Reborn For Vengeance, Not For Love

From the back cover

The sterile scent of the morgue was the last thing I remembered, watching my own lifeless body while my mother sobbed for someone else.

My death, labeled a suicide after pushing my foster sister Ashley down the stairs, was a lie.

No one cried for me, Chloe Chen; only for Ashley Miller, my mother Sarah' s "precious" foster daughter.

My mother's betrayal had been a slow poison: she' d stolen my inheritance, my future, even fabricated a criminal record for my decorated NYPD father to disqualify me from a prestigious government job, all for Ashley.

The final blow was discovering the truth in my mother's safe: a secretly altered birth certificate listing Ashley as her biological daughter, and me as erased.

The grief consumed me, and my final confrontation ended my life.

Lingering as a ghost, I saw Ashley' s faint, triumphant smirk, very much alive, playing the tragic victim.

Rage consumed me-a tearing force demanding justice, revenge.

Then, the world twisted violently, dissolving into white light, pulling me backward through time.

I gasped, sucking in a real breath of warm, lemon-scented air.

I was in my childhood bedroom, my phone buzzing with the date: the day my background check for the government job began.

I was alive.

I was back.

This wasn't just a second chance; it was a chance to fight.

I heard my mother' s cheerful voice downstairs, cooing over Ashley: "Ashley, darling, come see what I bought you."

She presented Ashley with an expensive designer bag, then offered me a cheap knock-off.

In my past life, I' d forced a smile, but now, I saw the deliberate cruelty.

"No, thank you," I said, my voice clear and firm.

My mother' s smile faltered, her face hardening as I called out her insult and Ashley' s fake concern.

When I denied Ashley was my sister, her fury erupted, culminating in a violent slap that left me bleeding.

Any shred of hope for my mother vanished with that blow.

She blamed me for Ashley's feigned injury, demanding an apology.

"You hit your own daughter to defend a fraud," I spat, revealing I knew about Ashley' s true parentage, the truth about Jake Miller.

Leaving their shattered lies behind, I contacted Officer Thompson, my father' s best friend, to uncover everything about Jake Miller and their scheme.

He revealed the horrifying truth: my mother, a victim of human trafficking by Jake Miller at fifteen, had given birth to Ashley and abandoned her, consumed by guilt.

Now, that guilt had been weaponized into a calculated criminal conspiracy by Ashley and the recently released Jake Miller.

I was done being manipulated.

At Ashley' s lavish "victory" party, poised to celebrate her stolen job, I delivered my counter-punch.

As the clock struck 8 PM, Ashley' s name was missing from the State Department list.

Mine was at the top.

Then, the doorbell rang.

Two NYPD officers, with David Thompson, delivered the crushing blows: my mother was arrested for fraud and bribery.

Ashley' s meltdown began.

I silenced my condemning relatives, exposing my mother' s hypocrisy and her scheme to slander my father and erase me.

On the living room TV, I projected the forged birth certificates, revealing Sarah' s deceit and Ashley' s true parentage: the daughter of a human trafficker.

"This is my father' s house," I told a stunned Ashley, opening the door. "Get out."

She retorted with a threat: "My father will hear about this."

Knowing Jake Miller' s greed, I set a trap, luring him into a confession that led to his re-arrest.

I sent Ashley a photo of her father in handcuffs.

I never heard from them again.

The past was behind me.

I was Chloe Chen, no longer a victim, but finally free.