The Villainess Rewrites Her Redemption

I threw my arms around his waist, clinging to him for dear life. "No!" I cried out. "I won't let you leave!" Christian stiffened. Yet his voice came out completely detached. "Why not? After all, I was just a dare you took when you lost a game, wasn't I?" How did he know that? Had he known all along? Guilt seized me, forcing my gaze to the floor. I couldn't bear to meet his eyes. My silence was an admission. Christian gave a soft, broken laugh. "You won your bet." "Why do you still need me around? So I can keep begging at your feet like a dog?" "I'm tired, Amanda. I'm sick of rich kids and your cruel little games." "I just regret ever falling for you." Before I could find my voice, he pulled away and walked down the hallway. His retreating back looked so desolate and utterly shattered. The senior, whose face was already swelling with nasty bruises, actually had the nerve to crawl off the bed and whine. "Amanda, he hit me so hard. How about a kiss to make it better?" "Get the hell away from me!" I couldn't hold back my spoiled temper anymore. I spun around and slapped him across the face with everything I had. "If you breathe a single word about tonight to anyone, I swear to God you'll regret it." He rubbed his stinging cheek and backed off without another word. God, but what about Christian? Was he really done with me? A cold ache clenched in my chest. In the original storyline, Evelyn had warned him countless times to stay away from a spoiled brat like me, but he had refused to listen. She was probably the one who saw me check into this hotel and tipped him off. I silently thanked whatever divine force was watching over me that I had awakened before crossing the point of no return. If I had actually slept with that guy, Christian's pride would have never allowed him to look at me again, no matter how much he loved me. That very night, I went looking for Christian's place. After asking several classmates, one of his close friends finally gave me an address, though he hesitated visibly. "Look, Amanda, I know you're some rich heiress none of us can mess with," his friend warned quietly, eyeing me with suspicion. "But since you dragged Christian into your life, the least you could do is treat him decently. He's had a really, really rough life." I nodded frantically, my eyes stinging. Had I truly been that terrible to him in the past? I hurried to the address. When I arrived, the sight took my breath away. The neighborhood was pure urban decay. Down a crumbling, narrow alley, a drunk sprawled on the pavement grabbed at my coat, slurring crude jokes. Swallowing my revulsion, I navigated the maze of broken pavement until I reached an apartment building that looked like it might collapse at any second. Standing outside the peeling door, I hesitated, unsure if I should knock. Suddenly, the crash of shattering glass echoed from inside, making me jump. "You ungrateful little bastard! I raised you all these years, and you won't even give your old man a few bucks?" "Always fighting me, huh? I'll beat you to death!" Before I could react, the door flew open. A heavy stench of stale tobacco hit me like a wall. A greasy, middle-aged man in his late forties stared at me under the flickering hallway light, making my stomach turn. "Well, look at that. Never seen a girl this pretty around here. How much for a night, sweet cheeks? Guess coming home was worth it after all." He grabbed my wrist, trying to haul me inside. I struggled frantically, screaming at him to let go. This couldn't be Christian's home. I had to have the wrong place. Then my eyes met a familiar, cold pair of eyes inside the dingy living room. Christian was standing there, his lip split and bleeding, his arms covered in dark, ugly bruises. "What happened to you?" I cried out, breaking free and rushing to his side, panic flooding my veins. "We need to get you to the ER!" The older man seemed to put two and two together. "Oh, so you're my boy's little plaything! Moving up in the world, aren't you, boy? Bringing home prime meat like this. Takes after his old man! But hey, since you're already sleeping with him, you won't mind spending a night with his dad, right?" "And for free, too. Damn, talk about hitting the jackpot." I instinctively shrank behind Christian. Like a wounded, cornered beast, Christian shielded me with his body, his voice dropping into a dangerous, lethal growl at his father. "Touch her, and I swear I will kill you." "You insolent brat! Talking back to your own father? You asking to die?" Terror paralyzed me. I watched in horror as the man snatched up a wooden stool and charged forward, swinging it straight toward Christian's skull. Christian didn't even flinch. He didn't even try to dodge. Without thinking, I threw myself across him. The blow struck my back. As darkness swallowed my vision, the last thing I heard was Christian's raw, agonizing scream, and a wild, fleeting thought crossed my fading mind: "Does this mean you forgive me now?" I never got the chance to ask.

I ended up in the hospital. For an entire month, Christian never showed up. Unable to bear the silence any longer, I broke down and asked my best friend, Chloe. Chloe sighed, her expression grim. "Amanda... Christian stabbed his dad to protect you. He's sitting in a holding cell right now, facing felony charges. The university found out, and they're expelling him." What?! Panic surged through me. I ripped the IV needle right out of my hand, blood smearing my skin as I tried to scramble out of bed. It was all my fault. If not for me, his life wouldn't be spiraling into ruin. In the original book, he had a brilliant future with Evelyn. He was supposed to build a multi-million-dollar company and become a brilliant, celebrated tech prodigy. I shouldn't have been so selfish. I shouldn't have tried to alter his destiny just because I couldn't bear to let go of his love. Tears blurred my sight as I wept uncontrollably. "Chloe, it's my fault... I ruined him." Chloe gently wiped my tears away with a tissue. "This isn't on you, Amanda. How could you have known his family was that messed up?" I shook my head violently. "No, Chloe, you don't get it. I'm his curse! The story says he's only supposed to find his bright future after he completely abandons me. It's because I held on... because I wouldn't let him go that this happened!" Chloe stared at me intently. "Amanda, I don't believe in fate, and neither do you. Nothing is written in stone. If you don't like how things are going, you fight to change them." Her words hit me like a bolt of lightning. She was right. If my consciousness hadn't awakened, I would have walked blindly into a tragic end and deserved every bit of it. But I already knew the pitfalls ahead. I had the power to rewrite my own ending. Sitting here crying like a helpless victim wouldn't fix anything. I needed to pour every resource I had into changing our story. I immediately called my older brother and demanded he hire the absolute best criminal defense attorney in the country for Christian. Next, I called my dad, ordering him to leverage his status as the university's largest donor to pressure the administration into dropping the expulsion. I made sure there wouldn't be a single black mark left on Christian's academic record. Finally, I begged the doctors to discharge me and, with Chloe supporting my arm, rushed straight to the police precinct. There, in the grim visiting room, I saw Christian looking utterly defeated. The moment his eyes met mine, a flicker of light flashed across his gaze, only for him to quickly look away. "What are you doing here?" I swallowed the lump in my throat. "I came to see you." He squeezed his eyes shut, his voice dripping with self-hatred. "You shouldn't have. I wanted to kill that monster for years anyway. It has nothing to do with you, so don't feel guilty. And stop wasting your time on me... Someone like me isn't good enough for you." "Christian... oh, Christian." I remembered how he had worked three part-time jobs for months just to buy me a decent birthday gift, only for the old me to mockingly toss it into the trash. I remembered how, on a pouring rainy night, I complained about feeling sick, and he spent days' worth of wages on an expensive Uber across the entire city just to bring me soup—only for it to turn out to be a cruel prank. I remembered being drunk at a VIP club with my wealthy friends, putting him on speakerphone and humiliating him so everyone could laugh at my "loyal little dog." Even then, he had never walked away. He had never once said he wasn't good enough. The truth was, I was the one who was never good enough for him. The old Amanda—petty, selfish, toying with genuine hearts like cheap playthings—had never deserved a shred of real love. Memories of my past cruelty flashed before my eyes, tearing at my soul. My voice trembled. "Christian." "Yeah?" He kept his eyes closed, like a condemned man awaiting his final sentence from the universe. "You have always been good enough for me. Always. The only thing I will never regret in this life is falling in love with you." "My only regret is that I didn't give you my whole heart from the very start." Christian's eyes snapped open. He stared at me in complete disbelief, his breath catching in his throat. "Don't worry," I said fiercely, locking my eyes onto his. "I won't let that monster destroy your future. I'm going to get you out, I'm going to protect you, and I'm going to make sure you become the person you were always meant to be." "Do you trust me?" After laying my bare feelings out in the open, my heart hammered against my ribs, waiting for his verdict. I watched his lips, desperate for an answer. "I trust you," he whispered. A tear slipped down his cheek, followed by the faint, tremulous curve of a smile.

I had assumed Evelyn would swoop in to play the savior while Christian was at his lowest. Strangely, she vanished completely. Christian had always been the star of our campus—the brilliant, brooding scholar on a full academic ride. He and Evelyn had consistently traded the spots for class rank one and two. She was head over heels for him, and everyone saw them as the campus's golden couple waiting to happen. Naturally, my twisted, competitive nature had flared up back then. I had wanted to pluck that untouchable flower from the mountaintop. I wanted to see that crisp white shirt stained with human desire. I wanted those aloof, icy eyes to look only at me, to soften with longing, to hear him whisper my name with raw emotion. So when I lost that game of Truth or Dare, I took full advantage of it. I had fallen for Christian from the very start; I was just too proud to admit it. In my spoiled, privileged mind, my attention was an honor he should have been groveling for. I purposely started frequenting the small campus coffee shop where he worked. Eventually, I pulled strings to get a part-time shift there too. To my surprise, he recognized me immediately. I had just batted my lashes and smiled. "What, rich girls aren't allowed to work customer service?" At first, he gave me the cold shoulder, assuming I was just a bored socialite playing at being a commoner. Then came the day an arrogant customer threw a drink at him over some petty issue. I had stepped right in front of him. Pointing straight at the customer's face, I snapped, "Everything you have is thanks to your daddy's trust fund! If you had started where he started, you wouldn't even be fit to wipe his shoes!" The customer turned purple with rage, hurling slurs at me: "Drop the act, princess! I can buy a dozen girls like you for pocket change." I laughed in his face. "A rotten mind only sees trash wherever it looks." Before the guy could escalate, I grabbed Christian's wrist and dragged him out of the shop. The manager docked our pay for that stunt. I thought Christian would be furious with me, but instead, that afternoon changed everything. "You're not like the other rich kids," he had murmured, looking down at our joined hands. A flutter of triumph sparked in my chest, and I teased, "Oh yeah? How am I different?" A dark blush spread across his pale cheeks, reaching the tips of his ears. He turned and practically fled. What he didn't know was that while he was falling for me, I had fallen just as hard for him. Later that winter, during the first snowfall of the season, I confessed to him under the streetlights. "Christian, I really like you. Be my boyfriend." He hesitated for so long that I felt humiliated and turned to walk away. Just as I took a step, his arms wrapped around me from behind, locking tight around my waist. "I will, Amanda. I want to. But... but..." "I don't have anything. I'm dirt poor right now. Are you going to get tired of me and leave?" Before I could answer, he rushed out, voice trembling with earnest devotion: "I swear I'll work harder than anyone. I'll make so much money and give it all to you. I'll give you the life you deserve." Back then, I didn't understand that his hesitation was born of an overwhelming, terrified love. I had played the part of the devoted lover: "I won't ever leave you, Christian. Never." "As long as I have you, I don't care about anything else." That was why my eventual betrayal broke him so completely. Catching me in that hotel room, hearing those muffled, intimate noises... It had ripped his soul apart. He had wept, his voice cracking: "You lied to me the entire time, Amanda. The girl I fell in love with was just an act, wasn't she?" Irritated and defensive, I had coldly agreed. Wiping away his tears, he had offered that tragic, hollow smile: "You're not my Amanda. You're just a stranger named Amanda."