I was the unattainable first love of a Manhattan elite. When we reunited at my engagement dinner, I found out the man I was marrying was actually his brother. I forced a calm smile and greeted him, "Carter. It’s been a while." "I’m about to be your sister-in-law." Under the watchful eyes of everyone in the room, Carter dropped his cigarette and strode right up to me. "Sister-in-law?" He leaned in slightly, his lips brushing my ear. "Do you think becoming my sister-in-law wipes our slate clean?" 1 My engagement dinner with Nolan Davis was meant to be an intimate affair. We only invited our parents and a few important relatives from both sides. We planned to finalize the wedding details over a nice meal. If everything went according to plan, we would go to City Hall to get our marriage license this afternoon, hold the ceremony later, and officially become a family. It was all happening so fast that I felt a little dazed. Nolan, my soon-to-be husband, sat beside me, meticulously peeling shrimp for me. When our relatives teased him for spoiling his future wife, his ears turned red and he just offered a soft chuckle. He placed the peeled shrimp in a small bowl, casually pushed it in front of me, and even mixed a dipping sauce for me. In that moment, just like many times before, I felt so lucky to have met a man as good as him. I was just about to dip a shrimp into the sauce when the private dining room doors were violently shoved open from the outside. Every eye in the room darted toward the door, including mine. But the moment I saw who had walked in, I froze. A second later, I calmly averted my gaze and turned my head away. I heard Nolan’s father speak up. "Carter? What are you doing here?" My first thought was sheer confusion. Why did Mr. Sterling know Carter? Nolan’s family was well-off, sure, but compared to the Sterling family—an old-money dynasty that practically owned the city—they were miles apart. They shouldn't even run in the same circles. "My son is getting engaged. How could I not be here? Right, Dad?" Carter placed a heavy, venomous emphasis on the word "Dad." I couldn't help but look up at Mr. Sterling. Looking closely, the two men actually did share a resemblance. He was Carter's father? Then that made Nolan... Carter’s brother? After all these years, my life had come full circle, only for me to become my first love's sister-in-law? It was absurd. While I was still drowning in this unacceptable reality, Mr. Sterling let out an awkward, nervous laugh. He quickly flagged down a waiter to add another chair. "Right, right, right. You should be here." He was clearly terrified of Carter. The tone and posture he used to speak to him were painfully cautious. "Let me introduce everyone. This is my youngest son, Carter." The waiter brought a chair, and Mr. Sterling patted the back of it, waving him over. "Carter, come sit." But Carter was exactly the same as he was years ago. He didn't give a damn about saving face for anyone. He stood rooted to the spot, his sharp gaze sweeping the room before locking dead onto me. With an unreadable emotion flashing in his eyes, Carter lifted his chin in my direction. "Aren't you going to introduce us?" My stomach dropped. Mr. Sterling opened his mouth to speak, but the man sitting quietly beside me suddenly stood up. Nolan placed a hand on my shoulder, looked at Carter, and said slowly, "Carter, this is my fiancée, Vivian Hayes." I didn't know if I was imagining it, but there was a faint trace of provocation in Nolan’s tone. 2 The air pressure in the room plummeted. A scorching gaze pinned me to my seat and refused to look away. Nolan patted my shoulder, signaling me to stand up and say hello. It looked like I couldn't hide from this. But on second thought, so many years had passed. The young heir of the Sterling empire never lacked beautiful women around him. There was no way he was still hung up on a nobody like me. Thinking this, I stood beside Nolan and greeted him calmly. "Hello, Carter. I'm Vivian Hayes." His eyes were cold and piercingly direct. I was terrified he was going to say something he shouldn't. My mother cared deeply about this engagement, and I naturally didn't want anything to go wrong. "If nothing goes wrong, I’ll be your sister-in-law soon!" I stated my identity clearly, a subtle warning for him not to cause a scene. But I forgot that Carter was a madman. Six years had passed, and he was even crazier now. Under the watchful eyes of everyone in the room, Carter dropped his cigarette and strode right up to me with absolute arrogance. "Sister-in-law?" His tone was dripping with blatant mockery. With his hands shoved in his pockets, he completely ignored Nolan standing right beside me. Carter leaned in slightly, his lips brushing my ear. "Do you think becoming my sister-in-law wipes our slate clean?" His voice wasn't quiet. It was loud enough for every single person in the room to hear clearly. Mr. Sterling was the first to speak. "Vivian, you know Carter?" I gripped the fabric of my dress, my knuckles turning white. I kept a polite smile glued to my face. "We were in high school together." Hearing the words "high school" fall from my lips, Carter's eyes turned to ice. Even the mocking smirk on his lips vanished. He narrowed his eyes, his voice dripping with danger. "Were we just classmates?" It wasn't just him; everyone in the room was holding their breath, waiting for my answer. I stared straight into Carter’s eyes. "Just classmates." Carter’s body went rigid for a split second. He stood up straight, looking down at me from his towering height. He was a tall man, and his gaze always carried a suffocating weight—even more so now, considering the guilt eating me alive. "Vivian Hayes," Carter said my name suddenly. "Hugging and making out with normal classmates... You were pretty wild in high school, weren't you?" 3 That single sentence sent a shockwave through the room. The way everyone looked at me instantly changed. Only Nolan acted like he already knew. He grabbed my hand, pulling me behind him protectively. "Carter, the past is in the past. From now on, she will be my wife, and your sister-in-law." Carter ignored Nolan’s words entirely. His eyes were glued to our intertwined hands. He let out a cold, dark laugh. "You really think you can steal my woman and live long enough to marry her?" "Let me make this perfectly clear. Whoever dares to marry her, I’ll kill him. If you don't believe me, try it." He aimed that threat directly at Linda, Nolan’s mother. The effect was immediate. The warmth in Linda’s eyes vanished. She glared at me, blaming me for provoking a monster like Carter. She marched over and physically yanked Nolan away from me. "I'm so sorry, Vivian! But I really don't think you two are a good match. Let's just call off this engagement." I lowered my head, my grip tightening on my now-empty hand. Nolan refused to leave with her. "Mom, what do you mean call it off?! I'm marrying Vivian!" His mother dragged him toward the door. When Nolan resisted, the usually gentle Linda suddenly slapped him hard across the face. "Carter just said he'll kill whoever marries her! Do you have a death wish?!" "Did you forget that he and his mother are both absolute lunatics?!" Nolan, who had been fighting her off, suddenly went completely still. He let his mother drag him out of the room. My mother rushed out after them. I knew she was going to try to salvage the situation. Eventually, Carter and I were the only ones left in the private room. I stepped around him, preparing to leave. But as I passed him, his hand clamped down on my wrist like a vice. "Vivian, it's been so long. Do you really have nothing to say to me?" I struggled, but couldn't break free. He hadn't changed a bit in six years. I sighed, exasperated. "Carter, stalking me won't change anything. I said everything I needed to say six years ago." He still refused to let go, but thankfully, my mother rushed back in at that exact moment. She shoved Carter away, pulling me behind her, eyeing him defensively. Without a word, she dragged me out the door. In the elevator, I expected my mom to interrogate me, but she didn't ask a single question. Seeing my body trembling uncontrollably, she just wrapped me in a tight hug. "Vivian, Mom won't let anyone bully you." She smelled so comforting. I took a deep breath and nodded against her shoulder. But the moment we stepped out of the elevator, she clutched her chest and collapsed forward. My mother suffered from severe heart disease. In the blink of an eye, her face turned a terrifying shade of pale. I screamed for help. Carter, who had just stepped out of the neighboring elevator, saw what happened. He immediately rushed over, scooped my mother up in his arms, and sprinted toward the exit. In that moment, I threw all our past grudges out the window. I only prayed he could get her to a hospital in time. On the frantic ride there, Carter didn't forget to comfort me. "Don't be scared. She'll be fine." Years ago, in the pitch black, he had said those exact same words to me: "Don't be scared, Vivian." 4 Thankfully, we made it in time. The doctors stabilized her and said she was out of danger. When I went to the billing window, I realized I had left my purse behind in the chaos, and my phone was nowhere to be found. Just as I stood there panicking, Carter reached from behind me and handed a sleek black card to the nurse. I looked at him with genuine gratitude. "You saved her today. Thank you! I’ll pay you back later." "The doctor said she's going to be okay. You can go home now." Carter stood silhouetted against the hospital lights. Hearing my words, his body went rigid. He let out a self-deprecating laugh. When he spoke again, his voice was chillingly cold. "Vivian Hayes. You use me when you need me, and you kick me to the curb the second you don't. Six years ago and today... nothing's changed, has it?" He wet his lips, leaning in close. "Do you really think I'm going to let you run away so easily this time?" The sweltering afternoon sun poured in from the window at the end of the hallway. Carter’s towering frame cast a heavy shadow over me. Just as I was struggling to find an answer, a sharp, crisp female voice shattered the eerie tension. "Carter." The clicking of designer heels approached. Carter looked past my shoulder. I didn't even need to turn around; just hearing that voice made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. "I heard you were here, so I came to check on you." The woman speaking was Regina Croft—the living nightmare of my youth. She stopped about three feet behind me, scanning me from head to toe before speaking with feigned uncertainty. "Vivian Hayes?" Great. She actually remembered me. I turned to look at Regina. Years had passed, and she was even more radiant and glamorous than before. Usually, beautiful people naturally draw others in, but I felt nothing but pure, visceral disgust for Regina. "I'll pay you back later. I'm leaving." Without another word to Carter, I turned on my heel. I didn't want to spend a single extra second near them. My dismissive attitude clearly pissed Regina off. She called after me. "Vivian Hayes, you actually have the nerve to show your face in this city again?" I was no longer the timid, terrified little girl I used to be. I threw a cold smirk over my shoulder. "Why wouldn't I? Because a ghoul like you lives here? Regina, we're adults now. Can you grow up?" Of course, Regina was no longer the explosive, raging bully she used to be either. Everyone had changed. Everyone except Carter, who stubbornly clung to the past. I instinctively glanced at him, then steeled my resolve and walked away quickly. Behind me, I could hear Regina questioning him. "Carter, why are you still entangled with her? Did you forget what she did to you?" "You almost died because of her! And her? Did she even look back at you once?" My footsteps faltered. Was there something I didn't know about what happened back then? But the past was the past. I had fought so hard to crawl out of that darkness; I didn't dare stop and look back now. I felt a gaze following me down the hall until I turned the corner. Just before I disappeared, I heard Carter's voice, cold as ice: "Shut your mouth." 5 On the way to the hospital, I had been too worried about my mom to notice that Carter had brought us to an ultra-exclusive private hospital in the suburbs. It was impossible to hail a cab out here, and I didn't have a dime on me. I had no choice but to head back inside to borrow a nurse's phone to call a friend. But I had barely taken a step when a sleek black Bentley swerved in front of me, blocking my path back to the entrance. The window slowly rolled down. Carter was in the driver’s seat, one hand lazily gripping the steering wheel. "Get in." I originally had zero intention of humoring him. But when I casually glanced up, I saw Regina standing in front of a floor-to-ceiling window on the second floor, staring down at us. When our eyes met, a flash of memory hit me. Back then, she used to look at me with that exact same expression, right before dumping a tidal wave of abuse on me that I couldn't endure. Sunlight works in mysterious ways. I felt like this moment mirrored the past perfectly. Suddenly, I smiled right at her, walked over to the Bentley, and slid into the passenger seat. Regina loved Carter. She was obsessed with him. She was back then, and she still was now. From the suburbs to the city center, the starry sky was eventually replaced by the neon glow of Manhattan. "Where do you live?" Carter was the first to break the silence, slowly pulling the car over to the side of the road. I only got into his car to spite Regina. It didn't mean I wanted anything to do with him. "I'll get out here. Thank you." I was reaching for my seatbelt when the car suddenly lurched forward with a violent roar. I froze. I snapped my head to look at him. He was staring straight ahead, his face dark. "When you're ready to tell me your address, I'll take you home." "Carter, stop acting like a child." I pressed myself against the seat, taking a deep breath. "Don't make things uglier between us." The car shot forward again, then slammed to a brutal stop without warning. I thanked God it was late at night and the road was empty. "Did you forget who provoked who first?!" Before my head even stopped spinning from the whiplash, Carter unbuckled his seatbelt, lunged over the center console, and pinned me violently against the passenger seat, his hand gripping the back of my neck. He was so close that even in the dim streetlights, I could see the red rims of his eyes. "Why are things ugly between us? Isn't this entirely your doing, Vivian?!" His mocking tone cracked, betraying a barely noticeable tremor. "You wouldn't let me drive you home because you're terrified I'll stalk you?" "Vivian, don't you think you overestimate yourself?" "I am Carter Sterling. What kind of woman can't I have? Do you honestly think you're irreplaceable?" He let go of me, threw himself back into the driver's seat, and stared out his window. "Get out." The second I stepped out of the car, as if to prove a point, the black Bentley peeled away from me like a rocket. In the blink of an eye, the taillights disappeared into the night. 6 The next morning, I asked my assistant to handle the hospital transfer paperwork for my mom. After work, I immediately drove out to pick her up. Before heading over, I tried calling her, but no one answered. I only relaxed when I peeked through the small window in her hospital room door and saw her sitting safely in her wheelchair, waiting for me. I opened the door and walked in. She whipped her head around, a flash of pure panic in her eyes. It wasn't until she recognized me that her tension slowly melted away. I frowned, walking over. "Mom, what's wrong?" "Nothing, I was just... thinking about something. You scared me opening the door so suddenly." Her eyes darted around as she spoke, and she nervously fiddled with her hair. My heart sank. I knew that was her "tell" when she was lying. As she lifted her hand, the sleeve of her hospital gown slid down, exposing nasty dark bruises on her wrist. I grabbed her arm. "Where did these come from?" She kept stammering, refusing to tell me the truth. I looked around the room. The patient in the neighboring bed had already been moved. It was a massive VIP suite, and my mom was the only one in it. It was way too convenient that everyone else was suddenly "discharged" right after she moved in. I carefully examined her. Aside from her wrists, she had bruises on her back and legs too. I photographed every single one. Then I went to the nurses' station to demand answers and asked to see the security footage. The nurses wouldn't look me in the eye either. What started as a suspicion quickly morphed into certainty. When I ran into Regina here the other day, she was wearing a white lab coat. The hospital walls were lined with her accolades: "Genius surgeon," "Ivy League prodigy," "Award-winning researcher." It wasn't that I was assuming the worst of her; it was that she had been rotten to the core since we were kids. I marched straight to Regina’s office and threw the door open. She wasn't surprised to see me. "You're pretty protective of your mother, huh?" She wore a sickeningly fake smile that made me want to rip her face off. "Did you do this to my mom?" She tilted her head back and laughed, utterly unapologetic. "So what if I did? What are you going to do about it? I waited until no one was around, pushed her to the edge of the stairwell, and made sure she took a nice tumble." "Vivian, I'm admitting it to your face. What are you gonna do? The security footage has already been wiped!" Her absolute fearlessness because of her privilege was probably her only consistent trait. Back in high school, every time she tormented me, she had that same smug look, knowing I was too powerless to fight back. But things were different now. I walked right up to her and slapped her across the face with everything I had. She stumbled backward. Before she could even lift her head, I backhanded her across the other cheek. "You dare hit me?!" I had noticed when I walked in—there were no security cameras in her private office. "Surprised?" I shook my stinging hand. "Did you really think I was scared of you back in school?" I attended an elite Manhattan prep school on a full ride. Not because my family had money. In fact, we were dirt poor. The school waived my tuition and offered a massive stipend. But the condition was that I had to maintain the #1 rank in my grade and couldn't have a single disciplinary strike on my record. So, when Regina bullied me ruthlessly, I had to swallow my anger and take it. I stepped closer, grabbed a handful of her perfectly styled hair, and yanked her head back so she was forced to look up at me. "I warned you six years ago. Don't mess with me." "Did you think I let you off easy back then? Did you forget what I said?" Maybe remembering how unhinged I went back then brought back some trauma, because fear started creeping into her eyes. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw her hand creeping toward her phone to make a call. I slapped the phone out of her hand, picked it up, and chucked it out the window. I grabbed a heavy metal pen off her desk, gripping it tightly, and walked slowly toward her. "S-sorry," Regina suddenly stuttered out an apology. Hearing that, I laughed softly. I stopped, tossing the pen aside. "Since I'm the one who hit you, I should be the one apologizing." I gave her a perfectly polite, formal bow. "I'm sorry, Regina. I shouldn't have hit you." I stood up straight. "Now, it's your turn to go apologize to my mother." Regina was frozen stiff by my terrifyingly calm smile. "Regina, you really don't want anyone seeing you looking like this, do you? Be a good girl and wait right here for me to come back." Watching her nod frantically, I smiled in satisfaction, turned the doorknob, and prepared to leave. But the moment I opened the door, I looked up and saw Carter standing right outside. Regina saw him too. She looked like a drowning woman spotting a life raft. "Carter, save me! Vivian's insane, she's trying to kill me!"
? Continue the story here ?? ? Download the "MotoNovel" app ? search for "395072", and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel