Chapter 2

"Aria, my friend who works at the Marriage Bureau checked for me. You're definitely not Ethan Quinn's spouse."

I set down my phone.

Something in my chest—so quietly, so gently—shattered.

Five years married to Ethan.

Throughout those five years, no matter what I did, the Quinn family elders never accepted me.

My mother-in-law never mentioned my name in front of others, only referring to me as "that girl from the mountains."

At family banquets, I was always seated in the most remote corner.

In group photos, I was always arranged at the edge where I could easily be cropped out.

He said he didn't want me to feel hurt, so he had me return to the village first.

He said he'd wait until he completed our village's bride snatching ritual, followed all the proper procedures, then bring me back legitimately.

I obediently returned.

Though we spent little time together, to outsiders we seemed loving and harmonious enough.

But I'd waited three years for him, saved up three years' worth of things to say, longed for this night for three years.

Yet he came for another woman.

He'd fooled me with a fake certificate for three years.

All just so I wouldn't discover—the person he truly wanted to capture was my stepsister, Chloe.

I looked at the woman in the mirror.

Expressionless, neither joyful nor sorrowful.

Soon, commotion erupted in the courtyard. The bride snatching had begun.

People were shouting "They're here, they're here!" Someone laughed. Footsteps pounded past in chaos. Someone deliberately blocked the path.

The firelight painted half the sky red. The excitement belonged to them.

The excitement was for Chloe.

The other group consisted of people from the neighboring village who'd come for the capture.

They'd originally come to capture Chloe.

According to tradition, if a girl was unwilling, she could hide away early and let them make a wasted trip.

But Chloe didn't hide.

She'd been waiting in her room all along, waiting to be carried away.

And the person she was waiting for—

Was my husband.