Chapter 1

The ninety-ninth attempt at our wedding. When it came time to exchange rings, my fiancé lifted his hand and slid the band onto the maid of honor's ring finger.

"The ring goes on Brooklyn Fox first. You can use the pull-tab off a soda can for now."

I froze where I stood.

Quinn Vance went on.

"The three of us are doing the ceremony together today. Brooklyn just went through a breakup, she's not doing well, and she wants to feel what it's like to be a bride."

"I already agreed. She'll be standing in for you for the rest of the ceremony."

The officiant, mic in hand, forced himself through the script. "Will the groom now kiss his… bride…"

I looked up. Quinn's girl "buddy" Brooklyn had already tucked herself into his arms.

Seeing me bite down hard on my lip, he sighed.

"A wedding is just a formality. What difference does it make who stands there? When are you going to be as reasonable as Brooklyn?"

"If you're really that unhappy about it, we'll just redo it for you next time. Women are so much trouble."

When I said nothing, he tossed out those words, scooped Brooklyn up, and walked off without a backward glance.

Leaving me, once again, to face the sneers and the humiliation of every guest in the room.

I looked at the ring box he'd dropped on the floor, and all at once none of it seemed worth anything.

I pulled out my phone and dialed the number that had called me one hundred and eight times.

"Rupert Rowe, does your family still need a daughter-in-law? I'm in a bit of a rush. The wedding has to be done within three days."

——

The voice on the other end lifted with delight. "Really? That's wonderful. I'll have that boy submit a marriage application to his unit right away."

"Callie Pratt, don't you worry. If that boy dares mistreat you or let you down, I'll be the first one to break both his legs."

Bitterness spread through me. I fought down the crack in my voice and went on. "All right. Then thank you, Rupert, for taking me in."

I hung up, tore off my veil, and lifted my head to face the guests who'd come for the show.

Quinn left me his messes every single time, but this time I wasn't going to clean any of it up.

There would be no more partnership between the Vances and the Pratts. Nothing that touched the Pratt family's interests could reach me now.

Without a word, I turned and walked out.

Quinn and I had loved each other for five years. Ninety-nine weddings, and not one of them had come off.

The first time, he got word that Brooklyn had a stomachache, and he drove through the night across four cities to bring her congee, missing our wedding.

The second time, Brooklyn got drunk at a bar and was about to drag some other man off to a room, so he left me standing at the venue in my wedding dress.

The ninety-eighth time, he rushed out during the vows because Brooklyn had sent a photo of her "slit wrist"…

Brooklyn, Brooklyn, always his childhood-sweetheart girl "buddy" Brooklyn.

This time, I was truly worn out.

If marriage was the same no matter who I married, then I didn't have to keep choosing Quinn.

Out of the wedding dress, I sat down at the vanity, my gaze falling to the plain silver couple's band on my index finger.

It was the gift Quinn had given me for our first anniversary as a couple.

Back then he'd slipped it onto my index finger with his whole heart, kissed the back of my hand, and said, his eyes full of devotion, "The company isn't doing well right now, and it's hard on you, sticking with me through the lean times. On the day we officially marry, you'll trade this in with me for a bigger, finer ring, and I'll put it on your middle finger for all to see. After the wedding, you'll wear it on your ring finger. I want everyone to know you're my wife."

Too bad promises only counted while love lasted.

I came back to myself, calmly took off the ring, and set it on the vanity.

Then I rose and went into the dressing room.

I'd just loosened the wedding gown when the door opened.

"Strange. I definitely saw that little bitch come in here. Where'd she go?"

"Tch, if you ask me, she's probably hiding in the bathroom crying. Why don't we go check?"

"Look at this, isn't this the ring she was always so precious about? She actually took it off. Guess she really did fall apart this time. Hahaha…"

The mocking voices poured into my ears, one after another.

The voice was familiar. It was Quinn's friend.

I was just about to step out and confront them when I heard someone say, "What a piece of junk this ring is. You can tell at a glance it's cheap, nothing compared to the top-grade sapphire my brother gave Brooklyn. Ugh, and that bitch actually wore it. Filthy."

That was Quinn's younger sister. I'd stayed up nights tutoring her, and she used to cling to me and call me sister.

She'd said that without my help she never would've scored so well, and that if Quinn ever treated me badly, she'd be the first to object.

"I heard this was Quinn's first-anniversary gift to her, and she treasured it like her life. But what she doesn't know is that on that very night, Quinn had Brooklyn pinned down going through a hundred and eight positions, went through eight boxes of condoms, and afterward he gave Brooklyn five villas and a set of jewelry worth tens of millions as a present."

That was Quinn's friend. The one who'd once asked me to bring him documents he'd left at home.

That day it was pouring. My tires slipped and I hit a lamppost, and the engine died.

Soaked through and running a high fever by the time I got the documents to him, I earned his endless thanks. He'd said those papers were tied to a project worth tens of millions, that I'd saved his life.

"This piece-of-junk ring was nothing but a freebie thrown in with that jewelry set. Only a cheap thing like her would cherish it."

At that last sentence, I stood there as if struck by lightning, all the blood in my body running backward.

A freebie?

So over all these years, nearly everything that had trickled down to me through Quinn's fingers had been Brooklyn's castoffs?

And Quinn had already cheated on me, long ago?

Back when I first noticed there was someone new around Quinn, I asked him right away what was going on. He'd only told me, breezily,

"Why's my sweetheart getting jealous over nothing? She's just my girl buddy, don't read into it. If that little tomboy and I were going to be together, we'd have been together ages ago."

Later Brooklyn provoked me at every turn, targeted me, and when I finally couldn't take it anymore, I lost control and slapped her.

After that, Quinn's favoritism toward Brooklyn only grew more blatant, guarding her like the apple of his eye.

For the first time, he lost his temper over Brooklyn and smashed the couple's ceramic dolls we'd made with our own hands.

For the first time, he left me stranded at the company until midnight on a snowy night and turned around to go pick up Brooklyn, and I ran a high fever and spent three days in the hospital because of it.

For the first time, while I was in surgery, he rode roller coasters with Brooklyn at an amusement park.

It was as though, once Brooklyn had the title of girl buddy, Quinn had his excuse to openly cross every line with her.

When Brooklyn drove me to a breakdown and I confronted Quinn in a frenzy, only then did he tell me, careless as ever, "She's my first love, but there's nothing left between us. It's only brotherly affection now. She was betrayed by her ex-boyfriend, and it's only right that I look after her as a friend. Can't you be a little more sensible and stop being so paranoid all the time? You're wearing me out."

I'd thought Quinn was only acting out of a sense of duty. Who could have known it had been outright betrayal all along.

Like a fool, I'd been kept in the dark by every one of them.