She Stole the Auctioned Bride

Summary

I was supposed to be the Bradford family’s crowning achievement.

At eighteen, I was crowned Miss International. At twenty, my face was plastered across billboards from Manhattan to Milan.

Then I woke up in the back of a greasy-spoon diner on the wrong side of the tracks, staring at the ceiling through a haze of burnt lard and hickory smoke.

My soul had been traded for another girl’s.

She announced her conquest with a selfie posted from my verified account. In the photo, she was draped in fifty carats of Bradford heirloom sapphires, flashing a triumphant, predatory grin into the lens.