Swapping the Male Lead

I was pulling out my nolimit black card to pay Grayson Mercer's tuition when he got reborn. Right in front of me. Midswipe.

The boyish softness drained out of his face between one blink and the next. What replaced it was cold. Polished. Expensive.

Then the floating comments exploded across my vision. [THE MALE LEAD IS REBORN. He's back at the very beginning!] [This life, he can finally end up with his childhood sweetheart.

No more regrets!] [Last life, if the villainess hadn't used her dirty money to wedge herself between the leads, they never would have missed each other for an entire lifetime!] I looked up, straight into Grayson's suddenly wintry eyes.

Eyes that only went red when they landed on his childhood sweetheart. Welp. The male lead was reborn. Reborn dead broke. Eighteen. Not a dollar to his name.

Last life, he spent six years living large on my black card. This life, a $1,280 dinner bill is going to break him in public.

He is going to beg, again and again, for me to hand him that card just one more time. He'll still be begging the second time he slams into a guardrail. Spoiler: I never do.

Chapter 1 Standing this close to Grayson, the change in him was impossible to miss. That polish only years of money can buy. It does not grow on broke college freshmen.

He glanced at the black card in my hand like it was something scraped off a shoe. His voice stayed flat. "I told you. I'll figure out my own tuition.

I don't need your money insulting my dignity." Then he walked right around me and pulled Daisy into his arms. She was still glaring daggers at me over his shoulder.

He crushed her against him like a treasure he'd lost and clawed back from the grave. "Daisy, after everything, I finally understand. The love of my life is you.

It has always been you." A ripple of oohs went through the crowd. The comments scrolled faster. [AHHH he's so brave!

First minute of his new life and he confesses to the female lead!] [No hesitation. None. That's a man on a mission.] [The villainess must be in shock.

Last life the male lead only took her black card because he was desperate for tuition money. Too bad, honey.

This time your money is worthless!] I rubbed my eyes at the text scrolling through thin air, and pieced it together. I was the villainess they kept talking about.

The evil rich girl who bought herself a boyfriend. The Grayson standing in front of me had lived this all before. Last life, freshman me fell for him at first sight.

When I heard he couldn't make tuition, I pulled out my black card and covered all four years. Tuition, housing, everything. Then I asked him to be mine. Grayson agonized. Ached.

Finally took the card, deeply humiliated, and said yes. And buried his childhood sweetheart at the bottom of his heart. He decided I was the one who tore him away from Daisy.

He resented my spoiledprincess temper. Insecure, prickly, convinced he ranked beneath me in his own relationship. A man with no dignity left.

He also got extremely comfortable living rich. Couldn't quite bring himself to give up his walking ATM. Two years after graduation, the news broke that Daisy was getting married.

Six years of buried feelings came roaring out at once. Grayson jumped in a car and floored it toward his sweetheart's wedding, planning to crash the ceremony and steal the bride.

The whole movie. He was so busy burning with destiny that he drove straight into a truck. Dead on impact.

So, reborn, the very first thing he did was say the love he never got to say. Out loud. To her. Closing last life's one great regret. How touching.

I'll give the comments this much: they had my personality down cold. Spoiled. Imperious. Guilty as charged. But let's do the math their way. Grayson took my money for six years.

After graduation, I handed him the connections to launch his own company. So he bowed a little to the heiress bankrolling his entire existence. So he did as he was told.

Isn't that just the job description? Or was the plan to freeload with attitude and swallow the whole Lancaster fortune while he was at it? I laughed. Once. Cold.

Then I flipped the black card to a random guy walking past. "Grayson, who said I was paying your tuition?" "The person I want to give it to is him." I smiled at the stranger. "Hey, handsome.

Want to be my boyfriend?" The comments went into meltdown. [Wait. Did I miss an episode?? Why does that guy have the black card?] [Buddy, that card means nothing.

The villainess only has eyes for the male lead. She would never look at another man in her life.] [She's just playing hard to get, lol.

The male lead is not falling for that.] Chapter 2 Grayson went rigid. Fresh off his rebirth, disbelief flickered through his eyes. Confusion.

As if he hadn't quite registered that this life's script had already skipped a line.

But his beloved was right there in his arms, and the terror of dying plus the high of a second chance were still shortcircuiting his brain. He didn't think too hard about it.

Meanwhile, I warmly invited my brandnew boyfriend to dinner. The semester had barely started. I didn't know most faces on campus yet.

Grayson, I only knew because classmates kept whispering that he still hadn't scraped his tuition together. That's it.

That's the whole reason I pulled out the card, planning to ask if he'd like to date me.

Because that jawline hit my aesthetic dead center, my hormones took the wheel, and my brain left the building. Maybe last life, I really did love Grayson.

This life, the love died before it ever sprouted. Stomped flat in the seedling stage. I have money. Endless money.

I am the only daughter of the Lancasters, the richest family in Boston. I have never once been wronged in my life, and I don't plan to start now. Why die on that particular hill?

A boyfriend is a boyfriend. And the stranger currently holding my black card? Also dead center on my aesthetic.

I picked the most expensive restaurant near campus, flipped through the menu once with a frown, and tossed it to the waiter. "Bring every signature dish you have.

All of them." The waiter practically skipped away. Then the front doors swung open, and every head in the room turned. I glanced back. The reborn male lead.

With his beloved childhood sweetheart tucked under his arm. I'll say this for last life's money: it trained him beautifully.

His table manners, his posture, the way he carried a room: flawless. Richboy polish, head to toe.

He kept sneaking glances my way, contempt and irritation leaking out past whatever control he had. Clearly convinced I was here to ambush him. That I simply could not stay away.

Even more convinced that dinnerwithanotherman was my sad little attempt to make him jealous.

Grayson straightened his spine, ordered seven or eight signature dishes without glancing at a single price, and turned the full soulful gaze on Daisy. "Daisy, the food here is mediocre.

Bear with it, just for today." "When I have time, I'm taking you out for real sashimi. Flown in fresh, same morning." "Then we'll hit the designer stores.

Get you this season's newest everything." Daisy looked like a winning lottery ticket had fallen out of the sky and landed directly on her face. Lucky enough to faint.

She shot me a smug look and raised her voice on purpose. "Gray, since today is our first official day together, I have a present for you.

I've been getting it ready for so, so long." Her whole face glowed with the showingoff.

According to the comments, Daisy and Grayson were childhood sweethearts, just waiting to land at the same college before confessing, right on schedule.

The day I pulled out my black card, Daisy nearly ground her teeth to powder. She looked at me like I was the homewrecker who had stolen her man. Funny.

When lastlife Grayson agreed to be my boyfriend, he never once mentioned any Daisy. Did he. Daisy, with great ceremony, produced a shabby little box. Grayson's whole face lit up.

Chapter 3 The comments were screaming. [OMG the leads' first meeting after rebirth is SO sweet.

This is moving so fast!] [Too fast, I can barely keep up with them!] [Guys, guess what's in the box!

Last life, Sloane's first gift to the male lead was a watch worth over a million dollars!] [The female lead isn't rich like the villainess, but I bet her gift is full of heart.] The box sat weightless in his palm.

Grayson opened it like it was Christmas morning. Inside lay a little jar of handfolded paper stars. Daisy blinked up at him. "Gray, I folded these all summer.

I was saving them for the day we got into the same college, so I could confess." "Every single star has a note folded inside. Each one says I love you." "Well?

Do you like it?" The comments, so noisy a second ago, went dead silent. If I didn't know Grayson was reborn, I would have assumed he'd love it.

Maybe, to an actual eighteenyearold Grayson, a jar of paper stars was a rare and precious thing. Young. Sweet. Pure. But under that boyish face lived a twentyfouryearold soul.

A soul that had eaten at every tasting menu in Boston. That treated luxury watches and luxury cars like disposable razors.

A few hours ago, subjective time, the man had died behind the wheel of a Maybach. From my garage. Buttersoft leather steering wheel, meet roughsanded craft box.

The texture gap alone could kill. I smiled and pulled a watch out of my bag. Picked it up on a whim that afternoon, walking past a luxury watch boutique.

Since this Wesley Whitmore person was now officially my boyfriend, I couldn't play favorites, could I? I slid the sleek watch case across the table to him. "Hey, boyfriend.

Today's our first day together too. Here's your present." "Do you like it?" [Hold on. Wasn't that watch a gift for the MALE LEAD last life?

Why is she giving it to someone else?] [She's still playing hard to get, trying to make the male lead notice her. Trust me, she won't last.] [Exactly.

The villainess is completely losing the plot.] The watch gleamed under the restaurant lights.

Wesley, who still hadn't recovered from the black card, now took his second shock of the day. His hand trembled toward the dial.

Grayson roared across the room. "Don't touch it!" "That watch is m—" He swallowed the rest whole. I knew. He wanted to say the watch was his.

According to the comments, he wore it for six years last life. Loved it. Took it off every night before bed, wiped it down, laid it in its case like a sleeping child.

But that was then. Now he had his beloved childhood sweetheart. Surely such vulgar objects held no interest for him anymore. Daisy's face darkened.

She rolled her eyes at me. "You think money makes you special?" "You reek of it. A soulless watch, against my stars?

Every one of mine was folded with love." "Gray, tell her I'm right." Grayson finally came back to himself.

He squeezed out a smile that looked like it hurt. "Daisy's right." He pulled himself together and reached to serve his sweetheart the first bite. His phone rang.

Chapter 4 The cheap burner phone leaked sound like a sieve. Even from a table away, I heard the icy female voice on the line, word for word. "Mr.

Mercer, your mother's hospital bills are due. Please arrange the next payment." Grayson's face changed. The comments panicked instantly. [I almost forgot!

The male lead's mother is in the hospital. She's waiting on that money to survive!] [Last life the villainess just threw a million dollars at the hospital.

The surgery went perfectly.] [Oh no. The leads just met, they've barely had one sweet moment.

Don't tell me the villainess is going to use his sick mother to blackmail him into dating her again!] [Why can't the villainess ever just let them be?] [Guys, she's looking at the male lead right now.

She thinks this is her opening!] I remembered what classmates had said, back before I ever pulled out the card. Grayson's mother. Cancer, for years. Savings gone.

Debt on top of debt. I turned right back to Wesley. "Nobody in your family is sick, right?" "No!

No, everyone's fine..." Grayson shot to his feet, face gray, already moving for the door. The waiter blocked him. "Sir. You haven't paid." Laughter rippled around the room.

Last life, with the Lancaster family behind him, every highend restaurant in Boston flung its doors open for him. Owners beamed. Bowed.

Insisted there was no rush on the bill, they'd settle it all later, please, enjoy. He'd been reborn for less than a day. Old habits hadn't gotten the memo.

The waiter had already printed the check. $1,280. Pocket change. Less than half a bottle of what he used to drink. Grayson reached for his black card on pure muscle memory.

His hand found an empty pocket. Cold sweat beaded at his hairline. Right. He was eighteen again. Younger. Softer. Broke. Forget the $1,280. He didn't have the eighty.

The waiter's trademark smile did not move. Grayson ground his teeth and turned to Daisy, strained. "Daisy, cover the bill for now.

I'll transfer it back to you." Daisy went on high alert. "Gray, my allowance is $1,500 a month. This one meal is $1,280. What am I supposed to live on?" "Trust me.

I have ways to make money." "What ways? You? And besides, you said this was your treat. Why am I paying?" She grumbled on, wallet firmly shut.

The young leads, not one hour into their confessed love. Meeting the first pothole on the road to forever.

I picked my moment, raised the card, and called out. "Waiter." Grayson's head snapped away in disgust. As if any second now I would pounce. Cling. Beg.

Reborn, he wanted nothing to do with a spoiled heiress like me. The humiliation of last life, of my money raining down on him, was apparently still fresh.

His voice came out soaked in loathing. "Sloane, how many times do I have to say it? Stay away from me. I am sick of you throwing yourself at me.

I am sicker of you wedging yourself between me and Daisy." "Neither I nor my mother will ever need your dirty money!" Chapter 5