To Burn His World Twice Novel – My hand rested on my five-month-pregnant belly as I watched my husband Ronan’s adoptive sister, Genevieve, douse the entire balcony of our Veridia City lakeview apartment with gasoline. This time, I didn’t press the fire alarm like I did in my past life. In my past life, Ronan had rushed into the fire to save me. But after Genevieve “took a bullet” for him during a hit by a rival family, that surface-level warmth curdled into the cruelest of masks.
On the fourth night after I gave birth to our son, he personally locked my son and me in a car and sank us into the icy waters of Lake Cinder. He pressed my head against the car window as the bone-chilling water surged in. In that velvety voice of his, he whispered that he’d drag me and everything I cherished into darkness with him. When I opened my eyes again, I was back on the floor of this burning apartment. ———————— 1 The acrid smell of gasoline filled my nostrils—thick, sharp, suffocating. Five months pregnant, I woke up in the thick smoke of burning Italian leather furniture and custom silk curtains. Through the haze, I saw her: Genevieve, my husband’s adoptive sister, the Principessa of the Griffin family, pouring gasoline from a vase onto the Persian rug on our balcony.
I didn’t touch the emergency panic button on my wrist. In my last life, I had called him for help on the family’s secure line. Ronan—my husband, my protector, the man I’d become obsessed with during my criminal psychology studies—had arrived just in time to save me. He rescued me from what he thought was an assassination attempt by a rival family, and Genevieve “took a bullet” for him right in front of us. For the remaining months of my pregnancy, he was impeccable. He arranged for the best private obstetrician in Veridia City and attended every check-up, always gentle and attentive.
But on the fourth night after our son was born, he took us to our private dock on Lake Cinder. He stood under the moonlight, his custom-tailored suit immaculate, and pronounced our death sentence. He would sink us into the deep. First my son’s carriage, then me. “Now you can sink with the treasure you cherish so much,” he said as the icy water submerged us. When I opened my eyes, I was back on the floor of our burning lakeview apartment. This time, I covered my mouth and nose with a soaked Hermès silk scarf and anonymously sent the apartment address and the estimated time of the fire alarm to “The Serpent’s Kiss,” the most feared underworld gossip site in Veridia City.
Let him choose her again. But this time, in front of the entire underworld. Three minutes later, the Czech crystal chandelier came crashing down. Shards of crystal slammed into my shoulder—the bone snapped, and I screamed, the sound swallowed by the thick smoke. Another burning beam hit my hip.
Blood pooled quickly, soaking the home I had so carefully decorated for him. My son—five months old, once safe in my womb—kicked faintly, then went still. Even through the roar of the fire, I recognized the sound instantly. The sharp click of Italian leather shoes on marble. A tall figure slicing through the smoke.