One Night With My Best Friend's Uncle

Brea Sinclair was finally brought back to her wealthy biological family in New York after years in the Rust Belt. She thought they had missed her, but the reality was sickening. They only brought her back to be a walking bone marrow bank to cure her sister, Caitlynn. Tied to a wooden chair in an abandoned warehouse, Brea could only watch as Caitlynn smiled triumphantly and confessed a horrific truth. Their mother hadn't died of a sudden illness; the Sinclair family had poisoned her for her trust fund. To ensure Brea couldn't fight the marrow harvesting, Caitlynn had a contractor douse the concrete floor in gasoline. "A tragic fire leaving you with third-degree burns and in a comatose state will make the hospital paperwork so much easier." With a serene smile, Caitlynn tossed a lit match into the fuel. As the wall of orange fire swallowed her, melting her clothes to her blistering skin, Brea choked on the smoke and her own distilled hatred. Through the agonizing pain, she swore a silent, bloody oath: if there was a next life, she would carve them all to pieces. Opening her eyes, the roaring fire and searing heat instantly vanished, replaced by the mechanical rumbling of train tracks. She was staring at her unburned, eighteen-year-old reflection in a grimy window. She was back on the night train to New York, on the exact day her nightmare began. This time, she was going to tear the Sinclair family apart from the inside.

My ex-boyfriend of three years, Axel, married a perfect wealthy heiress. I attended his wedding, not to mourn our relationship, but because he had spent the last three years bleeding me dry. He left me with absolutely nothing but a final notice from the hospital for my dying brother's life support. Instead of feeling guilty, Axel cornered me in the church hallway, crushing my wrist. "I'll set you up with an apartment. You won't have to work another day in your life." He thought he could buy my silence with spare change, while leaving my seventeen-year-old brother, Julian, to die when his treatments were cut off the very next day. When I refused to be his dirty little secret, Axel used his power to utterly destroy my acting career. He had my talent agency terminate my contract under a fake morals clause, publicly humiliated me on set, and blacklisted me across the entire industry. I was shoved out into the freezing rain, left with a torn dress and absolutely no way to pay the five hundred thousand dollar medical bill. He actually believed he could step on my brother's dying body to build his own fake empire. He thought I was just a weak, pathetic victim who would eventually crawl back to him on my knees. But he forgot about the one monster he was absolutely terrified of: his legitimate, ruthless billionaire half-brother, Jace Bauer. Looking at the three positive pregnancy tests hidden in my drawer, I stepped right in front of Jace's armored Maybach. "Marry me, and I'll give you the heir you need to secure your empire."

I was married to billionaire Alessandro Dorsey for four years. The only person in his cold, elite family who truly cared for me was his grandfather. But when his grandfather suddenly passed away, my husband dragged me to the freshly dug grave and threw a newspaper in my face. The headline blamed me for his death. Before I could process the grief, Alessandro forced me to my knees in front of dozens of flashing cameras. "Admit your negligence, or you will never see the sun rise in this city again." He threatened to destroy my own family if I didn't publicly apologize for a crime I didn't commit. Back at the estate, his mother falsely accused me of stealing a priceless family heirloom. I begged my husband to believe me, but he just looked at me with disgust, froze all my personal bank accounts, and handed me a divorce agreement. Sign it, forfeit everything, and erase my identity, or go to prison. I was stripped of my dignity, my money, and the man I loved. I fled New York with nothing, only to discover I was pregnant with his triplets. For years, the injustice burned in my chest. How could the man who once meant safety throw me to the wolves without a second thought? Five years later, I stepped back into the city with my three children. This time, I wasn't the broken woman he discarded, but a powerful gemologist ready to tear down his empire.

I gave up my twenty-billion-dollar inheritance and cut ties with my family, all for my boyfriend of five years, Ignatz. But just as I was about to tell him I was pregnant with our child, he dropped a bombshell. He needed me to take the fall for his childhood sweetheart, Everleigh. She'd been in a hit-and-run, and her career couldn't handle the scandal. When I refused and told him about our baby, his face went cold. He told me to terminate the pregnancy immediately. "Everleigh is the woman I love," he said. "Finding out you're pregnant with my child would destroy her." He had his assistant schedule the appointment and sent me to the clinic alone. There, the nurse told me the procedure carried a high risk of permanent infertility. He knew. And he still sent me. I walked out of that clinic, choosing to keep my child. At that exact moment, a news alert lit up my phone. It was a glowing article announcing that Ignatz and Everleigh were expecting their first child, complete with a photo of his hand resting protectively on her stomach. My world shattered. Wiping away a tear, I found the number I hadn't called in five years. "Dad," I whispered, my voice breaking. "I'm ready to come home."

I was the wolfless, arranged mate to Alpha Kain of the Blackwood Pack. The positive pregnancy test in my hand was a miracle, the only hope I had left to salvage our freezing marriage. But when I went to share the wonderful news, he coldly slid a *Dissolution of Union Agreement* across the table. His ex-girlfriend, Galilea, the "true Luna," had returned. Overnight, my world was destroyed. Kain paraded her around the pack, suffocating me with her scent, and forced me to hand over my hard-earned career campaigns to her as a welcome gift. My packmates mocked my wolfless existence, even twisting my father's heroic death into a cheap transaction. But the most devastating blow came when I tentatively asked Kain what he would do if we had a child. "I would not allow a pup born from a bond I intend to sever to see the light of day." He would kill his own flesh and blood just to wipe the slate clean for her. The sacred mate-bond designed by the Moon Goddess meant absolutely nothing to him but a disposable debt. I was paralyzed by the injustice, terrified for the tiny, condemned life growing inside my womb. Staring at the man who was supposed to be my soul's other half, my bleeding heart finally turned to cold ash. I swallowed my secret, walked into his office, and calmly asked when the rejection would be finalized. I needed to run.

When I was being torn apart alive by starving dogs in an abandoned warehouse, my fiancé Forrest was drinking whiskey in our penthouse. I had called him begging for help when the serial killer cornered me, but he just yelled at me over the loud party music. "I never want to hear your voice again," he had snarled, before hanging up and leaving me to die. After my brutal death, my soul was dragged back to our shared home. I watched Forrest pull his new lover, Evelin, into his arms, letting her wear my clothes while my blood was still wet on the concrete. When the police showed him photos of my blood-soaked purse and the absolute carnage of the crime scene, he didn't shed a single tear. "She's faking it," he sneered to the detective. "She probably bought pig's blood to stage this little play just to force me to marry her." He completely erased five years of my devotion, reducing my horrific murder to a pathetic, jealous tantrum. I couldn't understand how he could be so cruel, abandoning me in the freezing rain while I was pregnant with his child just to comfort Evelin. But as my ghostly form floated above my own corpse, the terrifying truth finally hit me. Evelin hadn't just stolen my fiancé. She had deliberately dressed me in a floral gown, knowing it was the exact trigger for a local serial killer, and spoofed Forrest's phone to lure me into the trap. They think they have won, burying my existence under perfect lies. But as a dark, violent energy begins to pulse through my translucent hands, they are about to learn a terrifying lesson. A woman scorned is dangerous, but a murdered woman is a force of nature.