This Time, I Choose Her to Live

My best friend, Jenna Brooks, and I were kidn*pped together, and the kidnappers gave my husband, Ethan Pierce, 10 minutes to choose which one of us to save.   Ethan picked me without a second thought.   By the time I was rescued, Jenna had already sunk into the deep sea.   Ethan locked down the entire dock, put up a 10 million bounty, and searched the area so thoroughly that he might as well have turned the whole place upside down.   And the mastermind they finally uncovered? My older brother, Ryan Hayes, who had been missing for years.   Ethan immediately jumped to the conclusion that I'd asked Ryan to plan the entire k********g.   On our wedding night, he slammed me into a bathtub filled to the brim with seawater.   "You took advantage of how much I loved you, paid off those kidnappers, and killed Jenna," he snarled. "I'm going to make you spend the rest of your life paying for what you did to her!"   Later, he personally made sure Ryan was sent to death row and executed.   He slept with one woman after another who looked strikingly like Jenna. Ethan said this was all the retribution I deserved. It was not until ten years later that Jenna appeared before me again, tangled in desperate passion with Ethan on our marriage bed. Only then did I learn that Jenna had never died. In the days that followed, I was forced to watch Jenna and Ethan love each other tenderly, and in the end, I died of grief.   *****   When I jolted awake, I was right back on the day Jenna and I were kidn*pped together.   The kidnapper was barking demands into the phone, forcing Ethan to choose right then and there.   This time, I spoke first, my voice steady and unwavering.   "Save her, please." The line went silent for 2 seconds.   Ethan clearly hadn't processed what I'd said.   "What did you say?"   The kidnapper was still counting down nearby. I stared at the seawater creeping around my ankles and repeated.   "I said, save Jenna."   "Don't be ridiculous. Tell me where you are!"   Ethan's voice was tight with strain.   I didn't answer. I simply hung up.   Less than 5 minutes later, the Pierce family's helicopter thundered low over the water, while three rescue boats moved in and sealed off the entire dock.   The warehouse's iron gate was rammed open by bodyguards. Ethan came charging inside, cut through my ropes in one swift motion, and pulled me straight into his arms.   "Scared out of your mind, huh? Why did you tell me to save her?"   When I was 17, he'd held me just like this when he confessed his feelings.   Jenna had crouched on a nearby reef that day, taking pictures of us and laughing that the three of us would never be apart.   Later, the Pierce family rose to become the richest in Westhaven, while my family built the city's largest shipping company, Oceancrest Group.   We were a perfect match in status and genuinely in love, and our marriage alliance followed naturally. Ethan said he would give me a wedding for the ages, and Jenna said she would be my chief bridesmaid. Suddenly, an urgent cry for help came over the walkie-talkie, pulling me back from my memories. "Miss Brooks's heart has stopped!" Ethan's arm abruptly let go. He hurriedly tossed out a "Stay put and wait for the doctor," then turned without hesitation and rushed toward the other dock. I slid down the wall and sat on the floor, watching his retreating back.   Strangely, I felt calmer than I had in my previous life when I'd heard Jenna was dead.   At least this time, she'd live.   The ambulance took both of us to the same hospital.   My parents arrived not long after.   Jenna was the orphaned daughter of my mother's best friend. She'd been raised in our home since she was little.   Mom camped out beside her hospital bed, while Dad pulled every string he could to get the city's top specialists on her case.   No one even bothered to ask if I was okay.   Ethan bandaged my wrists, then spent the entire night waiting outside Jenna's emergency room.   Early the next morning, he brought me a bowl of soup. His fingers had just brushed my forehead when we heard Jenna coughing from the room next door.   He immediately pulled his hand away.   "Eat up. I'll go check on her."   The soup was still my favorite flavor.   But on our wedding night in my previous life, those same hands that had just tested its temperature had shoved my head beneath the surface of a bathtub filled with water.   I'd nearly drowned before he grabbed me by the hair and dragged me back up, gasping for air.   On this day in this life, Ethan and I had already obtained our marriage certificate, and the wedding was just seven days away. Remembering the marriage from my previous life, which had felt like a prison sentence, I decisively took off my wedding ring and contacted a lawyer to draft a divorce agreement.   That evening, Ethan pushed a man into my hospital room.   I hadn't seen him in five years, but I recognized Ryan immediately.   He was wearing police restraints, and there wasn't a trace of joy in his eyes at our long-awaited reunion.   Ethan slammed an 8 million transfer record onto my hospital bed.   "He was the one who contacted the kidnappers, and the money ended up in your account. You counted on me choosing you no matter what, so you thought you could gamble with Jenna's life, didn't you?"   He'd interrogated me exactly the same way in my previous life.   At first, I'd sobbed as I tried to explain.   Then I'd knelt and begged him to believe me.   By the end, I was choking on seawater, half-drowned and too weak to do anything but shake my head.   I'd spent 10 years explaining myself, yet all that I had said was outweighed by one stupid transfer slip.   I turned to Ryan.   "Did I tell you to do this?"   His lips twitched, but in the end, he simply lowered his eyes.   That silence was as good as a guilty plea, making me responsible for every accusation Ethan had thrown at me.   A hollow ache spread through my chest.   I'd been in pain for so long in my previous life that even despair felt numb this time.   Suddenly, a weak voice came from the doorway.   "Ethan."   Jenna had only just woken up. Barefoot and unsteady, she was leaning against the doorframe for support.   Ethan let go of me instantly.   She collapsed into his arms, sobbing so hard her whole body shook.   Ryan took half a step forward, then forced himself to stop.   He stared at Jenna's face, buried against Ethan's chest.   The heartache and bitterness in his eyes were so intense they were almost impossible to contain.   So that's what it was.   He'd cooked up this entire twisted scheme, gambling with his own sister's life, all so the woman he loved could end up with Ethan.