The Heiress's Ultimatum

As the storm tore my family's private yacht apart, Seraphina strapped the only life vest tightly over my custom suit.

Freezing seawater washed over her shredded Chanel haute couture as she gave me her final words. "Julian, thank you.

But if there is a next life… don't choose me." Then, she turned away, pressing a kiss to the plain band on her ring finger—the one she never took off. "Miles," she whispered, "I'm coming." That was the exact moment I realized the inside of that ring was engraved with my ultimate rival's name.

Reborn. Thrust straight back into the arranged matchmaking banquet. Seraphina sat across the long table, swirling a martini in her hand. Her long legs were crossed.

She still wore that arrogant, untouchable look, where even the downward sweep of her lashes radiated cold indifference.

My father lowered his voice, delivering a sharp warning. "Secure her, and the company's crisis is over." Instead, I stood up and walked straight to the corner, stopping in front of Miles—the man currently rotting in the gutter of his recent bankruptcy. "Congratulations, man." I slammed a halfempty glass of bourbon onto the table in front of him. "That highandmighty heiress is your problem now.

Hope you two grow old together in this bankrupt mess." Seraphina, you told me not to choose you in the next life. I couldn't wait that long. I'm granting your wish right now.

Chapter 1 At the Manhattan penthouse charity gala, the refracted light from the milliondollar Swarovski crystal chandelier stabbed at my hungover eyes.

The air was thick with a cloying mix of expensive perfume and catered food—a familiar stench that made my stomach churn.

My father, Warren, sat beside me. "Julian, wipe that dead look off your face." He lowered his voice, dripping with the ruthless calculation of an old Wall Street fox. "The Gu family heiress is right across from us.

Lock her down, get the marriage contract signed, and our conglomerate's cash flow crisis is over." Across the long banquet table, Seraphina sat in perfect stillness.

She wore a vintage white silk gown that flawlessly hugged her curves. Her long hair was casually pinned up, exposing a fragile, enticing neck.

She didn't even spare me a glance, keeping her icy blue eyes cast down.

She slowly stirred her black coffee, as if the billionaires and politicians buzzing around her were nothing but a swarm of flies. Cold. Untouchable.

Exactly like the woman I remembered being married to for fifty years. [Fifty years… I actually spent a lifetime playing house with a woman who kept another man in her heart.] My fingernails dug deep into my palms until the skin turned white.

The sinking private yacht. The freezing seawater. The dead finality in her eyes. And that whispered, Miles, I'm coming. The scenes flashed behind my eyelids like a broken projector.

Miles. My lifelong rival. The ghost she worshipped her entire life. My gaze slid past Seraphina and hit the far corner of the ballroom.

There stood a man in a cheap, overworn suit, awkwardly clutching a glass. He stuck out like a sore thumb among the elite. Miles.

In this timeline, his family's empire had just crumbled. The golden boy had faceplanted into the dirt, surrounded by vultures.

Warren noticed my hesitation and nudged my arm. "What the hell are you waiting for?" "Go over there. Say hello to the heiress.

Make a move!" I took a slow breath, swallowing down the bitter taste of bile in my throat. Make a move? Fine. I pushed my chair back, stood up, and adjusted my silk tie.

The room's attention snapped to me. Warren flashed a smug, satisfied smile. Seraphina's entourage paused their conversations to watch. Finally, Seraphina lifted her chin.

Not a single ripple disturbed those stunning eyes. She looked at me like I was a piece of furniture. [Right. We are strangers now. Perfect.] I didn't step toward her table.

Instead, I cut straight through the crowd, heading directly for the dark corner. Directly toward Miles. He looked up as my shadow fell over him.

His posture stiffened, a sharp, defensive wariness flaring in his eyes. The whispers started immediately, rippling through the ballroom. "Isn't that Julian?

What does he want with Miles?" "To rub his nose in it, obviously. Everyone knows they hate each other's guts." "Miles lost everything.

Julian kicking him while he's down is just brutal." I tuned out the static, just staring at Miles.

That was the face I had stared at on the covers of Forbes and Fortune, the name etched at the top of my hit list for an entire lifetime.

I closed the distance, stopping right in front of him, my shadow swallowing his frame. I reached out and slapped a heavy hand onto the shoulder of his cheap suit.

He flinched like a kicked stray dog, his body instantly going rigid. A slow smirk curled my lips.

I spoke clearly, pitching my voice just loud enough for the vultures in the room to hear. "Man, stop drowning your sorrows in the corner." I jerked my chin toward Seraphina's table. "The heiress is waiting for you over there.

Have a happy life together." I dropped my hand, turned on my heel, and walked away. The entire ballroom plunged into dead, suffocating silence.

Chapter 2 I could feel the weight of a hundred stares drilling into my spine. There was my father’s impending explosion. The Gu family’s sheer shock. The wealthy guests’ disbelief.

And two more. One belonged to Miles, his brows knitted in a tight, uncomprehending knot. The other was Seraphina’s.

I didn’t look back, but the silence behind me was heavy enough that I could almost hear the ice cracking on her perpetually perfect face.

You told me not to choose you in the next life, Seraphina. I couldn't wait.

I’m giving you exactly what you want right now. "Are you out of your damn mind, Julian?!" Warren’s roar detonated the second I stepped out of the ballroom.

He was vibrating with rage, jabbing a finger toward my face. The skin of his neck had flushed a dangerous, mottled red. "Do you have any idea what you just did?!

You threw this family's reputation into the gutter! You took our only corporate lifeline and snapped it in half!" I stared at him. A lifeline? No.

It was a noose that choked the life out of me for fifty years. "Warren, I don't want the CEO seat anymore." I ripped my tie loose, leveling a deadeyed stare at him. "As for Seraphina, whoever wants to marry that heartless woman can have her.

I'm out." "You—" Warren choked on his next breath, clutching his chest as a violent coughing fit hit him.

His executive assistant rushed forward, grabbing his arm and frantically patting his back. "Mr. Zhou, please breathe.

Julian is just… he's just confused…" "I'm not confused." I cut the assistant off, my eyes locked entirely on my father. "I know exactly what I'm doing.

I will fix the corporate deficit, but I'm not using my marriage as currency to do it." Warren froze. He stared at me like I was a total stranger.

In his eyes, I was the obedient, spineless heir who followed orders. This sudden rebellion had derailed him. "You'll fix it? How?!

Do you even know how much debt this company is burying right now?

Do you know how many vultures are waiting to tear the Zhou family apart?!" "I know." I nodded once. "Give me three days." I didn't wait for his screaming reply.

I turned on my heel and walked straight toward the VIP parking garage. Last time, I bled myself dry for his expectations.

I guarded a hollow marriage with a woman who couldn't stand me for half a century, only to die with absolutely nothing. This time, they can keep the cage. I'm done.

I dropped into the leather driver's seat of my Aston Martin. Before I could even punch the ignition, sharp knuckles rapped against the tinted glass. Seraphina stood outside.

The night wind whipped her silk dress around her legs. A sharp tightness gripped the corners of her mouth, finally cracking her icy facade. I hit the button.

The window glided down. "What kind of sick game are you playing, Julian?" Her voice was just as freezing as her stare. "No games." I leaned back against the headrest, giving her a lazy, thoroughly bored look. "I meant exactly what I said.

I'm stepping aside for you and Miles." Her perfectly manicured brows snapped together. She scrutinized me like a specimen under a microscope. "Do you think this makes me grateful?

Shoving me at a… at him, like some kind of charity case? Are you trying to humiliate me, or him?" [There it is.

The instinct to protect him.] A muscle ticked hard in my jaw, but a harsh laugh ripped from my throat instead. "Don't flatter yourself, Seraphina." I leaned closer to the open window, dragging a dismissive, mocking gaze over her pale face.

A cruel smirk twisted my lips. "I have zero interest in playing humiliation games.

I just simply feel that… sharing the same oxygen as you makes me physically sick." It was the honest truth. I had stared at that beautiful, empty face for fifty years.

Now, looking at her only triggered a cold, nauseating exhaustion. I rolled the window up in her face. I hit the gas. Chapter 3 Seraphina's face lost all its color.

She had probably never been dismissed this brutally in her entire life. Her lips parted, words caught in her throat, but all she did was glare at me with a cold death stare.

I didn't waste another second on her. I rolled the window up and slammed my foot on the gas. The Aston Martin shot forward like a bullet.

In the rearview mirror, she was still standing there, frozen like a lonely marble statue under the streetlights.

Only after putting miles between us did I realize my fingers were trembling against the leather steering wheel.

I pulled over to the shoulder, fished a cigarette out of my pocket, and lit it. Through the curling smoke, the image of that plain platinum band flashed behind my eyes.

The name Miles engraved on the inside was a poisoned needle buried deep in my spine. My phone vibrated. An unknown number flashed on the screen. I answered it.

A young male voice came through the speaker, the words grinding like stones in his throat. "Julian, what the hell was that?" It was Miles. "Exactly what it sounded like." I blew a ring of smoke, my voice flat.

My total indifference seemed to set him off. His volume spiked. "You pull that stunt in front of the entire room—what does that make me?

What does that make her?" "Some kind of object you can just toss away? Julian, I know you look down on me, but you didn't have to humiliate us like that!" [Humiliation?

I traded fifty years of isolation and misery to hand her to you on a silver platter, and you call it humiliation?] A harsh scoff tore from my throat. "Miles, pack up your pathetic, fragile ego." "Did you think I was blind to what you and Seraphina have?

High school sweethearts. Starcrossed lovers.

If your family’s empire hadn’t just crashed and burned, you’d be the one sitting across from her tonight, not me." The line plunged into a dead silence.

The only sound was his heavy, ragged breathing—like a trapped animal pulling fruitlessly at a steel chain. "Am I wrong?" I pushed the blade in deeper. "You love her, but you can't afford her future.

The Gu family isn't marrying their precious heir off to a broke guy, which is why she was forced to sit at my table." "Julian!" he barked, the sound desperate. "Don't yell at me." My tone dropped to subzero. "I didn't lay it all out tonight for a cheap laugh.

I’m telling you I'm out.

That’s one less obstacle between you two." "Whether you can drag yourself out of the gutter and actually put a ring on her finger—that's your problem, not mine." "But a quick headsup, Miles.

Seraphina's maintenance fees aren't exactly cheap. Let's hope your new salary flipping burgers is enough to buy her a pair of Christian Louboutin red bottoms." I cut the call.

I tossed the phone onto the passenger seat and squeezed my eyes shut against the exhaustion. I was no saint.

Half of this was just me escaping a lifetime of misery, but the other half was pure, calculated malice. [I handed you the keys, Miles. But can you actually drive?

Last time, you died in the dirt without making a comeback.

This time, without me playing the villain in your love story, let's see just how bulletproof your 'true love' really is.] The car was dead quiet.

After a minute, I punched the ignition again. I didn't head to my penthouse. I drove straight to corporate headquarters. Now wasn't the time to drown in past ghosts.

I said I was going to fix the financial bleeding, and I never missed a target.

Thanks to the memories of my past life, I knew a nearly bankrupt tech startup was sitting on a revolutionary patent.

In exactly three days, a massive overseas conglomerate would buy them out for an astronomical price. Right now, their stock was absolute trash.

All I had to do was convince my stubborn father to dump our last remaining liquid assets into the ultimate gamble.

Chapter 4 The next morning, I walked straight into Warren's corner office, tossing a comprehensive acquisition proposal onto his desk. He clearly hadn't slept.

His eyes were a map of busted red capillaries.

When he looked up at me, he glared like I was his worst enemy. "You still dare to show your face in this building?" I ignored his hostility, tapping a finger on the cover of the file. "Warren, this is the company's only way out." He didn't even glance at it.

He swept his arm violently across the desk, sending the thick stack of papers scattering all over the carpet. "Our only way out is the one you destroyed with your own damn hands last night!

Get the hell out of my office!" I bent down.

I picked up the papers one by one, squared the edges perfectly, and slapped the stack right back down in front of him. "Believe me or don't, Warren.

We have to acquire this tech startup by the end of today. If we don't, the Zhou conglomerate is completely dead." My stare didn't waver.

It was a level of absolute, cold certainty he had never seen from me before. He froze. The furious shouting died in his throat as his suspicion warred with sheer desperation.

Slowly, he reached out and picked up the file. Right at that moment, the heavy double walnut doors burst open. The executive assistant rushed in, looking highly stressed. "Mr.

Zhou, Seraphina's private helicopter just landed on the rooftop helipad.

Her head bodyguard is demanding to see Julian immediately." Warren blanked for a second before a greedy spark of hope lit up his face.

He thought the marriage was still on the table. He shot me a lethal warning glare. "Quick! Let her in!

And you better watch your mouth this time, boy!" I just narrowed my eyes. [What the hell is she doing here?] The doors swung wide. Seraphina walked in.

She had swapped last night's silk gown for a razorsharp designer power suit, but her face was still unusually pale. She ignored Warren completely.

Her icy blue eyes locked directly onto mine. "Julian. We need to talk." She was gripping something in her hand. A tiny, silver, plain platinum band.

My pupils dilated violently. [Impossible… how the hell does she have that ring right now…] She walked straight up to me and uncurled her fingers.

The ring sat quietly in the center of her palm. "Is this yours?" she asked.

A microscopic tremor cracked through her usually flawless, robotic voice. "I found it near the curb where you sped off last night." The blood draining from my face must have given me away.

That ring… it was the exact one she had worn for almost fifty years in my past life. No, not the exact same one.

That specific ring went to the bottom of the freezing ocean with her. This one