“Please, God… not today. Not when she’s supposed to get married tomorrow.”

Sophia Martinez pressed her forehead against the cold glass of the ICU window, staring at the pale, broken figure of her identical twin lying among the wires and tubes. Machines beeped steadily, the sterile rhythm of life being borrowed one second at a time.

Her chest ached as though the sound itself were chiseling cracks into her ribs.

“Ma’am, visiting hours are over,” a nurse murmured, touching her shoulder.

Sophia shook her head without looking away. “She’s all I have left.” Her voice wavered. “I can’t lose her too.”

The nurse softened. “The surgery relieved the swelling in her brain. Now… we wait.”

If she wakes up, Sophia thought. But she didn’t dare say it aloud.

Three floors above, their mother lay in the cancer ward, held alive by machines Sophia could barely afford. Three jobs, endless debt, and still it was never enough. The only reason her mother was still breathing was because Elena—reckless, glamorous Elena—had accepted an arranged marriage contract with the Blackwood family. The advance money had paid for the surgery. Two million dollars. Two million reasons Sophia couldn’t allow herself to break now.

She swallowed hard, pressing her fist against her mouth. Elena had always been the wild one—the one behind the wheel of a Ferrari at sixty miles an hour, texting wedding plans instead of watching the road. Elena was supposed to marry Alexander Blackwood, the city’s youngest billionaire, in less than two days. Sophia still couldn’t understand how her impulsive, drama-loving sister had landed a man so coldly untouchable.

“...Sophia?”

The voice was paper-thin, but it sliced through her thoughts like glass.

Sophia jerked forward, heart hammering. “Elena? I’m here, I’m right here.”

Her twin’s eyelids fluttered. Eyes the same shade as her own cracked open, hazy with pain. A trembling hand reached toward her. Sophia caught it, holding on desperately.

“The… wedding,” Elena rasped.

“No, don’t—don’t talk. You need to save your strength.”

“Listen!” Elena’s grip, weak as it was, tightened like iron. “You have to… take my place.”

Sophia froze. “What? No. No, you’re delirious—”

“Elena, don’t—”

“Promise me!” Elena’s nails dug into Sophia’s palm. Her voice dropped, broken but sharp. “Alexander can’t know. If the wedding doesn’t happen, his mother… she’ll demand the money back. All of it.”

Sophia’s breath caught. Two million dollars. Her mother’s life.

“Elena, stop—”

“I’m dying.”

The words were flat, too calm, too certain.

Sophia shook her head wildly. “No. No, don’t say that—”

“I can feel it,” Elena whispered, tears leaking from the corners of her eyes. “Promise me you’ll do it. Mama will die without those bills paid.”

The machines began to shriek, frantic, her sister’s vitals spiking. Nurses rushed in, pushing Sophia aside.

“Elena!” Sophia cried, fighting the hands guiding her toward the door. “Elena, hold on!”

Her twin’s lips parted again, her gaze locking on Sophia’s with a desperate intensity.

“There’s something else… you need to know. I’m… I’m—”

But the words strangled, lost in the mechanical chorus of alarms. Her body convulsed once. Then flatlined.

“No!” Sophia screamed, but the door slammed shut as doctors swarmed the bed.

She stumbled into the corridor, dizzy with grief. Her twin’s last half-formed words echoed like a curse: I’m…

What?

What had she tried to say?

“Darling, thank God you’re alive!”

The sharp voice jolted Sophia. She turned—and her blood went cold.

An elegant woman swept toward her, wrapped in a mink coat and diamonds that glittered under the hospital lights.

Perfectly coiffed hair, flawless poise, and eyes like carved steel.

Victoria Blackwood.

Sophia had seen her face splashed across magazines enough times to recognize her instantly.

The woman grasped Sophia’s hands, squeezing them with cool precision. “You’ve frightened us all half to death, my dear. But you’re strong, stronger than I expected. Alexander was beside himself.”

Sophia tried to pull away. “I think… you’ve mistaken me for—”

“Nonsense.” Victoria’s painted lips curved in something between a smile and a command. “I know my future daughter-in-law when I see her. You look dreadful, of course, but that’s to be expected after such trauma. Still, the important thing is—”

Alarms blared from Elena’s room. Shouts filled the hall. “Flatline! Clear!”

Sophia shoved past Victoria, but a doctor stepped into her path. His eyes gave her the answer before his words did.

“I’m sorry. We did everything we could.”

Sophia’s knees buckled. The world tilted—cold linoleum rushing up to meet her—but arms caught her. Victoria’s perfume enveloped her as the older woman steadied her.

“It’s the shock,” Victoria murmured, her tone clipped but not unkind. “She needs rest. Tomorrow is too important for hysteria.”

Tomorrow.

The wedding.

Sophia’s stomach lurched. Elena’s words rang in her skull. Take my place. Mama will die without the bills paid.

She turned, numb, and saw through the small glass window as nurses pulled a sheet over Elena’s still form. Her identical face vanished beneath white cloth.

Sophia’s throat closed. She had no air left. No tears. Just the weight of impossible choices crushing her chest.

Victoria’s hand squeezed hers, grounding her with icy certainty. “The doctors tell me you’ll be discharged tomorrow.

Thank heaven. The ceremony will proceed without delay. You need only walk down that aisle with grace. Blackwoods don’t falter.”

Sophia opened her mouth to say the truth—I’m not Elena—but the words stuck. Her mother’s face flashed before her eyes. Her mother, tethered to machines three floors up, depending on money they didn’t have. Depending on Elena’s contract.

If the wedding doesn’t happen, Mama dies.

Her lips trembled. She heard her own voice before she’d decided to speak.

“Yes… I just need rest. Tomorrow is… the most important day of my life.”

Victoria’s smile sharpened, satisfaction glittering in her gaze. She patted Sophia’s cheek. “That’s my brave girl.

Alexander chose well. Even in tragedy, you think first of duty.”

Sophia swallowed the lump in her throat, her heart pounding with guilt. If only you knew.

Behind them, the flatline tone cut off, replaced by silence. Elena Martinez was gone.

And Sophia was about to marry a stranger under her sister’s name.