Chapter 1

My husband's first love, Celine, lured me to a remote cabin under the guise of an "apology."

She then poured gasoline all over the porch and locked the door from the outside.

In my past life, the moment the fire began to spread, I desperately called my husband, Julian—a fire captain—for rescue.

He smashed the door open and saved me.

Ironically, Celine's scheme backfired, and she died of smoke inhalation outside.

Yet, Julian pinned her blood debt entirely on me.

He kept me at the hospital with his hypocritical comfort, only to tear off his disguise the day I was discharged. He tied me to a pillar in an abandoned warehouse and poured gasoline at my feet.

As the flames ignited, my ten-week-old unborn child and I were swallowed by the raging fire.

Julian's eyes were bloodshot. Facing my agonizing screams, his gaze held nothing but pure, unadulterated hatred:

"If you hadn't gone mad with jealousy and locked the door from the inside, Celine would never have died! Stop playing the victim!"

"The pain she suffered before she died... I'm going to make you pay for it ten times, a hundred times over!"

In the blazing light, he watched coldly as I was burned alive, turning into a charred corpse.

When I opened my eyes again, I was back at the exact moment the fire started to spread.

......

I snapped my eyes open, gasping. A violent coughing fit tore through my lungs with agonizing pain.

The heat around me was suffocating, and the timber cracked with a bone-chilling pop under the roaring flames.

Soaked in cold sweat, my mind blanked for a second before sharp clarity hit me.

I had been reborn.

I instinctively covered my stomach.

My baby. Inside me, a fragile little life of barely two months was growing.

In my previous life, I hadn't even gotten the chance to tell Julian the news before my child and I were turned to ashes.

I looked down at the phone dropped on the floor. Its screen glowed in the smoke, displaying Julian's speed dial.

All I had to do was press it, and he would descend like a god with his crew, just as he did in my past life.

But instead, I painstakingly grabbed the phone, swiped away Julian's name without a second thought, and dialed 911.

In my past life, because the rescue was delayed, Celine ultimately died from severe smoke inhalation on the way to the hospital.

And Julian convinced himself that I had locked the door out of jealousy, deliberately murdering his precious first love.

I could never forget how that life ended.

He tied me to a load-bearing pillar in that abandoned warehouse.

Holding a torch, he looked at me as if I were a sickening, rotting corpse.

"Elara, I'm going to make you taste the exact pain Celine felt before she died!" Those were the last words he ever said to me.

Then, the flames devoured my hair and my flesh. The excruciating agony of being burned alive was still etched deep into my marrow.

A sharp, twisting cramp in my abdomen violently yanked my mind back to reality.

I hung up the phone, struggled to tear off a piece of my hem, and soaked it with the last few drops of water from a nearby vase.

Pressing it firmly against my nose and mouth, I curled up on the floor in the deepest corner of the room.

The throbbing ache in my belly grew unbearable. A warm liquid slowly trickled down my inner thighs, staining my dress crimson.

I knew it right then—I was probably going to lose this baby.

Crash!

With a deafening smash, the front door of the cabin was hacked open by a fire axe. A rush of fresh air surged inside, bringing a dangerous backdraft of licking flames.

Julian barged in, fully geared in his turnout coat and gas mask.

The very second he breached the room, his eyes didn't even attempt to search the back room for me. Instead, they locked instantly onto Celine, who was slumped by the entryway.

Celine was deathly pale, looking utterly fragile and pitiful. But only I knew she had just been sneering while pouring the gasoline moments ago.

"Celine! Hold on! I'm here!" Julian's voice rang out through his mask, fraught with panic.

Without a moment's hesitation, he strode past the hallway leading to the back room. Never once glancing in my direction, he bent down, scooped Celine into his arms, and spun around to charge back out into the night.

"Captain! I think there's someone else in the back room!" yelled a young firefighter who had rushed in right behind him.

"Save Celine first! She has asthma and can't breathe in the smoke!" Julian roared without looking back, carrying his beloved out of the sea of fire.

Watching his ruthless, retreating figure, my heart felt completely encased in solid ice.

"Ma'am! Are you alright?!" The young firefighter finally spotted me. He dashed over, trying to help me up.

He looked down, and his flashlight beam swept across the floor beneath me, illuminating a horrifying, pooling puddle of blood.

He gasped and immediately yelled into his radio, "Medics! We have a pregnant woman heavily bleeding in here! Get a stretcher, now!"

But when a female paramedic walked over, a sarcastic, mocking smirk pulled at the corner of her lips.

"Elara, the Captain already got an SOS text from Celine on our way here. She said you wanted to start a fire so you both could die together. Who are you trying to fool with this poor-victim act?"

"Enough is enough. Keep this up, and you're going to make us sick. Everyone at the firehouse knows how insanely jealous you are of Celine. Never thought you'd actually play with people's lives and go as far as arson."

"Even if you want to steal the Captain's attention back, have some decency. Your top priority right now should be praying Celine survives. Because considering how much she means to the Captain, he will absolutely send you to jail!"

The relentless, excruciating spasms in my abdomen rendered me completely speechless. The blood beneath me gushed out, as if it were draining the very life out of me.

Eventually, I was lifted onto the stretcher. My vision had already blurred immensely from the thick smoke. The exact moment they wheeled me out of the cabin, I weakly turned my head toward the ambulance.

Julian was down on one knee beside Celine's stretcher, clutching her hand tightly. He had even stripped off his own oxygen mask to strap it onto her face, his eyes brimming with unmistakable agony and heartache.

And there I was, wheeled right behind his back, my blood dripping off the edge of the stretcher drop by drop.

Yet, he never turned around to look at me, not even once.

I closed my eyes and let the darkness consume my consciousness entirely.