534 Book(s) Related to cardi b story on october 13 2020

I loved Callum Crane for five years. He said I didn't fit. Then he proposed — to my sister.
The same night, his brother called me with the most insane idea I've ever heard: marry him instead. Same day. Same venue. Right across the hall from my ex and my sister's ceremony.
I said yes. Not because I loved Emrys Crane. Because I'd rather set the whole thing on fire than sit in a pew and watch.
Here's the thing about revenge marriages, though. They're supposed to be fake.
Nobody told Emrys.
The man had a wrench set in his truck that only fit my grandmother's machine — bought years before I ever spoke to him. He'd been sneaking looks through my workshop window so often the stone wore down. He fixed my motorcycle three times and never mentioned it. He remembered that I stared at a piece of almond brittle for ten seconds once, and bought it for me weeks later.
Seven years. He'd been in love with me for seven years. Said nothing. Did everything.
And Callum? The man who told me I didn't fit?
He showed up at my orchard with an apology and a folder full of evidence against my sister, begging for a second chance.
I looked him in the eye and said: "Too late. Wrong harvest."
He tried five more times. It only got worse for him.

"I'm six weeks pregnant with Asher's baby," my husband's mistress texted me, attaching a photo of a torn condom wrapper on my husband’s desk.
"If he really loved you, what am I?"
I just called a secret number.
"Are you sure you want to activate the Ghost Protocol?" my brother asked over the encrypted line.
"Once done, your identity is erased. You will cease to exist."
"Do it," I replied coldly.
My billionaire husband thinks he can keep his perfect marriage and his wild mistress.
He has no idea that his gentle, low-profile wife is actually the most dangerous princess of the New York Mafia.
I gave him a 15-day countdown.
On the final day, he opened his "anniversary gift"—only to find his cheating evidence and a house completely emptied of my existence.
He tore the city apart looking for me, going insane.
But how do you find a woman who never legally existed?

I was at my favorite artist's concert, phone up, recording the Kiss Cam segment. My boyfriend Mason said he was three hours away having dinner at his parents' house and couldn't make it, even sent me a selfie as proof.

Then the Kiss Cam found him.

On the giant screen, Mason wore the exact same gray vintage rock tee and black ripped jeans from his "family dinner photo," his arm around a blonde girl with her head on his shoulder.

The arena erupted: "Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!"

He looked like he'd seen a ghost, frantically trying to block the camera.

My phone's location alert read: "Mason is nearby (0.1 miles)."

Three years of us, exposed as a massive lie in front of thousands of cheering strangers.

On my due date, my husband Russell locked me in an underground freezer at minus ten degrees.

The Pembroke family's unbreakable rule: the first-born male inherits the entire mafia empire. My sister-in-law Natasha and I were both pregnant, our due dates only one day apart. To ensure his brother's child was born first, Russell made this insane decision.

"My brother and Natasha's baby has to come first—this is what you owe them!" He ignored my desperate pleas and violent contractions, coldly shoving me into the freezer.

But that wasn't enough. They forcibly injected me with labor-delaying drugs. I curled up in agony on the freezing concrete floor, feeling my baby slowly slipping away, tears of despair streaming down my face.

My baby, Mommy is so sorry...

On college application day, my two childhood sweethearts, Blaise and Kieran, were completely bewitched by Mari. The manipulative girl talked them into abandoning their prestigious university spots to attend a small community college with her. I tried desperately to stop them, even contacting their parents to prevent them from ruining their futures.
Yet when Mari ended up dead months later, the blind boys blamed everything on me. They tricked me to the cliff and shoved me down brutally, making me pay for a crime I never committed.
Miraculously, I am reborn on this exact day. This time, I will not interfere. I will watch silently and let them bear the consequences of their own foolish choices.

The voice in my head called itself the Favoritism System.
It said I was the false heiress, that the true daughter would come home and ruin me, and that my only chance was to steal everyone’s affection first.
I was ten.
So naturally, I cried and told my entire family.
Grandpa ordered DNA tests. Mom threatened to tear someone’s mouth off. My brother offered to drive me away in his toy truck.
The test came back positive: I really was fake.
But instead of throwing me out, the Vale family began searching for their lost daughter.
Twelve years later, they found her.
And the woman who came home was not the jealous true heiress the system had promised.
She was far more terrifying.

My name is kiven, and I found myself stranded on an unnamed deserted island following a plane crash. As the saying goes, "Great misfortune promises great fortune." At the outset, with a beauty in one hand and supplies in the other, watch how I create a diverse community on this nameless island. However, in the face of treacherous human nature and an emerging mysterious civilization, where will destiny lead me?

After two years of marriage, I humbled myself to the dust, only to be called "scheming" by him. In his eyes, I was just a woman who crawled into his bed through dirty tricks, using children as tools, never comparing to his pitiful "sister-in-law."

When he disgustedly tore my clothes and roughly pressed me down, I tremblingly told him: "I'm pregnant!" But he sneered, saying I was acting. Even after I lost the child, he was still happily chatting with the perpetrator's family.

Finally, I was tired and exhausted. All my love and endurance meant nothing to him.

When I threw the divorce papers in his face, I thought it was the end, but it was just the beginning. When he gripped my wrist tightly, pinned me against the car door, and sealed my lips with a punishing, possessive kiss, I shamefully felt something... What does this man really want?

Elena was born to lead, but her father strips her of her birthright and gives it to her younger brother. Desperate to get back at her father, she does the unthinkable: she sleeps with her father's greatest enemy, Alpha Axton.

But Axton is more than just a rival, he's her fated mate. And he's been searching for her not for love, but for revenge and a chance to destroy her father's pack. The next morning, Elena rejects him, walking away before he can trap her in his ruthless schemes.

But Axton does not take rejection lightly, and his retaliation is brutal: a leaked video, a ruined reputation, and a family that turns their backs on her drive her to flee the city in disgrace.

But when Elena disappears, she takes something Alpha Axton never planned to lose - his sons. Now, he'll stop at nothing to get them back. He wants his heirs, he wants his mate, and Elena will learn that no one runs from the Alpha.

Fresh off the operating table after barely surviving a miscarriage, I received a $50,000 bill—every cent spent on a waterbed and aphrodisiac aromatherapy on a yacht.
 
I called my husband, the only other person who knew about that account.

Over the phone, he sounded gentle yet aggrieved: "Honey, how could I afford a luxury yacht? It must be a banking error. You just lost our baby; please rest well. My flight to New York is taking off soon, and I'll be right by your side the moment I get back!"
 
I didn't expose the deafening sounds of the wild party in his background. I simply hung up.
 
He thought his lie was flawless. He had no idea that as the hidden heiress of the Windsor Consortium, that priceless yacht, the Poseidon, was actually a coming-of-age gift from my grandmother.
 
I ripped the IV out of my arm and dialed a number I hadn't called in years since marrying beneath my station.
 
"Grandma, you were right. He doesn't deserve me. I'm going to the ship to catch him red-handed."

My mate, Rhys, brought his dead brother's pregnant widow into our house.
He swore up and down I'd never have to lift a finger for her.
The next morning he stood by the door with a packed bag and a grin.
"Babe. Big news. The pack called me up. Border post out east, two years. I ship out tonight."
He looked at me like he was waiting for me to promise I'd take good care of his brother's widow.
So I pulled my own bag out of the closet, right there in front of him and the woman in the back room.
"Funny. The alliance called me up too. Medic rotation. Two years."
"We can leave together. Lock up on the way out. Colette can rest easy with the whole house to herself."

"Lilith, are you sure there's nothing wrong with this soup?"

"What, you’re doubting your own mother’s love now?" she sneered.

Grinding my teeth, I forced it down—only to feel a searing pain twist through my gut like knives a moment later.

Alpha Kane burst into the room and gathered my lifeless body into his arms. His eyes burned crimson as he roared to the Eternity Pack:

"I’ll burn this world to the ground for what you did to her."

But fate wasn’t done with me yet.

It gave me another chance.

Back on the day of the poisoning,  my cold smile slicing through the stunned silence.

"This time," I said, "you’ll be the ones begging on your knees."

And as it turns out…

Revenge is sweet, but love? Even sweeter.

I boarded The Elysium, thinking it was just another job.

A luxury cruise ship. A floating paradise for the world’s elite.

Private. Untouchable. Unregulated.

I was wrong.

Within hours, I was accused of a murder I didn’t commit.

And on The Elysium, innocence is not something you prove.

It’s something you lose.

That’s when I met him.

Silas Voss.

They call him the Sovereign of the ship.

He didn’t ask if I was guilty.

He asked how much I was worth.

I was given a choice:

Death… or a ninety-day contract under his control.

His physician.
His property.
His possession.

I signed it.

Because I had no other way to survive.

I told myself I could endure him.

I told myself I could outsmart him.

But The Elysium doesn’t break people through violence alone.

It breaks them through permission.

And Silas Voss never takes what he can’t make you agree to give.

Every attempt I made to escape only brought me closer to him.

Every rule I broke only made him calmer.

More patient.

More interested.

Until I realized something I never should have felt in a place like this—

Fear wasn’t the worst part anymore.

And what he was turning me into… might be worse than what he did to me.

⚠MATURE READERS ONLY⚠ DARK ROMANCE | MORALLY GREY HERO | OBSESSION | FORCED PROXIMITY ⚠

My Husband Cheated on Me with His Cousin, So I Married His Boss.

Kalyssa always believed her marriage could survive anything. She trusted James until he started slipping away. Late-night calls. Locked doors. Half-truths dressed up as excuses.
When she finally follows him, she discovers the kind of betrayal that breaks something inside you forever…her husband in the arms of his cousin, Melissa. What should have ended in tears turns into something far worse. In one night, Kalyssa loses her company, her home, and nearly her life.
But someone saves her. A man she doesn’t know, or couldn’t remember. He’s powerful. Controlled. Dangerous in ways that make her pulse quicken. And he isn’t a man who lets go of what he wants.
As Kalyssa rebuilds her life, her husband and his cousin suddenly want her back.
How was she going to get back what he stole from her? What would she do when the man who saved her proposes a contract marriage?

Jessica Howard was Ridgeview Homecoming Queen.

She smiled for the cameras, accepted her crown... and disappeared before the after-party. No body was found. No ransom. No answers.

The next morning, every student's phone lit up with the same notification. ‘A new app has been installed.’ No one downloaded it. No one can delete it.
It's simply called NEXT.

At midnight, NEXT chooses a name. The next day... Someone dies. Or something even worse happens.

The police call them accidents, the students call it a curse. I call it impossible.

I was never supposed to be part of this. I’m Sabrina Markson. The scholarship girl nobody notices. I came to Ridgeview to earn a future, not become part of its darkest mystery.

But somehow I ended up with the final piece of Jessica’s puzzle. The one clue that could blow the whole thing wide open.

Now the whispers are turning into threats. And the only person who’s willing to help me is the last person I should trust, Luke Carpenter. The school’s notorious bad boy. Trouble with a capital T.

We started out hating each other. But late nights chasing clues turn into shared moments. Stolen glances in empty hallways turn into him walking me home when NEXT starts targeting people close to me.

With every secret we uncover, it gets harder to tell if I’m falling for him... or falling into a trap.

As Luke and I dig deeper, it gets harder to tell who’s hunting who. And to figure out if what’s growing between us can survive when everyone around us is dropping.

Together, we need to unmask the culprits, and stop the stupid app from sending any more death notifications.

Because if we don’t find them first…
We’re next on the list.

Five years ago, Eric took the fall for his fiancée’s brother and was thrown into the notorious Saint Paul Mountain Women’s Prison.

Little did the world know, this hell on earth became his ultimate training ground.

Enduring brutal training under seven legendary masters, he emerged as a supreme martial artist and a divine healer, eventually taking over as the prison’s absolute warden.

But when he steps out, his world shatters: his three general brothers were ambushed and killed in action, his grandfather is on his deathbed, and his family empire has been reduced to ruins by wolves.

Now, the King of Saint Paul Mountain has returned to the city.

To those who betrayed his family and brought shame to his name—prepare to pay a hundredfold!

“You look soft, Pretty Boy. Like one hard hit on the ice would break you in half.”
“Then don’t hit me, Captain.”
A slow, dangerous smile curved his lips. “Who said anything about hitting you?”


My twin brother lived for hockey.
He was the university’s star winger, and the boy everyone expected to go pro but then he died.
Everyone called it an accident. I didn’t.
The last person seen with him was the university’s hockey captain.
The same captain everyone worships and the same captain I know is hiding something.
So I did the only thing I could.
I cut off my hair, bound my chest, buried my identity, and transferred to the same university disguised as a boy, determined to uncover the truth behind my brother’s death and expose the captain for the monster I believe he is.
No one can know who I really am, not my teammates, not the coaches.
And especially not the captain who watches me like he already knows I’m lying.
Living with twenty hockey players is a nightmare.
Becoming roommates with the one man I came to destroy is even worse.
He calls me Pretty Boy, pushes every button I have and protects me when no one else does.
And with every passing day, the man I swore murdered my brother becomes harder to hate… and impossible to stop wanting.
But someone knows why my brother died.
Someone is willing to kill to keep the truth buried.
And if I don’t uncover it before my disguise falls apart…
My brother won’t be the only one who never makes it off the ice.


…
A hidden-identity MF hockey romance.

BLURB

She is the nerd nobody cares about.

He is the hockey team captain and the popular guy on campus.

She's always an object of ridicule.

He is always there to save her.

He is her enemy.

She is the one girl that is able to catch his attention.

Their worlds couldn't have been more different.

Everything goes down the drain when Skylar falls in love with the one boy she is supposed to guard her heart around.

And even messier when the one person she hates the most in school not only stands up for her but kisses her as though his life depends on it.

What starts out as a contract becomes too real to be true, especially when she finds out her perfect golden boy is not just good on ice but rides his bike like he was born with the brakes.

A biker gang prince, a nerd guru, and secrets that come crashing down on them.

Their love gets forbiddenly sweeter when the biker prince finds out that everything Skylar has suffered is traced back to his bloodline.

During the SATs, someone in the exam room went completely mad, screaming about a freezing apocalypse and ghouls eating everyone in the world. Everyone laughed at him, but I was the only one frozen in shock.
Because the pendant on my chest, which could warn me of danger, was emitting an unprecedented, blazing alarm...

This was the most miserable Christmas I had ever experienced.
On Christmas Eve night, my husband brought his mistress home and demanded that I, his pregnant wife, leave with nothing.
On this day, I lost my husband and also lost the child in my womb...

My husband often made me suffer for the sake of my younger sister, even divorcing me because of her.
My parents gave all their love to my sister and neglected me.
My husband and parents even had my sister perform surgery on me.
But they didn't know that my sister had no idea how to perform surgery.
It didn't matter though, because I no longer cared.
On Christmas Day, when they were celebrating, they finally remembered me.
But I was already dead.

"I'll have her in my bed before prom."
That's what my "perfect boyfriend" wrote about me, in a group chat with his best friend — betting on me like I was some kind of prize, with his friend's ridiculously expensive vintage Porsche on the line.
Me, the nobody scholarship girl, somehow ending up with the most popular playboy in school? I actually thought it was fate. I thought it was my fairy tale.
Turns out, I was just the trophy they were fighting over the whole damn time.
So if you boys want to treat my heart like it's just some stupid bet, fine. Let's play this game to the very end.
At prom, I'll make sure they know it: they picked the wrong girl to mess with.

"Stay in the apartment," he said, straightening his tie as I fixed his collar. "I'll be back tonight." Then he walked out the door — straight to his wedding. What he didn't know was that my flight was already booked.
For three years I was his canary: locked in a penthouse, the only woman he let close when he bled, forgotten the moment another woman entered the room. I watched him let her wipe the blood from his face. I lost our child alone on a cold floor. I apologized to the woman who destroyed my mother's watch.
I was done waiting.
When the bells of Saint Patrick's rang out across Manhattan, he was welcoming his bride — and I finally flew out of my cage.

“You can stand there and deny it all you want,” he said huskily in my ear. “But I know how drenched you were that night. Your tight little p*ssy? It was calling my name, baby.”

“You’re insane! I never wanted you!” I gritted out, hating how weak I sounded. Hating how my arms suddenly didn’t have the strength to push him away.

How there was a part of me that truly wanted him, despite everything.

“Keep denying it,” he murmured, eyes darkening. “It just makes me more eager to bend you over my desk and f*ck that attitude right out of you.”


When executive assistant Alice Rhodes sent her arrogant and insufferable boss, Theodore Linden-Hawthorne, a sext during the company’s New Year’s party, her life turned completely upside down.

She lost everything: her fiancé, her family, and her best friend, all because of one embarrassing mistake. To make matters worse, Theodore seemed incapable of staying away from her, and Alice was horrified to realize that the feeling was slowly starting to become mutual.

But this attraction between them came at a price. Alice and Theodore came from two completely different worlds. Their attraction was forbidden and frowned upon by everyone around them. Would their love survive vengeful exes, juicy scandals, hidden secrets, and unexpected surprises?

She’s a widow by day, a wild biker by night. Two ruthless men want her. Only one will own her in the end.

Carlotta Russo survived her marriage to the cruel Alpha Dante—now, at just eighteen, she’s a widow with scars and secrets. By daylight, she keeps her head down, playing the good girl everyone wants to break. But after dark, she becomes a legend on the city’s underground racetrack—leather-clad, fearless, riding her bike like she’s running from hell itself.

And hell is coming for her—twice.

Gabriel, the school’s dangerous king, wants her on her knees, desperate for his touch.
Paxton, the cocky, blue-eyed street racer, wants her screaming his name, begging for more.

They don’t just want her. They want to own her.

Tonight, the rules are simple—first to catch her, first to claim her. The loser walks away.
The winner gets Carlotta in his bed. All night. No limits.

“You want a taste, Gabriel?” Paxton smirks, eyes dark with hunger. “Beat me on the track. Winner takes her home.”
Gabriel’s grin is pure sin. “Don’t worry, baby. I’ll make you forget you ever belonged to another man.”

Carlotta’s heart races almost as fast as her bike. She should run. She should fight. But every wicked promise, every hungry glance, makes her body ache for more.

In the dark, between burning engines and hotter hands, she’s the prize in a game that will break every rule—and maybe her.

Widow. Biker. Bad girl in the making.
Tonight, Carlotta will be claimed.
But when the sun comes up, who will she be calling Daddy?
18+ ONLY. BDSM, EROTIC, AND RAW HOT SCENES INSIDE.
Read this book if you want to cum hard and beg for more.

My husband's first love was in trouble.
When the news came, I was lying on the operating table.
Dr. Miller put down his scalpel and said to Dr. Johnson, "I'll leave my wife's surgery to you."

"If I don’t go now, I might regret it for the rest of my life."

With that, he turned and walked away.
Watching my husband's retreating figure, I couldn't hold back—tears fell.
The next second, the cold blade of a scalpel touched my skin.

Dr. Johnson spoke calmly, "Why the tears? With me here, you'll be fine."

The heiress of the wealthiest family was dead. Her death was caused by a plane crash planned her adopted sister. At a young age of 17, she had mastered so many skills while conquering the world. A top professor in world-class healthcare, she topped the world hacker list, joined a mercenary group ten years ago and became the world's top assassin with more hidden talents she used with hidden identities.
After her death, she's reborn into another body known as a worthless piece of trash, an ugly fat kleptomaniac filled with scars and acne and a foolish prankster.
She was scorned by her parents and often schemed against by her twin sister. The people in the society often curse and avoid her like the plague.
Until unexpectedly her beauty suddenly came back in thousand fold and then they started to realise otherwise.
Her top agenda is to reclaim her identity back and take back her position that her scheming adopted sister stole from her at all cost!

They chose her. They always chose her.
For eighteen years, I was the ghost in my own family while my adopted sister was the star. So when the ransom call came and they had to choose which daughter to save, I knew the answer before they spoke.
"Save her," they told the kidnappers, nodding at my sister. Then they turned to me. "She's strong. She can survive."
They were right. I was strong enough to survive the warehouse. Strong enough to disappear. Strong enough to come back.
Now I’m stepping onto the nation’s most-watched reality show, right alongside the people who left me for dead. They’re here to polish their perfect image for the cameras. I’m here to strip it bare—one live scandal at a time.
The problem? The show’s most powerful investor isn't playing their game. He’s a cold, record-breaking F1 champion​ who shuts down my sister’s tears and backs my play every single time. When my family tries a live ambush, he steps in front of the lens and makes it clear: I’m under his protection.
They called me strong because they thought I was disposable. Strong is the last thing they should have made me.

Six months after watching my mother murder my father, she took the last thing I had left—my boyfriend and f**ked him right before me beneath my dead father’s photo frame.

She pushed me out, and I ran straight into the arms of Hockey Coach Jethro Meyers.

Ruthless and dangerously attractive, the moment our bodies collided on the ice, the mate bond snapped into place with violent force.

But he shoved me away. “Leave before I hurt you, Cross.”

I thought that was the end of it.

Until my mother came again, this time with an announcement—she’s getting married.

To who?

“Jethro Meyers, my childhood best friend,” was her reply.

Now I was doomed to live under the same roof as my mate while he prepared to become my stepfather.

But there was no way I would let the marriage happen after everything she had done to me.

The moment I got into Jethro’s locker room and caught him naked, I dropped to my knees and whispered, “I’m yours now, Coach Daddy.”

I expected him to push me away.

Instead, he looked at me like a starving wolf who had finally found his mate.

And we were only getting started.

Three years of marriage, and she was nothing but his invisible "secretary" — or worse, the woman he accused of drugging him to get a ring on her finger.
It wasn't until Grace watched Alfred stroll out of the VIP terminal with his ex on his arm that she finally understood. This marriage had only ever been real to one of them.
She signed the divorce papers without a scene. Quietly resigned. And moved on.
That's when he lost control.
"Grace, who gave you the right to just leave?"
"Is this about another man? You're divorcing me for him?"
Then came the night he stood in the rain, eyes red, blocking her path.
"I was wrong. Can we go home?"
She looked at him and said simply, "Mr. White, we're already divorced."

On the third day after the Ice Age began on Earth, the temperature plummeted to minus fifty degrees Celsius, and human civilization disintegrated in the extreme cold.

My name is Anson, an ordinary convenience store clerk. After the apocalypse broke out, I risked my life to drive to pick up my mother-in-law Martha and her family and take them to a shelter.

Along the way, I unexpectedly discovered a large supermarket with abundant supplies, and I collected supplies with my wife Erin, mother-in-law Martha, father-in-law George, and brother-in-law Tom.

Just as we were about to leave with two trucks full of life-saving supplies, my mother-in-law, Martha, tricked me into going deep into the warehouse to move some goods. Then they locked the iron gate and drove away, leaving me to die in the supermarket surrounded by icy beasts.

In that moment of despair and waiting for death, the [Ice Fishing System] activated in my mind...

In the dim VIP massage room, I dragged my crippled right leg. Once a prima ballerina, I was now reduced to massaging clients just to survive.

Until I realized the man lying on the table was my so-called "penniless" boyfriend.

Right now, he was laughing and bragging to a friend. He had paid a top surgeon $300,000 to intentionally sever my Achilles tendon. As long as I remained a cripple, the national ballet championship would safely belong to his mistress.

For two whole years, he faked bankruptcy and crushing debt.

I gave up on my medical treatments and my ballet dreams, working two grueling jobs day and night just to support him.

But all of my suffering... was just to clear the obstacles for his lover.

My hands froze mid-air.

He had no idea that the disabled masseuse standing behind him in a mask was me.

That very night, I packed my only bag and boarded a red-eye flight out of the country.

Two years later. The International Ballet Finals.

The blinding spotlight hit the stage. I stepped out in my Black Swan tutu, letting the horrific surgical scars on my right leg be exposed to an audience of thousands.

As the heavy bass dropped, I leaped with absolute power, executed a flawless rapid pirouette, and landed perfectly.

In the VIP front row, my ex-boyfriend—who had long dropped his fake poverty to inherit his family’s billionaire empire—stumbled, knocking over his chair in absolute shock.

The moment the competition ended, he tore through the security line like a madman.

He fell to his knees at the edge of the stage. With bloodshot eyes, he reached out with a trembling hand, trying to touch my ankle.

"I'm so sorry... please, come home with me..."

Anne-Marie’s world collapses after spending one night in the bed of a total stranger, leaving her to pick up the pieces of her broken life. But survival is a must. Two years later, she returns to college, focused solely on securing her degree and making something out of her life against all odds.

She has to pick up figure skating again and is shocked out of her mind when she discovers that the hockey captain with whom she’ll be sharing the ice rink is none other than the ‘Champion’ she spent an unforgettable steamy night with. Memphis McCarthy.

Memphis is elite, passionate, persistent, ruthless on ice, and dangerously hard to resist. Despite their entanglement with others and a complicated buried past that will tear them apart, he is determined to make her admit she never forgot him, just as he never forgot about her. Their love is impossible, but as they dance on ice together, he slowly melts down the frozen walls she’s built around her fragile heart. He wants her burdens, her mess, her pain. He wants her, even if it will cost him everything he’s spent his whole life building.

Ruby Steele, 30, beautiful, fit, seems just like any other ex-pat hiding out in the Bahamas and playing local bartender. But unruly patrons find out the hard way: Ruby is a mixed-martial-arts pro, and not one you’d want to cross.In fact, Ruby would be a champion if she hadn’t been forced to walk away and hide out in the Bahamas.Because Ruby knows too much. She knows where the bodies are buried. And she knows when it’s time to get out of town.But what Ruby doesn’t know is why there is a dead tourist in the dumpster behind her seedy bar.Or why, she, of all people, had to find it.Or why this guy was out at 3am when he had a pretty fiancé waiting in a hotel room a mile away.Or why the local cops are pinning her.Or why she’s gonna be forced into a choice: find the killer, or do hard time herself.For Ruby, good choices have never been her strong point.And this one’s definitely not going to be good…Welcome to the Bahamian world of Ruby Steele, replete with her local dive bar, her wily pet monkey, her major drinking problem, her (way) too many fights, her inability to get herself out of trouble, and her fists made of stone. Ruby’s life is a complete wreck. But there’s one thing she’s good at: capturing your heart.ON THE ROCKS (A RUBY STEELE COZY MYSTERY) is the debut novel in a page-turning cozy mystery/thriller series, one that will linger with you long after the last page is read. Books #2 (EXTRA DIRTY) and #3 (FULL-BODIED) in the series are also available.

When the apocalypse broke out, I risked my life to save the woman I loved, and spent three years wandering around just to help her find her white moonlight.
Just when I thought she was finally moved, she stabbed me to death on our wedding night!
Reborn back to the first day of the apocalypse, I coldly watched her kneel down and beg for mercy.
You want me to be your lapdog? Dream on!
In this life, I will make her taste the bitterness of despair, and make her kneel down and beg for my forgiveness!
Forget about white moonlight and true love, they all have to kneel down before me!

Everyone used to say Ethan Ward was crazy about me.

Then, three days after our worst fight, he got together with Avery Shaw—the freshman who had been chasing him for months.

That same day, the world ended.

I got bitten and turned into a zombie.

For days, I wandered without thought or purpose. Then I saw Ethan shielding Avery with his own body, and something inside my ruined head woke up.

His friend asked, “Aren't you worried about Nora?”

Ethan's brow tightened.

“Don't say her name. She was too stubborn for her own good. If she got turned, that's on her.”

He glanced over.

His eyes met mine.

In the glittering world of high society and cutthroat ambition, a single sentence shatters a marriage: "Let's get a divorce."

For three years, Claire Thompson has lived in exile, her marriage to the powerful Nelson Cooper a hollow shell existing only on paper. Shipped abroad on her wedding day and utterly forgotten, she returns only to be handed divorce papers. But Claire is no longer the timid, heartbroken girl she once was. Behind her quiet facade lies a woman transformed, secretly rejoicing at her newfound freedom.

However, freedom comes with a price. As Claire signs the papers with relief, a chilling phone call reveals a dark truth: the threats she faced overseas were no accident, and the trail leads shockingly close to home—to the family that raised her and the husband who discarded her.

Just as she prepares to sever all ties, a twist of fate pulls her back into the gilded cage. Nelson, for reasons unknown, suddenly stalls the divorce. Meanwhile, the family that disowned her and the fragile, manipulative sister who stole her life are determined to ruin her reputation and drive her out for good.

But Claire is playing a different game now. With a mysterious new identity, powerful allies, and secrets of her own, she is no one's pawn. As hidden truths unravel and loyalties are tested, a stunning question emerges: In this high-stakes battle of love, betrayal, and revenge, who is truly trapping whom?

My name is Marlow Kane. I’m an orphan. I grew up in a lab—daily injections, pills, training—until I escaped and learned how to pass as “normal.”

No one knows what I used to be.

To my classmates, I’m the quiet nobody—the guy you forget is even there.

Then graduation trip hit. The boat went down, and I dragged seven classmates onto a deserted island.

At dawn I scouted the treeline and found a corpse—its wounds looked like someone had chewed the flesh right off.

I warned them not to go inland, not to wander. The school bully laughed in my face, said I was making up ghost stories because I wanted to play leader.

That night no one took watch. Everyone slept shoulder-to-shoulder by the fire—except me.

After midnight, one of us started shivering, shaking uncontrollably… then snapped upright and launched at the person next to her, teeth first.

The bully stumbled back. I was the only one who moved. I rushed in and drove a knife straight into her skull.

Firelight washed over her gray skin and bloodshot eyes. No one laughed anymore.

Blake sat in the sand staring at me, lips trembling, unable to say a word.

Ten years into my marriage, I'd traded my paintbrush for a spatula and turned into Mrs. Holloway.

Ever since my sister Brooke moved in, my husband Bennett and my daughter Lucy had picked up a habit. Anytime Brooke and I disagreed, they put it to a vote.

On my birthday I wanted steak. Two hands went up for the salad bar Brooke liked. When I hadn't slept in weeks and wanted to see a therapist, they sided with Brooke, who said I just had too much time on my hands.

We'd decided long ago that for our tenth anniversary, we'd go back to Jenny Lake, where Bennett had proposed. Then Brooke mentioned she wanted to surf in Maui. Another vote. Two to one, again.

Bennett finished booking the tickets before it even occurred to him to look at me.

"There were only three business-class seats left, so we grabbed them. Just book yourself an economy seat, okay?"

I nodded and bought a one-way ticket to Wyoming.

This time, I wasn't going with them.

At the engagement party, Adrian walked in with pregnant Celeste: "Sorry, the engagement is off."

"Why?" I stared at him intently.

"The baby is Adrian's," Celeste sobbed, "I can't let my child grow up without a father..."

"You're just an orphan with no money or connections," Adrian looked at me coldly, "You're not good enough for me."

Just when I was completely humiliated, butler Steven found me. "Miss Hayes, we've been searching for you for twenty-three years. You're the long-lost heiress of Hayes Corporation."

A week later at the family reunion banquet, Adrian knelt before me: "Iris, please give me another chance!"

"You can stay by my side," I looked down at him condescendingly, "but not as my boyfriend—as my servant."

But when Celeste accidentally miscarried, the truth shocked everyone...

The day before Thanksgiving, my husband, David, dragged his suitcase to the airport, claiming he was flying to Seattle to meet an important client.
My parents took my younger brother to Miami for a vacation and conveniently took my six-year-old daughter with them.
With the house empty, I picked up a last-minute catering shift that paid double the usual hourly rate. I needed the extra money to cover next month's rent and buy David a gift. So I temporarily filled in as a dinner server at a mansion in Beverly Hills.
After changing into a black-and-white uniform, I entered the employer's home through the service entrance.
The person in charge was the lady of the house—a young, beautiful blonde.
She had barely led me through the hallway toward the main room when I saw several workers hanging a massive engagement portrait on the central wall.
The man in the photograph, dressed in a perfectly tailored suit, was my husband of six years.
David.
I froze where I stood, my mind going completely blank.
"Move it a little to the left. Yes, that's it. Straighten it!" the blonde girl called out to the workers.
Then she turned toward me.
"What? Can't take your eyes off it? That's my fiancé."
She looked me up and down, her voice dripping with condescending, fake sympathy.
"Working on a major holiday? I guess you're not married yet."
I closed my eyes and took a slow, deep breath. "I am. But I'll be a widow very soon."

The world knew my grandfather as Professor Guo Zhenghua—a man who spent fifty years lecturing about justice.
They knew his wife as Lin Wanyu, a celebrated artist admired for her integrity.
Both reputations were built on a stolen identity.
The real Lin Wanyu was my grandmother.
She died in a mountain village with no legal name, no recognized grave, and her eyes still open.
When their grandson demanded a place at my law firm, I gave him the answer no one had ever dared give his family.
“No.”
By morning, they had taken my job.
By noon, I was ready to take everything else.

Sofia married into a brutal mafia clan, trapped in a hollow marriage to distant crime lord Edward. For three years, she's fought a shameful, burning craving for his eighteen-year-old son Ryan—a brooding werewolf heir with golden beast eyes and primal hunger simmering beneath his quiet coldness.
When a risky highway escape forces her onto Ryan's lap, repressed longing erupts into forbidden friction.
Hidden from Edward's line of sight, Ryan marks her, staking primal claim to the woman who should only be his stepmother.
Torn between crippling guilt and addictive obsession, Sofia surrenders to his feral passion.
Until one day, the door swung open...
The taboo stepmother-stepson forbidden love was exposed.

When Fairview University abruptly cuts the women’s hockey program, Ava Hale’s Olympic dreams are practically dead. Her only shot at staying on the ice is taking an unprecedented walk-on tryout for the brutal, championship-hungry men’s Division 1 team.
Walking into an all-male locker room is bad enough. Dealing with Liam Reed, the arrogant 6’2” captain determined to run her off the ice, makes it worse.
But Liam isn’t the real danger.
The real danger is the new head coach, Dominic Carter. Brooding, ruthless, and an ex-hockey prodigy whose NHL career was ended by a severe knee injury, Dominic rules the rink with an iron fist.
He also happens to be Ava’s brand-new stepbrother.
With their newlywed parents away on a four-month European honeymoon, Ava and Dominic are left completely alone in the same house.
At the rink, he treats her like a stranger to keep their secret safe. But late at night behind closed doors, the forbidden heat between them threatens to destroy his career, her roster spot, and both of their lives.

On our wedding day, she vanished wearing the gown I had bought for her.
I didn’t chase her. Instead, I went back to the operating table.
For three years, I had paid off her debts and filled the holes she left behind—enough for her to live a second life. My heart couldn't take it anymore; I had a stent implanted, though she never knew.
Three days later, I died in the hospital corridor. My ECG flatlined.
She didn’t know. She was still at a cocktail party in another city, clinking glasses with someone else.
A month later, she came back, kneeling before my tombstone in tears.
But it was all too late.

"What is love!? Carmen did you just mention that!?" With his speaking of rage and burning in anger; he asked.

"Yes... I have always do— I love you" she mouthed with her words stressed.

"You can try and ignore me if you can... Only if you know how eager I am and how badly I want to tame you". With those promising words from her which left a dark creepy smile on her face; she walked out.

"Love did she just call it? Did she think I will fall for that shit? If only she knew how much love is a weakness to every man". He muttered to himself as he sat down worriedly.

As a mafia boss, he must not have compassion nor can he fall in love.

She is the only one who have that fits to talks bravely to him. Even with his powers, his strength have it's limitations as it went down when he is before her.

He's fearless,
Dangerous,
And kills without a sparing a second to think!
He kills to live and lives to kill!
The smell of blood is what he enjoy most!!!

The dangerous man never forgives anyone even if it is blood—"fuck blood relatives when it comes to the smell of blood!"

He's not just all about dangers but handsome! He's a demigod and every ladies hopes for just a nightstand with him.

A girl sold to him by ruthless father and stepmother changed everything...

*She's annoying
*She's irresistible
*She's hot
*She's the goddess of beauty

What follows when she do the undo—...

She's a spy sent to monitor him, find his weakness and win his heart, will she accomplish that? Won't she fall in love in the process? What if the devil finds out?

For years, I'd covered everything for my mate's family. The house, the car, the bags, the clothes.

So when they planned a family vacation, I thought I'd finally earned a spot.

Instead, they booked tickets for the whole family, plus Sloane, the childhood sweetheart who never quite left my mate's side. Even the dog had plans.

I was the one they expected to stay home and keep working. They called it a kindness.

And they expected me to cover the bill.

Fine. Let them go.

It would be the last trip of theirs I ever paid for.

I straighten up after three back-to-back all-nighters, my stomach aching so badly I can barely stand up straight. At one in the morning, I head to the twenty-four-hour diner below my studio for a bowl of soup, just to keep myself going.

Steam rises off the bowl, and when I look up, my blood goes cold.

Beckett Wexford, my husband, head of the Wexford Group and a man with a serious germ phobia, sits right there, completely out of place in this greasy late-night diner.

He patiently picks the onions out of her burger, one piece at a time, while the girl next to him laughs, bright and carefree, her profile eerily close to what mine looked like at twenty.

"Beckett, you're so bad at this. It's just an onion."

The man who's been ice cold to me for years has a look in his eyes I've never seen before, soft, doting, like she's something precious to him.

"Hold on, almost done."

Eight years of marriage, and I turned myself into some neurotic housekeeper. Turns out all that tenderness was just going somewhere else.

I pull out my phone and open the divorce agreement I drafted a while ago.

Eight years. It's time to get myself out of this.

"You were like a starved beast last night," I complained, spreading jam on my toast.
Gideon's hands froze mid-knot on his tie. He turned to me, his eyes filled with utter bewilderment.
"Nadia, are you out of your mind? I was in the study finishing up that proposal last night. I crashed on the couch at three in the morning. I never even went into the bedroom."
The knife dropped from my hand onto the table.
If the man I made love to all night wasn't my husband.
Then... who was it?

Three years ago, billionaire Theodore Chambers handed Victoria Ellis divorce papers with cold eyes and colder words—all for the sake of his first love, Isabella Waters.
Victoria didn't cry. She didn't beg.
She simply signed her name, walked out of that golden cage, and disappeared from the world of the rich.
What the world didn't expect…
Was for the discarded ex-wife to rise from the ashes—not as a socialite, but as the world's most sought-after reconstructive mortician. Behind every high-profile crime scene and closed casket, she was the one restoring dignity to the dead—and building a name powerful enough to shake law enforcement and the elite alike.
Now, at a funeral of all places, their paths cross again.
She stands beside another man, radiant, untouchable.
He watches in disbelief—his ex-wife, no longer his.
"You handle corpses every day. Aren't you afraid of bad luck?" he growls, grabbing her wrist.
She smiles coldly.
"In my heart, the grass over your grave has already grown two meters tall."
But fate has one final card to play.
When Victoria finds Theodore lying in a pool of blood, clutching an old photo of her, everything unravels.
Was it too late after all?
Or is love just another body she's not willing to reconstruct?