Ghost of His Secret Bride

My body lay mangled at the bottom of the cliff.

The woman who shoved me into the abyss threw herself into my husband's arms. She wept, painting a perfect picture of fragile innocence.

It's all my fault. I didn't explain it clearly to her, she wiped away fake tears. She was drinking that night. She said she never wanted to see you again in her next life.

Six years of a secret marriage. My husband and I were supposed to finalize our divorce right after this trip back to the States.

But his rumored girlfriend couldn't even wait a few days. She murdered me outright and staged it as a suicide.

Too bad she missed one crucial detail.

I was deathly allergic to alcohol.

Sebastian stared dead at her. A bone-chilling smile crept up the corners of his mouth. "Is that so? What else did she say?"

Chapter 1

Before the overseas press tour kicked off, I ran into Piper.

She stepped into my personal space with a bright smile. "I'm Piper. You must recognize me, Laur, right?"

The air in the room instantly thickened. Just a week ago, paparazzi caught her walking with my husband, Sebastian, late at night. It pretty much cemented her status as his new obsession.

"Mhm." I gave her a flat, deadpan response.

Her eyes raked up and down my body. "Your dress today, Laur it feels a little dated."

The age-based superiority dripped from her words. My expression didn't shift a millimeter. "That's fine. You'll reach the age for this kind of dress eventually."

Once we were out of earshot, my manager, Diane, couldn't hold back. "You haven't even signed the divorce papers yet, and she's already practically dancing on your grave."

A sharp prick flared in the center of my chest.

I let out a dry, self-deprecating laugh. "It's happening soon anyway."

Before leaving the country, Sebastian and I had a massive blowout. The trigger was the endless stream of PR articles pushing his romance with Piper.

He had just gotten back from set, looking completely drained. Faced with my interrogation, he sank into the couch. "We're just co-stars. Reading too much into it is pointless."

A wave of pure exhaustion hit me. I practically screamed at him.

"Then what has meaning? Your late-night dates? Letting the whole world think you two are together?"

"Enough, Lauren." He pinched the bridge of his nose. "You were the one who insisted on keeping our marriage a secret."

Every word, every ounce of fire in my lungs, instantly evaporated.

I knew exactly what he meant.

I demanded the secret marriage. Now that the internet shipped him with someone else, I had no right to blame anyone. But he never bothered to shut those rumors down, either.

After a suffocating silence, I forced the words out. "Do you have feelings for her?"

Sebastian let out a long, heavy sigh. His tone shifted from exhausted to wildly impatient. "Stop acting crazy. I'm exhausted."

I stared at him as he rested his eyes. Over the past few years, he skyrocketed to A-list status. Fame looked good on him. He had only grown more striking, his jawline sharper, his presence more commanding.

But somewhere along the line, a massive chasm opened between us. Every bitter argument. Every freezing silent treatment that followed. It all steadily chipped away at a marriage already starved for time.

I swallowed hard, finally locating my voice. "When I get back to the States, let's get a divorce."

Sebastian snapped his eyes open.

The living room lights were dim. I couldn't read the emotion flickering in his gaze.

He stayed quiet. A second later, he dropped his head and lit a cigarette. The orange cherry flared and dimmed, illuminating the absolute blankness on his face.

Reality slammed into me.

He was agreeing through his silence.

Acid burned the back of my throat.

He stopped loving me a long time ago.

All my probing, all my desperate questions. I was just humiliating myself.

Chapter 2

After the press tour wrapped, Diane and I took some time off to clear our heads at a coastal getaway across the border.

Right before we were supposed to head back, I drove out to a local spot known as Lover's Leap. The sky hung low and gray. The cliffs stood completely empty.

I sat near the edge, letting the freezing ocean wind numb my skin before I pulled out my phone. Sebastian and Piper's names dominated the trending topics.

I tapped the top link. It was a clip from Sebastian's latest late-night interview.

The host leaned in. "Is there anyone special in your life right now?"

Sebastian froze. A beat of heavy silence stretched. "Yes."

My breath hitched in my throat.

The host gasped, pressing for a name.

Sebastian offered a polite, evasive smile and shifted the subject. The comment section was a war zone of praise.

[ "Do you even have to ask? It's obviously Piper." ]

[ "America's sweetheart and our A-list king. The ultimate power couple." ]

I scrolled through the endless feed, a masochistic urge keeping my thumb moving. I finally stopped at a top comment.

[ "Remember when people spread rumors that Sebastian secretly married Lauren? Lauren is constantly typecast as the evil bitch. She could never compare to our darling Piper." ]

The user had tagged Sebastian directly. Neither of them had stepped up to deny it. In this industry, silence was an admission of guilt.

A sudden, reckless urge clawed its way up my chest.

We were getting a divorce anyway. Why not burn it all down on my way out?

I switched to my official account and hit quote-retweet on that comment. I tagged Sebastian. My fingers flew across the keyboard, driven by a bitter impulse.

[ "I'm sorry for holding you back all these years." ]

My thumb hovered over the post button.

White-hot agony exploded at the back of my skull.

The world spun.

My phone flew from my grip, shattering against the rocks.

Bile rose in my throat as I forced my head to turn.

A second blow landed.

The sickening crunch of bone echoed in my ears.

Warm liquid flooded my vision, staining the gray sky red.

Piper stood over me. She gripped a heavy steel pipe. Her eyes were bloodshot, completely unhinged.

"You old bitch. You should have died a long time ago."

She lunged.

Her hands slammed into my chest.

Gravity vanished.

I had zero time to process, zero time to brace myself.

Flocks of seagulls scattered from the cliffs.

My body shattered into a broken, unrecognizable mess on the jagged rocks below.

As the last ounce of consciousness drained from my brain, one thought looped endlessly.

Sebastian and I were getting a divorce anyway. If she just wanted his fame, why did she have to kill me?

The moment my lungs stopped, my consciousness untethered.

I floated in the freezing air above the drop. I watched Piper calmly kick my cracked phone over the edge. She wiped down the steel pipe. She bagged her blood-splattered windbreaker.

Clinical. Efficient.

Then she walked back toward the resort like she had just finished a morning hike. Meanwhile, my mangled corpse lay rotting in the cold, damp shadows of the ravine. It would be days, maybe weeks, before anyone found me.

Back in her luxury suite, Piper hauled a massive black binder onto the coffee table. She flipped it open. Inside were hundreds of photos of me. Taken from the shadows.

Me on set. Me eating at a diner. Me sitting in my own goddamn living room.

A phantom chill violently ripped down my spectral spine.

Even without a physical body, the cold dread paralyzed me.

Piper traced the glossy paper. Her sweet smile warped into something vile.

"I tolerated you for so many years, you old hag." She spat the words out. "Every time I looked at you, I wanted to vomit."

She ripped the pages from the binder. Her manic laughter bounced off the walls as she shredded the photos. Torn pieces of my face drifted to the carpet like grotesque snow.

It was a scene straight out of a psychological thriller. I still couldn't grasp the depth of her hatred. Why me?

Then, Piper unlocked her phone. She logged into a secret burner account on X and typed out a single post.

[ "Mission accomplished." ]

I drifted closer to look at the screen.

When I read the handle at the top of the profile, my entire soul violently shuddered.

Chapter 3

It was the handle of Sebastian's most deranged stalker.

The one who had planted hidden cameras in our house. The one who used to camp out on our front porch. Once she uncovered our secret marriage, she escalated.

Dead rats. Blood-stained knives. Funeral clothes. Doctored photos of my corpse.

She had spent every waking second praying for my death.

The stalking had miraculously stopped two years ago. And Piper had made her Hollywood debut exactly two years ago.

A deep, unsettling cold washed over my ghostly form.

The puzzle pieces snapped together.

This innocent, sweet girl was a twisted, deeply disturbed psychopath. Her absolute hatred for me wasn't new. It had been festering for years.

After sending the tweet, Piper switched back to her verified account. The trending hashtag with her and Sebastian's names had started to dip in the rankings. She drafted a suspiciously delayed, perfectly ambiguous statement.

[ "Please don't jump to conclusions, guys! Sebastian has always been an industry senior I deeply admire. Our new movie is coming out soon, so please support it! P.S. It's been raining a lot lately. Watch your step and don't slip! :P" ]

The engagement metrics instantly skyrocketed. The replies flooded in like a tidal wave.

[ "An industry senior you admire. Wink wink. Let's give the lovebirds some space, guys." ]

[ "Can't wait for the movie!" ]

[ "Omg, Pip told us to watch our step. She cares about us so much." ]

I let out a dry, hollow laugh. The internet's precious, harmless sweetheart. In reality, she was a venomous, cold-blooded murderer.

After posting, Piper frantically refreshed Sebastian's feed. She was practically vibrating with the hope that he would post something to match her energy. But her screen remained static. He posted nothing.

Piper's lips twisted into a pout. She bypassed the apps and dialed Sebastian directly.

The second the line connected, her voice morphed into a sickeningly sweet whine. "Hey, Seb. I ran into Laur today."

She contorted her face into a mask of pure, unadulterated grievance. "She called me a homewrecker. She said I was shameless. She called you a cheating bastard and said your marriage makes her sick."

She leaned so hard into the performance that actual, wet tears spilled down her cheeks.

My limbs went ice-cold as I watched her expertly flip the narrative. I was already dead, utterly powerless.

I couldn't hear Sebastian's end of the call. But I watched Piper's fake tears melt into a radiant, triumphant smile. He was probably feeding her some sickeningly sweet reassurance.

Right before she hung up, Piper let out a soft, breathy giggle. "Okay. Whatever you say."

A massive, gaping void ripped open in my chest.

The phantom agony of my shattered bones and rotting flesh flared, burning through every nerve ending I no longer had.

I trembled violently.

If Sebastian ever found out the truth. If he knew his shiny new rumored girlfriend was the deranged stalker from our past. The monster who slaughtered his wife. I wondered if it would break him.

But maybe he would just never know.

Piper hummed a cheerful pop tune. She crouched and picked up a torn half of my face from the carpet.

"You see? Sebastian checked out of your relationship ages ago. Your death is just setting him free."

I couldn't stomach another second of it.

I drifted straight through the glass window, out into the freezing air.

The moon slid behind thick clouds, plunging the night into absolute pitch black. I floated aimlessly forward. I drifted over mountains, rivers, and endless stretches of the dark ocean.

I found myself hovering over Copenhagen. The moon reflected off the harbor, illuminating the countless ships returning to the docks.

This was exactly where Sebastian and I first crossed paths.

I was seventeen, wandering the cobblestone streets of a foreign city, when a local snatched my purse. A teenage boy with striking Asian features lunged after the thief.

He returned my stolen bag, out of breath, and asked, "You from the States too?"

That was the exact moment our story began.

Chapter 4

We weathered the crushing loneliness of living abroad together. We survived the absolute obscurity of our early days in the industry.

In the chaotic, scrappy years of our youth, I would excitedly paint a picture of our perfect future. He would just stand beside me, his eyes overflowing with total adoration.

But after walking enough red carpets and basking in the flashing lights, we drifted apart. Until there was absolutely no turning back.

Eventually, my spirit crossed oceans and continents, drifting right back to Sebastian.

The living room was pitch black. Sebastian sat on the couch, his face half-swallowed by the shadows. I couldn't read his mind.

A sharp crack pierced the silence.

The framed photo in the entryway plummeted to the floor, shattering into pieces.

Sebastian's head snapped up.

Our eyes locked.

My breath caught in my throat.

A second later, his completely blank expression slammed reality back into me