Your Cruelty Was My Paycheck

I had been trapped in this twisted nightmare of a novel for three years. Id been broken, humiliated, and tormented by Damian Cross exactly ninety-nine times, yet the progress bar for my mission was stuck at 99.999%.

So, I decided to stop trying. I checked out. I went completely, blissfully rogue.

At the charity gala, LydiaDamians "Untouchable Muse," the woman hed spent years mourning before she suddenly reappearedaccused me of stealing her heirloom diamond necklace. Again. It was a tired script.

Instead of crying or pleading my innocence like I usually did, I simply unzipped my designer gown and let it pool at my feet right there in the middle of the ballroom.

"Go ahead," I said, standing there in nothing but my skin and defiance. "Search me. Check every inch."

Damian looked like hed been struck by lightning. His composure shattered, he lunged forward, frantically wrapping his tuxedo jacket around me, his hands shaking.

Lydia stood trembling, her eyes brimming with calculated tears. Damian turned on me, his face a mask of cold fury. "Stop these pathetic theatrics, Sophie. If you pull a stunt like this again, Ill throw you off the balcony myself."

I didn't hesitate. I turned and sprinted toward the terrace.

"Great idea! Lets save you the trouble," I shouted over my shoulder.

I swung a leg over the marble railing. Damians face went white. He tackled me back onto the stone floor, pinning me there as if I were a wild animal he couldn't comprehend.

That night, Lydia came down with a minor fever. I didn't wait for his orders. I stayed up all night, calling every top-tier surgeon in the tri-state area.

"Doctor," I said, my voice eerily calm as I stood in the hospital hallway the next morning. "Im here to donate my kidney. When can we start the surgery?"

The specialist pushed up his glasses, looking at me as if Id lost my mind. "Ma'am, the patient has a common cold. A mild viral infection. She doesn't need a transplant."

I stood there, feeling a genuine, crushing wave of disappointment. "Oh. Just a cold? Are you sure? What about a liver lobe? Or my corneas? Surely she needs something."

Behind me, Damians shadow loomed. He grabbed my wrist, his grip like a vice. "Sophie Knight! Have you finally lost it?"

I turned to him, my eyes wide and sincere. "Im serious, Damian. I want to give her whatever she needs. If not today, then eventually, right? Isn't that what youve been planning for three years? To harvest me piece by piece for her?"

Damians chest heaved. He looked like he was about to have a stroke.

Lydia leaned against the pillows, looking like a tragic Victorian waif. "Damian, its my fault. If I weren't so fragile, Sophie wouldn't be acting like this..."

"Its not your fault," Damian murmured, his voice softening instantly for her. Then, he whipped his head back to me, his eyes spitting ice. "What kind of game is this? You think by playing the martyr, Ill suddenly feel sorry for you? Let me be clear: I will never love you."

I stared at him, but my mind was miles away, flickering through the fragments of my real life.

I was an interloper here. A system had plucked me out of my world and dropped me into this "Angst-Fest" novel. The deal was simple: reach 100% "Cruelty Value," and Id receive two billion dollars andmore importantlymy mothers terminal lung cancer would be cured back in reality.

So, I had played the part of the tragic wife.

When I accidentally spilled wine on Lydias dress, Damian locked me in the wine cellar for three days without light. When Lydia claimed she felt "anemic," he forced me to donate blood while I was delirious with a 103-degree fever. When she whispered that my architectural designs looked "familiar," he personally shredded six months of my hard work.

But after three years of hell, the meter was stuck at 99.999%. That last 0.001% was more elusive than a winning Powerball ticket. I was exhausted. My soul was frayed at the edges.

Damian glared at me, giving his final warning. "Sophie, if you don't start behaving, I will make you regret the day you met me."

I felt a surge of pure, unadulterated joy. Yes. Here comes the angst.

I grabbed his hand, tears spilling over on cue. "Damian, please! Im not playing. Tell me what I did wrong. Ive given you three years. Ive given you everything! Why can't you just love me?"

He sneered, ripping his hand away as if my touch burned him. "You think you can even be mentioned in the same breath as Lydia? She is the sun, Sophie. Youre just the dirt we walk on. Know your place."

I wiped my face, nodding slowly. "I see. Im just the placeholder. The joke in your epic love story. Fine. Ill go out to the gravel driveway and kneel until youre satisfied with my penance."

Damian frowned, a flicker of confusion crossing his face, but he didn't stop me.

The driveway was sharp, jagged crushed stone. I knelt there for three hours. The rocks sliced through my leggings and into my skin. Blood mixed with the grit.

Then, the sky broke. A typical East Coast torrential downpour. I was soaked to the bone within seconds, my body shaking with a deep, bone-deep chill.

Finally, my strength gave out. As I collapsed onto the wet stones, I whispered into my mind, System... please. Im literally bleeding in a storm. Give me that 0.001%.

The System was silent for a long time. Then, a cold, mechanical voice echoed: Mission progress: 99.9999%.

My brain felt like mush. How many zeros is that now?

Four zeros after the decimal.

The world went black. Id seen fewer zeros on a billionaire's bank statement.

Word reached me that Lydia fainted when she saw me passed out in a pool of blood and rainwater. Apparently, she "accidentally" hit her head on a marble vanity, aggravating an old injury. Now, she supposedly needed a corneal transplant.

"Sophie," she whimpered from her bed when I was brought into her room, "I know you didn't mean for this to happen... but my eyes hurt so much. The doctors say if they don't find a donor soon, Ill be blind forever."

Damian loomed over my bed. I was still shaking from the fever, but his voice was like a whip. "This is on you, Sophie! If you hadn't been throwing a tantrum in the driveway, she wouldn't have been distressed enough to fall. The tests say youre a perfect match. Youre giving her your corneas. Now."

I sat up so fast I nearly got vertigo. "Really? A perfect match? Right now?"

Damians brow furrowed. He expected a fight, a scream, a plea for mercy. "Don't play dumb. This is the debt you owe her. There is no negotiation."

Lydia grabbed his sleeve, her voice trembling. "Damian, don't force her. If Sophie doesn't want to... Ill just live in the dark. Its okay."

"No," Damian barked. "Your sight is everything. She will do it."

I swung my legs out of bed. "Wheres the surgeon? Do we do this now? Do I need to sign a waiver? Give me the pen!"

Damian grabbed my shoulders, staring into my eyes as if trying to find the hidden trap. "What are you planning, Sophie? Is this some new way to get my attention? You think if you go blind for me, Ill finally care? I won't."

I shook him off. "Im not planning anything. I genuinely want to do it. Its a mitzvah, Damian. Bringing light to Lydias world? Its the most meaningful thing Ive done in three years."

I actually ran toward the door, shouting for a nurse. Damian caught me by the waist and threw me back onto the mattress.

"Sophie! Be goddamn normal for once!"

I rubbed my bruised arm. "You want my eyes, Im giving you my eyes! Why are you stopping me?"

Lydias sobbing intensified. "Sophie, do you hate me that much? Are you doing this just to make Damian feel guilty? To make it look like Im a monster?"

"I am not!" I yelled. "I am being incredibly sincere! Let's go! Cut them out!"

I tried to get up again, but Damian pinned me down, his face inches from mine. "You pathetic woman. You think I don't see through you? You want me to feel a shred of remorse, to pity you. Well, its not happening. Even if youre blind, I will still despise you!"

He had said these words a thousand times. He had broken my heart a thousand ways.

But this time, I felt a surge of adrenaline. This was it. This was the peak angst I needed.

I let my eyes well up with tears. "Damian... is that all I am to you? A monster? I just want to make things right. I just want her to be okay. Why won't you believe me?"

Damian let out a harsh, mocking laugh. "Believe you? Youre a manipulator, Sophie. Its all you know how to do."

I screamed in frustration, grabbed a paring knife from the fruit basket on the nightstand, and pressed the blade against my cheek, just below my eye.

"I am not lying! If my eyes are what it takes to save her, Ill do it myself!"

Damian and Lydia froze. They hadn't expected me to actually draw blood.

Damian lunged for the knife, his face filled with a sudden, jarring terror. "Sophie, stop! Are you insane?"

The blade sliced a jagged red line from my cheekbone to my temple. Blood erupted, warm and thick, blurring my vision as it poured down my face.

The blood was iron and salt in my mouth. Security guards pinned me to the bed while a doctor rushed in.

System, I screamed internally. Look at this! Im literally disfigured! Whats the count?

There was a pause. +0.00005. Current progress: 99.99996%.

I started laughinga jagged, hysterical sound that echoed through the sterile room. Ninety-nine-six. The universe was a cruel accountant.

Images of the last three years flashed before my eyes like a mocking highlight reel.

When I first arrived, Damian hadn't been a monster. Not yet.

He used to pick me up from my studio at midnight with a container of my favorite takeout. When my seasonal allergies flared up, hed cancel his board meetings just to sit by my bed and apply cool compresses to my forehead. He once bought a small, hidden cottage in the countryside because Id mentioned I loved the smell of wild jasmine. He took me there on my birthday and promised hed watch the flowers bloom with me every year.

Back then, I was a fool. I almost forgot I was in a tragedy. I almost forgot my role.

Then Lydia came back, and the "plot" took over.

If Lydia didn't like the soup I made, hed throw the boiling pot at me, scalding my arms. If she lost a bracelet, hed lock me in the crawlspace for forty-eight hours. If she felt faint, hed drag me to the clinic to pump a pint of my blood into her veins.

I knew this was the script. I knew I had to endure it. But the fact that it was stalling at the very end was driving me to the brink.

I forced myself out of bed, needing to wash the blood from my face, when I heard voices from the private lounge attached to my suite. It was Damian and Lydia.

"Damian," Lydia whispered, her voice devoid of its usual tremor. "Aren't we taking this a bit far? Sophie clearly loves you. She knelt in the rain, she let herself get burned, shes even willing to give up her sight. We don't need to keep testing her."

Damians voice was casual, almost bored. "She loves me. Thats obvious. But theres one last threshold. If shes willing to actually give her life for me, then Ill know her devotion is absolute. Once she proves that, Ill stop. Ill settle down and be a real husband to her."

My heart stopped. Then it shattered.

It was all a test.

He wasn't some tortured hero driven by a tragic past. He was a sociopath using my heart as a lab rat. Every scar, every tear, every ounce of blood Id shedit wasn't because he hated me. It was because he wanted to see how much Id take before I broke. He wanted to be a god in my eyes.

The progress bar was stuck because his "cruelty" wasn't fueled by malice, but by a sick, twisted vanity.

The System hissed in my ear. That disgusting piece of work. I thought there was a glitch in my sensors. Hes been treating your soul like a stress test. Im actually nauseous.

My fingers curled around the fruit knife again.

Host! Don't! the System screamed. The sunk-cost is too high! If you kill yourself now, we lose everything! Your mother dies!

I stared at the door, my eyes cold. Im not going to kill myself. Im going to kill him.

But they were gone by the time I reached the lounge.

I crawled back into bed, my body aching, my mind on fire.

Host, listen to me, the System pleaded. He wants a life-and-death proof of love? Fine. Give it to him. Lean into the drama. Let him think hes won, get the points, and then we get the hell out of here. Don't let him actually win.

I took a deep breath, forcing my heart rate to slow. Fine. If he wanted a grand finale, Id give him an Oscar-winning performance.

A week later, I was "discharged." As I pulled up to the Cross estate, I saw orange light flickering against the night sky.

The mansion was on fire.

Lydia ran to me, grabbing my arms, her face smeared with soot. "Sophie! Damian... he went back in! He went back for your wedding rings! The fire is too fast, he hasn't come out! What do we do?"

I looked past her. There were three professional-grade fire engines parked in the back of the property, hidden by the hedges. The "fire" was a controlled burn on the east wing.

He was so predictable.

But I played my part. I let my face go pale, my breath hitching in a sob. "What? Damian! No! He... he really does love me."

I sprinted into the house. The foyer was empty, filled with thick, theatrical smoke. I ignored the ground floor and ran to the second story, where the fire was actually starting to catch for real. I burst into the master bedroom and found the rings in the nightstand.

Three years of marriage, and wed barely worn them. Damian was really committed to this production.

I grabbed the rings, but instead of leaving, I slammed the bedroom door and locked it from the inside. Then, I threw open the heavy French windows.

The sudden influx of oxygen turned the controlled fire into a literal inferno. The curtains ignited instantly. Thick, black smoke began to fill the room, searing my lungs.

I leaned out the window and saw Damian standing on the lawn, looking up.

I dialed up the desperation. My eyes were red from the smoke, my voice a ragged scream. "Damian! I have them! I have the rings! As long as youre safe, nothing else matters!"

I sounded like a woman staring into the abyss of her own death.

Lydia was down there, jumping up and down. "Damian! Send someone in! Shes not going to make it!"

Damian glanced at the growing flames, his expression terrifyingly calm. "Relax. The walls are lined with fire-retardant foam. It won't actually spread. The trucks are right there. Lets give her one more minute. I want to see if she tries to save herself first or if she stays for the rings."

Inside, the heat was becoming unbearable. The "retardant" foam was melting, releasing toxic fumes. My vision began to swim. I collapsed by the window, clutching the rings to my chest, my lungs screaming for air.

A minute passed. Then two.

Suddenly, I heard heavy boots thundering down the hall. Damians voice, now genuinely panicked, echoed through the door. "Sophie! Open the door! Sophie, Im coming in!"

He kicked the door, but Id jammed the antique lock.

The world began to fade into a dull gray. My heart slowed. And then, a chime rang in my headthe most beautiful sound Id ever heard.

Detection: Male Lead experiencing maximum levels of regret and existential terror. Mission Progress: 100%! Initiating immediate extraction from the World of Suffering. Returning to Reality.

I let out a soft, wheezing laugh. My grip on the rings loosened as the light finally took me.