Louise gasped, her lungs filling with air that tasted distinctly like... nothing.
Wait a minute.
Do dead people breathe?
"Aren't I supposed to be dead?" Louise murmured, patting her chest. "Or did the doctors actually save me? If they did, I hope they didn't cut my shirt. It was on sale, but still."
She tried to move her legs and realized she wasn't in a hospital bed. She was floating. In a void. A very sparkly, very beige void.
"The bad news is, yes, you are definitely dead," an elegant voice chimed in, sounding like wind chimes made of diamonds. "The good news is, death is less of a full stop and more of a semicolon. Grammatically speaking."
Louise whipped her head around—relieved to find she still had a head.
Standing beside her was a woman who made supermodels look like potato sacks. She wore a robe woven from actual moonlight, and her hair flowed upward, defying gravity like a majestic silver waterfall. Her eyes held the entire cosmos, swirling with nebulae and judgment.
"Who are you?" Louise squeaked. "The Grim Reaper? You've had a makeover."
The woman chuckled, a sound that vibrated in Louise's soul. "People call me the Moon Goddess. Though, honestly, the branding has suffered lately. Teenagers these days are more into vampires."
Louise's jaw dropped.
She had prayed to the Moon Goddess every full moon since she was a pup. She always assumed it was like writing letters to Santa—therapeutic, but ultimately futile.
"Hello, Moon... uh, Your Moon-ness," Louise stammered, doing an awkward little bow while floating horizontally. "I'm a big fan. Huge. I love what you've done with the tides."
The Moon Goddess smiled, reaching out to pinch Louise's cheek. "Oh, aren't you a delightful little thing. I do apologize for the abrupt exit from your life. I admit, my oversight." Her expression shifted to a gentle scolding. "But really, child? Why did you marry that waste of carbon instead of waiting for the Fated Mate I spent decades designing for you?"
Louise winced. "To be fair, he wasn't a waste of carbon when I met him. He was more like... a recycling bin of potential. I didn't know he was a jerk."
"I gave you intuition!" The Goddess threw her hands up. "That gut feeling? That was me screaming, 'Run, girl, run!'"
"I thought that was indigestion," Louise muttered. "So, who was I supposed to marry?"
"An absolute alpha specimen," the Goddess drawled, her eyes twinkling. "Handsome, wealthy, brilliant, a bit of a drama queen, but devoted to the bone."
For a split second, Andy Finch's face—smirking, arrogant, and infuriatingly handsome—popped into Louise's mind.
No, she told herself firmly. The Goddess said "devoted," not "professional bully."
"Is it Richard from Accounting?" Louise asked hopefully.
The Goddess gave her a withering look. "Louise, aim higher. But I can't give you a name. GDPR rules. General Divine Privacy Regulations."
"But I'm dead!" Louise protested, pouting. "Don't I get a spoiler alert?"
"If you were staying dead, sure," the Moon Goddess said, checking her nails, which were painted with literal stardust. "But you, my dear, are being sent back. You're being rebooted."
"Rebooted?" Louise blinked. "Like a computer?"
"Like a Phoenix. But less fiery, more wolf-y."
Louise clapped her hands together. "Oh! Is this because of my prayers? Did I accumulate enough loyalty points?"
"Ah..." The Goddess looked awkward, shifting her weight. "Well, I wish I could take credit. But the truth is, the werewolf population has exploded. Billions of you. My inbox is a nightmare. I haven't checked my voicemails since the 90s."
"Oh," Louise deflated. "So, I'm a glitch?"
"No, you're a beneficiary," the Moon Goddess corrected. "You aren't being reborn because of me. You're being reborn because your Fated Mate—the one you ignored—just broke about fifty laws of physics to save you."
"He... what?"
"He activated a time-reversal device," the Goddess explained casually, as if discussing a microwave. "Cost him a fortune. And likely his sanity."
"Time-reversal?" Louise frowned. She remembered a meeting at Moonlit Tech years ago. Project Chronos. She thought it was a joke.
"So, this mystery man loves me enough to turn back time?" Louise whispered, touching her heart. "How did he even know I died?"
"He's been watching you," the Moon Goddess said softly. "Always watching. Always waiting. That's all I can say."
Louise felt a pang of guilt. Whoever this man was, she had broken his heart by marrying David, and yet he had moved heaven and earth to save her.
"Now, pay attention, adorable one," the Goddess snapped her fingers. "There are Rules. The Universe hates a paradox, so we have to be careful."
"I'm listening."
"Rule Number One: You are going back seven years. No more, no less."
Louise groaned. "Seven years? I was already with David! We were engaged! Can't you send me back ten years? I'd really like to not date him at all."
"Sorry. Seven years is the limit of the spell," the Goddess shrugged. "As for the man you hate... just dump him." A mischievous, slightly wicked glint flickered in her starry eyes. "Or... don't just dump him. Don't you want revenge?"
"Revenge?" Louise blinked. "I was thinking I'd just... break up with him via text. Or maybe post a really unflattering photo of him on Facebook."
The Moon Goddess laughed, a sound like thunder wrapped in velvet. "Oh, honey. You are too kind. Let me introduce you to Rule Number Two: The Conservation of Fate."
"That sounds like math," Louise warned. "I'm bad at math."
"It means Fate is a zero-sum game," the Goddess explained, leaning in close. "Misfortune has to go somewhere. The cancer? The bad luck? The premature death? That energy has been generated. If you don't want it to hit you again, someone else has to take the hit."
Louise's eyes widened. The realization dawned on her slowly, then all at once.
"So... if I want to be healthy," Louise whispered, "someone else has to be sick?"
"Exactly," the Moon Goddess smirked. "And I think you know two people who are very deserving of some bad karma. Perhaps a cheating husband and a backstabbing sister?"
A chill ran down Louise's spine—not of fear, but of excitement. She didn't just have a second chance. She had a weapon.
"I can transfer my bad luck to them?"
"Think of it as re-gifting," the Goddess winked. "But there is a catch. Rule Number Three: No one else will remember this future. Not David, not Natalie..."
"What about my Fated Mate?" Louise asked quickly. "The one who saved me?"
The Moon Goddess's face softened with pity. "Especially him. The spell consumes the memory of the caster. He won't know he saved you. He won't know he loves you. To him, you'll just be the girl who got away."
Louise felt a heavy weight in her chest. "That's not fair. He saved me, and he won't even know it?"
"That is the price of magic, dear."
"Then I'll make him know," Louise vowed, her small hands curling into fists. "I'll find him. I'll figure out who he is, and I'll make him fall in love with me again. And I will make David and Natalie pay for every tear I cried."
"That's the spirit," the Moon Goddess beamed, looking like a proud mother. "Go get 'em, wolf."
"Wait! How do I find him?" Louise yelled as the void started to spin.
"Look for the purple tulips!" The Goddess shouted, her voice fading as she became transparent. "And Louise? Try to have some fun this time!"
"Tulips? What tulips?"
But it was too late. The Goddess snapped her fingers.
The beige void dissolved instantly. The silence was replaced by the hum of computers, the ring of telephones, and the smell of cheap office coffee.
"Louise? Earth to Louise. Did you hear what I said?"
Louise blinked, her vision blurry. She wasn't floating anymore. She was sitting in a swivel chair.
She looked up.
Standing right in front of her, holding a stack of files, was David.
He looked younger. His skin was smoother, his stomach flatter, and he wore that fake, endearing smile she used to love.
But Louise didn't see a husband.
She saw the man who stood by and watched her bleed out. She saw the foot that didn't move to help her. She felt the phantom pain of her skull cracking against the nightstand.
"Babe?" David leaned in closer, reaching out to touch her shoulder. "Are you okay?"
Terror, cold and primal, seized Louise's heart.
"AAAAHHH!"
Louise screamed—a high-pitched, blood-curdling shriek that shattered the office calm.
She scrambled backward, kicking her feet. Her swivel chair spun wildly, launching her out of it.
"Don't touch me! Don't kill me!" she yelled, her brain not yet processing the time travel, only the threat.
"Louise?!" David recoiled, dropping the files. Papers scattered everywhere like snow.
Louise didn't wait. She scrambled to her feet, her heart hammering against her ribs like a trapped bird. She had to run. She had to get away from the murderer.
She spun around and bolted toward the exit, eyes wide with panic, not looking where she was going.
She rounded the corner of the cubicle row at full speed and—
WHAM.
She slammed into a wall. A very hard, very warm wall that smelled of expensive sandalwood and pine.
"Oof!" a deep male voice grunted.
The impact was catastrophic. Louise bounced off the solid chest, her feet tangling with the stranger's long legs.
Gravity took over.
They went down in a heap of limbs and fabric.
THUD.
Louise landed hard on her back, the wind knocked out of her. A heavy weight landed on top of her, pinning her to the carpet.
For a moment, the entire office went silent. You could hear a pin drop. Or a career ending.
Louise groaned, opening her eyes.
Hovering inches above her face was a pair of piercing blue eyes. They were framed by thick lashes and set in a face that was annoyingly symmetrical.
It was Andy Finch.
Her boss. The Billionaire. The Alpha.
He was hovering over her in a push-up position, his arms bracing himself on either side of her head to avoid crushing her. His tie dangled, brushing against her nose.
He didn't look amused. He looked shocked, and perhaps a little bit intrigued.
"Mrs.Salinger," Andy drawled, his voice deep and vibrating through her chest where they were pressed together. "I know the employee handbook encourages close collaboration, but I believe this is considered... aggressive tackling."
Louise lay there, paralyzed, staring up at the man she had spent years avoiding, her legs tangled with his, her heart racing for an entirely different reason now.
She had just time-traveled, screamed at her husband—no, fiancé, and tackled the CEO to the floor.
"I..." Louise squeaked, her face turning the color of a ripe tomato. "I... nice tie?"