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The agony of dragonfire tearing through my flesh still seared my memory.
But I had been reborn.
I touched my reflection. No scorch marks. No melted skin. My eighteen-year-old face stared back.
The door burst open. Zephyra swept in, her dragonfire pendant gleaming.
"Megan, don't be nervous." Her voice dripped honey-sweet. "Even if you can't sense dragonfire, the Dragon God won't judge you harshly."
My father's legitimate daughter. Pure dragonblood. The family's pride.
And me? The bastard. A half-blood who couldn't even conjure a spark.
"The prophecy bond isn't set in stone." Her hand landed on my shoulder, grip too tight. "If Lord Roran feels overwhelming, bond with a lower-tier knight. I'll support whatever you choose."
Support me? The word tasted like ash.
Roran was the empire's youngest Dragon Knight Commander. In my past life, I'd believed her lies and married him.
I thought it was salvation. Instead, I became his shield while he slept with Zephyra.
At Zephyra's ascension ceremony, when a wyvern lunged for her, he shoved me into the beast's path.
The wyvern's claws tore into my abdomen. My unborn child died inside me.
Then came the dragonfire.
Roran unleashed it to save Zephyra. The flames swallowed everything: the beast, me, and the dragon egg I'd carried for months.
Through the agony, I watched him scoop Zephyra up. "Save Zephyra! The child—"
My child was already ash. He mourned hers.
"If I hadn't been pregnant, Megan wouldn't be so jealous..." Zephyra whispered.
"If there's a next life, I'll make this right." Roran's hollow guilt.
Next life?
Your dragonfire burned my child alive. You let me bleed out. And now you want redemption?
Not a chance.

The day I found out Quinn Prescott had pulled strings to give away my Ivy League recommendation to some transfer student, I packed up everything he'd ever given me and dumped it on his doorstep.
The next day, I found that same box in the dumpster outside my building.
Quinn's face was twisted with irritation.
"Drop it. So what if we don't go to the same college? You can get a full ride anywhere on your own, but Paula can't even afford tuition without that recommendation letter."
He let out a cold laugh. "And if this actually blows up, I promise you—it won't be me walking away with regrets."
I pressed the UCL acceptance letter tighter against my back, looking at him one last time with perfect calm.
He looked exactly like he always did when he knew he'd already won—like the outcome wasn't even a question.
But Quinn, I don't need you either.
My one-way ticket to London was already booked. We never had to see each other again.

Three days after I died, the morgue called my husband Sebastian to collect my ashes.
He was kissing another woman when he hit speaker, his voice cold and dismissive: "She's dead? Cremate her. Don't call me again."
And just like that, my body was wheeled into the cremation chamber.
When he finally showed up to collect my remains, he smashed the urn on the floor and ground every fragment of my ashes into the tile with his shoe.
"Playing dead? What a pathetic stunt," he sneered. "Tell her the anniversary of my mother's death is coming up. She'd better show up at the cemetery on her knees, or even if she really is dead, I'll scatter her ashes in the sewer myself."
But he didn't know—I truly was dead.
My soul was bound to him, forced to drift at his side as he planned a lavish wedding with his adopted sister Claire—his mother's true killer.
By the time he discovered the truth and exposed Claire at the altar, I had already vanished.
He lost his mind, racing to the ocean to search for my ashes.
Never knowing that the remains he'd crushed like garbage under his shoe—the "fake ashes" he'd dismissed as part of my act—
Were all that was left of me.

When my boyfriend of three years won the student body presidency, I rented out the entire bar to celebrate. But when I came back with the cake, I heard deafening jeers from the private room.
"I bet ten grand I can get her to ditch the engagement her family arranged and elope with me before graduation."
"That uptight bookworm? Sweet-talk her a little and she's wrapped around your finger."
"Guess what would happen if she found out—even the money for my off-campus apartment with Marie came from her part-time jobs. Think she'd go ballistic?"
The cake box slipped from my hands. Cream splashed onto my white sneakers—the ones I'd worked three part-time jobs to afford, the ones he said he loved because I looked so "pure" in them.
Turns out what he loved wasn't my purity, but how cheap and controllable I was.
I didn't storm in and confront him. I simply turned around, stepped over the mess, and walked away.
Everyone seemed to forget—Calvin and I were never equals.
I am Athena Stavros, only heir to one of Europe's old money families.
And this three-year charade of being just another student was about to end.

Ice slammed through my veins.
My throat locked up, crushed by an invisible fist. My body convulsed violently, mouth gaping open and shut, but no air came.
Through blurring vision, I saw my polished stepbrother Damien standing there, watching his watch—counting down the seconds I had left.
And Sophie—that scholarship kid who used to sob over dead ants—stood holding the empty syringe, her smile twisted and ugly. "Don't worry, Charlotte. I'll take real good care of your Ivy spot and your boyfriend."
The darkness swallowed me whole.

When my own family and fated mate forced me to leap into the abyss, I did not hesitate.
"You wicked woman, why don't you just die?" My brother Carl pointed at the cliff and roared. "Jump into the Abyss of Sin and atone before the Moon Goddess!"
My fated mate, Enzo, looked at me coldly. "You owe Lilith this."
They expected me to kneel and beg as I had so many times before, insisting that I had never harmed my adopted sister.
Instead, I simply nodded.
Under their horrified gazes, I threw myself over the edge. My body vanished into the silver flames below and turned to ash in an instant.
They did not know this was the seventh obedience contract I had made with the Moon Goddess.
Once I completed seven acts of absolute obedience, I could sever my old bonds and be reborn.
Goodbye, my family—the people I once would have died for.

I am Mandy Langley, 42 years old, CEO of Sterling International. In Manhattan's cutthroat business world, I'd earned the name "Ice Queen."
Five years divorced, my ex-husband's parting words still stung—he'd called me cold as stone, said I was nothing but a dictator even in bed.
He had no idea my frost was a facade, hiding an emptiness and a craving no one could touch.
I controlled billions in assets, yet I lay awake every night, consumed by a single thought: I wanted a man to make me let go, to force me to surrender completely.
That man walked into my office three years ago, and I'd been drowning ever since.
Allen Thorne, my chief assistant, 28 years old—too young, shamefully young, and yet I couldn't resist him.
A year ago, I discovered the truth: he was the CEO of Vortex Capital, my rival, planted here to destroy me.
I should've fired him on the spot. Instead, I kept him close, pretending it was to watch him, when really, I just couldn't let him go.
Dangerous, magnetic, ruthlessly in control—he was everything I shouldn't want. I never exposed him. I fell harder instead.
I buried this forbidden desire, but every day he was there, right in front of me, taunting me.
What was I supposed to do? Cut him loose—or let him claim me?

"Please—I can't—not like this—"
The Abyss was chaos. A masked stranger pressed against me from behind. The lace corset and thong weren't protection—they were an invitation.
His hand slid under my skirt, palm scorching against bare skin. The music was so loud no one could hear me.
Everything spiraled too fast.
The crowd shoved forward. I stumbled back—
Something thick and burning pushed inside me.
I went rigid.
My first time. In the middle of a crowd. With a man I couldn't see.
The mask covered his face. I didn't know his name. Didn't know what he looked like.
I didn't know if this was the worst mistake I'd ever made.
But I couldn't make myself pull away.

For five years, my crime boss husband made me take off my wedding ring nine times—all for his precious damsel in distress.
When we first married, he promised me: "From now on, you're my queen, the queen of New Orleans."
But whenever Odette came crying for help, he'd change his tune: "Mr. Laurent saved my life, Cordelia. I owe his family everything."
And like a fool, I believed him eight times.
Eight times I watched from the shadows as he took another woman to our favorite restaurants.
Eight times I explained to the crew that our "separation" was just giving each other space.
Eight times I watched her move into my bedroom, use my dishes, sleep in my bed.
All for a man who kept making me slip off my ring, then slide it back on, over and over again.
Until the ninth time, when he said he needed to provide sperm for her fertility treatment, and I offered to leave.
He still thinks this is just another temporary break, expecting me to come crawling back in a month like always.
He'll never know I've already booked my ticket out of here.

A mouth after my best friend Laura jumped to her death following a rape, I was dragged onto a makeshift stage in St. John's High auditorium by a mob of vengeful students.
They accused me of protecting the real rapist—of being complicit in driving Laura to suicide.
My boyfriend Zayne Spencer, also Laura's childhood friend, was coldly pressing the sensors of a "memory extractor" against my temples.
The agony from my terminal illness made me shake violently, but he didn't even flinch.
He stared down at me, his eyes ice-cold. "Helen, last chance. Either you give up that bastard yourself, or I let this machine rip it out of you."
Thousands of students were screaming for my blood.
And Zayne was about to crack open my skull in this livestreamed witch hunt to drag out the so-called culprit.
But he had no idea that when that face finally flashed across the giant screen, the first person to shatter completely would be him.

I was dying, and my husband was busy planning a lavish welcome-home party for his true love—my stepsister.
For years, I was the despised "country girl" who ruined their perfect romance. So, I decided to finally give him what he wanted: divorce papers, and my quiet disappearance. Let them be happy.
What Cillian didn't know was that my terminal illness was the fatal price of a brutal lie—an organ stolen from my body years ago to save her life.
By the time the bloody truth unraveled and he tore the world apart looking for me, I was already gone.
But the final countdown of my life—and the death of our bitter marriage—all began on the day I received my death sentence...

When the fourth victim from the Chicago arsonist landed on my brother's autopsy slab, I watched from above, a ghost trapped in the room.
As the city's star medical examiner, he recited his findings with detached precision. "Female, twenties. Evidence of controlled, prolonged burning prior to death." He had no idea he was cataloging my murder.
Three days earlier, in that same warehouse, I'd begged into my phone. His fiancée, Harper, held it for me, her smile a blend of sugar and venom. "Call him again, Ivy. Maybe he'll answer for his poor little sister this time?"
A click. Then, his voice.
"Julian, please—"
"Not now, Ivy. I'm choosing our wedding rings."
The dial tone pierced the air. Harper struck the match.
Now, in the morgue's fluorescent glare, I see the blood drain from his face. The report trembles in his hand. Every measurement, every scar—they all whisper my name.
Oh, Julian. With every incision, you were reading my last words.
The killer is right beside you, already in her white dress.

Caspian kept me locked in the basement as a living blood bank.
This mafia don was also my husband. Ever since he discovered I could heal instantly, I became nothing more than a consumable—kept alive to sustain another woman.
That woman in the hospital bed was his stepmother in name, his forbidden obsession in reality—the desire he could never speak aloud.
Unable to claim her, he went mad. He tried to fill her dying body with my life.
When she was poisoned, he forced toxins down my throat to test antidotes, watching coldly as I convulsed on the floor, vomiting black blood.
When assassins came for her, he yanked me in front as a human shield, letting bullets turn my body into a sieve.
Covered in blood, I clutched his pant leg, begging through tears for him to just kill me.
But to protect his precious stepmother, he kicked me away without hesitation, his voice utterly cold: "Stop playing dead, Aria. You're a monster. You can't die anyway."
What he didn't know was that every time a mermaid heals, she burns through her soul's essence.
Through each shattering and mending, he was draining my very source of life.
Today, he strapped me to the operating table again, ready to drain more blood for his forbidden love.
He had no idea this would be the last time.

"Sloane, where there's smoke, there's fire. If you're really clean, why is it only burning you?"
In my last life, when those fabricated hotel records went viral on the company Slack, I scrambled to explain. I cried. I begged.
What I got was a suspension, a blacklist, and a foster mother who died on a hospital bed because I could no longer pay for her meds.
The person who started it all? Walked right over my corpse into a partnership.
Then I opened my eyes—and I was back. Three days before the promotion list dropped.
I stared at the pixelated "explicit screenshot" on my screen, and I didn't cry. Didn't rage.
I just smiled and hit screen record.
This time, I'm not proving I'm clean.
I'm proving they're guilty.

Jennifer suddenly announced in the sorority common room: "Everything's on me tonight, ladies—oceanview cabana at The Pearl!"
The whole room cheered. I kept my eyes on my textbook.
Yesterday she borrowed twenty bucks from me for a salad. Now she's booking a five-thousand-dollar minimum venue? She wanted the black card in my bag.
"Teresa, just lend me your card to get us in the door. I'll cover everything myself." I stared at her for three seconds, then handed it over. Her face lit up.
I stepped away and called the club manager. "Lock my account, highest security tier. Without my verification code, not a single charge goes through."
She took my card and rounded up five girls, headed straight to the club. Champagne, caviar, Wagyu, Louis XIII—she ordered all of it.
When the check came, it totaled fifty-two thousand, three hundred and eighty dollars.
And the card wouldn't go through.

Three years ago, my pairs skating partner and I had a beautiful wedding surrounded by friends and family—but we never actually got around to signing the legal papers.
Over those three years, he has stood me up at City Hall exactly twenty-eight times.
One time, he stole my cab while I was burning up with a fever, leaving me shivering on the curb because his new, pampered protégée had a stomachache from drinking too much champagne.
Another time, he blew off our anniversary to rush to her side for a minor sprain.
Every single time we were supposed to finally make our marriage official, his precious junior skater somehow had a devastating emergency.
After twenty-eight broken promises, I finally stopped waiting. I dropped our partnership, shredded our application, and boarded a one-way flight to Milan.
But the moment I completely vanished from his life, the man who couldn't spare an hour to marry me suddenly lost his mind—chasing me across the globe to a city he swore he’d never return to, begging on his knees outside my door for a twenty-ninth chance.

At my mother's funeral, my fiancé held my frail Omega servant tightly in his arms.
And my father—the Alpha of the Crescent pack—struck me across the face in front of everyone, all for the sake of the woman who had gotten my mother killed.
"Your mother brought this on herself. Lilith is just a poor, helpless girl!"
That was the moment I heard my faith in this family shatter.
Later, to force me to bow to Lilith, they smashed the one relic my mother had left behind, right in front of my eyes.
I looked at them and smiled coldly. Then I turned and stepped off the edge into the abyss.

Three years since I married into the Hawthorne family, I had already lost two children.
And the one who decided whether my babies lived or died wasn't a doctor—it was a potted plant in the manor's living room: the Crimson Orchid.
In this family, if the petals withered and reeked after drinking the pregnancy blood, it was an unbreakable rule: the child had to go.
The first two times, all I could do was lose my children in despair under the anesthetic mask at some underground clinic.
To save my third pregnancy, I secretly went to a top medical center out of state for an amniocentesis.
The diagnosis, there in black and white, proved it: my baby was perfectly healthy and carried the purest family bloodline.
I thought I was safe this time. But when my finger blood dripped into the black soil again, the orchid once more oozed foul-smelling black water.
My in-laws crushed my medical report underfoot without mercy and had their people drag me toward the operating table.
I couldn't understand it: the scientific evidence clearly confirmed my child was healthy and pure-blooded.
Why did they insist on trusting a mutated, stinking flower and killing their own grandchildren over and over again?

In my past life, I was shoved into oncoming traffic by my husband's widowed cousin, Isabella.
"Why do you get the perfect husband and the Romano fortune? Go to hell!"
I died, and my unborn child died with me. Up until my last breath, I thought she killed me out of purely manic, bitter jealousy.
When I opened my eyes, I was back at that exact crosswalk, rewound to the second she was about to push me.
Only this time, I stepped aside.
And I finally learned the truth. She wasn't just an envious widow—she was my husband's secret lover. And the one who paid the million-dollar bounty for my murder to steal my mafia empire was the "flawless" man sleeping in my bed.

I am Catherine Holloway, CEO of a tech company in Seattle.
It was just an ordinary rainy night. I was driving my Porsche Cayenne toward the airport when a beat-up Ford pickup rear-ended me on the off-ramp.
I never imagined that this seemingly routine accident would drag me into a serial murder case — turning me from a witness into the police's prime suspect.

He ruined her reputation—now she wants nothing to do with him.Brynn Windham loves being a member of the US Ski Team. But after learning a disturbing family secret, she loses her focus and puts her spot on the team in jeopardy. Her coach assigns a skier to help Brynn regain her competitive edge. Unfortunately, the one person who can help her is the last person she trusts.Ryland Guyer might be the heir to his family’s sportswear company, but skiing is his priority. As he recovers from an injury, his coach asks him to help another skier salvage her season. The only problem? He and Brynn have history. They haven’t spoken in five years, and he doubts she’ll want to talk to him now.Not wanting to give up on her dream, Brynn struggles with skiing and Ryland. He wants to make amends for the hurt he caused her and start over, but being around him stirs up old feelings and new, deeper ones emerge. Being on her own is better…safer. But he isn't ready to give up on her. Or them.With a mountain of struggles to face, can Brynn and Ryland learn to forgive so they can reach the top—together?* Parts of this 54,000 word novel were previously published in a Kindle World novella called Race of Love.*One Night to Forever series:Book 1: Fiancé for the NightBook 2: The Wedding LullabyBook 3: A Little Bit EngagedBook 4: Love on the SlopesBook 4: Love on the Slopes

One couple, a pending divorce, and a baby who needs a family...No matter how hard Kate Malone strives to be perfect, everyone she's ever loved leaves. She foolishly believed "I do" meant "forever." Now, her wedding ring is in a jewelry box, and she's alone once again. But when Kate and her soon-to-be ex-husband become the sole guardians of an infant, divorce is not an option with a new baby counting on them.Jared Reed loves Kate more than anything—even if he did push her too far. Now he's determined to keep his promises to his best friends and especially to his wife. A marriage of convenience sounds rather inconvenient, but Jared will do whatever it takes to get Kate back and provide their new little girl with parents who not only love her, but love each other, too.Parenting brings them closer, but their undeniable attraction makes Kate want to keep her distance. Jared, however, won't give up on having the family and marriage he wants. Can Jared prove to his wife that he's the husband she's always wanted before it's too late?

One tech entrepreneur, one blond bombshell, and two rival dating sites.When Dani Bennett lands a new marketing job, she can't wait to prove herself. But her excitement fizzles when her new boss insists she create an online dating profile to spy on the competition. Quitting isn't an option; she needs the money. Now, she must meet the charming guy who's been messaging her. Dani, however, has played this game before. She knows exactly what he's after—what they're all after. It's a good thing she has a foolproof plan to keep her date from being interested in her.Bryce Delaney works hard to keep scammers from infiltrating his dating website. He'll do anything to keep his clients and his company safe, like asking a potential corporate spy to meet him for coffee. When the woman turns out to be more hobo than hottie, he's intrigued. She has no idea he founded the dating website, and he plans to keep it that way until he can uncover her agenda.As one date leads to another, sparks fly. Dani knows a relationship built on lies will never work, but she's not the only one with a secret. Will the truth bring her and Bryce closer or send them back online to find someone else to love?

A marriage proposal gone wrong—a second chance to get it right.When architect Marley Patterson goes out with Von Ryan, she never expects her practical, cautious life to be turned upside down by the handsome contractor. Von is the definition of fun, until his proposal sends her into a panic. Marriage is too serious a commitment to make after dating for only six months. Even though she cares for Von, they are too different, so she breaks up with him.Being rejected hurts, but Von blames himself for not reading the signs or Marley better. He finds solace in work; however, his construction company’s success isn’t enough. He wants to share his life with a woman who’ll love him as much as he loves her. She’s out there. All he has to do is find her and, this time, be patient for the relationship to develop on its own.After Marley is assigned to Von’s new project in Indigo Bay, he treats her the same as everyone else—professionally and with respect—though neither can deny a strong mutual attraction still exists. Soon Marley realizes she may have been the problem with their relationship, not just Von’s proposal. She wants a second chance, but after breaking his heart once, will he give her a do-over?

My name is Gemma and I'm the white wolf.

My life has been really, really shitty.

At 3, the pack I stayed at was attacked, I lost my mother, was kidnapped and abused by some people. They asked me to reveal the identity of the white wolf. I was only 3 for goddess' sake! How was I supposed to know? After I was deemed useless to their search, I became their maid. I lost 12 years, 12 freaking years, to these people but I escaped.

I had planned it for a long time and managed to get from America to England. I met my mate there. Alpha Conner Hughes. I love him. He helped me figure myself out and taught me about gifted wolves.

I'm a gifted wolf, scratch that, His Gifted Luna.

Everything was quiet for four years, four beautiful years, until fate just decided to just fuck with me and send me back to my old pack to deal with hunters.

Secrets will be revealed, hardships will be overcome and hearts will be broken. I just hope i can get through it all with Conner by my side.

One beach cottage, two strangers, and a kiss under the mistletoe that changes everything…Sheridan DeMarco wants to be anywhere but home for the holidays. She’s happy to spend Christmas house-sitting in South Carolina, far away from her parents’ new blended families. Too bad when she arrives at the charming beach cottage, she isn’t as blissfully alone as she planned.Michael "Mikey" Patterson needs to stay out of sight until his attorney gives him the all clear. He finds the perfect place in a small coastal town, but there’s a problem. Mikey isn’t the only one staying at the beach house, and his surprise roommate pushes all his buttons.A sprig of mistletoe and one memorable kiss make Sheridan and Mikey forget their plans to stay away from each other. But when family gets in the way, will their happily ever after get tossed out along with the discarded wrapping paper and tinsel?

When a message in a bottle unwittingly brings together two vastly different strangers, will opposites attract, or will their worlds collide?Jenny Hanford never expects anything to happen the night she whimsically throws her requirements for true love into the ocean. Thirteen months later, however, she hears back from the man who found her bottle.Exchanging carefree emails and texts with Dare is as exhilarating as it is nerve-wracking. He's a complete stranger, and though his humor and kindness keep her replying, she worries her heart is on the line.Flirting long-distance is fun and safe, but when Dare, a soldier, is injured in the line of duty and Jenny's given the opportunity to visit him, will she seize the opportunity? Or will her fear that Dare can't possibly be her real dream hero stand in their way?

At 2:47 AM, half-asleep, I made the biggest mistake of my life—I posted my forty-seventh secret love letter to the anonymous school forum instead of deleting it.
Even crazier? Star pitcher Caleb Sullivan found me in the cafeteria the next day, got down on one knee in front of everyone, and asked me to be his girlfriend. I thought I was living in a dream.
Until Mom told me she was getting married.
When her fiancé walked in with his son, I saw Caleb standing in our doorway—face white as a sheet, eyes wild with panic.
First love. Boyfriend. Stepbrother.
He said Mom and I were gold diggers scheming our way into his family. By Monday, he had his arm around the cheer captain, destroying my reputation in front of the entire school and turning me into the biggest joke at Seacliff High.
Just when I thought I'd drown, Zane Knight—the transfer everyone whispered about—found me in the abandoned art room.
He crouched down, those black eyes cutting right through me: "Crying won't change a damn thing, Daphne Pierce."
Brutal, guarded, but the only person who'd looked at me like I was still human.
As he walked away, something buried deep in my memory suddenly surfaced—that voice, the angle of his jaw...
Had we met before?

I clicked the anonymous link, and my world shattered. There was my perfect fiancé, in a live stream, entangled with the woman who was supposed to be my maid of honor—my best friend.
He was the hero who donated his bone marrow to save my life. Now, he was defiling our future marriage bed in the most vile betrayal. I thought this was their twisted idea of a game, until I dug deeper and uncovered the truth: our "fateful" connection three years ago was nothing but a calculated lie.
My savior, my soulmate, the father of my child... it was all a facade. Now, I've vanished into the night, carrying a secret they know nothing about—his child. Their little show was just the beginning.
My revenge? It's just getting started.

Two years ago, at the Mating Ceremony, my fated mate, Alpha Jason, rejected me in front of the entire pack. He chose my stepsister, Maggie, simply because she had pure blood, and I was just a "Wolfless" waste.
Two years later, I returned to the Blackwater Territory with my new mate.
I met Jason at the forest entrance bordering the territory. For the sake of his pack’s "interests," he dared to order me to warm my stepfather’s bed and serve his new mate as a maid.
He had no idea that the "Wolfless" waste he was sneering at was now the most revered woman in North America—the Luna Queen.

At the Falcone estate's riding ring, I watched my eight-year-old son Leo mount Starlight, preparing for the most important performance of his young life.
Before the third obstacle, the horse spooked. The instant Leo was thrown, I rushed forward to shield him—the cost was three shattered ribs and a kicked left lung.
When I woke from unconsciousness, I found myself in Dante's private clinic downstairs. From the adjacent room came the doctor's angry voice: "We agreed this was just a marrow extraction. Why did you set up what happened with the horse?"
My husband Dante Falcone's response made my blood run cold: "Leo was Mia's donor. Now that the procedure is complete, there's no point in continuing treatment. Mia is the real heir."
Eight years of marriage. I'd always believed that beneath Dante's cold exterior, Leo was still a son he treasured.
Only now did I understand—from the moment of his birth, Leo had been nothing more than a living donor prepared for his stepsister Mia.
The cruelest irony? Mia, the girl Dante loved so deeply, wasn't even his biological daughter.

I thought drowning while trying to save a little girl was the end of my story. Turns out, it was just the beginning of my empire in the Land of the Dead.
Now, I'm the infamous owner of the afterlife's most intimate boutique. My clients? A community of skeletons so conservative, they excuse themselves before holding hands and have been sleeping in separate beds for thirty years of marriage.
To make sure my boyfriend Carlos doesn't forget me, I convinced him to become my interdimensional supplier. But my thriving business comes at a deadly cost: every product he sends drains his life force. And just as I make this horrifying discovery, I learn the little girl I died saving is in deadly danger once again, as her stepmother plots against her again.
With the love of my life fading away and an innocent child's life on the line, what price am I willing to pay for a second chance at life?

I was the most envied mafia wife in Chicago, until his Tibetan Mastiff tore apart what remained of our child.
Everyone called it an accident. I knew it wasn’t.
While I was bleeding out on the operating table, my husband was in the VIP ward, personally attending to his “traumatized” adopted sister. The whole family coddled her delicate state. Only I saw the smirk she couldn’t hide behind every calculated “panic attack.”
Then the Feds gave me a choice: keep playing the perfect, miserable wife, or vanish into a classified program so secret, I’d be dead to everyone I ever knew.
I signed. I uploaded the audio proof of their affair. I watched my old life disappear.
You swore you’d protect the family above all else, darling?
How fitting. My new mission is to protect this country from all threats.
Starting with you.

I thought the orchestrated assault was the most profound betrayal of my life. Then, from the shadows of the wine cellar, I heard my husband and his brothers toasting to their success.
"The slow-motion capture of her climax, paired with those broken whimpers... it was cinematic perfection."
"She played her part beautifully. After all, she’s just a Valenti."
I learned the devastating truth: my agony was their scripted entertainment. My husband. The director.
He married me to claim his inheritance.
He branded me to mark his property.
He caused my miscarriage in that dungeon, coldly calling it "tidying up loose ends."
But they overlooked one ancient law—the Moretti blood oath: should the Don betray his vows, everything becomes his wife's.
Now, I stand in the penthouse of his casino.
My fingers trace the scar on my shoulder—now transformed into a dagger.
"Darling, you celebrated the anniversary of your production. My gift to you is a lifetime behind bars."
Now, the final cut is mine.

Those beautiful dark golden eyes of Cassius should have been filled with dependence and longing for me.
Not like now—bewildered, innocent, like a lost fawn.
I perched high on an oak branch, watching the man below who was being ordered around like a servant by the knight squad gathered around their campfire.
The most feared top-tier human assassin, and... my devoted hound who warmed my bed.
Three days ago, he'd vanished without a trace after getting caught in a spatial rift while searching for abyssal crystals for me.
Never imagined when we'd meet again, he'd not only lost his memory but been picked up by a bunch of self-righteous fools.
I pulled out my communication crystal and reached out to my vampire bestie Lilith: "He's gone from attack dog to puppy dog, and I'm not sure how to handle it. What should I do?"
Her reply came instantly: "Easy—make him remember who owns him."
I curved my lips into a smile, my gaze piercing through the darkness to settle on the man by the flickering campfire below.
The dancing flames illuminated his half-wet, tattered shirt, clinging to outline that lean, muscular waistline in exquisite detail.
I stared at him, silently clenching my jaw.
I wondered—when night fell and I slipped into his tent, when I bit down on that strong nape of his neck again... would this sweet, innocent pup still be able to hold back those enticing gasps of his?

In the third year of my marriage to Damian Spencer, I accidentally scratched his first love.
For that insignificant little scratch, on the evening of my birthday, he personally brought his bodyguards and cornered me in a damp, cold alley.
Without flinching, he had them crush my right hand—the one that held my bow—bone by bone.
He looked down at me coldly as I slumped in the mud, his voice devoid of any warmth: "Just be a good Mrs. Spencer. You don't need this anymore."
Yet later, this same man caged me in his arms like someone possessed, begging again and again—pleading with me not to forget what we'd been.
But all that met him was my empty gaze—hollow, confused, as if he were no one to me.

For three years, Caleb Vance and I were the two most mismatched people at Hometown Beans.
We fought every single day, couldn't stand the sight of each other — even Frank, our boss, just assumed it was a matter of time before we tore the place apart.
But I never expected that after one of our fights, an accident would cost me my memory.
And I definitely never expected to wake up to find the man I hated most in the world, his eyes red, telling the doctor:
"I'm her boyfriend. We've been together for three years."
Except I remember perfectly well that we were never together.
So when I decided to fake amnesia, I had no idea I was about to uncover a secret that would upend three years of bad blood between us.
And it all started the day Frank announced he'd be handing Hometown Beans over to one of us.

The spring semester at the Academy had barely begun when Mother's enchanted letter burst into flames on my desk, that familiar acrid smoke already filling the air.
The smoke swirled and her voice emerged, sharp with anxiety:
"Cecilia, have you found a human man yet?"
"Less than a month left before we must present our tribute to the tribe. Noah is your own brother—can you really stand by and watch him die?"
Surrendering Noah meant certain death.
Over eighty Medusa females in the tribe were of breeding age. Noah had been frail since birth, his scales pale as paper.
If he were dragged onto that cold stone altar to serve as a breeding tool, he wouldn't survive the first night.
But where the hell was I supposed to find a human man?

Three years ago, Marco Ferraro stepped over the corpses of the Vancetti family to claim his throne, delivering my sentence with cold indifference: "Don't take it personally, Noelle. It's just business."
Three years later, he is the untouchable new Godfather of New York, while I am nothing but a ghost in a threadbare coat.
His classless fiancée didn’t just buy my mother’s legacy—she took that rare pink diamond and dropped it, right in front of everyone, into a glass of whiskey thick with spit.
"Thirsty, fallen princess?"
She kicked the backs of my knees hard, forcing me onto the glass-strewn floor. Her sharp stiletto heel ground into my knuckles. "Drink it, or die."
Marco stood to the side, lighting a cigar, his eyes filled with nothing but boredom.
I tightened my grip on the shard of glass hidden in my palm, ready to drag us all down to hell.
But before I could strike, the deafening roar of rotor blades tore through the dome of the auction house. A pitch-black military helicopter hovered just outside the floor-to-ceiling windows, the violent rotor wash instantly shattering every champagne tower in the room.
A voice that made the entire underworld tremble boomed through the speakers:
"Which one of you suicidal bastards touched my woman?"
A dozen crimson laser dots instantly painted a target on Marco’s forehead.
Rafael, "The Phantom," had arrived.
Tonight, no one makes it out of here alive—except me.

Three years ago, in that deadly barrier, I carved out half my progenitor heart and dragged Theron back from death's door. The wound on my back has never healed.
I thought it was a soul blood pact—bound in life and death. Then Samaela appeared, that fragile human with barely a century to live, and it all became a joke.
He believed her lies. Swallowed every word about how I'd murdered her parents in cold blood.
For that pathetic creature who couldn't even bear sunlight, my carefully groomed blood vassal sawed off my pureblooded wings, ripped out my progenitor fangs with his bare hands, and threw me into the Silver Cathedral.
Three years. Nailed to a cross with pure silver chains, I endured concentrated UV rays and holy water burning through me day and night.
Everyone waited for me to go mad, to beg, or turn to ash. I didn't.
Listening to their wedding bells toll outside, I simply watched—in the silence of my flesh charring and regenerating—as the silver light on my chains fractured inch by inch.
Then I tore out the silver spikes embedded in my rotting flesh, dragged my bleeding wreck of a body forward, and kicked open the doors to the Crimson Blood Moon Gala's hall.
Theron had forgotten one forbidden clause in the blood pact: The oathbreaker's life belongs not to the gods, but to me.

To save my sister, my husband carved open my chest with his ice blade and ripped out my phoenix heartblood.
He doesn't know the true phoenix bloodline runs through my veins, not hers. Doesn't know I was the one who threw myself into the abyss to pull him from death's grasp.
He doesn't know I am the First Phoenix—the Fire God who descended from the celestial realm for one purpose: to survive this mortal trial.
After my body crumbles to ash, when he finally watches the truth unfold in that memory crystal, madness will consume him. He'll prostrate himself before my fading remnant and beat his head bloody against the stone.
But the divine grant no mercy to betrayers.

Six months after our bonding ceremony, I was ambushed by rogue wolves while searching for rare herbs in the Black Forest.
Their poisoned claws shredded my abdomen—and with it, any chance of ever carrying pups.
But my mate held my hand and wept. My mother swore she'd save me. My father said everything would be fine.
How pathetic—
Right before they wheeled me into surgery, I heard them through a cracked door, calmly discussing how to harvest my heart for the adopted sister who'd been waiting six months.
Turns out the "accident" was a gift from my loving family of four.
Turns out the last six months of "coming home" was just them fattening up my heart for harvest.
What they don't know? The voice memo on my phone caught everything.
What they really don't know? Six months from now, I'm coming back—
With a Dark Moon Alliance badge. And a heart much colder than the one they stole.
Shh. Listen.
That stolen heart? It's starting to reject.

The day the butler of Sterling family came to claim me, the folks back in my dusty hometown lined the streets with tears in their eyes, waving goodbye like I was headed somewhere better.
The moment I stepped into that mansion, armed guards pinned me down in the first-floor medical suite, demanding I donate bone marrow to their precious adopted daughter, Celeste.
I responded by ripping out Celeste's dialysis machine.
My biological parents, Richard and Eleanor, went ballistic. They locked me in the attic storage room to "reflect on my behavior."
That night, while the house slept, I crept down to the basement and twisted open the main gas line valve.
I was halfway through rigging a candle delay fuse when the thermal imaging system caught me. Armed security tackled me before I could finish the job.
They'd had enough. They blindfolded me, tossed me onto a private jet like garbage, and flew me overnight to the most notorious hellhole in America—Deadwater, Texas.
The car had barely stopped in front of the bullet-riddled town sign when Richard leaned in with a cold warning:
"Listen to me. These people don't show mercy. An ungrateful brat like you? Three days, tops, before they pick your bones clean."
Eleanor stood beside him, dripping with fake concern:
"Willa, just agree to donate your marrow to Celeste, and you'll still be a Sterling. Stay here in this godforsaken wasteland, and you're dead."
I spat blood at her shoes. Eleanor's mask shattered. She ripped off my hood and shoved me hard into the dust.
I pushed myself up slightly, staring coldly at the yellow sand beneath my hands, and shook my head.
I squinted up at the familiar landscape—the rusted water tower, the butcher shop with skinned hogs hanging in the window, the faint smell of gunpowder in the air.
Funny. Nobody ever told me that the place I'd spent twenty years calling home was what rich people called "Deadwater."
Well. Since I'm here anyway.
Nobody's leaving this town alive today.

We were ambushed by rogue wolves and chased all the way to the cliff's edge.
Caleb—my mate, Alpha of Ravenrock Pack—was covered in blood, barely strong enough to carry one person across the chasm.
Forced by the alliance marriage between our packs, he ultimately chose me.
Laura was left behind. The feral rogues tore her apart, piece by piece. They didn't even leave a body.
Three days later, Caleb acted as if nothing had happened and completed our mating ceremony on schedule.
After the wedding, he stripped me of every dignity of my position as Luna. He treated me like a prisoner, a punching bag for his rage, making me pay for Laura's brutal death.
When I learned that my entire pack had been slaughtered, I was locked in a freezing dungeon, wanting nothing more than release.
I used the last of my strength to rip apart our mate bond. But Caleb, driven completely mad, tore me to pieces with his own hands.
When I opened my eyes again, I found myself back on the day of the rogue attack.
This time, I chose to step back and give the one he truly loved a chance to survive.

One month until the SAT.
Staring at my phone screen—at the pulsing number on "Oracle," the mandatory score prediction app that Elite Prep forced every student to install—I couldn't help but think it was all a joke.
In my previous life, every time I finished a practice test, this garbage system would automatically dock twenty points from my predicted score.
But skip class for a day? The number would mysteriously jump up twenty points.
Back then, I actually believed in this bullshit algorithm. I completely gave up for an entire month, watching that predicted score skyrocket all the way to 1550.
But when I finally logged into College Board to check my real results, I'd scored a pathetic 400.
And that brilliant 1550? It appeared on my stepsister Dahlia's score report instead.
Disgusted that I'd embarrassed the Wright family, my father Harold froze my credit card without a second thought and threw me out of the family estate, clearing the path for Dahlia to claim Grandpa's ten-million-dollar trust fund all for herself.
That night, homeless on the streets, I was cornered by some thugs in a filthy Brooklyn alley and beaten to death.
Lying in a pool of my own blood, fading fast, I heard Dahlia's voice.
"Your GPA's been crushing mine since we were kids. I thought you, the so-called 'Straight-A student,' were supposed to be so smart."
She stood over me, mocking. "Turns out you got played by a prediction app. Pathetic."
That's when it finally clicked. My Oracle prediction system had been completely rigged from the source code—by Dahlia.
I shot up in bed, gasping, my shirt soaked through with sweat. I'd actually gone back in time—one month before the test.
Right now, the Oracle widget glowed eerily on my phone's home screen, displaying a single number: 1350.

My name is Megan, and I am the Queen of the Star Fae.
Sixteen years ago, I left my Mate — Orlando, Alpha of the Darkmoon Pack — and the daughter we had just brought into the world, to hold back an invasion of Abyssal demons.
Sixteen years of war in the Void — and at last, the Abyss was sealed.
I came home crowned in glory, my mastery over the Source of Starlight absolute. I expected my husband's arms and my daughter's smile waiting for me.
I never imagined that setting foot on Darkmoon land again would mean no flowers, no cheering — only the sound of my own child screaming for help from inside a filthy dungeon.

In my third year at the Eden Center, I forgot how to play guitar, forgot the rhythm of rock and roll, and forgot the name Melody.
They used twelve thousand electric shocks and seven hundred hours of sleep deprivation to scrub my name down to Number 2963.
Now, I'm their perfect instrument. No preferences, no pain, only commands.
My parents finally got the perfect daughter they'd always dreamed of—until the day they ordered me to die.

I'm Ophelia, a design student about to graduate.
I've been pulling all-nighters at my aunt Millicent's adult store, frantically working on my graduation project.
Aunt Millicent's shop sells all sorts of bizarre stuff - from massage chairs to aromatherapy products, the works. The demo area is constantly busy with customers wanting to try out the newest items.
Seeing me looking like a complete zombie from exhaustion, my aunt handed me a bottle of sleep aromatherapy and a matching eye mask, swearing they'd have me out like a light till morning.
Well, that sleep did more than knock me out cold - it landed me in the biggest mess of my life! A mortifyingly embarrassing situation was about to hit me out of nowhere!

Aston Whitmore thought I loved him. Truth is, his mother bought a year of my life for a million dollars.
He thought those 3 AM study sessions were about redemption and romance across class lines. He didn't know I was never watching his pretty face—I was watching the countdown to my mother's kidney transplant payment.
I froze this trust fund prince's credit cards, cut his internet, and nailed him to that desk until his eyes went bloodshot cramming calculus.
When he turned into a guard dog in front of the whole cafeteria, publicly staking his claim on me, all I was calculating was the date that final payment would clear.
Today, he burst through the mansion door clutching his Yale acceptance letter, ready to give me some grand confession.
I was already thirty thousand feet up on a flight to Zurich, staring at that million-dollar deposit notification, face blank as I pulled out the SIM card, snapped it in half, and tossed it in the trash.
No note. No goodbye.
Just one notarized Service Completion Certificate sitting on that empty desk. Terms fulfilled. Transaction closed.

When I accepted the Global War Photography Award at the ceremony, a reality TV crew crashed through the velvet ropes, their cameras flashing like strobes at a crime scene.
"Ms. Evelyn Vance!"
The host shoved a microphone in my face. "After twenty years of silence, are you still holding a grudge against your father? Just because he saved the neighbor's orphaned child first and left you in that burning building?"
I looked up, past the blinding lights, toward the figure at the edge of the crowd. Robert Bennett.
He pushed through and stepped forward, his calloused hands trembling as they closed around my cold fingers.
"Nora, Kayla's parents didn't make it out. Under those circumstances, I had to get that newly orphaned child to safety first."
His eyes pleaded with me. "You're my daughter. You understand, don't you?"
I stared at those hands imprisoning mine, then pulled my lips into a cold smile and wrenched free.
"You've got the wrong person," my voice was ice. "There's no Nora here. My name is Evelyn Vance."