634 Book(s) Related to don t be harden

Four months pregnant, I went to the bar to bring Connor his wallet, only to overhear a conversation that made my blood run cold.

"She's so controlling. Billy and I can barely breathe," my husband told his friends. "I'm taking Kelsey to the countryside for three months of therapy. I'll just tell Nadia it's a parent-child program abroad."

The worst part? My ten-year-old son Billy would cover for him.

Then I had a miscarriage. In my darkest moment, Connor said he'd use experimental hypnotherapy to help me "forget the pain" so I wouldn't suffer or cling to them while they vacationed for three months.

I agreed.

But when he got everything he wanted, he regretted it.

I survived 100 underground death matches just to keep my brother alive.
My reward? A rusted coffee can holding his ashes.
When I knelt in the pouring rain, desperately scraping his ash out of the black mud, Cassian—the mafia boss I'd bled for ten years—kicked the can away.
He pulled a gun and pressed it to my head. All because his innocent fiancée felt "scared" by my look.
"Apologize to her," he commanded.
Looking at the gun I had engraved with his name years ago, I didn't cry. I didn't beg. I just laughed.
Clutching the battered, empty tin can to my chest, I turned and stepped off the cliff into the raging Black Sea.
Only then did the great Cassian panic, his desperate screams swallowed by the dark waves.

Preston Ashford and I made a promise to get into UCLA together.

I held onto that promise through all of senior year, surviving on four hours of sleep a night. Then results day came, and I found out someone had logged into my application and changed it.

I only ever gave Preston my password.

I storm over to confront him and catch Vanessa Ashby, the daughter of an old family friend, the one everyone tiptoed around because of her depression, laughing. "Preston, what do you think Elise looked like when she found out?"

Preston lets out a lazy laugh. "She'll freak out, obviously. Girl's wound so tight, might as well get some use out of her."

Vanessa has depression, and I'm the one who's supposed to make her laugh.

I'm the one who ate dirt at track meets. I'm the one who got laughed at for singing off-key. I'm the one everyone pointed and laughed at. And every time she doubled over laughing, Preston told me I was a good girl.

I turned myself into a joke, just to get a little scrap of kindness thrown my way.

But not this time. I'm done playing the clown.

I'm a siren. Every fifty years, I need to eat a heart. Not just any heart—it has to be rotten to the core. The more evil, the better it feeds.
So when Arthur Pendleton, billionaire marine philanthropist and secret trafficking kingpin, spotted a helpless blind girl sitting alone at his charity gala, he thought he'd hit the jackpot.
He took me to his cliffside villa. Cooked me dinner. Drugged my milk.
Cute.
The drugs broke down the second they hit my stomach. His guard found out about the restraints the hard way—right before I snapped his neck.
Now Arthur is steering his yacht into open water, chasing a sunken treasure that doesn't exist, too drunk on greed to notice the strange singing in the fog, or that the blind girl in his passenger seat can see him perfectly fine.
He has no idea what's waiting in the deep.

The Percy Family Heir's Scandal Leaks Again!

Cecilia Davis sat curled up in the master bedroom, scrolling through photos of Edward Percy and Jessica Brown.

The photos were taken secretly, but from a sharp angle.

Through a car window — the two of them, going at it hard.

Cecilia let out a cold laugh, tossed the photos into the trash, and felt a wave of deep exhaustion wash over her eyes.

"Do I really have to cut it?"

"Ma'am, this is Mr. Percy's request. Only if you cut your hair as short as Ms. Brown's can we clear up last night's rumors. Of course, you don't have to go — that is, if you never want to see your brother again."

Edward's assistant Leo spoke with a dismissive air, not a trace of respect in his eyes.

As if she, the so-called Mrs. Percy, was nothing more than a joke that nobody needed.

And honestly, that's exactly what she was.

As if being sold as a slave wasn't enough, she has to bear the ruthless alpha king a heir which she does,but in his absence, because she had to run to save her life and that of her babies.

Years later, she returned but not as the pathetic little girl that she was. she is now a woman sort after by many alphas and he would have to fight them all to win her back.

''Well, do you have something to say?''
A strapping, muscular naked man asked me as he sat across from me as I was also sitting there naked, half-submerged in this large tub of water.
''Don't worry, I won't bite you, baby...''
He said as he moved closer to me, pulling me into his lap and placing me on his leg.
''Wh-what is this, Master?'' I finally asked him as he handed me a small bar.
''I am not your Master,'' he snapped at me in a harsh tone.
''I am your Mate.''

After the death of Alasia's mother five years before, her stepfather used the trust given to her upon her mother's death to support his drinking habits.
Once he was broke and refusing to manage the one low-end job he had, he felt he was left with no other choice. He decided to sell his eldest stepdaughter in the event that he could get enough to move away, and therefore, take her younger brother along with him.
Alasia at the mere age of 16 is sold into slavery into the most fierce werewolf pack, The Crimson Caine, by her overzealous and abusive step-father.
How can she survive under the most ruthless and Alpha?
And what if she finds out she's his MATE?

Dear readers! If you love this story, check out my other book: My Husband Loves Someone Else.
I was cheated on my wedding night when I witnessed my husband passionately making love to two blonde, blue-eyed women on our marriage bed.
However, I didn't cry or make a scene. I divorced him, became an independent woman focused on my career, and then met an excellent man.
Just when I achieved success and fame, my ex-husband got on his knees begging for my forgiveness.
I smiled. "Get lost."

Dear readers and friends, thank you for reading this novel. I have recently written a new novel titled , and if you're interested, you're welcome to look it up and give it a read.

“You can’t do this,” he said, voice cracking. “I have a scholarship. I have a team. If anyone finds out—”
“I’m not here to blow up your life,” I said, holding his stare so he understood I could if I wanted to. “I’m here because the guy on that couch wasn’t pretending. He was real for three minutes.” I didn’t blink. “I want that guy. And I’m not going anywhere until I get him.”

Ethan Drake is the golden boy of college hockey team—the disciplined captain, scholarship star, and future NHL prospect whose smile never slips. Behind the flawless image, though, Ethan is drowning in a secret that could cost him everything: he is gay. The only proof is a drunken kiss last summer with a boy whose face he can’t remember—until the new transfer rookie walks into the locker room with a small, unmistakable scar on his lower lip.

Ares Cole is everything Ethan trained himself to ignore: tattooed, sharp-tongued, and unapologetically out. He was outed in high school, lost his scholarship, and transferred twice before landing here. Now he’s sharing Ethan’s bedroom for the season, and he’s carrying a blurry phone video from that night—one that shows Ethan’s team bag in the background.

Ares has spent a year searching for the boy who kissed him like he meant it. He’s not leaving until Ethan admits the truth.

Trapped between the life he built and the one he wants, Ethan is forced to choose. When Ares announces he’ll quit the team unless Ethan stops hiding, everything explodes in a raw, public confrontation in front of the entire arena. Ethan’s secret spills out—not on his terms, but on the ice where it matters most.

Jevan Hollen was the most popular boy at his highschool. Blossom Wright was the new student who earned a scholarship to Jevan's school during their senior year. When she first laid eyes on him, she knew she immediately liked him although the fast friends she made warned her against it due to Jevan's ex-girlfriend, head-cheerleader and 'queen b' but Jevan and Blossom grew closer and eventually started dating which made his ex-girlfriend furious. She cooked up a lie and it led to Blossom and her mother getting deported.
It's years later when Blossom returned and she now has a son. And Jevan has a fiancee.

“You’re not having her,” I spoke, shielding her with my body.
“So be it.” And he fired.

Six years ago, a stupid lie shattered the bond between rich heiress Zenobia Hollen and her best friend, Kyle Livingston. Now, Kyle is back—broke, regretful, and desperate for a second chance. When Zenobia needs a new personal bodyguard, he seizes the opportunity, determined to prove he’s more than the boy who betrayed her.

But forgiveness isn’t Zenobia’s strength. Forced into proximity, their past is a minefield of resentment and unresolved passion. As Kyle risks his life to protect her from real threats, the line between duty and desire blurs. Can they navigate the dangers of the present and the ghosts of their past, or will the secrets and scars they carry destroy any chance of a future? In a world of luxury, lies, and lethal intentions, some second chances come with a bullet.

“If anyone’s putting a baby in you, it’s gonna be me, Nolie… with your legs shaking, your lips moaning my name, and my cum dripping down your thighs.” Zorak snarled.
Twelve months ago, Nolie wrapped a cello string around a billionaire heir’s throat and killed him.
To keep it quiet, she was forced to marry the mad son of the Veltrona Syndicate.
Twelve months in hell.
Now her husband’s been killed, and his powerful, twisted family wants her pregnant by his obsessed little brother.
But the man who watched her kill?
The one with golden eyes and a hunger that never left?
He’s back.
Not to save her.
To ruin her.
He wants her mouth on his name.
Her thighs open for his revenge.
Her womb carrying his claim.
Because to him, Nolie isn’t a widow.
She’s his favorite obsession.
And tonight, he’s coming to collect.

For his mother's life, he willingly became a live-in son-in-law for three years, enduring countless humiliations from his wife and male lover. Only when they themselves unplugged the life support pod did he retrieve the dusty cell phone from the pool of blood. The "Zero" access to the Silicon Valley dark web had been unlocked; this time, he would make the entire Crawford empire pay with its life.

My husband, the terrifying Mafia Don, dropped fifteen million dollars on a luxury yacht just to throw a lavish, high-profile birthday celebration for his precious first love.

And today marks exactly seven days since I died of an infection in a Detroit slum, simply because I couldn't scrape together a few cents for antibiotics.

At the banquet, an oblivious guest tactlessly brought up my name.

Alessandro dialed my number for the first time in five years.

"Genevieve, if you've suffered enough, crawl back here and beg Elena for forgiveness."

That is, until the estate doors were violently shoved open.

A scavenger walked in, leading a little boy whose face was an eighty-percent match to Alessandro's.

Mature Content Warning!
An erotic reverse-harem romance. Two men with one woman.

Riya had a perfect life: Happy family, wonderful boyfriend, wild friends and amazing grades. Everything was perfect.

But her life takes an unexpected turn when her parents force her into a marriage, and all her beliefs are set to trial.

She is sold for a deal, quarantined in the pandemic, and her monogamous beliefs are shaking. She is trying to choose one when she doesn't really want to.

So will she get everything she desires or will she have to compromise?

Updated daily.

To help my girlfriend climb the ranks, I handed over my life's research and propelled her into the inner circle of power.

Her repayment? To secure her status, she threw my thirteen-year-old sister outside the city gates to feed the zombies.

When I uncovered the truth, she showed zero remorse. Instead, she knocked me out herself, tossing me into a metal transport truck to serve as zombie rations.

She thought dead men tell no tales.

What she didn’t know was that the moment the zombies bit me, I swallowed my newly developed serum.

When I opened my eyes again, I hadn't lost my mind. Instead, I had become the Zombie King, commanding an endless horde of the infected!

Half a year later, Eden City’s energy is depleted, and the city is besieged by a massive army.

Dressed to the nines, my girlfriend steps out of the city to beg and negotiate with the rumored "Zombie Boss of the Wasteland."

Sitting across the negotiation table, looking at her hypocritical face, I slowly take off my gas mask...

In this damned wasteland, nobody wants to travel with a burden.
But there were four filthy little ones who stubbornly insisted on following me, refusing to fight back or retaliate.
I looked at them, then at the approaching horde of zombies in the distance, and tossed a loaded pistol in front of them.
"Want to follow me? Fine."
I coldly placed a knife to the neck of the outermost zombie. "Here, if you want me, the lone wolf, to take you along, you'll have to prove you're not trash!"
"Take it and shoot it in the head! That's the only ticket to joining my team!"
The sixteen-year-old girl, tears streaming down her face, gritted her teeth and pulled the trigger.
I knew I could never shake them off again.

After struggling with infertility for years and being betrayed by her lover, Ella finally decides to have a baby on her own.
However everything goes wrong when she gets inseminated with the sperm of intimidating billionaire Dominic Sinclair.
All of a sudden her life is turned upside down when the mix up comes to light -- especially because Sinclair isn't just any billionaire, he's also a werewolf campaigning to be Alpha King!
He's not going to let just anyone have his pup, can Ella convince him to let her stay in her child's life? And why is he always looking at her like she's his next meal?!
He couldn't be interested in a human, could he?

"Why do you run away from me?"

"Why this obsession with me?"

His fingers continue caressing my skin, sending shivers down my spine, "Do you think it's just an obsession? What I feel for you goes beyond that-I would even kill anyone who looks at you."


In a city steeped in the shadow of crime, Don Morgan emerges as a ruthless Mafioso, accustomed to bending everyone to his whims. But when his eyes meet those of Laura, a woman of magnetic beauty and unwavering determination, everything changes.

Don Morgan's heart is seized by an unknown feeling: love. Determined to make her his, he plunges into a dangerous game of seduction and power, willing to break his own rules. Laura is not a woman who is easily swayed by others, especially the mafia.

"You do realize we're getting married this Friday, right?"
"It's just a contract. No feelings. No strings."
"Then why do you keep looking at me like that?"
Sienna Madsen had always played by the rules. Until life left her no choice.
With her beloved mother gone, hospital bills piling up, and rent soaring beyond reach, Sienna is desperate. Her best friend has a wild solution: marry a brooding Canadian hockey player who needs a green card. One year of fake marriage, a free apartment, and no strings attached—what could go wrong?
Enter Matt Gruber. Grumpy. Gorgeous. Guarded. He's the last person Sienna expects to share a roof with, let alone a bathroom. But what begins as a paper arrangement quickly sparks forbidden chemistry neither can deny. He cooks. She tempts. And the boundaries between pretend and passion blur dangerously fast.
Sienna promised herself she wouldn't fall. But when the season ends and the divorce papers are signed, can she really walk away from the only man who's ever made her feel at home?

Liam O’Grady is a powerful loan shark and realtor, a man mixed in crime and an underground fighter, a King. He owns all the main gambling dens in the city and in the areas around and does not hesitate to use muscle or kill his opponents.
Between them, his half-brother Finn St Just and he run the city of Hunter’s Folly, with the strength of their muscle and money power.
The brothers are Dominants and they enjoy subjugating the women they take. And they have the habit of sharing a woman.
But the jaded Liam knows that something is missing. He has turned thirty and he feels cynical, bored.
Like a breath of fresh air, innocent young Bianca Cruz turns up at their doorstep, asking for help. The nineteen-year-old is trying to get her family free of the clutches of the evil Dean Nelson, who was also responsible for the death of her father.
Liam agrees to help her, for he is intrigued by the young woman who is untouched and other-worldly, an innocent who appeals to his jaded self. It is like a jest to him, this chance to bed a girl who is totally inexperienced in the ways of his world. A virgin at that!
He along with his brother proposes a deal with the desperate young woman. They will help her; they will even restore her father’s beloved bakery and hand it over to her.
But the price is this:
She will be their willing submissive for a year.
*
Does she cave in and accept their terms?
And what will happen during this year to the girl who has no experience of men?
Worse, what will happen to her at the end of the year?
For Bianca is a sensitive young girl.
And the men who will own her are experienced , hard-hearted and callous men who do not care for the women they bed…

I am the adopted daughter of the Blackwell family.
The day they found their biological daughter and kicked me out, my birth parents found me, and I became the heiress of a top-tier billionaire family.
But none of them know that I am the sole apprentice of a legendary miracle doctor.
I am the founder of a famous aromatherapy brand.
My hacking skills might not be the world's best, but cracking a system is something I can do in minutes.
When my adoptive parents mocked me for being down and out, I just smiled.
Later, when they went bankrupt and begged for my help, I just smiled.
I also slept with Vincent, the head of the powerful and aloof Thorne family, treating him like a male model.
He initially suspected I was a spy sent by his rivals and pursued me aggressively.
Later, he hooked his arm around my waist and whispered seductively, "Claire, be my girl, won't you?"

But Owen. You can’t just quit your job, sell your house, and run away with a band. People just don’t do that.

When her childhood sweetheart Owen breaks off their engagement, quits his job, and sells his house to pursue a career as the lead guitarist of a band, Emily’s world comes crashing down around her.

Owen was, after all, her best friend and always had been. They had grown up next-door neighbors, gone to the same school, the same university. They had even bought houses next to each other.

They had been each other’s first for everything. Absolutely everything. There had never been anyone else, not even for a moment.

Just as Emily begins to find her feet again and form her own plans, Owen’s backup singer calls in sick, and Emily steps in to save the day.

Soon she finds herself swept up in a crazy ride to the top of the music industry which might just save her relationship with Owen or end it completely.

Have you ever seen a screaming toddler and thought, wow, they just can’t be the same good-natured kid who was eating cereal ten minutes ago?
Well… Sometimes you just might turn out to be right.
It turns out, the fae stole my little brother. In his place? A pixie with boundary issues and a talent for home repairs.
I’ve spent my life taking care of everyone else. So when my baby brother is taken, I don’t hesitate. I walk straight into a faerie mansion and make a bargain with its infuriatingly charming master.
Kie is everything you’d expect from a dangerous fae, beautiful, political, and entirely too amused by me. Power wrapped in a smirk. Sensual, mischievous, and far too aware of the effect he has on people. He agrees to help me find my brother.
For a price.
Now I’m bound by a faerie bargain and navigating a world of glamour, manipulation, and ancient rules I definitely should have learned sooner, enchanted forests, political games, magical contracts, and a fae lord who treats seduction like a perfectly reasonable negotiation tactic.
Iron is how I keep people out.
Glamour is how he draws them in.
And apparently, they just don’t mix.

Warning Matured Content [Rated +18]

Randall lifted the veil I was wearing and gently pressed his soft lips against mine. I closed my eyes.

“I am so pleased to present the newlyweds, Randall Adams and Winter Harris Adams!”

I yearn after I open my eyes. It is just a dream. But that didn't happen because rising my eyes, only the click, the light of the camera, and the applause of the people popped into my depressed eyes.

Randall, the handsome billionaire, stands beside me, claiming that we have been a pair of lovers for so long.

But I don't recognize him.

Because I lost my memory.

Eleanor Blackheart’s life is already in shambles—divorced, alone, and hunted by the mafia. When her ex-husband, a member of the Blood Reapers crime family, bursts through her door with a mysterious silver chain and a death sentence on his heels, Eleanor is yanked into a deadly game she can’t escape. After he’s gunned down, a bike accident throws her into the arms of Don Knox, ruthless leader of the rival Iron Serpents. Saving her could spark a brutal war, but walking away is no longer an option for his heart beats for her. With the Blood Reapers demanding her head and Emily guarding a secret powerful enough to upend the criminal world, survival may come at the cost of everything—and everyone.

My name is Dafu, I am a dog, and I can smell death.

Sweet, cloying spores and a metallic, fishy stench seeped in through the cracks in the door.
The owner's friend was crying and calling for help outside the door , but all I could hear from my nostrils was the gurgling of mucus and the rustling of fungal hyphae climbing—
The person outside had no heartbeat.

The owner ultimately decided to open the door and rescue the person .
no!

I bit his hand tightly , my eyes pleading desperately—
Master, trust me !
That thing outside the door! It's not a person at all!

Before the zombie outbreak, I was a hardcore doomsday prepper. I hoarded countless supplies, but when the apocalypse actually arrived, I ended up turning into a zombie myself. Just as I was overwhelmed with panic, my girlfriend and the guy she was cheating on me with brought a mob of thugs to smash down my door...

(She's my niece. I know this is a line I should never cross.)

The first time we met was at her grandfather's funeral. She was trembling in black lace, and all I wanted was to pull her close and never let go.
The second time, she showed up at my door soaking wet, the night her fiancé shattered her. I peeled the wet clothes from her skin and told myself I was just being a good uncle.
I lied.
The third time, she whispered we shouldn't. I swallowed every word right off her tongue.
The fourth time, she stopped pretending she wanted to leave.
What she doesn't know is that every favor had a price. Every touch in the dark was a thread, pulling tighter. Every rescue, another lock on the cage I built just for her.
When she uncovers the truth between her fiancé and her stepsister, something clicks.
The obsession. The possession. The way he owns her and calls it love.

She's felt this before.
Because the man who swore to protect her plays the very same game — only he plays it in her bed, and he's far, far better at it.

He slept with her the night before he found out she was his mission.

One drink turned into three. One conversation turned into the kind of night he had no business having the evening before a job. He left before she woke up, told himself it meant nothing, and opened his mission file two miles down the road. Her photograph was on the first page. The woman from last night. The woman his Alpha had sent him to protect. The woman a syndicate had been hunting for eighteen months and was getting very close to finding.

Now he is living in her apartment as her service dog, trapped in a dangerous kind of forced proximity. He hears every secret she tells him in the night. He has watched the men outside her window and handled threats she never sees coming. His wolf recognized her the moment he walked through her door, and the fated mate bond has not stopped pulling him toward her since.

She trusts the service dog completely. She has no idea the dog at her feet is a wolf shifter hiding a secret identity. She has no idea the stranger, the protector, and the animal beside her are all the same dangerous secret.
She survived a murder trial that destroyed her life once already. Now this trauma survivor is being protected by turns out to be the most intimate lie of all?

"I never believed in soulmates, but how do you explain the feeling of déjà vu when her eyes meet mine? How do you explain the certainty that I’ve known her forever, even when we’ve only just met?"
Emma’s life is a mess. Recovering from a devastating breakup with her controlling ex-boyfriend, she’s determined to rebuild herself—piece by piece, step by step. But the summer holidays drag on, her attempts at distraction failing, and loneliness starts to creep in. Enter Alice, her mischievous best friend, who dares Emma to take a leap into the unfamiliar world of online dating.
What Emma doesn’t expect is Irene—a stunning, confident, and enigmatic girl with a mischievous sense of humor and eyes that seem to hold the weight of centuries. Their connection is instant, electric, and utterly consuming. But just as Emma starts to believe she’s found something real, Irene drops a bombshell: she’s not looking for anything serious, and her heart might already belong to someone else.
Conflicted but unable to let go, Emma agrees to stay in Irene’s orbit, even if it means risking her heart all over again. As their relationship deepens, Emma can’t shake the feeling that she’s known Irene far longer than a few short weeks. Could their connection be something more—a bond forged long before their paths crossed in this life?
Will Emma risk her heart again for a love that feels destined, or will Irene’s walls prove impossible to break? And if soulmates truly exist, what happens when one of them refuses to believe?

Dive into this heart-wrenching and passion-filled story of love, self-discovery, and the aching beauty of letting someone in, even when the future remains uncertain.

After my parents passed away, I regarded the Carter family as my last blood relatives and Jessica as the light for the rest of my life. Until that day, Dafu, who was sitting next to me on the sofa, suddenly looked up and his voice hit me directly in the head.
It said that Jessica holding Brad's arm was a ploy to force me to sell my house. It said that my parents' insurance money had long been "borrowed" away by Carter time and time again. It said that in thirty days, extreme cold would arrive, with temperatures dropping to minus eighty degrees Celsius, turning the world into hell.
Memories of my past life were also poured in by Dafu—they broke my legs and threw me outside, where I froze into an ice sculpture in a blizzard.
Dafu rushed to save me, but Brad pinned him to the snow, skinned him, made a fire, and ate him.
I silently pulled out the Glock 19 my father had left me and chambered a round.
Click.
In this life, I won't listen to people anymore; I'll listen to dogs.

My name is Maya Wilson. I'm seventeen, I have 100K TikTok followers, and I just watched my dad destroy our family for a twenty-five-year-old homewrecker named Ashley.

"Ashley makes me feel alive again," he said, dismissing seventeen years of marriage like a bad business deal.

"We'll be one happy family," she smiled, standing in our kitchen like she already owned it.

That's when I knew: Mom needed my protection.

What followed was a war fought with laptops and lies, fake pregnancies and real heartbreak. A battle between a broken housewife discovering her strength, a teenage girl wielding digital weapons, and a woman who thought she could manipulate her way to victory.

Six months later, Mom would be accepting awards. Ashley would be gone. And Dad?

Dad would be begging for forgiveness he'd never get.

Three years ago, on a night when it wouldn't stop raining, I carried Victor Caster out of a pile of bodies.

He'd taken two bullets. He grabbed my ankle and said: when I get back, I'll give you the world.

But when he came back, it was my sister Sabrina on his arm.

After that she was the woman who ran the Caster house, and I was the crazy one they locked away upstate.

Three years later, at the engagement party, Sabrina opened up her own wrist and screamed that I did it.

I tried to explain.

But the man I'd given half my life to save wouldn't even look at me. He just flicked his hand.

"Her hands don't know their place. Take them. And I don't want that face in front of me."

He never once looked up.

So why is it that the next time he sees me, the moment he really looks at my face, he goes down on his knees?

My ex-husband found me selling hair clips at a flea market. Rosie was asleep in her stroller.
"Come home. She's too young for this."
I said yes.
After that, I stopped checking his phone.
Rosie stopped crying when the other girl took her toys.
He spent the night at Simone's—we didn't call.
We ran into them at the mall—we walked the other way.
We finally became what he always wanted. Easy. Quiet. No drama.
So why is he the one who can't sleep now?
"Why don't you get mad anymore?"
"Rosie, why won't you ask me to stay?"

I thought I had finally married for love, that I had become the most cherished woman of a Mafia godfather.
Until I discovered the real reason he chose me in the first place.
For three years, Marcello Giovanni treated me as the most precious woman in the world.
Until the day I stumbled upon a hidden room, filled with hundreds of photographs—and every single woman in those photos looked exactly like me.
Then, I heard his underboss whisper:
"Boss said her eyes look just like Miss Camilla's."
I thought that even without real love, I could still keep living.
But I was wrong.
The moment Camilla came back from the dead, Marcello chose her without a single moment's hesitation.
And I was forced to jump into the ocean...

A marriage proposal gone wrong—a second chance to get it right.When architect Marley Patterson goes out with Von Ryan, she never expects her practical, cautious life to be turned upside down by the handsome contractor. Von is the definition of fun, until his proposal sends her into a panic. Marriage is too serious a commitment to make after dating for only six months. Even though she cares for Von, they are too different, so she breaks up with him.Being rejected hurts, but Von blames himself for not reading the signs or Marley better. He finds solace in work; however, his construction company’s success isn’t enough. He wants to share his life with a woman who’ll love him as much as he loves her. She’s out there. All he has to do is find her and, this time, be patient for the relationship to develop on its own.After Marley is assigned to Von’s new project in Indigo Bay, he treats her the same as everyone else—professionally and with respect—though neither can deny a strong mutual attraction still exists. Soon Marley realizes she may have been the problem with their relationship, not just Von’s proposal. She wants a second chance, but after breaking his heart once, will he give her a do-over?

“Do I really deserve this?”
Dr. Xavier Brown asked the void after the woman he loved smiled and shoved him off a rooftop.

He died a brilliant, betrayed genius… only to wake up as the worthless secondary character in a trashy web novel.

The pathetic live-in son-in-law.
The disposable husband.
The man scripted to be humiliated, divorced, and killed so the protagonists could shine.

Died once.
Refused to die again.

Armed with every humiliating page of his own doom, Xavier signs the divorce papers with a smirk, takes the money, and kicks the first death flag into the dirt.

But the story doesn’t let go so easily.

When he saves the mother of Isabella Voss, the novel’s ice-cold villainess, using medicine this world has never seen, she doesn’t destroy him.
She builds him a kingdom: a hospital with top-notch facilities, an empire of shadows, and a love that feels dangerously real.

Then the truth rips the script apart.

He isn’t Alexander Rodriguez.
He is Alexander Winchester, erased heir to a hidden mafia family, legendary assassin king, memory wiped and chained as a live-in dog by the very people who now call themselves heroes.

Six deadly sisters descend to reclaim him.
A ruthless CEO. A ghost hacker, an assassin trainer, a pharmaceutical prodigy, a public opinion goddess, and the youngest who sees what’s coming before it breathes.

With a system that evolves from cold machine to snarky partner in crime, Xavier walks two paths at once:

The Healer who rewrites life, and the Ruler who burns false fates to ash.

But Karma never dies, Damien and Sophie met with their consequences

Every betrayal returns.
Every death flag screams.

“Do I really deserve this?”

Xavier smiles, scalpel in one hand, shadow in the other.

This time the answer is yes.

That scumbag who turned into a jerk as soon as he had some money had been sneaking around with my stepsister behind my back. On our wedding night, no less, he was still carrying on with her! To make matters worse, my shameless stepsister drugged me, causing me to lose my long-preserved virginity to some stranger, and I even ended up pregnant with his child! And now, that traitorous bastard wants to divorce me so he can be with my despicable stepsister! Over my dead body!
Four years later, I returned to the country with triplets born abroad, armed with unparalleled medical skills and a burning desire for revenge against those who betrayed me. My ex-husband, that scumbag, begging for a second chance? Get lost!
But what’s the deal with this billionaire I accidentally saved? Not only does he look just like my kids, but he’s also shamelessly insisting on being their father!
The billionaire: "They are my children. Who else do you want them to call dad?"

My husband handed me divorce papers at 2 AM—right after he'd had his way with me. Three years of marriage, and he never once believed I was anything but a scheming woman who trapped him. He said he wanted his real love back. I said I wanted our daughter.
He laughed and told me I couldn't afford to raise her alone.
He was right about one thing: I needed money. So I took the only job that could change everything. He showed up at the presentation as the client. When he saw my work, his face went pale. He accused me of plagiarizing a famous designer—the very genius who had saved his company years ago.
He has no idea.
That genius is me.
And he's about to find out exactly who he just let go.

When Dorian Falco’s stepsister and secret lover was found brutally violated in a slum alleyway, the Mafia Don lost his fucking mind.
And he blamed me.
He dragged me into the manor's dungeon, throwing me to a dozen of his most depraved enforcers.
"Whatever Camilla suffered, you'll pay back a thousand times over."
I collapsed on the freezing floor, sobbing as I desperately clutched his pant leg. "I love you! I would never hurt her! Please, Dorian, believe me!"
Dorian only offered his cruelest sneer.
"Jealous that she gets the real thing? Fine. I'll make you filthier than she ever was."
He locked me in that blood-stained cell for seven days and nights.
His thugs, given carte blanche by the Don, whipped me with chains and violated me without restraint. I screamed Dorian's name in the darkness until my throat shredded.
Seven days later, Dorian returned with a recovering Camilla.
He stood outside the heavy iron door, his voice dripping with mock generosity.
"Crawl out here, Saoirse. Get on your knees, kiss Camilla's shoes, and maybe—just maybe—I'll let you live."
Silence. No answer.
Because three days ago, I had already died in that cell.

Three years ago, Marco Ferraro stepped over the corpses of the Vancetti family to claim his throne, delivering my sentence with cold indifference: "Don't take it personally, Noelle. It's just business."
Three years later, he is the untouchable new Godfather of New York, while I am nothing but a ghost in a threadbare coat.
His classless fiancée didn’t just buy my mother’s legacy—she took that rare pink diamond and dropped it, right in front of everyone, into a glass of whiskey thick with spit.
"Thirsty, fallen princess?"
She kicked the backs of my knees hard, forcing me onto the glass-strewn floor. Her sharp stiletto heel ground into my knuckles. "Drink it, or die."
Marco stood to the side, lighting a cigar, his eyes filled with nothing but boredom.
I tightened my grip on the shard of glass hidden in my palm, ready to drag us all down to hell.
But before I could strike, the deafening roar of rotor blades tore through the dome of the auction house. A pitch-black military helicopter hovered just outside the floor-to-ceiling windows, the violent rotor wash instantly shattering every champagne tower in the room.
A voice that made the entire underworld tremble boomed through the speakers:
"Which one of you suicidal bastards touched my woman?"
A dozen crimson laser dots instantly painted a target on Marco’s forehead.
Rafael, "The Phantom," had arrived.
Tonight, no one makes it out of here alive—except me.

The night I was reborn, my adoptive brother—Viktor Konstantin, the Don of the Chicago Outfit—was poisoned during a negotiation.

In my past life, I loved him desperately. So when the aphrodisiac took hold and he gasped for me to call Liliya, I made a selfish choice. I stayed. I gave myself to him.

She arrived too late. When she saw us together, she ran. Her plane crashed over the Atlantic that same night.

Viktor married me without a word of blame. Until a turf war when our enemies captured me—seven months pregnant, chained up, beaten bloody. I called him, begging for help through my tears.

His answer shattered me: "You want to live? After killing Liliya? You and that bastard don't deserve to breathe. Go to hell, Eve."

I died in that cell. Our daughter died with me.

Now I'm staring into those same drugged eyes again.

This time, I'm making the call.

Thirty-two times.
That was how many times Tristan had "tested" me during our three years together.
When I met Tristan Bennett, we were both hiding our true identities. He never mentioned he was the Bennett family heir, and I never brought up the surname Torrente. We were just ordinary college sweethearts in Ashborne City. He said he loved me, and I believed him.
The seventeenth time: driving across town late at night to deliver documents for him, I was run off the road and crashed into a guardrail, earning nine stitches in my forehead. His first words at the hospital were, "Can't you even drive properly? You delayed my business."
The twenty-sixth time: he owed money at an underground casino. He sent me to negotiate. A gun was drawn, and a bullet grazed my arm, soaking my sleeve in blood. The scar is still there. He never asked if I was in pain; he only cared if his debt was cleared.
The thirtieth time: he asked for my entire life savings for an "emergency." He turned around and used that money to buy someone else a new car.
I thought if I endured it all, we would eventually have a future.
Until he announced he was opening a casino and demanded ten million dollars. "The ultimate test," he called it. If I passed, he’d marry me.
I refused.
He immediately bought Aurelia Gallom a twenty-million-dollar mansion. Waving the property deed in my face, he said, "Vesna, I was just testing you. It's a shame you failed. We're done."
I didn't cry, and I didn't beg. The moment I walked away, I had never felt so free. He didn't know I was a Torrente, or that my father, Dario, owned the criminal underworld of this city. And he certainly never imagined that I would later marry Silvio Marchesi—the most powerful Mafia Boss in Ashborne City—and become the Donna of the Marchesi syndicate.

I snapped photos of pale yellow baby clothes I’d bought at Target, posted them on Instagram captioned “Juno's wardrobe.”
Right after I put my phone away, my mother-in-law Genevieve called and berated me. She claimed I’d lost my mind after our stillbirth, insisted I wasn’t pregnant, and demanded I delete the post.
As soon as we hung up, my water broke.
Six hours later, I woke up worn out on a hospital delivery bed at Devereux Memorial Hospital. No baby cried anywhere.
My husband Elias sat beside me with bloodshot eyes. He pulled a lifelike silicone fake pregnancy belly out and set it on my lap, begging me to accept I wasn’t actually carrying a child. I screamed that I’d given birth and demanded to know where my baby Juno was.
Dr. Beckett and a team of doctors walked in, diagnosing me with pseudocyesis—phantom pregnancy. They said I’d only worn a silicone pad to fake a belly. My parents stood nearby, staring at me with shameful pity.
They forced me onto a psychiatric ambulance. I was locked in a windowless ward, drugged nonstop, tormented by the loss of my daughter, until every ounce of my will faded away...

One hundred years married to Everett, and I've learned one thing: whenever he wants to push me into a corner, he throws the mate bond dissolution agreement in my face. Whenever my parents want me to cave, they hold the family name over my head.

They've always wanted the same thing — for me to hand over everything I have to my twin sister Rosalie, who's been sick her whole life.

I've fought it. I've grieved over it.

But when the doctor slid the diagnosis across the desk — Blood Depletion Syndrome, late stage, less than two weeks left — something in me just went quiet.

What's the point of fighting when you're already dead?

For the tenth time, James Smith left me behind because of a call from his female student.
But it was as if I had become a different person—I no longer doubted that there was something ambiguous between James and his student.
Even on our wedding anniversary, when he abandoned me in the remote mountains for Sophia's sake, I bore no resentment.
Eventually, James began to sense something.
"Emily, you seem different," he said.
I shook my head with a smile.
Because I had simply made a different choice from the one in my past life.

For five years, my marriage was nothing but a lie, a perfect show Aiden staged for the entire family.
I loved him for more than a decade. And for his lover, he threw our five-year-old daughter, Chloe, into the basement to be fed to his Dobermans.
All because Chloe accidentally shattered an antique crystal cup, a so-called love token between Aiden and his precious Sophia.
I dropped to my knees and begged. He looked at me like I was nothing and said Family rules matter more than blood.
When I carried my daughter’s mutilated body out of that basement, fireworks were exploding on the rooftop above, celebrating his grand confession of love to Sophia.
He froze my accounts. And on the day of Chloe’s funeral, he took her to a concert.
I was holding my daughter’s ashes, trapped, desperate, with nowhere left to go when a message from an unknown number appeared. A car was waiting at the side gate. It was Daniel, my childhood friend.
Only after I disappeared with my daughter’s ashes did Aiden finally realize the truth—that the “sweet, innocent” Sophia was the real killer of his own child.

In Chicago, the Belinni name is not spoken—it is feared.

Dan Belinni was raised inside violence, trained in the blood-soaked discipline of the Outfit until he became its sharpest weapon. At nineteen, he is already known for illegal fights, brutal enforcement, and a temperament that turns any challenge into punishment. He doesn’t believe in mercy. He doesn’t believe in love. He believes in control.

Milena Lima has spent her life surviving, not living. An undocumented immigrant in Chicago, she works herself to exhaustion just to stay afloat and protect the only stability she has left—her friend María. But when she loses her job and her visa expires, Milena becomes invisible to the law and vulnerable in ways she never imagined.

Desperate, she steps into a Belinni-owned nightclub, hoping to earn enough to survive another week. One stage. One performance. One decision.

That is all it takes for her to cross paths with Dan Belinni.

He is not a man who lets go.
And she is not a woman who submits.

But beneath survival and violence lies a truth neither of them is ready for—Milena is tied to a mafia legacy she never chose, one that makes her both a target and a claim in a world where women are never just women.

When their worlds collide, obsession replaces restraint, and a single night changes everything.

Because in Dan’s world, love is not given.

It is taken.