Chapter 1Vanishing Point

My wife, Sarah, a seasoned pilot, had just told me she was pregnant when her plane went down in a catastrophic crash. In her final, desperate moments, she somehow managed an emergency landing. I scoured the wreckage, searching for any sign of her, only to be told there was nothing left—no body, no trace. Besides me, only Sarah’s twin sister, Emily, and her husband, Jake Thompson, had survived the tragedy.

I became obsessed, chasing every phantom lead, desperate to find my wife. Then, eight months later, I overheard something that ripped my world apart. My sister-in-law, Emily, drunk and arguing with a friend, her voice slurring, "Jake suddenly lost his wife, and his arm is broken. How could I abandon him?"

"Alex's mother drugged me all those years ago, forced me into marrying him. I've harbored resentment for so long. Maybe this is my chance to finally make things right, to fix what was broken, until Jake recovers."

The words hit me like a physical blow. Emily? No. It was Sarah. The woman I’d been searching for, the one I thought was gone forever, stood before me, playing the part of her own dead twin.

My heart turned to ash. I walked over to the framed photo of Sarah I’d kept on my bedside table, the one I’d believed was her memorial. I tossed it into the trash, the glass cracking with a sickening snap. Then I called my parents.

"Don't look for Sarah anymore. Just... declare her legally deceased. Erase her from the records. I'm remarrying."

"Even if Sarah really died, there should have been a body, a trace. There's nothing. Are you truly giving up the search?" my mother's voice, thick with concern, asked through the phone. I clutched the device, my knuckles white, unable to speak for a long moment. Despair was a lead weight in my gut.

From the next room, I could hear Sarah's friend, Chloe, her voice hot with righteous anger. "You faked your death, fine! But at least you could have left your sister’s body! At least then Alex could have found closure! He’s been out of his mind, searching everywhere, a pitiful sight…"

Sarah, lounging on the plush sofa with infuriating nonchalance, her expression a complex mix of emotions, finally spoke. "I was worried Jake would be too upset, so I had Emily’s body cremated immediately. If Alex wants to keep searching, let him. Why should I care? Their family used such disgusting tactics to force me into that marriage. This is just… payback." As she finished, a fierce, burning resentment blazed in her eyes.

She blamed my mother, who, in a desperate attempt to ease my agonizing, unrequited love, had impulsively drugged Sarah on the night of our arranged engagement. It had shackled Sarah to me for five miserable years. Who could have imagined that the wife who had always shown me such warmth and care could harbor such deep-seated hatred for so long, all for that single night? A bitter laugh escaped my lips. Then, against my will, tears welled in my eyes, tracing cold, unforgiving paths down my cheeks.

On the day of the crash, all of Sarah’s colleagues from AeroWing Airlines had come to offer their condolences, urging me to find peace. But the suddenness of it all, the brutal finality, had been impossible to accept. I had knelt outside the airline’s headquarters for three days and three nights, begging for a rational explanation. Why was there no trace of my wife’s body? Why was there no clear conclusion to the crash investigation? I’d clung to the desperate belief that she was still alive. Yet, with every fruitless lead, every unanswered prayer, countless nights had found me teetering on the edge, wanting nothing more than to end it all, to follow her into death.

Now, I knew the sickening truth. It had all been Sarah’s elaborate, absurd, and cruel charade. She had orchestrated her own disappearance, a grotesque play she’d directed herself. Living under my roof, under my very nose, flaunting her affection with Jake day after day – had she never felt a flicker of remorse? Welcoming me into the Peterson family home as her sister, offering me calculated gestures of sympathy and concern – did she truly believe that could somehow atone for the profound pain she’d inflicted?

I slumped against the wall, sliding slowly to the floor, the world suddenly too heavy to bear. It took me a full minute to find my voice. "Mom," I rasped, "from now on, I'll focus solely on the Stone family business. If I'm remarrying, then let it be to Chloe Sterling, the Sterling Group heiress." The Sterling Group and the Stone family were perfectly matched, a strategic alliance. She was the ideal candidate.

My mother, despite her reluctance to see me marry a woman rumored to be confined to a wheelchair, quietly agreed after hearing the brutal truth. "But… aren't you going to tell Sarah about your kidney injury? What if it makes her feel something? After all, you loved her so much back then…"