Chapter 2

Aria and Colin didn’t start dating until after college.

Aria had fallen for him at first sight during freshman orientation. Colin was handsome and aloof, which only made her more determined to pursue him. She spent all four years chasing him relentlessly, despite his indifference.

It wasn’t until after graduation, when Colin broke up with his ex-girlfriend, that he finally agreed to date her.

Once they got together, Aria became completely obsessed. She saw every woman in Colin’s life as a threat, convinced that any female interaction was a potential rival.

Even I—her younger cousin, whom she met only once on their engagement day—wasn’t spared from her suspicions.

In truth, Colin was exhausted. He’d tried to break up with her several times because of her unhealthy possessiveness, but every time, Aria would spiral into threats of self-harm to force him to stay.

I only learned about this from my aunt when she came to our house, crying about the situation.

So, when Colin finally agreed to marry Aria, she was over the moon. Her obsessive love for him blinded her to everything else.

On the day of the engagement, under Colin’s sweet words and grand promises, Aria happily placed the engagement gift—the box of purported gold bars—into our family’s safe for safekeeping.

The very next day, Aria showed up at our house in a hurry, saying she felt uneasy and wanted to keep the gold bars closer to her.

Thinking nothing of it, I retrieved the box from the safe and handed it to her.

She opened it on the spot and was horrified to discover its contents—cheap, fake gold ornaments, not real gold bars.

Her face turned pale as she clutched the box and ran out the door.

I assumed she was rushing to confront Colin, so I didn’t think much of it and moved on with my day.

But what came next was something I could never have imagined.

Aria burst into my house in a frenzy and stabbed me to death. Not only that—she dismembered my body.

It wasn’t until after my death that I learned the truth.

Colin had used Aria as a scapegoat, claiming she had lost the engagement gift. Then, he turned around and married another woman.

When Aria tried to reconcile with him, he not only rejected her but also demanded she repay the “missing” engagement gift worth hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Consumed by rage and despair, Aria blamed everything on me. In her twisted mind, I was the cause of her humiliation and loss. That’s why she showed up at my door and killed me.

The pain of dying like that was indescribable—pure agony. No one would ever want to experience it again.

Just thinking about it sent a shiver down my spine.

This time, I vowed to stay far away from Aria and her obsessive, toxic love life. I was determined to live, and to live well.