After effortlessly disposing of the guards stationed outside, Theodore entered her room. The girl before him was no longer the child hiding behind bushes, but a fragile young maiden with long, tangled hair fanned across her pillow like seaweed drifting in the tide. Her lips were pale, her face flushed with fever, her body burning and shivering as if life itself was slipping away.
To Theodore, she was a responsibility—an obligation born from blood, not affection. That was all. Or so he told himself.
But then, the girl stirred. Her lashes fluttered weakly, her feverish gaze blurred as it sought him out. And with the faintest breath, she whispered, "Big brother…"
Her voice was fragile, but it clung to him.
The words hung in the silence, trembling yet piercing, and something inside Theodore snapped.
His eyes widened—just slightly, but enough to shatter the polished mask he always wore. For an instant, raw shock cracked across his face, like a blade of lightning across a midnight sky. His breath caught, his pupils constricted, and in that heartbeat he looked less like the untouchable heir of House Bolton and more like a man dragged back into a memory he could not escape.
But then it was gone.
The mask slammed back into place, colder than before, his expression carved into steel. Yet that single, fleeting break had already betrayed him.
Theodore's gaze turned sharp, too sharp, as if her words had clawed into his chest and left something bleeding. He loathed weakness, but the way her voice clung to him—like a ghost whispering from the grave—unsettled him more than her fevered state ever could.
He leaned closer, his shadow falling over her frail body, his voice a low hiss that brushed her ear with venom and something she couldn't name.
"You should not be alive."
The words dripped like poison, yet behind them trembled an emotion he had buried so deep it frightened even him.
And then, as if fleeing his own weakness, Theodore turned sharply, his steps retreating into the dark, leaving Cassandra with nothing but her racing heartbeat and the unbearable weight of his gaze that still lingered, even in his absence.
----------
When Cassandra Bolton stirred awake, the first thing she felt was the cool press of a damp cloth against her fevered skin. Relief seeped into her burning body, and she instinctively leaned into the sensation, savoring the fleeting comfort. Slowly, her lashes fluttered open—and froze.
The man sitting at her bedside, one hand steady with the cold towel, was none other than Theodore Bolton. Her infamous big brother.
For a moment, she forgot to breathe. In all the scattered memories she inherited from the original Cassandra Bolton, this man was a ghost—a looming figure of indifference who never once turned back to look at his sister. He was cold, distant, and untouchable. And yet now, he sat here, cloaked in quiet authority, with a blanket tucked around her frail body as though… as though he cared.
Her heart skipped. This couldn't be real. Was she still dreaming? Or was this her greatest weakness—her secret brother complex—mocking her in the cruelest way?
Back in her past life, Cassandra Feng had begged heaven for a brother who would protect her, tease her, spoil her rotten. But she had died an orphan, wish unfulfilled. And now, in this twisted new life, she woke up with one—the very thing she had craved, in the most dangerous man of all: Theodore Bolton.
But why? Why the sudden change?
Her fever-hazed eyes studied him with a strange mixture of disbelief, wariness, and reluctant hope. He was close enough for her to reach out and touch, yet he felt like a stranger wearing the face of family.