8709 Book(s) Related to where can i read night by the sea

My labor pains flaring violently the same day my husband’s widowed sister-in-law, Nancy, went into labor.
Nancy tricked everyone into believing I carried a girl while she bore the heir son.
Obsessed with securing the inheritance for Nancy’s fake male child, Rowdy locked me inside a hospital morgue cold storage, transferring all doctors, blood reserves and emergency gear to her VIP ward.
I knelt on icy ground, begging him to spare our baby and swore to renounce all family wealth, yet he kicked me aside and called me a greedy schemer.
His adopted sister Gina sneaked down, beat me brutally and injected a high-dose labor suppressant straight into my womb to stall my delivery.
It was only after Nancy delivered her baby that Rowdy belatedly remembered I was also stuck in labor downstairs.
Before he could head down to the basement, his panicked subordinate rushed in and cried, “Boss, Awful!—your wife and your son are died!”

When the bridal bouquet landed directly in my arms, the entire reception erupted.
All eyes shifted to Elias, the man I had loved for seven years.
"Propose! Put a ring on it!" the crowd chanted, pushing him toward me.
My heart raced. I thought my endless waiting was finally over.
Instead, Elias stepped up, smiled... and pulled the flowers right out of my hands.
He turned around and shoved them into the arms of his twenty-five-year-old assistant.
"Don't be greedy, Kalinda. Let Mia have the luck today," he chuckled, patting my hair like a pet. "We've got plenty of time. Next time, I promise."
I watched his assistant bury her face in the white peonies, shooting me a triumphant smirk.
I just smiled back.
There isn't going to be a "next time."
My wedding is coming. And he isn't the groom.

Three months ago, I was kidnapped. When Alexander rescued me, I woke up in a hospital bed with my clothes disheveled and bruises covering my body. What happened during those hours? I don't remember any of it.

A week ago, I found out I was pregnant. He held me as I shook and told me that it wasn't my fault. That he failed to protect me. Even if the baby wasn't his, he'd raise it. He'd still give me the perfect wedding.

But the guilt ate me alive until depression took hold.

Every night, sleep stays out of reach. Nightmares find me the moment I close my eyes. I've tried to end it. Three times now. Each time, someone found me just in time.

After the third failed attempt, I make tea and head toward his study to apologize. Voices drift through the door before I reach it.

"Are you out of your mind? Evelyn's your fiancée!" His friend sounds disbelieving. "You actually hired someone to kidnap her? Made her think she was assaulted? Just so Lily could take her place? Do you know how messed up that is? What that does to someone?"

Alexander's voice comes out calm. "Lily got sick because of me. Her dying wish is to marry me once before she goes. If I didn't push Evelyn out of the picture, her father would never let Lily take her place."

All those nights. All those nightmares. All those times I scrubbed my hands raw until they bled. It was all a lie. A setup.

For another woman.

I pull out my phone and call my father.

"Dad. I'll agree to the arrangement."

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.

For the tenth time, James Smith left me behind because of a call from his female student.
But it was as if I had become a different person—I no longer doubted that there was something ambiguous between James and his student.
Even on our wedding anniversary, when he abandoned me in the remote mountains for Sophia's sake, I bore no resentment.
Eventually, James began to sense something.
"Emily, you seem different," he said.
I shook my head with a smile.
Because I had simply made a different choice from the one in my past life.

I was marrying Boone Ashcroft on a Saturday morning. Before I could step out of the truck, his mother walked up with a rope and pointed at the cattle chute behind the barn.
Her terms: hands and knees through six inches of mud and manure. A metal headgate clamped around my neck at the end. That was the price of walking through her front door.
I said no.
Then forty Ashcrofts surrounded the truck. My phone had zero signal. My family was blocked behind a hay baler a quarter mile back. And the man I'd spent three years with looked me in the eye and said: "You're going through that chute today. Crawling or walking — pick one."
They cornered my best friend. Threw hog blood on the windshield. Thought nobody was coming for me.
They didn't know about the CB radio under the console — or the ten cousins listening on the other end.

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!"

"I gave you a life… and you took mine with it."

She woke up in a sterile hospital room, her body aching, her womb empty.
The child she carried—gone.
No name. No face. No goodbye.

To him, it was just a transaction. A contract. A child born of benefit.
To her, it was the beginning of everything—and the end of herself.

Years passed. Her heart hardened. But fate, cruel and poetic, dragged him back into her orbit.
Only this time, there are secrets.
And bloodlines.
And a storm of revenge, waiting to unravel them both.

In a world where love is a luxury and hatred is inherited, how do you survive the one man who cost you everything… yet still makes your heart ache?

It would be beyond shameful… I slept with my sister's fiancé on the very day my husband died.
"Tell me, princess." Matt shoves my panties aside, sliding a finger inside, and I gasp. "How long you've been wishing for my dick?"
"Just get this over with. I need to get out of here," I say flatly.
In an instant, he bends me over, forcing my back to arch. He shoves my panties aside roughly, like my words have fueled his rage.
His hand wraps around my neck, squeezing firmly as he slams into me without warning.
"God—!" A loud gasp tears through the room, and I try to fight it but it is too late.
Pain and pleasure explode hot between my legs.
I hate how my walls clench around him—like they want more.
"Greedy cunt." He smacks my ass hard. "Look how it swallows my dick."
He pulls back, then drives into me once more, the wet slap of his hips against my ass echoing through the room.
"I can tell from the way your pussy swallows my dick… so hungry for more."
I shake my head, teeth gritting. "Go to hell—"
"Hmmm." He pauses for just a second before ramming into me again, his rhythm increasing. "I wish I could go to hell, princess… but as it stands, I'm going nowhere but inside this pussy."
"Now tell me how this dick feels inside you," he murmurs.
"Doesn't feel good," I lie, knowing it will rile him up.
But this time, the bait doesn't work.
Matt just laughs.
He slaps my ass twice in quick succession, each smack loud enough to make my eyes water.
Then he starts driving into me faster—brutal, punishing strokes that make my thighs tremble and my knees buckle.
"Beg for it… your sister Daisy begs for it every time I fuck her."
Jealousy fills my chest instantly. "Well, too bad I'm not Daisy. I'm Ashley," I bite back.
"Oh, I know exactly who you are," he says coldly. "Daisy's replacement. Nothing else."
"Just shut up and fuck me." I grit out, rage and jealousy rising in my chest.


At twenty-one, Ashley Knowles is forced into an arranged lavender marriage with the most feared biker president in California.
Twenty-four hours later, she's a widow.
Thrust into the ruthless world of the Sons of Chaos Motorcycle Club, Ashley inherits an empire of oil rigs, ranches, illegal dealings, and blood-soaked power she never wanted. But the club brothers don't bow to outsiders—especially not a girl who knows nothing about their world.
Three dangerous men circle her like wolves:
Matt —her dead sister's fiancé blames Ashley for the death of his fiancée and wants brutal personal revenge. He'll break her body to heal his grief.
Bran —her scarred brother-in-law craves slow, psychological payback for the high-school sin that scarred him forever and ruined his life. He'll take her body piece by piece until there's nothing left.
Ripper —the Vice President, protects her with fierce loyalty no one understands… but his devotion comes with secrets that could destroy them all.
Caught between these three men, Ashley must find a way to protect herself, because the Sons of Chaos don't share.

Kael Varez spent his entire life being treated like dirt, mocked for being poor, humiliated for being fatherless and discarded by the woman he loved the moment a richer man appeared.

But on the night his dying mother whispers a terrifying secret, Kael’s world changes forever because the assassins hunting him believed that he is the missing heir to a brutal underground empire built on blood, power and fear.

Now, trapped in a deadly world where loyalty is bought and betrayal hides behind every smile, Kael must survive ruthless enemies, dangerous alliances and a family that wants him erased before he can uncover the truth about who he really is but the deeper he falls into the darkness, the more he begins to change.

So when the bastard everyone once despised finally rises, will he destroy the empire or become something even worse than the men hunting him?

In a world ruled by powerful werewolf bloodlines, one name was never meant to exist again.

Elias Ashford.

Born during the terrifying Blood Moon Eclipse, Elias was feared from the moment he took his first breath. Whispers followed him his entire life cursed child, monster, omen of destruction. Even his own father, the ruthless Alpha Darius Ashford, hid dark secrets about the night Elias was born.

But everything changes when Elias meets Vivienne Silvercrest the daughter of a rival bloodline and the girl tied to him by a forbidden bond older than history itself What begins as a dangerous mate connection soon awakens something ancient buried deep beneath the werewolf world.

An ancient kingdom erased from history A forgotten throne A power capable of destroying gods As mysterious enemies known as the Black Moon Order rise from the shadows, Elias discovers the horrifying truth:

He is not just a cursed Alpha.

He is the reincarnation of the First Alpha the legendary King of the Void, a being so powerful the Moon Goddess herself betrayed and sealed him centuries ago Now the seals are breaking Monsters buried beneath the earth are awakening Ancient prophecies are coming alive.

And Vivienne may be the only person capable of either saving Elias or destroying him forever.

Bound by love, hunted by fate, and surrounded by betrayal, Elias and Vivienne must uncover the truth behind the curse before the world falls into darkness again.

But some curses were never meant to be broken.

And some kings were never meant to return.

Aria lost her ten fingers and her entire future to a pair of fake lovers in her past life. Reborn before the crucial music competition, she abandons her role as a shadow pianist and picks up her abandoned violin again. With bleeding fingers and a death wish for revenge, she teams up with Adrian, the ruthless piano tyrant of Juilliard Prep. They burn down the perfect reputation of the hypocritical genius who once ruined her. Broken strings can be re-tuned. Broken talent always plays louder than lies.

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.

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.

On our third anniversary, I gave my husband my pregnancy test results as a gift. What I got back was a photo—a man's hand on a woman's chest. The wedding ring on his finger told me everything I needed to know. He was my husband. And he was cheating.

What happens when Kyrah Bailey falls in love with the son of a tycoon, Blake Dawson and later finds out that he has strings attached with his neighbor Sabrina Johnson? Will Kyrah be able to dig out Blake's past? Will she forgive Blake or not? Torn between her boyfriend, Blake and her best friend, Scott Stone, her world crumbles down as she tries to fight for her lover forgetting about her friends and family. Will she realize her mistakes and who will she end up falling for?

The plan was simple: Break the nephew by seducing the uncle.
Wesley Vance didn't just break my heart; he tried to sell my dignity. So, I went after the only man he feared. The man who owned the city, the empire, and Wesley’s future.
Lance Lawson. He’s cold. He’s untouchable. He’s my ex-boyfriend’s uncle. I thought I was the one setting the trap. I wore his shirts, haunted his penthouse, and chipped away at his legendary control until the ice finally cracked.
But I made one fatal mistake. I thought Lance was a man I could use and discard. I didn't realize that once you wake a predator, he never goes back to sleep.
Now, Wesley is gone, the Vance family is in ruins, and I’m trapped in a gilded cage of my own making. Because Lance doesn't want my loyalty. He wants my soul.
I wanted revenge. I got an obsession.

"I, Alpha Xander Finch of the Red Moon Pack,” he said. Wait, is he going to accept my rejection now? “Reject your rejection, Alpha Chastity Reid of the Silver Moon Pack,” he added, and my eyes widened when I felt something extraordinary. Maybe he felt it too because he was surprised as well. Then he carried me before he pinned me at the back of the now already closed door and kissed me and, oh goddess, I felt like I missed him for a thousand years already, so I kissed him back.


Chassy, an omega who carries the weight of her heritage, is mistreated by her mother and the Red Moon Pack for her entire existence. Her real potential, which was acquired from a father who came from a mysterious lycan clan, is hidden from her and her tormentors. She found out that Xander, her Alpha, was her mate. For some reason, he hurt her. As a result
Chassy leaves and rejects him.

But destiny has more in store for her. With the advent of her lycan beast, she unexpectedly rises to the position of alpha in her adopted pack. Then she met her father whom she never knew and found out more about herself.

The persistent vampires, push packs to band together under an alliance. Chassy's previous and present lives intersect when Xander stops by her new pack for a joint training session against this backdrop of peril and unity. Will Xander and Chassy be able to cross the gap between them? Can they stand together in the face of the impending vampire threat?

What will Chassy do when she knows that she's unable to give Xander an heir and a boy with his mother comes to the pack claiming Xander to be the father?

My husband swore I was the only woman he would ever love.
Then my half-sister handed me her ultrasound. His baby. Growing inside her.
Three years of marriage. Three years of building everything together. Gone in one moment.
I should have thrown the proof in his face.
But my doctor gave me news that made his betrayal feel like nothing.
So I did something he will never expect.
I disappeared.
Let him search. Let him lose his mind.
He will never find me.

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.

After eight years in the military, Frank Moore returned to New York.

He had intended to attend his comrade's sister's wedding, only to witness her being utterly humiliated by mafia thugs, forced to drink their foot-washing water.

Enraged, Frank crippled the young thug's legs, condemning him to a wheelchair for life.

Faced with assassins from both the underworld and above, Frank made a phone call.

Hundreds of elite mercenaries descended from the sky, and the entire New York mafia fell to their knees in terror.

The tide in New York was about to turn!

"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.

woke up with the worst hangover of my life and a half-naked man tied to my bed.

Not just any man. Kai Donovan, my best friend's older brother, semi-pro hockey captain, and heir to the city's most dangerous crime family.

I had zero memory of how he got there. Before I could figure it out, armed men burst into my dorm room and Kai did the only thing that would keep me alive.

He claimed I was his fiancée.

Now I'm trapped in a fake engagement with the most dangerous man I've ever met. I have to move into his penthouse, attend family dinners with actual criminals, and pretend to be madly in love with him while my heart still belongs to his younger brother Asher, the sweet, golden boy I've been hopelessly in love with for three years.

The boy who just found out I'm marrying his brother and looks at me like I betrayed him.

Kai tells me this is temporary. Play the role until the threat passes, then I can have my life back.

But living with him changes everything. He's not what I expected, protective and possessive, dangerous and gentle, making me feel things I've never felt before. Every fake kiss starts feeling real. Every touch blurs the lines. And somewhere between the lies and the danger, I stop pretending.

I'm falling for Kai Donovan.

Rival families want me dead for some reasons . Asher is transferring schools because watching us together is destroying him. And people keep asking questions I can't answer.

Kai says he'll keep me safe. That he's falling for me too.

But in his world, love might not be enough to keep us both alive.

He claimed me to save my life. Now I'm his for real, and there's no going back.

"Use me to get back at your ex. Make him jealous. Even if he doesn't love you, he won't handle seeing you with someone else. Especially someone like me."
I blinked at him, confused. "Especially someone like you? Why would he be jealous? He doesn't even like me."
He smirked. "Trust me. Derek will lose his mind watching his ex-wife move on. He'll wonder if you ever loved him... and why you replaced him so easily. That's when he starts running back."
"Deal?"
His eyes glittered with danger. My brain screamed run. But I still found myself nodding.
"Deal."
Vanessa Holland thought signing divorce papers with Derek—a man with the emotional depth of a teaspoon—was the worst day of her life.
She was wrong.
Rock bottom has a basement... and Ryker Holland is waiting there, handsome, ruthless, and armed with a plan.
Ryker, Derek's half-brother and the real power behind the Holland empire, offers Vanessa a deal she's not supposed to refuse: Make Derek jealous enough to crawl back in humiliation, while Ryker secures the CEO throne he's been denied.
But this isn't kindness. Ryker is petty. He is cruel. And he wants to destroy Derek—piece by piece.
Vanessa is the perfect weapon: a discarded wife with nothing left to lose... and maybe just enough vengeance in her heart to play along.
Except fake dating Ryker doesn't stay fake for long.
Emotions blur. Lines cross.
The man she should fear becomes the one she can't stay away from.
Now Vanessa must decide: Is she Ryker's pawn? Or has she learned how to play the Hollands better than either brother ever expected?
Two brothers. One broken heart.
Revenge never looked this tempting...
And the Holland boys are going down—
one will break, and the other will enjoy every second of it.
Disclaimer: Contains morally grey characters, power games, manipulation, emotional cruelty, and a whole lot of chemistry. Reader discretion advised.

Gabrielle Wheeler is a plus-sized nerd from a struggling pack and feels trapped by her life.

Wanting to rebel, she drinks too much at a party and drives home drunk.

On an empty road near the pack borders, she hits a lone motorcyclist.

Panicked, she rushes him to the hospital, but the doctor tells her he has a severe spinal injury and might never walk again.

Afraid of jail or exile, Gabrielle leaves him there and runs away.

When Gabrielle returns home, she discovers her mother is marrying Ronan Blackthorn, the richest and most powerful Alpha in the country.

All their debts are wiped clean, and Gabrielle must leave her old life behind to attend the prestigious Raven Wood University, a mixed human-werewolf school.

At the Blackthorn estate, Gabrielle meets her new stepbrother, Kalvin Blackthorn, the same boy she hit on her birthday.

The pack discovers she was responsible for the accident. Her mother pleads for her, but Gabrielle is punished: she must take care of Kalvin for one year until he is fit for surgery.

That same night, the full moon rises.

Gabrielle discovers that Kalvin is her fated mate. Kalvin almost rejects her, furious over his injury, but he comes up with a dark and wicked idea.

He will use the mate bond to punish Gabrielle for what she did to him.

Gabrielle’s life is turned upside down, trapped with the boy she almost ruined and forced to live under his control while learning the power of their bond.

Will a man learn to love me if I’m good to him long enough?

I tried for seven years to warm his heart.
I thought if I just held on a little longer, he’d finally see me.
Because I loved him so deeply.

But what did I get in return?
His endless tenderness for another woman.
I pretended I didn’t care, until pneumonia landed me in the hospital.

On the day I was discharged, I found him standing there with our daughter, his whole world focused on caring for that woman.
Even my daughter, whom I’d raised with everything I had, wished that woman was her mother.

In that moment, my heart died completely.

I left the divorce papers, gave up custody, and walked back into the chemical industry.
So what if seven years of marriage had worn me down?
I was still the top genius in my field.

But the divorce I’d wanted so badly never went through.
The man who once couldn’t have been colder to me now held on to me tighter than ever.
Our daughter refused to leave my side.

When he found my divorce papers,
the always cold and arrogant man pushed me against the wall and growled:

“Divorce? You’re mine. For life.”

No one knew she was swapped at birth, doomed to be the family’s endless cash supply.
She died exhausted by their greed, yet woke up back to the fateful day of the unfair contract.
Reborn, she hides her cards well.
She will uncover all the fake heiress’s dark plots, retrieve her lost wealthy bloodline, and never let anyone drain her life again.

<>



Vanessa thought rock bottom was signing divorce papers with Derek Holland, a man with the emotional depth of a teaspoon. Turns out, rock bottom had a basement, and Ryker Holland was waiting for her down there with a smirk and a plan.

Ryker, Derek's older half-brother (aka the family's dirty little secret), shows up offering Vanessa a deal: help her make her ex-husband, Derek Holland, jealous enough to come crawling back. In exchange, he secures his position as CEO.

But Ryker isn't doing this out of kindness. He is petty and cruel. He would do anything to trample all over Derek, and now he has the perfect weapon. Vanessa, freshly dumped and just desperate enough to play along. And if she happens to enjoy making her ex suffer too? Well, that's just a bonus.

As Vanessa sinks deeper into Ryker's twisted world of fake romance, secrecy and family dysfunction, things start getting real. Because fake love? It's a lot easier to control than real feelings. And Ryker has no idea what to do when the game stops being a game.

Is Vanessa walking into a trap or building one of her own? Either way, the Holland brothers are going down. One's going to break, and the other's going to enjoy every second of it.

_Disclaimer:

This story contains morally complex and flawed characters, who often operate with hidden motives and questionable ethics. Themes explored include emotional manipulation, gaslighting, power imbalance, dual identities, and blurred lines between love, control, and obsession. Certain scenes may be intense or unsettling. Reader discretion is strongly advised.

On the night of the charity gallery opening, I caught Lucas and Lila tangled together in the storage closet.
He pulled the girl tight against his chest and sneered, “Stella, you’re eight whole years older than me. You’ve controlled my life for five years—when are you gonna realize you can never hold onto me?”
Lila giggled, snuggling deeper into his arms. “You’re past your prime, ma’am. Why cling to someone who was never yours to begin with?”
Snickers and mocking laughter rippled through the onlookers.
I gave a slow, hollow smile.
For five years, I single-handedly kept Scott Enterprises afloat, mopped up every mess he made, and buried every scandal spawned by his endless string of flings.
Still, he hopped from one girl to the next, weaponizing our age gap to mock and hurt me, over and over again.
Then he shoved me hard. I crumpled to the floor in a pool of my own blood, watching him bolt out with another woman in his arms, not a single glance thrown back my way.
I knew right then the baby was gone.
Everyone whispered how pathetically I’d bent over backward for love.
No one ever learned the truth: I endured everything only because his face mirrored my late fiancé, Elias.

I'm the forgotten eldest son of the Cross family.
My parents see me as a walking blood bag for my brother Colin, while my wife views me as a sinner destined to spend my life atoning for my mistakes.
When Audrey pressured me to donate a kidney, I agreed.
Not only did I agree, but I also liquidated all my assets and transferred them to my lab.
They thought I was foolish, that I was still begging for their love.
In reality, I was just tying up loose ends.
The night before the surgery, I coughed up a pool of blood.
Audrey laughed coldly over the phone: "Stop the act, Evan. You just want to dodge responsibility. You'll go to any lengths for attention."
The surgery was a "success."
Colin got the kidney he'd always dreamed of.
And I died in the recovery room.
My soul floated in the air as I watched Audrey push open the hospital door, wearing a smile that dripped with pity, ready to put on a show of "redemption."
"Evan, I know you've been wronged. Let's start over..."
The only response to her was the white sheet covering my lifeless body.

For three years, I deliberately suppressed my grades to rank under my boyfriend William, paving his way to our promised Cambridge exchange. I overheard him and my best friend Maddie confess they framed me for plagiarism in my past life, driving me to jump off the 38th floor, yet they still carried on an affair. They lied and ignored my pain afterward. Heartbroken, I secretly applied to Cambridge alone. The twist? My years of hiding my brilliance were never selfless sacrifice. I collected all their dirty secrets. I’m going to Cambridge not to flee, but to ruin every dream they cling to.

My husband bought a necklace for the woman who killed my mother.

When I saw my foster sister Rebecca Rebecca wearing that emerald necklace with Aaron at the party, I knew history would repeat itself. Seven years ago, my mother lost everything the same way—her husband, her dignity, and finally her life.

I wouldn't follow in her footsteps.

So after slapping Rebecca across the face, I told everyone I was divorcing him and walked out with my suitcase.

Rebecca thought she'd won again. Aaron thought I was just being hysterical.

Neither of them saw it coming—

This time, I'd make them pay.

My adopted sister, Adriana, hit and injured Hadley Brooks—the prized mistress of Hartwell’s mafia boss, Dario Salvatore—and fled the scene.
Don Salvatore gave us exactly three days. And so, my husband and my parents all turned their eyes to me: Go take the fall for her. You always know how to fix things.
I agreed.
What they didn't know was that on that very same day, my doctor had given me my own deadline: I had, at most, three days left to live.

I barely escaped the Valley of the Dread Dragon, my magic completely drained. A betrothal awaited me in Winterhold. But the moment I arrived, my fiancé Arthur refused to acknowledge who I was. He stood by and watched as his socalled true love Elena stole my wand, scarred my face, and swore to strip me bare and parade me through the streets. He thought he stood above me, blind to exactly whom he was defying — I held his entire family in my power. When my brother Damian arrived, he did not merely rescue me. He gave me the chance to pay back every wound and humiliation I had suffered, one by one.

To please his mistress, Callum ordered me—pregnant—to dance barefoot in the black salt ice cellar.

When I stumbled back to the doorway to warm myself, the mistress covered her mouth and retched.

"I'm pregnant. I can't stand this death-stench of winter."

Only because I was a princess of the Winter Realm, born carrying frost in my veins.

Callum flew into a rage and had me locked inside a frost-crystal cage, sunk to the bottom of the ice well. No one was allowed to release me without his command.

"A princess of winter, afraid of the cold? What a joke!"

No matter how I struggled or begged, he couldn't have cared less. He and his mistress treated it as entertainment. And just like that, I froze to death at the bottom of that well.

What he didn't know was that although we winter-born are forged in bitter cold, when we carry a child, every drop of magic goes to protecting the baby. We have no defense left for ourselves. The very ice that shaped us becomes the thing that kills us.

Two days later, he was finally satisfied and ordered them to pull me up.

But I could never come back up again.

I grew up alongside my next-door neighbor, ice hockey prodigy Lachlan, silently paving the way for his future. In my past life, he planned to quit his crucial scout game for his girlfriend Tamsin.
Fearing he would ruin his career, I tipped off his parents to stop him. After graduation, I joined his sports agency and spent three years cleaning up his messes, clinging to the hope that my devotion would eventually win him over.
Yet after Tamsin’s death, he blamed me entirely, shattered my fingers, and drowned me in a frozen lake. Reborn back in high school, I finally woke up. I will no longer stop him from chasing his doomed fate.

I gave Arthur a thousand years. A thousand years to secure his throne as God-King.

And on the day of our engagement ceremony, he announced he was marrying someone else.

In my past life, I bled myself dry for him.

He told me Lilith needed Seraphim blood to live. I believed him. He bound me to the Divine Punishment Pillar and carved open my chest, one cut at a time.

He massacred my entire clan, calling it "treason."

I only learned the truth as I was dying. That pitiful "saint" was a demon from the Abyss all along.

Now that I'm reborn, watching him sit on that throne makes my skin crawl.

I destroy our engagement in front of everyone and take the entire Seraphim clan with me.

This time, I'm only here to watch him destroy himself.

Everyone knows my fiancé, Alex, is the kind of madman who would call off a billion-dollar merger just for me.
For years, he convinced the world I was his one and only, risking the wrath of the board just to keep me by his side.
But that kind of devotion is mostly for show.
In reality, he already had a legal wife—and a baby on the way, carrying his blood.
When I learned the truth, I went straight to my best friend.
"Maya, help me stage a car accident. One where the body can't be identified," I said calmly. "It's the only way I can truly escape Alex."
The night I disappeared, he spent hours kneeling by the burned-out wreck.
He destroyed a high-profile marriage alliance, drove his pregnant wife to madness, and became a complete wreck himself.
But when he finally found me—
He realized I didn't love him anymore.

Ten years ago, my mate faked his death in the war and ran off with his childhood sweetheart.
No goodbye. No contact since.
All he left me were two things — a debt of six hundred and eighty thousand, and a notice declaring him lost, stamped four years later by people who'd never met him.
The bank took our den. I moved into a shared burrow-flat at the edge of the settlement.
Three jobs after hours. Sold blood. Scrubbed latrines. Tested tonics for the healers until my nose stopped working right.
Ten years to pay off the debt. A desk at the Missing and Fallen Registry Office, once the ceasefire finally came.
My first case file was a man the law had already declared dead.
He said he'd been young and reckless. Walked out. Never looked back.
Now his family's land was due a war reparations payout, and he needed his name restored to collect it.
I stared at the name on the form. Recognized it instantly.
Smiled.
"Insufficient documentation. Application denied."

In my past life, I personally dug up two alien meteorites, handing the blue one that granted "Frost Mastery" to my childhood friend, Mike. He repaid me by sealing me inside an ice wall, cursing me to "die like a piece of trash" in the minus 70-degree blizzard.
When I opened my eyes again, I was back at the initial blast site.
This time, I didn't even spare him a glance; I stuffed both meteorites into my pocket.
I transformed a missile silo into a doomsday bunker, brought my parents inside, and stockpiled ten years' worth of supplies.
When Mike arrived with a gang of thugs to smash my door down, I stood in the warm command center, watching half his face rot with frostbite on the monitor.
I didn't open the door.
This time, I am sending back the despair of my past life tenfold.

Dear readers, this book has come to an end. Thank you for sticking with me and reading all this time. I highly recommend another amazing novel of the same genre:
. I’d be grateful for your support, thank you!
On my wedding day, I found another woman's sexy lace bra in my husband's car, with semen still on it...

For three years, she nursed her paralyzed husband, risked her own life testing experimental drugs, and nearly destroyed her health to pull him back from the brink of death.
But on the very day he fully recovered, he held his first love in his arms and declared, “I will take care of her and our child for the rest of my life.”
Heartbroken, she asked for a divorce. In return, he coldly froze all her bank accounts and forced her out of the house with nothing, sneering, “You are nothing without me.”
It was not until she hid her pregnancy test and walked away for good that he finally panicked.

One month before my wedding, I was trying on the wedding dress I'd designed myself when a message from a friend popped up: [Diana, get over here! Your fiancé just lost at Truth or Dare and has to kiss your rival.]