"Before the wedding, didn’t you say the biggest regret of your life was marrying me? You’d rather die than let me touch you. So what now? It’s only the first night after the wedding, and you already couldn’t hold back, huh? Came here to seduce me?"

The cold, hard tiles dug into her back so badly it felt like her bones were being crushed. The chill seeped through her soaked skin and drilled straight into her marrow.

Serena Harrington’s eyes flew open.

For a second, her vision blurred, then snapped into focus.

What she saw was not that filthy, blood-soaked hell from before, but the misty steam of a luxurious bathroom... and a face right in front of her. Stunning, flawless, and cold enough to freeze someone dead. A face filled with fury.

"You’re awake?" Sebastian Harrington’s voice was low and terrifying, every word edged with ice. "Serena Harrington, so this is your version of 'I’d rather die than let you touch me'? Crawling into my bathroom like some desperate stray and throwing yourself at me?"

A splitting headache crashed into her skull. Broken memories came at her all at once—mud, agony, Lydia Caldwell’s twisted smile, the numb cold of a bullet tearing through her body... and then the sharp, unmistakable pain deep inside her, the pain of being taken by force.

The truth hit Serena like lightning.

She had been reborn.

She was back on the night Lydia had set her up, back to the very first night of this marriage, back to the night she and Sebastian ended up together.

Humiliation. Rage. The towering hatred from her last life. The bitterness of being misunderstood.

Everything slammed together until her chest felt ready to explode.

"Let go of me, Sebastian Harrington! You think I wanted this? If it weren’t for—"

If it weren’t for Lydia.

If it weren’t for that drugged glass of milk.

If she had never slept with him—

Then maybe, in her last life, she would never have ended up dying that miserably.

"If it weren’t for what?" Sebastian let out a cold laugh, and his grip tightened even more.

His icy gaze swept over her body, over every intimate mark left behind, and the mockery in his eyes was brutal.

"If it weren’t for the fact that you’re shameless by nature and can’t stand being alone? Or what, is this one of the Caldwell family’s grand little schemes? On the wedding night, you climb into your husband’s bed on purpose, then turn around and accuse me of forcing you? So you can cry your way back into your childhood sweetheart’s arms with a perfect excuse?"

"That’s not true!" Serena was shaking all over, furious, hurt, and so wronged she could barely think straight. The despair from her previous life surged up with it, and the words burst out before she could stop them. "You don’t know anything! It was Lydia! She—"

"Shut up!" Sebastian cut her off sharply, his eyes turning dangerous in an instant. "Blaming someone else, throwing responsibility around—is that what passes for manners with you, Miss Caldwell? Looks like Mr. Caldwell really spoiled you rotten."

He suddenly let go of her like he had just touched something disgusting.

The force sent Serena stumbling hard to the floor. Her naked body was instantly swallowed by the freezing air of the bathroom.

Sebastian grabbed the bathrobe nearby and threw it on with casual ease. Even the way he tied the belt carried that same cold elegance, that same untouchable distance.

He looked down at the woman curled up on the ground, his disgust almost tangible.

"Drop the act. I have zero interest in you. I have no desire to touch a woman who has another man in her heart and uses such filthy tricks. Get out. And don’t let me see you again."

It felt like a knife had been driven straight through Serena’s heart.

The memory of being hated and cast aside by him in her last life overlapped perfectly with the humiliation of this moment. It crashed over her so hard she nearly drowned in it.

But right in the middle of that suffocating despair, a voice inside her started screaming like crazy.

Had she really come back to life just to make the same stupid mistake all over again?

No. Absolutely not.

She could not keep dancing to Lydia Caldwell’s tune. And she definitely could not let Sebastian Harrington become her enemy again.

"Sebastian Harrington!"

The moment he turned to leave, Serena Harrington forced herself up with every last bit of strength she had. Her voice shook so hard it sounded torn apart, but every word landed clearly.

"I'm sorry!"

The tall man’s rigid back froze on the spot.

Serena lifted her head. Wet hair clung messily to her pale cheeks. A second ago, her eyes had still been full of fury and despair, but now there was something else inside them—a strange, all-in kind of resolve, like she had already smashed the pot and sunk the boat. She stared straight into his cold, bottomless eyes.

"I'm sorry for all the chaos before the wedding. Sorry for all the trouble I caused you. But what just happened... I didn't mean for it to happen like that. Can we... can we try to get along?"

Her throat was raw, her voice low and hoarse, carrying a cautious little test of hope—along with a kind of fragility so unfamiliar that even she felt shaken by it.

"Get along?"

He turned and walked back toward her, one step at a time. His presence was so overwhelming it felt like the air in the room had stopped moving.

Then he crouched halfway down.

His long fingers were cold as ice when they suddenly clamped onto her chin, forcing her to raise her face.

"Serena Harrington, tell me this—how exactly is a woman who carefully drugged me on our wedding night, climbed into my bed, and then turned around and tried to pin the blame on me supposed to talk to me about 'getting along'? Hm? With what? Those cheap tears of yours? Or these shameless marks all over your body?"

His thumb pressed harder, almost crushing her jawbone. The chill in his eyes was enough to make anyone’s blood run cold.

That low "Hm?" was packed with deadly pressure, like a hammer nailing her straight onto a pillar of humiliation.

Right then, the bathroom door that had been left slightly ajar was gently pushed open.

A slim figure in a snow-white dress appeared at the entrance, wearing just the right amount of shock and innocence.

"Brother Sebastian? Serena? Oh my God! You two... what are you doing?!"

Lydia Caldwell’s voice was full of disbelief and neat little slices of "concern."

Her gaze swept quickly over Serena’s naked body, over the red marks scattered across her skin, and finally stopped on Sebastian’s hand gripping Serena’s chin. Deep in her eyes, a flash of twisted delight and calculation flickered by.

Hearing someone come in, Sebastian frowned, irritation obvious on his face. He grabbed another bathrobe and tossed it over Serena.

Then he shot her a glance like she was trash, turned around, and walked out of the bathroom.