Bing Caratozzolo

Cecile jolted awake from months of prescription haze, only to realize she was trapped in a live reality show designed to destroy her. Her billionaire husband had orchestrated the broadcast to publicly humiliate her and elevate his own PR image. He ordered her to follow a degrading script. What was worse, her five-year-old son, Damien, was genuinely terrified of her. When an empty wine bottle rolled across the floor, the tiny boy instantly threw his arms over his head, bracing for a hit. The production crew shoved microphones into the trembling child's face, trying to trigger his trauma for ratings. The live chat cursed Cecile as a toxic abuser. The show's golden girl maliciously tried to poach Damien on camera to prove Cecile was an unfit mother. The crew even rigged the game, forcing Cecile and her son into a freezing, rotting mud shack with a collapsed roof. They were all just waiting for her to break down and beg. "A toxic woman like you doesn't deserve to be a mother." The crew read the hateful comments aloud, expecting a hysterical meltdown. The realization that she had been manipulated into destroying her own child hit Cecile like a physical blow. How could a father subject his own son to this public cruelty? The weak, easily manipulated Cecile was dead. She threw the PR script away, rolled up her sleeves, and picked up a rusted hammer. This time, she would protect her son and tear down anyone who stood in her way.

For seven years, I played the obedient, "wolfless" wife to Julian Carlisle, the billionaire Alpha of the Black Stone Pack. I endured the pack's mockery, surviving solely on his charity. But on our eighth mating anniversary, he didn't come home. Instead, he took our seven-year-old son out to celebrate with his childhood sweetheart, Chloe. When I called them, my own flesh and blood laughed through the phone. "She doesn't even have an Inner Wolf! I wish Auntie Chloe was my mom!" Julian didn't just break our mate bond; he handed the groundbreaking AI project I had secretly built for him straight to Chloe. When I finally walked out and captured photos of them kissing in broad daylight to file for a divorce, Julian ordered his Gamma to crush my shoulder on a public street. He forced me to delete the evidence while he watched coldly from his armored SUV. He looked at me with absolute arrogance, completely certain that a scentless, helpless human would just cry, submit, and crawl back to his cage. He thought he had destroyed my only way out. But as his car drove away, I calmly typed a hidden command into my phone, recovering every single deleted photo from my dark-web server. He didn't know the metal cuff on my wrist wasn't a mark of a genetic defect. I was the true heir to the Supreme White Wolf bloodline, and I was going to tear his empire to the ground.

For five years, I was the perfect, silent fiancée to the most feared Underboss in the Cosa Nostra. On the eve of our wedding, I opened his sacred syndicate ledger and found a painstakingly detailed log of my best friend, Serena. He tracked the exact phases of her menstrual cycle and her preferred brand of imported painkillers. Yet just last month, when I was doubled over on the bathroom floor in agony, he refused to go to the pharmacy for me. "An Underboss does not run mundane errands," he had told me with flat, incurious eyes. He bought Serena a twelve-thousand-dollar blood-red gown, forced me into a cheap off-the-rack slip, and demanded she stand right between us at the altar. Worse, I discovered they were plotting to drain my parents' entire life savings to fund a money-laundering front for his illicit gambling operations. I had endured his coldness and emotional neglect, believing his severe mafia code applied to everyone. I never imagined he reserved every last measure of his humanity and warmth for the woman who was supposed to be my maid of honor. Looking at his handwriting, the blindfold finally fell from my eyes. I calmly photographed the damning pages, wired my parents' money to a secure offshore account, and sent a new directive to our wedding planner. If he wanted to give my best friend my place, I would make sure the entire underworld was there to witness it.

For two years, I endured agonizing chemo for my leukemia, believing my struggling family was sacrificing everything to save me. But right before my surgery, I overheard my brother and mother whispering outside the door. I didn't have cancer. My family, who were actually billionaires in the Syndicate, had been secretly poisoning me. They needed me weak and dying so my betrothal to the supreme Don could be transferred to their newly found biological daughter. "Once the betrothal is transferred, I will find the best specialists to cure Clara," my brother said coldly. But they didn't know I had already made my choice. Thinking my treatments were starving them, I had just swallowed a vial of lethal, untraceable poison in the bathroom. I died in excruciating agony on the operating table before they even made the first cut. When the surgeon announced I had committed suicide, my family's world completely shattered. My brother found my blood-stained suicide note and the meager cash I had saved to buy them gifts. "We murdered our own daughter," my father sobbed. My mother went completely insane, clutching my rotting corpse, while my brother slit his own wrists in a desperate attempt to feel my pain. They kneeled before my grave, weeping and begging the heavens to let them protect me in the next life. Floating above them as a ghost, I watched their absolute despair with a numb heart. I harbored no hatred, but I knew one thing for certain. In the next life, we will be nothing but strangers.

On my eighteenth birthday, I expected to find my Fated Mate. Instead, I found my executioner. I shifted for the first time, but my wolf was small and frail. Marcus, the future Alpha and the man I had secretly loved, looked down at me not with adoration, but with cold, clinical disgust. "A weak, scrawny Omega," he sneered, his voice echoing across the silent clearing. "You have no muscle. Your bloodline is nothing." He didn't just reject me; he humiliated me. "I, Marcus, reject you as my mate." The bond snapped, shattering my bones and my spirit. He banished me to the human city, leaving me to die in a freezing alleyway like unwanted refuse. For weeks, I lay in the mud, my body ravaged by fever and the agony of a severed soul tie. I accepted that I was worthless, a mistake made by the Moon Goddess. But just as the darkness threatened to swallow me whole, a pair of strong arms lifted me from the dirt. A stranger with eyes like obsidian fed me his blood and whispered a truth that changed everything. "You are not weak, Ellie," he growled, his power vibrating against my skin. "You are a White Wolf." I wasn't a runt. I was a legend. Now, fully healed and radiating power, I am returning to the pack that threw me away. Marcus is about to marry another, but when he sees me, he won't be looking at a reject. He will be looking at the biggest mistake of his life.

I was the daughter of a wealthy tycoon, deeply in love with my fiancé, Conrad. But on our wedding day, he arrested my father. My ten-year relationship was a lie. He was an FBI agent, and my best friend, Bonny, was his accomplice. The betrayal shattered me. I was forced into electroshock therapy, which erased my talent for architectural design-the one thing that was truly mine. My life fell apart. After a failed suicide attempt, I was saved by a kind stranger and my father's last words. I rebuilt my life from the ashes, becoming a successful photographer. Years later, Conrad reappeared, full of fake regret, begging for a second chance. I looked at the man who had destroyed me and compared him to a cat that had once bitten me. "I forgave you," I told him, "but I will never trust you again." My friend Corey, acting as my fake husband, defended my honor by punching Conrad in the face. Eventually, Conrad's career imploded due to a scandal involving Bonny. He was ruined. As for me? I was in Paris, my photography career soaring, when I picked up a sketchbook. Miraculously, the lines flowed. My gift was returning. I was finally in control of my own story.

On our seventh anniversary, the Capo dei Capi lit up the New York skyline with drones spelling my name, swearing on his life that I was his only Queen. Moments later, he abandoned me on the dock to rush to his mistress—my own sister, Sophia. Sophia sent me a photo of him kissing her belly with the caption: "He finally has a real woman. It's a boy." Lucien wanted an heir above all else. I was just the placeholder; she was the vessel. I didn't scream. I didn't confront him. I simply initiated Ghost Protocol. I left the wedding ring, signed the divorce papers, and erased Eleonora Marino from existence. By the time Lucien found the DNA test proving Sophia’s baby wasn't his—that he had betrayed his loyal wife for a lie—I was already gone. He executed my sister in a rage and spent his fortune burning down the world to find me. Six months later, he bought the high-security Swiss lab where I was hiding, forcing his way back into my life. He stood before me, gaunt and desperate. "I killed her, Nora. She paid for what she did to us. Come home." I looked at the man I had once worshipped. "Infidelity is a choice, Lucien. But murder? That is who you are." "We are enemies now."

For eight years, I thought I had succeeded in my mission to save Mark Johnson, a "high-value target with self-destructive tendencies," as the System called him. I was his fixer, his anchor, the stable force that pulled him from the brink, transforming him into a successful, confident husband. My mission, it seemed, was complete. But peace, I learned, was a language Mark never truly wanted to master. His craving for chaos reawakened with the return of Emily Carter, his old flame. I smelled her perfume on him at 2 a.m., then heard him arranging for her to stay in our home under the pretense of her being his cousin, shattering the world I had built. I confronted him, not with tears or accusations, but with cold, hard facts-the perfume, the late nights, the fingerprint security he' d never deleted for her. He looked ashamed, but still had the audacity to suggest Emily was "fragile" and "needed him," as if his betrayal was a mere inconvenience. Then, the true horror: he suggested, with earnest eyes, that I should "accept her." "Can' t you just… accept her? We could make this work. The three of us." The sheer audacity, the monstrous lack of respect, turned my love into pure revulsion. In that moment, the last ember of affection died. I looked at the man I had dedicated my life to, the "project" I had poured my soul into, and finally felt nothing but a vast, cold emptiness. I picked up my phone. "<System, I need to know my options.>" A white-hot rage, pure and clean, burned through my heartbreak, cauterizing the wound. I accepted the Exit Protocol, ready to forfeit everything to sever ties with this man and this life.

On the eve of my dream wedding, everything seemed perfect with my charming fiancé, Ethan Blackwood. Our partnership was built on mutual respect and shared ambitions, or so I believed. Then, his mother raised a toast to Chloe Hayes, the "dead" childhood friend Ethan rarely spoke of, the girl who supposedly died saving him. The next day, as I walked down the aisle, all eyes were on me, but Ethan' s were fixed on the church doors. A stunning woman stood there, frail but firm, her voice echoing, "Ethan? I came back for you." My groom' s face went white. He whispered, "Chloe?" In front of the city's most influential people, Ethan stumbled towards her, pulling her into a desperate hug, completely forgetting I existed. My white silk dress turned into a humiliating shroud as cameras flashed, capturing my public discarding. He finally looked at me, with no love, no apology, just annoyance. "Olivia," he stammered, "I… I' m sorry. I don' t know what' s happening." His attention quickly returned to Chloe, whom he shielded, calling her "fragile" and leaving me abandoned at the altar. The headlines screamed: "Billionaire Groom Abandons Bride at Altar for Ghost of Dead Girlfriend!" My parents, concerned only about stock prices and reputation, told me to "handle this" and "not look weak." I watched as articles about Chloe' s death vanished from the internet, Ethan already controlling the narrative to protect her. Alone in my hotel suite, I wondered, who was I without him? I was just the woman publicly discarded. That night, my phone rang. It was him. "Liv, are you okay?" he asked, but then Chloe' s voice cut in, dripping false innocence, "Oh, Ethan, tell her I' m so, so sorry." My rage finally boiled over. "Get her off the phone, Ethan!" He defended her, spoke of his guilt, then offered to "compensate" me. I laughed, a bitter sound. "You think this is about money?" I was a placeholder. The moment his ghost became flesh, I was disposable. He pressured me, "Liv, please, just try to be reasonable." I gave him an ultimatum: "You tell her to leave. You come back here and explain yourself to me, alone." Chloe wailed in the background, "Oh, Ethan, she hates me!" His voice hardened, blaming me, "Do you hear that, Olivia? Is that what you want? To be this cruel?" I hung up, the phone clattering to the floor. He was still in love with her. I was the third person in a two-person story. With cold resolve, I pulled off my engagement ring and threw it out the window. Then, I called my agent. "Book my flight. I want to leave tomorrow."

My mother' s voice cut through the party noise. "If it wasn't for my sacrifice, how could Kyle be so successful today?" She was openly boasting that she' d given my college fund to my cousin, Kyle. I stood hidden in the shadows, my hands shaking. Years of scholarships, working dead-end jobs, meticulously saving every penny for my Ivy League dream-all gone. "Ethan was never going to amount to much anyway," my aunt, her sister, added with a sneer. "Look at him now. A dead-end job, a miserable wife." My parents had enabled it all three years ago, when I'd been eighteen, acceptance letter in hand. "There's a family emergency," my mother had said. "Kyle has an amazing opportunity to study in Europe, and they're a little short." A little short for his tuition, but my entire life' s savings for my own education was apparently disposable. Now, Kyle swaggered through the party, designer suit, wealthy wife, a life that should have been mine. And I, Ethan? I was trapped in a mind-numbing warehouse job, just paying the bills for a small apartment I shared with a wife I didn' t love and a daughter who deserved so much more. "Ethan just doesn't have the drive," I heard my mother tell a neighbor. "He's lazy. Not like Kyle." The words hit me like physical blows. My vision blurred. The anniversary cake I bought with my overtime pay, a small gesture of connection, slipped from my numb fingers. It crashed to the floor. "Ethan! What is wrong with you?" my mother shrieked, rushing over, not to me, but to the mess. "You clumsy idiot! You've ruined everything!" My father followed, his face a mask of disappointment. "Can't you do anything right?" They stood there, judging me. My aunt and Kyle smirked. Later, my last twenty dollars, a fruit basket, rejected. "We don't need this cheap junk," my father said, not even looking at me. "Go make yourself useful. Your aunt needs another drink." That night, listening to them celebrate the man who stole my future, something inside me finally broke. The buried resentment ignited. It wasn't just about the money. It was about my life. And I was going to take it back.

For ten years, I poured my heart into Ethan Scott. My father, a New York media tycoon, had groomed Ethan to inherit his empire and marry me, his only daughter. I was hopelessly devoted, convinced he was my forever. That belief shattered today. I walked in on Ethan revealing his true plan to an intern, Maria: he' d marry me for control, then discard me and take over my family' s empire with her. My decade of love was just a stepping stone. Later that evening, as my father asked me to choose a husband from Ethan and two others, Maria' s calculated lie from years ago-the one that made them brand me a cruel heiress-boiled to the surface. Ethan, Andrew, and Brian still believed her, their contempt a constant reminder. They saw me as the prize, but I was just a pawn to them. Why did they believe Maria so blindly? How could they be so utterly wrong about me, and so righteously cruel? How could my deep love turn into such a brutal, calculated betrayal? Then, at my 21st birthday gala, Andrew slapped me across the face, Maria dramatically burst in, framing me for attempted murder, and Ethan publicly shamed me in front of New York' s elite. They thought they had won. They thought they had annihilated me. But they were about to witness a different kind of coronation.

Sarah Miller, with her uncanny gift of foresight, was a sensation. Her "Sarah Sees" livestream, broadcast from her humble Vermont farmhouse, brought comfort and answers to thousands. She was a rising star, a rare and authentic voice in the world of online spiritual guidance. But then, out of nowhere, an old childhood acquaintance, Jessica Evans, appeared. "Mystic Jess," she called herself, launching a strikingly similar channel. Whispers of Sarah being a "copycat" began, subtly fueled by Jessica and an influential local figure, Alex Peterson. The online comments turned vicious, branding Sarah a "fraud" and "liar." Her followers evaporated, her income vanished. The local community, once supportive, grew cold, and the stress bled into her family's life. Then came the vandalism, spray-painted threats, culminating in a confrontation that tragically led to her father's fatal heart attack. I watched my family shatter, my life ruined, all by someone who seemed to mimic my every move, even my private thoughts, always one step ahead. How could Jessica know what I was about to say or do before I even did it? My own gift, once so clear, became a dark, confusing static whenever I tried to foresee anything about Jessica or my grim future. It made no sense. Crushed by grief and public scorn, wishing for an end to it all, I closed my eyes. A snap, a void, then a gasp. I opened them to find sunlight streaming through my old bedroom window, my laptop waiting-showing the exact date I launched my first livestream. I was back. And I wouldn't let it happen again.

The federal courtroom buzzed, a low hum under the harsh fluorescent lights, as my fiancée Chloe begged me to sign a plea bargain for corporate espionage. This exact scene, these same tear-streaked pleas were painfully familiar. I'd lived this nightmare once before, framed by Chloe and her lover Derek, condemned to a brutal prison where I was left infertile, slowly dying alone in a cold cell. But this time, I was reborn, remembering every agonizing memory, every betrayal, burned into my mind. I feigned compliance, signing what sealed my supposed guilt, my heart a brewing storm under a calm facade. Chloe, dripping with false sympathy, celebrated, convinced Derek's narrative of my villainy would protect him as she took over my life, discarding my belongings and claiming our home as hers. She then imprisoned me in the building's damp basement, where she confessed the horrifying truth: she had systematically poisoned me for years to ensure my infertility, then brutally whipped me, counting each lash. The searing pain of the blows, the cold calculation in her eyes, mixed with the shock of realizing her long-term, meticulously planned evil, threatened to break me. How could someone I loved mete out such depravity? Yet, beneath the agony, a burning resolve tempered my spirit. Then, just as I was dragged back to court, battered and broken, seemingly destined for ruin, the doors burst open. Olivia Hayes, CEO of the company I supposedly betrayed, the woman from my true past, strode in, radiating icy power. She not only unilaterally withdrew all charges but then, to the utter shock of everyone, knelt before me and asked: "Ethan, this lifetime, will you marry me?" She remembered. And this time, armed with a second chance, our perfect revenge was just beginning.

My parents were murdered, our family bakery destroyed, and my fiancé walked out. That’s when Detective David Carter, his brother, swooped in like a hero. He promised justice and protection, then proposed. Five years later, I was pregnant, building a new life with him, certain I was finally safe. But that safety shattered one night. I overheard David’s hushed confession: he was obsessively in love with Veronica Hayes—my parents’ killer. He’d married *me* to protect *her*, to keep me quiet, a mere pawn in his twisted game. My entire life, even our unborn child, was a monstrous lie designed to shield a murderer. The betrayal burned deeper than any wound. At his family’s dinner, Veronica brazenly confessed to the killings, taunting me with a chilling detail. I slapped her in a desperate rage. My husband, David, violently shoved *me* aside, his fury reserved for me, not her. I fell, the pain unbearable, losing our baby in a bloody haze. His family cast me out like trash. Abandoned, violated, and gutted by grief, I was just another casualty in his sick obsession across two families. How could the man who promised to protect me be the architect of my deepest agony? How could his love for another destroy everything, even his own child? With nothing left to lose, I engineered my own disappearance, vanished, and then strategically unleashed every piece of evidence hidden by my supposed savior. The truth, now exposed, would finally bury them all.

I, Mike Evans, died young from endless work, a fool who gave everything to build a future. But then, as my soul drifted, I watched my supposed devoted wife, Jessica, calmly discard my ashes, her face devoid of grief. Moments later, she was in *our* bed with Chad Peterson, my best friend, laughing, truly laughing. My son, Kevin, the one I poured every dime into for his surgical career, walked in and called Chad, "Dad." My entire fortune, built brick by painful brick, was now theirs to exploit. Jessica’s "girls’ trips" and Kevin’s "specialized training" were just cover stories for their years-long affair. This sickening truth, this profound betrayal, ripped through me with a pain far more searing than death itself. My life, my sacrifices, had fueled their illicit happiness, making me nothing more than a convenient workhorse to be discarded. How could I have been so monumentally, tragically blind to such a colossal lie? Then, an unexpected jolt, a blinding flash, and I gasped, choking on lake water. I was back, years in the past, at the exact moment I was supposed to "save" Jessica from drowning. The very incident that launched my miserable first life of servitude. But this time, things would be different. This time, the game would change.

My sister and I are twins. In a big fire, my sister died. My parents actually made me marry the prince instead of my sister. After marrying him, he asked me, "Why did you disappoint him, not fulfilling his wish to climb onto the dragon bed, only able to marry him, do you regret it?" He treated me as if I had betrayed his sister, humiliating me step by step...

To help her husband build his business empire, Veyra worked two jobs, skipped meals, and sacrificed everything she had. When her mother desperately needed life-saving treatment, she couldn't even scrape together the money. Then, on a New Year's Eve flight, fate seated her beside her husband's mistress. That's when she discovered the cruel truth. Her husband had secretly amassed millions long ago. The wedding ring that belonged to Veyra now glittered on another woman's finger. The $500,000 that could have saved her mother's life had been spent instead on luxury gifts and pocket money for his lover. She lost her baby. She lost her mother. And finally, she lost every illusion about the man she'd loved for years. After leaving the airport, Veyra walked into a bar, kissed the most dangerous-looking stranger she could find, and spent one reckless night in his arms. By sunrise, she disappeared without leaving so much as her name. She thought it was nothing more than a farewell to her broken past. She was wrong. The stranger was Dorian-the most powerful, mysterious billionaire in the business world. Meanwhile, her cheating husband finally realized what he had thrown away. He begged on his knees, signed a postnuptial agreement worth billions, and swore he would give up everything if she would come back. But just as Veyra began plotting to reclaim everything that had been stolen from her, a mysterious car accident brought Dorian back into her life. Only then did she learn the truth. He wasn't a stranger at all. He was her ex-husband's older stepbrother. Now two powerful men are fighting for the same woman-one consumed by regret, the other determined to make her his. Sorry, cheating ex... I choose your brother.

One lab error. Two betrayals. And a billionaire who doesn't believe in accidents. Emily Vance thought she was carrying a miracle. After her fiancé, Julian, ended up in a coma following a horrific car crash, she underwent IVF to keep his legacy alive. It was supposed to be her anchor. Instead, a clinical mix-up reveals that the child in her womb isn't Julian's at all. It belongs to Alistair Wolfe, a man whose name is synonymous with ruthless power and a heart made of ice. The nightmare doesn't stop at the doctor's office. When Julian finally wakes up, he doesn't call for Emily. He calls for her stepsister, Chloe, revealing a secret affair that turns Emily's years of loyalty into a joke. Backed into a corner by a family ready to sell her to a predatory debt collector to save their failing business, Emily is left with a devastating choice. Her doctors warn her that this is her last chance at motherhood. To keep her baby and escape her family's reach, she has to make a deal with the wolf at the door. Alistair Wolfe wants his heir. Emily wants protection. No love. No strings. Just a temporary union until the child is born. But as Emily moves into Alistair's world, she quickly learns that playing the wife of a man like Alistair is a high-stakes game where the heart is the first thing you lose.

They say what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, mine didn't. I came back with a marriage certificate bearing a stranger's name, a ring worth more than my parents' love ever was, and a son whose father I've never seen, never known, never remembered. I went to Vegas for a racing competition. I won. I celebrated. And somewhere between the victory and the sunrise, my life changed forever. For six years, I've lived with the consequences of one reckless night. I built an empire. I raised my son. And I searched for the man who changed my life without even knowing it. Then fate laughed in my face. My sister married my ex-fiancé-the man I was promised to since childhood. The man I was supposed to become Mrs. Windsor for. The man who now wears my family name... and looks far too much like my child. Every time I'm near him, the past presses closer. Every glance feels like a question I'm terrified to ask. I shouldn't notice him. I shouldn't feel anything. He is my sister's husband. But some secrets refuse to stay buried. Because the truth about Vegas isn't just in the ring on my finger or the child in my arms. It's standing right in front of me. And when it finally comes out, it won't just destroy a marriage, it will burn an empire to the ground.

To revenge herself on her unfaithful fiancé Kevin, Isidora hides her striking beauty behind a plain disguise, and targets his uncle - the most formidable man Kevin fears. After one reckless night, Isidora leaves cash as payment and says lightly, "You were good last night." She tries to leave quietly, but is pulled into his arms. "You think you can walk away after this?" he says, his tone low and possessive. Cedrick is a feared, untouchable titan on Wall Street - elegant, aloof, and completely uninterested in women. Not even the most beautiful socialites in the city can catch his eye. When gossip spreads that he was seen pressing a woman against a wall and kissing her fiercely, no one believes it. When the rumors name Isidora, the crowd scoffs. He rejects even the most beautiful women, so why would he notice a plain girl like her? All doubt disappears when they see the dignified Cedrick drop to one knee to help Isidora with her shoe, pleading softly for just one kiss. When Kevin finally sees Isidora's true beauty and begs for forgiveness. But Cedrick kicks him out at once, slams a marriage certificate on the table, and says sharply. "Call her Aunt."

Amelia sat alone at the City Marriage Bureau, watching the clock tick down to closing time. Fifteen minutes before the doors shut, a phone call shattered her last flicker of hope. Her fiancé, Kayson, wasn't coming. He had abandoned their wedding registration because Kamila-her stepsister-had twisted her ankle. It was his ninth broken promise. When Amelia returned home, there was no comfort. Her biological mother sneered at her humiliation, shielding the stepsister while ordering Amelia to apologize to Kayson. "Who would she marry without Kayson?" her mother mocked. "Let's see how long she survives out there without his money." Meanwhile, Kayson arrogantly dismissed her absence. Finding out she had vanished, he just laughed it off with his assistant. "It's just a tantrum to force my hand," Kayson smirked. "She still can't live without me." After nine years of absolute devotion, she was nothing but a convenient placeholder to the man she loved, and a worthless joke to her own family. The suffocating weight of their betrayal finally snapped something inside her. She packed a single suitcase, threw away nine years of anniversary gifts, and permanently blocked Kayson's number. Standing in the freezing wind, she pulled out her phone and dialed the private number of Kayson's biggest, most ruthless rival. "Mr. Thornton, what you said seven months ago... does the offer to marry me still stand?" Ten minutes later, a sleek black Maybach pulled up to the curb.

"You want a divorce? Fine. Complete an IVF cycle, give me an heir to unlock my trust fund, and I'll sign the papers." In the dim underground garage, my cheating husband gripped my wrist tightly, his face twisted in a mocking sneer. "Stop dreaming, Ellie. Your family is bankrupt! You think if you leave me, some Wall Street billionaire is going to be blind enough to be your knight in shining armor?" Looking at his arrogant face, I felt nothing but pure disgust. For three years of a dead marriage, he paraded his mistress into our marital bed, letting her wear my clothes and carry my bags. When I demanded a divorce, my own vain mother tried to force me back to be his incubator, all for a seven-million-dollar bribe. "I'd rather die than have your child." I looked at him coldly and slammed the "PETITION FOR DISSOLUTION OF MARRIAGE" right into his face. Infuriated, he tightened his grip on my arm, ready to explode. Just then, blinding LED headlights tore through the darkness of the garage. A custom black Bentley Mulsanne glided silently out of the shadows, stopping inches behind us. The tinted window rolled down, revealing a sharp, lethally handsome face. The most ruthless, untouchable billionaire on Wall Street-Cosmo James. He also happened to be my husband's former best friend. Cosmo's ice-blue eyes locked onto the hand gripping my arm. His deep voice cut through the freezing air like a blade: "Take your hands off her." Cosmo leaned slightly forward, radiating sheer, predatory authority. A cold, ruthless smirk touched his lips. "You asked which Wall Street billionaire is going to be her knight in shining armor." "It's me."

SEVEN DAYS BEFORE MY WEDDING, I walked into our bedroom and found my neurosurgeon fiancé plowing my cousin on our bed. Six months later, Oliver and Vanessa are married, my humiliation is office coffee-break gossip, and I've done everything possible to disappear off the face of the earth. Then I find out my grandmother is dying. This birthday might be her last, and I refuse to let my ex take that from me too. Problem is, going means facing my own personal nightmare head-on: Oliver and Vanessa, happy and married, right in front of me, while the rest of my family looks at me like I'm a walking tragedy. That's when Simon Hart-my billionaire boss, arrogant as hell, and the only man who can irritate me, make me laugh, and dismantle every single one of my defenses in the same conversation-makes me an absolutely ridiculous proposal. "Just think about it." He spreads his hands. " You're tired of everyone pitying you. I'm rich as fuck, handsome as hell, and charming as fuck. Who's going to feel sorry for you when you show up with Simon Hart on your arm?" The problem is, he's right. I need a boyfriend to survive my grandmother's birthday weekend without turning back into the official family disaster. And Simon needs a serious girlfriend to prove to all of New York that the city's most eligible bachelor has finally settled down. It was supposed to be simple. Fake dating. Two events. Some convincing touching. Absolutely zero feelings. Until we added new terms to the agreement. No-strings sex. No jealousy. No expectations. Just sex. And it worked perfectly. Right up until everything went completely off the rails.

I carried a thermos of homemade chicken soup to the VIP lounge to surprise my husband after his ice time. But through the unlatched door, I caught him tangled naked on the sofa with Kyleigh—the "grieving sister" of a fallen teammate he claimed desperately needed our family's charity. I froze in the hallway, pressing my back against the cold concrete, only to hear something even more chilling. "What if she finds out the Nevada marriage certificate you gave her is completely fake?" Kyleigh purred. My husband scoffed, calling me a cold, arrogant idiot. He bragged that once he finished draining my family's century-old hockey trust funds into his agency's account, he would discard me. Even worse, I realized the four-year-old orphan he had begged me to sponsor was actually their biological child. Three years of my complete devotion and financial support, all built on a forged piece of paper and a calculated lie. He really thought I was just a sheltered heiress he could bleed dry and toss aside. I didn't kick the door open, and I didn't scream. Instead, I pulled out my phone, calmly recorded their naked betrayal, and dumped the three-hour soup into the trash bin. Since I was legally a single woman, I immediately called my Wall Street counsel to freeze all my offshore assets. He thought he was a mastermind, but he had no idea who he had just provoked.

I was an intern. John Carter was my billionaire boss who didn't even know I existed. On top of that, everyone knew his heart belonged to a woman from his past. I knew where I stood, so I kept my secret crush buried. Then came the company trip. One drunken night, one colossal mistake, and I woke up in his bed. Terrified and embarrassed, I packed my things and snuck out before dawn, hoping we could both just move on. Two weeks later, he called me into his office and tossed a marriage contract in front of me. He didn't marry me for love. He needed a quiet, manageable wife to satisfy his family, and I was available. Overnight, Hannah Baker became Mrs. Carter. His relatives loved me, the press couldn't get enough of us, but behind closed doors, I was invisible. He treated our marriage like an obligation and treated me like a stranger. For two years, I stayed silent and tried to win him over. I was wrong. Now I am done waiting for a man who will never see me. I took off my ring, signed the divorce papers, and packed my bags. But just as I reached for the front door handle, the husband who ignored me for years grabbed my wrist and refused to let me go.

I was Landon Mercer's secret girlfriend and loyal assistant for four years. I thought my absolute devotion would eventually win his heart. But he casually announced his engagement to a wealthy heiress, reminding me I was just a convenient nobody from an orphanage. When I got trapped in a horrific car crash and begged him to call an ambulance, he just hung up on me, annoyed that my bleeding was ruining his romantic getaway. He even blackmailed me with my orphanage's land lease, forcing me to attend his engagement party as a prop. At the party, his elite family and friends brutally humiliated me. They deliberately crushed my broken arm, poured red wine over my head, and kicked me into a freezing pond. When Landon finally pulled me out, he didn't care that I was suffocating and turning blue. "Are you out of your mind? You come out here and cause a scene during my engagement party?" He threw a stack of cash at my shivering body, furious that I had embarrassed him in front of his wealthy guests. Looking at the hundred-dollar bills floating in the muddy water, my four years of foolish love completely died. To him, I wasn't even human; I was just a cheap toy he could abuse and pass around. I didn't cry, and I didn't beg. I dragged my soaked, battered body into a car and headed straight to the penthouse of his biggest billionaire rival. It was time to burn Landon Mercer's world to the ground.