2182 Book(s) Related to where to read one piece

Hiding my identity and marrying an ambitious female celebrity—this is the most boring social experiment I've ever done.
She wants me to leave with nothing.
She gave my family heirloom to that gigolo.
She tweeted that I was "low-class trash".
She didn't know that Hollywood, which she was desperately trying to climb up to, was nothing more than my backyard.
She had no idea that those capitalists she fawned over would all bow down and call me "Mr. Rockwell."
Until that night, she stripped naked, attempting to offer herself to the enigmatic "godfather of capital"—
The leather sofa slowly turned around.
The lights were on.
She saw my face.
“Chloe,” I flicked my cigar ash, “what brings you here?”

Last time, she chased the “true love” a corporate spy sold her—publicly branded me controlling, stole my core tech, and helped him shove me off a rooftop.

When I opened my eyes again, I was back before it all began.

This time I didn’t expose her, didn’t confront her, and didn’t beg her to stay. I set the trap—watched her come close again, test my limits, and steal the “core technology”…

Until the stolen code blew up the rival company, until she was unmasked in front of the cameras and taken away in handcuffs.

Through tears, she demanded, “Why didn’t you tell me sooner he was a corporate spy?”

I answered only, “I did. Last life.”

"I need to bear my sworn brother a child first."

At our engagement ceremony, my wife took her sworn brother's hand.

"Brother has been so good to me—he even sacrificed his fertility to protect me. This is my way of repaying him."

So they made me wait three years.

When those three years ended, they still thought I'd be the same as before—obeying their every command like a loyal dog.

What she didn't know was this:

I am the Supreme Wolf King.

Everything her family possessed—I gave it to them.

Now, I'm taking it all back.

My name is Damian Lemaître.

In my past life, I was Serafina Camarilla's lapdog for ten years, being drained of my life, used, and squeezed dry of my last bit of value.

I opened my eyes and found myself back at the scene of the blood pact ceremony. She sat on the high seat, waiting for me to kneel down and swear the oath with the same excitement as in my previous life.

"Damian Flamel, are you willing?"

"No."

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

The day I signed the divorce papers, Ethan Frost lit up the night sky with thousands of drones spelling out, ‘Vivian Moore, I love you.’ The whole city celebrated his new romance.
On our daughter, Sophie’s birthday, he watched coldly as Vivian’s daughter snatched away her favorite Elsa princess cake—and didn’t even blink when I was shoved down the stairs. Bleeding and trembling, I looked up to see him tenderly massaging Vivian’s feet.
But what truly shattered me was the day Sophie struggled in the pool—Ethan held me back, eyes dark, roaring, “What do you want?”
Later, he scrambled to Sophie’s photo on his knees, crying “Where’s Sophie? Bring her out.” While I only felt absurd, I smiled through my tears “you will never see Sophie again—ever.”

My mate—Alpha Jasper—knelt on one knee, proposing to me at my birthday party when Sienna Burrows suddenly appeared.
She was his fated mate once. His first love.
Dressed in the exact same backless red gown I was wearing, she stood there like a queen, regal and untouchable.
She let out a soft, mocking laugh. "Hah. Alpha Jasper, no matter how perfect a copy may be, it will never be me."
Alpha Jasper didn’t even spare her a glance. Instead, he turned to me, gently taking my left hand in his. His voice was deep, filled with emotion.
"Cynthia, will you marry me?"

Warning: This book contains steamy, raw, and mature content.
"Please, let me taste you," Ava begged, broken and desperate—after he tortured her by forcing her to watch as he fucked that blonde. "Now, spread those thighs, sweetheart. Show me how wet that pussy already is."
Ava Sinclair Vance was once a stripper. Now she's the wife of billionaire Leon Vance, bound by vows of forever—until his endless "business trips" left her aching and burning with unmet desire. One reckless night, she returned to Club Orion for a single pole dance. Just to feel alive again. A stranger in the shadows had other plans.
What began as one lap dance exploded into a night of ruthless, filthy sex that left her utterly ruined for anyone else. She woke up wrecked, convinced it was a nameless one-night mistake she could bury and forget. Until the next morning's business lunch with Leon's best friend. She discovered she couldn't escape him—not when the stranger and Leon's best friend were the same man. And certainly not when he was the one demanding more nights… to cover up her "one little mistake."
How long can Ava stay trapped between two ruthless billionaires before one claims her completely? And what if those nights were never about silence… but about breaking her so thoroughly she begs to stay?

Alpha Blake exterminated her pack. She was taken to the Ralton pack as a trophy and punching bag.
Upon shifting, she finds that his son is her mate.
He rejected her because she was a weak rubbish- an Omega!
Heartbroken, she left the pack and was hunted by the Alpha's son who shot her.
But she didn't die, nor did she reject him.
Years later, a kick-ass female whom every Alpha wants as Luna, returns to the Ralton pack. Her aim? To crush the pack and make the Alpha bow!
Pretty cool right?

Add to your libraries. More updates are coming soon. Lest I forget, accept my kisses! :)

I boarded The Elysium, thinking it was just another job.

A luxury cruise ship. A floating paradise for the world’s elite.

Private. Untouchable. Unregulated.

I was wrong.

Within hours, I was accused of a murder I didn’t commit.

And on The Elysium, innocence is not something you prove.

It’s something you lose.

That’s when I met him.

Silas Voss.

They call him the Sovereign of the ship.

He didn’t ask if I was guilty.

He asked how much I was worth.

I was given a choice:

Death… or a ninety-day contract under his control.

His physician.
His property.
His possession.

I signed it.

Because I had no other way to survive.

I told myself I could endure him.

I told myself I could outsmart him.

But The Elysium doesn’t break people through violence alone.

It breaks them through permission.

And Silas Voss never takes what he can’t make you agree to give.

Every attempt I made to escape only brought me closer to him.

Every rule I broke only made him calmer.

More patient.

More interested.

Until I realized something I never should have felt in a place like this—

Fear wasn’t the worst part anymore.

And what he was turning me into… might be worse than what he did to me.

⚠MATURE READERS ONLY⚠ DARK ROMANCE | MORALLY GREY HERO | OBSESSION | FORCED PROXIMITY ⚠

My Husband Cheated on Me with His Cousin, So I Married His Boss.

Kalyssa always believed her marriage could survive anything. She trusted James until he started slipping away. Late-night calls. Locked doors. Half-truths dressed up as excuses.
When she finally follows him, she discovers the kind of betrayal that breaks something inside you forever…her husband in the arms of his cousin, Melissa. What should have ended in tears turns into something far worse. In one night, Kalyssa loses her company, her home, and nearly her life.
But someone saves her. A man she doesn’t know, or couldn’t remember. He’s powerful. Controlled. Dangerous in ways that make her pulse quicken. And he isn’t a man who lets go of what he wants.
As Kalyssa rebuilds her life, her husband and his cousin suddenly want her back.
How was she going to get back what he stole from her? What would she do when the man who saved her proposes a contract marriage?

Jessica Howard was Ridgeview Homecoming Queen.

She smiled for the cameras, accepted her crown... and disappeared before the after-party. No body was found. No ransom. No answers.

The next morning, every student's phone lit up with the same notification. ‘A new app has been installed.’ No one downloaded it. No one can delete it.
It's simply called NEXT.

At midnight, NEXT chooses a name. The next day... Someone dies. Or something even worse happens.

The police call them accidents, the students call it a curse. I call it impossible.

I was never supposed to be part of this. I’m Sabrina Markson. The scholarship girl nobody notices. I came to Ridgeview to earn a future, not become part of its darkest mystery.

But somehow I ended up with the final piece of Jessica’s puzzle. The one clue that could blow the whole thing wide open.

Now the whispers are turning into threats. And the only person who’s willing to help me is the last person I should trust, Luke Carpenter. The school’s notorious bad boy. Trouble with a capital T.

We started out hating each other. But late nights chasing clues turn into shared moments. Stolen glances in empty hallways turn into him walking me home when NEXT starts targeting people close to me.

With every secret we uncover, it gets harder to tell if I’m falling for him... or falling into a trap.

As Luke and I dig deeper, it gets harder to tell who’s hunting who. And to figure out if what’s growing between us can survive when everyone around us is dropping.

Together, we need to unmask the culprits, and stop the stupid app from sending any more death notifications.

Because if we don’t find them first…
We’re next on the list.

I kept a list. Ninety-eight times my husband chose another woman over me.

Missed birthdays, ruined anniversaries, broken promises—all for his "patient" Sophia, who seemed to have a medical emergency every time we had plans.

"It's just my job, Emma," he would say. "You understand."

Ryan thought he could have his cake and eat it too. He was wrong.

After an incident, I was determined to leave him, and before I left, I gave him an unforgettable "gift."

During the SATs, someone in the exam room went completely mad, screaming about a freezing apocalypse and ghouls eating everyone in the world. Everyone laughed at him, but I was the only one frozen in shock.
Because the pendant on my chest, which could warn me of danger, was emitting an unprecedented, blazing alarm...

"I'll have her in my bed before prom."
That's what my "perfect boyfriend" wrote about me, in a group chat with his best friend — betting on me like I was some kind of prize, with his friend's ridiculously expensive vintage Porsche on the line.
Me, the nobody scholarship girl, somehow ending up with the most popular playboy in school? I actually thought it was fate. I thought it was my fairy tale.
Turns out, I was just the trophy they were fighting over the whole damn time.
So if you boys want to treat my heart like it's just some stupid bet, fine. Let's play this game to the very end.
At prom, I'll make sure they know it: they picked the wrong girl to mess with.

My downstairs neighbor tagged me in the building group chat at ten p.m.
His wife just had a pup, he said. Pups need moonlight, he said. So starting tonight, my private moon terrace belongs to his family.
He'd even pay me rent. Ten dollars a month.
For the terrace of a three-million-dollar penthouse.
When I said no, he reminded me he wasn't just my neighbor. He's my supervisor at the Calloway Group, and my probation review sits in his hands. Hand over the door code, or I'd never survive at that company.
He kept saying it. I can crush you at the Calloway Group.
Funny.
My mother owns the Calloway Group.
I was going to let him dig his own grave quietly. Then his family broke into my home, walked up to the one thing on that terrace worth half a million dollars—
And smashed it.

"In the toxic halls of Eastview High, Aria Bellwyn has mastered the art of being invisible. But when she's forced to tutor golden boy Knox Hale, she's thrust into a world of danger and desire. As they navigate the treacherous social hierarchy, Aria becomes the target of Knox's manipulative ex, Blaire, and the ruthless queen bee, Sarah. But Knox's secrets run deeper he's trapped in a deadly debt to a local crime lord, and Aria's the only one who can help him take down the corrupt empire controlling the school. As they risk everything to expose the truth, can they survive the betrayal lurking in every corner and find love in the process?

Dive into this heart-pumping, high-stakes romance where the line between invisible and irresistible is about to get blurred."

Victoria discovered that I hadn't submitted any supplemental medical expense claims for two weeks.
She assumed I had finally been disciplined and had given up what she called "the exploitative nature of the lower class."
Little did she know, my backpack held the signed divorce papers and my mother's death certificate.
As I turned to leave, I was still wearing the discounted trench coat she'd casually given me three years ago when we got married.
What she didn't know was that I, a deep-sea geology genius from MIT, willingly endured three years of her humiliation and ridiculous rules, just so my mother could stay in her conglomerate's private hospital to prolong her life.
Now, my mother has died because of unpaid bills , and even her ashes are carried by me in a cheap canvas bag.
Now that my loved one is dead, there's no need for me to continue being her obstructive dog on Wall Street. The lives she owed with those approval forms, I will settle with the collapse of her entire conglomerate empire.

Intro: I'm an S-Class superhuman, but I was locked in a basement for five full years, subjected to inhuman abuse and torment. All they wanted was to drain my blood and energy dry. I once believed that if I could just endure it all, I would see my family again. Until my wife Valen's voice came through the intercom and revealed that it was all a lie. I will turn my fury into strength and tear it all apart with my own hands.

After sleeping for a thousand years, I returned to the ancestral castle that was supposed to be mine.
Only to find my throne torn down and turned into an auction block for the black market, my territory carved up clean by traitors.
And my only pureblood descendant in this world was actually being auctioned off like livestock—covered in blood, chained up with a cheap dog collar around his neck.
The entire room of nobles and elites mistook me for the lowest kind of half-blood trash, mocking me as a rat too stupid to know when he was dead.
The usurper, eager to curry favor with the Abyss, shouted that he would drain me dry and offer my blood as a tribute to the three pureblood princes deep within the Abyss.
Then the void split open, and those three supreme princes—the untouchable monsters the world worshiped—truly descended.
Under the horrified gaze of more than a thousand nobles and elites, those three ancient monsters threw themselves at my feet, scrambling and crawling, wailing in terror without even daring to raise their heads:
"Your unworthy descendants... welcome the Ancestor's return!!!"

On the night before my sister's bone marrow transplant, my parents confiscated my EpiPen and locked me in the attic.

Their "genetic consultant" warned them that the medication would contaminate the stem cells meant for my sister.

I had eaten the meal they provided—one secretly laced with lethal traces of nuts.

The resulting anaphylactic swelling was suffocating me completely.

I frantically bashed my head against the door. "My pen... Mom, I can't breathe..."

"Stop putting on a show!" Mom snapped through the wood. "That meal was entirely nut-free! Are you faking an allergic reaction just because you can't stand the thought of your sister finally getting well?"

Her footsteps retreated.

Agonizing pain and oxygen deprivation overtook me as I clawed at the floor until every one of my nails snapped off.

Until my breathing stopped completely.

The world thought I was a broken man after rotting in the Abyss for five years. Even Moretti, the wealthiest mogul in Cold Harbor, dared to point a finger at my nose and demand I kneel.
He razed my estate, seized my daughter, and humiliated my past on a city-wide livestream.
What he didn’t know was that the moment his infrared scanners locked onto me, I had already initiated the sequence for a dormant orbital satellite that had been sleeping above us for five years.
When the skyscraper turns to ash, the man kneeling before me won’t be that arrogant tycoon—only a trembling corpse.
After all, in this city, I don’t believe in reason. I only believe in retribution.

Y

Before the apocalypse hit, my ex-girlfriend called me, laughing like a maniac: "Jack, you pathetic loser—still playing that stupid farming game? Gonna whack zombies with a hoe? Open the door right now, get on your knees, and beg us, and maybe we'll throw you some table scraps."
I listened to the faint scrape of a tactical knife being drawn on the other end of the line, and silently glanced at my computer screen—at the maxed-out Greenfield Manor game, with its gold cap glowing at [999,999,999] .
"You misheard." I dropped my voice, lacing it with just the right amount of embarrassment. "I was checking the weather forecast."
The other end erupted in unrestrained laughter: "Then forecast this—how you're gonna die today!"
I hung up without changing my expression, flipped open the system, and spent a million on the [Absolute Defense Shield] —then brought out a steaming plate of roasted meat.
Forecast?
I forecast that tonight, you'll be gnawed down to bare bones by zombies.

Clare Voss has spent five years loving her stepbrother Zane in silence, cooking his breakfast, cheering at every match, and dreaming of the day he would finally see her.

But on his birthday, everything falls apart when his girlfriend exposes Clare's most humiliating secret in front of the entire team.

Just when Clare is ready to disappear, Rhys Calloway, her worst enemy and the team's arrogant captain, pulls her into his arms and tells everyone she is his girlfriend.

She should have pushed him away, but she kissed him back instead.

Now Clare is locked into a two-month fake relationship with the most infuriating man she has ever met, trying to get over a stepbrother who never cared and survive a captain who makes her forget why she was supposed to hate him.

The problem is that Rhys kisses like he means every single second of it, and just when Clare starts to move on, Zane decides he wants her back.

One girl, two hockey players, and a heart that was never supposed to feel this much. Will she choose the stepbrother who broke her or the enemy who caught her when she fell?

Six years ago, Evelyn White caught her husband Arthur Collins cheating, then left his mansion—pregnant and unseen. Now she’s back as Eve, a top artist, with two genius twins. At her exhibition, the kids yell “Mommy”… and Arthur’s world breaks. He’s obsessed with dragging her (and the kids he never knew) back. She just wants to paint and protect her family. But as their past’s lies unravel, escaping him means fighting for more than just freedom.

Five years ago, Eric took the fall for his fiancée’s brother and was thrown into the notorious Saint Paul Mountain Women’s Prison.

Little did the world know, this hell on earth became his ultimate training ground.

Enduring brutal training under seven legendary masters, he emerged as a supreme martial artist and a divine healer, eventually taking over as the prison’s absolute warden.

But when he steps out, his world shatters: his three general brothers were ambushed and killed in action, his grandfather is on his deathbed, and his family empire has been reduced to ruins by wolves.

Now, the King of Saint Paul Mountain has returned to the city.

To those who betrayed his family and brought shame to his name—prepare to pay a hundredfold!

My husband often made me suffer for the sake of my younger sister, even divorcing me because of her.
My parents gave all their love to my sister and neglected me.
My husband and parents even had my sister perform surgery on me.
But they didn't know that my sister had no idea how to perform surgery.
It didn't matter though, because I no longer cared.
On Christmas Day, when they were celebrating, they finally remembered me.
But I was already dead.

On college application day, my two childhood sweethearts, Blaise and Kieran, were completely bewitched by Mari. The manipulative girl talked them into abandoning their prestigious university spots to attend a small community college with her. I tried desperately to stop them, even contacting their parents to prevent them from ruining their futures.
Yet when Mari ended up dead months later, the blind boys blamed everything on me. They tricked me to the cliff and shoved me down brutally, making me pay for a crime I never committed.
Miraculously, I am reborn on this exact day. This time, I will not interfere. I will watch silently and let them bear the consequences of their own foolish choices.

"Stay in the apartment," he said, straightening his tie as I fixed his collar. "I'll be back tonight." Then he walked out the door — straight to his wedding. What he didn't know was that my flight was already booked.
For three years I was his canary: locked in a penthouse, the only woman he let close when he bled, forgotten the moment another woman entered the room. I watched him let her wipe the blood from his face. I lost our child alone on a cold floor. I apologized to the woman who destroyed my mother's watch.
I was done waiting.
When the bells of Saint Patrick's rang out across Manhattan, he was welcoming his bride — and I finally flew out of my cage.

Nora Vale was never supposed to be seen.

For three years, she rebuilt hockey captain Callum Pierce after the injury that nearly ended his career. She tracked his tremors, rewrote his recovery protocol, and carried the private marriage his family refused to make public.

Then he won the championship.

Under the arena lights, Callum lifted the cup and thanked Sloane Mercer, the beautiful sports host the cameras already loved. Backstage, Nora watched her own medical system appear under Sloane's name.

That night, Nora left with the evidence and the child Callum never knew existed.

Three years later, Nora is no longer hiding in the tunnel. She is the chief medical consultant for the rival team, the one woman the league needs when old concussion records begin to surface. Callum wants answers. His father wants control. Sloane wants the public story to stay clean.

Nora wants her name back.

But the fight is no longer only about a stolen system. It is about a son whose medical records could shift a franchise, a trust that could break the Pierce family, and a championship myth built on the woman they erased.

Callum thanked the wrong woman on the night he won.

Now the whole league is about to learn who made him a champion.

He hated her, believing she betrayed him and his family. Only to discover that he was the villain all along...

Mila Russetti’s life turned upside down the moment she decided to break the rigid rules of her foster family__the most dangerous Mafia family in the USA__for the first time in her life.

By that single act of rebellion, she payed dearly: she was set up, raped, used as a pawn to break down the Haydens.
Her foster family kicked her out of their lives and sent her overseas treating her as a traitor.

After four years, they showed up again in her life, claiming she owed their dying father a last visit.
She returned to the Hayden's mansion with her three years old son, only to discover that they were trying to cage her again and forcing her into a marriage.

Will she give in to their abuse, especially after she had discovered the shocking truth of the identity of her rapist? And how will she take her revenge on them when she finds out that she's the heiress to a Tycoon mafia empire?

How does her biological mother's shady past affect Mila's present?

Is it true that the only thing that brings dangerous and ruthless Mafia Lords, those who are morally gray to their knees, begging and regretting, are the women they worship?

A juicy and twisted love-hate dynamic, Obsession, toxic attraction story.


When she pressed the knife to her own throat, his mask finally cracked. He hesitated for a second before confessing with guilt, “I know who did it, Mila. I know who raped you that night four years ago. And I assure you, he wasn't one of Hayden's enemies.” He stared toward his two brothers with an accusing look.

TRIGGER WARNING:
The story too dark.

I loved Callum Crane for five years. He said I didn't fit. Then he proposed — to my sister.
The same night, his brother called me with the most insane idea I've ever heard: marry him instead. Same day. Same venue. Right across the hall from my ex and my sister's ceremony.
I said yes. Not because I loved Emrys Crane. Because I'd rather set the whole thing on fire than sit in a pew and watch.
Here's the thing about revenge marriages, though. They're supposed to be fake.
Nobody told Emrys.
The man had a wrench set in his truck that only fit my grandmother's machine — bought years before I ever spoke to him. He'd been sneaking looks through my workshop window so often the stone wore down. He fixed my motorcycle three times and never mentioned it. He remembered that I stared at a piece of almond brittle for ten seconds once, and bought it for me weeks later.
Seven years. He'd been in love with me for seven years. Said nothing. Did everything.
And Callum? The man who told me I didn't fit?
He showed up at my orchard with an apology and a folder full of evidence against my sister, begging for a second chance.
I looked him in the eye and said: "Too late. Wrong harvest."
He tried five more times. It only got worse for him.

BLURB

She is the nerd nobody cares about.

He is the hockey team captain and the popular guy on campus.

She's always an object of ridicule.

He is always there to save her.

He is her enemy.

She is the one girl that is able to catch his attention.

Their worlds couldn't have been more different.

Everything goes down the drain when Skylar falls in love with the one boy she is supposed to guard her heart around.

And even messier when the one person she hates the most in school not only stands up for her but kisses her as though his life depends on it.

What starts out as a contract becomes too real to be true, especially when she finds out her perfect golden boy is not just good on ice but rides his bike like he was born with the brakes.

A biker gang prince, a nerd guru, and secrets that come crashing down on them.

Their love gets forbiddenly sweeter when the biker prince finds out that everything Skylar has suffered is traced back to his bloodline.

Self-made CEO Angela Vale dies in a high-speed car crash, only to wake up on an 1800s execution block. Trapped in the body of a low-ranking maid framed for poisoning the royal princess, she has zero voice to defend herself.
When the terrifyingly handsome Emperor Alexander spares her neck at his daughter's request, Angela thinks she survived the worst. But the palace is full of vipers. That very night, the evil Queen Mother gives her a deadly choice: seduce the cold-hearted Emperor in thirty days, or be quietly strangled.
Without a voice, Angela has to use her sharp corporate brain to navigate lethal court politics, play the icy King like a violin, and survive a world trying to kill her, again.

“You look soft, Pretty Boy. Like one hard hit on the ice would break you in half.”
“Then don’t hit me, Captain.”
A slow, dangerous smile curved his lips. “Who said anything about hitting you?”


My twin brother lived for hockey.
He was the university’s star winger, and the boy everyone expected to go pro but then he died.
Everyone called it an accident. I didn’t.
The last person seen with him was the university’s hockey captain.
The same captain everyone worships and the same captain I know is hiding something.
So I did the only thing I could.
I cut off my hair, bound my chest, buried my identity, and transferred to the same university disguised as a boy, determined to uncover the truth behind my brother’s death and expose the captain for the monster I believe he is.
No one can know who I really am, not my teammates, not the coaches.
And especially not the captain who watches me like he already knows I’m lying.
Living with twenty hockey players is a nightmare.
Becoming roommates with the one man I came to destroy is even worse.
He calls me Pretty Boy, pushes every button I have and protects me when no one else does.
And with every passing day, the man I swore murdered my brother becomes harder to hate… and impossible to stop wanting.
But someone knows why my brother died.
Someone is willing to kill to keep the truth buried.
And if I don’t uncover it before my disguise falls apart…
My brother won’t be the only one who never makes it off the ice.


…
A hidden-identity MF hockey romance.

I was at my favorite artist's concert, phone up, recording the Kiss Cam segment. My boyfriend Mason said he was three hours away having dinner at his parents' house and couldn't make it, even sent me a selfie as proof.

Then the Kiss Cam found him.

On the giant screen, Mason wore the exact same gray vintage rock tee and black ripped jeans from his "family dinner photo," his arm around a blonde girl with her head on his shoulder.

The arena erupted: "Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!"

He looked like he'd seen a ghost, frantically trying to block the camera.

My phone's location alert read: "Mason is nearby (0.1 miles)."

Three years of us, exposed as a massive lie in front of thousands of cheering strangers.

This was the most miserable Christmas I had ever experienced.
On Christmas Eve night, my husband brought his mistress home and demanded that I, his pregnant wife, leave with nothing.
On this day, I lost my husband and also lost the child in my womb...

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

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

"My brother and Natasha'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...

On our wedding day, Declan sent me out to Long Island. We'd been together seven years.

He said he'd left his grandmother's lucky cufflinks at the family house.

But when my car died in the storm, I opened my bridesmaid's Instagram live.

Declan was sliding my custom diamond ring onto Phoebe's finger—my adopted sister, the one with the bad heart.

My own parents were crying in the front row. My bridesmaids were cheering.

They'd turned my wedding into a dying wish ceremony for Phoebe.

Hours later, alone in the ER, I called forty-seven times.

No one picked up.

Not until after I lost the baby and disappeared from Manhattan.

That's when Declan finally came apart.

What is fate? Waking up three days after you rejected your fated mates in front of the entire school, with the memories of your husband's betrayal still burning in your chest? Or finding out that the only way to save your empire is to compete for love on national television—against the man who murdered you?

Make your pick.

Odessa Montgomery died at thirty—cheated on, poisoned, and blown to pieces by the husband she trusted. Then she opened her eyes at twenty-one, three days after the mating gala where she publicly rejected the De Luca triplets. The rejection is still fresh. The whole school is still talking. And Damien Gracias, her charming hockey-star boyfriend, has no idea she remembers every lie he ever told her.

She dumps him. Publicly. Brutally. But freedom comes at a cost. Her grandfather's will is clear: find a mate or lose the Montgomery empire. With Damien out and the De Luca triplets—her humiliated fated mates—lurking in her past, her options are nothing.

Then comes Moonlit Bonds, a televised competition where unmated shifters compete for love and a life-changing prize. Win, and her inheritance is hers. Lose, and lose everything.

There's just one problem. Damien and his true mate, Sarah, have joined the show, hoping to legitimize their bond on camera. And the De Luca triplets are also contestants—three alphas she rejected, two who bullied her, and one who has never stopped watching.

Now Odessa is trapped in a villa with cameras in every corner, a public audience that votes on her fate, and enemies who want her dead.

She came to win.

She might just find revenge.

But falling for the enemy? That was never part of the plan.

My girlfriend told me she was part of a social experiment. Her task was to get close to a target, and if she quit, she’d owe a crushing penalty.

So she kept canceling on me, staying out all night, and letting another man hold her—then came home in tears and said she had no choice.

I believed her for three years.

What she never knew was that I was the hidden heir to a billion-dollar family empire. While we were together, I was under a private family test and forbidden to reveal who I really was.

The day that test ended, I took back my name.

The first thing I did wasn’t return to the boardroom. I went straight to the lab behind her so-called experiment.

The man in charge turned the screen toward me. “We never had any massive penalty. The contract is clear. She could have quit at any time.”

Three years. No forced mission. No trap she couldn’t escape.

Every line she crossed, she chose to cross herself.

I didn’t confront her. I just took my things, ended the relationship, and walked away.

She thought I was just angry.

She had no idea that after reclaiming my identity, the first thing I did was uncover every lie she had ever told me.

Before the zombie outbreak, I was a hardcore doomsday prepper. I hoarded countless supplies, but when the apocalypse actually arrived, I ended up turning into a zombie myself. Just as I was overwhelmed with panic, my girlfriend and the guy she was cheating on me with brought a mob of thugs to smash down my door...

Last life, my girlfriend was trapped in a fire. I ran in, took the burns, and dragged her out alive.
When she woke up, she pointed at me first: “He’s the arsonist.”

Only later did I learn the truth—she’d been sleeping with her boss. They set the fire for an insurance payout and pinned everything on me.
Police investigations, the company cutting ties, the media turning me into a monster—I couldn’t prove a thing. I died in the rain, discarded like trash.

This time, I didn’t expose them. I didn’t call the cops.
On the night of the fire, I left early—then staged a robbery and walked myself into a police station, building the cleanest alibi possible.

They lit the match on schedule, trapped themselves, and waited for me to charge in.
As the flames grew and I never showed, she called—furious—demanding I come now.

I glanced at the officer taking my statement and said into the phone, calmly:
“Sorry. I can’t leave right now.”

I have guarded the Abyss on the Ashen Plains for a thousand years.

My daily routine: chewing rock-hard rye bread, single-handedly crushing the skulls of trespassing demons, wiping their slime off on a ragged surcoat, and leaning against a bronze pillar to catch the wind.

Today, a dying girl stumbled into the wasteland. Her fingers were locked in a death grip around the bloodstained iron crest I had left behind a millennium ago. Up on the ridge, three hundred heavy cavalrymen of the Alliance drew their lances, forming a wall of steel as they closed in.

I stared at the blood on the ground. I didn't make a sound.

I just brushed the biscuit crumbs off my lap and stretched my stiff neck. Turning around, my fingers hooked onto the hilt of a rust-eaten battleaxe resting beneath the bronze pillar. I dragged it along with casual ease.

"Troublesome."

I muttered that single word, and walked alone toward the formation of steel.