3054 Book(s) Related to Loving Him Was Too Painful

My father sold me to the Dragon Academy for the price of one dead wolf, tossing me into a hall full of monsters who wanted to eat me alive. "She has no shift. She has no use. The dragons will take her," he said, leaving me in heavy iron chains that bit into my bone. The beautiful, cruel dragon students laughed. "Prey," one of them dropped the word at my feet. "Maybe it's lunch." I was property. A broken wolf girl meant to cancel out a debt. But then the hall went dead quiet. The Dragon King's son walked in. He didn't look at me like I was a price tag. He looked at me like a predator realizing the floor beneath it wasn't solid. His pale gold eyes snapped to mine, and the temperature in the room skyrocketed. "Who brought her here," his voice was low, dangerous. He crouched in front of me, his fingers closing tight around my forearm. He turned my wrist toward the light, exposing the faint silver tracery under my skin—the mark my father swore would get me killed. The breath went out of the prince. His hand tightened until it bruised. "That mark," he whispered so only I could hear, "belongs to the bloodline my family slaughtered."

Zara Torres has three rules at Harlow University.
No drama. No distractions. And absolutely no hockey players.

She breaks all three before October ends when a journalism assignment lands her in Declan Mercer's orbit starting center, infuriatingly perceptive, and somehow always exactly where she isn't expecting him.

Zara tells herself it's professional. She's documenting the ice conflict between two programs sharing one rink. She's not falling for the guy who shows up at six AM with terrible coffee and the unsettling habit of telling her the truth.

She's definitely not thinking about the jump.

The quad Lutz she hasn't fully landed in two years. The fall that broke her wrist and quietly broke something else. The confidence she rebuilt around a gap she keeps pretending isn't there.

But when a journalism assignment becomes something larger, a testimony, an investigation, a story that reaches backward through thirty-three years and fifteen countries. Zara discovers that the thing she thought was a skating problem was never really about skating.

It was about learning who built the walls around the thing that was hers.

And deciding to tear them down anyway.

This story is a young adult sport romance about the cost of excellence, the courage of going first, and what it means to fight for the thing that was yours before anyone decided it was worth something.

The ice was hers first.

She just had to remember that.

Sometimes the richest prize isn’t money—it’s the one heart you can’t afford to lose.

Callie Monroe never imagined leaving the wide-open skies of Bandera, Texas. But when tragedy struck her family ranch, her father demanded she marry the wealthy widower next door to pay the bills. Callie refused. Instead, she ran—straight to New York, where she traded sunsets for subway rides and survival meant slinging cocktails in a Brooklyn dive.

She wasn’t looking for love. She was looking for a way out. But a televised dating game with a cash prize too good to ignore was about to change everything.

Grayson Wolfe built his empire with ruthless precision. Billionaire. Innovator. Cold as steel. But his late father’s will forced him into a corner: marry for one year, or lose control of the Wolfe fortune. A man who didn’t believe in love suddenly needed a bride—fast.

So he entered the game show.
Not for money. Not for fame.
For a loophole.

He thought every woman would beg for him.
Until she didn’t.

Callie Monroe, fiery redhead in a red dress, was the only one who told him no. And in that rejection, she became the one prize he couldn’t walk away from.

But when their worlds collide again—this time with him as her boss—the rules of the game change. Desire becomes dangerous. Pride becomes a weapon. And the lines between business and passion blur into obsession.

He had everything…until her.
Now she’s the only prize worth winning.

Five years in captivity. They said Nora would be free after five years of working for the mafia king but they lied. Now Nora is forced to work permanently for the dangerous mafia king, executing dangerous cons with Noah, her only ally and her most dangerous temptation. The one man who makes her feel human again. But in a world built on lies, trust can be deadlier than betrayal.

When Trevor Sullivan had nothing, I gave up billions to follow him to Silicon Valley. Everyone said I was crazy in love with him, until his first love came back to the States right after he made it big.

Seven years of playing the perfect wife and mother, and then I hear him coaching our five-year-old daughter: "Ruby, you can't tell Mommy about my fake wedding with Amber. Not a word, okay?"

"But Daddy, Mommy's gonna be sad..."

"If you tell Mommy, Daddy won't love you anymore. Got it?"

My daughter trembles, nodding frantically.

I stand outside the door, my heart turning to ash.

For the woman he never got over, he doesn't just betray our marriage. He makes our five-year-old lie for him.

Everyone expects me to cry, to beg, to fall apart.

Instead, I dial the number I blocked seven years ago: "Dad, can the family jet still come get me?"

Trevor Sullivan has no idea. I was never some gold digger who needed him to survive. I was the one with everything who made myself small for his sake.

I died—not in the way you'd expect, but slowly, painfully, while he was entangled with her.

He called her his savior, the woman who sold everything to rescue his failing empire. Little did he know, it was my money, my life's work, that he squandered.

The betrayal burned hotter than any flame, and I vowed he'd pay.

Now, he's gone—a leap from the heights he once ruled, his fall as swift as his rise.

Two best friends. One girl. Two sudden rivals.
She never wanted to come between them. But they didn't give her a choice.
One was hopelessly in love. The other just wanted to have a good time.
Until he caught feelings, too.
Now, it was a battle to win her heart.
But there is one who already held her love. Years has past, was it too late to choose?

They gave him 24 hours to hand over the girl.
He gave them 30 seconds to regret .

Jack Cole was supposed to be nobody—just another quiet college student.
No records. No past. No trace he ever existed.

But when a powerful family tries to take his cousin as part of a dirty deal…
and a billionaire heiress becomes the target of a professional kill team…

Something buried comes back.

The campus?
Just his cover.

The truth?
He’s a weapon trained for war—
the kind governments deny, and enemies never see coming.

Now the richest family in the city wants him dead.
A private army is moving in.
And a global biotech empire is pulling strings from the shadows.

They think they’re hunting him.

They’re wrong.

Jack isn’t running.
He’s choosing who dies first.

Turns out, for five years, all Callum ever saw when he looked at me — the wolfless one — was a stain on his Alpha reputation.
Everyone knew he was about to marry Elvira, the pureblooded heiress of the Silverfang pack. The entire Blood Moon pack was already gearing up for their bonding ceremony.
My best friend Tessa, a Beta, fed them updates on my every move in their group chat, laughing along as I made healing broths for Callum like I was a joke to them.
They figured as long as they dangled my brother's medical care over my head, I'd swallow my pride and stay their dirty little secret forever.
Until the day Elvira decided to prove who was in charge, and threw my brother into a pit lined with silver spikes.
Watching Callum shield blood-soaked Elvira behind him, I didn't cry. I didn't scream.
I just pulled a knife and drove it into the bond mark on my neck.

Tags: MxM, friends with benefits, unrequited love, jealousy, Dl, secret, interracial, first love.

Demi and Alex have been best friends for as long as anyone can remember. They know each other’s habits, flaws, and breaking points. What they don’t know is how to undo the night they crossed a line neither of them saw coming.

Drunk, Curious, Complicated.

Demi is hiding who he is. Alex insists he’s straight. And somehow, they keep ending up in each other’s beds anyway.

They call it friends with benefits, why?, because calling it anything else would force them to face the truth. But feelings don’t follow rules, and denial only works until it doesn’t.

Set in the uneasy final stretch of senior year, this is a story about desire, denial, and the terrifying risk of wanting someone who might never want you back the same way.

Five years ago, Nia Morgan was supposed to die. She had seen something — something the billionaires at Westwood Global couldn’t afford to let her live with. Her own future father-in-law ordered the hit. Her fiancé never came looking.
But the thing about dead girls? Some of them don’t stay buried.
Now, she’s back. New face. New name. New mission. As Elise Ward, she slips quietly into the same empire that tried to erase her. Her heart’s not here for revenge — it’s here for the truth. But if revenge comes with it? She won’t say no.
The problem? Damien Westwood. The man who once held her heart — and unknowingly watched her die.
He’s darker now. Harder. Colder. And when he starts to dig into her past, it’s not just her cover that’s at risk… it’s everything.
Because the deeper she goes, the more bodies start to surface. And someone else knows she’s alive.
Someone who kills just to keep the past buried...

The night my sister, Quinn, got her registered nurse license was supposed to be Jude's big moment—down on one knee, proposing.
Instead, Garrett showed up. The same animal who assaulted Quinn in the redwood forest six years ago and drove our mother to her death in the ocean.
Her future mother-in-law took back the ring on the spot, and her fiancé trailed after her like a kicked puppy.
The entire town of Hawkins went from pity to disgust when they looked at us.
Seven days later, the deputy sheriff stood in my kitchen, staring at the twenty-second batch of bubbling meat sauce...

The childhood love between “Kab Kluen” and “He Xing Yi” began with the close bond between their families, tied together by a promise that the two would one day marry.
But fate had other plans.
When Kab Kluen’s family had to return to Thailand permanently,
distance and time caused He Xing Yi to forget that childhood vow.
He found love with someone new and had no interest in marrying Kab Kluen anymore.
Yet fate intervened again.
On his deathbed, Kab Kluen’s father made one final request:
that He Xing Yi marry his son.
Though unwilling, He Xing Yi had no choice but to comply.
What followed were two long years of a marriage in name only.
Kab Kluen gave his all, hoping that one day, He Xing Yi would love him back.
But in return, he was met only with indifference… and heartbreak, again and again.
Where will this love—so painfully one-sided—ultimately lead?
Even Kab Kluen himself doesn’t know the answer…

I couldn't get my eyes off my window as I couldn't believe what I was seeing. Outside there in the darkness that was gradually going down due to the faint morning light, I continously stared at a thing no word in the English dictionary can explain.
*It was a black wolf with red eyes. So big that I could bet that it was two times bigger than Zane in his wolf form. But that wasn't the scary thing. The scary thing was that, it had a round substance on it's mouth. And since I know that I could see clearly in darkness, I activated my night gaze and discovered that it was the head of another wolf. Not just another wolf, but the kind of wolf Luca said I was... "A WHITE WOLF!"


The wolf world has been in a war for leadership, blood sheds so many that one could swim in it. A white wolf was born, his name is Lucian and he's destined to end the war between the two Wolf Delimitation.
Lucian goes through a lot of pain and betrayal, he lost the person that guided him through life to the cold hands of death. Will he survive the many temptations to end his life? Find out in this interesting story of Love, hate, betrayal and passion.

When the Tide Took Him — A Romantic Suspense Novel
Four years ago, on a fogchoked night in coastal Maine, Silas Ward vanished without a trace. The town moved on. The police closed the case. But Eveline Shore never stopped searching—or feeling the echo of the boy she once loved whispering, “Eve, I’ll always find you.”
When Eveline discovers a torn page from Silas’s notebook hidden inside the abandoned lighthouse—written in his unmistakable handwriting—everything she believed shatters. The message warns that she “wasn’t alone” the night he vanished…and that someone has been watching her ever since.
Determined to uncover the truth, Eveline is drawn into a dangerous web involving Silas’s best friend, Jonas, whose guilt and evasiveness suggest he knows far more than he’s willing to admit. And when a mysterious man named Rowan arrives—someone who knows Eveline’s name, her past, and the night Silas disappeared—the pieces begin to fall into place in the most terrifying way.
Silas didn’t vanish by accident.
He was taken.
And the person who pushed him off the cliffs that night wasn’t after him.
They were after her.
As Eveline uncovers the chilling truth and the secrets Silas died to protect, she realizes he survived the fall—not to save himself, but to keep her alive. Their longawaited reunion becomes a heartbreaking confrontation with betrayal, sacrifice, and the dangerous legacy she never knew she carried.
Set against the haunting backdrop of early2000s coastal Maine, When the Tide Took Him blends deep emotional romance with escalating mystery and suspense.
A story for readers who crave love that endures, secrets that haunt, and endings powerful enough to stay with them long after the final page.

It took her five years to follow her own wishes and marry him. Yet he sold her to the Resorts World LA, killed their baby with his own hands...... What he did reduced her to the unprecedented misery and uncountable unhappiness. However, when she finally got rid of her love for him, which was like a poisonous thorn, he changed his mind and begged her to stay as if he"s gone mad. But for her, none of them mattered--love or reputation. He"d rather die than crawl back to the grave he built for her!

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.

“I have to feel instant attraction to my roommate, unlike anything I have felt before, but he is not only straight, but a player!”-Remington
“My best friend is a geek in the most adorable way ever.”-Cassidy
Sometimes opposites really do attract. These seemingly very different college room mates have become best friends over the last decade, but how long can Remington keep the decade long secret of his infatuation with his best friend, especially, when Cassidy is such a playboy with the ladies and is being pressured to find a mate?
Remington is a gay hybrid werewolf/fae, but he has only a small bit of fae magic and seemingly no shifter abilities. He's smaller in stature than his brother and father who both have their wolves and he has his mother's pointed fae ears and wings that he can free as needed. He feels like computers and plants are easier to handle than the questions, strange looks and worse, teasing, that he receives. When he meets his gorgeous college roommate, he falls fast, but the only problem is his roommate is both straight and a player.
Cassidy has no problem fitting in anywhere and that includes college and later the business world. His college roommate easily became his best friend, and his grounding force. He swears without Remi he'd get into far more trouble. So when he is faced with trying to find a mate and failure leads him to soul searching, he realizes his ideal mate has been beside him for a decade.

Camilla is a decent girl by the books — The greatest bad thing she did was burn her own home.
The other complication in her life is a secret that includes Dylan Emerton.
What's absurd is that Camilla is compelled to move into Dylan's house, the alternative is being homeless.
Being this close to him is futile; Camilla thinks back to her past. His touch. The pain that ensued. But Dylan doesn't. Not even in the slightest.

How long will it take before their past traps them? And of what good is the undeniable attraction to each other.

One year after the events in Lewiston, Carolina Lane and Kayler Brown are ready to go to college, away from their town. Thinking that the worst is behind them, new problems start to arise. Carolina struggles to control her wolf half and makes some mistakes. Kayler will do everything possible to protect her, but with the arrival of the blue moon, it becomes quite difficult.

Carolina starts to feel that Kayler is hiding things from her and becomes suspicious of him, especially since he has been seen getting close to her new enemy, Darla. Kayler feels that someone is trying to harm them, and that someone might be closer than they think. But will they ever find peace? Will they ever have their happy ending? Can Carolina forgive when she finally reads Scott's Diary and discovers a terrible secret that the Browns have been hiding from her for over a year?

Sera dedicated her everything to caring for Callum Weston- her husband- only to hear him say that marrying her was doing charity for the needy as he held the hand of another woman.

Given another chance to wake up 10 years into the past, Sera chooses to focus on choosing herself, but the past continues to haunt her.
The last thing Sera heard before she died was her husband on the phone telling someone to come and clear her body from his property.

This time, she is not here to love him.

She is here to ruin him.

The one variable in her plan is the cold-eyed man who keeps finding her in all of the wrong places.
And why does he take pleasure in her slapping Callum?

Lyra never wanted a mate.
Not when she had nothing left.
Not when the only man she was given to… was the Alpha everyone feared.
Cold. Dangerous. Silent.
He didn’t want her either.
He only kept her because she was “useful.
”
She thought he would throw her out.
But instead, he locked her away.
Hid her from his world. From his people. From his own family.
And when they came to hurt her…
He stood and watched.
He didn’t speak for her.
He didn’t defend her.
But he didn’t let her go, either.
Now, Lyra is trapped in a place where no one wants her, and the only one who touches her
heart is the man who makes it bleed.
But maybe… just maybe…
The Alpha she feared is the only one who truly sees her.
And that is the scariest part of all.

I grew up being my father’s prisoner, didn’t know the outside world. Not in the way I wanted, I was tired of doing only your wishes and living only in my own home. What I most desire is to be free, to live and to love without limits.
And I did, as soon as I met him.
Jordan, it was different and at first glance it won me, it became my salvation, and my redemption. He was much more than I imagined, was the love of my life, but what we did not imagine, however, was that because of intrigues involving our families in the past, our love would be put to the test and thus, we would be separated without knowing for sure what fate reserved us.

Sophie Bennett is a ghost. A scholarship student at Crestview Academy, her only goal is to stay invisible and get close to Daniel Vale, the golden heir her family desperately needs her to befriend. Daniel is perfect, kind, and safe. But on her first day, a wrong turn puts her in the path of the "Wrong Brother."

Harrison Vale is the school’s shadow. He’s dangerous, silent, and feared. While the world sees Daniel’s light, Sophie is inexplicably drawn to Harrison’s darkness. As Serena Cole and the elite "Royals" of the school target Sophie for her low-income roots, Sophie finds herself caught between two brothers: the one who can save her future, and the one who might destroy her heart.

Maya has been secretly in love with Liam Miller, her best friend Chloe's older brother, for years even though she knows he is five years older and completely off-limits. When Liam gives her his hoodie in the rain and tells her she is growing up dangerously fast, Maya's carefully hidden feelings begin to surface. On Liam's twenty-first birthday they are left alone and share a kiss that changes everything, but Liam pulls away saying Maya is too young and this cannot happen. Maya tries to move on by agreeing to attend Spring Formal with Noah, but Liam cannot handle watching her with someone else. When their forbidden relationship explodes into a public scandal, they face backlash and accusations that tear both families apart, Maya and Liam must decide if their love is worth the price or if some lines should never be crossed.

“You are going to suck my dick like a good girl.” He commanded, slapping his dick on my already stick out tongue. I wrapped my full lips around him and began bobbing my head up and down.

“I am going to cum but I still need to fuck your little pussy so good.” He pulled out of my mouth and pushed me down onto the bed.

“Fuck, you are so wet and dripping.” He groaned when he pressed his dick to my entrance, rubbing up and down my folds and coating it with the juice leaking out of me.

“Oh my goodness.” I breathed, instantly felt full. He was so damn big.


Evelin was forced into sheltering at the mafia Don safe house when her family was attacked and her father sent to prison under suspicion circumstances. She has to share space with the mafia heir, next Don Anthony Vincenzo. He was known as the Devil himself and pussy hunter.

When she becomes suspicious of the attack on her family, she begins a dangerous road to find answers. But what is more dangerous for her; the mafia Don or the truth someone desperately doesn't want her to find?

Lysa loved Damian for seven years, yet hypnotic manipulation warped his memories, leading him to brand her the killer of his parents. With his own hands, he cut her bones and implanted canine fur, transforming her into a deformed half-human beast and subjecting her to endless humiliation and torture. She watched her mother die a brutal death and was forced to swallow her mother’s cremated ashes. At the brink of death, her ancestral sea spirit pendant awakened, shedding her mangled hound form to birth a tyrannical deep-sea siren. Once the scheming fake heroine’s lies were laid bare, Damian descended into madness, drowning in desperate remorse. Wielding the immortal power of a siren, Lysa cast all her tormentors into an endless living hell—and she would never grant them forgiveness.

I've been secretly married to him for five years, but he's never treated me as his wife. Our six-year-old daughter has never called him Dad in public.

One drunken night, I got pregnant. He gave me a marriage contract that came with one condition: secrecy.

I thought time would change everything. I stood by him through the company's darkest days. When I was hospitalized with a bleeding ulcer, he didn't come. When our daughter was born, he was in a meeting. Every moment that mattered, he wasn't there.

Then that clumsy intern showed up.

From that point on, he gave her all his attention and patience. He broke his own rules for her again and again. That's when I finally understood: when someone doesn't love you, they just don't.

So I took my daughter and disappeared from his world completely.

But why did that calm, controlled man lose his mind?

After two years of marriage, I finally got pregnant. I rushed to my husband's office with lunch to share the news, but his assistant mistook me for a sugar baby trying to trap the CEO. She dragged me into a back room and dumped scalding coffee on my head. When I tried to explain I was the wife, she laughed and called security. They stripped my clothes, kicked my stomach repeatedly, and destroyed my ultrasound photo. I begged them to call my husband, but they smashed my phone instead. By the time he found me, our baby was gone.

After living in the countryside for eighteen years, Laura's real father came to her. For a moment, the upper class knew that the Taylors had an additional illegitimate daughter of a bumpkin. When she got back to her real family, everyone mocked her for not being as versatile, gentle, and considerate as her older sister.

Her father looked down upon her and warned her to keep her nose clean.

Marcus was the son of the first wife of Mr. Brown. His brothers were all hostile to him, so his aunt want to connect with the Taylors through marriage to crack Marcus down. Laura was forced to marry the sick and unfaithful man, and everyone said that they are a "perfect match".

It didn't take long for Laura's various alias to be dug out, and the members of the Taylors felt regret. All young talents were crazy about her. However, Marcus just laughed out of court and unhesitatingly declared their relationship.

Catherine accepted her fate as an object of pleasure for the cold Alpha Nathan who had previously rejected her. Her not-so peaceful life is distracted when she found out she's pregnant. She flees to a different pack where she sought new beginnings. A year later, she comes running back to her pack in tears to seek for help.
Just when she thought everything was over, a mystery of her identity comes to light and the pack she once called home, wants her dead! Why did she come back? And why do they want her dead?
Join on this intriguing journey of love, betrayal and emotional roller coasters.

They said I killed them all.

My father. My daughter. My brother's legs. One explosion, one moment of selfishness, and I became the family murderer.

My husband Dominic—the most feared mafia boss in the city—drowned himself in whiskey. I drowned myself in something worse.

Three years on the pole. Three years with strangers' cash stuffed in my bra, their cocks shoved down my throat, their fists in back alleys, their cameras catching every degradation. Three years swallowing cum and shame to scrape together half a million for my brother's surgery.

Then the doctors found the tumor. Three months left.

One last show, I told myself. A blindfolded performance. Enough to pay off Ethan's debt before I died.

That's when someone ripped off my blindfold.

Dominic.

Behind him stood my very-alive father. And Ethan—on two perfect legs, kicking aside an empty wheelchair. And my adopted sister Vanessa, draped over my husband, flashing a diamond ring.

This whole performance? Her birthday present.

"Surprise, sweetheart." Dominic smiled. "The explosion was fake. We just needed to put you in your place."

Ethan laughed. "Three years of stripper money made one hell of a party, sis."

My father still wouldn't look at me. "Learn to treat Vanessa right, or you're no daughter of mine."

The room exploded in laughter.

I stood there, diagnosis crumpled in my fist.

The explosion was fake. The crippled legs were fake. Everything was fake.

But the cancer eating my brain?

That was real.

She thought it was nothing more than a one-night mistake — not knowing she had long since become an obsession he couldn't shake.

Emily was just an ordinary woman, yet she stumbled into Evan's world by chance. He was cold, domineering, and untouchable — and yet, time and again, he lost control in front of her. He said he needed to restrain himself, yet he appeared at her most vulnerable moments again and again. He said he felt nothing for her, yet in the instant she trembled and broke into tears, he gently pressed his forehead against hers — "I'll admit it. What I feel for you is different."

But who, exactly, was the "you" he spoke of?

Her name, her body, every sound she made — he said they were identical to someone else's.

Was she a substitute? Or the one he truly wanted, buried somewhere deep inside him?

As desire and secrets became entangled, as the closeness of flesh could no longer silence the questions in her heart, Emily began to realize — this man's reasons for drawing near to her may never have been impulse alone, not from the very beginning.

"Are you really Emily?"

Amber was raped by her uncle.

She was an orphan. Her parents died in a road accident.

She was later taken to her grandmother. One day she went to a party.

There she met a rich pervert.

He tried to sexually abuse her there.

Later he forced her to marry him and she had to, due to certain family conditions.

There too rape torturers didn't end for amber.

They both used to hate each other.

Will they ever fall in love or this will end up only being a rape story.....

Let's see.....

Presley Duval had a nickname for me all through high school. Two-Twenty.
Because at sixteen I weighed 220 pounds.
Thirteen years later she rented out a private beach in Cabo for our class reunion. One rule. Every woman had to show up in a bikini.
She made a point of sending me one.
By the time I got there her phone was already up on a tripod, live. 370,000 people watching.
"She's actually gonna show?" someone asked.
"Why wouldn't she?" Presley smiled into the camera. "I had the hotel set aside an extra-large changing tent just for her. Wouldn't want her scaring the other guests when she takes her clothes off."
Everyone around her cracked up.
"I got her a gift, too."
She lifted a pink bag off her chair and pulled out a neon pink bikini. It took two people, one on each end, just to hold it stretched out.
"3XL. I called the company. That's the biggest they make. If it still snaps, that's not on me."
A row of phones went up.
"Don't laugh." She hung the bikini over the back of the chair. "Two-Twenty's had it rough. If I hadn't stayed on her about her weight back then, who knows if she'd even be able to walk through that door today."
"Oh, and I invited someone from Meridian." She lifted her chin. "So certain people can see what a real body looks like. Instead of copying models online and embarrassing themselves."
What she didn't know was that the big shot she kept name-dropping worked for me.
I walked down the boardwalk and stopped right in front of her.
"Where's the tent?"

The Plan: Travel back in time to high school, identify my insanely intimidating future billionaire boss before he gets rich, and suck up to him so hard I secure a six-figure job for life.
The Execution: Perfect. I brought him coffee, cheered at his games, and basically operated as his unpaid teenage executive assistant. He’s totally buying it.
The Problem: I was trying to network my way into the C-suite. I think I just networked my way into his bed.

Damian Cole lives in the shadows... a phantom, a name whispered in boardrooms and corners of the country as the Ghost CEO. No one knows his face, but every empire fears his name.

And there is one man he wants to destroy more than anyone else: Victor Lancaster, the ruthless tycoon responsible for shattering his family... Raped his sister, leading to her death, and killed his father in front of his eyes.

At the age of sixteen, the horrible event that day will forever haunt Damian. Thus... he made a vow. A vow to destroy Victor Lancaster and everything he cherishes.

To execute his plan, Damian must infiltrate Victor’s world more closely than ever before... by becoming the bodyguard of the one person Victor cherishes most: his daughter, Elena Lancaster.

Elena sees only a stoic bodyguard, a man who keeps his distance while saving her life. What she doesn’t know is that every step he takes, every breath he takes in, is part of a cold, merciless plan to bring her father to his knees.

But the closer Damian gets, the more dangerous the game becomes. Elena is smart, suspicious, and far more fragile than she pretends. And though Damian’s heart is hardened by hatred, there are cracks in his armor he never planned for.

In a world of betrayal, power, and secrets, one truth is certain:
Vengeance has a price. And Damian Cole is willing to pay it in blood.

When hatred guards his heart, will she be able to slip in?

Three torturous years hauling bodies on the mortuary night shift, and I'd finally scraped together the cash for my brother Charles's heart transplant.
He just waved it off.
"My heart is fine. Mom and Dad didn't die in that gang war, either. I orchestrated the hit. You were the only casualty."
Nearby, my husband, Gerald, casually lit a cigar to deliver his own confession. "I never went bankrupt. 'Laying low' was just my excuse to avoid squeezing into that dingy funeral home dorm with you. I've been at the Long Island estate."
"I was going to punish you for another three years," Charles added, "but the stench of formaldehyde on you is nauseating. We couldn't take it anymore."
I froze, still clutching the credit card. Charles plucked the plastic from my numb fingers and shoved his phone screen in my face. A banking app stared back at me.
Balance: exactly zero.
"My name is still on the joint account," he sneered, tossing the card into the trash. "I drained it this morning. That blood money you made bagging stiffs is being handed out to street junkies as we speak. We'd never touch that filth."
Before the sheer absurdity of it could suffocate me, my parents walked in. Flanked by bodyguards, they kept their distance, eyeing me like a plague rat.
"You thought being the biological daughter gave you the right to ruthlessly bully Violet. We simply wanted to put you in your place."
"Swear you'll never cross Violet again, and you can remain a Falcone," my mother added coolly. "Otherwise, you're dead to us."
In the stifling silence that followed, my phone buzzed. A text from my oncologist.
[Mrs. Castello, the results are back. It's terminal. Do you consent to initiating the hospice and DNR protocols we discussed?]

When I was reborn, and my Alpha husband's ward clamped a muzzle around my neck as a joke...
I didn't shift into my wolf and tear her arm off like in my past life.
I ripped off the bloody muzzle and gave Roman a smile.
"If you think this is a joke, keep indulging her."
And I walked away without looking back.
Because my death in my previous life was too miserable.
After our fallout, Roman used his Alpha authority to freeze my accounts overnight.
Exiled, I was diagnosed with terminal silver poisoning.
Dying in agony, I swallowed my pride and crawled back to the Pack gates.
But he let Chloe force me to my knees and refused to open the doors.
In the end, my wolf spirit shattered, and I froze to death.
I only understand after dying: love and dignity are worthless.
Survival and money are all that matter.

New Powers and Old. A conflict millennia in the brewing. And at the center of it: one man.Michael has escaped the clutches of the Dark, if only temporarily. Surfacing in the world above, he finds matters no less complex than down below and survival as challenging as it had been in the dungeon.Is the harder path the one you must forge on your own?Many want Michael as their ally. Yet more want him dead, and the Dark is not done with him either. Can he find a way to navigate the treacherous waters of the Game and uncover the mysteries about himself?Or will Michael bend to Powers greater than him?Follow him on his epic journey of discovery and find out!PRAISE FOR THE GRAND GAME:“Interesting portal litrpg. Well-paced and the start of a new series. Curious to see where it goes...” —Tao Wong on goodreads.com.“… Great action, great storyline and I honestly binge read it, start to end…” —Alex Kozlowski on goodreads.com.“Smart MC. Great Tension. Full of Action.” —CookieCrumble on RoyalRoad.com.“Everything I look for in a LitRPG.” —CosmereCradleChris on RoyalRoad.com“Oh I liked this very much!” —The Enlightened Beard.“One of the best in this category this year.” —kindle customer.

I was married to Vera for three years.

In those three years, every time we fought, I was the one who backed down first. She got used to being indulged, and she got used to using the silent treatment to make me fold.

Then a blizzard grounded my flight. I didn’t make it back for her birthday. She filed for divorce out of spite and left the country.

Three years ended without dignity.

A year after the divorce, Vera returned with a new jewelry brand and a high-profile comeback. Everyone assumed I was still waiting for her—she assumed it too.

At dinners, she hinted at reconciliation, using our old story to build hype for her brand. The circle started whispering that I’d end up back by her side.

I corrected it, again and again. She ignored every word.

What she didn’t know was that I already had someone new—and we were preparing to get engaged.

When she saw the engagement planning booklet, she convinced herself it was my signal to take her back.

I explained. She insisted.

Until the day of the engagement, when she stormed into the venue…

"So that's it, huh? All that talk was just to trick me into fucking you?" he growled against my lips, not giving me a chance to respond as he pumped his fingers deeper, curling them to hit that spot that made me moan despite myself. "You greedy little bitch, spreading your legs for cash."
He flipped me onto my stomach with brutal efficiency, his hand coming down hard on my ass in a stinging slap that echoed in the room.
"That's what you want, isn't it? To be treated like the cheap whore you are."


Hannah became a surrogate to save her benefactor’s “dying” son—only to learn it was a drug addict’s lie.
Now, carrying the child of Finn Sterling, a man as cold and ruthless as he is dangerous, she has no way out.
She thought everything would go according to the agreement: she would spend her pregnancy in a remote sanatorium, give birth, and then walk away.
Until the Sterling family sent word—Finn wanted to marry her.
Hannah was stunned. The last time they met, Finn had made it clear he wanted as little to do with her as possible.
What had changed his mind? Or… was this truly Finn’s idea at all?

18+ Mature sexual Content

What do you do when you fall in love with the man who hurt your best friend?
Her plan was simple: seduce the scumbag who shattered her best friend's heart, make him crawl, and then ruin him. It was supposed to be a cold, calculated game.
Enter Jason: the campus heartthrob, the future Alpha heir, and—according to Lysa's intel—the target. She played the innocent girl, lured him into her trap, and waited for the perfect moment to strike. She thought she was the cat and he was the mouse.
She didn't know she was hunting a predator who had already claimed her as his Fated Mate.
Now, an Alpha knows his human Mate only approached him to destroy him. And he wants her back anyway.
"The game ends when I say it ends, Lysa. Not when you decide you're bored. When. I. Say."