When Trading Husbands Backfires on Her

On the same day, my older sister, Kelsey Shaw, and I marry into the Coyle Clan, a powerful clan of serpent shifters. Kelsey wants the prestigious title of Lady of the Clan, so she chooses to marry Zane Coyle, a powerful black serpent shifter. What she doesn't realize is that Zane cares about nothing but his own ambition. He neglects her, shuts her out, and even tries to hand her over to someone else in exchange for power and status. Meanwhile, Mike Coyle, the sickly white serpent shifter I marry, turns out to be fiercely devoted. His dormant power erupts in a second awakening, and during the Clan Trials, he slays Zane—who by then has risen to Clan Alpha. The day I become the new Lady of the Clan, Kelsey looks at me with resentment burning in her eyes and plunges a silver hairpin straight into my chest. When I open my eyes again, we're both back on the day we choose our husbands. This time, Kelsey beats me to it and chooses the white serpent shifter with limitless potential. I smile, completely unfazed. The truth is, neither the black serpent nor the white serpent is any good. Chapter 1 When Mom was pregnant, she saved the life of a serpent shifter who was also expecting. To repay the debt, the shifter sent our family a betrothal contract. As fate would have it, both women later gave birth to twins. The shifter was deeply grateful to Mom. On top of that, shifter clans regularly needed to introduce human blood into their bloodlines to keep their inner beasts from going feral. So, the clan asked for both my older sister, Kelsey Shaw, and me to marry in. On the day we were to choose our husbands, Dad laid two photos on the table in front of us and told us to decide. One showed Zane Coyle, a powerfully built shifter whose beast form was a black serpent. The other showed Mike Coyle, a pale, sickly shifter whose beast form was a white serpent. Dad had barely set the photos down before Kelsey snatched up Mike's. The corners of her mouth curled up slightly. She drew out her words on purpose, but she couldn't hide the joy underneath. "Kenzie, they say Zane is the one most likely to become the next Clan Alpha. He's the strongest and most gifted of them all. What a shame. If I didn't like Mike and his white serpent form so much, I would've taken Zane for myself." She tilted her chin up, giving me a look of open contempt, as though she'd been forced to give up something precious for my sake. "Kenzie, when you become the Lady of the Coyle Clan someday, don't forget me. I just handed you a straight shot to the top." I took my time picking up Zane's photo, lowering my gaze to hide the faint amusement in my eyes. … On our wedding day, Kelsey gathered up her skirt and hurried to catch up with me. She leaned close to my ear, her voice soft and warm despite the malice dripping from every word. "Kenzie, this time around, it's your turn to be a wife in name only. I wish you every happiness." I pushed her away and smiled, looking her over as she stood there, radiant in all her bridal finery. My dear sister. Even after five years at Coyle Manor, she was still as naive as a child. That place was a snake pit. How could anyone there be any good? Whenever Dad brought up the betrothal between my late mother and the Coyles, the smug calculation on his wrinkled face was impossible to miss. "Your mom got lucky back then," he would say. "She threw a fit and walked out on me, but who would've guessed she'd end up saving the Lady of the Coyle Clan? "The Coyles are one of the top ten shifter clans in the world. Once you two marry in, there'll be more money and power than you'll know what to do with. Don't forget your family when you get there." In our past life, Kelsey had been completely sold on Dad's words. She'd chosen her husband in her heart long before the photos were ever laid out on the table. She wanted Zane, the designated heir. Marrying him meant she'd be one step away from becoming Lady of the Clan. What she never considered was that Zane cared about nothing but his own ambition. There was no room in him for anything resembling love. No matter how much she flattered him or threw herself at him, he gave her nothing in return. As far as he was concerned, the training dummies in the yard were far more interesting than his wife. Once he became Clan Alpha, he traded her away without a second thought. At a banquet, he handed her over to another shifter clan in exchange for a contract the Coyles wanted. Meanwhile, after I married Mike, the two of us became the human-shifter couple the entire clan envied. He was romantic and attentive, openly affectionate with me in front of everyone and always surprising me with sweet little gestures. The clan wives teased us endlessly for being so lovey-dovey. Then came Mike's second awakening. At the Clan Trials, he killed Zane without breaking a sweat and declared himself the new Alpha on the spot. Kelsey was there that day. By then, Zane had already given her away to an eagle-shifter clan ranked a tier above the Coyles, where she'd endured endless torment before they finally sent her back. She'd convinced herself that even without her husband's affection, she was still the Lady of the Clan—respectable and enviable. However, when Mike killed Zane, she lost even that status. Across the crowd, her eyes locked onto mine, burning with fury and envy. I leaned against Mike, whose body was drenched in blood, fighting to keep myself from shaking. The coppery stench filled my nostrils. My head was too clouded to understand why she was glaring at me like that. I wasn't the one who had killed her husband. The day I tried on the Lady of the Clan gown, Kelsey, who had been recuperating in her own room, slipped into mine. She shoved me to the floor and yanked a sharp silver hairpin from her hair. "Kenzie Shaw, did you know all along that Mike would have a second awakening?" The silver hairpin pressed slowly against my vulnerable throat. In the fitting mirror, I could see her behind me. Her eyes were bloodshot with resentment. "You've never come out ahead of me since we were kids," she spat. "And you're not starting now. I'm the only one who can be Lady of the Coyle Clan!" I stared at my pale, vulnerable neck in the mirror, recalling how mercilessly Kelsey had stabbed me in our past life. A cold laugh escaped my lips. This time around, she'd chosen Mike, determined to be the one who came out on top. The only question was whether she could actually handle a twisted snake like him. Chapter 2 From the moment I stepped into the bridal suite, Zane spared me a single cold glance before ignoring me completely. He sat on the wide wedding bed and shifted into his beast form right there. The thick black serpent coiled himself into loop after loop until he filled the entire bed, then shut his eyes and sank into his training. Left with no choice, I lifted my veil myself and walked over to him in silence. Sensing my approach, the black serpent flicked his forked tongue with a hiss, though he still refused to open his eyes. I bent down, picked up the tip of his tail where it hung off the edge of the bed, and stroked it lightly until his eyes finally opened. He glared at me with slit pupils and jerked his tail back. "What do you think you're doing?" he snapped. I rolled my eyes inwardly, though outwardly, I put on a bashful expression. "Zane, we got married today, so of course we should… we should…" He shoved me back several steps with his tail, disgust written all over his face. "You sleep on the floor. Don't interrupt my training. I'm not like the lustful common snakes in this clan. That kind of thing doesn't interest me." "But…" With tears brimming in my eyes, I took a step forward. He immediately whipped his tail across my legs, hard enough to knock me to my knees. "Get out!" he roared, his temper snapping. "You married into this clan, so I'm the one you answer to now. You listen to me, and you do what I tell you. I'm going to make this clan the top clan in the world. You think I've got time for romantic crap?" With that, he wrapped his tail tightly around my waist and flung me out of the bridal suite. I landed on the hard floor, my waist aching from how tightly he'd squeezed me. I slowly pushed myself up against the wall. In my past life, I'd heard Kelsey was thrown out of the bridal suite just as fast. She was so furious that she actually stood outside, waiting for Zane to apologize and call her back in. However, he never apologized, and she stayed out there long enough for a passing servant to see her. By the next day, everyone at Coyle Manor knew she'd been kicked out of the bridal suite and that her husband didn't like her. For a long time after, it remained a running joke among the clan wives. Thinking back on that, I let out a heavy sigh. I hadn't realized Zane's distaste for women ran so deep. If I'd known, I would have just slept on the floor from the start. I rubbed my aching waist and stepped carefully back into the suite. Zane moved to fling me out again, but I spoke before he could. "I was wrong. I won't bother you while you're training anymore. Please don't kick me out." Once he saw I was actually behaving, he curled back up on the bed, closed his eyes, and went on with his training. … The next morning, the first ray of sunlight shone into the room. Zane exhaled a breath of stale air and shifted back into his human form on the bed. He looked more than satisfied when he saw that I really had made myself a bed on the floor. He changed his clothes and reached for the doorknob. Sensing his movements, I quickly pinched my palm hard and forced myself awake. "Zane, you need to come with me to the family banquet tonight." He frowned and turned around, puzzled. "I never go to those boring banquets. Can't you handle it yourself?" My eyes reddened as I looked up at him, putting on the most pitiful expression I could manage. "If you don't show up with me on the first day of our marriage, people will talk about both of us." He kept his hand on the doorknob. "Who cares?" "If they do, it could spill over into business. People will gossip about you. I know efficiency matters to you more than anything. If you come to the family banquet with me tonight, you can put an end to all of it once and for all." I looked up timidly at the tall man scowling down at me. His face was as dark as a storm cloud. "Two hours of keeping up appearances, and nobody in this clan will be able to find fault with your marriage and lecture you about it. Isn't that worth it?" He seemed to recall some unpleasant memories. His handsome face darkened another shade, but in the end, he nodded. The second he was gone, I sprawled out on the big bed. In my past life, I hadn't known much about what went on behind Kelsey's bedroom door, but whenever the clan wives got together, I always heard about how she'd gone to Zane's grandmother, Rosalind Coyle, again and again to complain that Zane refused to consummate their marriage. Every time Rosalind sat him down for a lecture, he'd stay away from home for ten days or even half a month. He was a serpent shifter born at the very pinnacle of power, yet he craved strength more than anyone else in the clan. He hated anything that wasted his time. … After going back to sleep for a while, I got myself ready and went to pay my respects to Rosalind. On my way back, I ran right into Kelsey and Mike. Their fingers were laced together, and she leaned against his arm, looking sweet and blissfully happy. She'd made a point of wearing a low-cut blue knit top, leaving a pink mark partly exposed on her bare collarbone. When she spotted me, she actually tugged her neckline down a little further and smirked, showing it off. I said nothing. In our past life, Kelsey had lived like a widow—with sorrow and resentment etched deep into her face. I'd had no idea she could be so bold and uninhibited. Mike saw what she was doing and pinched her cheek indulgently. His eyes were soft with tenderness. Then, his gaze swept over to me. "Didn't Zane come with you?" I forced a smile, fighting to keep my body from shaking. "Zane is busy with work. He couldn't spare the time." Something shifted in Mike's eyes at once, and I knew I'd hit a nerve. Mike and Zane were twins, but Mike had been born frail. He couldn't push himself too hard, and his gift fell far short of Zane's, so he'd spent his whole life envying his brother. He wanted to run the clan's company, and he wanted to join the hunts himself, but his body couldn't handle either one. That was why he resented Zane so fiercely, simply for having a healthy body. I watched Mike walk off with his arm around Kelsey and couldn't help but sigh. Maybe the seeds of his twisted nature had been planted the moment he was born. Fed on envy, they had grown into a sprawling tree that no one could ever cut down.