The Day That Already Happened

Celeste's POV

My breath ripped into my lungs, a ragged, desperate sound lost in the cacophony around me. Noise, that’s all there was. A dense, oppressive wall of it. Seven hundred individual conversations, a gentle, insistent string quartet sawing away at some classical piece. My head throbbed, a dull ache just behind my eyes. I felt a vague, disorienting pressure all over my body, like something heavy had just been lifted off me. I was standing, impossibly. My legs were under me, and my heart hammered a frantic rhythm against my ribs, a trapped bird desperate to escape. The air was thick with the cloying scent of lilies and expensive cologne.

I blinked, taking in the ballroom. The Harlow Grand, lit to perfection, every surface glittering. Faces, so many faces, all smiling, all impeccably dressed. A champagne flute, half-filled, was clutched so tightly in my hand my knuckles were white. What was happening? The last thing I remembered…

No. Not now. Focus.

I fumbled for my phone, my fingers shaking as I unlocked the screen. The date stared back at me, a cruel, impossible joke.

September 2nd, 2022

Three years. Three years in the past. It was the night of my engagement party.

A wave of nausea washed over me, so intense I nearly dropped the phone. It couldn’t be. This wasn’t real. A dream. A nightmare.

“Celeste, darling, there you are!” A voice, syrupy sweet and familiar, sliced through the noise.

My head snapped up, my gaze darting across the room. There he was. Julian. He looked exactly as he did in my memories, before everything turned to ash. Magnetic, commanding. He was laughing, a low, rumbling sound, head tilted back slightly. His mother, Beatrice, was next to him, her hand on his arm, her own laughter thin and brittle. They were oblivious. Truly, utterly unaware that the woman he was about to propose to had just watched him, dispassionately, calmly, order her death.

Terror seized me, cold and sharp. I had to disappear. Now. Before he saw my face, before anyone noticed the sheer panic etched into my features. My eyes scanned frantically, landing on the ornate double doors leading to the ladies’ powder room. An escape.

I moved on autopilot, weaving through the chattering guests, my body a phantom among them. No one saw me. No one called out. They were all too engrossed in their own conversations, their own carefully constructed illusions of grandeur. The marble floor felt cold beneath my thin heels.

I burst through the powder room doors, slamming them shut behind me with a soft thud that still felt deafening in the sudden quiet. I leaned against the polished wood, gasping for air, clutching my chest. My reflection stared back at me from the vast, gilded mirror. Wide, panicked eyes. Hair perfectly coiffed. The elegant, ice-blue dress. All wrong. All a lie.

I stumbled to one of the sinks, gripping the cold marble counter with both hands, knuckles aching. My breath came in shallow, ragged gasps. I splashed cold water on my face, hoping to shock myself out of this impossible reality. It didn’t work. The nightmare persisted.

This was real. I was here. Back.

My phone buzzed in my hand, making me jump. A text message. From Julian.

My blood ran cold. I stared at the screen, every word a fresh stab wound.

*“Don't forget, darling. Keep that beautiful smile on, sign the papers when they come, and remember who keeps you safe. M xx”*

A leash. Not a love note. It always was. The words, once brushed off as his playful possessiveness, now replayed in my mind with a chilling, sickening clarity. *“Remember who keeps you safe.”* He wasn’t keeping me safe. He was keeping me *contained*. Held. Owned.

Two years. Two years of my life, rewritten in a terrible, blinding flash. Every memory. Every shared laugh, every tender touch, every whispered promise. They all reordered themselves, slotting into place with brutal, horrifying precision. The loveless marriage that followed. The endless, empty dinners. The way he meticulously carved away my independence.

And Father. Oh God, Father. His slow decline. The sudden, debilitating illness that had stolen him from me, piece by agonizing piece. The asset transfers, all those documents I had signed without a second thought, because Julian had insisted, because he said he was *protecting* my family’s future, because I trusted him. I had signed my name, my birthright, my whole life away, believing I was loved. Believing I was protected.

He wasn’t protecting me. He was clearing the board. Methodically, ruthlessly, he dismantled my entire world around me, while I stood blissfully ignorant in his shadow, a fool. My naive, trusting heart, utterly blind to the monster I was about to marry.

And tonight. Tonight was the beginning of the end. Forty minutes. Perhaps less. Julian Simpson, the man who calmly, casually ordered my death in another life, was going to get down on one knee. He was going to ask me to hand him the starting piece. My full, unyielding devotion. My future. My life. Everything he hadn’t already taken.

I looked at myself in the mirror. Truly looked. The panic was still there, a frantic flutter beneath my skin, but something else was hardening in my eyes. A cold, quiet resolve. The girl who had just walked into this powder room was gone. She had died, three years from now, and in her place, something sharper, colder, more dangerous had awoken.

I took a deep, shuddering breath. Then another. My hands, still clutching the marble, slowly unclenched. I reached for the champagne flute, placing it carefully on the edge of the sink. I wouldn’t need it. Not tonight. Not ever again.

I walked back to the door, my heels clicking softly on the polished tiles. I paused, my hand on the cool brass handle. This wasn’t a second chance. It was a second war. And this time, I wasn’t going to lose.

I pushed the doors open.

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