After the car crash, my adopted brother thought I had amnesia. He pointed at his best friend, Lucas Vance, and tried to mess with me: "This is your boyfriend." In my past life, I immediately exposed his lie and continued to desperately cling to him. Eventually, I died a horrific death in a secret psychiatric facility where my adopted brother had locked me away. Three years after my death, a severely depressed Lucas Vance slit his wrists in front of my grave. When I opened my eyes again, I was back on the day of the car crash. This time, I walked straight up to Lucas and opened my arms: "Hubby, hug me." Across the room, my adopted brother accidentally crushed the medicine bowl in his hand. The man standing in front of me, his eyes turning red, pulled me into his arms and answered in a hoarse voice: "Okay." 1 The hospital room smelled strongly of disinfectant. My adopted brother, Arthur Miller, and his best friend, Lucas Vance, stood side-by-side in front of me. I shook my throbbing head, completely disoriented, feeling like the scene playing out before me couldn't possibly be real. "Where am I? Who am I?" Arthur, assuming I had amnesia, eagerly pointed at Lucas, his eyes filled with mocking amusement. "You're my sister, Mia Miller. And this is your boyfriend, Lucas Vance." I looked at Lucas in shock. The man's sharp, handsome features were cast downward, tinged with a deep loneliness. He intentionally avoided looking at me, but his gaze kept flickering back to me anyway. He looked like he was suppressing an agonizing amount of emotion. Just exactly like he did in my past life. 2 In my past life, I had been desperately, hopelessly in love with my adopted brother, Arthur, for years, clinging to him until he couldn't stand it anymore. After the car accident, he mistakenly thought I had amnesia. Desperate to shake me off, he lied and told me Lucas was my boyfriend. Honestly, when I first woke up from the crash, I did have a brief moment of amnesia. But my memories returned very quickly. Faced with Arthur's cruel joke, I didn't think much of it. Instead, like a stubborn idiot, I immediately exposed his lie, desperate to prove my memory was intact. I tentatively grabbed the hem of Arthur's shirt, tears welling in my eyes. "Brother, I don't have amnesia. I'm not lying." Arthur didn't know what to do with me. He stiffly pulled me into his arms. Just like he had done every time I cried for the past five years. "I'm sorry, Mia. Brother made a mistake." I was overjoyed, completely tossing that bizarre incident to the back of my mind. I went right back to clinging to Arthur like I always did. Since I was sixteen, I realized my feelings for my adopted brother were anything but platonic. Every time he got a new girlfriend, I would deliberately sabotage the relationship. The psychology books call it toxic possessiveness. I couldn't deny it. And Arthur silently permitted my outrageous behavior. Many times, when I was dealing with those girlfriends, he was secretly pulling strings in the background to help me. He indulged my worst impulses, and he let me cling to him endlessly. Once, when I was blackout drunk, I threw my arms around him and demanded a kiss. He didn't push me away. Instead, his body went completely rigid as he let me take whatever I wanted from him. Back then, I arrogantly assumed Arthur loved me back. But I ignored the most critical detail: he had never, ever verbally confessed his feelings for me. I held him and kissed him for a long time, until he suddenly jolted awake and shoved me away in absolute disgust, ordering me to get off him. Arthur wiped his swollen lips, a cruel, mocking smirk twisting his features. "Mia Miller, how could you possibly be in love with your own brother? You're a sick freak." I felt like I had been violently woken from a dream, like a bucket of freezing water had been dumped over my head. My entire body went stiff, paralyzed by agonizing shame. "I don't. I don't love you." My voice grew quieter with every word. His sarcastic retort, however, was sharp and piercing. "You don't love me, huh?" The raw disgust in his eyes carved out my heart piece by piece. I couldn't answer. Deep down, in my most private thoughts, I did love Arthur. I was an orphan. My brother was the only person in the entire world who treated me well. How could I possibly not fall in love with him? Arthur, acting as if he had just uncovered my darkest, most depraved secret, looked at me with even deeper revulsion. "A sick freak like you belongs locked away in a psych ward to be 'rehabilitated'." 3 My thoughts snapped back to the present. I stared in shock at Arthur, who was smirking at me. He was looking back at me, the cruel amusement in his eyes completely undisguised. In that split second, goosebumps erupted all over my body, and I couldn't suppress a violent shiver. I dug my nails so deeply into my palms that the sharp pain forced me to stay rational. I looked Arthur dead in the eye and answered, enunciating every single syllable: "I understand, Brother." In this lifetime, I absolutely refused to let my life intertwine with his ever again. Everything between us ended the moment I died that horrific, agonizing death in my past life. The days in that psychiatric facility were a living hell. Arthur visited me once every two weeks. Unable to endure the daily beatings and electroshock therapy, I sobbed and begged him to let me out. I screamed with every ounce of strength I had left: "Brother, I was wrong! I'll never love you again, I swear!" But every single time, Arthur would just stare down at me with cold, detached superiority, his voice devoid of a single drop of humanity. "Mia, it seems your illness is acting up again." And with those words, the agonizing, unbearable torture would resume. I tried desperately to contact anyone I knew, begging them to save me. But Arthur had planned for everything. He had buried my existence so deep that absolutely no information ever leaked out. In just six short months, I was tortured to death. After I died, Arthur acted like a lunatic, clutching my corpse and refusing to let go. He said he regretted everything. He said he loved me. He sobbed endlessly, repeating his twisted logic and his deep-seated terror. Falling in love with his adopted sister would have made everyone look at him with disgust and suspicion. My soul stood right next to him, watching the entire spectacle with absolute, chilling apathy. I just wanted to vomit. Even now, just looking at Arthur made me physically nauseous. So, I immediately shifted my gaze to Lucas. I opened my arms to him, forcing down my tears, and said in my sweetest, most pathetic voice: "Hubby, hug me." 4 CRASH! The sound of porcelain shattering in the hospital room was deafening. I slowly turned my head. Arthur's palm was a bloody mess. The dark brown medicinal broth mixed with his blood, dripping onto the pristine floor. It was absolutely nauseating. He stood frozen, the cruel amusement entirely vanishing from his eyes. Replaced by an endless, burning fury. However, I had absolutely no interest in him right now. All of my attention was focused entirely on Lucas Vance. From the second the word "Hubby" left my lips, Lucas's eyes had rapidly turned red. His body went rigid, and he looked up at me in pure shock. Confusion and overwhelming emotion battled in his eyes, eventually coalescing into a profound, violent tremor. His lips parted slightly, his voice thick and raspy. He took a few quick steps forward, pulled me tightly into his chest, and murmured low in my ear: "Okay." Arthur clenched his bleeding fist, fresh blood bubbling up from the cuts. He coughed a few times, raised his injured left hand, and shoved it right in front of me. The metallic stench of blood made me gag. Lucas smoothly pulled me aside, unzipping his trench coat to wrap it securely around me. I peeked my head out from his chest, only for a warm hand to immediately cover my eyes. "Don't look. It's disgusting." With that, Lucas positioned himself defensively in front of me, glaring furiously at Arthur. His disgust was palpable. "You know perfectly well she hates blood and pain, and you're deliberately trying to make her sick?!" A strange, unfamiliar feeling bloomed in my chest. I pulled Lucas's hand away and looked closely at his pale, handsome face. His features were immaculate, exactly as I remembered them. But looking closer, he seemed sharper, more aggressive than before. In my memories, Lucas had always been silent and reserved. This was the very first time I had ever seen him deliver such a ruthless, uncompromising reprimand. Arthur was clearly just as shocked. "None of your fucking business." Arthur rolled his eyes and held his trembling, bloody hand out again. He looked like he was desperately waiting for my reaction. "Mia, I'm hurt." If this were the past, I would have panicked, frantically searching for ointment, sobbing uncontrollably while I bandaged his hand. But now, I just shrank deeper into Lucas's embrace, casting a look of pure disgust at his filthy, bloody hand. "Brother, there are doctors and nurses right outside. I don't know how to treat a wound." "You???" I cut him off, annoyed. "I'm tired. I want to go home." Out of the corner of my eye, I caught someone's lips curving upward. He looked like a smug little puppy wagging its tail. 5 Physically, I was fine. The doctor said I just needed bed rest at home. Lucas absolutely refused to let me walk. He insisted on carrying me out of the hospital. Arthur's face was as dark as a thundercloud. In that moment, he finally snapped. He grabbed my arm in a death grip. "Mia, didn't you say you wanted to go home?" I pried his vice-like fingers off me, one by one. His grip left bright red marks on my skin. "I did. I'm going to my boyfriend's house. Is there a problem with that, Brother?" "Mia Miller, you are going to regret this." Arthur let out a self-deprecating laugh, practically growling the words through gritted teeth. Regret? My only regret was not realizing my own heart sooner. My only regret was being an absolute idiot in my past life, letting Arthur play me like a fiddle. Lucas carried me to his car and carefully buckled me in. He started the engine, slammed on the gas, and we sped away. For the entire drive, his large hand completely enveloped mine, never letting go for a single second. When we arrived at his place, I felt gross and sticky from the hospital and desperately wanted a bath. Lucas thoughtfully ran the bathwater for me. He pulled a brand-new, unopened bottle of essential oil from the cabinet. He opened it. It was my favorite scent: jasmine. Then, Lucas opened his massive walk-in closet and pulled out a set of loungewear still with the tags on. It fit me absolutely perfectly. I was genuinely confused. Lucas scratched the back of his neck, his face flushing red all the way to the tips of his ears. "I saw it when I was shopping, thought it would look good on you, so I just bought it." "You 'just bought' all of this?" I pointed at the massive section of women's clothing taking up more than half his closet. They were all brand new. And they were all from my favorite designer brands. "Don't misunderstand, I was just... I just..." I blinked at him, waiting for the excuse. Lucas sighed heavily, his expression basically screaming, 'Fine, the gig is up.' "Is it a crime to buy clothes for my own girlfriend?" Was this really the insecure, sensitive Lucas I remembered? The guy who used to blush furiously if I so much as spoke two sentences to him? In my past life, right up until I died in that psychiatric ward, he and I barely interacted. It wasn't until after I was dead that I finally glimpsed the sheer, overwhelming depth of Lucas's love for me.
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