I was penniless the day the Sterling family’s true heiress kicked me out of the house. All I had with me was a single cosplay outfit. To make ends meet, I started taking commissions from the city’s elite circle of billionaires, specializing in embodying the one that got away—their unforgettable lost loves. It worked like a charm. And soon enough, no matter which tycoon my ‘sister’ Stella tried to win over, she was met with the same cold line: “Oh, you’re the one who bullied my commissioned muse, aren’t you?” When I was dropped into this ‘mistaken-identity’ novel, the story was already in its final act. I was the fake heiress, despised by everyone and cast out onto the streets. Luckily, my real-world profession was as a cosplayer. And as everyone knows, the world of novels runs on two fundamental laws. First, billionaires are a dime a dozen. Second, you never, ever chase after the one that got away, especially if she’s moved overseas. This created a perfect market for my skills. I could become, for a price, the ghost of a love they’d lost. Business was booming. Tonight’s commission was to accompany a Mr. Marshall to a gala. He was a quiet, intense man who ran a shipping empire. The moment I stepped into the grand ballroom, however, I ran right into my sister. Or rather, my ex-sister. Stella Sterling, draped in a couture gown, stared at me, her perfectly sculpted eyebrows arching in surprise. “Well, well, if it isn’t my dear sister,” she announced, her voice dripping with venom, loud enough for everyone nearby to hear. “Dressed so… quaintly. Are you here begging for scraps? Or have you finally decided to find yourself a sugar daddy?” In the novel’s narrative, I was the imposter, the one switched at birth. I’d grown up coddled, adored by my parents, wanting for nothing. That all ended when the real heiress, Stella—sallow-skinned and gaunt from a life of hardship in a forgotten rural town—returned. Overnight, I became a master of self-effacement. She liked my bedroom? I moved out. She wanted a ‘real’ family vacation with just her and our parents? I stayed home. When she was cornered by a group of thugs in an alley, I threw myself in front of her, shielding her from their knives. I took three deep cuts for her. I barely survived. When I woke up in the hospital, Stella was holding my hand, her face a mask of tear-streaked sorrow. “Ava,” she’d sobbed, “they told me… they told me you hired those men. Were you that desperate to get rid of me? Did you hate me that much for taking your place?” My parents, standing behind her, embraced their precious, trembling daughter. They called me a monster, a venomous snake they had unknowingly raised. The wounds I’d suffered, they said, were my just deserts. They refused to listen to a word of my defense. They just threw me out. And so, they would never know the truth. The fake heiress they so despised had already bled out on the grimy pavement of that alley. Perhaps it was for the best. At least the original Ava died clinging to a happy delusion—that if she was just a little kinder, a little more selfless, her parents might finally look at her with love again. A few months had done wonders for Stella. She was radiant now, all sharp angles and polished glamour, with no trace of the scrawny, awkward girl she’d been. I, on the other hand, was pale and drawn, a lingering shadow of the injuries I’d sustained for her. “You look dreadful, Ava,” Stella said with a saccharine smile. “Maybe I should ask Mom and Dad to take you back? I’m sure they could find a place for you… scrubbing toilets, perhaps?” She pressed a hand to her mouth, her shoulders shaking with suppressed laughter. I smiled back. A slow, wicked grin. Then I lunged. Don’t mess with a cosplayer who can trek three miles in six-inch heels carrying a forty-pound prop. Taking down a pampered socialite like Stella was child’s play. I tackled her to the marble floor, the sound of her shriek echoing through the ballroom. I straddled her, raining down slaps left and right. The sharp, satisfying smack of my palm against her cheek silenced the polite chatter. Gasps erupted around us. Women in glittering gowns recoiled, champagne flutes shattered, and the scene devolved into chaos. No one dared to intervene. I was a cornered animal, ready to bite anyone who came near. A panicked assistant, seeing the commotion, scrambled upstairs to find the host of the evening. The room at the end of the second-floor hall was cloaked in darkness. Hearing footsteps, a figure lounging on a sofa lifted his head, a thread of irritation in his voice. "What is it?" The assistant stammered, “Mr. Marshall, sir… there are two women fighting downstairs. They… they’ve knocked over that new oil painting you acquired. The thirty-million-dollar one.” A heavy, weary sigh filled the silence. The man rose languidly from the sofa. "Let's go." By the time Jeremy Marshall arrived, Stella’s right cheek was already swelling into a plum-colored bruise. If his bodyguards hadn’t pulled me off her, I would have made sure the other side matched. The moment she saw him, Stella burst into a fresh round of theatrical sobs, clutching her face. “Mr. Marshall, you have to do something! This… this bitch Ava tried to have me killed a few months ago, and now she’s crashed your party just to attack me! She’s ruined everything! You have to make her pay!” The noise seemed to grate on him. He shot a cold glare at his staff. “Useless, all of you. Get security in here and call the police—” He stopped mid-sentence. I looked up from the floor. My dress was a simple, plain white. My dark hair fell like a curtain around my shoulders. My eyes, wide and almond-shaped, shimmered with unshed tears. I looked like I’d been wounded to the very soul but was too afraid to speak of it. Jeremy froze. His perpetually half-lidded eyes flew wide open. He stared at me, his mouth parting slightly as if to speak, but no words came out. He looked rooted to the spot, afraid that a single move might startle me. Afraid he might shatter the waking dream. Stella, oblivious, continued her screeching. “Mr. Marshall, what are you waiting for? Throw this trash out!” Jeremy finally snapped back to reality. He walked over until he was standing beside me, then looked down at the whimpering girl on the floor. “She hit you?” he asked, his voice dangerously quiet. Stella nodded eagerly. “Yes! She did!” “Then it must have been your fault,” Jeremy stated flatly. “Get out.” Stella’s jaw dropped. She was the one who’d been assaulted. And she was the one being thrown out? What kind of twisted logic was that? As two imposing bodyguards ‘escorted’ her from the ballroom, Stella’s nails dug into her palms, drawing blood. The hatred for me burned hotter than ever. A fake, a nobody with tainted blood… how does she always manage to bewitch everyone? But then, a triumphant smirk touched her lips. She remembered the rumors. Jeremy Marshall had a lost love, a ghost from his past, and he had sworn he would never marry. So what if Ava had his favor for a night? She would always be a dirty little secret, a mistress people whispered about behind their hands. Stella, on the other hand, was about to marry into the Westwood family—the undisputed royalty of the city’s elite. Once she was a Westwood, she would spend the rest of her life grinding Ava Sterling into the dust beneath her heel. Back in the ballroom, Jeremy gently extended a hand to me. “May I have this dance?” he asked. I’d seen this man on the news. The bastard son who clawed his way to the top of a corporate dynasty. Ruthless, cold, and utterly unforgiving. But right now, the tips of his ears were red. He looked as clumsy and hopeful as a teenage boy. I smiled and placed my hand in his. “Of course.” His fee was a hundred thousand dollars. The request itself was achingly simple. He just wanted me to dance with him. “My girlfriend… she passed away from an illness,” Jeremy said, his voice a low, steady murmur as we swayed to the music. “She was cruel. So cruel she hasn’t visited me in my dreams once in the three years she’s been gone. So cruel she refused to accept my proposal, even at the end.” Before Jeremy had been acknowledged by the Marshall family, he was just an outcast, a ‘little bastard’ that everyone scorned. She was the only one who saw him, the only one who would sit with him, who would hold his hand. “But she got sick. Really sick. It was going to cost a fortune to save her.” “I worked three jobs. I sold my blood. It was never enough.” His eyes, dark and haunted, turned red at the corners. He quickly brushed a hand across his face. “My biological father found me. He said if I agreed to come back, to take the family name, he would get her the best doctors in the world.” “But he lied to me. He never paid the medical bills. She died… she died in that hospital bed, waiting for a treatment that never came.” “When I confronted him, he just laughed. He told me, ‘Son, if I’d cured her, you would have married her.’ He said I was a Marshall now. I could have any woman I wanted. Why would I chain myself to some poor girl from the sticks?” The music swelled, a wave of strings and horns rising to a crescendo, drowning out the broken fragments of his voice until I could no longer hear the words, only the pain. As the final note of the waltz faded, Jeremy pulled me into a gentle embrace. A single, hot tear landed on my shoulder. I heard him whisper, his voice thick with emotion. “Thank you.” “She loved to dance. I was always too shy, too awkward… I never danced with her.” “Now I have. My dream came true. And that’s enough.” The next day, photos of me and Jeremy dancing were splashed across every gossip site. The headline was in bold, brutal type: 【FAKE HEIRESS SHAMELESSLY IMPERSONATES DEAD WOMAN TO SEDUCE BILLIONAIRE TYCOON!】 I didn’t need a crystal ball to know Stella was behind this. She didn’t stop there. A swarm of paparazzi descended on my hotel, ambushing me outside my room. “Miss Sterling!” one of them shouted, shoving a microphone in my face. “Don’t you feel it’s ghoulish, pretending to be a dead woman for money?” When I ignored them, another reporter produced a megaphone. “MISS STERLING, WHAT’S YOUR OPINION ON THE TRAGIC LOVE STORY BETWEEN MR. MARSHALL AND HIS DECEASED GIRLFRIEND? DO YOU THINK YOU CAN EVER REPLACE HER IN HIS HEART?” It was a blatant, cruel provocation. Flashbulbs strobed, blinding me. But I just smiled. I tilted my head up, looking directly into the camera lenses. “Mr. Marshall and I have a purely professional relationship. He is my client, and I am his commissioned muse. He hired me to embody his first love for one evening.” The reporters stared, momentarily stunned. The scandalous narrative they’d been fed had just crumbled. A collective groan of disappointment rippled through the pack as they started to disperse. “Don’t you dare leave! I’m not finished!” I snatched a microphone from a stunned reporter, taking command of the situation. “That young woman may be gone, but I want to make one thing crystal clear,” I declared, my voice ringing with conviction. “Despite the monstrous interference of a heartless old man, she and Jeremy Marshall loved each other with everything they had, right until her very last breath.” I had a job to do, and professional integrity demanded it. I had to honor the memory of my client and his lost love. A love that pure, that profound, did not deserve to be twisted into something ugly by tabloid vultures. That afternoon, Jeremy called. “I’m so sorry, Ava. I was in meetings all morning. I’ve had my security team clear out the reporters, and I’ve sent a check for a million dollars over to you. Consider it a small token for your trouble. If they bother you again, you call me immediately.” I laughed. “Keep your check, Jeremy. Our agreed-upon price was one hundred thousand, and I won’t take a penny more. But there is something you can help me with. Do you know the Westwood heir?” “Who? Leo Westwood?” “Yes. Stella’s fiancé.” There was a pause. “We’re not exactly friends,” he admitted, his tone hesitant. I said nothing. Jeremy thought for a moment, and then a slow grin spread through his voice. “But… I do know his grandfather. The old king himself. Does that count?” “Who’s that?” “Arthur Westwood.” Arthur Westwood was seventy-eight years old. While he no longer possessed the devastating good looks of his grandson, he was the undisputed patriarch of the family. After his wife passed away, he’d lost all interest in the family empire, handing the reins over to his son and grandson. In the years since, his health had steadily declined. He spent his days watching over a framed photograph of his late wife, a man already half-gone, waiting for the end. A living ghost. So, when I stood among his wife’s prized rose bushes, dressed in a vintage blush-pink dress, and turned to look at him with a gentle, knowing smile, the old man clutched his chest with a strangled gasp. He almost checked out right then and there. Thankfully, the Westwood family doctor was a miracle worker. Arthur survived. “The resemblance… it’s uncanny,” Arthur whispered, chewing on a nitroglycerin tablet as he gave me a thumbs-up. “Eleonora… she always loved to wear pink.” Arthur and Eleonora had been inseparable for over fifty years. On her deathbed, she had made him promise. “I’m going first, but you’re not allowed to follow me. You have to live, Arthur. You have to live well.” Death was a force you couldn’t fight, only endure. Arthur, sobbing like a lost child, had nodded dumbly, snot and tears running down his face. And then she’d slapped him. Right across the face. His feisty Eleonora glared at him, her eyes blazing with the same fire he’d seen the day they first met. “Did you hear me, you old blockhead?!” Only when he nodded again, like a chastised schoolboy, did she smile and finally close her eyes. Now, looking at my face—a perfect echo of his young Eleonora—Arthur felt a familiar tremor of fear. The healthy, lifelong terror of a man utterly ruled by his wife. If Eleonora knew he was wasting away, moping and listless, she’d grab him by the ear and yell, “Are you deaf, old man? I swear I’ll box your ears if you don’t listen to me!” And just like that, Arthur Westwood found his motivation. His back stopped aching. His legs felt strong again. He could take the stairs two at a time. A week later, a housekeeper was polishing the grand foyer windows when she froze, her face paling as if she’d seen a ghost. With trembling hands, she scrambled to the landline and dialed the Westwood heir. “Mr. Leo! It’s an emergency!” “What happened?” Leo’s voice was sharp with alarm. “Is it Grandpa? Is he alright? Is he at the hospital? Stay calm, I’m on my way.” “No, sir, it’s not that! It’s… sir, your grandfather has a rose clenched between his teeth, and he just sped off on your Ducati motorcycle…” Leo was silent for a beat. “...He what?” Today was the last day of my commission. Arthur, clad in black leather, had taken me to one last place. The cemetery. “My son and that grandson of mine, they’re more old-fashioned than I am,” he said, a roguish twinkle in his weary eyes. “They say this place is bad luck, that I shouldn’t come so often. I don’t listen to them. I sneak out.” He grinned. “Besides, I figured she’d want to see this outfit for herself. You look fantastic.” The cemetery’s paths were a winding labyrinth, but Arthur navigated them with an expert’s ease, leading me to a large marble headstone. It was a double plot, but the name on the left was still uncarved, waiting for its occupant. Arthur reached out and stroked the cool stone. He smiled softly. “Eleonora, my love, look who I brought to see you today.” “Doesn’t she look just like you did? She’s doing this thing called… commissioned cosplay. It’s all the rage now. You always did love to keep up with the times. I think you would have liked it.” “This young lady I hired is a real professional. And her temper’s much better than yours…” He placed the rose he’d brought at the base of the stone, his tone conspiratorial and affectionate. “But, uh… for the record, I always preferred you feisty.” I couldn’t help but let out a small laugh. The cemetery was profoundly still. We sat there before the small monument, talking to her, our voices weaving together in the quiet air. At five in the evening, we left. My week-long commission was over. Arthur handed me a check with a flourish. I glanced down. My eyes widened at the number of zeroes. “Take it, Miss Ava,” he said, his smile kind as he noticed my hesitation. “Thank you for spending this time with an old man. I haven’t had this much fun since… well, since my wife passed.” I smiled back. “Keep it, Arthur. Next time you want to hire me, it’s on the house.” “No next time,” he said with a wave of his hand, his gaze turning towards the sky. “The more I look at you, the more I miss her.” He paused. “By the way, young lady, is there a special young man in your life?” I shook my head. “You’re not about to set me up, are you?” He chuckled. “Of course not. I just wanted to tell you something.” “Don’t search for love. Wait for it.” “Wait for the one who will truly love you to find you.” He gave me a quick wink and turned away. “Enough of that. I’m going to buy you a shaved ice. This old shop has been here forever. Eleonora adored their strawberry flavor…” He started across the street, a frail old man moving through the rush of modern traffic. I could almost see it: decades ago, a vibrant young woman dragging her handsome lover by the hand, laughing as they argued over which flavor was better before disappearing into the crowd. The rose garden she planted, I thought, is in full bloom now.
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