Chapter 1

My Sister Wants to Kill Me

The moment my mother stepped forward to help my sister, I gave up struggling.

Later, she underwent extensive plastic surgery to look exactly like me, sitting in my bedroom waiting for my husband to return.

My parents hoped she would live happily ever after with my husband and enjoy a life of luxury.

I laughed at their ignorance, not knowing how dangerous the man before them truly was.

Today is the day Alexander Thorne returns from his business trip abroad.

He's been gone for over two months, and I've been dead for a week.

My sister Natalie Reed nervously stands up when she sees Alexander enter the room.

"Alex, have you had dinner? I asked the cook to make your favorite pumpkin soup."

This should be their first time meeting. Yet Alexander doesn't seem to notice his wife has been replaced.

I have to admit, Natalie did an impressive job of making herself look exactly like me from head to toe.

Alexander hands his suitcase to the servant and rubs his temples. "I'll have a bowl."

Natalie smiles softly, perfectly mimicking my mannerisms from the secretly recorded videos.

She follows Alexander into the dining room. "Mrs. Wilson, please bring a bowl of pumpkin soup for Mr. Thorne."

Alexander turns and glances at Natalie when he hears this.

We have many servants, but I'm still in the habit of doing many things myself. After all, I don't have much else to do at home.

Even though I've been in the city for almost two years, I'm still not comfortable ordering people around.

Before marrying Alexander, I always lived in my hometown.

Originally, Natalie was supposed to marry Alexander.

The Thorne and Reed families used to be close for generations. The Thornes were the second most powerful family in the city, with no one daring to claim first place.

The grandfathers of both families saw that they had a grandson and granddaughter of the right age, so they arranged a marriage between them.

Twenty years ago, after both grandfathers passed away, the Thorne family fell victim to business sabotage.

Alexander's father brought up the marriage agreement again, hoping the Reed family would help save them.

But by then, my father had already been won over by other powerful families. He decided to take advantage of the situation to carve up the Thorne empire, no longer caring about their past friendship.

The Thorne Group went bankrupt. Alexander's father died of depression, and his mother disappeared from the city with her son and the butler.

Two years ago, Alexander returned from abroad with the Cloud Summit Group, devastating several major powers in the city.

Not a single person who had taken advantage of the Thorne family's downfall back then escaped. They either ended up drowning in debt with no way to recover, or were caught for their crimes and sent to prison. Family ruin became the norm.

People in the business world were relieved this was happening domestically. They had heard rumors about how ruthless Alexander could be in less regulated foreign markets.

When the Reed Group was on the brink of bankruptcy, my father remembered the old marriage agreement.

Natalie was afraid Alexander would torture her to death out of revenge, so she cried and made a scene at home, insisting that I return from our hometown to marry him in her place.

Business families tend to be somewhat superstitious, and my father was especially so.

On the day Natalie was born, my father successfully signed a major deal that elevated the Reed Group to new heights.

But on the day I was born, a project he had just acquired ran into problems, and the Reed Group lost half its assets.

He firmly believed Natalie brought him good fortune, while I brought him misfortune.

If it weren't for my grandfather using his last dying breath to protect me, I probably would have been drowned in a chamber pot as an infant.

So my father told everyone I was sickly and sent abroad to recuperate.

In reality, I was abandoned in the countryside and randomly given to a blind widow surnamed Mendez to raise.

My sister was named Natalie, with our parents wishing her peace and health.

I was named Evelyn, with my father hoping for my early demise so I wouldn't affect the Reed family's fortunes.

My grandmother felt sorry for me and secretly changed my name to Evelyn when registering me.

Though I escaped an early death, I still ended up dying in the prime of my youth.