Qing Gongzi

For three years, I stayed in the shadows as the secret girlfriend of Briar University's star hockey player. But when I woke up in the hospital, I was greeted by a screaming campus headline: he had just publicly claimed my stepsister as his new queen. My own mother didn't even ask why I had fainted. She called to force me into a blind date for her social climbing, coldly warning me not to embarrass myself over a man who was a "perfect match" for her stepdaughter. Meanwhile, my stepsister paraded around with my boyfriend, playing the innocent victim while living comfortably in my late father's house. I was reduced to the ultimate fool, a dirty little secret everyone laughed at. Three years of my devotion, completely trashed for their calculated business merger. They thought I was just a timid mouse who would hide in a corner, crying over a lying bastard while they took everything I had left. But they were dead wrong. I wiped my tears, extorted my father's hotel shares from my mother, and walked straight into that high-end restaurant. Instead of my mother's pawn, I sat across from Collier Rivers, the legendary heir to Boston's most powerful sports dynasty. "I need a contract husband for one year." Within twenty-four hours, I had a marriage certificate, his heavy jacket on my shoulders, and a plan to take back my home.

In her past life, she watched her brother, Andrew, destroy himself for a woman who never loved him. Family fortune gone. Their father's company gutted. Andrew framed, disgraced, dead in a prison cell. Then Chloe was pushed off a rooftop. The last thing she saw before the pavement shattered her body was Sloane Ashford's face-standing at the edge, smiling down at her broken form. That smile was the last thing she ever saw. Until she opened her eyes. Twenty-two years old. Two years before everything went wrong. The exact day Andrew was about to put a ring on Sloane's finger. This time, Chloe wouldn't scream at him. She wouldn't beg. She knew exactly what her brother feared more than anything-his sworn enemy, Julian Kensington. "What if I slept with my brother's worst enemy?" The thought was insane. She bought a custom body chain with the Kensington family crest engraved on its clasp. She slipped into a silk nightgown that left little to the imagination. She called her brother on video, let the camera pan lazily across her rumpled bed, and held up her new "gift" with a wicked smile. "Look what Julian gave me. Beautiful, isn't it?" The bait was set. The trap snapped shut. Andrew canceled the proposal. He raced home. Sloane was dragged out of Sterling Tower by security, soaked in rain, humiliated on every news channel in the city. Chloe's plan had worked perfectly. Too perfectly. On the other end of that video call-watching the entire performance from his sleek Manhattan office-Julian Kensington had one question. The girl he'd never met was wearing his family crest. His name was on her lips. And she was using him as a weapon. He leaned back in his chair, gray eyes fixed on the frozen image of her wrist, that delicate gold chain, that unmistakable griffin crest.

I was devastated when my boyfriend dumped me for my best friend, Candice. To numb the pain, I got blackout drunk and ended up having a wild one-night stand. The next morning, reality hit me like a truck when I realized the man in my bed was Jame Knight. He was Candice's older brother and the most feared, ruthless Alpha in our Pack. He coldly offered me a blank check to buy my silence, and I fled the penthouse in absolute humiliation. But returning home was a worse nightmare. I found my mother had given my late grandmother's precious moonstone necklace to Candice to "comfort" her. When I desperately demanded it back, my own mother and brother violently turned against me. "You are so selfish! Junior chose her because she is better!" They defended my cheating ex's new girlfriend and threw me to the wolves, all because they wanted to suck up to the powerful Knight family. I was completely abandoned by my own blood, my heart turning to ice. Why did my family treat me like trash while treating my tormentor like royalty? If power was the only language they understood, then I needed the ultimate power to crush them all. I pulled out my phone, ready to cash in the one favor Jame Knight owed me. But before I could dial, my mother frantically called me back to the living room. Jame Knight was sitting on our sofa. He placed my repaired necklace on the table, coldly announced to my terrified family that I was under his protection, and declared he was moving in.

Ciel rushed to the VIP hospital suite, terrified by an "urgent" text about her husband's grandmother. Instead, she found her billionaire husband, Dion, tenderly comforting his mistress, Baylie. Dion threw a separation agreement on the table, demanding Ciel take the public blame for his infidelity and leave with nothing. "Sign it," Dion sneered, "or tomorrow morning, every sordid detail of your time in the foster system will be on the front page." He threatened her with her sealed childhood records—the deepest, most painful trauma she had guarded with her life. The cruelty didn't stop there. To protect his mistress's fraudulent charity, Dion used his corporate power to get Ciel suspended from her law firm. Worse, just to punish Ciel, he deliberately funded a known domestic abuser, giving the monster the financial power to take away the children of Ciel's only pro bono client. For three years, Ciel had been a silent, obedient wife. She had endured his coldness, even foolishly hoping for the anniversary diamond necklace that she ultimately saw sparkling around Baylie's neck. How could the man who once vowed to protect her weaponize her deepest scars and destroy innocent lives just to prove he could? But the despair finally burned down to ash. Ciel didn't cry or beg. She calmly left the antique wedding ring on his pillow, shredded their only wedding photo, and completely erased her digital footprint from his world. When Dion finally realized what he had lost, the game had already changed.

I was a Vampire Princess, mated and married to an Alpha werewolf. But our child was neither vampire nor werewolf; he was nothing but a scrawny, feral mutt. In a fit of rage, Kaelen killed him and banished me. To save my baby, I drained every drop of my magic and died completely. Five hundred years after my death, Kaelen came seeking my heart to ensure his new Luna could bear an heir. "Five hundred years... has she learned her lesson? Tell her to offer up her heart, and I might just forgive her this once." But when he finally learned of my death, he fell to his knees before my grave, weeping and begging for forgiveness.

My husband, Hudson Higgins, used my dowry to buy his way into the Chicago underworld while his family treated me like a servant in my own home. I endured their insults for the sake of my five-year-old daughter, Josie. But then, the unthinkable happened. I found Josie's small, lifeless body by the garden fountain, while my sister-in-law Karly and mother-in-law Eleanor stood by, complaining about their party plans. "She was just too naughty," Karly sneered, adjusting her pearls over my dead child. When I turned to Hudson for help, he looked at me with dead eyes and told me it was just her fate. In that moment of absolute grief, I remembered the words of the ruthless Don Damien Falcone: "Your husband is a man who knows how to close a deal." The truth sliced through me like a blade. Hudson hadn't just ignored the Don's interest in me; he had actively sold me to the Devil of Chicago to buy his seat at the table. He let his family punish me for the very sin he committed. I had lost everything-my dignity, my mother, and now my baby-all sacrificed for a man who traded his wife's body for power. The sorrow in my chest evaporated, replaced by a scorching, blinding thirst for a blood vendetta. After lunging at Hudson and feeling the world explode into white, I opened my eyes to find myself back in the winter of 1928. It was the exact night the nightmare began, and Don Damien Falcone was walking toward me in his penthouse. This time, I won't be the broken bird in his gilded cage. If Hudson wants to use me to climb the ranks, I will use the Don's dark obsession to burn the Higgins family to the ground.

My husband gave $250,000 of our life savings to his mistress for a fake surgery. I had sacrificed my own career to build his, and this was my reward. When I confronted him, he twisted our deepest shared trauma into a weapon. "You were so quick to get rid of our first baby, weren't you?" he sneered. His words hit me just hours after I had secretly terminated our second pregnancy-a choice his cruelty had forced upon me. I found him at the hospital comforting her, and he shoved me to the ground in front of a crowd, calling me heartless. He brought her back to our home, wrapping her in my favorite blanket on my sofa, while I was still reeling from the loss of our child. He thought our twenty years together meant I would always forgive him, that our love was a fortress. He was about to learn it was a house of cards, and I was holding the match.

I stood at the edge of the freezing pond on the Boone estate, my body trembling with a fear that rattled my bones. Across from me, Amanda Olsen looked immaculate in her cashmere coat, a sharp contrast to the jagged reality I was trying to hold together. "Why?" I whispered. Amanda just smiled, admitting she killed Grandpa Boone because he actually liked me. She pulled out a thick envelope-divorce papers Cordero had signed that morning. She told me he called me a parasite and was celebrating with her the night I suffered a miscarriage. Before I could even scream, Amanda lunged and shoved me into the icy water. My heavy wool coat acted like a sponge, dragging me into the artificial abyss. I thrashed and gasped for air, but Amanda just stood on the bank, watching me drown with her hands tucked casually in her pockets. As my lungs burned and the darkness closed in, I realized I had spent my entire marriage taking their abuse. I was the "foster trash" and the "gold digger" who let them win every single time. I was dying alone, hated by the husband I had tried so hard to love, while my murderer stood victorious on the shore. I never fought back. I just let them destroy me. Then, a violent spasm tore through my body. I sat up gasping, sucking in dry, air-conditioned oxygen instead of murky pond water. I wasn't dead. I was back in the opulent master suite, surrounded by red rose petals and wedding decorations. The digital clock glowed: October 14, 2019. I had gone back five years to the very night my nightmare began. The bathroom door clicked open, and Cordero stepped out, looking at me with the same cold disgust I remembered. But as I gripped the silk sheets, a new resolve hardened in my chest. This time, I wasn't going to be the victim. This time, the Boone family was going to find out exactly what happens when you push someone too far.

My rival' s lies got me expelled from USC. The fight with my parents that followed was our last; they died in a car crash that night, leaving me with crushing debt and my rebellious brother, Bennie. To save Bennie from jail time over a fight he didn't start, I took a humiliating job at a high-end nightclub, a place where my dignity was the price of admission. There, I was forced to kneel before my ex-fiancé, Demetri. He watched with cold indifference, now engaged to the very woman who destroyed my life. He was even the lawyer for the family Bennie had supposedly bullied, his voice a weapon as he publicly shamed me. He was my everything, yet he believed I was a monster. He stood by as my world crumbled, choosing to defend the woman who orchestrated my downfall. After the truth was finally exposed, he sacrificed everything for me, losing his career and fortune in a desperate attempt at redemption. But it was too late. I had already taken my brother and moved to New York, ready to build a new life and find new love, far from the man who shattered my old one.

The alarm shrieked through the silent mansion, a sound I knew better than my own heartbeat. For fifteen years, I had been Dorian Steele' s living, breathing medicine, my blood the only cure for his fatal seizures. But then, his fiancée, Ainsley, arrived. She was flawless, a vision of cold, stunning beauty, and she looked like she belonged here. He shoved me away from him, pulling the silk sheets up to cover my worn pajamas as if I were something dirty. "Kira, clean this mess up. And get out." He dismissed me like a servant, after clinging to me for life just moments before. The next morning, she sat in my chair, wearing his shirt, a love bite visible on her neck. She taunted me, and when I spilled coffee, he didn't even notice, too busy laughing with her. Later, Ainsley accused me of breaking Eleanor' s prized porcelain vase. Dorian, without question, believed her. He forced me to my knees on the broken shards, the pain searing my flesh. "Apologize," he growled, pressing down on my shoulder. I whispered my apology, each word a surrender. Then, they drained my blood for her, for a fabricated illness. "Ainsley needs this," he said, his voice flat. "She's more important." More important than the girl who had given him her life. I was a resource to be exploited, a well that would never run dry. He had promised he would always protect me, but now he was the one holding the sword. I was nothing more than a pet, a creature he kept for his own survival. But I was done. I accepted an offer from the Estes family, a desperate, archaic idea of a "propitious marriage" to their comatose son, Emmett. It was my only escape.

After donating bone marrow to save my brother, a rare complication put me in a coma for five years. When I woke up, I found my family had replaced me. They had a new daughter, Hailie, a girl who looked just like me. They told me my jealousy over her caused a car crash that forced Hailie and my parents into hiding. To make me atone, my fiancé, Caleb, and my brother locked me in an isolated villa for three years. I was their prisoner, their slave, enduring their beatings because I believed my suffering was the price for my family's safety. Then, a doctor told me I had terminal lung cancer. My body was failing, but my tormentors decided on one last act of "kindness"-a surprise birthday trip to a luxury resort. There, I saw them all. My parents, my brother, my fiancé, and Hailie, alive and well, drinking champagne. I overheard their plan. My torture wasn't penance. It was a "lesson" to break me. My entire life had become a cruel joke. So, on my birthday, I walked to the highest bridge on the island, left behind my medical diagnosis and a recording of Hailie's confession, and jumped.

My husband, David, beamed with pride at our son Ethan' s university acceptance. I sat across the table, a ghost in a designer dress, invisible. I was the silent engine of their success, but tonight, I was out of fuel. That night, a notification from our shared cloud storage revealed David' s secret: a photo album of him and a young flight attendant, Olivia Hayes, on romantic trips. My heart shattered as I recognized a delicate silver necklace on her-the one I' d admired and hinted at to David, which he' d bought for her. When David and Ethan walked in, their laughter died as they found me on the floor, the truth exposed on my phone. David' s anger flared, accusing me of being hysterical, while Ethan, his loyalty firmly with his father, told me not to ruin their night. David then casually tossed a credit card at me, thinking money could fix everything. I refused, my voice clear and steady as they walked away, leaving me alone in the house I had built, a home where I no longer belonged. The man I married, who once vowed "Wherever you go, I will go," had just run to another woman as I lay bleeding on the airport lounge floor after an explosion. He didn't even glance back. That crystal-clear moment solidified everything: he wouldn't save me, he wouldn't even try. I looked at him, the stranger he had become. "I want a divorce, David," I declared, my voice loud and clear, silencing the chaos around us. I knew then that the only thing I regretted was not ending this sooner.

My hands methodically folded a sweater, placing it into an open suitcase on the bed, sharp creases betraying the inner turmoil I tried to hide. Outside, New York City glittered, oblivious, my life' s soundtrack of distant sirens and traffic hum now signaling its end. An email confirmed it: one-way ticket, New York to Rome. Then the elevator dinged. He was home, and he wasn' t alone. Liam O' Connell, my partner of eight years for whom I' d put my own promising career on hold, walked in with his protégé, Chloe Davis, draped over his arm, their laughter about a private joke stopping short at the sight of my packed bags. Chloe' s sharp eyes surveyed the scene, a triumphant smirk playing on her lips before she feigned concern, asking if I was redecorating. Liam' s charming smile faltered, replaced by annoyance, and he accused me of being dramatic, as if my leaving was just a tantrum. I had built his tech empire with my architectural eye, crafted presentations that won investors, only for him to shatter our partnership and give me a front-row seat to his betrayal. The man who once promised me everything on a Brooklyn fire escape, now stood before me, offering a new car key-a desperate, material bribe-for the wound that cut straight to my soul. He fundamentally misunderstood; he thought my love was a negotiation, a problem to be managed. "You were sleeping with your protégé, Liam," I stated, my voice steady, cutting through his classic, cowardly excuse that "it just happened." He dismissed eight years of my life, of my love, as meaningless, claiming Chloe was young, confused, and looked up to him. But I saw his profound, unshakable disrespect. I had given him everything, only to be replaced by a newer, shinier model, a cruel commodity in his world. "No, it' s not complicated," I said, ringing with clarity. "You made a choice. And now, I' m making mine." As the car sped towards the airport, I pulled out my phone and turned it off, leaving him on the sidewalk with his useless car key. This wasn' t an escape; it was a homecoming. I was flying towards a future I would build for myself, free from a man who knew the price of everything and the value of nothing.

I was 17, a perfect 1600 on my practice SAT in hand, and my controlling mother, Maria, was smiling. It was the unsettling, predatory smile that always preceded the worst moments of my first life. "Hypothetically," she purred, "would you swap that score with Jennifer, just to see your twin sister happy?" I was a fool then, so desperate for her approval, so blind to the truth, that I said yes. That "yes" sealed my fate: Jennifer stole my academic success, got into an Ivy League, and became a lauded 'genius' influencer. I was left with her failing grades, denied every opportunity, condemned to dead-end jobs, and ultimately, died agonizingly young in a hospital bed. My parents watched me fade, their low voices filled with chilling satisfaction, not grief. "Stella was born to ensure Jennifer's success," my mother had said, "It's her purpose. She served it well." That day, I learned my life was a resource pack, a disposable battery for my sister. But then, darkness turned to blinding light, and I gasped, bolting upright on our floral living room sofa. The same sun streamed through the window, the dust motes danced as before. My mother looked up from her phone, that same predatory gleam in her eyes, about to ask the same question. This time, no. This time, things would be different.

The Citadel' s emergency comms system exploded with red alerts. I was at my post, ready to defend, until I saw the man I loved, Matthew, my fiancé, leading his entire elite team off-campus for a supposed "training exercise." It was a lie orchestrated by his obsession with Sabrina, the newest recruit they were celebrating in downtown. In another life, I' d chased after them, only to witness Sabrina' s capture and execution, leading Matthew' s grief-fueled rage to turn on me, ultimately putting a bullet in my head. This time, I stayed, determined to change our fate, but Matthew' s arrogance and blinding infatuation led to a new nightmare. He cut me off, refused to believe the attack was real, clinging to his misplaced trust in Sabrina while the Citadel fell, his mother Maria captured and later brutally killed. Then came the accusation, an echo of my past: Matthew, again consumed by rage and manipulated by Scythe' s lies, aimed his gun at me, blaming me for his mother's death. Why did he always fall for the trap? How could he be so blind? But then, a loyal junior agent burst in, exposing Sabrina as the hidden daughter of Scythe' s leader, the true mole who poisoned our team. As Matthew' s world shattered, his father, Director Lester, stepped in, putting a decisive end to Sabrina' s treachery. Now, I'm back, armed with knowledge of betrayal and a second chance, tasked with rebuilding the Citadel from ashes. But the phantom pain of Matthew' s first betrayal and the searing memory of his bullet still haunt me.

My mother-in-law, Brenda, a vision of fragile piety, sat pregnant on my porch swing. Everyone saw a grieving widow; I saw a master manipulator. Then he arrived-the man who looked exactly like my husband, Mike, but wasn't. He defended Brenda's fake theatrics, grabbing my arm when I refused her water. Something inside me snapped. I slapped him. Brenda' s false shock turned the town against me, labeling me "unhinged." My imposter "husband" systematically destroyed my memories, even disassembling our baby' s crib. He called the sheriff, painting me a deranged threat. At a public ceremony honoring my real husband, Brenda feigned a fall, inducing premature labor. Amidst the horror, 'Mike' then accused me of infidelity, twisting my miscarriage into a tale of instability. The town condemned me, believing every word. I was the villain, the crazy wife; their judgment was a scorching fire. They thought they saw a monster. But their entire world was a carefully constructed lie. And I held the truth. "There is shame in this family," I declared, my voice cutting through their righteous fury, "but it's not mine." My methodical vengeance was about to dismantle everything.

For five years, I chased Marcus Thorne' s ghost. My husband, a test pilot, vanished, but I refused to believe he was gone. I sold my house, exhausted my savings, working endless shifts to fund my search. My last treasure, my father' s telescope, was pawned for a gala ticket-a chance at closure. At that glittering event, I saw him. Marcus. Alive. He smirked beside my stepsister, Izzy Vance. "She actually did it, Marcus! Pathetic," Izzy scoffed, revealing their cruel prank. His eyes, tender for Izzy but ice-cold for me, confirmed his betrayal. He blamed my father for Izzy's fake scar, claiming my family "owed" them. My five years of grief? A calculated lie to punish me. They publicly shamed me, then imprisoned me, slowly destroying my spirit. How could the man I loved orchestrate such monstrous cruelty with my own stepsister? Every taunt, every manipulation, the deliberate shattering of my father' s telescope-why this relentless torment? What secret sin warranted such vengeance? But when they framed me for arson, then abandoned me in the scorching desert with rattlesnake attractant, nearing death, a new fire blazed. I would not be their casualty.

My life was a perpetual grind, a blur of diner shifts and endless cleaning jobs. Every ache, every sleepless night was for him, for Mike, and the "debt" he owed to the terrifying Desert Scorpions motorcycle gang. Fifty thousand dollars, he said, or they'd kill him. I sold my mother's locket, praying it would buy his safety, buy our future. My son, six-year-old Leo, coughed beside me, his asthma worsening, the inhaler almost empty. I kept telling him, "Mommy's getting the money, sweetie. Daddy's going to be safe, and then we can get you the best doctor." But one night, Leo's struggle for breath became a desperate fight for air. Panic seizing me, I scooped up his limp body, clutching the crumpled "debt" money, and ran into the street. "Children's clinic, fast!" I screamed to the cab driver. The city lights blurred, Leo gasped, and then, a terrible, final silence filled my arms. He was gone. My baby was gone. Numb, I stumbled towards the warehouse Mike described, Leo's cold ashes in my bag, still with the money for his "contact." But then, Mike's voice drifted out, light and cruel: "This 'Scorpion' scare was genius. Got her working like a dog." "So, no actual threat?" I heard. "Nah. Just needed to keep her on the hook. Tiffany's wanting that new kitchen, and Cody's birthday is next month." My world shattered. Leo died for a lie. The money felt like poison, his ashes like lead. A cold, hard resolve solidified in my heart. Mike Johnson would pay.

Bella only found out her husband Adam had betrayed her when she was already pregnant. Not only did he take everything from her, but he even twisted the knife of betrayal upon divorcing her right after she had given birth. Now, all she could do is grit her teeth and walk away. However, the truth shed light on both parties, and Adam soon realized the misunderstandings and misfortunes that had coated their relationship from the very start. Determined to get her back, he promised to pursue her no matter how hard she refuses him. He wanted another chance. She wanted him gone. Would they ever mend their broken trust or would both of them live forever in regret?

Chloe had just given birth to twins, lying exhausted in a cramped, bustling hospital ward. When she called her husband, Julian, he was busy partying with his actress mistress. He coldly hung up on her, having already drafted a brutal divorce agreement that would leave her with a pittance. Strangers in the next bed loudly mocked her pitiful state, gossiping about how Julian was dumping her. For years, Chloe had erased her own identity to fit into his elite world, only to be thrown away like garbage. She was completely alone, clutching her helpless babies, bracing herself to sign the cruel papers just to survive. She couldn't understand why her absolute devotion was met with such chilling indifference. Why did she have to suffer this ultimate humiliation while he celebrated with the woman who ruined her life? But then, a senior doctor noticed a unique mole on her wrist and ran a secret DNA test. The results were staggering: Chloe was the long-lost daughter of the billionaire Beaumont family. With her fiercely protective parents and three powerful brothers suddenly forming an impenetrable fortress around her, Chloe picked up her phone and texted her arrogant husband. "City Hall tomorrow at 10 AM. If you don't show up, my lawyer will handle everything. And trust me, you won't like their terms."

Five years ago, I stood in the freezing rain at my mother's funeral, waiting for my husband. Blake Knight, the billionaire NHL superstar, was two hours late. When he finally showed up, he brought his rumored girlfriend, the woman he had just rented a hotel rooftop for to celebrate her birthday. Watching him defend her fake tears, my heart completely died. I took off my diamond wedding ring, placed it on my mother's headstone, and walked away from my marriage forever. I fled to London, changed my name to Ava, and secretly raised the triplets he never knew existed. I thought I was finally safe from him. But today, my kids vandalized a silver Aston Martin in our apartment's parking garage, and the owner caught my youngest daughter. My phone rang. The voice on the other end was Blake's. He had moved into my building, and he was holding my little girl in his penthouse, demanding her mother come get her immediately. Panic suffocated me. If I walked through that door, my five years of hiding would be instantly destroyed. He would recognize me, realize I didn't get rid of our child like everyone thought, and he would use all his power to take my babies away. I couldn't let him ruin my life again. "I'm just her nanny," I lied through my teeth. I frantically begged my best friend to go upstairs and rescue my daughter in my place. He bought the disguise, but now, the King of the Ice is dangerously obsessed with investigating my new identity.

She married him out of desperation, becoming the perfect docile wife while he treated her like dirt beneath his shoes. But everything shattered the night she overheard him mocking her with his friends-and discovered the necklace she'd cherished, her only link to the boy who once saved her life, didn't even belong to him. It was all a lie. No longer the doormat he married, she discards her fake identity and reclaims her birthright as the hidden heiress of Salvadore City. Now she's on a mission: find the necklace's true owner among his circle of friends, no matter how many hearts she has to break along the way. But her husband isn't ready to let go. Convinced she's playing games to make him jealous, he's blindsided when divorce papers land in his hands. By the time he realizes the woman he dismissed was never who he thought she was, she's already moved on-living her truth, chasing her destiny, and leaving him choking on regret. Some cages, once opened, can never be closed again.

My stepmother’s bodyguards were seconds away from dragging me back to a life that was essentially a prison cell wrapped in silk. I couldn't even scream for help because the words always died in my throat—a clinical condition called selective mutism that felt like drowning on dry land. I had just discovered the sickening truth: my father was planning to sell me to a sleazy investor named Sterling to cover his company’s bankruptcy. They were going to drug me, ship me off to a private island, and strip away the only thing I had left—my late mother’s multimillion-dollar art trust. When I arrived at the manor, my stepmother Lydia handed me a glass of wine laced with bitter sedatives, her smile sharp as a razor. "Drink up, darling. It’ll make the transition to Mr. Sterling much easier." My stepsister Harper stood in the corner, wearing a dress bought with my mother’s stolen money, mocking my inability to speak. My father didn't even look me in the eye as he calculated my price tag, treating his own daughter like a piece of damaged, mute inventory. They thought because I didn't speak, I didn't hear them laughing about the "accident" that killed my mother or how they planned to burn her final restoration work. They assumed my silence was a sign of surrender, a white flag waved by a broken girl who would never fight back. How could the people who were supposed to be my family treat me like a commodity to be traded? Did they really think my silence meant I was weak, or that I didn't know every dirty secret they were hiding in their ledgers? I didn't drink the wine. Instead, I burst into the VIP suite of Carlisle Pierce, the most cold-blooded billionaire in New York, and slammed a crumpled napkin on his table with a desperate, last-second gambit. "MARRY ME. NOW. $1 MILLION."

On our third anniversary, my husband canceled our dinner, claiming a sudden work emergency. I tracked his phone to an exclusive French restaurant, only to find him tenderly fastening a blessed bracelet—one I had flown across the world to get for him—onto his college ex-girlfriend's wrist. The sheer shock triggered a violent placental abruption. Bleeding out in my car just across the street, I frantically called his number. Through the window, I watched him glance at his screen, frown in annoyance, and press decline to focus on his lover. While I was wheeled into a freezing operating room for an emergency C-section utterly alone, he took his mistress back to our marital bed. He didn't even bother to check if I was alive, completely oblivious that our premature daughter was fighting for her life in the NICU. I soon discovered our entire marriage was a sham. He had used my family's wealth to save his company, and now he was trading me to secure a massive business deal with his ex's father. The man I loved didn't exist; he only saw me as a disposable asset. "I'm going to make him wish he had never been born." After secretly securing my baby in a private retreat, I ordered a medical-grade silicone pregnancy belly to hide my flat stomach. I stepped back into our penthouse, ready to burn his precious empire to the ground.

My sister-in-law didn't want me to marry for love. She wanted me to marry rich-so she could turn my husband into her personal ATM. So I did the one thing guaranteed to ruin all her plans. I got myself a broke hockey player. At least, that's what everyone was supposed to believe. Beckett Hayes needed a girlfriend badly. The Chicago hockey star had a reputation problem, angry sponsors, and too many headlines painting him as arrogant, reckless, and impossible to settle down. I needed a man convincing enough to stop my family from arranging my future for me. Our solution was simple: fake date. His rules were even simpler. Live in his shabby apartment. Help sell the struggling-player act. Smile for the cameras. No real feelings. Easy. Until my family showed up to mock the "loser" I'd chosen-and Beckett stepped between us like they had insulted something that belonged to him. Until he put a no-limit black card in my hand and told me to stop sacrificing my dream of becoming an artist just because I was afraid to spend money. Until our fake dinners started feeling domestic, his hand started finding mine under the table, and I began forgetting that every protective look and possessive touch was supposed to be part of the contract. Then Beckett's grandfather arrived at our tiny apartment wearing cashmere, flanked by bodyguards, carrying a priceless Hayes family heirloom for me. Apparently, pretending to be broke was the easy part. Pretending I wasn't falling for my fake boyfriend was becoming impossible. Especially when his grandfather took our only bedroom and left Beckett and me with one pullout sofa, one night, and absolutely nowhere left to hide.

As I lay on the floor of our manor, bleeding out from a ruptured ectopic pregnancy, I used my last ounce of strength to call my husband, Cole. I begged him for help, my vision blurring. But the only thing I heard was the clinking of champagne glasses and his mistress's giggle in the background. "Stop the drama, June," Cole snapped, his voice cold. "We're about to go on stage. Don't call again." He hung up, leaving me to die alone on the Persian rug while he accepted an award with another woman on his arm. I woke up in the hospital days later. My baby was gone. They had removed my fallopian tube. Cole finally arrived, smelling of expensive scotch and his mistress's perfume. He didn't hug me. He didn't cry. Instead, he leaned over my hospital bed, pressing his knee into the mattress until my fresh stitches tore open and bled. "You embarrassed me by calling an ambulance," he hissed. "My mistress, Alycia, says you're faking it. Clean yourself up." He left me bleeding again to go announce a $10 million donation to Alycia's "groundbreaking" medical research. I stared at the TV screen, numb. The research Alycia was taking credit for? It was mine. I wrote that patent years ago under a pseudonym. They thought I was just a poor, orphan housewife who needed Cole's money to survive. They had no idea I was actually a billionaire scientist hiding my identity. I pulled the IV needle out of my arm. A drop of blood fell onto the divorce papers I had been hiding. I didn't wipe it off. I signed my name right over it. Then I walked into the bank, reactivated my dormant account with $128 million, and bought the penthouse directly overlooking Cole's house. The mourning widow is dead. The avenger is born.

I was an intern nurse working exhausting shifts, yet my mother constantly forced me into blind dates with wealthy, arrogant men to secure our family's social standing. During a terrifying hospital lockdown, an assassin disguised as a doctor held a scalpel to my throat. I was almost killed, but a high-ranking military colonel threw his own body down a flight of concrete stairs to shield me. I survived with cuts and bruises, but when I went home, my mother didn't care about my near-death experience. She was only furious that I had rushed out on my blind date with Preston, a rich financial analyst. She forced me to meet him to apologize. When Preston grabbed my arm, bruised me, and mocked my attack as a pathetic lie, my mother still took his side. "Men get angry," she told me coldly. "It's your job not to provoke them. You will beg for his forgiveness, or you are no longer welcome in this house." I had narrowly escaped an assassin, yet my own family was willing to feed me to a monster just for a fat paycheck and neighborhood gossip. My heart went completely dead. So, when the intimidating Colonel appeared, offering me maximum military protection through a sudden marriage, I didn't hesitate. I walked back into my parents' house and calmly slapped a crisp marriage certificate onto the coffee table. "I won't be apologizing to Preston. I got married today."

I was carefully folding a new silk nightgown, ready to fly to New York and surprise my fiancé of several years, Donald. Then my phone pinged with a photo from my stepsister, Cindy. It was a high-resolution image of her and Donald, tangled together naked on messy bedsheets. On his arm was the one-of-a-kind silver bracelet I had custom-designed for his birthday last month. Cindy was staring right at the camera with a triumphant, provocative smile. A second message popped up: "Omg, sis, so sorry! Sent that by accident!" It was a blatant, mocking slap in the face. Later, I even intercepted a call where Donald laughed with his mother about how my declining family was just a worthless stepping stone for them. He called me a "boring, good girl" who was easy to manage, bragging that he would just go back to having his fun with Cindy right after our wedding. They really thought I was just a naive fool who would either come crying to him or quietly swallow this humiliating betrayal. They thought my silence meant I was weak and defeated. But I didn't shed a single tear, nor did I scream. A cold, sharp anger shot up my spine, extinguishing every last ember of heartbreak. I threw the silk nightgown into the trash, opened my laptop, and used my MIT computer science background to hack straight into their luxury hotel suite's smart system. I wasn't going to New York to cry. I was going to broadcast their filthy affair to the entire city at the most prestigious charity gala of the year.

I gave up my college dreams and spent every penny I had to support my boyfriend Boyce's NHL ambitions. But as I lay dying in a damp hospital room, I called him begging for treatment money, only to hear his new girlfriend laughing on the line. Boyce coldly called me a useless "Puck Bunny" and a convenient ATM before hanging up. Moments later, his new girl Beryl called back to deliver a truth that shattered my reality. "Do you know how you got sick? It wasn't an accident." Boyce had deliberately arranged for me to be infected with HIV. He thought I was too clingy, and this was the easiest way to get rid of me so he could chase his hockey dreams without baggage. Just before I took my last breath, a man arrived to save me, sent by Case Hoover-a wealthy fiancé from an old family arrangement I had completely forgotten. The irony was crushing. I had destroyed my life serving a monster who murdered me, while my actual fiancé tried to protect me. I died in excruciating agony, my soul held together by nothing but pure, bottomless hatred. Why was I so blind? Why did I give everything to a man with a heart blacker than a starless night? Opening my eyes, I gasped for air, finding myself staring at my healthy, eighteen-year-old reflection in the mirror. I was reborn in my senior year of high school. This time, I wouldn't be his stepping stone; I was going to make him pay the ultimate price.