Part 1Two Brothers One Perfect Life

Caspian faked amnesia just to break up with me.

“Who are you?” he asked.

I paused for a breath, then smiled.

“I’m your brother’s fiancée.”

Caspian froze.

Later that night, Pierce, his older brother—the one who had been urging us to split—sent me a frantic series of texts:

[YOU EVIL BITCH! When did you and I get together?]

[Caspian is standing outside my apartment with a goddamn machete!]

* * *

When I arrived at the hospital, Caspian “Cas” Miller was lying in bed, a perfectly respectable, if slightly dramatic, gauze bandage wrapped around his head.

He looked up at me with a confused, lost expression and asked:

“Who are you?”

I let the question hang for a moment, then laughed softly.

I reached up and subtly pulled the collar of my silk blouse lower, exposing a faint, reddish mark on my neck.

“I’m your brother’s fiancée.”

The door was closed. Pierce, Cas’s elder brother, was standing just outside, waiting for me to deliver the final, clean breakup speech.

I’d been with Pierce when the news of Cas’s minor car accident and subsequent hospitalization came in.

Pierce had leaned back in his leather chair, a cynical smile playing on his lips, and flashed a certified check for five million dollars at me.

“Sasha,” he’d said, his voice smooth and cold. “The future with Caspian is unpredictable. Yours, however, can clear a path to the top right now.”

Cas and I had been together for two years, and in all that time, he’d been stubbornly silent about the Miller family's staggering wealth.

It wasn't until I picked up a shift at a high-end resort that I ran into him.

He was out with friends, checking out of a presidential suite that cost more than my annual rent.

I stood silently at the reception desk, watching him.

I wasn’t bitter. I wasn't even tired.

Cas looked up, and we locked eyes. He flushed bright red, mortified.

“I… I didn’t tell you before because I was afraid you’d feel too much pressure being with me.”

I stared at him, pointing a disbelieving finger at myself.

Me? Did I look like someone with that much pride?

Kid, if you’d mentioned the generational wealth sooner, you wouldn't have had to chase me for over a year.

Our relationship had been a private affair. But after that run-in with his friends, the news inevitably reached the ears of the Miller patriarch—his older brother, Pierce Miller.

I met Pierce shortly after. The brothers shared seven-tenths of a face, but Pierce’s expression, when he looked down at me, carried a stifling, heavy aura that made me instinctively tremble.

Pierce wanted me to break up with Cas.

The previous night, he’d sent me a recording.

In the video, he and Cas sat across from each other. Next to the visibly raw and youthful Cas, Pierce looked impossibly polished and mature. Pierce’s voice, slow and deliberate, sounded like a hammer tapping on a delicate glass heart.

“You met Sasha in college, right? You chased her for ages. She was always volatile, a real piece of work. But the moment she found out who you were, she suddenly became sweetness and light.”

His implication was crystal clear: I was a gold-digger, a phony, someone who groveled for cash.

“She’s not like that!” Cas shot back immediately. His voice was unsteady, lacking any conviction.

He was only desperate to defend me, but his words were hollow; he didn’t even believe them himself. Compared to an old fox like Pierce, Cas was a lightweight.

Pierce simply smiled, seeing his trap set.

“Is that so? Then let’s run a small test. You fake a car accident, pretend you have amnesia. You treat her like a stranger, cold and indifferent. Then we’ll see what her true reaction is.”

The video ended there.

This scene in the hospital confirmed everything. Cas had chosen to play along.