That night, I ripped open the freshly delivered medical exam report with a sharp rip. I spotted the gut-wrenching line labeling the condition as a mild stroke, and panic slammed into me out of nowhere. My voice shook as I called out, "Babe, come look at Mom's test results. What do we do?" Kian Reed skimmed the report once or twice, his face twisted into a heavy, grave frown. After a long, heavy pause, he let out a sigh. "Aria Moore, what Mom has is a chronic illness. No matter how much money we pour into treatment, it'll never be cured." Tears burned my eyes and spilled down my cheeks, panic coiling tight in my chest. "Even if I have to borrow every last cent, even if I have to sell every last pot and pan we own, we have to treat her." He paused for a beat, his eyebrows furrowing into a deep scowl. "I can't drag our whole family through hell just for Hazel Moore alone." I froze, stunned. Kian didn't stop there. "Our son still needs to go to school. We still have to live. If it was one of my relatives who got this diagnosis, I'd give up right away too. Aria, you can't be this selfish." I stared at Kian's familiar features, but they felt like they belonged to a total stranger. A cold, hollow feeling spread through my chest. My lips trembled for a moment before I found my voice. "Fine. We won't treat her then." But Kian had messed up one critical detail. That wasn't Hazel's medical report. It was Eliza Reed's, my mother-in-law's.

I was a human orphan adopted by the Alpha of the wolf pack, and I grew up as the pack's most treasured darling. When a rival pack kidnapped me as a hostage, my adoptive father wiped out their entire tribe that very night. When a vampire tried to make me his blood slave, the pack turned him into a museum specimen. On my 17th birthday, I decided to experience normal human life and enrolled in a high school. On the first day of school, a girl's heel snapped. She stumbled and bumped into my shoulder. Wanting to get along with my classmates, I apologized first. But she called me blind and careless, then stole my nameplate. My deskmate looked at me with pity. "You should go apologize on your knees right now. And buy some nice gifts for her. Otherwise, once she calls Summer, you're done for." She told me that Grace was Summer's best friend, and Summer represented the highest authority in this school. Anyone who'd ever crossed Summer either became the school's punching bag or dropped out entirely. I laughed. "Really? I don't believe it."

The day I went to try on my wedding gown alone, an eerie message flashed across my phone. It was a countdown to my death.   Death Notice: Seven days from now, on the day Owen Parker gets married, you'll die. After catching your groom, Owen, cheating with Grace Scott, you'll be pushed past your breaking point and jump off a building.   The message bore one signature: J.   Every drop of blood drained from my face. The wedding gown I had on was exactly designed by Grace.   I stormed out of the fitting room and grabbed the nearest sales associate. "Where's Ms. Scott?"   Following the clerk's directions, I rushed to the hospital, only to find my fiancé, Owen, who was supposedly away on a business trip, holding Grace close by the waist. Hidden in the stairwell, they were kissing like no one else existed.   "This is incredible, Grace! I'm finally going to be a dad!"   The grin on Owen's face was blinding. It hit me like a bucket of ice water straight over my head, freezing me from the outside in. My heart went completely numb as I called my professor.   "I'll join the Antarctic glacier expedition."   Instead of dying for love, I would rather live for myself again.