1555 Book(s) Related to charlie wilson i still have you

Ava Duval gave up everything for love. She left a promising fashion career and poured five years of her life into building a multimillion-dollar empire from the bottom with her husband by her side.

She was a bubbly woman until she lost her children during delivery, and out of her husband's love, or so she thought, he adopted twins for her, and she raised them as her own.

She was blessed to have a supportive husband and did not hesitate to give him her kidney when she heard that he was terribly ill. She gave him pieces of herself until the truth surfaced.

Her pregnancy had been purposely sabotaged; the children were never adopted but are her husband's blood, borne by his mistress, and the kidney she had donated never went to her husband.

She realizes too late that she sacrificed everything for a man whose heart was with another woman. Now, she has to rebuild herself with the scars she has gotten from marriage.

Will she forgive him, claim her revenge for every cruel thing that has been done to her, or pick up the pieces and move on? Or will she do all three until her heart is finally satisfied?

Stealing from rich men was never personal…It was how Maya survived.

For years, she has lived by three simple rules: never use her real name, never get attached, and always disappear before sunrise. It's the only way she's managed to keep a roof over her head while raising her fifteen-year-old sister after escaping the family that abandoned them.

Then one reckless night changes everything….
After a one-night stand with a captivating stranger, Maya slips out of his luxury suite with a wallet full of cash and a designer watch, convinced she'll never see him again.

She's wrong.

The man she robbed is Xavier Lockwood, the feared heir to one of America's most powerful mafia families…a man who never forgets a face and never lets anyone walk away owing him.
Within hours, Maya is dragged into Xavier's world. Escape becomes impossible and every attempt to outsmart him only pulls her deeper into a life she never wanted, while the man determined to make her pay slowly becomes the one person capable of lowering every wall she's spent years building.

Just as Maya begins to believe there might be something real between them, Xavier's father arrives with the woman chosen to become the future Mrs. Lockwood.

Maya knows her. She could recognize that smile anywhere….the voice, the cruelty hidden behind perfect manners.
The woman chosen to become his wife is the very stepsister Maya swore she would never see again…the same family she swore she'd never go back to.

Now she's trapped under the same roof as the man she's falling for, the people who shattered her childhood, and a future that was never meant to include her.

Will Xavier choose the woman his family promised him...Or the thief who stole far more than his money?

She was supposed to be powerless.

Everyone told her so: her family, her pack, and society itself.
Ravenna Vale was the mistake, the outcast, the shadow they were all ashamed to acknowledge.

But when her hidden power awakened, everything changed.

The Alpha wants her obedience.
The Council wants her compliance.
Her family wants her silence.

And Ravenna?
She wants none of it.

When a hidden Lycan discovers that she's not only powerful, but also unstoppable, she refuses to bow to anyone.
Not her family. Not the Pack. Not destiny.

She will rewrite the rules of their world.

This is the story of the woman who chose to become the feared Alpha, not the one they wanted her to be.

Welcome to HER reckoning.

I was the most pathetic existence on campus.

Thick glasses, baggy sweaters, walking through the cafeteria like crossing a minefield. Albert, my childhood crush of three years, publicly mocked me as "a pathetic little dog following him around." Campus queen Madison crushed me under her heel. That rainy night, I gave up completely and swore to make them all pay.

Three months later, I returned.

Bronze skin, perfect curves, stunning hair—the entire campus was buzzing about this "mystery goddess." No one recognized that I was once the pathetic Molly Baker.

When Albert discovered the truth, it was too late. The man standing beside me shocked the entire school.

My fiancé, Liam Miller, slapped me more than a dozen times in front of everyone over his childhood sweetheart.
Then he shoved me down a spiral staircase.
Both my legs were shattered. My skull cracked open. I spent an entire month in the ICU.
He never came to see me.
Not once.
He was too busy staying by Sophia’s side, planning her birthday party, and getting down on one knee in front of everyone to propose to her.
As for me, I couldn’t even get through the doors of his headquarters anymore. My access had been revoked. My position had been taken. Every trace of my place in his world had been erased.
Nine years.
From nineteen to twenty-eight, I gave him the best years of my life.
In the end, I had given them to the wrong man.
On the day I was discharged, I didn’t cry. I didn’t scream. I didn’t cling to him and beg for answers.
I simply called my mother.
“Mom,” I said calmly, “that overseas mafia empire you wanted me to inherit? I’m ready to take it.”
There was a brief silence on the other end.
Then my mother said, “I’ve waited ten years for this day.”
The night before my flight, Liam’s messages flooded my phone.
“Emma, I was wrong. Don’t go.”
What do you think?
Would I ever look back?

Have you ever been treated like a stand-in for your dead sibling by your own mother? I have.

Have you ever been murdered by your own mother? I have.

My name is Aira, and today is my sister Lily's birthday. It's also the anniversary of my death—the day the washing machine became my coffin.

"Why couldn't it have been you who died?"

After four long years, my mom finally got her wish.

Kael ruined my life, drained my divine blood, and framed me for murder in my past life. Given a second chance, I reject his fake tenderness and tear down every lie he built. The almighty Dark Duke who once played with my life now craves only my mercy. He abandons his army, destroys his status, and begs for my punishment. I end his tyranny, chain him with my golden blood, and turn my worst tormentor into my most obedient hound.

On my wedding anniversary, I died a brutal death, drained of every drop of blood by my husband’s socalled “sacred snow ferret”. That creature was Sylvia, his longdead true love striving for rebirth. For three long years, I was nothing more than a disposable blood vessel. Even my own son betrayed me for hollow, false affection.
Given a second chance at life, I cast aside all foolish mercy. I watched coldly as my hypocritical mage husband and traitorous son doted on the ferret, and documented every one of their heinous crimes.
I turned his longawaited reunion into a boneandflesh feast.
When the Templar tribunal finally arrived to pass judgment, I broke free from the cage of my old life and stepped out toward my own boundless freedom.

I make a living solving cold cases, earning just enough to get by.
Until I saw my long-time crush on the latest corpse.
He used to be an unreachable light, but now he's the deepest darkness before my eyes.
At this moment, he stands across from me, eyes full of innocence, asking for my help, saying he loves me.
Should I arrest him, or trust him?

The adoptive brother I'd been secretly in love with for a decade took my virginity on the night of my twentieth birthday, fueled by alcohol.

I thought I had finally found love.

Until I stood outside his half-open apartment door and heard his teammates mocking me.

"Damn, Dax, you actually slept with Elara? That boring good girl?"

My hand froze mid-air above the doorknob.

Dax's tone was dripping with contempt. "Look closely at her face. It's exactly like Cassandra's, isn't it?"

"It's no big deal. She revolves around me every single day. All it took was crooking a finger."

"With Cassandra gone, she's the perfect stand-in to kill time."

The room instantly erupted into a fit of unbridled, mocking laughter.

I dug my nails fiercely into my palms, opened my phone, and found the email I had deliberately ignored for a month.

[Florence Academy of Fine Arts — Exchange Program Confirmation]

Three years ago, my best friend Juliana Pierce was raped and jumped from a twelve-story building. I was there. I saw everything. I know exactly who did it.

Alexander Knight—Juliana's boyfriend, brilliant scientist, the man I've secretly loved for seven years—has spent every moment since hunting for answers. He believes I'm shielding a predator. He's dedicated his life to making mine hell.

Now I'm dying of ALS, and Alexander's dragged my broken body onto his "Memory Judgment Stage" for the world to see. His new technology can rip memories straight from my brain and broadcast them as holograms.

"Tell them who killed Juliana," he shouted.

I refuse. So he cranks up the machine, letting the neural probes tear through my dying brain. My hand shatters. My body convulses. But I won't break.

Until the memories start bleeding out anyway.

And when Alexander sees the rapist's face—Completely loses his mind.

I was born able to see threads tying certain people to one another. A thin red thread stretched right above Mom and Dad’s heads.
I hurried over to Mom at once. “Mom, why is there a red thread connecting you and Dad?”
Mom laughed when she heard me, booping my nose fondly.
“That’s proof that Daddy loves me.”
Later, at our family gathering, Aunt Celia brought me a present just like she always did.
“Luna? Come see what Auntie brought you.”
I trotted over and found a cloth doll.
Just then, Dad walked up, knelt down beside me, and stroked my head.
“Luna, what do you say?”
I glanced up at Dad, then turned to look at Aunt Celia.
Little me was filled with huge confusion.
“It’s weird. Why is there such a thick red thread connecting Dad and Celia?”

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?

Did you slaughter your roommates?" the detective sneered. "No!" I screamed. The polygraph technician stared at the flawless readouts confirming I told the absolute truth. I was innocent. But if a human didn't tear those girls apart in our locked dorm... then what exactly is hunting me now?

My birthday was never truly mine.

Everyone was busy making sure she was comfortable, happy, and protected.
When she deliberately handed me chamomile tea—knowing I was allergic—they told me not to hurt my sister’s good intentions and forced me to drink it.

My brother accused me of being jealous and locked me in the basement.

They all forgot about me to celebrate her birthday, even my fiancé.

Lying there, I realized something worse than pain—I was replaceable.

That was the day I understood the truth about my family.
I was dying on “my” birthday, and no one chose me.

That was supposed to be one of the most anticipated days of my life—the wedding of my best friend, Sarah.
But when I put on my bridesmaid dress, she called me a bitch.
"Get out." Sarah looked at me like I was trash.
"I don't want to see you at my wedding."
I stood frozen in place, staring down at the broken Cartier bracelet she had given me, now lying scattered on the floor.

The winter I was eight, I found my own face in a trash can.
It was on a missing-child flyer. The girl on it had been gone five years. She had a birthmark on the back of her neck.
So did I.
There was a reward. A number with a long row of zeros. I didn't want it.
I was cold. I hadn't eaten since yesterday.
I just wanted a mom.
So that night, with a stranger's coins, I called the number at the bottom.
A woman answered on the first ring and screamed a name at me like it was mine.
She got to say it three times.
Then a hand came out of the dark behind me and hung up the phone for me.

"Enough, Serafina! The thing rigged to the parasail is just a mannequin. It's not your mother! Cut the damn act!"

I watched helplessly as my severely ill mother plummeted from hundreds of feet in the air, smashing into the bone-chilling ocean.

My husband was holding my stepsister, a doting smile playing on his lips.

My own biological son clapped his hands in glee—because he was the one who had blindly pushed the release button.

They all said I was faking it. They said I was vicious, toxic, and jealous.

It wasn't until I erased every last trace of my existence and vanished entirely from their lives that they dug through the wreckage of our past like madmen, desperate to find me.

They thought I was just a helpless blind wife. They couldn't have been more wrong.

After miraculously regaining my sight, the first thing I witnessed was my devoted husband entangled with his mistress. His “unwavering love” was nothing but lies—a scheme to steal my fortune.

Now it's my turn to take control. I'll gather every shred of evidence and leave him with nothing.

But when the city's most powerful and ruthless billionaire enters the picture, my revenge plan grows complicated. He knows my secret and offers a devilish deal: “Become my personal assistant to pay off your debts. And divorce your husband.”

That cheating husband thought my blindness made me weak. He's about to learn nothing is more dangerous than a wife who finally sees clearly—and holds a fortune in her hands.

Sheetal's Soliloquy
I know you. You were the one who had been bothering me. With a chuckle, he replied, "I know you'll never forget me, Dolce." However, you made a small mistake. Honey, that wasn't harassment. That was my devotion to you. " He abruptly grabbed my waist as he spoke. I arched my back and stared at him, my eyes wide. This crazy boy has returned, but he is not the same as before. He is now more attractive.
When I thought, I coughed unexpectedly and said, "Excuse me." What's your name? "

His hand tightens around my wrists above my head. “This pretty dripping pussy of yours. The most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen is fucking begging me. But maybe you’re soaked and needy because of his fangs.” He slaps my pussy. Hard.

I cry. “Ahhhh! No!” I let out a whimper, then a moan.

Earlier, of fucking course yes, but now, it’s just for him. But if I come to think about Griffin’s fangs—

Aemon opens my pussy lips with his long fingers at an obscene angle. I curl my toes. Oh, Goddess, oh Goddess!

I’m so wet! “Griffin—I mean—Your brother means nothing to me.” I whimper.

But as soon as I say his brother’s name I know it is the wrong thing to say.

🥀 🥀 🥀

To vampires, blood is everything.

When it stops flowing, so do you.

Blake is human. Offered like cattle by the very pack that raised her.

But the moment her blood touches Griffin’s tongue, the Vampire Leader knows—she is his fated mate.

There is only one problem: his brother wants her too. And he’s not willing to let go.

Violet, a rich blind girl, gets married to the man she falls in love with, everything changes when she finds out her husband was having an affair with his lover disguise as a maid in the house, using her disability to his advantage. Violet learns about her husband plans and flees back to her fathers house, but then Violet is put in a bigger situation that cost her everything. To get her revenge, Violet teams up with Luther her ex-bodyguard, they fake a relationship and make a come back into her husband's life.

Michael Rod is a ruthless man, obsessed with his ex-wife's daughter, he plans a trap to get his hands on her. Kidnapping is his goal. Michael is not willing to negotiate with her. He will make her his by force. Amelia is a young girl who just wants to find her mother after she disappears. She suspects that Michael has a lot to do with her disappearance and will jump into the lion's den to get her back. Even if she has to sleep with the man who has hurt them both so much.

“In your dreams, O’Shea.”
Noah's cocky grin disappeared, replaced by a searing look. “You almost fooled me.”
“I… I'm not trying to.” I swallowed, but the lie died off as I traced the hard line of his jaw.
“Do I make you uneasy?” His deep voice made my toes curl in my boots.
“You wish.”


He's the Captain. She's the Janitor. And her ex is about to lose his pucking mind.

Kendra Drake's future burned bright with straight A's and big dreams, until a tragic accident left her father on life support. Now she's trading her textbooks for a mop, scrubbing the floors at Templeton University.

Fate has other plans. Hockey royalty and her ex-boyfriend's biggest nightmare, Captain Noah O'Shea, has set his sights on Kendra. He's the first guy to look at her with a fierce intensity she secretly craves.

What starts as a reckless night escape from grief quickly turns into an irresistible attraction. What happens when Kendra's ex, Simon, discovers she's been in the arms of his rival—and how far would he go to tear them apart?

In my past life, when the apocalypse hit, I relied on my training as an ex-Special Forces soldier to escort a group of arrogant corporate executives safely to a military base, fighting tooth and nail the entire way.

Yet, just to steal the vital supplies I had risked my life to gather and trade them for special privileges, they locked me out of the escape route the moment a zombie horde closed in.

When I opened my eyes again, I had been reborn. It was the third day of our office building being surrounded by the undead.

A military rescue armored vehicle was waiting right downstairs. However, these corporate "elites" merely sneered in disgust. Still clinging to their superiority, they arrogantly demanded to stay on the 36th floor to wait for a supposedly incoming "private helicopter to a tropical island"—a rescue that I knew didn't exist.

In my previous life, I had practically begged and dragged them onto that rescue vehicle, a decision that ultimately got me killed.

This time, I just let out a cold laugh, grabbed my backpack, and boarded the armored vehicle without a single backward glance.

The building's backup generators were about to die, and the ground-floor electronic doors were on the verge of failing. Without my protection, trapped on the top floor by tens of thousands of ravenous zombies... I can't wait to see how many days these big shots manage to survive this apocalypse!

"You're terrible in bed! The stamina of a goldfish! I want someone else!"
"Oh yeah? Who exactly?"
"Someone who can actually keep up!"
My husband's jaw ticked. That night, he proved exactly how much stamina he had—and I could barely walk the next morning.

Three years of marriage. Three years of negative pregnancy tests. Desperate times called for desperate measures—so I pushed every button he had, hoping to finally conceive.
One reckless night of passion later, I thought we'd finally made progress.
Instead, divorce papers slammed into my hands.
"Anyone could mother my child," he said coldly. "Literally anyone but you."

Six years later, I returned from overseas—CEO of a medical empire, renowned archaeologist, certified gemologist, and secret heiress to the nation's wealthiest family. Oh, and I brought along my adorable twin geniuses.
My multiple identities? Mind. Blown.
Meanwhile, my ex-husband's dirty secret hit tabloids: He's firing blanks. Always has been.

Just as I'm about to marry my charming new fiancé (who actually appreciates me), my ex corners me in a hotel suite. His eyes bloodshot, voice cracking:
"You're the only one—the ONLY one—who can be my children's mother. My love. Please..."
Too bad, buddy. You snooze, you lose.
💎 Revenge. Rebirth. Twin Chaos. And one groveling ex who's about to learn what he lost. 💎

I was once a world-renowned designer, but I retired for love, dedicating six years to my husband and daughter. But on our anniversary, he spent millions on my final masterpiece, only to place it around another woman's neck on live TV. My own daughter then ran on stage, sweetly calling her 'mommy.' My six years of devotion became a joke. When I asked for a divorce, he sneered, thinking I was just a housewife who couldn't survive three days without him. He has no idea that the legendary designer 'Octavia' he's desperately trying to meet is the wife he cast aside. Now, I’m back. And I'm ready to take back everything that is mine.

On our third wedding anniversary, my husband's gift to me was a set of divorce papers.
I ended up on the streets with my critically ill daughter, so desperate I sold the only keepsake my late mother had left me.
But when the family estate was revealed, my daughter was named heir to the lion's share.
When my ex-husband took me to court to fight for custody, I pulled out a paternity test report in front of everyone.
"You're sterile. You were never her father — someone else is."

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.

Rowan is seven years younger than Max; the first warning to stay away. But staying away isn’t an option. Forced to live under the same roof as his mulish stepbrother, Rowan discovers the one person he should fear most is the one he can’t stop thinking about.

Max thrives on chaos, and Rowan quickly becomes his favorite target. But Rowan has a secret: he’s falling for the boy who bullies and seems determined to destroy him. Max makes it clear he hates Rowan, and even clearer that he doesn’t like boys.

In a house built on resentment, the line between hate and need starts to blur. And once Max starts watching, Rowan might never be able to hide, and Max might never be able to look away.

Alexander's lips crash against hers, urgent and consuming, his hard dick pressing against her throbbing pussy, igniting a primal ache. His hands seize her breasts, fingers teasing, before his teeth graze her nipple, biting softly, sending shivers as her body arches, slick with need.
Olivia Harper wakes with no memories. Everyone tells her she's madly in love with her fiancé, but her dreams suggest otherwise. Until the ruthless CEO Alexander Blake confines her, his voice a husky purr. "Forgotten? Perfect."
Memories surged: he had pinned her in a car, her sobs were raw. Why did his possessive eyes burn with grievance?

In every story, the villain died. Jessica had always thought that was fair, until she woke up as one.
Neria Virethorn was a disposable villainess, written to suffer and disappear. After breaking her engagement to a duke, her father treated her like a ruined object, making pain the primary language of their home. But her father wasn’t the greatest threat.
Sebastian Blackmoor, the crown prince and the story’s primary villain, was a man who viewed mercy as a weakness. Neria’s only goal was to stay small enough to survive him.
She failed…
After stumbling into a sealed royal vault, Neria accidentally bonded with a dragon egg that belonged to him.
The bond was permanent. Sebastian didn't see fate; he saw theft. He began hunting her with the cold patience of an executioner. Realising running was futile, Neria chose to interfere with the plot itself. She revealed Alistair…the rightful heir, the story’s "hero," and the man destined to kill Sebastian.
It should have been her escape. Instead, it trapped her between two blood-soaked futures: one where Sebastian destroyed her for her "theft," and another where Alistair used her as his reason in his war for the throne.
Neria was never meant to matter. But with a dragon bound to her soul and the narrative fracturing around her, she realised the truth.
This villainess was no longer a side character; she was the mistake the entire plot had to answer for. If she was destined to be the villain, Neria would become the kind that ruined everything.
“Fine! I’ll be your villain in this story!”

Kate Brady doesn’t exist. She’s a name on a passport, a voice Jackson Ruspoli has started to trust, a lie built carefully enough to survive inside the walls of Ruspoli Industries. Underneath her is Natalie Cromwell, a woman who died the same year her father did, when his ruined name became the only inheritance she had left.

Getting close to Jackson was supposed to be simple: find the buried proof that clears her father, and disappear before anyone learns her real name. But Jackson isn’t the careless mark she expected.
He’s sharp enough to know something about her doesn’t add up, and dangerous enough that being caught could cost her more than the job.

Then someone else starts using her real name.
Someone who remembers exactly what happened ten years ago, and wants the kind of ending that doesn’t leave room for the truth to matter, only for everything to burn. Now Natalie isn’t just racing to expose what Jackson’s family did. She’s racing to stop a stranger from destroying her only chance to do it right, before she becomes the one person left to blame.

The closer she gets to the truth, the closer she gets to Jackson. And the more she has to lose the moment he finds out who she really is.

She came here to be the hunter. She’s starting to realize she might already be the prey.

They say the truth will set you free, but what if the truth revealed a darker side of your life you would have never believed existed?

Just when Vanika Merrick was finally getting comfortable with her boring life laden with strange rules, Derion Silber barged into it and turned everything upside down.

From making her break every single rule, to unraveling the mysteries surrounding her life, Derion didn't know he was digging his own grave.

When she eventually remembered who she truly was, he found himself positioned as the target she had vowed to eliminate for the second time.

His military medals from three hundred years ago are the last mark of his human identity; now hidden in a junkyard, he is forced to tear off the disguise of the progenitor of the night due to a forced marriage. With powerful figures pressing in, vampires besieging him, and the Holy See approaching, he, in his mortal body, protects the orphan of his benefactor and faces the destined battle.

My biological parents and my fiancé shove me into a sterile room for a forced drug trial. The chemicals completely destroy my cranial nerves.

They lie about my adopted sister Mia having a terminal illness, using my college admission and trust fund as leverage to make me sacrifice myself.

I used to put my life on the line for Liam, staying up all night to finish his homework, draining everything I had to please my family.

But they are putting on an act from the very beginning. Mia isn't sick. The drug trial is just a front for money laundering.

Stripped of all love, hate, and empathy, I am left with only cold logic after enduring imprisonment, beatings, and endless injections.

Afterward, Liam falls to his knees, sobbing and begging to get back together. I dodge his touch with a blank face.

"Don't come near me. The smell of you makes me physically sick."

For eighteen months, I loved Asher in secret, betting all my pride and heart on our hidden affair. He took my tenderness while prioritizing his rich fiancée, mocking my love and sacrificing my future for his family’s marriage deal. Shamed online, shunned at school and tormented, I made no fuss. I repaid every dollar he gave me, cut all ties, transferred schools and rebuilt myself. He broke off his engagement, lost his pride and begged me to come back—yet all I offered was a final goodbye.

I married my abuser by choice.
To everyone’s confusion, I stay by his side silently, tolerating his endless humiliation and public degradation in front of tens of thousands of livestream viewers. I never cry, never resist, always flawless and docile.
No one notices I’ve kept a perfect physical form, hiding a terrible secret beneath my makeup.
When a strange superchat tears through the live stream and reveals my true identity, my husband is terrified yet obsessed with viral fame. He plans to test my truth tonight.
The meek wife act is over. My quiet, deadly revenge is finally coming true.

I gave him seventeen chances to marry me, yet he eagerly toasts with his new flame, showers her with gifts, and retreats to hotels with her.
He has forgotten that I do not have pierced ears, presenting me annually with earrings I can never wear; he has overlooked our seven-year anniversary but vividly remembers the one-year anniversary of his new lover's employment.
Seventeen promises of marriage, each one an empty promise; seven years of devoted affection, ultimately reduced to a mere laughingstock.
So I flew straight to his worst nightmare—Mexico.
And let him burn in the regret he never earned.

The day my sister and I came back to life, we made one call: swap fiancés.

Last time, Dad burned every favor he had to lock down two marriage deals for the family. One with a mafia family that runs the West Coast. The other with a corporate CEO.

My sister married the mafia leader. She was too gentle, too kind for a world that ran on blood and backstabbing. The man had a childhood friend who played soft and helpless but was vicious as hell underneath. That woman tormented my sister for decades before finally arranging an "accident" that killed her.

And me? I got the polished CEO.

Sounds good, right? Except we tortured each other from day one. He was all rules and manners, always talking like he was giving a speech. Me? I blow up fast and if I can throw a punch, I will. Every day was the same standoff. He'd pull back, I'd push forward, and nobody gave an inch.

We spent our whole lives being polite and miserable.

Then one day, my sister and I woke up on the afternoon they announced the engagements.

My parents ruined my wedding six times.

Every single time, right at the moment the ring was about to slip onto my finger—the first time, Mom knocked over the champagne tower. The second time, Dad drove his pickup truck straight through the floral arch... Either the groom wasn't good enough, or the wedding was too cheap. Each time was more batshit crazy than the last. The sixth time, Mom even held a knife to her own throat, threatening me not to put on the ring.

It made no sense to me—why push me to get married while doing everything to stop me from wearing that ring?

So for the seventh wedding, I chose a small chapel in a remote mountain area, went completely off-grid, dead certain they'd never track me down.

Just as Ethan was about to slide the ring onto my finger—

The chapel doors burst open.

Two figures stumbled in, gasping for air, faces streaked with tears.

My parents.

My husband Spencer quit his job to manage a rising model's career. In six months, she dropped the weight, blew up online, and turned into a supermodel — magazine covers, major runways, deal after deal.

Meanwhile, I watch myself expand by the day. Bloated. Double chin forming. Skin getting worse.

The whole world calls me greedy, lazy, out of control. Even my parents call to tell me to watch what I eat. And there's nothing I can say to make anyone understand.

Then one night, I catch them on the balcony, voices low, thinking no one can hear: "Forget about that fat cow. Once she drops dead, the house and the insurance are all ours."

That's when it finally makes sense.

Camille has a system tied to her. And it's tied to me.

Every pound I gain, she loses one.

I'm the fuel. The stepping stone. The inheritance they're waiting to collect.

She gets thin while I get fat?

So as long as I keep eating, she keeps losing weight?

Good.

I go ahead and spend a hundred grand booking a reclusive private chef for a full month. No limits on ingredients, price doesn't matter. The more extravagant, the better.

I'm going to eat whatever I want and actually enjoy my life.

Let's see how long she stays thin while I'm out here actually living my life.

Ryan Aldridge had one rule: he showed up for whoever needed him most.

The problem was, it was never me.

Throat swelling shut in the ER? He was unclogging Sloane Harrington's drain. Anniversary dinner? He left between courses because Sloane was "spiraling."

I forgave it every time. I was the cool girl. The understanding fiancée.

Then my studio caught fire, and a beam came down on my chest.

I lay there—bleeding, pinned, choking on smoke—and watched Ryan vault over me to carry out a woman with a sprained ankle.

"Jocelyn, come on. You can handle this. Look at her—she's shaking."

Something in me went still. Not broken. Finished.

I twisted off the ring with blood-slick fingers and let it disappear into the ash.

Then I disappeared too.

Three months after my miscarriage, at the celebration dinner he hosts for my "recovery," he tells his partners in French, "She's just a trophy wife. Doesn't understand basic business."

"What about that new assistant? The twenty-two-year-old?"

"So much smarter," he laughs. "And in bed? Way more exciting."

They think I don't understand. To everyone here, I'm just the stay-at-home wife who gave up her VP position at an investment bank to play house.

They don't know I minored in French. I spent a full year studying abroad at the Sorbonne.

As I lay in the operating room, bleeding out from the miscarriage, he was already seeing her.

Je comprends tout. I understand everything.

Over the champagne and candlelight, I smile at him.

He has no idea this is the last time he'll ever see it.

Everyone in town said I dumped my blind boyfriend because I couldn't stand being poor.
Five years later, I'd become a blind drifter myself, relying on handouts just to eat.
And he'd become one of Silicon Valley's hottest rising tech moguls.
He recognized me, but pretended he didn't.
He wanted me on my knees. Wanted me begging. Wanted me to pay for "abandoning" him.
Until he found out the person who gave up everything for him back then was no one else...
But me.