Page 1 of The Villainess Chose Naps Over Death Flags

Chapter 1

The Worst Contract I Ever Signed

The clock on Carol Reed's computer screen read 2:47 AM.

She blinked at it, her vision blurring from exhaustion, and wondered distantly if this was what dying felt like. The spreadsheet in front of her had stopped making sense three hours ago, but the quarterly report was due at 8 AM, and Sterling Capital Markets didn't accept excuses—only results.

Twenty-eight years old. Six-figure salary. A corner cubicle with a view of other cubicles. Carol had achieved the American Dream, and it was killing her.

Her phone buzzed with a text from Lanna: "Still at work? Carol, it's almost 3am. The pets miss you. I miss you. Please tell me you're coming home soon."

Carol smiled despite herself, picturing her roommate sprawled on their secondhand couch, their cat Meow Meow sitting on her keyboard and their dog Coco sleeping at her feet. Lanna worked from home as a graphic designer but spent most of her time gaming. She'd probably been yelling at her computer screen about some fantasy game while Carol crunched numbers in corporate purgatory.

"Almost done," Carol typed back, which was a lie. She had another three hours of work, minimum. "Promise I'll take a day off this weekend." That was also a lie. She'd been saying that for six years.

She had money in the bank—more than she'd ever dreamed of growing up. Money for vacations she never took, restaurants she never visited, a life she never lived. The rat race had her by the throat, and she'd forgotten how to stop running.

Carol saved her work, shut down her computer, and gathered her things with the mechanical precision of someone who'd done this a thousand times before. The office was a graveyard of empty desks and flickering fluorescent lights. She was always the last one here. Always.

The elevator ride down felt longer than usual. Twenty-three floors of wondering if this was all there was—work, sleep, work, sleep, die at her desk with an unfinished spreadsheet as her epitaph.

The night air hit her face when she stepped outside. Cold. Sharp. October in the city, where the buildings blocked out the stars and the streetlights drowned everything else. Carol's heels clicked against the pavement as she walked toward the parking garage, her laptop bag heavy on her shoulder.

She made it exactly fifteen steps before the world tilted.

Oh, Carol thought distantly as her knees buckled. So this is happening.

Her vision blurred. Her chest felt too tight, like someone had wrapped her ribs in steel bands and was slowly tightening them. The pavement rushed up to meet her face, and Carol had just enough time to think, Of all the ways to go, death by quarterly report is so lame—

Everything went black.

Her last conscious thought, crystal clear despite the darkness closing in: Lanna, please take good care of Meow Meow and Coco.

◆◆◆

Carol woke up to the smell of lavender and the distinct impression that she was sitting on a cloud.

Because she was.

She was sitting on an actual cloud.

"What the—" Carol looked down at herself. No more pencil skirt and blazer. She was wearing a simple white dress that looked like something from a Renaissance painting. Her laptop bag was gone. Her heels were gone. Her crushing sense of existential dread was... actually, that was still there.

"Hello, Carol Reed."

Carol's head snapped up.

Sitting on the cloud across from her was a cat.

Not just any cat—a pristine white cat with enormous golden eyes and wings. Actual, honest-to-god feathered wings that glowed with soft light.

Carol stared. The cat stared back.

"Oh," Carol said slowly. "A talking cat." She paused, her brain apparently deciding that the most important thing in this moment was not the fact that she was dead, but that there was an adorable creature in front of her. "You're so cute. Can I pet you?"

"No."

"Pretty please?"