4543 Book(s) Related to one two buckle my shoe agatha christie

Everyone said I killed my mother.

So Dad and Carter hated me from the start. They only had love for Vivian.

On my eighteenth birthday, Vivian drugged me and I was nearly raped. That's when Nolan Blake showed up—business tycoon, my savior. He claimed me as his in front of everyone and warned anyone who dared mess with me would pay the price.

After that, Vivian bullied me? He made her apologize. Dad humiliated me? He made him shut up. Carter mocked me? He destroyed all of Carter's business deals.

No one had ever protected me like that. I fell HARD.

Three months later, I walked down the aisle in white.

Nolan spoiled me rotten. I became the woman the whole world envied.

Until the day I was five months pregnant.

At a family party, the balcony railing gave way. I was falling, screaming—then Nolan caught me. His arm broke. I only had minor injuries.

Everyone said how LUCKY I was—a husband willing to break every bone for me.

Until I stood in the hospital corridor and overheard that conversation—

"Aurora is the only match for Vivian," Charles's voice came from the hospital room. "Vivian's kidney failure is getting worse. We can't wait anymore!"

"You think I don't KNOW that?" Nolan lowered his voice. "But she's already pregnant! Pregnant women can't donate organs!"

"That's why we staged the fall," Carter said coldly. "It was supposed to make her miscarry—"

"ENOUGH!" Nolan's roar cut him off. "I want to save Vivian MORE than ANY of you! She's the one I love. But you can't hurt Aurora like this. I have my own plan—after she gives birth, I'll make her donate 'willingly.'"

After hearing those words, I collapsed trembling in the hallway.

So that was why he married me. Not because he loved me, but to save Vivian. Everything he did for me—his tenderness, his protection—it was all for HER.

Just like Dad and Carter, he loved Vivian.

Not me.

I touched my slightly rounded belly as silent tears streamed down my face.

If no one wanted us, then we'd disappear.

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.

In seven years of marriage, I miscarried five times. I nearly died on the operating table.

My husband, Lorenzo Castellano—the mafia king who controlled the entire East Coast—gripped my blood-stained hand and choked out: "It's okay. You're all I need."

I believed him.

Until our anniversary, when I smelled her perfume on his shirt and discovered the truth: his sister-in-law had given him a three-year-old son—those same deep brown eyes I'd bled five times trying to create.

The cruel irony? Just the day before, two pink lines had appeared on a pregnancy test.

That night, the explosion lit up the entire ocean, our private yacht burning like a funeral pyre.

The man who made all of New York's underworld tremble finally learned what it meant to lose.

He lost his wife.

And the child he would never know existed.

Ten years loving Liam Rockefeller cost me everything.

He said the football team jumped him—so I charged in and took the punches. He sobbed that his stepbrother would destroy him at Yale—so I ripped up my acceptance letter. He held me at midnight whispering "I'm so lucky to have you"—and I thought that meant forever.

Three months later, I heard him laughing in the locker room—laughing about me.

"Iris is like a fucking puppy, so easy to fool. Now that the Yale spot's open, Emily can go with me."

The bullying was staged. The tears were fake. Those intimate embraces—just tools to control me while he fucked his side piece.

He thought I'd still stand in front of him even with a broken nose. He thought I'd never wise up.

I wised up.

In his stepbrother Sebastian's bed.

Twenty years ago, four-year-old Alicia vanished from a park, falling from Connecticut's wealthiest heiress to an orphan overnight. Twenty years later, her birth parents find her working at a coffee shop, bringing her back to a life of luxury.

But behind the fairy tale reunion lurks deadly danger. A mysterious guardian angel named Gabriel begins sending her prophetic warnings about her family's impending doom. Yet Alicia, drunk on newfound happiness, dismisses these as mere hallucinations.

The price of her disbelief is devastating. Her father dies in a horse-riding accident at the country club. Months later, her mother perishes in a car crash on her way to a charity gala. Shattered by grief and guilt, Alicia leaps from a hospital rooftop in despair...

Only to wake up back on the day her parents found her.

This time, she vows to heed Gabriel's every prophecy and save her family. But as she follows the angel's guidance, she discovers that fate's wheels may not be so easily stopped...

The real test has only just begun.

Three years of chasing Chase Blackwood, and all I got was a front-row seat to him tonguing my "sister."

The old me would've cried. Begged. Made a scene.

The old me also ended up dead.

Funny how a second chance at life gives you clarity.

So here's what's different this time: I'm done being the pathetic ex. I'm done playing nice.

I'm throwing champagne in his face and climbing into bed with Asher Hayes—his best friend, his rival, his worst nightmare.

And Chase? He can rot.

I ripped out half my heart for him.

Literally.

Six years ago, Draco—the Black Dragon Lord—was dying on the battlefield, enemy claws buried in his chest. So I tore myself open and shoved half my witch's heart into his body to save his life.

After that, I lived with constant pain, my magic drained to nothing. I fought his wars, nearly died a dozen times, all while waiting for him to keep his promise—that he'd make me his queen after the coronation.

But on coronation day, Draco brought back the half-elf Ivy and told me to give up my crown.

Why? Ivy stayed with him in the Abyss for three years. And now she was pregnant with his child.

It destroyed me. So I drank the Oblivion Potion—the one thing that could strip away every ounce of love I had for him.

And in three days, I'm leaving for the polar regions to marry into the Silver Wolf Clan.

The loan sharks who kidnapped us wanted payment for my twin sister's gambling debts—in blood.

When my FBI negotiator father showed up with his tactical team, he found Lily with a paper cut, crying her heart out. I was dying from a gunshot wound in a basement below.

I called him with my dying breath: "Dad, please send help. I'm bleeding out."

"Are you kidding me right now, Emily? Your sister just went through hell, and you're pulling this pathetic stunt for attention? How sick are you?"

He hung up. I died alone, dismissed as a liar.

Three days later, they found my body. And the truth that came with it burned their perfect world to ash.

My family used me as bait to destroy my sister's happiness.

The plan was simple: fake being poor, watch my sister's construction worker boyfriend run when times got tough, then reveal the truth and break her heart. I was supposed to be the convincing proof of our "poverty."

But I didn't know I was acting. For ten years, I lived their lie for real. Starved while they feasted in hiding. Worked myself to the bone while they watched me suffer.

Then I got my dream job and burst through the door to save everyone—only to find my sister's engagement party in progress.

But she'd dumped the construction worker for a tech mogul. "Maya's suffering was so authentic," she laughed to her guests. "It showed me exactly what I'd become if I stayed with Jake. Thank God I came to my senses."

My pain was her wake-up call.

Three years barren, and Jessamine walked on thin ice in the elite household. Her mother-in-law spat venomous curses daily, calling her a "worthless waste of space" and threatening to force her son into divorce.

She could still remember when Damien had severed all ties with his family to marry her—kneeling outside their door in the pouring rain, begging his parents to accept her: "Jessamine is my one true love! I can't survive without her!" Back then, she was the only woman who existed in his eyes.

But now, for the sake of family inheritance, he had the audacity to demand her consent for his childhood sweetheart Celeste to bear their child. Jessamine endured the soul-crushing agony of watching her husband entwined with another woman, night after torturous night.

Even more devastating—after Celeste delivered a daughter, Damien had the shameless nerve to declare: "The family still needs a male heir."

In that shattering moment, Jessamine finally saw the brutal truth.

On our seventh anniversary, Jeffrey brought his mistress home for dinner.

Calla wore my dead mother's necklace and called me a "boring housewife" while I cooked for them. Jeffrey laughed, saying I was lucky he kept me around since I'd never contributed anything to our marriage.

What he didn't know? I'd given up my six-figure tech career to nurse him back from his car accident. Sacrificed everything while he treated me like his personal servant.

For seven years, I endured his cheating and cruelty, thinking love meant sacrifice.

I was wrong.

When I left him the divorce papers, Jeffrey screamed that I'd come crawling back within a week.

But when I never came back, he was the one who lost his mind.

I married Massimo Salvatore, the mafia don, thirty-two times. And divorced him thirty-two times.

Every single time for the same reason—his precious Claudia came back from her overseas treatment facility.

"She took a bullet to the head for me. Any stress could kill her." That was his only explanation.

The first divorce, I trashed the entire living room. He slapped me across the face: "Cut the DRAMA. We'll get back together once she's stable."

The third time, I followed them to the club and caught them kissing. I confronted him—got locked in the basement for seven days.

Sign the papers, take off the ring, pack my bags. Like a nightmare on repeat.

Until the thirty-third time.

A rival family grabbed both me and Claudia. With a gun to his head, he could only save one of us. I looked at him, voice breaking: "Massimo, just this once, pick me."

He walked toward her.

Four hours later, his men found me in some abandoned warehouse. Three broken ribs, blood everywhere. Our baby—gone.

Massimo camped out by Claudia's hospital bed, wouldn't leave her side. Didn't visit me once. Not even when I got discharged.

That's when I was done.

My fiancé has tried to kill me seventeen times.

Everyone says I'm cursed by the Moon Goddess. Five years, seventeen mating ceremonies—all ending in blood.

An eagle's talons through my spine. Poisoned wine that stopped my heart. Ritual flames that charred my skin. Each time, I survived. Each time, Kael Silverblade held my hand and swore it was fate's cruelty, not his.

I believed him.

Until the seventeenth time.

Blood moon. Three assassins. Nine bone blades cutting precise lines across my body—missing every vital organ, maximizing the pain. I writhed on the sacred stones, screaming until my voice broke.

Three days later, still wrapped in bandages, I heard him talking to his lieutenant outside the healing den.

"Lord Silverblade, she almost died this time. Maybe we should—"

"No." Kael's voice was ice. "Her brother saved my life. My grandfather swore a blood debt—a mating bond to repay it. But goddammit, I love Vira. I've always loved Vira. Not her."

Silence.

"Keep the accidents coming," he said. "As long as she won't let go, we keep going. She'll break eventually. She has to."

I pressed against the wall, tears streaming down my face.

Seventeen times. Not curses. Not fate.

Him.

The male I'd loved since I was sixteen.

But here's what Kael doesn't know—this time, he finally wins.

I won't survive the next full moon.

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.

At my seventh wedding, they replaced me.

The Oracle pointed at me and screamed one word: "CURSED."

Father's hand cracked across my face. Mother tore the wedding dress off my body and shoved my cousin Seraphine into it.

"She'll marry him instead," Father said. "You'll destroy us all."

What they didn't know? A thousand years ago, our family made a blood pact with the Shadow Lord himself: if the eldest Ashford daughter remained unmarried on her twenty-sixth birthday, she belonged to HIM.

Today was my twenty-sixth birthday.

I begged Julian to run. "Please. We have until sunset."

He laughed. "The Shadow Lord's a fairy tale, Anna. Seraphine's just going through the motions. You're being dramatic."

Then he told my parents everything.

They locked me in the tower.

But the Shadow High Priest's warning was clear—at sunset, the Shadow Lord would come. And when he did, I'd drink the Potion of Forgetting and lose everything.

My memories. My name. My soul.

The clock struck five.

He was coming.

"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.

I was dying, but honestly? Death felt like mercy.

As a vampire, I should have been immortal. But at six years old, I'd made a deal with a demon, gambling my fate on "true love"—if three times I failed to win the heart of the one I loved, the demon would claim my soul.

Just when I thought death was certain, I got pregnant. Morag, the demon, showed rare mercy, promising to wait until I gave birth.

But at eight months, my husband sneered about removing the "bastard." My brother didn't even flinch as he sliced open my belly. My parents cursed that I deserved it—all to save my sister Lycia, who'd somehow "returned from the dead."

The day they cut my child out, not one tear. Not for me.

So why, after I died, were they all on their knees at my grave, sobbing?

The tour bus hung precariously over the cliff's edge, smoke billowing from its engine. Inside, two pregnant women were trapped.

"Captain Walker, both pregnant women are in critical condition. Who do we save first?"

I had been pierced by a steel rod through my abdomen, my water had broken, and I was screaming desperately at my husband:

"Ryan Walker! My water broke! The baby's dying!"

On the other side, his first love Stella clutched her chest, her face deathly pale:

"Ryan, I'm having a heart attack! Save me!"

The man in the firefighter uniform charged toward Stella's side without hesitation.

"Captain, your wife's position is easier to reach!" team member Mike shouted.

"SHUT UP! Follow orders!"

He rushed to Stella without looking back, leaving behind one sentence:

"She won't die. I'm her husband, I take full responsibility."

When my parents forced me to donate my organs to my sister, I didn't refuse or run away. I just quietly signed the surgical consent forms, willingly giving my kidney to Vivienne, their beloved daughter.

A few months ago, my sister was hospitalized with kidney failure. The doctor said she needed a transplant. My family's first thought was me—the backup daughter they'd kept around all these years.

When my husband Allen took my hand with tears in his eyes and said, "Only you can save her," I agreed without hesitation.

When the doctor explained the surgical risks and potential complications, I smiled and nodded my understanding.

My parents said I'd finally learned what sisterly love meant.

Even Allen, who'd always been cold to me, held my hand gently and said, "The surgery's safe. You're so healthy, nothing will go wrong. When you recover, I'll take you to Hawaii."

But they don't know that no matter how the surgery goes, I won't be around to celebrate.

Because I just got my own test results—I have terminal brain cancer. I'm going to die anyway.

I bought my five-year-old son a Captain America shield for his birthday.

But when I landed in New York, the hospital called.

"Your son died during the medical procedure your husband authorized."

Marcus had signed Axel up as a living donor. For his mistress's kid.

While our baby bled out on the operating table, Marcus was cutting birthday cake with his new family.

Even used Axel's favorite Superman pillow as decoration.

I stared at my child's mutilated corpse and made a promise.

You fed my baby to wolves for a whore's smile. Time to return the favor, Marcus.

Five years ago, my ex-boyfriend Jason said coldly when he abandoned me: "Charlotte, you're not worthy of my dreams."

Five years later, when I saw him again, he had become Floreton's tech mogul while I remained a simple sculptor. His new fiancée—a wealthy heiress—sneered at my modest attire: "Someone like you can actually afford to book a top-tier wedding venue?"

She stole my venue, crushed my fingers, and forced me to kneel and apologize: "Say you don't belong here!"

Jason stood by watching coldly, just as indifferent as he was on that rainy night five years ago.

I desperately thought this was my fate, until that familiar, furious voice echoed throughout the entire venue:

"What bastard touched my woman!"

My Bradley had arrived.

This time, I would be the one laughing last.

I was dying in an emergency room when my husband chose his ex-girlfriend over me.

"Stop being dramatic, Olivia," Matthew said over the sound of champagne and laughter. "Rebecca's gallery opening is tonight."

Dramatic? I was hemorrhaging from a miscarriage, signing my own surgical consent because my husband of seven years couldn't be bothered to save my life.

While I flatlined twice on the operating table, Instagram showed him tenderly wrapping his coat around Rebecca under fireworks.

Seven years of marriage. Seven years of being his backup plan while she remained his priority.

I survived that night, but something inside me died forever.

I signed the divorce papers with the same pen I'd used for my surgical consent—alone.

My husband stole credit for my work, gave it to his girlfriend, and waited for me to say thank you.

He assumed I'd never leave, so he missed me selling our apartment, cutting off his money, and meeting with divorce lawyers.

When he graciously offered me a second chance, I just smiled: "Thanks, but we're already divorced."

My six-month business trip to Europe was finally over. I decided to surprise my husband Nathaniel by coming home early without telling him, bringing my six-year-old son Lucas straight to his newly opened upscale restaurant.

Lucas excitedly ran toward the children's play area while I scanned the restaurant for Nathaniel, eagerly anticipating our reunion.

Suddenly, a scream shattered the peaceful atmosphere.

I turned to see a woman in work uniform roughly shoving my son, snarling viciously:

"What the hell are you RUNNING around for, you little brat! Can't you watch where you're going?"

I froze. How DARE this woman treat my child like this in my husband's restaurant?

Seven years married. Seven years reading minds. Still ended up the biggest joke in New York's underworld.

My husband Dante—Mafia boss—put that ring on my finger thinking, "This should be Elena's."

Seven years taking bullets for him. Seven years tortured for him. All I got was his cold contempt.

Then Elena came back with a kid. I became trash.

"Victoria, you disgust me." He crushed me under his boot, had me beaten bloody—all for her.

That's when my heart died.

I didn't explain. Just watched the clock.

Three hours until the boat leaves.

Dante, we're done. Forever.

Criminal profiler in training (and newlywed) Jessie Hunt, 29, discovers that dark secrets lurk in her new suburban town; when a body turns up dead, she finds herself caught in the crosshairs of her newfound friends, her husband’s secrets, her serial killer caseload—and the secrets of her own dark past.In THE PERFECT WIFE (A Jessie Hunt Psychological Suspense Thriller—Book One), Criminal profiler-in-training Jessie Hunt is sure she's finally put the darkness of her childhood behind her. She and her husband, Kyle, just moved from a cramped downtown Los Angeles apartment into a Westport Beach mansion. Kyle's promotion has them swimming in money. And Jessie is on the verge of getting her Master's degree in forensic psychology, the last step in her dream of becoming a criminal profiler. But soon after their arrival, Jessie begins to notice a series of strange developments. The neighbors—and their au pairs—all seem to be hiding secrets. The mysterious yacht club Kyle is desperate to join is rife with cheating spouses, and with troubling rules of its own. And the notorious serial killer being held at the psychiatric hospital where Jessie is completing her degree seems to know more about her life than is normal—or safe. As her world starts to unravel, Jessie begins to question everything around her—including her own sanity. Has she truly uncovered a disturbing conspiracy buried within a sunny, wealthy Southern California beach town? Does the mass murderer she's studying really somehow know the origin of her private nightmares? Or has her tortured past finally come back to claim her?A fast-paced psychological suspense thriller with unforgettable characters and heart-pounding suspense, THE PERFECT WIFE is book #1 in a riveting new series that will leave you turning pages late into the night.

Ethan Ashworth had nothing — no money, no family, no future. Just a rundown room, a handsome face that brought him nothing but pain, and the daily beatings from rich bullies who saw him as trash.

Then came the brutal ambush behind the school building. Left bleeding and alone as the weekend began, Ethan finally gave up on life.

That was when the voice spoke.

[Bloodline Legacy Contract activated.]

Suddenly, the frail orphan from the slums was thrust into another world — a realm of magic, kings, and monsters. With a mysterious system at his side and a sword in his hand, Ethan must complete deadly missions to grow stronger.

Because back home, the rich still rule… and he has a score to settle.

Layla Byrne arrives at Blackwater Hall with one letter in her bag and one ugly truth in her chest. Someone is dead, someone is definitely lying.

The school welcomes gifted students, bloodline heirs, and the children of old magical families. It also hides a forest full of sealed power, missing students, and a history everyone has been trained to forget.

Layla is the outsider from the coast, the scholarship girl with the wrong surname, the wrong accent, and a magic she cannot control. The moment she steps onto Blackwater Hall grounds, she feels eyes on her. Notes appear where they should not. Doors open behind her when nobody is there. Someone knows where she sleeps before she does.

The worst part is that the boy who keeps appearing whenever danger comes near her looks like the one who is doing it. Callum Reid is the academy’s golden enforcer, the respected heir with sharp hands, colder manners, and a habit of being too close for comfort. Layla decides he is the stalker. Callum decides she is a threat to the school and to herself. Neither of them is completely wrong.

As Layla digs deeper, she learns that Blackwater Hall does not merely educate students. It ranks them, watches them, marks them, and uses them. Students with the right bloodlines are pushed toward the hidden forest seal beneath the school. Records vanish. Names are being erased. People disappear.

The woman running the academy smiles through all of it. The archivist who keeps the records knows exactly how the old power works.

And the first boy Layla ever trusted in the academy turns out to be the real predator, the one who has been stalking her from the shadows long before she understood she was being hunted.

Someone posted a love confession to me on the campus board the same week I got nominated for the Outstanding Thesis Award. By that evening, my roommate's boyfriend had already commented—claiming I'd slept with our professor and faked my entire thesis.
My roommate swore she'd handle it.
She didn't.
A used condom appeared at my lab bench. Photos of a woman leaving my advisor's building at 2 a.m. went viral. The university pulled my thesis. My professor told me to disappear quietly. My parents drove six hours to slap me and tell me my sister would never.
I lost my degree, my family, and my name. Then I lost my life.
The night I died, I finally saw what I'd missed in those photos—a detail that proved it was never me.
I woke up three weeks before my thesis defense.
I remember everything. And this time, I'm not keeping quiet.

Seven years ago, he gave me 52 love letters, promising to prove his love through each of the 52 weeks of a year.

Seven years later, I burned them one by one—each betrayal claiming another letter.

Layla thought she had married her fairy tale—the coffee-stained graduate student working late nights in the lab, the tender man who wrote her love letters every single day. She used her mother's inheritance to fund his education, stayed by his side through countless sleepless nights, even sacrificed her own Harvard opportunity for his dreams.

But everything changed when Mia appeared—young, beautiful, and brilliant.

The public humiliation, the ruthless betrayal, the cold calculation... With each heartbreak, she burned another letter he had written with his own hand. From 52 to 51, from hope to despair, from deep love to complete devastation.

When the last love letter turned to ash, the man finally realized—he had lost her completely.

I spent twenty years being invisible. Twenty years making his favorite meals, raising his daughter, loving his family like my own.

On our anniversary, I baked a cake for six hours. He came home and ripped diamond earrings from my ears—they were for his mistress, not me.

My daughter rolled her eyes: "I wish Victoria was my mom."

My five-year-old grandson looked at me with disgust: "You're old and ugly. We want Victoria!"

So I filed for divorce, packed my bags, and called my father—the same father who stands on palace steps, waiting for his daughter to come home.

My ex-husband thought he married a nobody. He's about to discover he threw away a princess.

And when he finally figures out who I really am? It'll be far too late.

I'm Riley. Orphan. Motorcycle mechanic. And the biggest fool in Texas.

For ten years, I thought oil tycoon Colt loved me. His adopted daughter by day, his woman by night. I actually believed his whispered promises in the dark.

Then I watched him announce his engagement to someone else.

"Your father saved my life. You're my responsibility," he said when I confronted him. Like I was some charity case. Like everything between us meant nothing.

I was never his girlfriend. I was his guilt.

But here's the thing—I never asked to be anyone's debt.

So I'm packing my tools, starting my bike, and getting the hell out of here.

I used to think I was the luckiest woman in the world.

Married to my first love, Matteo Rossi—mafia boss—with an adorable son.

Until that afternoon. Luca was running a fever, whining for cake from that shop across town—a four-hour round trip.

I hesitated.

Matteo immediately chimed in: "Go ahead, babe. Don't worry, I got him."

I grabbed the car keys and turned. Before leaving, I glanced back—he was kneeling beside Luca's bed, his large hand gently stroking our son's burning forehead.

What a perfect fucking picture.

Until I heard that GODDAMN surveillance recording.

I am the pampered Princess of the Carpenter crime family, a girl whose three fiancés once leveled a city block just to retrieve her lost diamond.

But next to Avery—a battle-hardened medic who showed up with her kid and could dig out bullets without blinking—my "spoiled nature" suddenly became such an exhausting joke that Jackson and Rhys simply walked out on me.

Gabriel was the only one who didn't. He was my safe haven, kissing my forehead and promising, "They’re fools. They don't appreciate you."

I believed him. Until I looked out the window.

My proud, untouchable Gabriel was down on one knee in the dirt, humbly wiping the mud off Avery’s high heels.

I didn't scream. I didn't throw a fit. I just turned around, walked straight into my father's study, and looked the Godfather in the eye.

"Dad," I said. "That marriage alliance with the West Coast 'Butcher' family next month. I'll do it."

Twenty-five years I cooked, cleaned, and worshipped my husband David.

Then I found the Hawaii tickets on his phone. For him and his secretary Lily.

"You're just a free maid, Helen," David laughed when I confronted him. "Lily's young, smart, useful. You? You're nothing."

My son Luke not only covered for his affair but high-fived him in celebration. "Finally, Dad! Mom's so embarrassing. Lily's way cooler, and she bought me those limited edition Jordans!"

They wanted me gone? Done. I signed the divorce papers, walked away with nothing.

Sitting in my crappy Honda, broke and homeless at fifty, I checked my phone.

Lottery notification: "Winner! $150 million!"

I stared at those zeros and started laughing like a maniac.

Time to destroy them both.

Born into the most powerful mafia family in the city, I've had seven bodyguards since I was ten years old.

Seven heirs from allied families. Seven men trained to protect me. Seven potential husbands.

On my eighteenth birthday, I had to pick one and marry him.

Everyone knew I'd choose Dante Lucchese. How could I not? I'd been stupidly in love with that arrogant bastard since I was seven.

But I'll never choose him again.

Because I've already lived through what happens when I do.

The wedding. The explosion. Flames devouring my dress as I clawed at Dante's sleeve, begging him to help me.

He ripped his arm away.

And ran straight to Isabella—the pathetic little charity case my family took in, who always played the victim so perfectly.

"Serena, stop being selfish!" he shouted over the roar of the fire. "Isabella's hurt worse than you! I have to save her first!"

I screamed his name as he disappeared into the smoke with her in his arms.

The last thing I heard was Isabella crying. The last thing I felt was my skin burning.

Then—nothing.

Until I opened my eyes and found myself staring at the calendar on my bedroom wall.

Six months before the wedding.

The morning my father called me into his study to tell me it was time to choose.

This time, I crossed Dante's name off the list first.

This time, I chose Enzo Corleone—the quiet one who never said much, who everyone underestimated.

The one who died trying to pull me out of that fire.

So why the hell is Dante on his knees at my wedding to Enzo, tears streaming down his face, begging me to marry him instead?

I nearly died in the freezing ocean at my adopted sister Jane's birthday party.

When the yacht started tilting and alarms shrieked through the corridors, Dad grabbed Jane and bolted for the deck without looking back. Mom clutched Jane's ragdoll cat in her arms, following close behind under the bodyguards' protection.

They saved the cat.

But left their biological daughter to drown.

Three days later, I staggered home covered in wounds. The living room was decorated with scented candles and a three-tier birthday cake. Light piano music mingled with laughter—they were throwing Jane a makeup birthday party, celebrating how "the whole family" survived the disaster.

Julian and I played house for five years—minus the actual marriage certificate. Because he bailed on me at the registry office twelve times. All for Mia, some intern.

First time: Mia screwed up her pitch.

Sixth time: Mia had the flu.

Twelfth time: Mia's ex showed up at our architecture firm throwing punches. Julian had to play knight in shining armor. I got knocked into a desk, cracked my head open—he didn't spare me a glance before whisking her off to the ER.

Before, I would've lost it. Screamed. Sobbed. Begged him to tell me who the hell he was actually planning to marry. And every single time, Julian would sigh and say, "Chloe, really? She's just an intern. Practically a child."

This time, all I said was: "Go ahead."

Then I turned around and took that job overseas.

When his thirteenth text came through—yet another registry office reschedule—I was already at the gate for my London flight.

This time? I'm choosing me.

My sister Chiara and I had fought over Matteo for more than a decade.

In my first life, I got my wish and married him. Everyone said he adored me, trusting me to manage the entire Salvatore family's books and money laundering operations. I worked myself to death, literally dying from exhaustion. On my deathbed, he coldly told me the truth: "I never loved you. You're the one who begged to marry me."

In my second life, I let Chiara have her chance. She bore him four children in five years, trying desperately to earn his love, only to die in childbirth. I rushed to her bedside for her final moments, and she cried out to me: "Matteo doesn't love me either... there's another woman in his heart..."

When I opened my eyes again, it was my third life.

This time, we would NOT make the same mistakes.

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.

To marry me, my fiancé Sebastian Knight said he wanted his childhood friend Isabella to be our surrogate.

I agreed. Because I couldn't have children, and the Knight family desperately needed an heir.

After Isabella "successfully" got pregnant, Sebastian became a completely different person. He started making her nutritious meals, accompanying her to prenatal appointments, even memorizing every food she disliked.

Yet he couldn't even remember my birthday.

Two weeks before our wedding, I received an anonymous email.

The video on the screen made me understand everything in an instant—Sebastian and Isabella were in bed together.

So this was his "surrogacy plan."

I, his fiancée, was just the last fool to find out.

I canceled all the wedding arrangements, tore up the wedding dress, and threw away the ring.

On our original wedding day, Isabella gave birth to his son in the delivery room, while I was already sitting in first class on a flight abroad.

Sebastian, this time I'M the one leaving YOU.

In my last life, Natalie insisted on stepping out of the car to feed a wild grizzly.

I tried to stop her. Daniel shoved me into the bear's path instead — to save her.

The grizzly's teeth tore through my throat. My blood sprayed hot across the snow.

And there was Daniel, my boyfriend of three years, holding Natalie close. Not a scratch on her.

He even raised his phone to film me being ripped apart, then posted it on TikTok with the caption: "She gave her life to protect us." The donations poured in for weeks.

Now my eyes are open again. Natalie's pushing the car door open, sandwich in hand, ready to hand-feed the cubs.

This time, I don't scream. I don't stop her.

I just watch her lean halfway out the door — and lock it behind her.

My best friend murdered me.

Before the team tryouts, Mia handed me a pink energy drink. I didn't know it was laced with sleeping pills.

Thirty feet in the air. Top of the pyramid. My body went limp, collapsing like a puppet with cut strings.

I can still hear my bones shattering.

Mia threw herself into my fiancé Carter's arms, sobbing: "Oh God, I grabbed the wrong bottle! The vitamins and sleeping pills got mixed up! Vic will forgive me, right?"

Carter held her tight, not even glancing at me lying in a pool of blood. "Stop crying. It was just an accident."

An accident? My spine snapped in three places.

He lied to the police, saying I was under too much stress and took the pills myself. Packaged my death as the suicide of someone who couldn't handle the pressure.

When I died, the whole school treated me like a joke.

But now I'd opened my eyes. I was back on that day.

The werewolf world has one brutal rule: whoever can first produce a powerful Alpha heir gets to claim the throne and become the new Alpha King.

My sister Bella and I are daughters of the Red Moon Pack Alpha, born with the rare ability to bear Alpha-level offspring. This made countless Packs fight tooth and nail to claim us.

In my past life, I was fooled by Rex's handsome appearance—the Steel Fang heir. I married him and successfully bore him an Alpha bloodline pup, helping him ascend to the throne.

But fate played a deadly joke on me. Bella, consumed by jealousy after her own marriage failed, pushed me off a cliff during my postpartum weakness and took everything that was mine.

Now I've opened my eyes again, back at the mate selection ceremony. What shocked me was that Bella had also been reborn, and she'd already seduced Rex before I could.

But that's fine. My naive sister has no idea what kind of devil she's chosen.

On my due date, my husband Matteo locked me in an underground freezer at minus ten degrees.

The Torrino family's unbreakable rule: the first-born male inherits the entire mafia empire. My sister-in-law Jennifer and I were both pregnant, our due dates only one day apart. To ensure his brother's child was born first, Matteo made this insane decision.

"My brother and Jennifer's baby has to come first—this is what you owe them!" He ignored my desperate pleas and violent contractions, coldly shoving me into the freezer.

But that wasn't enough. They forcibly injected me with labor-delaying drugs. I curled up in agony on the freezing concrete floor, feeling my baby slowly slipping away, tears of despair streaming down my face.

My baby, Mommy is so sorry...

At my boyfriend Liam's startup funding celebration, his best friend Mia showed up with a homemade cake.

I'm severely allergic to peanuts. The second I caught that smell, I said no.

Mia's face fell. Liam shot me a dark look and told me to eat it.

So I did.

The reaction hit within minutes—throat swelling shut, hives breaking out everywhere, couldn't breathe.

I reached for my EpiPen.

Mia got there first.

She grabbed it and started tossing it between her fingers like some party trick, showing off to everyone.

"Yo, check this out!"

The room went wild.

I grabbed Liam's arm, gasping for help. He jerked away, irritated.

"Stop being so dramatic. Mia had a sip of my drink and now you're gonna fake an allergy attack for attention?"

No one believed me.

No one helped.

My vision blurred. I found my phone between the cushions and sent one last text to my brother before everything went black.

They found my husband locked inside his mistress.

Not metaphorically. Literally locked—a medical phenomenon called vaginal spasm, triggered when their sports car crashed mid-affair on a mountain road. The doctors said separating them required a high-risk spinal injection. Without it, he'd lose everything below the waist. Possibly his life.

They needed my signature. The wife's consent.

I looked at the consent form. Then at my phone—47 missed calls from three nights ago, when our four-year-old son stopped breathing.

Adrian never picked up. He was too busy.

Now he was begging me to sign.

I wiped away my tears, picked up the pen.

Now it was his turn to die.

I was dead, and the whole world was celebrating for my sister.

For twenty-two years, I had been the hardest-working but most invisible daughter in the Sterling family, forever living in the shadow of my gymnastics prodigy sister.

Running a high fever, I begged my family to take me to the hospital, only to hear: "Don't you DARE ruin Bella's award ceremony!"

When I was tricked into the abandoned equipment room and used my last breath to call my boyfriend while lying in a pool of blood, all I heard was: "Grace, quit the drama! Bella's accepting her award on stage!"

On stage, thunderous applause erupted as Bella lifted the "Young Gymnast of the Year" trophy.

And I drew my final breath.

When they returned home triumphant, thinking I had run away in a tantrum, they had no idea I was already dead right under their noses.