Yue Manshuang

For ten years, I was Sarah, the billionaire tech mogul Alex Thorne’s secret girlfriend, a ghost hidden away while he built his empire. I toiled in his marketing department, hoping one day he'd make us public. But then my father, my only family, was dying, needing a treatment I couldn’t afford. Alex wouldn't see me, not even for an emergency, and my father died waiting. Heartbroken, I went to his penthouse to collect my things, only to find his icy COO, Jessica, lounging on his bed, wearing my silk robe. Alex emerged, unfazed, then Jessica smirked, confessing she’d methodically sabotaged my career for a decade, suppressing my pay, blocking my promotions. To my horror, Alex dismissed my ten years with him as a mere “transaction,” calling me a "liability" and siding with the woman who gleefully admitted destroying my life. The man I loved, the man who could've saved my father with pocket change, had allowed this calculated cruelty to unfold. How could my loyalty and love be so profoundly worthless to him? But a quiet strength surged. I raged, not about his money, but his fraud, his betrayal of a decade of my life. Then, a surprising proposal from my childhood friend, David, offered a lifeline. I quit, and with a defiant click, posted my wedding invitation, marrying David in seven days, announcing a true new chapter to Alex's entire company. They threatened, slandered, but I was done being quiet; I had my own truth to tell, a new life to build, and this time, it was all mine.

After the accident that took my parents and stole my sight, my childhood friend Leo swore he would be my eyes. For years, I believed him, my dark world revolving around the boy who described every ray of sunlight for me. I was even undergoing a risky, experimental surgery to restore my vision, just for him. Then, I saw the truth with my own eyes. On his phone screen, I was just the "little blind girl" he had to take care of, a burden he was tired of carrying. The cruelty didn't stop. He let his new flame publicly humiliate me, and when she faked an injury, he forced me to apologize for a "carelessness" that never happened. The final betrayal came in a dark sea cave. He abandoned me to the rising tide and the pitch-black darkness, leaving me to face the same terror that had once consumed my entire world. He chose her. He broke his promise. He broke me. So I left. I found my own vision, my own strength. Three years later, I returned for my first solo art exhibition, and when I saw his face in the crowd, I knew he was about to see everything he had forced me to be blind to.

For three years, I was Colton’s hands and feet. I wiped the sweat from his brow and taught him to walk again after the accident that nearly killed him. He promised me a future. But the moment his ex-girlfriend, Charlie, returned from Paris, I became nothing. "She was just the crutch I needed to walk to you," I heard him tell her. At his recovery party, Charlie shattered his late father’s cherished wooden puzzle box and blamed me. She shrieked that I had poisoned her soup out of jealousy. Colton didn't hesitate. He didn't check the security footage. He didn't ask for the truth. He gripped my jaw, his fingers digging into my cheeks, and forced the scalding broth down my throat. "Eat it! Prove you're not crazy!" He roared while I choked on blood and blisters, the hot liquid searing my skin. He chose the woman who abandoned him over the woman who saved his life. I took the severance check, deleted every photo, and vanished into the night. Six months later, I was accepting an award for my new rehabilitation clinic in Australia, wearing a diamond ring given to me by a man who treats my scars like gold. Colton stood in the back of the auditorium, looking like a ghost. He had finally discovered that Charlie was a fraud who faked her "spiritual journey" to get illegal plastic surgery. He came to beg for forgiveness. But when our eyes met, I didn't feel anger. I didn't feel love. I turned my back on him and walked into the light.

Tomorrow was the grand opening of my dream restaurant, "Aura," a place I'd poured my life and soul into. As I stood there, taking it all in with my girlfriend and business partner, Sarah, a man from the Department of Health showed up for a "surprise inspection" based on an "anonymous tip." My blood ran cold when he walked directly to the walk-in, pulling out rancid meat and a dead rat from a container I' d never seen. Within an hour, my restaurant was padlocked, and the next morning, my face was plastered across every news site, branding me a "Chef's Dream Restaurant a Health Hazard." My 15 years of relentless work were instantly ruined. I stumbled home, desperate for Sarah' s comfort, only to find her on the phone, her back to me, whispering, "It went perfectly, Mark. Better than we could have hoped." My culinary rival, Mark Davies. My heart stopped as she continued, "He completely fell apart. He looked like a kicked puppy." Then the chilling revelation: "The money is safe. I moved the last of it this morning. He never even checked the accounts. He trusted me completely." She had embezzled everything, justifying it as a "mercy killing" for my career. The betrayal was a physical blow. The world tilted, and I fell, hitting my head, the last thing I saw Sarah' s cold annoyance. I woke up in a hospital, two days later, to news that my license was permanently revoked. My life, my name, my future – all gone. They thought I was weak, finished. They had killed Ethan Miller, the chef. But a ghost could do things a living man couldn' t. A plan, desperate and insane, began to form. I reached for the phone, dialing a number I hadn' t called in years. "Chef Dubois," I whispered. "It's Ethan. I need your help. I need to disappear."

The light hit me, sharp and clear, after five years of living in a blurry world. My sight was back, a miracle spurred by my pregnancy. But the miracle quickly turned to horror when I returned home from the doctor's. I saw my husband, Liam, on a news channel, announcing his engagement to another pregnant woman named Chloe, and proudly stating he was divorcing me-his "blind wife." I watched in daze as he treated Chloe with tenderness I' d never seen, even feeding her the special nutritional soup our housekeeper made for me. That same night, suffering from intense pain, I reached out to him, but he coldly dismissed it as "just pregnancy cramps," preferring to text Chloe next to me. Later, I found him kissing Chloe, their voices drifting, revealing his contempt: "She's blind and deaf to the world, Chloe. She only knows what I want her to know." The contempt, the betrayal, and the public humiliation scorched through me, leaving nothing but a vast, empty void. How could the man I loved, the man I sacrificed my sight for, be such a cruel, selfish stranger? I knew then what I had to do. I would play their game, be the foolish wife, until my baby was safe. Then, I would leave, and he would finally see who he had truly lost.

It was my birthday, and my stepsister, Tiffany Stone, stood before me, a sickeningly sweet smile on her face. In her hands, she held my mother' s cherished vintage record, the last thing I had left of her. Then, with a sharp, deliberate motion, she shattered it on the marble floor, stomping on our mother' s smiling face. That night, they came for me-a black van, no license plates. They dragged me from my bed to an abandoned warehouse, smashing my hands and feet with a cold metal pipe. Then came the gasoline, poured over me as I screamed. My therapist, Dr. Ethan Sterling, the only person I trusted, had given me a distress beacon, but as I reached for it, I heard his voice over a walkie-talkie: "Keep her alive, but don' t actually kill her." My blood ran cold, hope replaced by an abyss of despair. I woke up in the hospital, and Ethan sat by my bedside, a mask of concern. But before I could speak, my father stormed in, slapping me and accusing me of faking my kidnapping for attention. Tiffany, my stepmother, and my half-brother joined in, a united front of accusation. Ethan then forced me to my knees, instructing me to apologize. My heart shattered. Back home, I overheard Ethan and Tiffany, him comforting her for being "shaken" by "what happened." I found out my mother's irreplaceable necklace was up for auction. At the auction, I tried to buy it back, but Ethan outbid me, then publicly proposed to Tiffany, who promptly shattered the necklace and then shoved me down a grand staircase. I lay there, bleeding, as Ethan turned his back to comfort Tiffany. I knew they would never see me, never believe me. Why did he betray me? What did I do to deserve this endless torment from the people who were supposed to protect me? How could the man who promised to save me be the one orchestrating my downfall? My world didn' t just collapse. It ceased to exist. On the night of Tiffany' s fashion show, after being further humiliated by my family, I disowned them all, including Ethan, and, drawing a dagger, plunged it into my own chest, staging my death.

My life was a carefully constructed ballet of order and purpose. As an ER doctor, I thrived in controlled chaos, with a loving husband, Mark, a rising star in the police force, and a seemingly ordinary life. Then, one volunteering shift at a free clinic shattered everything. I was brutally attacked, injected with a mysterious virus, my very being violated by a gang. But the real horror began when I discovered the footage-a humiliating video of my assault, captured and uploaded by my own stepson, Kevin. My career, my reputation, everything I had built, crumbled overnight, reduced to internet fodder. How could this happen? Why would Kevin, the boy I tried to love, betray me so cruelly? The pain was a physical ache, deepened by the bizarre, almost theatrical sympathy from Mark, who swore he' d find my attackers. The truth unfurled with sickening clarity: it wasn't random violence. Mark had orchestrated my assault, weaponizing a virus and manipulating his son to pave the way for his ex-wife, Sarah, to return. My loving husband had tried to erase me. The call to my former mentor at the FBI, Dr. O' Connell, was my only hope.

My life at Johns Vineyards, one of Napa Valley' s most prestigious wineries, was perfect. I was the 25-year-old VP of Operations, dating my boyfriend of eight years, Anthony, and living the legacy I'd been raised for. Then, a new field hand, Sabrina Chavez, walked in, casually mocking my simple choice of wine. Soon after, I found a discarded condom in our family picnic area, a disgusting violation. Storming towards Anthony's office to vent, I stumbled upon a scene that froze me: Sabrina, in a revealing top, flirting brazenly with Anthony, who was flustered and complicit. His pathetic excuses, her deliberate "trip" into his arms, and a button conveniently popping open, confirmed my worst fear: a betrayal happening right before my eyes. The disgust choked me, but the real shock came when he chugged non-potable water, only for unedited CCTV footage to pop up showing him and Sabrina in a tool shed, their vile secret exposed. Instantly, Anthony dropped his act, wrapping his arm around Sabrina, snarling that she was the "real" heiress, the one who "deserved" my life. My world shattered. How could the man I loved turn on me so viciously, siding with a stranger who claimed my identity? Amidst a dramatic board meeting and a public birthday humiliation orchestrated by Sabrina, aided by Anthony, I felt utterly alone and betrayed. But just when all seemed lost, my brother Andrew, who had flown in, held crucial evidence: the full hospital security footage from my birth. He looked at the screen, a forgotten memory surfacing, and pointed at a tiny figure. "I remember this," he whispered, his eyes widening. "I followed that nurse. She took my baby sister, Gabby, into that little dark room. I was worried she' d be scared of the dark." He unknowingly corrected the swap, ensuring my place in the family. The truth was out, changing everything.

For ten years, I was the picture of a devoted husband, building a life with Chloe in our comfortable Bellevue home. My life felt stable, successful, exactly what her image-conscious parents approved of for their daughter. Then came the news: Leo, Chloe' s tumultuous musician ex, had died. A drug overdose, labeled suicide. Days later, my wife, my Chloe, drove her car straight off the Deception Pass Bridge. Grief-stricken, clearing out her laptop, I stumbled upon a password-protected blog. "Leo1998." Inside, ten years of her raw thoughts: "I married Ethan today... They just gave me a life sentence with his shadow." Another entry: "I had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from screaming... I felt so disgusted afterward I scrubbed my skin raw." My heart, already broken, shattered into a million pieces. The woman I adored had spent a decade despising my every touch, every act of love, pretending I was another man. My entire existence was a lie. The words burned through me: disgust, resentment, pity. My world collapsed beneath the weight of her betrayal. How could my decade of unwavering dedication, my honest love, have been nothing more than a painful charade for her? The sheer, pointless waste of it all. Then, darkness. But instead of an ending, I jolted awake to the smell of stale coffee, in my old college dorm. My phone buzzed: a text from Chloe. The date: September 15, 2014. Ten years in the past. The day of our first official date. This time, I knew the cost of playing her fool. This time, I would write my own story.

Mary had been selected on the recommendation of her adopted brother for a modeling assignment for an advertisement. However, it so happened that the CEO of that company was the man she had been trying to avoid for many years --- Marts. The day she broke up with him, he issued her a threat. His words sent a shiver down her spine. When they met again, he still had no resistance to her. Love mixed with hatred, he still chose to avenge himself. To get her back, he set up numerous traps, waiting for his prey to fall into them one by one.

Being second best is practically in my DNA. My sister got the love, the attention, the spotlight. And now, even her damn fiancé. Technically, Rhys Granger was my fiancé now-billionaire, devastatingly hot, and a walking Wall Street wet dream. My parents shoved me into the engagement after Catherine disappeared, and honestly? I didn't mind. I'd crushed on Rhys for years. This was my chance, right? My turn to be the chosen one? Wrong. One night, he slapped me. Over a mug. A stupid, chipped, ugly mug my sister gave him years ago. That's when it hit me-he didn't love me. He didn't even see me. I was just a warm-bodied placeholder for the woman he actually wanted. And apparently, I wasn't even worth as much as a glorified coffee cup. So I slapped him right back, dumped his ass, and prepared for disaster-my parents losing their minds, Rhys throwing a billionaire tantrum, his terrifying family plotting my untimely demise. Obviously, I needed alcohol. A lot of alcohol. Enter him. Tall, dangerous, unfairly hot. The kind of man who makes you want to sin just by existing. I'd met him only once before, and that night, he just happened to be at the same bar as my drunk, self-pitying self. So I did the only logical thing: I dragged him into a hotel room and ripped off his clothes. It was reckless. It was stupid. It was completely ill-advised. But it was also: Best. Sex. Of. My. Life. And, as it turned out, the best decision I'd ever made. Because my one-night stand isn't just some random guy. He's richer than Rhys, more powerful than my entire family, and definitely more dangerous than I should be playing with. And now, he's not letting me go.

She spent ten years chasing after the right brother, only to fall for the wrong one in one weekend. ~~~ Sloane Mercer has been hopelessly in love with her best friend, Finn Hartley, since college. For ten long years, she's stood by him, stitching him back together every time Delilah Crestfield-his toxic on-and-off girlfriend-shattered his heart. But when Delilah gets engaged to another man, Sloane thinks this might finally be her chance to have Finn for herself. She couldn't be more wrong. Heartbroken and desperate, Finn decides to crash Delilah's wedding and fight for her one last time. And he wants Sloane by his side. Reluctantly, Sloane follows him to Asheville, hoping that being close to Finn will somehow make him see her the way she's always seen him. Everything changes when she meets Knox Hartley, Finn's older brother-a man who couldn't be more different from Finn. He's dangerously magnetic. Knox sees right through Sloane and makes it his mission to pull her into his world. What starts as a game-a twisted bet between them-soon turns into something deeper. Sloane is trapped between two brothers: one who's always broken her heart and another who seems hell-bent on claiming it... no matter the cost. CONTENT WARNING: This story is strongly 18+. It delves into dark romance themes such as obsession and lust with morally complex characters. While this is a love story, reader discretion is advised.  

The rain in Detroit was slick with grime when my family finally came to fetch me. They didn't want a reunion; they wanted a sacrificial lamb to marry into the Kaufman empire to save their failing business. I thought I was just being sold off, but the limo ride ended under a dark overpass where six hired thugs were waiting with chains. My own sister had ordered them to "break my spirit" so I’d be a shaking, pathetic mess by the time I reached the altar. They called me "Detroit trash" and sprayed air freshener when I sat on their leather seats. My stepmother wanted a video of me begging for my life, and my father was ready to trade me like a used car to a man everyone called a "vegetable." They expected a submissive country girl, unaware that I was a high-level "cleaner" who could snap a radius bone before they could even scream. When I finally reached the Kaufman estate, I found my fiancé, Barron, slumped in a wheelchair, drooling and silent. But as soon as the doors closed, the "invalid" grabbed my wrist with a grip of iron and whispered a command that changed everything. I didn't understand why my own blood was so desperate to see me destroyed. What had I ever done to deserve a hit squad and a forced marriage to a man they thought was a corpse? But Barron isn't a vegetable, and I'm not a victim. We just touched down at the Moon family gala in a matte-black helicopter, and as the doors slide open, the "broken" bride is about to show them exactly what happens when you throw away the wrong daughter. "If we're going to crash a party," Barron whispered, his eyes burning with lethal clarity, "we should make an entrance."

Camille Lewis was the forgotten daughter, the unloved wife, the woman discarded like yesterday's news. Betrayed by her husband, cast aside by her own family, and left for dead by the sister who stole everything, she vanished without a trace. But the weak, naive Camille died the night her car was forced off that bridge. A year later, she returns as Camille Kane, richer, colder, and more powerful than anyone could have imagined. Armed with wealth, intelligence, and a hunger for vengeance, she is no longer the woman they once trampled on. She is the storm that will tear their world apart. Her ex-husband begs for forgiveness. Her sister's perfect life crumbles. Her parents regret the daughter they cast aside. But Camille didn't come back for apologies, she came back to watch them burn. But as her enemies fall at her feet, one question remains: when the revenge is over, what's left? A mysterious trillionaire Alexander Pierce steps into her path, offering something she thought she lost forever, a future. But can a woman built on ashes learn to love again? She rose from the fire to destroy those who betrayed her. Now, she must decide if she'll rule alone... or let someone melt the ice in her heart.

She hides behind ugly suits and fake names. He's done trusting women. When they meet in a masked sex club, neither realizes they've been fighting each other across boardroom tables for eighteen months. At Taylor Industries, she's Joy Smith-the frumpy CFO who drowns her curves in shapeless polyester and wearing a wig. At home, she's the forgotten wife of a cheating lawyer who hasn't touched her in so long she's starting to wonder if she's broken. When she finds hot pink lace panties stuffed in her couch cushions...definitely not hers, it's not heartbreak she feels. It's freedom. Grayson Taylor doesn't do relationships anymore. Not after walking in on his actress fiancée with another woman. Now he channels everything into hostile takeovers and board meetings, especially the ones where his overcautious CFO fights him on every goddamn acquisition. Joy Smith is brilliant, infuriating, and funny when he pushes all her buttons. But Honey is tired of being invisible. Tired of never having felt real pleasure. So, when her best friend gives her the details of The Velvet Room-Manhattan's most exclusive masked club-she promises herself just one night. One night to find out if her husband's right, if she really is frigid, or if she's just never been touched by the right hands. She doesn't expect the masked stranger who claims her the second she walks in. Doesn't expect the chemistry that ignites between them, the way he makes her body sing, or the orgasms that leave her shaking. Doesn't expect him to hand her an email address with one command: "Only me. No one else touches you."

I was at my own engagement party at the Sterling estate when the world started tilting. Victoria Sterling, my future mother-in-law, smiled coldly as she watched me struggle with a cup of tea that had been drugged to ruin me. Before I could find my fiancé, Ryan, a waiter dragged me into the forbidden West Wing and locked me in a room with Julian Sterling, the family’s "fallen titan" who had been confined to a wheelchair for years. The door burst open to a frenzy of camera flashes and theatrical screams. Victoria framed me as a seductress caught in the act, and Ryan didn't even try to listen to my pleas, calling me "cheap leftovers" before walking away with his pregnant mistress. When I turned to my own family for help, my father signed a document severing our relationship for a five-million-dollar payout from Julian. They traded me like a commodity without a second thought. I didn't understand why my own parents were so eager to sell me, or how Ryan could look at me with such disgust after promising me forever. I was a sacrifice, a pawn used to protect the family's offshore accounts, and I couldn't fathom how every person I loved had a price tag for my destruction. With nowhere left to go, I married Julian in a bleak ceremony at City Hall. He slid a heavy diamond onto my finger and whispered, "We have a war to start." That night, inside his secret penthouse, I watched the paralyzed man stand up from his wheelchair and activate a screen filled with the Sterling family's darkest secrets. The execution had officially begun.

I was sitting in the Presidential Suite of The Pierre, wearing a Vera Wang gown worth more than most people earn in a decade. It was supposed to be the wedding of the century, the final move to merge two of Manhattan's most powerful empires. Then my phone buzzed. It was an Instagram Story from my fiancé, Jameson. He was at Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris with a caption that read: "Fuck the chains. Chasing freedom." He hadn't just gotten cold feet; he had abandoned me at the altar to run across the world. My father didn't come in to comfort me. He burst through the door roaring about a lost acquisition deal, telling me the Holland Group would strip our family for parts if the ceremony didn't happen by noon. My stepmother wailed about us becoming the laughingstock of the Upper East Side. The Holland PR director even suggested I fake a "panic attack" to make myself look weak and sympathetic to save their stock price. Then Jameson’s sleazy cousin, Pierce, walked in with a lopsided grin, offering to "step in" and marry me just to get his hands on my assets. I looked at them and realized I wasn't a daughter or a bride to anyone in that room. I was a failed asset, a bouncing check, a girl whose own father told her to go to Paris and "beg" the man who had just publicly humiliated her. The girl who wanted to be loved died in that mirror. I realized that if I was going to be sold to save a merger, I was going to sell myself to the one who actually controlled the money. I marched past my parents and walked straight into the VIP holding room. I looked the most powerful man in the room—Jameson’s cold, ruthless uncle, Fletcher Holland—dead in the eye and threw the iPad on the table. "Jameson is gone," I said, my voice as hard as stone. "Marry me instead."

I received a pornographic video. "Do you like this?" The man speaking in the video is my husband, Mark, whom I haven't seen for several months. He is naked, his shirt and pants scattered on the ground, thrusting forcefully on a woman whose face I can't see, her plump and round breasts bouncing vigorously. I can clearly hear the slapping sounds in the video, mixed with lustful moans and grunts. "Yes, yes, fuck me hard, baby," the woman screams ecstatically in response. "You naughty girl!" Mark stands up and flips her over, slapping her buttocks as he speaks. "Stick your ass up!" The woman giggles, turns around, sways her buttocks, and kneels on the bed. I feel like someone has poured a bucket of ice water on my head. It's bad enough that my husband is having an affair, but what's worse is that the other woman is my own sister, Bella. ************************************************************************************************************************ "I want to get a divorce, Mark," I repeated myself in case he didn't hear me the first time-even though I knew he'd heard me clearly. He stared at me with a frown before answering coldly, "It's not up to you! I'm very busy, don't waste my time with such boring topics, or try to attract my attention!" The last thing I was going to do was argue or bicker with him. "I will have the lawyer send you the divorce agreement," was all I said, as calmly as I could muster. He didn't even say another word after that and just went through the door he'd been standing in front of, slamming it harshly behind him. My eyes lingered on the knob of the door a bit absentmindedly before I pulled the wedding ring off my finger and placed it on the table. I grabbed my suitcase, which I'd already had my things packed in and headed out of the house.

"I will marry you. Wait for me!" Mabel woke up. She had that dream again. In her dream, a man said he would marry her. Just a dream. Five years ago, she was set up by her stepsister and became pregnant out of wedlock. She lost everything, including her baby. Five years later, she was forced to marry her stepsister's fiance, Jayden, who was sick and going to pass away. Having no choice, Mabel decided to marry Jayden, not expecting that Jayden was the man...

I just got my billionaire husband to sign our divorce papers. He thinks it's another business document. Our marriage was a business transaction. I was his secretary by day, his invisible wife by night. He got a CEO title and a rebellion against his mother; I got the money to save mine. The only rule? Don't fall in love. I broke it. He didn't. So I'm cashing out. Thirty days from now, I'm gone. But now he's noticing me. Touching me. Claiming me. The same man who flaunts his mistresses is suddenly burning down a nightclub because another man insulted me. He says he'll never let me go. But he has no idea I'm already halfway out the door. How far will a billionaire go to keep a wife he never wanted until she tried to leave?