7996 Book(s) Related to they fear me

When Scarlett Monroe entered her new house, she didn't expect a dangerously handsome stepbrother who despised her no reason and her irresistibly charming best friend who was dead set in winning her.

Asher Callahan was Scarlett's stepbrother. With arrogance, coldness and mysteries that surrounded him, Scarlett feels an unexplainable pulls towards him.

Bring in Ethan Kingsley, Asher's best-friend, the charming boy with a pleasant smile on his face. When Asher's nonchalance and coldness pushed Scarlett away, Ethan's charm pulled her closer.

Torn between choosing between illicit relationship and calmness, Scarlett must make a choice.

"Choosing you would ruin everything for me, Asher." I said, looking into his dark eyes, and he took another step forward, leaving barely any space between us.

"But losing you would ruin me far more, Scarlett." And with that, he captured my lips with his, kissing me like I had never been before.

"Siblings don't do this," he murmured, his thumb tracing my jaw. "So tell me, Nyra... does he know you the way I do? Does he know what you're capable of?"
Three years ago, I escaped the empire that raised me.
I left behind my father's world of blood, violence, and impossible choices, determined to become someone else.
Someone ordinary.
For three years, I believed I had succeeded.
Until my father was murdered.
One phone call drags me back to the compound I swore I would never see again. But grief quickly gives way to betrayal.
The man I planned to marry isn't who he claimed to be.
Old enemies are hiding in plain sight.
And everyone wants something my father left behind.
Everyone has lied to me.
Everyone... except Raze.
He was my first mistake.
My greatest weakness.
The one man I could never truly forget.
Three years ago, I walked away from him.
He waited 1,095 days.
Now, he's done waiting.
As secrets buried for years begin to surface, I'm forced to face the woman I once was, the weapon my father spent years creating.
I came back wanting answers.
Instead, I found blood, betrayal, and a man who still knows exactly how to unravel me.
Now I have only two choices:
Become the weapon I was raised to be...Or die pretending I was ever meant for a peaceful life.

I’ve had the Sight for as long as I can remember.
Born into a matrilineal line of Salem witches, I can pierce the veil of the dead. I see the wandering souls and the lingering traces of magic left behind in the mortal world.
I always assumed this gift was nothing more than my own harmless little secret.
Until the night of our fifth wedding anniversary.
I lit the final taper candle on the long dining table. As the flame flickered, my Sight instinctively slipped open, my gaze drifting toward the deep shadows by the fireplace.
A spirit was huddled there in the dark.
It was my husband—Silas Blackwood.
Ice flooded my veins. What the hell is going on? Is Silas... dead?!
My hands shook as I fumbled for my phone, stumbling back in a frantic rush to dial his number.
But before my thumb could hit the call button—before my lips could even form the words of a banishing spell—
Click.
The front door opened.
Silas strode in, bringing the damp, fresh scent of the rain with him.
"Sorry I'm late, Evie."
My breath caught. If Silas was dead... then who the hell was standing right in front of me, wearing his skin?

In the apocalypse, during my escape, I awakened a useless superpower: reset .
My girlfriend, despising me as a burden who only creates junk, conspired with the mercenary captain to kick me into a horde of zombies.
She had planned everything, except for one thing.
My superpower wasn't "creating junk," but a conceptual-level divine skill !
A zombie bites my heart? Reset my body's state, instantly revived!
A rabid mutant attacks? Reset its hunger nerve, making it instantly kneel like a dog!
I single-handedly fought my way through the zombie horde and knocked on the shelter's door.
Beside the captain's shattered neck, I held my desperately begging ex-girlfriend upside down, smiling as I suspended her directly above the zombie horde.
"You were right, useless people should be zombie food. Now, it's your turn to prove your worth."
Then, I released her.

In my past life , I was delivering supplies in the scorching heat of the apocalypse , only to have my ex-wife 's lover smash my head with a stick.
daughter, whom I've spoiled for sixteen years, looked at me with disgust: "Pretending to be a good girl is disgusting. Kill him and take his supplies."
When she opened her eyes again, her daughter had been reborn.
She cried and clung to my legs, begging to be taken in, all to trick me into believing she was building a shelter.
I decided to play along, spending all my savings to build her a top-of-the-line temperature-controlled fortress, and then "meticulously" teaching her the secrets of switching on the electric grid.
As the apocalypse arrives, the ex-wife and her lover launch a night raid on the high wall.
my daughter pressed the switch, trying to let her father in and kick me out the door.
The next second, with a loud "boom," the multi-million-volt high-voltage power grid was instantly activated !
The daughter collapsed in the control room, trembling : "Why is the switch upside down?!"

Everyone says I’m crazy.
My husband, Adrien, is Ashmont College’s most esteemed professor—suave, composed, and highly logical. I, on the other hand, am an investigative journalist whose nerves are fried by looming deadlines and too much caffeine. Yet, I insist there’s a woman who shares my exact face, who crawls out of our bedroom mirror every night and slips into my husband’s bed.
Our security cameras always "happen" to glitch at the crucial moments. My son avoids me like I’m a monster, and my neighbors claim they cheerfully greeted "me" in the driveway a few days ago—even though I don't even own a vintage pink dress.
Adrien has started dropping phrases like "psych evaluation" and "sole custody." If I let this drag on any longer, he’s going to personally commit me to a psych ward.
So tonight, I lied about flying to Chicago. Instead, I’m hiding in my own study—waiting for that identical face to crawl out of the mirror one more time.

My father chose two vampires as marriage prospects for my sister and me.

One was an immensely powerful pureblood aristocrat.

The other was Cassian, crippled by a silver curse. Confined to a wheelchair, he was a laughingstock—wracked by phantom pains and constantly on the verge of madness.

In my past life, I chose Cassian.

I drained my own blood to ease his agonizing curse. I shielded him from the relentless mockery of the Vampire Court. I even gambled my life in werewolf territory to beg for his cure.

But he never seemed to get better.

I didn't care. I remember holding his hand and telling him, "It doesn't matter. No matter what happens to you, I will always stay by your side."

Until the accident. A pack of rogue werewolves ambushed us.

Cassian shoved me precisely into the path of their claws.

Just to shield my sister, Serena, from the fatal blow.

Silver claws completely shredded my throat.

Through my fading vision, I watched Cassian stand up from his wheelchair.

The terrifying aura of a Vampire Lord erupted from him, crushing the werewolves instantly. Countless night-thralls emerged from the shadows, dropping to their knees at his feet.

That was when I understood. He was never paralyzed, and he was never mad.

Because Serena hadn't chosen him, and because he wanted absolutely nothing to do with me, he faked the illness to disgust me for years.

Then, he used my life to save his true love.

"I'm sorry for deceiving you. But I couldn't just watch Serena die."

"Elara... whatever I owe you, I'll repay in the next life."

In the bone-piercing cold, I took my last breath.

When I opened my eyes, I was back on the exact day my father forced us to make our choice.

I waited five years for a heart transplant.
My mother—the Luna of our Pack, the healer everyone worships—gave it to someone else.
An orphan girl she took in. A girl who now calls her "Mom."
Ivy got my heart. She got a wolf. She got a mate and a wedding so grand the whole Pack attended.
Me? I watched from the corner, still dying, while my mother smiled for the cameras and accepted praise for her "selfless sacrifice."
When I finally snapped at the ceremony, she slapped me. Told me to apologize. Said I was embarrassing the family.
I'm her actual daughter. I'm the one who can't shift, can't feel a mate bond, can't survive another six months.
But sure. I'm the problem.
They wanted me to stay quiet and die gracefully.
I chose to make sure everyone sees who their perfect Luna really is.

My husband used my cottage to cheat on me. Fine. I found out, I drove three hours, and I walked into my own house to find his mistress wearing my dead grandmother's sweater.
She told me to leave.
He showed up, kissed her in front of me, then grabbed my arm and shoved me into the door frame.
That's when I had the asthma attack. He's known about my asthma for five years.
My inhaler rolled across the porch floor. His mistress picked it up, held it out, and told me to sign a statement saying I'd caused all of this. Then she'd give it back.
He looked at me on the ground and said: She's performing.
I'm sitting on the floor of my own grandmother's house, gasping, and my husband is telling the neighbors I'm acting.
Nobody thought to ask whose family manages every property on this coastline.

My childhood sweetheart, Henry, gave me a glass of milk the night before my Harvard interview.
I thought he cared.
Until I woke up with my waist-length hair hacked off and my brain drowning in sedatives.
Later, I found him at a cafe, laughing with the prettiest girl, Madison, in our class.
"You actually cut her hair? You're insane, Henry!" she giggled.
"Truth or dare, babe," I heard him. "She's fat anyway. But you need that Harvard spot, Madison."
The boy who promised to marry me traded my dream to impress someone else.
I didn't scream. I didn't cry.
Let him have his joke. I'm taking my life back.

I was four months pregnant when the truck hit my car.
I woke up on a gurney outside the OR, bleeding, half-conscious, thinking my husband was saving my life. Then I heard him through the door.
"The baby's gone. Her right hand is finished—her career's over either way. Just take her kidney now and put it in Mia."
My mother agreed. My father told him to switch my architectural draft to Mia's name before Friday.
Mia. The sister they'd raised for twenty years while I was missing. The sister whose body was failing. The sister my husband had apparently been in love with the whole time I was married to him.
I was supposed to die on that table. I wasn't supposed to hear anything.
But my phone was in my coat pocket, and the voice memo app had never stopped recording.
And now I had a choice to make.

In order to rush to comfort his assistant whose apartment was leaking, Richard signed his name hastily without even glancing at the documents on the table.
I put away the divorce agreement with a wry smile.
When he and my son completely disappeared, he finally panicked.
Three months later .
He knelt down on the streets of Chicago in despair, begging me to remarry him.
My six-year-old son looked coldly at his biological father and said, "Get lost, you bad uncle! You don't deserve to be my dad!"

My wife and my best friend had been sleeping together behind my back for a long time. Once the apocalypse hit, they completely dropped the act. While I was still stressing over how we would survive, they threw me straight into a zombie horde—just to buy themselves a few seconds to escape.
Given a second chance at life, I chose to report the impending zombie outbreak to the government, securing my place as a top-tier protected asset for the nation.
But what I didn't expect was... my wife and best friend were reborn too.

My grandfather was a thief.

He did not steal money.

He stole my grandmother's name, her return papers, and the life that should have carried her out of the mountains.

Fifty years later, his granddaughter sat across from me in a law firm interview and smiled like the world already belonged to her.

I opened her file, saw the family name, and closed the folder.

"You didn't pass."

Three years ago, the night before my wedding, I was kidnapped and nearly killed.

When I woke up, Julian was crying over me. "The kidnappers hurt you so badly, Elsie. The doctors—they had to remove your uterus to save you. I'm so sorry. I'm so, so sorry."

My world shattered.

I cried for a week straight. Cried until I had no voice left, until my eyes couldn't open from the swelling. I'd lost everything—my chance at motherhood, my chance at being whole.

But Julian squeezed my hand. "I love you, Elsie. You're all I need."

He married me anyway. Against his family's wishes, he married this broken woman.

For three years, he was perfect. Gentle. Loving. I thought I was the luckiest woman alive.

Until today.

Today, I learned the truth—

There was no kidnapping. No random attack.

It was all planned. Orchestrated by Julian himself.

For one reason only—to give my uterus to Chloe, my sister who was born unable to have children.

On my first day at St. Clair University, my roommate Lysandra laughed at me in French.

Wrapped in designer logos, she called me a nobody who did not even recognize luxury perfume.

She thought I could not understand her.

She was wrong. French was my first language.

I was also Iris Russell, the hidden heir to the Russell Group.

But I kept that to myself.

Then Lysandra set me up at a Michelin-starred restaurant. With the manager's help, she placed a fake $450,000 bill in front of me and demanded humiliating photos to erase the debt.

They expected me to break.

Instead, I opened my phone and started a livestream.

By the time Lysandra learned who I was, the whole internet had seen her trap.

"Sign the Brooklyn house over to Isla. I'll cover your tuition next semester."

Gabriel didn't look up. Just sat there in his leather chair like he was doing me a favor.

My mother grabbed my sleeve. "She has depression, Rachel. She just needs a studio. Why are you making this so hard?"

I looked at her, then at him. That house was the only thing my father left me when he died. The only thing. And my stepbrother was sitting in his leather chair, offering me a trade like it was nothing.

"That house is the only thing my father left me," I said. "You know that."

Gabriel finally looked up. "I know. Sign anyway."

My mother tightened her grip on my sleeve. I shook her off.

"Give me the pen."

I signed. Grabbed my suitcase — packed for three days — and walked out.

I had nowhere to go. I didn't care.

A forced marriage: Aurora, masquerading as her sister, married the city's most ruthless business tycoon—"From today, you are Bella Moretti."
On their wedding night, her husband Gael left her alone in the empty room, leaving her trapped behind the walls of their marriage.
The pressure from her family to have a child was relentless, and she was married to a man who didn't love her. Just as they were finally starting to grow closer, her sister Bella, who had been in a coma, suddenly woke up—right at the most intimate moment!
"Everything you thought was an accident was my plan!" Her sister's cold laughter shattered all illusions, revealing that Aurora had been a pawn all along. And could Aurora still believe Gael's words, "I never wanted Bella"?

I hid my identity and pretended to be a country bumpkin by Christopher's side, caring for him and healing him. I never expected that the first thing Christopher would do after his recovery was dump me.

On the day my half-sister and I shared our birthday, he made a grand appearance at her party while leaving me to be mocked and ridiculed by everyone: "A country bumpkin doesn't deserve to be Christopher's wife. Go back to the countryside where you belong."

I just smiled. If not for repaying the debt I owed Christopher, I would never have stayed here in the first place. Any one of my hidden identities was someone they could only look up to.

No one expected I'd have the backbone to throw the divorce papers in Christopher's face, declaring that I was the one leaving him!

"Let’s divorce."

After three years of marriage, my husband’s true love has returned. He ended our three-year marriage with his own lips. Just like that, I was ruthlessly abandoned, and everyone is laughing at my misery.

I hid the news of my pregnancy and vanished from his world completely. I thought my sacrifice would give him the happiness he wanted. I never expected that when we met again, my ex-husband would confront me with bloodshot eyes.

"Whose child is this?"

——

As for the story after I left, I heard a different version. From the moment I disappeared, my ex-husband went insane searching for me all over the world...

Maya froze when the man who drew every eye in the room walked in. Her ex-boyfriend, who‘d vanished five years ago, was now one of Boston’s richest tycoons. Back then, he’d never hinted at his identity—then he’d disappeared without a trace. Seeing his cold gaze now, she could only assume he’d hidden the truth to test her, decided she was vain, and left in disappointment.

Outside the ballroom, she went to him as he smoked by the door, wanting to at least explain herself.

“Are you still angry with me?”

He flicked the cigarette away and looked at her with open contempt. “Angry? You think I’m angry? Let me guess—Maya finally finds out who I am and now she wants to ‘reconnect.’ Another chance now that she knows my last name comes with money.”

When she tried to deny it, he cut in. “You were a blip. A footnote. If you hadn’t shown up tonight, I wouldn’t have remembered you.”

Tears stung her eyes. She almost told him about his daughter, but stopped. He’d only think she was using the child to trap him and get his money.

Maya swallowed everything back and left, certain they would never cross paths again—only for him to keep appearing in her life, until he was the one lowering himself, humbly begging her to take him back.

At twelve, I lost my parents and was taken in by the Brooks—our families had a marriage pact. For a decade, everyone expected me to marry their son Conner, a future I'd accepted as duty.
Then Conner's tabloid scandal with another woman destroyed the engagement. Chaos hit our family businesses—until Dylan, Conner's uncle who barely spoke to me, offered: Marry me instead.
It was the only way to save everything. I said yes, no time to fear marrying a stranger.
What stunned me? The wild side of Uncle Dylan I never saw. It hit fast, hot—pulling me in until I was hopelessly falling.
And my best friend? She's about to find a chaotic, twisty romance of her own. Turns out, life's best gifts are the ones you never see coming—even if they start with a marriage of convenience.

"What is the meaning of this?" I questioned still in disbelief. Where had it all gone wrong? We were happy, he respected me and so did I...I even fell in love with him so how could he do this to me?
"It's exactly what it says in the paper, Ciara"
"And what is that?" I stubbornly inquired.
Ryan had uttered those words I so desperately dreaded,"I want a divorce, Ciara"
Ciara is the heiress to her father's company but she left all of that to be in a contract marriage with Ryan. It was supposed to be a 'no-strings-attached' kind of feeling but, she couldn't help but fall in love with him. Just when she wanted to start a clean slate on their first anniversary, she was handed a divorce paper.
Ryan is a billionaire and a man with a hardened heart. He never saw Ciara as something more than just a 'fake wife' who was willing to help him out with a case. Deciding that he had had enough, Ryan hands Ciara a divorce paper setting himself free from her but 5 years later, he seems to have a change on heart and wants to win Ciara back at all cost.
But on his way to the office of the new investor of his company he is overcomed by a welling shock that the name of his new investor was Ciara. The same Ciara he'd known and once loved.
What happens when this two dual meets for the first time since their rough divorce? Would they rekindle their feelings or would they leave it at that?
Could second chance love prevail?

"You're going to run on the count of three, Janice Cross," He whisper. "And make sure you don't let us find you."
"No… Lucian."
I moved my gaze to the men at either side of him, willing—begging them to say something.
Help me. "Calder, please… Aiden…"
Both turned their heads to the side. They couldn't even look me in the eyes as they chose their brother.
"One."
"Lucian…"
"Two."
"I didn't mean to."
"Three."


After losing the man she believed she would marry and her parents within a week, Janice just wants to care for her sick sister. She doesn't want a man. She doesn't want three men.
But one night is enough to change her life and point her in a new direction.
Aiden Grant. Calder Vaughn. Lucian Graves.
She doesn't expect the line to blur when it comes to these older men.
And when it comes to an end, she does not expect these men to continue wanting her as badly as she wants them.

"Please, Lydia, give me a second chance. I swear, let me love you again." "Too late, Nathaniel, I have someone else now."
In a twisted tale of deceit and sacrifice, Lydia Milan, who hid her identity and family, endures a loveless marriage to handsome, wealthy Nathaniel King, who views her only as a blood source for his ailing ex.
Struggling against mistreatment, Lydia Milan finally demands a divorce and leaves the marriage, and that was when Nathaniel King discovered that she was the only daughter of the richest man in the country, whom he had been trying to have an audience with since.
A suspenseful journey unfolds, revealing the complexities of love, betrayal, and redemption in this gripping novel where hidden identities and vengeful schemes entwine in a web of secrets.

The night before the engagement, Rosaline was tricked by her cousin. She was drunk and sent to a stranger’s room. She broke free from their control, went to the next room through the window, and had a one-night stand with a mysterious man.

She didn't want to have anything to do with him, so she matched wits with him and finally escaped. The man stared at silhouette with a smile: "You will never escape from me."

It was five years later when they met again. Neither of them recognized each other, but she was stopped by him in a dramatic way,
"Sir, anything can I do for you?"
"Yes."
"So, what's the matter?"
"I need a wife." He looked at her, and his lips twitching slightly.
"Sir, I don't quite understand what you mean."
"I needed a wife, and you are just the right one for me."
"What! Why?"
"I don't like women who are too beautiful or too smart."
“...”
"I'll see you at the Bureau House at ten a.m. tomorrow."
“...”
What?Was she proposed by the richest bachelor in this City!

I am the fearsome godfather of the Mafia.
For the woman I love, I sheathed my fangs and willingly became a despised commoner son-in-law.
In the horrific car accident, I shielded her with my own flesh and blood, and steel bars pierced through my chest.
Faced with the only life-saving machine in the entire hospital, she did not hesitate to save her lightly injured "white moonlight" brother-in-law, leaving me to die in the basement.
She thought that as long as I bled to death, she could naturally embrace perfect love.
But she didn't know—
Without my protection, her proud, century-old family wouldn't even last a month ...

"Abort her mutt. Liora is carrying my true pureblood heir."
My Alpha husband’s voice was ice-cold as I bled out on the delivery bed.
The woman he was protecting? My fiercely loyal best friend.
While I was screaming in pain, biting my lips bloody to birth his child, he was in the next room, making her moan.
He killed our baby.
When I returned from burying my grandmother in the freezing rain, his guards threw holy water in my face.
"Wash her," Lachlan ordered coldly. "The stench of death on her will harm Liora's pup."
I stared at the man who once took nine lashes of a barbed whip just to marry me.
He aborted my baby to save hers. He let my only family die.
He tossed me a bag of gold like a beggar and told me to stop causing drama.
So, I packed my bags, and vanished into his world.

Every night, dragging noises come from the floor above.
The neighbor claims he just can’t sleep, yet he stares at my window and grins in the dead of night.
Later, he dies.
But at two in the morning, I still get a text message from him.
Someone else warns me: Don’t go to the sixth floor.
The police say this building doesn’t even have a sixth floor.
Yet I’ve seen people go up there with my own eyes.
Where exactly does this so-called sixth floor lead?
Who really died?
And who on earth is the one texting me?

On the eve of my mating ceremony, my twin sister and I were abducted by rogues.
My Alpha fiancé and my parents drained our territory's wealth, but only bought back my sister Elara's life.
Upon her safe return, Elara seamlessly took my place, claiming my marking ceremony to become his Luna.
Meanwhile, left to rot in the rogue camp, a wolfsbane-laced blade violently carved out my wolf's essence.
Tossed into the wilderness like rotting meat, stripped of my ability to shift and bear pups, I became the Crescent Pack's ultimate disgrace.
Forsaken by my pack, Silas—Alpha of the Obsidian Pack and my childhood friend—defied the Council’s fury. Under the Moon Goddess, he publicly marked me, sheltering me like an absolute treasure.
But now, in the third year of our bond, I accidentally knocked over a half-sealed Memory crystal in his study.
It projected a hidden dark magic ritual into mid-air, tearing the lie of that kidnapping to shreds in an instant.
In the projection, Silas held my sister's hand, his eyes brimming with a sickening devotion.
"Don't be afraid, Elara. Aria's twin essence is a perfect match. With this, you'll safely carry pups with the strongest Alpha bloodline."
A heartbeat later, Silas approached my blindfolded, bound body.
With zero mercy or numbing agents, he carved out my essence with his own hands, drowning out my agonizing howls.

After the crash, my husband, Darius, lost his ability to speak. The trauma to his cervical spine left him unable to even lift a finger.
The doctors said his only remaining way to communicate was to nod, or to shake his head.
Sitting by his hospital bed, I finally asked the question that had been eating away at me for three months.
"When the crash happened... were you on your way to see your mistress?"
Darius stared dead at me. Then, slowly, he nodded.

My two best friends killed me over a girl who'd been dead six months.
Lila Bishop never got a single offer. So she cried and clung until Cole and Wes were ready to throw away their full rides and follow her to nowhere. I tried to stop them — they called me jealous and cut me off. So I went over their heads. I called their moms. I fixed their signing papers myself, the night before the deadline.
Six months later Lila was gone, and they blamed me. They dragged me to the roof of our gym and threw me off.
Then I opened my eyes — three months back, the day it all started.
Last time, I broke myself trying to save them.
This time, I'd let them jump.

My long-lost twin sister has returned.
The first thing she did was demand to marry my fiancé.
Jayden, murmuring apologies, held her close as they walked into the city hall.
My family urged me to be generous, saying, "After all she’s been through, you owe her this much. You've had a good life all these years—why not let her have this?"
Until the day of their wedding, no one could find me.
But what they didn't know was that my body had been drifting at sea for over ten days.

In my family, "democracy" was just a gilded word for bullying.
Every time there was a conflict between me and my adopted sister, Ivy, my fiancé and my brother would settle it with a family vote.
The location of my marital home? I lost, 3-1.
The guest list for my wedding? I lost, 3-1.
 
And when Ivy wanted the massive south-facing master suite in my new house to build her walk-in closet?
"Let's vote to keep things fair," my fiancé, William, declared.
I was a rising architect at Boston's most prestigious firm, yet I didn't even have the right to design my own marital home.
The result was unanimous. The bride's bedroom would be half the size of the adopted sister's closet.
 
Out of more than a hundred family votes over the last ten years:
My fiancé's votes for me: Zero.
My own brother's votes for me: Zero.
 
I finally realized this game was rigged from the start. I didn’t say a word. I just packed my bags.
Let them play their little voting game without me.

On our first wedding anniversary, I walked into my husband's office and found him having sex with my best friend.

He didn't even apologize. Instead, claiming he was disgusted that I hadn't produced an heir in a year of marriage, he threw divorce papers in my face.

Five years later, I returned to New York with my new husband—Cassian Vitiello, the Godfather of the North American underworld.

Vincent ran into me at the docks. He handed me a business card, offering me a job as a nanny for his mistress's son.

What he didn't know was that the woman he was mocking was now the Donna—the woman the entire East Coast underground feared.

Seven years ago I gave up my inheritance and went door to door with Nolan—a broke director shooting street documentaries—my belly out to here, begging investors to take a chance on him.

Everyone said I'd thrown my life away on him.

Seven years later he's a name everyone knows. And Emily, the first love who walked out when he had nothing, is back in Chicago with her daughter.

That afternoon I came home early and heard him pull five-year-old Ivy into his arms: "You can't ever tell Mom that Daddy and Emily are having a fake wedding."

"But Daddy, Mom will be so sad..."

"Say one word and Daddy won't love you anymore. Got it?"

Her little shoulders shook as she nodded, and nodded.

Out in the hallway, I couldn't even be bothered to cry.

I dialed the number I'd kept blocked for seven years. "Dad—can the family plane still come get me and Ivy?"

Nolan, what you lost wasn't a housewife you could push around. You threw away the only person who ever made you her whole world.

Five years into my marriage, I took off my Donna necklace at the Rossi family’s New Year’s Eve banquet and Noah still thought I could never leave him.
He stood by the long table with his mistress, Amelia, and said in front of every capo, “Some people will never measure up to her. Not even close.”
I didn’t cry. I didn’t make a scene. I just turned and walked away. On my way out, my cousin Lucas, my fixer, handed me a cup of coffee.
Three days later, he brought me two pieces of news.
Amelia was four months pregnant. And Noah was trading family territory to get his bastard child recognized by the family.
“What are you going to do?” Lucas asked.
I stared out the window, thinking about the red lipstick stain on Noah’s shirt. Thinking about the smug look in his eyes when he told me, “I only helped her because I felt sorry for her.”
“Wait,” I said. “Wait until they think they’ve won.”
What Noah didn’t know was I was still holding one last trump card.

She never saw it coming. After five years of marriage, it took a DNA test to blow everything up.

The son she raised from birth? Her husband's kid with his ex. And somehow, both of them knew the whole time and said nothing.

It gets worse. She overheard her husband's actual plan: wait for the ex to come back, then push her out of the company "nicely" and hand her five million as a goodbye gift.

Five million? She single-handedly kept that company alive, pouring in her own money and connections to clean up his messes. And that's all she's worth?

She was done. She wanted everything back that was hers.

The ungrateful kid? She's over it. The husband chasing his first love? Good riddance.

But the moment she walked away for real, both of them came running back.

"Baby, please. Just give me one more chance."

She didn't even look up.

Once, I was the Golden Dragon Princess, loved by my family and cherished by the man I would have died for. Then one accusation shattered everything. My dragon core was sealed, and I was cast into the frozen abyss to repent for a crime I never committed. Three years later, I died alone beneath the endless snow. My body was brought back on the day he was supposed to marry another woman. He stared at my lifeless face, trembling. “Seraphina… please wake up.”

Beta Malcolm and I were at the Civil Affairs Bureau, ready to register our marriage. We were just waiting to take the final photo when he got a phone call and left.
He abandoned me right there at the marriage registration office, leaving me stuck in an impossible situation.
I called him—no answer.
I messaged him—no reply.
In the end, I had no choice but to call his childhood sweetheart’s number. Beta Malcolm answered.
“Rowena, can you stop being so annoying? Queenie twisted her ankle—I need to take care of her today. Stop calling and waking her up. We’ll reschedule the registration.”
I bit my lip and murmured into the phone,
“This makes it the seventh time we’ve rescheduled.”
“So what? The Civil Affairs Bureau isn’t going anywhere—it’s not like it’s going to disappear!”
My face was blank, but it felt like my heart was being carved open.
A staff member looked at me with pity and asked,
“Alpha Rowena, are we still doing this?”
I gave a small nod.
“Yes. Let’s go through with it.”

On the execution platform, my noble and beautiful wife used her dagger to carve open my chest.
My nominal adopted son pressed a red-hot iron into my skin, branding me with the "F"-class mark of the lowest outcast, draining my transcendent bloodline dry.
"The Storm Kingdom has no use for a cripple with zero beast-spirit affinity. You belong rotting in the abyss!"
They cut the chains and kicked me into the Black Abyss—a place from which no one returns—then turned to carve up my throne.
They thought I was as good as dead.
They had no idea that the deepest darkness of that abyss harbored the most terrifying ancient demon in existence.
Two weeks later, as they raised their glasses to toast the new king's coronation, I kicked down the castle gates, wielding the ember-fire of annihilation and a tide of ten thousand beasts.
Looking down at the woman who once stood so high above me, now groveling in the mud and begging for mercy, I tossed the bloodstained broken blade onto the hem of her dress:
"Remember this forever—it was you who took a nobody you crushed beneath your feet and turned him into a king you'll kneel before and never win back. Now, hand over your lives."

I was reborn, back to the moment before I was dragged to death by motorcycles in the wasteland.

In my previous life, I listened to the moral blackmail of the saintly female lead Daisy and used my abilities to desperately save a motorcycle gang surrounded by zombies.

As a result, I was severely injured from ability overexertion, and these ungrateful wolves used me as a tool to establish dominance, dragging me to death with motorcycles across the wasteland.

Before I died, Daisy was still there crying: "We tried our best, this isn't our fault."

Now that I have a second chance, she stands before me again shouting:

"Cole! What are you standing there for? Go save them! Those people are going to die! You have abilities, you must save them!"

Looking at her hypocritical saintly face, rage burned in my chest.

Why should my abilities save ungrateful wolves? Why should my life be a stepping stone for others?

The kindness of fools is worthless!

So I threw her out to feed the zombies!

On a rainy evening, Ophelia Taylor caught her husband Benjamin White cheating, shattering their marriage and her happy illusions completely. Plunged into despair, she found solace in Benjamin’s younger brother, William. Gentle and steady, William silently guarded her—bringing warm milk on sleepless nights, defending her from Benjamin’s coldness—slowly melting her broken heart. Unknowingly, both fell for each other, a forbidden affection blooming amid betrayal. Torn between her unfaithful husband and her off-limits brother-in-law, Ophelia stood at an emotional crossroads. Her reason screamed it was wrong, but her heart clung to William’s warmth. This tangled struggle of love and guilt had just begun.