Chapters of Surrogate To My Ruthless First Love: Chapter 31 - Chapter 40

The ride home from Family Day felt different to Luna even though nothing around her had changed. The city outside the car window still moved the same way, people still crossed streets, traffic still slowed at intersections, and Clara still sat beside her checking messages every few minutes, but something inside Luna refused to settle because the certificate folded inside her school bag felt heavier than paper and lighter than a secret she did not understand yet. She had looked at it three times before leaving school and every time her eyes stopped at the same line because Leo Thorne’s birthday sat exactly where hers sat, carrying the same day, the same month, and the same year as though someone had copied it and forgotten to change the details. Emily had noticed first. Not at school. Not during the activity. Later. When everyone was packing up. Luna still remembered it clearly. Emily had leaned over the table, swinging her legs beneath the chair while looking at both certificat

The academy auditorium buzzed with energy from the moment students arrived because the regional robotics announcement had turned an ordinary school morning into something closer to a festival and children who normally dragged their feet toward class were suddenly moving faster while teachers struggled to keep everyone seated. Posters had been placed across the walls during the night, banners carrying competition dates hung above the stage, and every member of the science division looked as though they had been waiting weeks for this moment. Leo sat in the second row with Nathan on one side and Mia on the other while Oliver kept whispering guesses about prizes they definitely were not winning yet. “You think they’ll give us tablets?” Oliver asked. “No,” Mia replied without looking up from her notebook. “Probably trophies.” “I like tablets more.” Nathan folded his arms. “You like anything expensive.” Oliver grinned. “That is not false.” The robotics teacher stepped onto the sta

The apartment felt too quiet after Vanessa left because silence had become dangerous lately and Clara was beginning to understand that noise had protected her more than she realized. Noise meant interviews, invitations, cameras, fashion calls, event planners, brand messages, wedding updates, and people pretending she still mattered, but the silence sitting around her now felt different because it carried absence and absence was harder to fight. Her phone lay on the glass table. Three unread emails. Two cancellations. One sponsorship withdrawal. She opened the first. Regretfully withdrawing partnership support. The second looked worse. Campaign paused indefinitely. The third barely bothered pretending. Public image instability concerns. Clara stared at the screen. For six years she had survived by staying visible. Pretty. Desired. Relevant. Now attention had moved. Not slowly. Not gently. Completely. Everything pointed toward Seraphina. Madam S. The woman who retu

Morning arrived quietly at the Thorne Mansion, but Luna woke with the strange feeling that something had changed even though the walls looked the same, the hallways still carried that expensive silence she hated, and Clara’s voice floated downstairs while speaking sharply to someone on the phone about photographers and ruined schedules that nobody seemed to care about anymore. The academy had sent another notice the previous night. Additional family memory display required. Students needed extra photographs. Parents. Birthdays. Special moments. Family milestones. Luna sat on the edge of her bed holding the paper in both hands because Leo had photos with his mother, Emily had albums filled with vacations and birthday cakes, and even Nathan complained loudly about having too many pictures to choose from. Luna had her father. Only her father. The empty place beside him remained blank. She stood slowly and walked toward the built in shelf beside the window where old albums had

King Holdings had already come alive before sunrise because the lower floors buzzed with market reports, investor calls, and the nervous energy that never truly disappeared after Seraphina’s takeover, yet Marcus Hale stood alone inside his office with a cup of untouched coffee growing cold beside him while an old storage box rested open on the desk because Elias had asked him for hospital timelines the previous night and the request dragged him back toward memories he spent years locking away. Inside the box sat photographs. Company events. Medical reports. Old schedules. A faded invitation card. Marcus picked it up slowly. Marcus Hale and Elena Brooks. Wedding date. Seven years ago. Never used. He looked at it for a long moment before placing it back because some losses never became easier, they only learned how to sit quietly. A knock interrupted him. “Mr. Marcus?” He looked up. Leo stood at the doorway wearing his academy uniform with his backpack hanging carelessly