Chapter 2: The Past That Isn't Mine

Ezra lay frozen in Joshua V. Kwon’s grip.

His body was wrapped tightly around hers like both armor and restraint—his arm heavy across her waist, his bare chest pressed against her back, and the unbearable heat of his presence seeping through the thin layers between their skin. His breath brushed along her nape with a steady rhythm, the calmness of his sleep taunting her with indifference. There was no sign of the man who had just invaded her space and stolen her breath with a kiss that tasted like war. No flicker of the storm behind those cold eyes. He slept like a beast at rest—calm only because he had already taken what he wanted.

But Ezra didn’t sleep.

She stared into the darkness, every nerve in her body awake and pulsing. Her lips still ached from the violent kiss he had forced on her, raw with the memory of his mouth devouring hers without permission or warning. There had been no tenderness, no hesitation. Only power. Domination. A silent command that told her exactly where she stood in this twisted reality—beneath him.

And yet… her skin still burned. Her heartbeat wouldn’t slow.

It wasn’t just the kiss. It was the storm of memories that had come crashing into her mind the moment her eyes closed. Violent, fragmented images she couldn’t place but felt in her bones. A broken mirror reflecting her face, lips curled into a cruel smirk. Screams echoing through locked doors. Cold hands covered in blood. A voice—hers, yet not—laughing as someone fell to their knees.

Ezra’s stomach twisted violently.

> This isn’t a nightmare. This isn’t some hallucination.

I’ve transmigrated—again. Not into someone new… but into the past. Into her. A version of me I buried. A version I swore I’d never become.

And now I’m trapped in her body. Her story. Her marriage to a man who doesn’t love, only claims.

Joshua V. Kwon.

The coldest legend in uniform. A man made of war and rules… and rage.

He kissed me like he owned me. Like he didn’t care who I really was—as long as I bent to his touch.

She turned slightly, carefully, to look at him.

Even in sleep, Joshua was dangerously beautiful. The lines of his face were sharp and cruel, kissed by moonlight leaking through the sheer curtains. A faint scar dragged across his jaw like an artist’s final stroke. He didn’t look peaceful. He looked like a king resting after a massacre. The kind who dreamed not of peace—but of conquest.

Ezra’s jaw clenched.

> He thinks I’m still her. The old Ezra. The villainess who burned people for fun and whispered poison into noble ears.

Maybe he wants to punish her. Maybe that kiss was the start.

But I’m not her. Not anymore. And I won’t let him use me to kill her ghosts.

Her fingers curled slowly into the sheet beneath them, nails digging deep. Her blood boiled with fury and something hotter—shame, perhaps, for how her body had betrayed her. For how his touch made her tremble even in hate.

And then—impulse struck.

She shifted slowly, pretending to adjust in sleep, until her face hovered close to his. His lips were slightly parted. Calm. Relaxed. So unaware.

She leaned in, eyes narrowed with quiet rage, and bit him.

Hard.

Joshua jerked in his sleep, a sharp grunt escaping his throat as he stirred, hand gripping her waist tighter by reflex. His brow twitched. His lips bled—just a little. Just enough.

Ezra didn’t move.

She held his gaze for a breathless second as his eyes fluttered open halfway—hazy, disoriented, but dark with warning.

She smiled, just barely. A ghost of a grin, sharp as glass.

“Sleep tight, husband,” she whispered, voice low, venomous.

Then she turned away and shut her eyes—pretending, flawlessly, to sleep.

Let him wonder.

Let him taste his own blood and question what kind of woman now lay in his bed.

Because if Joshua V. Kwon thought he could control her with brute force and cold kisses, he was about to learn a new kind of war—one fought in silence, in shadows, and behind a sweet smile that bit back.

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