After surviving a suicide attempt brought on by severe depression, I woke up inside a novel.

The System shrieked a warning inside my head.

[You must take down the impostor heiress. Mission failure will result in immediate termination.]

For the first time in months, I felt a spark of interest. I latched onto the voice in my head.

"Wiped from existence? You mean it? No chance of survival whatsoever?"

The System hesitated.

[...Yes?]

Well, in that case, I had no reason to hold back.

On the very first day I was reunited with my birth family, their adopted daughter stood at the edge of the second-floor balcony, crying into the wind as she pulled her favorite stunt all over again.

"Please don't blame Mom and Dad for loving me. This is all my fault. If having me here upsets you, I'll give everything back to you right now..."

My parents and older brother rushed outside. From the lawn below, they pointed at me and screamed.

"How can you be so cruel? You just got here, and you're already trying to drive Sloane to her death?"

I did not get angry. I did not argue. I sprinted upstairs, yanked Sloane away from the balcony, then climbed over the railing myself. Half my body hung in open air as I called to her in delight.

"Sloane, killing yourself is hard work. You shouldn't have to do it. Let me take care of it for you."

Then I closed my eyes, smiled peacefully, and stepped off the balcony.

Halfway down, I heard my entire family drop to their knees and scream. The System exploded inside my head.

[Jesus Christ! You win! Just stop!]

...

"Nora Hale, even if you're desperate for attention, there are limits."

A low, controlled male voice came from beside the hospital bed.

I slowly opened my eyes to a painful expanse of white.

I had failed again.

The Ashfords had installed an absurdly expensive shock-absorbing turf system beneath the second-floor balcony.

All I had managed to do was break my left leg.

The System spoke in my head, sounding close to tears with relief.

[Please, I'm begging you. Can we just do the mission? Termination hurts.]

I ignored it and looked at the man in the tailored suit beside my bed.

Julian Ashford.

My older brother.

He held a glass of warm water. Behind his glasses, his gaze was cool, appraising, and condescending.

"You wanted Sloane gone so badly that you threw yourself off a balcony."

Julian set the glass on the nightstand without making a sound.

"Congratulations. You got what you wanted. She's in the next room on oxygen because you scared her so badly."

"But this family will not tolerate hysterics and suicide threats."

He never raised his voice or used a single ugly word. He did not need to. Every measured sentence branded me as the problem.

I stared at the ceiling light and calculated my odds of success if I jumped from the hospital roof that night.

"Julian, how can you speak to Nora like that?"

My mother, Meredith Ashford, entered carrying an insulated food container. Her designer suit was immaculate. Her eyes were red, but even her grief looked elegant.

"Nora spent twenty years suffering in a poor rural town. She never had the education or opportunities we gave Sloane. Of course she sometimes acts rashly."

Meredith came to my bedside and tucked the blanket around me. Her perfume smelled lovely.

Her words did not.

"Nora, I know you're angry with us. But Sloane has been our daughter for twenty years, and she's always been fragile. If your behavior had caused a serious attack, could you have lived with yourself?"

I looked at my mother.

My depression had hollowed out my ability to connect with other people. Anger, hurt, grief, all of it had long ago settled into stagnant water.

"I couldn't," I said at last. My throat was dry and my voice came out hoarse.

Meredith blinked. "What?"

I met her carefully preserved gaze and answered honestly.

"I couldn't live with it. I'm having a hard time accepting that I survived."

The room went dead silent.

Julian's brows drew together. He clearly took my honesty as one more act of defiance.

"Nora Hale."

Using my full name made the distance between us unmistakable.

"Our mother is trying to teach you how decent people behave. Is this really how you intend to respond?"

The door opened again.

Theo Mercer walked in.

He was heir to the Mercer fortune, and our families had arranged for us to marry before I was even born. He wore an understated designer coat, and his handsome face carried equal parts exhaustion and impatience.

"Sloane finally fell asleep," he told Meredith.

Only then did he look at the cast on my left leg.

"Nora, if all you want is to become Mrs. Mercer, fine. I'll marry you."

Theo stopped at the foot of the bed and looked down at me.

"You don't have to hurt yourself just to torment someone weaker than you. Sloane was crying in her sleep, begging you to forgive her."

He sighed, his disappointment almost theatrical.

"Being around you is suffocating."

I listened without defending myself or shedding a tear.

Then I pressed the call button.

A nurse arrived moments later. "Are you in pain? Is something wrong?"

I pointed to the window.

"Could someone remove the safety restrictor?"

She stared at me. "Why would you want that removed?"

"Because I want to jump, and the opening is too narrow for me to fit through."

The air in the room turned to ice.

The nurse looked at me as if I had lost my mind.

"I'm calling psychiatry for an emergency evaluation," she said, then hurried from the room.

At last, Meredith's elegant composure cracked. She took half a step back as if I were something dangerous.

"Nora, what is wrong with you?"

She kept her voice low, but disbelief sharpened every word.

"We're only trying to reason with you. What do you gain by threatening us with suicide again and again?"

I closed my eyes.

The exhaustion of depression rose like floodwater. I did not want to speak. Even breathing felt like work.

How had the girl whose life I had inherited survived twenty years in this world?

Fragments of her memories drifted through my mind.

At six, her adoptive parents locked her in an unheated shed in the middle of winter. She nearly froze to death.

At twelve, she developed a dangerously high fever. They refused to take her to the hospital because they wanted the money for their biological son's new gaming system.

Her life had been darkness layered upon darkness.

Then the Ashfords found her.

She thought she had finally reached the light.

Instead, she found Sloane's beautiful tears.

And with her own parents, who kept pushing her closer to the edge just to protect the impostor heiress's place in the family.

[Nora, are you okay?] the System asked cautiously.

[Maybe you should apologize for now. This is a rough starting position.]

I ignored the noise in my head.

Wheels whispered across the floor outside. An orderly pushed Sloane into the room in a wheelchair.

She wore a hospital gown. Her face was white as paper, and her eyes were swollen from crying.

"Nora..."

Tears slid down her cheeks before she finished my name.

"Please don't be angry with Mom, Dad, or Julian. This is all my fault."

She struggled to rise from the wheelchair.

Theo caught her immediately, his voice turning gentle. "You're still weak. Stop pushing yourself."

Using his arm for support, Sloane stood and looked at me with fragile determination.

"This private suite was supposed to be yours. But I had an asthma attack, and the nurse said the equipment was better in here, so they moved me in temporarily."

She bit her lower lip, the very picture of someone suffering nobly.

"If it bothers you, I'll move to a shared room right now."

Meredith hurried over and took her hand.

"Don't be ridiculous. Your health has always been delicate. You need peace and quiet."

She turned to me. Her tone sounded like a request, but the decision had already been made.

"Nora, you only broke one leg. You'll receive perfectly adequate care in a regular room. Sloane's condition is different. Can you please be generous about this?"

Julian added, "My assistant has already handled the transfer. We'll arrange a private-duty nurse for you. Sloane needs the monitoring equipment in this room. Giving it to her is the only sensible choice, so don't turn this into another grievance."

They dressed favoritism in the language of common sense.

Every sentence reminded me that I was the unreasonable one.

Theo watched me coldly.

"Nora, if you're capable of listening to anyone, do the gracious thing for once."

I looked at the polished, respectable people gathered around my bed and felt nothing but boredom.

I took my phone from beneath the pillow, searched for a number, and called it while they watched in confusion.

"Hello, is this Greenwood Funeral Home?"

The room became so quiet I could hear the fluorescent lights hum.

"Yes, I'd like to ask about your urns. Nothing expensive. It only needs to hold ashes."

"And how soon can I schedule a cremation?"

"Why would I need a family member's signature? Can't I sign the paperwork myself?"

The person on the other end seemed at a loss.

Sloane gasped, sagging against Theo.

"Enough!"

Julian strode over, snatched the phone from my hand, and ended the call.

For the first time, a crack appeared in his mask of perfect reason.

"Nora Hale, do you have to use something this disgusting to punish the entire family?"

I looked up at his furious face.

"I already told you. I want to die."

"Since none of you believe me, I'm making my own arrangements. Isn't that the kind of rational resource management you value so much?"

The uproar over the hospital room ended when Ashford Holdings used its influence to bury the story.

I got the shared room I had been promised.

Six beds. Crowded and loud.

Relatives shouted into their phones in the hallway. Babies cried. Machines beeped around the clock.

Every day, the System tried to talk me into finding some reason to care about this world.

[That nurse was so gentle when she gave you your shot.]

[Look how beautiful the sunshine is today.]

I gazed out at the gray rain and did not bother exposing the lie.

Two weeks later, the cast came off. I could walk with crutches.

The Ashfords sent a driver to collect me. There were no flowers and no family waiting downstairs.

The driver offered nothing more than a cool, "Miss Hale, your car is ready."

It was already dark when we reached the Ashford mansion.

Light spilled from every window, and the sound of a violin floated from the ballroom.

Tonight was my welcome party.

It was also the night the Ashfords would formally introduce their long-lost daughter to Manhattan society.

I entered slowly on my crutches.

Guests in couture and black tie stood in glittering clusters. When they saw me in a plain gray sweatsuit, every conversation faltered.

Meredith, wearing a wine-colored evening gown, was laughing over champagne with several Manhattan socialites. Her smile tightened for half a second when she saw me.

Then she crossed the room with practiced grace.

"Nora, why aren't you wearing the dress I picked out for you?"

The dress was a complicated confection of lace that required towering heels to hang properly. For someone fresh out of a cast, it might as well have been a torture device.

I did not answer. My attention shifted to Sloane.

She wore a custom white gown and stood surrounded by young socialites, delicate as a lily in bloom.

"Nora, you're home."

Sloane gathered her skirt and approached, her voice soft as water.

In full view of the room, she bowed her head deeply.

"What happened at the hospital was my fault. I never should have taken your private room, even if I was sick. I begged Mom and Dad to throw this party for you. I hope you can forgive me."

Whispers rose immediately around us.

"The long-lost daughter certainly thinks highly of herself. Sloane is practically begging, and she can't even manage a smile."

"I heard she threatened suicide to force Sloane out. You can take the girl out of a trailer park, but you can't take the trailer park out of the girl."

"The Ashfords are saints for letting her stay."

No one bothered lowering their voice.

They wore their cruelty as elegantly as their jewelry.

Theo came to my side and offered me a glass of juice.

"Sloane has done everything she can. If you keep sulking, you'll humiliate the entire family."

He leaned closer, lowering his voice so only I could hear.

"If you want to belong in this world, learn how to behave in public."

I stared at the golden juice.

Nausea surged through me.

The physical symptoms of my depression peaked all at once. My ears rang. Faces blurred and twisted around me.

Pressure. Suffocation. Revulsion.

I set the glass on a passing server's tray and turned toward the long dining table at the edge of the ballroom.

Steak knives gleamed beside the place settings.

I picked one up. The silver blade flashed beneath the chandeliers.

The whispers faded.

Meredith noticed first. Her brow tightened.

"Nora, what are you doing?"

Julian set down his glass, his eyes hardening.

"Put down the knife. We have guests. Do not turn tonight into another spectacle."

I faced them with the knife in my hand.

I did not scream or accuse anyone.

I calmly pushed up my left sleeve.

The original Nora had left a maze of scars there over countless desperate nights. Some were old, some new. Some were dark brown, others pale pink.

The sight silenced the room.

I gently rested the edge of the knife against the pulse in my wrist.

"Since all of you think I'm putting on a show," I said, watching the blood drain from Sloane's face, "I might as well give you a performance worth remembering."