Stranger at the Wedding

Chapter 2 Numbering

The morning sun shines on the glass dome of Victoria Station, casting diamond-shaped light spots. The commuting crowd surges like a tide, and the aroma of coffee mingles with diesel exhaust, creating the unique scent of a London morning. Ai Mili is wearing a black windbreaker and a baseball cap with the brim pulled low. She didn't tell anyone that she had come here. The DNA incident at yesterday's wedding has been handled by the public relations team as "a misunderstanding", and the entertainment section of the morning newspaper has the headline "Wentworth Heiress' Wedding Hit by Farce, Police Have Launched Investigation". Her name wasn't mentioned, but everyone knows who it is.

She waited at Platform 3 until exactly 10 o'clock.

A train pulled into the station, and passengers streamed out. After the crowd dispersed, an old woman still stood there. She was about seventy years old, wearing a gray woolen coat, carrying a cloth bag in her hand, and the wrinkles on her face were like tree rings, bearing the marks of time. Her eyes were blue - a very pale blue, as if washed many times.

"Emily Wentworth." The old woman called out her name, not as a question but as a statement.

"Who are you?"

"Margaret Sterling. In 1998, I was an archivist at St. Mary's Hospital in London." The old woman paused, her eyes sweeping around. "Only twenty minutes. Follow me."

They walked to a row of empty chairs at the end of the platform and sat down. Margaret's breathing was labored, each inhalation accompanied by a faint whistling sound, like an old bellows.

"Do you know why Samantha Black showed up at your wedding that day?" Margaret asked bluntly without any small talk.

"She said I was her missing daughter."

"You're not. But does she know about this? No. Samantha is not your mother, nor is she even your mother's sister. She is a pawn, a tool. " Margaret took out a manila envelope from her cloth bag and handed it to Ai Mili. "The real reason for her appearance is that someone wants you to start investigating."

"What are you looking for?"

"Check who you are."

Ai Mili opened the envelope, inside which was a yellowed piece of paper with edges as fragile as cicada wings. It was a hospital record, dated June 15, 1998. There was only one line on the record: "Baby Exchange Agreement, No. CE-1988-0615-L. Signatory: Ministry of Defence of the United Kingdom."

"Ministry of National Defense?" Ai Mili's voice was almost a whisper.

"Your birth was not an accident." Margaret's eyes fixed steadily on Ai Mili. "You're not your parents' child, nor are you Samantha's. You are—how shall I put it—you're part of the plan."

"What plan?"

“M-17。”

Ai Mili's pupils dilated slightly. She remembered that key, M-17, exactly the same.

"Your biological father was an agent of the national security department." Margaret's voice was so low that only Ai Mili could hear it. "Before going on a mission, he froze his . You are the product of artificial insemination. Your 'mother' was a surrogate. But something went wrong - a very serious mistake."

"What's wrong?"

Margaret opened her mouth but made no sound. Suddenly, her left hand grabbed Ai Mili's wrist with astonishing strength, strength that seemed unlikely for a seventy-year-old woman. Her lips began to turn purple, her eyes bulged wide, and blood vessels covered her eyeballs.

"Margaret? Margaret!" Ai Mili stood up, her voice beginning to tremble.

The old woman's hand went slack, and something slipped from her palm—a note. Then her body began to tilt, like a slowly falling statue, and finally crashed onto the platform floor. The surrounding passengers screamed; some knelt down to perform CPR, while others called for an ambulance.

Ai Mili didn't move. She looked down at Margaret's face, her pale blue eyes already out of focus, like two glass beads covered with a white film. Five seconds ago, there was a secret in those eyes. Now, that secret may be lost forever.

But the note is still there.

She crouched down, her fingers trembling, and unfolded the bloodstained note. There was only one line of writing on it, scrawled so sloppily as if the writer had exhausted their last bit of strength:

"Jack is not your brother. He is the rightful owner of your true identity - you stole his life."

Ai Mili clenched the note tightly in her palm, the edge of the paper digging into her skin like a knife.

The smell of the hospital is a mixture of disinfectant and despair.

Ai Mili sat in the corridor outside the emergency room, staring at the red light on the door. Margaret Sterling was diagnosed with poisoning - a fast-acting cardiac toxin, with the time of ingestion no more than an hour. The police found a handwritten letter in her bag, addressed to "Emily Wentworth", and the envelope was unsealed.

A police officer handed the letter to Ai Mili: "You should take a look."

The letter was typed on a very old typewriter, with uneven imprints of the letters, and several letters had already blurred.

Ai Mili:

If you're reading this letter, it means I'm already dead. I knew this was my last day. I chose to tell you the truth because they wouldn't let me leave alive.

*On June 15, 1998, the fire at St. Mary's Hospital was fake. It was a smokescreen created to cover up the transfer of infants. Three newborns were transferred that day, two of whom had their identities switched. File number CE-1988-0615-L corresponds to an infant exchange agreement, signed by the Ministry of Defense and executed by your adoptive father, Richard Wentworth.*

*Your biological father is William Sterling, who was the head of Project M-17. Your biological mother is Elena Voronova, a Russian national and a Defense Department informant, who was killed one month before your birth.*

*Your real birth records are in the National Archives, but not in the public area. They are in the underground archives of the Ministry of Defense, file number M-17-1. Only Attorney Henry Morris has access. He is the chief legal counsel of the Wen Tewosi family and the legal supervisor of Project M-17.*

Go find him. Before he destroys the evidence.

One last piece of advice: Don't trust anyone. Not even your fiancé.

Margaret Sterling

Ai Mili folded the letter, put it into his windbreaker pocket, and then took out his phone.

She dialed Henry Morris's number.

Busy tone.

She dials again.

Busy tone.

She dials for the third time.

A mechanical voice: "The user you dialed is powered off."

She thought for a moment and dialed James' number.

The phone connected within five seconds. "Emily? Where are you? Your mother said you left early this morning—"

"Find Henry Morris for me. Now."

"What happened?"

"Help me find him."

James paused for a second: "Locate his phone?"

"Yes."

"Give me two minutes."

She stood in front of the window in the hospital corridor, looking out at the parking lot. The sun was shining brightly, but it couldn't reach into this building. Two minutes later, James called back.

"His phone signal last appeared at Heathrow Airport, forty minutes ago. He bought a one-way ticket to the Cayman Islands."

"What time does the plane take off?"

"It's already gliding. Emily, you—"

She hung up the phone and started running.

Heathrow Airport's departure hall is always a mini Tower of Babel, where languages, faces, and purposes mingle. Emily threaded through the crowd, her trench coat behind her, and her high heels tapping out a rapid rhythm on the floor.

She missed the plane.

But she found Henry Morris, looking panicked, at the entrance of the first-class lounge.

He did not board the plane.

His flight was delayed due to a mechanical failure. Maybe it's a coincidence, maybe not.

When Henry saw her, the expression on his face was not surprise, nor fear, but something complex, a mixture of guilt and relief. The expression of someone who has done something wrong but no longer wants to run away.

"How much do you already know?" he asked, his voice hoarse as if he had been crying.

"Enough to know you're lying. Enough to know you're not a lawyer, you're the legal supervisor of Project M-17."

Henry closed his eyes, as if a man condemned to death had finally heard the sentence.

"You've looked into things you shouldn't have," he said, opening his eyes and looking at Ai Mili. "It's not up to me; there are people above."

"Who's up there?"

"Someone your father knows. Not your adoptive father, Richard, although he's not blameless either. I'm talking about your biological father - William Sterling."

"Is he still alive?"

Henry gave a bitter smile: "He's not only alive, he's doing well. Switzerland, the Alps, a villa, a new identity - diplomat. He's the one who issued the order to swap the babies. He swapped you to the Wen Tewosi family because Wen Tewosi could provide him with political protection. In exchange, Wen Tewosi got a defense contract worth £200 million."

"What about Jack Black?"

"Jack Black is the real son of Wen Tewosi."

This sentence hit Ai Mili like a sledgehammer, striking her chest. She had thought of many possibilities, but never this one. Her life not only didn't belong to her, but also to another person. And this other person, a man one year older than her, had been stripped of his name, identity, wealth, and status, all given to her.

"Does Richard know?"

"Richard knows. Veronica knows too. They chose you because they were afraid of William Sterling. But you have to understand one thing - William is playing a much bigger game. You're not his daughter, you're his pawn. Jack is another one of his pawns. Samantha is the third."

"Why?"

Henry was about to answer when his phone rang. He glanced at the screen, and his face instantly turned pale.

"They found me." he said.

Then the world slowed down.

Ai Mili saw a blurry shadow dashing towards them from the direction of the parking lot. It was a black SUV without a license plate. It was moving very fast, so fast that it didn't seem like it was going to brake. Henry saw it too. He tried to dodge to the left, and the SUV also went to the left. He tried to dodge to the right, and the SUV also went to the right.

It hit him precisely, without hesitation, like aiming at prey.

The sound of a body hitting metal is a special sound - dull, heavy, with the crisp c***k of bones breaking. Henry Morris's body flew two or three meters through the air like a puppet with its strings cut, landed on the ground, and rolled two more times. His leg was bent at an impossible angle, and blood spread out from beneath him like a slowly blooming red flower.

The SUV did not stop.

It accelerated and disappeared in the direction of the airport exit.

Ai Mili knelt on the ground, kneeling beside the pool of blood. Her knees were pierced by broken glass, but she didn't feel it. She pressed her hands against the wound on Henry's chest, and blood gushed out between her fingers, hot and sticky, like life itself was flowing away from her hands.

Henry's lips were moving, and he was saying something. Ai Mili leaned in closer with her ear.

"M-17... the underground archive... William... William he—"

Then his eyes fixed.

never moved again.

The siren of the ambulance came from afar, getting closer and closer, and more and more piercing. But Ai Mili didn't hear it. She only heard the sound of her own heartbeat, thump, thump, thump. Like a never-ending alarm clock, reminding her that time was running out.

The incandescent lights in the police station were so bright that Ai Mili's tears had nowhere to hide. In her statement, she named Thomas, Richard's driver, whose face she clearly saw at the moment of the car accident. She recounted every detail: the car model, the direction, and the time. But she didn't reveal what Henry had told her, those things about William Sterling, about M-17, and about Jack being the true Wentworth heir.

She didn't say these things because she was waiting.

She is waiting for Jack Black.

He appeared at the end of the corridor in the police station, wearing an orange jumpsuit, being led out of the detention cell by a police officer. Someone had paid his bail - anonymously, in cash, not by check from any bank.

He locked eyes with Ai Mili.

Separated by twenty meters, two iron fences, and an entire life woven with lies.

"Now you believe me?" He spoke first, his voice not loud, but the reverberation in the corridor made every word crystal clear. "I'm not here to claim kinship. I'm here to tell you that your life is mine. Wen Tewosi's money, fame, and status are all mine. And you should be an orphan of a military family, growing up in a welfare home."

Ai Mili did not flinch.

"So what do you want?"

Jack took a few steps closer. The corridor lights cast shadows on his face, half bright and half dark, like the two sides of a coin.

"Cooperate," he said. "Let's find out the truth together. Then, I want my name cleared. You can have half of the money."

"Why are you splitting it with me equally?"

"Because you're not a bad person." For the first time, a hint of softness appeared in Jack's eyes, but it quickly disappeared. "You're another victim."

“How do you know I'm not a bad person?”

Jack laughed, not mockingly, but with a bitter, self-deprecating smile: "If you were a bad person, you wouldn't be here. You wouldn't ask me these questions. You wouldn't look at me without hatred in your eyes."

At the end of the corridor, a police officer called Jack's name.

He turned around and walked away.

Taking three steps, then stopping without looking back, said, "Tomorrow at 3 PM, in front of the National Archives. Don't be late."

He left.

Ai Mili stood still, watching his back disappear into the shadows at the end of the corridor.

What she didn't know was that at the other end of the corridor, two men in plain clothes had been watching her all along.

They are not policemen.

Inside their briefcase is a document marked "Top Secret", with her photo on it, and a line of text written below the photo:

"Target 1: Emily Sterling (Code Name M-17-1). Status: Consciousness awakened. Recommendation: Recover immediately."

The document has no date, no signature, and no traceable marks.

Just like the M-17 project itself.

Just like her entire life.

She didn't get home until the early morning.

Wentworth Manor lay like a sleeping behemoth, prostrate in the moonlight. Ai Mili didn't ring the doorbell; she used her key to unlock the side door, walked through the dark corridor, and went up to the second floor.

Veronica was waiting for her in her study.

Mother was wearing pajamas, without makeup, and her hair was loosely draped over her shoulders. This was the first time Ai Mili had seen her mother without makeup. She looked old, tired, and scared.

"I knew you'd come," Veronica said, her voice calm in a way that didn't seem like a mother's, "Henry's dead, right?"

"You knew he was going to die."

"I knew he would be the next one. But not to die at my hands."

"I don't care who kills me." Ai Mili sat on the chair opposite her mother. "What I care about is, who are you? Who on earth are you?"

Veronica was silent for a long time.

Then she laughed. When she laughed, an expression appeared on her face that Ai Mili had never seen before—a look of relief, a look of finally being able to stop pretending.

"I'm not your mother," Veronica said. "I'm your father's liaison, William Sterling's liaison. He sent me to Wen Tewosi's house to go undercover and help him carry out the baby swap plan. Later, I fell in love with Richard, so I stayed. I chose you not because you were a pawn, but because I truly love you."

"You're lying."

"I've been lying my whole life." Veronica's tears finally fell, one by one, slowly. "But loving you is the only thing I haven't lied about."

She pushed a key across the tabletop.

Silver, old, with "M-17" engraved on the key handle.

is exactly the same as the one Ai Mili stole from Richard's safe.

"There's another one in the safe upstairs," Veronica said. "But that one won't open the real door. This one of mine will. Go check, kid. Find your real birth certificate. Find your twin sister. Find the secret I've hidden for twenty-five years."

"What twin sisters?"

Veronica shook her head, as if she had said too much.

"Open it, and you'll know."

Ai Mili picked up the key, walked out of the study, into the corridor, and into the darkness.

She didn't see Veronica take an envelope out of the drawer. The envelope was unsigned, with only a line of text: "William Sterling, Switzerland."

She also didn't see Veronica light the fireplace and throw the envelope into the flames.

The flames devoured the paper, devoured the words, and devoured all the lies of the past twenty-five years.

But lies cannot be burned out.

It will turn into ashes, into smoke, floating out of the chimney, drifting towards the night sky of London, towards the Swiss Alps, towards the man standing by the window of the villa waiting.

William Sterling.

His daughter finally came to him.

She just doesn't know yet.