After eight years as a stand-in, I let go first

My wife drugged me for the forty-ninth time and sent a woman to my bed.

I clenched my jaw until my teeth creaked, slicing my palm open with a shard of glass. The sharp, stinging pain anchored my last shred of clarity. I drove the woman out of the room.

For two hours, I submerged myself in ice water that bit into my bones, shivering until the drug's fire finally burned out.

Trembling, I climbed out of the bathtub. Dressed with mechanical precision. Smoothed every wrinkle. Headed to the KTV.

Inside the private suite, Daisy Gilbert lounged in the arms of a young host, a low, amused laugh escaping her lips.

"Looks like the honey trap failed again." She swirled her drink. "What is your type, anyway? I'll pick someone prettier next time."

I ignored the mockery hanging thick in the air. Walked over. Placed a single sheet of paper on the table.

"I agree to the divorce. You don't need to bother with the games anymore."

The silence that followed was absolute.

You could have heard a pin drop.

Daisy stood up abruptly, a flicker of genuine shock cracking her icy composure.

I forced a smile.

I had waited for her forty-nine times.

On the fiftieth, I was finally willing to accept defeat.

1.

Walking out of the Civil Affairs Bureau, Daisy and I officially entered the divorce cooling-off period.

She slid into her waiting sports car, sneered, and tossed her wedding ring out the window. It clattered onto the pavement like trash.

"You should have agreed sooner." Her voice dripped with disdain. "You wasted so much of my time."

The engine roared. The car vanished into traffic.

Bile rose in my throat. I crouched down, picked up the ring, wiped off the dust, and tucked it into my breast pocket.

Close to my heart.

Years ago, I had sold my only valuable guitarmy lifelineto buy this. Custom-ordered this pair of plain bands and a bouquet of roses.

Daisy, heiress of the Gilbert Group, was used to dazzling gems and six-figure jewelry. But when she saw the simple ring I pulled out that day, her eyes had reddened. She listened intently to my stumbling, heartfelt confession, then smiled and offered her hand.

I naively thought we would grow old together.

But time changes everything.

When I returned to the villa, my belongings sat packed in boxes, thrown onto the driveway.

Daisy stood in the doorway, her fingers interlaced with Luke Swanson's.

"Luke is moving in." She issued the eviction order with the casual cruelty of a monarch. "You don't need to come back."

Luke smirked. Wrapped an arm around Daisy's waist. Pulled her flush against hima declaration of sovereigntyand kissed her.

Even though I knew Daisy's heart had long since turned to stone where I was concerned, the sight still felt like a serrated blade twisting in my chest.

Luke released a flushed Daisy and looked at me, his expression provocative.

"Director Harding, thank you for introducing me to Daisy. When you get down to it, you owe all this to James."

Daisy's face instantly darkened at the mention of that name. Disgust flooded her gaze as she looked at me.

"He has wronged James his entire life."

My hands curled into fists at my sides, knuckles white.

But the fight drained out of me just as quickly.

I loosened my grip. Powerless.

Before I could speak, the heavy front door slammed shut in my face.

A self-deprecating laugh escaped my lips. Under the vast, darkening sky, I picked up my luggage and hailed a taxi to a hotel.

Once settled in the sterile room, my phone lit up with notifications.

**[Famous Director and Wife Spotted at Civil Affairs BureauDivorce Imminent?]**

**[Female CEO and Popular Actor: Late Night Hotel Visits Spark Rumors]**

I turned off the screen and collapsed onto the bed, exhaustion crushing me.

As a well-known film director, I had never cared about an actor's background. Luke Swanson had the looks. He was willing to grind. After playing the supporting male lead in my latest film, he had skyrocketed from obscurity to stardom.

The crew had held a celebration banquet. That was where he met Daisy.

The atmosphere between them shifted instantlyambiguous, charged, dangerous.

When I angrily confronted Daisy later, she only laughed, indifferent to my pain.

"If it wasn't Luke Swanson, it would be someone else."

Her eyes grew distant. "Besides, he looks a bit like James."

Then the venom returned. "You murdererwhat right do you have to question me?"

I trembled then.

Silenced by the weight of a sin she would never let me forget.

Night fell, swallowing the hotel room in pitch darkness.

Memories surged like a tidal wave, drowning me.

Eight years ago, I was a nobody singing in a bar. That was where I met Daisy Gilbert.

She sat in an inconspicuous corner, nursing a drink, listening to me sing for four hours straight. When my shift ended, she grabbed a handful of cash and stuffed it into my guitar case.

I looked up, startled, and found myself staring into a face of breathtaking beauty.

Daisy smiled at me. Her first words were not a greeting, but an observation.

"Hello. You look like a friend of mine."

I sat up in the dark hotel room, fumbling for a cigarette. The flame flickered, illuminating the smoke curling toward the ceiling.

That opening line had started our story.

It was also a curse, foretelling the shattered ending that awaited us.

Early the next morning, freezing water jolted me awake.

Daisy stood by the bed, dressed in a severe black suit, her face a mask of ice.

"Today is the anniversary of James's death."

A bitter laugh escaped me. I wiped the water from my face and silently changed into black clothes.

We arrived at an upscale private cemetery. Daisy placed a bouquet of white lilies before James Delgado's tombstone.

Two bodyguards stepped forward. Heavy hands pressed down on my shoulders, forcing me to my knees.

Daisy looked down at me, her sorrow mixing with a hatred so potent it burned.

"Tyler Harding, if it weren't for you, James wouldn't have died."

I knelt on the freezing bluestone slabs, offering no defense.

Daisy instructed the bodyguards to watch me, then turned and walked away without a backward glance.

As the click-clack of her high heels faded, I looked up at the tombstone.

In the black-and-white photo, James Delgado wore a flamboyant, dazzling smile. It felt like he was mocking me.

*Tyler Harding, you lost.*

I lowered my head, a wave of old pain crashing over my heart.

Three years since James died.

I admitted it. I had lost.

Thick fog began to roll through the cemetery, pulling my thoughts back into the past.

After that first night at the bar, Daisy and I became inseparable.

She was always there, waiting patiently for my shift to end. Eventually, my boss, eyes twinkling with gossip, asked if she was my girlfriend.

My face burned. I opened my mouth to deny itI was a poor singer, she was a goddessbut Daisy beat me to it. She took my hand, interlaced our fingers, and nodded at the boss with a smile.

We didn't need a formal confession.

We just happened.

After hesitating for weeks, I decided to take Daisy to my rental apartment. I needed to come clean about my reality.

But the moment we arrived, disaster struck.

Creditors were banging on the door, screaming for repayment of the loan shark debt my father had left behind before running off with his mistress.

Inside, the house was a wreck. My younger sister, who suffered from a mental impairment, huddled in a corner, screaming, having wet herself in terror. My sickly mother lay paralyzed on the bed, sobbing, begging for a few more days.

When I pushed the door open, a thug grabbed me by the collar, demanding money I didn't have.

Daisy froze for a split second.

Then her expression hardened. She pulled out a black card.

"Let him go." Her voice cut through the chaos. "I'll pay the debt."

The thug's eyes bulged. He took the card, bowing and scraping as he led his crew away.

My mother wept, trying to drag her paralyzed body off the bed to kneel before Daisy. Daisy stopped her, supported her gently, then went to the corner to comfort my sister.

That was the day I learned Daisy was the heiress to the Gilbert Group.

When I walked her out that night, shame burned in my gut. I promised in a low voice that I would pay her back every cent.

Daisy just hugged me, her embrace warm and safe.

"Tyler," she whispered, "I like you. Your problems are my problems."

She was true to her word. She paid for my mother's surgery. Moved my sister to a high-end nursing facility where she finally found stability.

I worked like a madman, desperate to be worthy of her. I asked her what she wanted from me.

Her eyes softened. She reached out and gently patted my head.

"I only want you to be happy. You've had a hard life, haven't you?"

In that moment, Daisy Gilbert was a beam of pure light piercing the darkness I had lived in for decades.

She pulled me out of the abyss.

Then her tone shifted, becoming playful.

"I don't lack money. I just lack a handsome husband."

My face turned crimson.

The next day, I sold my guitar, bought the rings, and proposed. When she nodded, I swore an oath to the universe: I would love her for a lifetime.

After the wedding, Daisy made me quit the odd jobs. She funded my return to university.

"My husband is brilliant," she'd say, eyes shining. "He's going to achieve great things."

I studied directing and screenwriting with a hunger I'd never felt before. Soon, I gathered a team. My first two films were critical darlings. The third, based on our love story, catapulted me to fame.

My career was soaring. My marriage was perfect.

Five years in, Daisy got pregnant. I was ecstatic, already planning the nursery, dreaming of our future.

And then James Delgado returned.

His appearance was a sledgehammer that shattered the dream.

The sky above the cemetery grew dark.

I checked my watch. 7:30 PM. Another four and a half hours of kneeling before I was allowed to leave.

Since James died, Daisy forced me to kneel here for twenty-four hours every year on his death anniversary.

For three years, I had never missed a minute.

*"Tyler Harding, you caused James's death. You owe him your life."*

Her words echoed in my skull.

And God help me, I couldn't refute them.

My knees were numb, devoid of sensation. I stared blankly ahead.

Suddenly, chaotic footsteps broke the silence of the cemetery.

The sharp click-clack of high heels stopped directly in front of me. I began to lift my head

*Smack!*

A palm connected hard with my face, snapping my head to the side.

"Tyler Harding!" Daisy screamed, her voice trembling with rage. "It wasn't enough that you killed James? Now you want to kill Luke too?"

I blinked, dazed. "What?"

"Don't play dumb!" Her chest heaved. "How did I not see how filthy and vile you are? Yesterday, Luke said a few things about you, and today you had someone run him off the road!"

She turned to the bodyguards, her face twisted. "Drag him to the hospital. He's going to apologize to Luke right now!"

Before I could protest, the bodyguards swarmed me, hauling me up and shoving me into the car.

At the hospital, Luke Swanson lay in bed, his arm in a cast. When he saw me, his eyes flickered with guilt before he masked it.

I gritted my teeth. "I didn't touch you. Why are you framing me?"

Daisy let out a cold, mocking laugh.

"If it wasn't you, are you saying Luke crashed his own car just to frame you? Tyler, not everyone is as scheming as you. Apologize. Now."

I stiffened my neck. Refused to speak.

Seeing Daisy firmly in his corner, Luke's confidence surged. His eyes shifted with malicious intent.

"Daisy, if Director Harding doesn't want to apologize, let it go." He played the martyr, his voice soft. "But... I heard he signed an organ donation agreement."

He paused. A cruel smile touched his lips.

"My mother has end-stage uremia. She needs a kidney urgently. Since he won't apologize, how about he gets tested? If he's a match..."

Luke leaned back against the pillows, eyes glittering.

"Donating a kidney could count as his atonement."

Rage detonated in my chest. My voice came out shredded, barely human. "Impossible. Stop dreaming."

But Daisy Gilbert's eyes glittered with cold triumph. She nodded oncesharp, final.

The bodyguards moved before I could react. Iron hands clamped around my arms, dragging me from the ward like a condemned man. Daisy was already barking orders at the doctors, demanding a compatibility test.

This was a private hospital. Gilbert Group property. State-of-the-art equipment, world-class surgeonsand Daisy's word was gospel.

The medical team wheeled out James's mother within minutes. Her face was a skull wrapped in papery skin, hollowed out by disease. They drew blood from both of us.

Hours crawled by.

Then the results came back.

A perfect match.

Of course. Fate had always had a sick sense of humor.

A satisfied smirk curved Daisy's lips. "Good. Prep him. The moment his vitals stabilize, operate."

My vision blurred. I thrashed against the guards, muscles burning, wrists screaming. "I don't consent! I'm not donating! Let me go!"

Daisy's gaze swept over me like I was already a corpse. "Tyler Harding. You killed James. Saving his mother is your atonement."

A flick of her wrist. The guards pinned me flat and wheeled me toward the operating theater.

Cold flooded my veins as the anesthetic hit. My thoughts fractured. My body turned to lead, dragging me down, down, down

Into a nightmare I couldn't escape.

In the dream, I was back in the past. Standing beside Daisy in a jewelry store. That was the day we ran into James Delgado, fresh off a plane from abroad.

His gaze raked over meslow, amusedand his lips curled into something between a smile and a sneer.

The moment his eyes met Daisy's, he shook his head with indulgent pity. "Daisy. You really have a type. He's my spitting image."

The bracelet slipped from her fingers. It hit the floor with a sharp clatter.

And her faceGod, her face.

Longing. Joy. Sorrow. Excitement. All tangled together in a way I'd never seen before.

Never directed at me.

The truth crashed down like a collapsing building.

I finally understood why she'd chosen me in the first place.

I was a stand-in. A cheap copy of James Delgado.

After that day, everything changed.

Daisy started meeting him constantly. Hotels. Restaurants. She'd lace her fingers through his right in front of me, pressing herself against his side like I didn't exist.

At first, when I complained, she'd offer a few placating words. But as the encounters multiplied, her patience evaporated. She told mecold, dismissiveto mind my own business.

Paranoia ate me alive. I checked her phone obsessively, scrolling through their messages until my eyes burned. Every time she reached for her keys, I grabbed her wrist. *Are you seeing him? Tell me.*

One night, I made a scene in a crowded restaurant.

Daisy finally snapped.

"Tyler, get a life." Her voice was ice. "If you can't stand me being close to James, then let's get a divorce."

The word hit me like a bullet.

She didn't come home after that.

I couldn't think. Couldn't breathe. My mind narrowed to a single, desperate obsession: *Keep Daisy.*

She was the only light in my pitch-black existence.

That was when I made my first mistake.

I went to James Delgado. Liquidated everythingevery asset, every cent I'd earned since the day I started workingand converted it into a massive sum.

I knelt before him.

Discarded my dignity like it was trash.

And begged him to leave.

James lit a cigarette. Smoke curled around his face as he looked down at me, amusement flickering in his eyes. After a long silence, he plucked the bank card from my outstretched hand like he was accepting alms from a beggar.

"I can leave Daisy." His voice was lazy, unhurried. "But I want to live on my own terms."

He leaned closer. His breath was warm against my ear, his words dripping with venom.

"Just remember this: even if I leave, you're still nothing but a pathetic substitute."

I didn't care about his mockery. I arranged a private plane according to his demandsfirst-class ticket out of the country.

That was my second mistake.

The plane crashed.

James Delgado's body was never recovered.

And in that moment, I finally understood what he meant by "living on his own terms."

He died.

But he would live forever in Daisy Gilbert's heart.

How can the living compete with a ghost?

When Daisy learned the truth, she didn't scream. She gnashed her teeth, her voice a low, trembling hiss, and branded me a murderer.

Then she aborted our child.

Her mind unraveled. In two weeks, she withered into someone I barely recognizedgaunt, hollow-eyed, a ghost wearing her skin.

Guilt consumed me. I tried to turn myself in to the police. Multiple times. They always sent me back. Everyone ruled it an accident.

But the fact remained.

James Delgado was dead because of me.

Sleep became impossible. Food tasted like ash. I wasted away to skin stretched over bone.

Daisy forced me to kneel before James's tombstone for an entire day. She broke down, screaming, demanding to know why I'd gone to see him.

Why. Why. *Why.*

I took her abuse in silence. I deserved it.

Six months later, Daisy finally went quiet.

Her voice was dry as dead leaves when she spoke. Thick with hatred.

"I want a divorce."

I refused.

She didn't argue. Just smileda cold, brittle thingand walked away.

After that, she stopped hiding. She flirted openly with other men. Worse, she used every method imaginable to throw women at me, hoping to catch me cheating so she could sue for divorce.

I held the line. Clung to the delusion that we could go back to the way things were.

Reality slapped me hard.

Over three years, Daisy drugged me forty-nine times.

Forty-nine different women shoved into my bed.

On the fiftieth attempt, I finally signed the divorce papers.

I was tired.

I didn't want to fight anymore.

When I opened my eyes, fluorescent lights glared down at me from a hospital ceiling.

Daisy stood at my bedside. Her voice was stripped of everythingemotion, warmth, humanity. "The surgery was a success. Rest. Once the cooling-off period ends, we finalize the divorce."

She turned and walked out.

Didn't look back.

I touched the bandage on my abdomen and closed my eyes. The pain was distant, muffled, like it belonged to someone else.

I spent the next month recovering in silence.

On the day we received the official divorce certificate, Daisy let out a long breath. A bright smileone I hadn't seen in yearsbroke across her face.

At the airport boarding gate, my younger sister sucked on her finger, confusion clouding her innocent eyes. "Brother, where is Sister-in-law?"

I smiled and patted her head. "Brother doesn't have a wife anymore, sweetie. And you don't have a sister-in-law."

Before boarding, I made one final call.

My voice was calm. Steady.

"Daisy. Thank you for pulling me out of the abyss all those years ago."

"Thank you for loving me once. I loved you deeply, too."

"But from today on, I don't owe you or James Delgado anything."

I hung up. Pulled the SIM card from my phone. Dropped it in the nearest trash can.

...

On the other end of the line, Daisy stared at the dead screen.

A strange melancholy settled in her chest. Heavy. Inexplicable.

The office door burst open. Her secretary stumbled in, breathless, face pale.

His words struck her like lightning.

"Ms. Gilbert... Mr. Delgadohe seems to be alive! He didn't die!"