Loves Reckoning
/1/129726/coverbig.jpg?v=d952b45e9b05aae9f5803a8b2c8d4fc6)
The Hockey Prince's Secret Ice Queen
All I wanted was to find a computer genius to process the non-linear dynamic equations for my ecological model. Instead, I found myself cornered by Julian Andrews, the university's hockey prince, trading a public, staged kiss for his academic support. To finalize our "deal," I was dragged to the campus ice rink. The cheerleaders and puck bunnies immediately swarmed him, mocking my plain clothes and treating me like a pathetic joke. Brooke, the head cheerleader, even set up a figure skating competition with a date with Julian as the grand prize. She performed a basic spin, blew him a kiss, and smugly waited for me to fall flat on my face and humiliate myself. His hockey teammates laughed from the sidelines, watching me try to support Julian as he stumbled around the ice like a newborn giraffe. But as I held his warm hand to keep him from falling, I couldn't help but feel something was terribly wrong. Why was a top-tier athlete faking such awful balance? And why did his ice-blue eyes stare at me with such knowing anticipation, as if he already knew about the professional figure skating past I had spent years trying to bury? "Just let go and skate." He whispered, slowly releasing my hand. I took a deep breath, glided to the center of the rink, and landed a flawless double Axel. As the entire rink fell into a dead, shocked silence, I realized I had just exposed not only my own hidden past, but also the biggest secret of the campus god.
Chapter 1 No.1
Sage POV:
"Let me kiss you."
The request was a low, hurried murmur—warm, quiet, and laced with the faintest edge of mortification.
Stunned, I snapped my head up toward the sound.
Julian Andrews filled my vision. He easily towered a head over me, his lean, athletic frame silhouetted against the bright morning glare, casting a long shadow across the cobblestones. Briar University's star forward. Team captain. The athletic department's untouchable golden boy.
Campus rumor had it that Julian was notoriously indifferent, never sparing anyone a second glance.
Behind him, a solid wall of navy-and-gold varsity jackets blocked the brick path. His teammates were whistling, shoving each other, and effectively cutting off my only exit.
The sudden commotion immediately bottlenecked the morning foot traffic. Whispers rippled through the crowd, and within seconds, a dozen students reached into their pockets out of sheer muscle memory, black camera lenses catching the light as they aimed squarely at us.
Julian's sharp eyes tracked the movement, his jaw tightening into a hard, irritated line.
Before I could take a single defensive step back, he closed the distance between us. Leaning down into my space, his broad shoulders shifted in a subtle, fluid maneuver—throwing up an impenetrable physical wall that completely shielded my face from the intrusive glare of the cameras.
His sharp, striking face hovered breathtakingly close. His deep baritone brushed against my ear, lost to the autumn wind, meant for me alone:
"Sorry to drop this on you," he whispered, his pale blue eyes disarmingly earnest, holding a quiet heat that sent a tremor straight down my spine. "The guys backed me into a locker-room dare... but I'm not here to use you as a joke. We can fake it. Angle it so it looks real—whatever you're comfortable with. Just help me get them off my back, and I owe you one."
It was only then that my brain finally rebooted.
What on earth? He's actually trying to kiss me?
A sharp flare of pure absurdity hit me, and my gaze dropped to my reflection in the dark glass door of the adjacent building: an oversized, faded gray hoodie that swallowed my frame whole, soft, thin jeans worn at the knees, bare-faced dark circles carved beneath my eyes from forty-eight hours of non-stop coding, my dark hair hastily twisted into a cheap plastic claw clip, and a pair of oversized, thick black-rimmed glasses sitting heavy on the bridge of my nose, completely hiding my face.
I looked like a refugee from an all-night disaster. How had Briar's golden prince ended up in front of me?
When I looked back up, my breath trapped in my throat anyway. He was too close, his clean scent of winter mint and cedar wrapping around my senses. Having those pale blue eyes staring straight down at me made my chest tighten in a way I really didn't want to acknowledge.
"Clock's ticking, Cap!" Landon howled from the sidelines, hands cupped around his mouth as the rest of the players lost their minds laughing. "Plant one on her, or enjoy the five-AM bag skate!"
A raucous chorus of barks and chest-thumping went up from the team.
A few yards away, two girls heading toward the dining hall froze in their tracks, pointing their phones.
"Wait, who the hell is that?" one of them laughed loudly, zooming her camera in on my face. "She looks like she just crawled out of a dumpster. There's no way Julian's actually kissing her. Post it on Sidechat right now—this is going straight to number one."
The cruel words hit like a splash of ice water, snapping me out of my daze and instantly killing the stupid flutter in my chest.
I hated the attention.
Four years ago, after my family and my former training partner framed me and destroyed my competitive skating career, I swore I would never be public entertainment again. I buried my name, switched majors, and hid behind oversized fleece and thick glasses just to live an invisible life. If I ended up on the campus forums with Julian Andrews, the internet vultures would dox me before noon—and drag up the toxic scandal I had bled to walk away from.
My research was already on the verge of falling apart. I didn't have time for this circus.
I locked my grip around my heavy binders, my knuckles straining white.
"Find someone else for your dare, Andrews," I said coldly, taking a step back to put distance between us, my voice tight with adrenaline. "I'm not interested in being part of your game. Move."
I kept my head down, attempting to brush past him.
"You're Sage Kelley, right?"
The sound of my name brought my boots to an immediate halt.
I blinked up at him, caught completely off guard.
"Professor Beaumont's senior research student," Julian straightened up slightly, his cadence measured and even, carrying an intellectual sharpness that seemed impossible beneath a varsity jacket. "I saw your Havenwood Creek senior capstone proposal sitting on his desk over Sunday dinner."
My heart gave a hard, hollow thud. Professor Beaumont was my academic advisor—and the guardian of the final research endowment my late father had left behind.
Julian leaned in slightly, his voice dropping to a near-whisper against the whistle of the wind. "I spent an hour going over your codebase."
My lips parted. "You... read my proposal?"
"Your simulation keeps crashing because your core fluid algorithm strategy is flawed," Julian murmured, his pale blue eyes deadly sharp. "And Uncle Des mentioned that if you don't deliver a working version by this Friday, the department is pulling your grant—which means you don't clear your senior thesis, and you don't graduate in May."
The hair on the back of my neck stood on end.
Friday was the deadline. If the funding was pulled, the project died, my senior capstone failed, and I would be forced to stay another semester without my degree. Worse, my father's final ecological legacy would be reduced to scrap paper.
I had been panicking over that exact deadline for two days straight, and Julian had just laid it out like it was nothing.
Worse, I couldn't even brush him off. I had heard the rumors about Beaumont's nephew—the CS prodigy everyone in the department talked about. I just had never realized it was him.
"I know how to fix your algorithm," Julian stated plainly, laying his cards on the table, his gaze locking onto mine with an unshakeable, quiet certainty. "Help me get through this bet. In return, I'll rewrite your boundary calculations tonight. Deal?"
/0/67346/coverbig.jpg?v=918476a6de842343118eda556de5284e)
HE LOVES ME, HE LOVES ME NOT
Zyline had liked Nick for a long time. There were six of them in their group of friends, including Nick. Everyone knew about her feelings for him-except, it seemed, Nick himself. She couldn't tell if he was just insensitive or if he simply didn't have any feelings for her. Brent was her closest be
/0/28119/coverbig.jpg?v=20220610181411)
He Loves My Blood
The time had come for the vampires to feed, they went into to cities, towns and villages to satisfy their hunger, leaving screams and pools of blood in their wake. The vampires never entered their homes so people had to lock their selves inside their homes or die, survival seemed easy till Henry ent
/0/40166/coverbig.jpg?v=20230601184427)
cross loves
Justin I like to flirt with trouble, and I always get what I want. All it took was a bit of liquor and a playful taunt between my best friend, Remi, and Julia, my wife. Then what I wanted was them. Together. Bound and beneath me. And it was better than I could’ve imagined. The three of us? We were p
/0/48107/coverbig.jpg?v=96dba3867dfd425347e9c7160f803cc4)
Loves' Redemption
This story follows Elizabeth's journey from a shy girl with a crush to a determined single mom. Fate reunites her with her long time crush from high school in college-James. This unfolds into a love story, marked by joy, heartbreak and a shocking revelation that affected their relationship. Years la
/0/26179/coverbig.jpg?v=20250124155822)
He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not
Matagal nang may gusto si Zyline kay Nick. Anim silang magkakabarkada kasali si Nick. Alam na ng lahat ang pagtatangi niya sa kaibigan maliban na lang yata rito. Hindi niya alam kung manhid lang ito or talagang wala lang gusto sa kanya. Si Brent ang pinaka-bestfriend niya sa lahat ng mga kaibiga
/0/46929/coverbig.jpg?v=a00ec7945ba478116f15a23940fe9ec5)
Echoes Of Loves
“You know your body is a walking temptation, you should cover it, instead of leading men astray with it," "I am inside the house," "Yes you are but there is a man here too and just in case you don't know, I do men and with a body like yours I don't mind throwing away all my morals to have that dick
/0/23162/coverbig.jpg?v=dd6a6d1e1b269efe279acdf5b1a72818)
That Billionaire Loves Me!
Alex and Naomi are a couple who have built a romantic relationship in the past. Their love did not run smoothly because Alex started their love affair at stake with his friends. After he was done making Naomi love him, he ends up slept with her. In addition, he even shared their indecent photos with
/0/25027/coverbig.jpg?v=909599c08b2dec0024f2eea8ef366951)
He Still Loves Her
Her husband affair with her best friend made her asked for a divorce, not knowing life of a divorcee is full of obstacles, she seems strong from the beginning, but her parents foul temper and her siblings rude behavior towards her for being a divorcee, make her grow depress, will she be able to endu
/0/68715/coverbig.jpg?v=1f1ea2b32a4e710107b44e1de96061af)
LUNAR RECKONING
Evelyn Hawke has always felt insignificant-a fragile human in a world that barely notices her. But when a tragedy pulls her into the supernatural shadows of Silverthorn, she discovers she's anything but ordinary. A mysterious power is awakening inside her, tied to a dangerous legacy that could shatt
/0/56647/coverbig.jpg?v=a5ac5f93193aff8a774916887e48f4b7)
Luna's Reckoning
She had just experienced the most humiliating rejection, unable to take the taunting anymore, she lashes out and runs into the woods to escape judgment. What she wasn't expecting was to run into the arms of drunk rogue wolves who wanted nothing but trouble. Fighting to survive and nearly losing the
/0/47237/coverbig.jpg?v=20250528095247)
When The Monster Loves
In "When the Monster Loves", Carlos and Bianca are two hearts wounded by a painful past. Carlos, a cold and powerful tycoon, bears the scars of a history of abuse and an aversion to female touch, leading him into BDSM-based relationships. Bianca, on the other hand, has faced the terrible experience
/0/49241/coverbig.jpg?v=2bdaf5254964b4ca6b3cb5644b5d5846)
Wife Loves Mafia
An Tinh Tuyet, originally the richest lady of the An family in H province, after witnessing the murder of her parents, was thrown by her aunt and uncle to a remote orphanage, suffering all kinds of abuse from the nanny and like her. The other children. An Tinh Tuyet finally broke out, killing everyo
/0/23618/coverbig.jpg?v=1d6053a46f988e68b24b3b6d498bb286)
Young CEO loves me
Betrayed and heartbroken by her lover and one of her best friends, Alisha Perry decided to end her own life but was fortunately saved by an unknown guy who turned out to be Kelvin McSmith, who was the heir to his father multibillon company. To make Alisha's ex boyfriend jealous, Kelvin came up with
/0/57081/coverbig.jpg?v=1b151a5a112a49ef0eca3013c6e58f47)
The CEO Loves Two Women
Seo Hyung Joon, the most coveted male figure to be a husband. Seo Hyung Joon is the most gentle with certain women and the most selfish in loving someone. In his prostration, Seo never begged to forget the past but begged him to come to her, love her and reciprocate his feelings. Asiyah Zharufa, Seo
/0/75048/coverbig.jpg?v=9f9d3b802bcd8b99e6e0d0d919061884)
The President Loves My Wife
The story follows Damian, a young man who achieves success early in life and decides to marry a girl from his village, believing that a simple and honest life would bring him happiness. However, his life takes a tragic turn when his wife, Diana, is seduced by the power and wealth of the President, w
/0/21400/coverbig.jpg?v=f8f0fb6de0018329fb6500ff66617272)
The Mafia Who Loves Me
"If I don't get her back, prepare to receive my dead body in a gold coffin, Father." *** Sold by her older brother's best friend into a merciless world of women trafficking, Hana Yun's life becomes deeply entangled into the affairs of Jin Lorenzo - the young Italian-Korean heir of the Dante Mafia
/0/52866/coverbig.jpg?v=20240314105815)
the ceo who loves me
Put your finger down if.... -You almost got hit by a car the day you found out about your father's other family. -You are saved by the nastiest boy in town and become convinced that he is now your white knight in shining armor. Naturally, you think you're in love with him. The only problem? You're t
/0/82812/coverbig.jpg?v=3f410213bfbc56ae82934ad40fb7f8c3)
The Quiet Force's Reckoning
My life revolved around AuraStream, the tech company I co-founded with my wife, Olivia, where I was the quiet force behind the scenes. Our shared tradition: Olivia, the CEO, would dedicate the prestigious Innovator's Chalice to me, acknowledging our joint vision, every single year. But this year,
/0/82824/coverbig.jpg?v=c82b9d310860b2b40cd87608141119c6)
The Southern Heiress's Reckoning
I woke with a gasp, the Southern sun blazing. Today was my debutante ball, the pinnacle for any young woman of the Ashley dynasty. But the date, the gown, the very air in my room, triggered a flood of memories from a lifetime ago-the same ball, the same stolen heirloom dress on Babs, my family's ch
/0/66937/coverbig.jpg?v=3254349f9337e732cab2591fc5e1e58f)
The Billionairess's Reckoning
Rose, a brilliant and beautiful CEO, has it all, except love. That is, until she meets Zack, a talented and enigmatic newcomer to her company. But as they grow closer, Rose must confront the secrets and lies that have defined her life, including the ruthless ambitions of the people around them, who
