Chapter 1

My father was a diviner known far and wide.

In the tenth year after the Simmons family took me back,

he decided to read the marriage fates of me and the false heiress through his divination.

On the day the Henson family came to arrange the match,

my father worked out that the false heiress was born under a cursed fate.

She would drag down the Henson family's fortunes.

And I carried a lucky star in my chart, a rare fortune-bringing fate that prospered a household.

After the wedding, Everard Henson and I kept a careful, courteous distance.

Until the day my twin sons were born.

An amniotic fluid embolism left me needing emergency resuscitation.

Yet Everard signed his own name on the form to abandon it.

"I don't believe in fate, but you had to try and fool me with some worthless chart."

"Aren't you supposed to have a lucky life? Let's see how you survive with no doctor to save you."

A cruel smile curled at his mouth.

He reached over and tore the transfusion needle out of my hand.

"You didn't just steal Dora's identity as the true heiress. You drove her to jump to her death on the night of our wedding."

"When you're dead, I want you to go down there and apologize to her in person!"

Outside the room came my parents' bitter, grieving voices.

"We were wrong. We should never have brought Annette Simmons back."

"And we should never have let her marry into the Henson family."

"Dora never told us she and Everard had already pledged themselves to each other."

Only then did I learn that if the Henson elders hadn't pressured Everard,

he never would have married me at all.

Under the hatred in all of their eyes,

I drew my last breath.

When I opened my eyes again,

I was back on the day my father cast the fate reading.

This time I spoke first.

"No need to read it. I'm the one born under a cursed fate. Let my sister marry into the family instead."

1

Eudora Simmons smiled at me, sure of her win.

"Sis, at least you know your place."

"The truth is, Everard and I pledged ourselves to each other long ago. This whole thing is just a formality."

"Your fate really is bad. You wandered off the year you were born, and now you'll never get the chance to marry into the Henson family either."

In my last life, once she learned she was the one born under a cursed fate,

Eudora fainted on the spot.

Everard questioned my father's result.

But my father said his readings had never once been wrong.

Everyone who came for the engagement was a person of standing in the Henson family.

They would never allow a jinx to marry into their house.

And so, no surprise, the one engaged to Everard became me.

Now,

Everard had already come striding into the courtyard with the betrothal gifts.

Eudora rushed up to him, smiling,

and hooked her arms around his neck.

"Everard, before my father even cast the reading, my sister already stepped aside."

"Whose fate is better couldn't be clearer, could it."

Everard was pleased, of course.

But behind him stood several respected Henson elders.

A white-haired old man stepped forward.

"Mr. Simmons, I think it's safer to actually cast the reading."

"How can we settle this on a few words alone?"

My father looked at the two young women standing before him. One was the adopted daughter he'd raised since she was small.

The other was the daughter of his own blood, lost outside for years.

Both were flesh he couldn't cut away.

He sighed and started to bring out the things he needed for the divination.

I hurried forward and caught his hand to stop him.

"No need to read it, Dad. Dora's right. If I could lose even myself, what kind of good fate could I have?"

"Besides, Dora and Everard have been together a long time. You wouldn't tear apart a pair like that, would you?"

Everard tried to talk his family around too.

"Don't worry. Dora and I have been together all this time. She'll only bring me more and more good fortune."

"If anything really does go wrong later, I'll carry it myself. I won't blame any of you."

In the end, the marriage between Eudora and Everard was settled.

Remembering the despair of that hospital in my last life, I couldn't stop a shiver of dread.

At least this time, I'd steered clear of it.

Now I only wanted to see how Everard would ever hold down the curse in Eudora's fate.

Eudora looked at the man standing at the very back of the crowd.

Mockery in her eyes.

"Everard, why is your brother even here? He's nothing but an omen of bad luck. He won't rub his misfortune off on me, will he?"

Everard tousled Eudora's hair with easy affection.

"My father arranged it. He's just here to make up the numbers."

Eudora's eyes suddenly darted to one side.

"Well, it's all marriage either way. Why not have my sister marry your brother?"

"Two cursed fates together. Who knows, maybe two negatives make a positive."

The suggestion won the near-unanimous approval of everyone there.

But one Henson elder raised a doubt.

"Like we said, Annette is born under a cursed fate. Whether she marries Everard or Steve, isn't it the same?"

Everard turned and shot him a sour look.

"When have you ever seen my father treat Steve Henson like a real son?"

"No room for him at home, no seat for him at the company. Apart from the Henson name, what about him tells you he belongs to this family?"

"Even if he and Annette marry, it can't touch us. So set your minds completely at ease."

Steve was reserved by nature and stayed clear of the family's power struggles.

That earned him plenty of the Hensons' scorn.

Even after I married Everard in my last life,

I'd barely exchanged more than a few words with him. But he never showed me any hostility.

He raised his eyes, a flicker of surprise in them.

I went to him instead, and gave him a smile.

"Today is a double blessing for both the Hensons and the Simmonses."

"Why not set both weddings on the same day."