Chapter 1

In my previous life, I raised an absolute monster. I worked my fingers to the bone to put her through school, only for her to turn around and murder me.

She had shouted, "If it weren't for you, people wouldn't call me fatherless! And Marcus wouldn't have dumped me!"

She claimed I didn't understand true love and never respected her choices.

Finding myself thrown back in time to the exact day she was screaming about running away from home, I stared straight into my daughter's furious, bloodshot eyes.

I simply gave a careless shrug and told her flatly, "Fine. Go ahead and leave with him."

*****

"I don't care! If you won't let us be together, you're dead to me!"

My eyes snapped open. My daughter, Sophia Whitfield, stood there with wild hair, screaming hysterically.

She glared at me with pure venom. My heart pounded. She looked at me like I was the woman who murdered her father, not her own flesh and blood.

How was this possible?

A second ago, she was plunging a knife right into my chest. Now, I was standing perfectly unharmed in my own living room.

Sophia saw me frozen in place, her rage spiking.

Her voice shot up an octave. "You know nothing about love. You've controlled my entire life. Your psycho behavior is exactly why Dad left you!

"Just because you're lonely and bitter, you want to ruin my happiness. You're completely insane!"

She went ballistic, sweeping everything off the console table. Glass shattered across the hardwood.

I flinched at the loud crash. Yet she just tilted her chin up smugly. She mistook my silence for surrender.

"But," she paused, crossing her arms. "If you hand over the cash and apologize to Marcus, I'll take back what I said."

Her expression flipped in an instant. She flashed a sickeningly sweet smile and made a heart with her hands.

It was aimed at the scrawny, bleach-blonde loser lingering by our front door.

Only I knew that innocent smile was pure poison. One drop could be fatal. The agonizing pain of my murder still burned in my chest.

My eyes locked on hers until the crazy truth sank in. I was thrust back to the very first time she threatened to walk away over that loser boyfriend of hers.

Thank God.

In my old life, this was the day Marcus first showed up to demand respect.

He actually had the nerve to tell me my pregnant daughter needed to drop out of college to rest.

Then he demanded half 1.6 million dollars for their "nest egg."

I was so furious I chased him out with a golf club.

But Sophia totally dropped her sweet, obedient act. She fell to her knees, sobbing and clinging to my legs. She started listing every basic thing Marcus Reynolds supposedly did for her.

She said, "Mom, he actually cooks for me! He even rubs my feet when I'm tired! He treats me like a queen. Why are you such a snob about him?"

Hearing that the first time around, I was blinded by rage. My heart turned to ice.

What mother would accept a degenerate lowlife who got her daughter hooked on vaping and booze?

But my daughter was totally brainwashed. She swore she would rather die than live without him. She packed her bags right then and there, threatening to cut me off forever.

I watched helplessly as the daughter I raised threw her life away for a boy.

Not long after, she ruined her future completely. The university kicked her out.

She called herself a "martyr for love." She went psycho and put her own roommate in the hospital just because the girl called Marcus a creep. The dean expelled Sophia on the spot.

Oh, she was a martyr alright.

To pay off Marcus's massive gambling debts, Sophia worked three shifts a day. She pushed herself until she eventually suffered a miscarriage.

My heart bled for her back then. I bailed them out with cash over and over. I even got that punk a job, praying it would give my daughter a better life.

But once the loser realized the bank of Mom was closed, he kicked her to the curb.

I thought she would finally wake up. I expected a tearful apology.

But I severely underestimated her toxic delusion. She actually blamed the entire mess on me.

When Sophia ruthlessly drove that knife into my chest, she finally spat out the truth. "If it weren't for you, people wouldn't call me fatherless! And Marcus wouldn't have dumped me!"

In that moment, I realized I had raised a literal parasite.

*****

Her crazed face overlapped with the memory of my murder. A cold sweat dripped down my back.

My nails dug into my palms. The sharp pain grounded my shot nerves. I forced down my surging fury.

Meeting my daughter's bloodshot eyes, I spoke with complete indifference. "Go with him."

Sophia froze. Her jaw dropped in sheer disbelief.