8313 Book(s) Related to the broken ring this marriage will fail anyways novel

I thought I was the perfect wife and mother, until I heard my husband outside his office, laughing, calling me a "prison warden" and planning to use our daughter as cover while he ran off to Tuscany with his grad student.

Everything fell apart. Then my daughter, in front of everyone: "That's just our annoying nanny."

I tried to hold on to what was left of our family, but my daughter shoved me down the stairs. I lost the baby, and my husband just checked his watch while I bled out on the floor.

They locked me in and left for Italy.

Alone in the hospital, they told me I'd lost the baby and had "memory damage."

Now they're back, expecting the same obedient wife.

She's gone.

And I'm done loving them.

On my twenty-second birthday, I cut my wrists and texted the undertaker I'd hired to collect my body.
My family was across town celebrating my sister— – the daughter they loved, believed, and chose every time. I expected to die alone before they remembered I existed.
Instead, the undertaker came running.
Elijah Hayes was supposed to bury me. He became the first person who asked me to stay. He took me to treatment, gave me the birthday I'd never had, and offered to be my family when my own had thrown me away.
By the time the Bennetts learned I was telling the truth, they were ready to give me everything.
They were simply too late.

I was "Ghost," the undefeated legend of the underground racing circuit. To uncover the truth behind the tragic fall that left my sister, Sylvia, in a coma, I disguised myself as a timid, pathetic scholarship student and infiltrated Spencer Academy—an elite world ruthlessly ruled by old-money families and the hockey dynasty.

I thought my petty revenge was flawless when I slashed a bully's tire with a razor blade hidden in my sleeve. But I was caught red-handed by the academy's most feared predator: Rowan King, the "Tyrant of the Ice."

He was Sylvia's rumored boyfriend. More importantly, he was the last person to see her that night.

With a single glance, he shattered my "good girl" facade. He knew my true identity as the street racer "Ghost," and he knew exactly why I had sneaked into his school.

I should have treated him as my prime suspect. But between his fiercely dominant advances and his reckless, deadly protection, he was making my heart race entirely out of control...

When I woke up in that hospital bed, legs wrapped in casts and burning like hell, everything came flooding back. This time, I wasn't the naive fool I'd been before.
Tyler, my brother Ryan, and that bitch Savannah—they destroyed me. Turned a gymnastics prodigy into a cripple.
Tyler had the nerve to grab my hand, begging me to forgive Savannah for ruining my legs. My brother chose outsiders over me, screaming about "family reputation."
Fuck their love. Fuck family.
This time around, I've got evidence of the $1.2 million they owe me. I know all their dirty secrets. Round two has started, and I'm done being their victim.
Those three bastards are going to pay back every damn cent they stole from me.

My biggest regret? Trusting my husband with my mother's life.

The day the mudslide hit, I was on my knees. Begging him to send a helicopter.

He told me to wait. Twenty minutes. But when the helicopter came, it went for his adoptive sister Vivian instead.

I held my mother in the ruins. Her body was shutting down. I waited. Waited until she went cold in my arms.

When he finally showed up at the hospital, the first thing he said? Accused me of faking it. Said I just wanted attention.

In that moment, my heart died too.

Later, I found out Vivian wasn't even sick.

She said "I don't feel well"—that's all it took. And he left my mother and me to die.

Called me a lunatic. In front of everyone. All for her.

I was ready to leave. For good. Then someone shattered my mother's ashes.

I was six years old when Mom took my brother and me by the hand, leading us into a mansion that looked like a palace. She told us this was our new beginning, after all the hardships we'd been through. But no one warned me that this so-called better life would mean giving up everything I had.

My scholarships, my prom dress, even my Stanford acceptance letter—they all turned into bargaining chips just to keep my stepfather and his daughter Sienna happy. Then, the night before my wedding, they even asked my fiancé to "temporarily" give himself to her as well.

I've always been the one giving everything, pouring myself out until there's nothing left, yet I've never heard the words, "You're enough." If love means endless sacrifice, why am I never the one on the receiving end?

Maybe only when I vanish completely will they remember my name—for the first and last time.

I am Seraphine Marchwood. For five years, I gave every piece of myself to Alpha Veyron, convinced our mate bond was fated—until the night I accidentally overheard the truth.
He never wanted me as his mate. The entire proposed bond was nothing but a cover, a farce to hide his scandalous affair with Ophelia, the woman he actually loved. She was carrying his pup, and I was just the disposable, respectable shield to keep his reputation untarnished.
I ran that night, blind with grief and rage, until I crashed through the rotting beams of an old, rain-soaked ruin. The last thing I remembered before blacking out was the taste of blood in my mouth, and the sound of his voice calling my name, too late.
When I woke up, I didn’t recognize him.
And for the first time since I’d known him, he looked terrified. The cold, unshakable Alpha who’d cast me aside without a second thought was panicking, desperate, scrambling to bring back the version of me that had loved him more than anything—even as a new, unforeseen path began to unfurl before me.

“Smile, Natalie,” Callum whispered before he walked onstage.

So I smiled while he thanked another woman for the crisis plan I had written. I smiled when he pinned my grandmother’s sapphire brooch to her dress. I even smiled when his message came in, canceling our nineteenth appointment at the county clerk’s office.

Then I walked out with our unsigned marriage license papers in my purse and called the one CEO he hated most.

By the time Callum realized I wasn’t waiting anymore, I had already taken my name, my work, and my future back.

I donated a kidney to my adopted sister.

Seven days later, I lay on the cold hospital bed, listening to my fiancé and family laughing down the hall.

They were popping champagne to celebrate my adopted sister's discharge.

No one remembered I had just had surgery. No one remembered my nut allergy.

When someone handed me a plate of almonds, I smiled.

I shoved them into my mouth, handful after handful, and swallowed them down. Then I told them I was done fighting for their love.

My fiancé demanded I postpone our wedding. My brother beat me until I bled and locked me on the rooftop to die.

After being abandoned eighty-eight times, I finally learned how to love myself—by cutting everyone who failed me out of my life.

My husband, Zachary, chose to save his sister-in-law right in front of the kidnappers.

The kidnapper pressed the gun to my temple and asked, "Choose your wife or your sister-in-law?"

Zachary didn't hesitate. "Let Valerie go," he said.

He actually chose to save his sister-in-law! In that moment, even the baby in my belly seemed to stop kicking.

Later, they locked me in the basement. Drugs to delay labor were pumped into my veins over and over. Zachary wanted to save the "firstborn son" status for his sister-in-law's child.

When warm blood finally soaked through my skirt, I dialed the number I knew by heart with shaking hands.

"Zachary," I whispered into the phone, "our child... can't wait any longer."

My fiancé and I held twenty-one weddings. I put on my wedding dress twenty-one times, only to crawl out of pools of blood each time.

Car accidents. Shootings. Explosions. Fires.

Everyone said I was cursed, that I was bad luck for my husband.

I was the only fool who believed they were accidents.

Until the twenty-second time.

That day, covered in blood, I escaped from an ambush back to headquarters and heard him say coldly over the walkie-talkie, "She won't die. Save Valerie first."

It turned out all the accidents were personally arranged by him.

He didn't love me—he just owed my parents a debt he could never repay.

So he staged disaster after disaster to get out of marrying me.

At the twenty-second wedding, I didn't wait for him to cancel.

This time, I was the one who called it off.

I never imagined that the most humiliating secret of my life would be laid bare in a flimsy tent in the middle of nowhere.

Even less did I imagine that the person witnessing my unraveling would be Sebastian. He’s the CEO of a top-tier conglomerate, my direct boss, and, most damningly, my ex’s stepfather.

A freak accident left us stranded in the jungle late at night. Inside that cramped, suffocating tent, the air felt scorching, almost unbearable. Worst of all, in my rush to leave, I’d forgotten to bring the medication that suppresses my “craving disorder.”

When that sickening desire surged through me like a tidal wave, when his body heat pressed against my back through his shirt, I could only bite my lip hard, teetering on the edge of shame and instinct.

“Mr. Blackwood, please… stay away from me.”

I wanted a second round in bed with my mate. He turned me down. He said he was tired.

A moment later, I heard what he told his best friend.

"I don't know why, but Tilly's gotten so... dull. It's all duty and routine with her."

"She's only getting older and duller. Honestly? My wolf doesn't even stir around her anymore."

Then he went behind my back and found himself a young girl.

Fresh. Bright.

He thought he'd hidden it perfectly. But before he knew it, I was sliding a Severance Pact across the table.

"Here's the thing about getting older, Cass. It buys you money, time, and the nerve to play, and to lose."

On my due date, my mate Kael locked me in the Frost Vault.
House Veyron's Hatching Law was absolute: the first dragon egg to break shell inherits the entire Emberscale empire. My sister-in-law Celine and I were both due to deliver—our egg dates only one day apart. To ensure his brother Roman's posthumous egg hatched first, Kael made his choice.
"Roman and Celine's egg must break shell first. You owe them that!" He ignored my ruptured water, ignored the agony of the egg already pressing into my birth canal, and shoved me into that dungeon built from ancient ice-dragon bones.
Then they injected me with Frostbind Serum—an ice-magic drug that freezes the life-bond between a mother dragon and her egg. I curled up on the frozen floor carved with suppression runes, feeling my child's pulse fade beat by beat, and wept.
My baby, I'm so sorry... I can't even protect you...

In order to rush to comfort his assistant whose apartment was leaking, Richard signed his name hastily without even glancing at the documents on the table.
I put away the divorce agreement with a wry smile.
When he and my son completely disappeared, he finally panicked.
Three months later .
He knelt down on the streets of Chicago in despair, begging me to remarry him.
My six-year-old son looked coldly at his biological father and said, "Get lost, you bad uncle! You don't deserve to be my dad!"

“The perfect romance or beach read, with a difference: its enthusiasm and beautiful descriptions offer an unexpected attention to the complexity of not just evolving love, but evolving psyches. It's a delightful recommendation for romance readers looking for a touch more complexity from their romance reads.”--Midwest Book Review (For Now and Forever)THE WITCHING PLACE: A FATAL FOLIO is the debut novel in a charming new cozy mystery series by bestselling author Sophie Love, author of The Inn at Sunset Harbor series, a #1 Bestseller with over 200 five-star reviews.When Alexis Blair, 29, is fired from her book publishing job and breaks up with her boyfriend on the same day, she wonders if life is urging her to make a fresh start. She decides it’s time to pursue her lifelong dream of opening a bookstore of her own—even if that means leaving Boston and accepting a job in a curious bookstore in a small seaside town an hour away.But the odd shop, Alexis soon learns, is from more than just a rare, occult bookstore. Something strange is going on in the shop’s secret back room, with its eccentric owner, and in the small town itself.And when a dead body appears, Alexis, with her beloved newfound cat, may find herself right in the middle of it all.A page-turning cozy, rife with the supernatural, mystery, secrets and love—and centered around a small town as odd and endearing as its shop—A CURIOUS BOOKSTORE will make you fall in love and keep you laughing out loud as you turn pages late into the night.“The romance is there, but not overdosed. Kudos to the author for this amazing start of a series that promises to be very entertaining.”--Books and Movies Reviews (For Now and Forever)Books #2 and #3 in the series—MURDER BY MANUSCRIPT and A PERILOUS PAGE—are now also available!

“The perfect romance or beach read, with a difference: its enthusiasm and beautiful descriptions offer an unexpected attention to the complexity of not just evolving love, but evolving psyches. It's a delightful recommendation for romance readers looking for a touch more complexity from their romance reads.”--Midwest Book Review (For Now and Forever)THE GHOSTLY GROUNDS: DISASTER AND DESSERT is Book #6—and the finale!—in a charming new cozy mystery series by bestselling author Sophie Love, author of The Inn at Sunset Harbor series, a #1 Bestseller with over 200 five-star reviews!Marie Fortune, 39, a successful dog groomer in Boston, leaves the stressful life behind and heads to a small town in coastal Maine to create a new life. She remains intent on renovating the old, historic house her great-aunt left her and giving it a new life as a B&B. Yet there was one thing she couldn’t plan for: the house is haunted. Two things, actually: her great-aunt also left her a dog—and he is far from a typical dog.In the series finale, Marie finds her own future on the line as a murder occurs near her premises, and she is forced to solve it or else be implicated. With her rival innkeeper involved, it could hardly get any worse.As if that is not enough, this series finale brings to a head many questions: will Marie finally find her mother and what will happen between them? Will Marie end up with Robbie? With Brendan? Will she finally be able to claim her gifts, without Boo's help? And will she decide to stay and run the B&B—or be forced to leave this small town that has become her life?A page-turning cozy, packed with mystery, love, hauntings, travel, pets and food—anchored around a small town and a B&B in need of renovation that will capture your heart—THE GHOSTLY GROUNDS is an un-putdownable cozy series that will keep you turning pages (and laughing out loud) late into the night.“The romance is there, but not overdosed. Kudos to the author for this amazing start of a series that promises to be very entertaining.”--Books and Movies Reviews (For Now and Forever)Don’t forget to check out Sophie Love’s other cozy mystery series, A CURIOUS BOOKSTORE, which begins with A FATAL FOLIO (Book #1), a bestseller with over 50 five-star reviews!

“The perfect romance or beach read, with a difference: its enthusiasm and beautiful descriptions offer an unexpected attention to the complexity of not just evolving love, but evolving psyches. It's a delightful recommendation for romance readers looking for a touch more complexity from their romance reads.”--Midwest Book Review (For Now and Forever)THE WITCHING PLACE: A PERILOUS PAGE is book #3 in a charming new cozy mystery series by bestselling author Sophie Love, author of The Inn at Sunset Harbor series, a #1 Bestseller with over 200 five-star reviews.When Alexis Blair, 29, is fired from her book publishing job and breaks up with her boyfriend on the same day, she wonders if life is urging her to make a fresh start. She decides it’s time to pursue her lifelong dream of opening a bookstore of her own—even if that means leaving Boston and accepting a job in a curious bookstore in a small seaside town an hour away.A cryptic visitor comes into town, looking for a rare book, and willing to pay anything.But when he ends up dead, Alexis wonders: was the price too high?And did Alexis’s mysterious store owner have anything to do with it?A page-turning cozy, rife with the supernatural, mystery, secrets and love—and centered around a small town as odd and endearing as its shop—A PERILOUS PAGE will make you fall in love and keep you laughing out loud as you turn pages late into the night.“The romance is there, but not overdosed. Kudos to the author for this amazing start of a series that promises to be very entertaining.”--Books and Movies Reviews (For Now and Forever)

“The perfect romance or beach read, with a difference: its enthusiasm and beautiful descriptions offer an unexpected attention to the complexity of not just evolving love, but evolving psyches. It's a delightful recommendation for romance readers looking for a touch more complexity from their romance reads.”--Midwest Book Review (For Now and Forever)THE GHOSTLY GROUNDS: VENGEANCE AND DINNER is Book #4 in a charming new cozy mystery series by bestselling author Sophie Love, author of The Inn at Sunset Harbor series, a #1 Bestseller with over 200 five-star reviews!Marie Fortune, 39, a successful dog groomer in Boston, leaves the stressful life behind and heads to a small town in coastal Maine to create a new life. She remains intent on renovating the old, historic house her great-aunt left her and giving it a new life as a B&B. Yet there was one thing she couldn’t plan for: the house is haunted. Two things, actually: her great-aunt also left her a dog—and he is far from a typical dog.When Marie is invited to exorcise a supposedly haunted house, she encounters a twist she never could have anticipated. But before she can wrap her mind around the situation, a man turns up dead—forcing her to solve the case and to clear her own name.A page-turning cozy, packed with mystery, love, hauntings, travel, pets and food—anchored around a small town and a B&B in need of renovation that will capture your heart—THE GHOSTLY GROUNDS is an un-putdownable cozy series that will keep you turning pages (and laughing out loud) late into the night.“The romance is there, but not overdosed. Kudos to the author for this amazing start of a series that promises to be very entertaining.”--Books and Movies Reviews (For Now and Forever)

In our third year of surviving the wasteland, my companions and I finally realized it was all a reality show.

The elites and billionaires on the outside had built a massive dome, tossing us into this irradiated hellhole to be tortured. They broadcasted it globally, watching us drink toxic wastewater and eat mutated meat, treating us like monkeys in a zoo.

The mole in our team knelt in the mud, sobbing, begging me to understand that it was all a script—that as long as I played along, I could live.

Without a second thought, I swung my blade. Right in front of ten million VIP viewers, I chopped off his leg.

"Crappy script," I sneered, kicking aside the severed limbs and blood on the floor. Gripping my machete, I walked toward the real world beyond the heavy gates.

To those who used our lives for entertainment: I'm coming for yours.

"I absolutely love your huge, thick cock, James. Just let me ride it tonight, and I'll pay you to be my secret whore," my wife's sister-in-law purred, climbing into my bed completely naked, her wet, dripping pussy grinding against my thigh.

I threw her naked body onto the floor like trash. For three years, I played the pathetic, submissive househusband to my arrogant wife, Emily. I endured their endless humiliation, hiding the fact that I was the billionaire heir and lethal ex-special forces agent keeping their pathetic family alive.

But today, the three-year contract hit zero.

When a rival mafia boss kicked down our door, threatening to massacre everyone, my wife's sister Rhea desperately ripped her dress open, exposing her heavy, bare breasts, begging the boss to fuck her raw right there on the floor if he spared her life.

I’d had enough.

I stepped forward, snapping the necks and shattering the bones of a dozen armed guards, leaving them choking on their own blood. As my fleet of twenty armored Rolls-Royces surrounded the villa, my true identity was finally revealed.

Seeing my unimaginable power, Rhea crawled to my feet, shoving her massive tits against my leg, begging to suck my cock and share my bed with my wife.

I slapped her across her slutty face, tore up the marriage contract, and walked out.

Behind me, Emily collapsed, sobbing hysterically. "If I had just spread my legs for him... if I had just let him breed me and fill my womb with his heir, I would be the queen of the world..."

She's begging for my seed now, but should I lock her in my basement and make her pay for the last three years?

At the company's annual client appreciation dinner, I was the one in charge of booking the venue.
To save the company money, I picked my aunt's upscale restaurant with a skyline view. Since we were family, she only charged us at cost. When I posted the details in our Slack channel to confirm with the team, no one had any objections—except for the intern, who slowly tagged me in the chat:
[Arthur, I don't mean anything by it.]
[I just want to ask—how big a kickback did you get for booking your family's restaurant?]
[After all, the money for this dinner is coming out of our bonus pool.]
[So you should return that money to the rest of us, right?]
The other coworkers started liking the message and chiming in to support him.
So I dropped the whole thing on the spot and handed the task over to that intern, who loved talking about "fixing workplace injustice."
Then the night of the dinner came.
From the CEO all the way down to the investors, everyone was pinned on the deck and searched by armed Coast Guard officers.
The most important client contact collapsed from a heart attack on the spot and was airlifted by helicopter straight to the ICU, costing the company a multimillion-dollar enterprise cybersecurity contract.

On Ivy’s wedding day to her fiancé James, Alexander, the ruthless Lycan King feared throughout the kingdom, storms in, tears her from the altar, and forces her to be his wife.

Believing Ivy responsible for his fiancée’s death, he vows to make her pay.

“You destroyed the love of my life,” he snarls. “So it’s only fair that I destroy yours.”

However, as their marriage unfolds, Ivy looks nothing like the schemer Alexander expected. Her gaze is too clear, too steady. And the harder he tries to hate her, the more his actions betray him.

When Ivy is publicly shamed at a royal banquet, Alexander is the last person she expects to defend her.
“You’re my mate, little liar,” he growls. “No one gets to hurt what’s mine but me.”

When Ivy struggles to afford her mother’s lifesaving surgery, she discovers Alexander has already covered the cost.

When Ivy learns James, whom she once trusted with all her heart, betrayed her long before their wedding ceremony, Alexander should have relished watching her break.
Instead, her enemy holds her together as she falls apart.

Alexander blames it all on the mate bond. Anything but love.

So why, when Ivy finally escapes him—when Alexander believes her dead and lost to him forever—does the monster who once ruled with an iron fist… kneel?

Three years later, when Alexander finds Ivy alive, a little boy stands beside her.
Ivy has built a life without him, and he can do nothing but wait outside her door like a supplicant awaiting mercy, begging for a single glance.

This time, Ivy is no longer a woman he can command to stay.
This time, the choice is hers.
If the Lycan King wants his Luna back, he’ll have to grovel and pray she chooses him.

Kiera Scott is a 21 years old single lady, she Lives alone since she graduated from high school. Sometimes her friends comes around to visit her. Luckily enough for her she's the only daughter of her family and very pampered. She's pretty... The perfect definition of beauty can be told alone by looking at her. She's loved by everyone and works in a very good company and paying one...loved by her colleagues..... But! The only problem is her Boss.

He's Tibby Wilf ...

Tibby Wilf is a sex freak, crazy, mean, extra arrogant... He hates being corrected... But Kiera keeps crushing on him.

her mom would always tell her her to quit her job since she has a boss as like him, but she keeps refusing cos she loves him but she never knew he was a sex addict.

He'd always scold her when she's wrong and not...till she got used to it


Kiera heard a female loud voice as she hurriedly ran to a room wondering who could that be
She doesn't wants to be seen by anyone cos her boss said so. if she by mistake let anyone see her in his house she'd lose her job.
panic took over as she ran in...just then Wilf walked out of the bathroom with towel around his waist
"you!!" he called as she turned back shocked to see her boss half naked.
"arrgh!" she screamed and shut her eyes
"what you doing here?" she asked
"I should ask you that!" he fired back as she opened her eyes
'gosh...so hot' she gasped inwardly
"I'm hiding... please" she whispered as she walked closer to him
"hey... stay back" he hurriedly said as she staggered back
"arrgh!" she screamed as he pushed her back but unfortunately... his towels fell of his waist.

The only sure thing in revenge is the beginning, the ending is uncertain. The truth can surprise you in ways you could never have imagined.

A sequel to His Booty Call.

I swear, I hate my husband.

At my birthday party, my husband whispered to his mistress in French that he missed her. His voice was low, but I heard it all—the black lingerie, the bit about how pregnancy makes you more sensitive. His French clients around us were laughing. He turned and put his arm around me, claiming he was just helping his clients come up with sweet nothings.

He doesn't know I understand every single word. Just like he doesn't know that inside my body, I'm carrying his other surprise. And his mistress—she's pregnant too. Two wombs, one secret.

Confrontation would be too cheap. Tears are worthless. I quietly started cataloging the hidden networks my father left behind, activating the Swiss accounts.

In seven days, Zoey Smith will cease to exist. And what will my husband's reaction be?

I clutched the diagnosis paper that read "Stage 4 Gastric Cancer," my knuckles turning white. For twenty-two years, no matter how bad things got, Ethan always said he could handle it. But this time, my call only reached his voicemail.

I still remember that snowy night when I was seventeen. Under that tree, he squeezed my hand and promised, "You don't have to be strong anymore. Just lean on me." He said he'd marry me once he became successful, vowed to protect me for a lifetime. I believed him—believed him so much that today I drove frantically to his recording studio, desperate to tell him about my diagnosis.

But the scene through the cracked door shattered every hope I had. The sight of him entangled with Victoria hurt worse than any diagnosis. Later, when he handed me divorce papers, I coughed blood into my tissue, and he didn't even glance my way.

How did the man who promised to protect me forever become the one pushing me into the abyss? I'm dying, and even my last shred of hope is being crushed. Is this really how it ends?

I had to claim Caleb tonight.

I had paid a six-figure premium to contract a high-level werewolf mate from the nation’s top "Fated Mates" agency. I had chosen him for his elite stats, the "absolute submission" guaranteed in his file, and most importantly, a face that could put any Hollywood A-lister to shame.

But over the last few months, things had completely derailed from my expectations.

He refused to let me touch him!

I have to figure out what's going on.

The day I walked in on my boyfriend screwing that blonde tramp, I dropped the homemade tiramisu right there on the floor—our two-year relationship smashed to bits, messier than the splattered cream.

I ducked into a bar, slamming back whiskey, when this guy in a sharp black suit sidles up, his voice smooth as silk laced with bourbon. I spat out, "Help me forget him," but ended up totally lost in the presidential suite. He backed me against the wall, tore open my blouse, his tongue circling my nipple before biting down hard, leaving me breathless. "You taste like candy, baby—tonight, I'm gonna eat you up."

But then my boyfriend FaceTimes, spots the guy behind me, and loses it, screaming, "Dad!"

I went ice-cold—my hookup was my boyfriend's stepdad? Even worse, this thirty-three-year-old powerhouse was Brooklyn's deadliest mob boss.

What began as a vengeful fling spiraled into a forbidden nightmare?

My husband and parents wanted me dead. All because my sister was "dying."

They shoved a divorce agreement and an experimental surgery consent form at me.

I was supposed to be her donor.

But they didn't know I was the one actually dying.

Three days ago, they told me I had terminal bone cancer.

One month to live.

So when they threatened me into some back-alley surgery, I smiled.

I was already dying anyway.

Sebastian is dead.

And I'm the prime suspect.

I thought Lucy was the only one on my side, but there's always panic in her eyes. Black stockings showing up in my closet, red marks on my wrists I can't explain, texts sent from my phone that I never wrote...

The evidence keeps piling up, choking me.

My memory's slipping, the same broken nightmares on repeat. Strange perfume, cruel words, and the name "Leah" that won't leave my head.

Who is lying? Who's pulling the strings?

I can't tell what's real anymore. All I know is everyone's lying to me.

I need to find who's behind this before it destroys me.

At the Aurelia International Youth Violin Competition, someone had hidden steel needles in my daughter's violin and bow. Her fingers streaming blood, she lost her footing and fell from a railless platform thirty feet up. Both her hands and arms were shattered.
I ran to her like a madwoman, desperate to call an ambulance, but the other girl's mother had her people pin me to the floor.
"You stole my daughter's violin? This is what happens to thieves!" she sneered.
But that violin was the one my husband had specially commissioned for our daughter in Paris!
"Save my daughter first! We can sort out everything else later!" I fought with everything I had.
A slap cracked across my face.
"A worthless life. If she dies, she dies!"
"I'm the wife of Dawnfrost's CEO, Mr. Sterling. I can afford it!"
The blood in my veins turned to ice.
Yale Sterling? That was my husband.
Perfect. Just perfect.
Yale had the nerve to keep a mistress behind my back, and to let her spend my money to buy my daughter's life!
If I didn't tear you two apart piece by piece today, I'd have carried the name "Reaper of Wall Street" for twenty years for nothing.

My name is Ivy, and I’m 18. My best friend’s father, Sebastian Blackwood, a Harvard law professor, is mature, cold, and authoritative. He’s been the centerpiece of every fantasy I’ve had since puberty.

Those nights, I toss and turn under the covers, imagining his fingers slipping into my wet, hot va*na, imagining his cok thrusting into me hard, driving me to the edge of climax.

I know it’s wrong. He’s off-limits.

But every time he looks at me, those deep, piercing eyes seem to strip away my clothes, staring straight at my most secret places. My heart races out of control, my body burns with heat.

I don’t want to just be his “good girl.”

I want to be claimed by him, completely, destructively.

During this 30-day seaside vacation, I’ll make him see that I’m no longer a little girl.

My body is wet for him, my soul burns for him.

Sebastian, will you resist, or will you pin me down and fu*k me hard?

I found out I was pregnant the same week our savings hit zero.
I didn't tell my boyfriend, Jovan. He was already hauling bricks all day and running deliveries half the night. One more thing on his shoulders, and I was scared it would break him.
So I said nothing. Just started picking up more work.
A friend got me a serving job at a private club downtown. Cash tips, she said. Pour tea, carry trays, nothing dirty about it.
I took it without telling Jovan that either. I told myself I'd surprise him with the extra money. I told myself this was me carrying my share of the weight, quietly, the way a good partner should.
That night, I pushed open the door to the biggest room in the club, tray balanced on my arm.
And there he was.
Center seat. A dozen people leaning toward him like he was the only light in the room.
Eighteen thousand a bottle. Seven or eight empty already on the table.

"Clyde, no—stop this right now. I only came to your class because Aaron recommended you to help me learn motorcycle riding for my job, not to get into something like this." On the open training field, as I struggled to balance the bike and keep it steady, my husband's old college roommate Clyde climbed on behind me to "correct" my form, his hands boldly cupping my large, soft breasts through my fitted top. The real problem hit when I felt his massive bulge pressing insistently against my backside, hard and unyielding, as he leaned in too close under the guise of instruction.

My mother-in-law was a spoiled and soft woman.
Fifty years old and she couldn't book a rideshare. Couldn't pick up a package. When the breaker tripped, she cried into a video call to her husband and her son.
The whole family agreed on it. Her only skills were clinging and being adorable.
Then I bled at nine weeks and took myself to the ER.
The OB who picked up my chart was my husband's best female friend. Sable.
She saw me, photographed my chart into their med-school group chat, and hit record.
"Come look, everybody. Dog's wife. Pregnant five minutes and already bleeding from bed."
"Twenty-eight and she's already a geriatric pregnancy. You've got to pace yourself, honey."
The whole room laughed and looked at my stomach.
My face burned white. My nails went numb in my palm.
Thirty minutes later the door hit the wall.
My mother-in-law, the woman who covered her ears in her husband's arms over a tripped fuse, walked in on four-inch heels.
Behind her: hospital administration, the compliance office, and the sitting Chief of Obstetrics.
She pulled the chart out of my hand without lifting her eyes.
"Twenty-eight is advanced maternal age? Normal physiologic fluid, and you called it too much sex?"
"Dr. Smith, is your mouth that filthy because your brain's been marinating in locker-room jokes, or did your ethics get eaten by a dog?"

I saw a post on Reddit, "Urgent! How do I convince my wife to donate bone marrow to my mistress?"

I scoffed and typed back, "What a piece of shit."

Right after I hit send, my husband came home. He grasped my hand, his voice shaky: "You have leukemia... but it's okay, we found a donor."

His right eye twitched—he always did that when he lied.

Then I remembered the worst comment on that post, "Trick your wife into thinking she's the patient."

Life imitating the internet, apparently.

He wanted to harvest my bone marrow for someone else.

When I finally saw his mistress's face, my world fell apart.

I never thought his mistress would be her......

Not long after I transferred to this school, I became the bullies’ favorite target.
They didn’t like how quiet I was or how pale I looked, so they casually slapped me with a nickname: “vampire.”
It started with shoves in the hallway and jeers in the classroom, escalated to messing with my drink, then stuffing trash into my locker.
They treated my silence as permission and wrapped every provocation in the same excuse: “Just a joke.”
Until that night, when humiliation wasn’t enough. They lured me into a tiny storage room behind the auditorium—locked the door, killed the lights, set up a fixed camera—ready to strap me to a chair and film an “execution” video that would make sure I could never hold my head up at this school again.
What they didn’t know was that the nickname wasn’t a joke. It was the one time they got the truth right.
I really am a vampire.

Alpha Kayle and I have spent the last five years locked in a brutal dance of hatred, resentment, and twisted duty.

He didn’t choose me as his Luna. He was forced—bound to me by the will of his parents and the Elders, not by love, not even by desire. Just obligation.

And Kayle?

He was the most ruthless Alpha alive. All sharp edges, broad shoulders, and cold, wild blood. The kind of man who doesn’t take orders—except, apparently, when it came to me.

So he punished me. Every. Single. Night.

He brought different women into our home, into our bed, like I wasn’t even there. And he made sure I heard every moan, every scream, every fake cry of his name echo through the walls.

The entire pack knew. They watched, whispered, laughed. I became the sad, silent Luna. The biggest joke in the werewolf world.

And still, I stayed. Because leaving would’ve meant surrender. And I wasn’t going to give him that satisfaction.

I thought love was enough.
I thought saving the Ember Claw Pack with everything I had—my heart, my loyalty, even my body—meant something. It led to a Moon Ceremony… and a marriage to Alpha William, the man I gave my soul to.
But love doesn’t protect you from betrayal.
Especially not when the one he truly wanted was never me.
I was glowing with the joy of carrying our pup when I walked in on him—holding her.
Quinn.
The fated mate everyone believed to be dead. Alive. Back. In his arms.
And me? Just the mistake he settled for.
"I only married you out of gratitude," he said, barely meeting my eyes.
Then, turning to Quinn with a softness I never got, he added, "If she hadn’t sold her ancestral land to save the pack, I would’ve never completed the Moon Ceremony with her."
And the final blow?
"So what if she found out? I’ll just say I thought she was you that night we slept together."
That night—The one I thought meant everything.
But it didn’t end with him.

BLURB

My breath hitched, my chest heaving as Salvatore's finger thrust into my pussy. I clenched my teeth, my fingers squeezing the bedsheets as I shamelessly parted my legs even wider.

“Do you want me to stop?” His voice was a low growl.

“No,” I breathed. “Faster…please,” I moaned loudly.

I knew Salvatore's and my attraction to each other was forbidden; he was the heir to a wealthy family, and I was just a maid in his house. But I have had an attraction to him since I met him and couldn't control it.

We both couldn't.


Lyra Whitman is from a poor home and has faced constant bullying in school. She and her mother finally moved away to a new city, where they her mother works as a maid for the Sinclair's, one of the wealthiest and most influential families in the county.

Lyra cannot help but fall for their son, and she is surprised to see that he feels the same. Knowing the dangers of being together due to their different backgrounds, they are forced to navigate their relationship in secret.

For the three years since I returned to the Hart family, I had always been the wildly out-of-place “burden.”

Vivienne, the family’s beloved fake heiress, broke a contract on her own and provoked a local gang. She was taken hostage and tortured in an abandoned auto repair shop.

To save his precious sister, my brother, Ryan, did not hesitate to trade me to the gang in exchange for Vivienne.
“She’s a movie star, and you’re just a useless nobody. It’s only natural for you to take her place and suffer a little.”
He looked coldly at the gang members who were eyeing me like hungry wolves, and violently shoved me toward them.
“Tonight, she belongs to you.”

Right before they dragged me away, I managed to call my husband, Alex, begging for help. But he rejected me ruthlessly, acting as if my plea was some cheap scam:
“Stop playing the victim. Why would they ever hurt you? Hurry up and clean up this mess. Don't let a girl like Vivienne face those thugs all by herself.”

Bang.
The heavy iron doors of the gang’s hideout slammed shut.
There were no negotiations. What greeted me was a merciless rain of fists, my clothes brutally torn to shreds, and the blinding flashes of cameras.
Amidst the ultimate degradation, they took photos of me, pinched my jaw, and violated my dignity over and over again.

At 4:00 AM, I was tossed out onto the street in front of my own house like a piece of discarded trash.
Upon dragging myself inside, Vivienne immediately began dropping hints to the family, implying that I was the one who tricked her into signing the illegal gang contract.
My family cursed me, telling me to drop dead.
My heart plummeted into a bottomless abyss of darkness. Numbly swallowing the bloody foam pooling in my mouth, I let out a hoarse, broken laugh.

“Since my return was a mistake from the very beginning…”
“Then why didn’t they just let me die?”

I once believed that if I was obedient enough, my birth family would finally love me. Instead, they gave everything to Anna, the fake heiress—my competition spot, my reputation, even my kidney.
Then I opened my eyes and returned to the year it all began.
This time, I won’t beg. I won’t yield. My achievements, my dignity, and my life belong to me.
When everyone called me vicious, Damian Sterling draped his jacket over my shoulders and asked in a low voice, “Am I an outsider?”
I leaned into him and smiled. “Of course not.”
But soon I discovered he was being slowly poisoned—and the culprit might be someone closest to him. Worse, the truth behind my death in my previous life may be darker than I ever imagined…

1

When we moved to the estate on the hill, all the bedrooms had already been assigned.
My parents had the primary suite.
My brother, Adrian, had the east wing.
The south suite, with its view of the Hudson—the nicest room in the house—was marked Grace's Room.
There was no room with my name on it.
In the hall, a worker was fastening brass plaques to the bedroom doors.
Not one of them read Claire.
Ten years earlier, Grace's father had been my dad's underboss. He had gone into a burning warehouse to rescue Adrian from the Bellinis. He hadn't come out.
Standing over his coffin, Dad had declared that Grace would be his daughter from then on.
What the Don said was law in our family. Somehow, though, I was always the one expected to cover the cost of that promise.
I asked Mom where I would sleep.
“You're going off to grad school soon, aren't you?” she said, as if it were obvious. “What would you need a bedroom for?”
Then she turned back to the pink curtains she was choosing with Grace.
Adrian knelt on the floor, lifting different fabric swatches for them to see.
Nathan, my boyfriend of three years, was putting up Grace's paintings. He insisted on hanging each one himself; apparently the movers couldn't be trusted with them.
Sitting on a packing box, I finally got it.
Nobody had overlooked me by accident.
They thought Grace should have the room, the family, even the boyfriend I had believed was mine.
I brought up the agreement on my phone.
A federal research site in the Nevada desert. Classified work.
A five-year commitment, with no outside contact.
I added my signature.
Ten days from now, I would be out of their lives. And I wouldn't be coming back.

The day he proposed, Atticus knelt before me, holding the Hale family's heirloom necklace.
I thought I had finally survived the ordeal.
After eight years of unrequited love, being humiliated by his sister, nitpicked by his mother, and mocked by the city's socialites for being unworthy of the Hales... Until this very moment, when he personally fastened the heirloom around my neck. Everyone saw it. I, Clara, was finally accepted by the Hale family.
Tears in my eyes, I said yes, thinking it was the happiest moment of my life.
But just days after putting on that necklace, bizarre red rashes crawled up my neck. My pale skin rotted away piece by piece, and my internal organs went into irreversible failure.
The most absurd part? The exact same day I started rotting, his dying mother miraculously cured her terminal illness, and his sister's half-destroyed face was restored to flawless perfection.
Disfigured and barely looking human, I threw myself off the Harbour Bridge—
I opened my eyes, and I was back on the day of the proposal.

For as long as I could remember, my family had insisted Vivian needed more because I could take more.
The pony I loved. The occasions meant to celebrate me. Time with my mother. If my twin wanted any of it, I was the one expected to go without.
Our induction into the Mafia Family was meant to be the exception. We were both daughters of Don Moretti. A crown was supposed to be waiting for each of us.
But Vivian's made-to-order crown glittered with both our diamonds, and the one assigned to me was tarnished, its setting bare. At the formal dinner, Father had my place card sent to the bottom of the table for not dressing properly—after I had spent my time crossing Manhattan to fetch Vivian's gown.
They assumed I'd give way, just as I always had.
This time, I canceled my part in the ceremony, filled a single suitcase, and took a flight with no return ticket.
When the Moretti Family assembled under its crest, two crowns were waiting. Only one daughter was prepared to put hers on.

Five years into living with my stepbrother Gideon, the scholarship girl he sponsored moved into our house.
To repay his "generosity," she made a habit of slipping into his bed at night. By day, she took it upon herself to "fix" my antisocial, withdrawn personality.
Three days before St. George Prep's graduation ceremony, she brought me a glass of juice wearing that nauseating sugar-sweet smile.
"You know, Charlotte, your peanut allergy is probably psychosomatic. You just need some exposure therapy. Let me help you get over it."
That night, my throat closed completely. She'd deliberately laced my drink with concentrated peanut extract.
I convulsed on the cold hardwood floor, vision tunneling as oxygen fled my lungs.
In the last second before darkness swallowed me whole, I clawed desperately toward the half-open door.
Standing in the hallway were my boyfriend Dylan and my stepbrother Gideon.
They simply watched me suffocate. Then Gideon calmly reached out and shut the door.
I died from anaphylactic shock.
Three months later, as a ghost tethered to this world, I watched her stride onto Stanford's campus. Wearing my clothes. Carrying my acceptance letter. Burning through my trust fund.
Through the crowd, I saw Gideon—my ice-cold, unreachable stepbrother—gently cradle her face and press his lips to hers.
Then I gasped awake.
I was back. Three days before graduation.

On a night twenty degrees below zero, in the middle of a blizzard, my own parents stripped off my coat and locked me outside.
All because my sister said she felt cold.
To survive, I struck a bargain with a stranger—my own health as the price.
From that night on, my body began to fall apart.
I told my parents I felt sick. They said I was faking it again, just to steal my sister's attention.
Then came the ice skating competition.
Racked with pain, I begged them on my knees to let me withdraw.
They said, "This is Daphne's dream. You have to help her make it come true."
I was forced onto the ice.
One jump. My bones shattered on landing.
When I collapsed and couldn't get up again, they finally realized—I hadn't been lying.