When I signed the marriage substitution agreement, my sister Pamela Gray was sobbing her heart out in the arms of her true love Leo Lambert.

"Zoe, I'm so sorry," she wailed. "I can't marry that living corpse from the Hawkins family. I simply can't live without love."

Her beautiful eyes brimmed with tears, as if she were the victim of some terrible injustice.

My parents stood off to the side, their eyes calculating and entitled as they watched me.

"Zoe, your sister is following her heart," Mom coaxed in a honeyed voice. "Be sensible and take her place. The Hawkins family is loaded beyond belief—you won't regret going there."

Dad maintained his stern expression and barked, "This is what you owe Pamela. If it weren't for your mother, you wouldn't even have the Gray name."

I nodded obediently, took the expensive fountain pen, and signed my name at the bottom of the agreement: Zoe Gray.

Pamela's tears magically vanished as she broke into a smile, clutching my hand as if we were the closest sisters in the world.

"Oh Zoe, you're such a sweetheart! When I win my Best Actress award, Leo and I will get married, and you'll be the aunt to all our beautiful children."

I smiled as I listened to her future fantasies, while my heart turned to ice.

Just last night, I'd gotten up for water and passed by her partially open door.

Her hushed voice, dripping with venomous excitement, carried clearly to my ears.

"Once my idiot sister marries into that family to live as a widow, the Hawkins fortune will practically be ours! Ethan Hawkins is basically a corpse—doctors say he'll never wake up. After the Hawkins family drives Zoe to her grave, I'll swoop in to offer my condolences. Old Mr. Hawkins absolutely adores me."

My fingers clenched around the water glass until my knuckles turned white.

She has no idea that Old Mr. Hawkins only values her because she stole credit for rescuing the Hawkins' only grandson from that fire ten years ago.

And that "freak" with the massive burn scar across her back—the one she mocked throughout my childhood—was actually me.

The wedding was understated yet exquisitely luxurious.

The groom was absent, with the Hawkins family butler standing in to exchange rings.

I walked down the aisle alone in my white wedding dress, my face a perfect blank, like an exquisite porcelain doll.

The guests' glances were a mixture of pity, contempt, and undisguised pleasure at my misfortune.

"How sad. The Grays are really throwing their daughter into the fire pit, aren't they?"

"Daughter? Please. She's just their bastard child they keep hidden away. Marrying into the Hawkins family is more luck than she deserves in eight lifetimes."

"I heard the Hawkins heir has been bedridden for ten years—basically a vegetable. Marrying him is like being widowed with your husband still breathing."

I ignored their whispers completely.

The moment the ceremony ended, I was whisked away to the Hawkins family's ancestral home—a castle-like mansion perched halfway up the mountainside.

The Hawkins family's elderly butler, Franklin, led me inside. His gaze was complex—scrutinizing me with a hint of barely concealed disappointment.

"The master awaits you in the study," he announced.

I followed him down a long corridor until we reached an imposing redwood door.

Old Mr. Hawkins sat in a massive leather armchair, his hair a crown of silver. He commanded respect without uttering a word. His piercing gaze seemed to cut straight through to my soul as he looked up at me.

"You're Zoe?" His voice was aged yet carried unmistakable authority.

"Yes, Grandfather." I lowered my eyes, adopting a submissive posture.

He remained silent for so long that I thought he might not speak again.

"Your sister—why isn't she here?"

I raised my head, meeting his eyes directly, and said softly, "My sister said she had more important matters to attend to."

Old Mr. Hawkins's gaze frosted over instantly.

I was escorted to the master bedroom on the second floor—the room of my husband-in-name-only, Ethan Hawkins.

The room was enormous yet felt eerily empty, permeated only by the clinical smell of disinfectant and the soft hum of medical equipment.

Ethan Hawkins lay on the massive bed in the center of the room, eyes firmly closed, skin pale as marble. If not for the rhythmic beeping of the cardiac monitor beside him, he could have been a wax figure.

This was my husband—in name only.

Ten years ago, when I dragged him from that fire, he'd been unconscious just like this.

But back then, his face had been blackened with soot, his body burning with fever as he clutched my arm with surprising strength.

Looking at him now, ten years later, he'd shed all traces of boyish awkwardness. His features had sharpened into handsome definition, and even unconscious, he radiated a commanding presence.

Franklin sighed. "The young master has been like this for ten years now. Mrs. Hawkins, I fear life will be difficult for you from here on."

I shook my head. "It won't be difficult at all."

Franklin assumed I was merely being polite. He gave me a few instructions before quietly withdrawing from the room.

In the room, there were only Ethan Hawkins and me, accompanied by the monotonous beeping of medical equipment.

I pulled up a chair beside his bed and studied him quietly.

"Ethan Hawkins," I said softly, "my name is Zoe Gray, not Pamela Gray. I'm the one who saved you."

The waveform on the cardiac monitor showed a slight fluctuation—so brief it might have been my imagination.

I smiled faintly and reached out, gently covering his cold hand with mine.

"Don't worry, I didn't marry into this family to play the grieving widow. I'm here to collect what I'm owed."

"Everything Pamela owes me, everything the Gray family owes me—I'll take it all back, piece by piece, with interest."

The Substitute Bride's Revenge — Chapter 5

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