My Fake Groom Is a Billionaire

My stepmother’s bodyguards were seconds away from dragging me back to a life that was essentially a prison cell wrapped in silk. I couldn't even scream for help because the words always died in my throat—a clinical condition called selective mutism that felt like drowning on dry land. I had just discovered the sickening truth: my father was planning to sell me to a sleazy investor named Sterling to cover his company’s bankruptcy. They were going to drug me, ship me off to a private island, and strip away the only thing I had left—my late mother’s multimillion-dollar art trust. When I arrived at the manor, my stepmother Lydia handed me a glass of wine laced with bitter sedatives, her smile sharp as a razor. "Drink up, darling. It’ll make the transition to Mr. Sterling much easier." My stepsister Harper stood in the corner, wearing a dress bought with my mother’s stolen money, mocking my inability to speak. My father didn't even look me in the eye as he calculated my price tag, treating his own daughter like a piece of damaged, mute inventory. They thought because I didn't speak, I didn't hear them laughing about the "accident" that killed my mother or how they planned to burn her final restoration work. They assumed my silence was a sign of surrender, a white flag waved by a broken girl who would never fight back. How could the people who were supposed to be my family treat me like a commodity to be traded? Did they really think my silence meant I was weak, or that I didn't know every dirty secret they were hiding in their ledgers? I didn't drink the wine. Instead, I burst into the VIP suite of Carlisle Pierce, the most cold-blooded billionaire in New York, and slammed a crumpled napkin on his table with a desperate, last-second gambit. "MARRY ME. NOW. $1 MILLION."

I was the architect of my husband's billion-dollar tech empire, but he repaid me by bringing his mistress to our son's funeral-the very woman whose negligence killed him. To protect her, he had me committed, tortured, and then burned every last memory of our son, systematically erasing our past. Then I discovered he'd secretly divorced me years ago, so I faked my own death and gave the source code to his rival, ready to watch his world burn to the ground.

I was an Omega born into a family of fierce werewolf warriors. My fated mate, Vance, was a high-ranking fighter who always despised my weakness. In my dreams, I saw our future. Our carriage was attacked by bloodthirsty Rogues. Vance shifted and ran ahead to fight, leaving me behind in the fragile wooden box. The violent crash over the rocky earth caused me to lose our unborn child in the freezing winter snow. Instead of comforting me, Vance used our sacred Mind-Link to pour his disgust directly into my brain, blaming me for being too fragile to protect our pup. He publicly complained about my weak scent and humiliated me in front of the entire pack, making it clear he only truly wanted my strong Warrior sister, Lyra. When I demanded a severance of our bond, he agreed with sheer relief. I was left to die a slow, miserable death in a forgotten, drafty corner of the pack. As I bled out in the cold, I felt nothing but absolute despair. Why did my endless submission and quiet obedience only earn me disgust and a pathetic end? Three times the Moon Goddess sent me that vision. Three times I woke with the taste of blood in my mouth. The third time, I knew it was not a nightmare—it was a warning. And when I opened my eyes, I was back in the Great Hall on the exact day my nightmare began. Vance was looking at me with pure resignation, arrogantly announcing to the crowd that he supposed an Omega was good enough for breeding, and he would accept me as his consolation prize. This time, I didn't lower my head. "I, Elara, reject you, Vance, as my mate." I turned my back on him and packed my bags for the Royal City. I was going to enter the deadly Luna Selection. But there was one detail in the vision I had never told a soul. In every replay of that nightmare, when the dream showed me a throne room soaked in blood, a pair of golden eyes always found me through the fog. And a voice—low, resonant, certain—spoke three words that followed me into waking: "There you are." I didn't know what they meant. I only knew that when I finally reached the Royal City, the King who ruled with blood and silver would already know my name—even if I had never spoken it to him.

Arletta Lee was dragged out of rural Pennsylvania to be a sacrificial bride for the comatose billionaire heir, Josue Mcconnell. The moment she stepped into the massive estate, she became the prime target of a vicious, greedy family. Josue's stepmother and half-brother viewed her as cheap trash. They didn't just want her gone; they wanted Josue dead. Kyler broke into her room at night reeking of bourbon, and later sneaked into the medical wing with a lethal synthetic neurotoxin aimed right at Josue's IV line. His jealous cousin even tried to permanently disfigure her face with a thermos of boiling water. "She's just a cheap good-luck charm the old man bought. We can throw her out with the trash whenever we want." They relentlessly bullied her, thinking she was just a helpless, terrified country girl who would quietly take the blame for their murder plot. But what the arrogant Mcconnell family didn't know was that her pathetic, trembling demeanor was entirely manufactured. They thought they had trapped a frightened rabbit in a den of wolves. In reality, Arletta was a brilliant underground surgeon. Using ancient neural acupuncture hidden in a simple wooden hairpin, she flawlessly turned their traps against them, locking Kyler away and winning the ruthless patriarch's absolute protection. As the supposedly brain-dead billionaire finally twitched and locked his fingers in an iron grip around her hand, Arletta smiled coldly. It was time to wake him up and let him tear this rotten family apart.

I spent a year hiding my lethal skills behind the stiff polyester uniform of a hotel butler. To the world, I’m just Betsey Madden, a "charity case" scrubbing floors at The Elysium to solve the mystery of my mother’s suspicious death. On the anniversary of her passing, my manager decided to humiliate me by assigning me to the Penthouse to serve Celestino Franklin, a billionaire known as the "Butcher of Wall Street" who supposedly eats staff for breakfast. When I stepped into the suite, I found the pristine white carpet stained with fresh blood and a wounded man lunging at me from the shadows. I didn't scream; I instinctively dropped into a combat stance I hadn't used since my days as a shadow operative in Vienna, pinning the billionaire before he could even blink. I had to choose between letting him bleed out or revealing that I was far more than a girl who folds napkins for minimum wage. I chose to save him, stitching his gunshot wound with a surgical precision that no ordinary servant should ever possess. As he gripped my wrist, the air turned cold. He didn't smell like a typical CEO; he carried the sharp scent of sandalwood and expensive scotch—the exact, intoxicating aroma of the man from the nightmares I’ve had since the night my mother died. "You have good hands," he rasped, his storm-gray eyes seeing right through my pale foundation and fake exhaustion. "You're wasting them on silver polish." I realized then that my cover wasn't just blown; it was the bait that had finally caught the monster I was looking for. I came to this hotel to find a killer, but I never expected my prime suspect to be the man now demanding I become his personal shadow. The hunt for the truth just turned into a deadly dance with a predator who knows exactly who I am, and I’m not leaving until I find out if he’s my savior or my mother's murderer.

For ten years, I was the secret girlfriend of my billionaire boss, Arthur. When my mother needed an emergency $50,000 surgery to save her life, I went to him, believing he would help. He coldly refused, citing "company policy" and sending me to his executive assistant, Deanne. She deliberately delayed the loan application. My mother died. When I confronted him, I found him with Deanne, who was wearing a dress he'd bought for me. He didn't just side with her-he fired me on the spot. He called me a gold digger and a slut in front of the entire office. I later learned Deanne had spent a decade sabotaging my career and withholding my bonuses, ensuring I'd never have the money to be independent. And Arthur had let her. But they underestimated me. As I walked out of that office for the last time, I made a call to the one man who had silently protected me for years. And when he answered, he didn't just offer me the money. He offered me a new life.