Gui Chen

For five years, I hid my supreme White Wolf bloodline to play the submissive Omega wife, building a medical empire for my Alpha husband, Carlo. But at the Pack Elder's funeral, he publicly flaunted his first love, Dallas, and stood by as her spoiled son threw boiling cocoa at our five-year-old autistic daughter. When I blocked the scalding liquid with my arm, Carlo didn't even glance at my blistered skin. Instead, he unleashed his crushing Alpha Command to force me to my knees in front of the entire hall. "Apologize to Dallas right now, Araminta!" Carlo roared, accusing me of being insanely jealous. He then announced he was handing over the top-tier neural lab I had spent five grueling years building to Dallas as a welcome gift. The entire Pack laughed at me and my "defective" child, treating us like garbage about to be thrown out. Looking at the mated husband who chose an outsider over his own terrified biological daughter, the illusion shattered. I felt no grief, only pure disgust. Did he really think an ancient White Wolf would just roll over and let a fraud steal her territory? I calmly signed the handover papers, secretly leaving them a hollowed-out system that would crash into scrap metal within a week. Touching the signed mate-rejection contract hidden in my coat, I walked out of the Pack headquarters for good. It was time to sever this rotten bond and begin my hunt.

For three years, I played the docile, uneducated orphan wife to tech CEO Emerson Hayes, swallowing his family's daily insults and his blatant obsession with his childhood sweetheart. Everything shattered the day I brought home the ashes of my parents—military heroes who died for this country. My mother-in-law called them "dead garbage" and physically attacked me to throw their flag-draped urns out of the house. When the heavy wooden urn was ripped from my arms and slammed into my ribs, Emerson didn't help me. He just coldly ordered me to take those "things" outside so I wouldn't upset his mother. Later, when a sudden shooting broke out at a boutique, Emerson lunged toward me. I thought he was trying to save me. Instead, he shoved me hard toward the shattering glass, using my body as a human shield so he could dive and protect his sweetheart. As I fell backward toward the bullets, the last shred of my love turned to dust. I had hidden my true identity as a top MIT genius and endured this hell just to keep the peace. How could I sacrifice so much for a coward who treated my life and my parents' blood like worthless trash? But I didn't hit the glass. A ruthless billionaire pulled me into his arms, shielding me with his own body. I survived, took his mother's hundred-million-dollar buyout, and signed the divorce papers. "I think your mother overpaid," I smiled at my shocked ex-husband. "You aren't worth half that."

Evelina Barrett was the legitimate daughter, yet she was framed for a disgusting sex scandal, expelled from the Ivy League, and locked out of her late mother's massive trust fund. While she was thrown out to rot on the streets with a jagged, hideous red scar covering half her face, her father and step-family were throwing a lavish charity gala to celebrate her total ruin. They laughed as they officially published her disownment notice in the Times to cut her off forever. "Without the school halo, that ugly freak will be begging on the streets by tomorrow," her sister Aspen sneered. Her stepmother Annabella toasted to taking out the trash, perfectly happy to steal Evelina's inheritance while ignoring the fact that Evelina knew exactly how they had murdered her mother. For years, Evelina had been locked in a dark basement, abused by bodyguards, and treated worse than a stray dog. Why should she, the true heir, suffer in the gutter while the leeches who destroyed her life enjoyed the wealth that rightfully belonged to her? She refused to be their victim anymore. Washing away her fake scar to reveal her true, breathtaking face, Evelina blackmailed New York's most lethal billionaire into marriage to secure the ultimate shield. Then, she put on a black mourning dress, ordered a dark web ghost crew, and climbed into a heavy semi-truck. At exactly 6:00 PM, she smashed through the iron gates of her family's elegant gala, delivering three pure black coffins directly to the lawn.

Eliza, a blind and pregnant woman, was hiding in a rotting motel room. The door was suddenly kicked in by Clifford Gray, the ruthless billionaire whose child she carried. He didn't come to rescue her. Instead, he dragged her to an underground clinic, ordering a forced abortion to protect his wealth. "The bloodline of the Gray family will never be left to rot in the stomach of a blind rat from the slums." Strapped to a freezing surgical bed with a scalpel pressed against her throat, Eliza was only spared when a sudden phone call ordered Clifford to marry her for inheritance shares. But the nightmare had just begun. On their wedding day, Clifford abandoned her, forcing her to be publicly humiliated and married off to a trembling stable boy. Inside the massive Gray estate, she became the ultimate target. His family mocked her, physically assaulted her, and plotted to destroy her, treating her like a worthless incubator. They all thought she was just a pathetic, helpless victim who would easily break under their cruelty. They had no idea she was the sole survivor of the Warren family massacre, secretly armed with a neural interface and lethal senses. Standing alone in the dark bathroom, Eliza dropped her terrified facade, her unseeing eyes burning with a cold, calculating fire. She was going to use their underestimation of a blind cripple to tear the Gray empire apart, brick by brick.

For ten years, I believed my husband Adrian was a frugal, hardworking man. We lived modestly, saving every penny while he preached about our tight budget. Then I found the burner phone hidden under our bed. The top contact wasn't me, his wife, but a woman saved as "My Love ." The phone revealed his eight-year double life. He had another family in Austin-a "wife" named Jasmine and a son, Angel. He'd bought them a $1.2 million house and a luxury SUV with our marital assets. All while telling me we couldn't afford a new dress or swimming lessons for our son, Cameron. His parents knew everything. They even attended his fake wedding to Jasmine while I was at home, pregnant with their first grandchild. My entire marriage wasn't just a lie; it was a financial shield for his real family. So when he came home from his latest "business trip" and asked to take control of my salary to "tie up loose ends," I didn't cry. I simply slid the burner phone across the table. "I've already hired a lawyer, Adrian. And I'm taking back every single penny."

For three years, I was the perfect wife to tech CEO Atticus Monroe, trading my architecture career to become his personal chef and perfect hostess. My world shattered when I brought him an eight-hour bone broth and overheard him confess to a friend. "I'm just... bored." His boredom quickly turned into an affair with his ex-fiancée, Isla. He spent nights at her apartment, then came home to blame me for his unhappiness. At a family gala, when I finally stood up to their public humiliation, Atticus grabbed my arm so hard it left a deep, purple bruise. He had cheated, humiliated, and hurt me, yet he refused my pleas for a divorce, desperate to maintain his perfect image. But his grandfather saw the bruise. He saw the video of Atticus and Isla. After punishing his own grandson, he handed me a check. "Go build the life you deserve." So I did. I filed for divorce to reclaim the life, and the career, I had sacrificed for him.

I suspended a five-year-old student named Leo for pushing another child down the stairs. As the head child psychologist at an elite academy, I was used to difficult children, but there was a chilling emptiness in Leo's eyes. That evening, I was abducted in the faculty parking lot, dragged into a van, and beaten unconscious. I woke up in a hospital, every inch of my body aching. A kind nurse let me use her phone to call my husband, Franco. When he didn't answer, I opened his social media page, my heart pounding with fear for him. But he was fine. A new video, posted just thirty minutes ago, showed him in a hospital room, gently peeling an apple for the little boy I had suspended. "Daddy," Leo whined. "That teacher was mean to me." My husband's voice, the voice I had loved for a decade, was a soothing murmur. "I know, buddy. Daddy already took care of it. She won't ever bother you again." The world tilted on its axis. The attack wasn't random. The man who had vowed to protect me forever, my loving husband, had tried to have me killed. For another woman's child. Our entire life was a lie. Then the police delivered the final blow: our five-year marriage had never been legally registered. As I lay there, broken, I remembered the wedding gift he'd given me—40% of his company. He thought it was a symbol of his ownership. He was about to find out it was his death sentence.

Seven years ago, I was Jocelyn Fuller, a girl desperate for love, standing in front of Ethan Lester' s apartment, begging him not to leave. He looked down at me, his face cold, and uttered words that shattered my world: "Don't be naive, Jocelyn. We're from different worlds." He took the money my father offered and vanished, leaving me so broken I tried to end my life twice. The devastation didn't just fade; it festered, hardening me into the CEO of Fuller Properties, a name synonymous with power in New York real estate. Now, Ethan Lester stands outside my skyscraper, looking up with desperate hope, roles agonizingly reversed. I made him wait for five hours in the freezing wind, just as I had waited for him, relishing the chilling echo of my past pain. I wanted to know why he had abandoned me, why he chose money over our love, and why he looked so utterly defeated now. This time, the game was on my terms, and his payment was just beginning in a meticulously cruel revenge.

The poison in my veins had two years left, just like me. Two years I' d spent trapped in a gilded cage by Ethan Lester, the man I once loved. He believed I betrayed him, orchestrated his family' s slaughter, a lie I carried to protect him from a truth that would have led him to self-destruction. I endured his hatred, the scars, the daily degradations, all while my life slowly ebbed away. Then came the night Sabrina, his new woman, a viper wearing a sweetheart's smile, orchestrated the unspeakable. She lured my little brother, Andrew, the only innocent left in my world, to the compound. She planned to drain his blood for a twisted art project. I found him, strapped down, and I screamed for her to take me instead. But Ethan, blind with rage and manipulated by Sabrina' s lies, saw my reaction as defiance. He threatened Andrew, trying to extract a "confession" from me. My truth would kill him; my silence guaranteed my brother's fate. He offered me everything I' d ever wanted – a future, marriage – if I just confessed. I couldn't. Sabrina, with a subtle push, guided his hand, and the blade sliced across Andrew' s throat right before my eyes. My world shattered as I watched him die, Ethan' s hand, bloodied, still on the knife. As I lay dying beside my brother's cooling body, my last words shattered Ethan' s delusions, revealing the true traitors. Now that it' s all over, all I want to know is: Can a man who destroyed everything he claimed to love ever atone for the irreparable damage he caused?

The screech of tires was my familiar lullaby, echoing another broken bone, another shattered illusion. I was Sarah, the trophy wife, trapped in a gilded cage, enduring a curse of endless resurrections. My husband, Ethan, always attentive to his perfect Ashley, had just shoved me into the path of a speeding sedan. For her, of course. He didn't care that I lay mangled on the asphalt, only annoyed by the inconvenience, the mess. Ashley, his scheming mistress, later set a trap: a near-fatal allergic reaction, and then framed me to ensure my "dissection" at a remote research facility. They believed they were finally ridding themselves of me, sending me to a permanent end. But what they didn't know was my secret, my bitter hope: 99 deaths down, one to go. Each resurrection had chipped away at my soul, leaving only a hollow anticipation for the final, permanent end. This was it. The hundredth. The profound relief of true oblivion, of peace, washed over me as they led me away. I was finally free, not knowing that my truest liberation would come not from the permanent death I craved, but from a rebirth I never expected.

Michael thought he had built a good life. His son, Leo, a brilliant debate champion, was headed to Yale on a full scholarship, a testament to hard work. Michael, a humble handyman, had willingly sacrificed his own dreams for his wife Jessica' s demanding, "modestly paid" corporate career. Then the phone rang. A multi-car pile-up. Leo, critical. Michael frantically tried to reach Jessica, but she was unreachable. He tracked her phone across the country to a lavish Miami yacht party, where she was cheering on her "nephew" Ryan with extravagant gifts. When she finally did answer, her voice was sharp, dismissing him because she was in a "very important business meeting." Leo died. How could the woman he loved, the one he sacrificed everything for, be so cold? He overheard her casually refer to their shared life as "slumming it," a revelation that shattered his world. Weeks later, he learned that Ryan, the spoiled relative Jessica adored, was responsible for the accident that killed Leo. Yet, Jessica protected him, openly preferring him over their dead son. His entire existence with Jessica, a profound, agonizing lie. Who was this woman? And why had she hidden immense wealth while he struggled? Michael found a hidden bank statement, zeros stretching endlessly, confirming decades of deception. He had lost his son, his wife, and his life as he knew it. With his body failing from stress-induced illness, Michael chose to leave, walking away from the ruins of his past, seeking a different kind of peace.

I spent six years pouring my heart, my hidden family fortune, and my shelved art dreams into Ethan’s Silicon Valley startup, "Innovatech." It was my birthday, and a velvet ring box in his jacket pocket made my heart race with anticipation. This was it – the culmination of our love, the proposal I’d been waiting for. But my world shattered with a single Instagram post: Ethan, on one knee, proposing. Not to me, but to Isabella Rossi, his lifelong "what if," at an exclusive Napa restaurant. The diamond on her finger flashed, blinding me with betrayal. He later breezed in, claiming Isabella had a rare heart condition, making her "dying wish" his priority. He then publicly humiliated me, appointing her to my suppressed dream role and framing me for corporate theft. In front of our colleagues, he slapped me, callously grinding my precious clay sculpture under his heel, dismissing my pain with a casual "sorry about the coffee." Six years of unwavering loyalty, reduced to a staged corporate scheme, an outright assault. How could the man I loved believe I was a thief and sabotage my entire life? The injustice burned hotter than the scalding coffee on my arm. With nowhere left to turn, my father offered a lifeline: Liam Hayes, son of the very venture capitalists who funded Innovatech. My path was clear: New York, a new life, and a fight that was just beginning.

Our wedding invitations were chosen, promising a beautiful future with Mike, my college sweetheart of eight years. Then, Mike arrived, face ashen, eyes haunted. He thrust an envelope at me: "I can't do this, Sarah." Pure terror consumed his face as he fled. That was just the first loop. Friends whispered about "what they saw" and abandoned me. I lost my job to "disturbing incidents." My beloved cat mysteriously died, then my mother collapsed, eyes wide with paralyzing fear. My father, seeing something monstrous in me, whispered, "It's better this way," as he smothered me. Each time, I woke on "breakup day" again, trapped in a horrifying cycle. Everyone I loved vanished, terrified of *me*, yet I had no idea why. What was I? What was happening when I slept that drove them to such profound fear? Desperate, I wired my apartment with hidden cameras. The footage I played back shattered my world: *I* was the monster. Crawling on all fours, vacant eyes, unnatural speed, guttural sounds – it was utterly terrifying.

It was a deliberate conspiracy. She was sent to the bed of the 'disabled' man. Three months later, she was found to be pregnant. She was framed, got ruthlessly kicked out of the house, and became homeless. When the truth was unmasked and the secret of his body was revealed, she turned around and left with a mystery and the child.

She had been set up and slept with a strange man for a night. The fact that she lost her virginity had ruined her reputation and become a joke in the eyes of everyone. Signing the contract, she became a surrogacy mother for him. Every night they spent together was burning with desire. Love gradually burgeon deep inside them. But when her goal was achieved and the baby was just born, she was ruthlessly driven out, and she didn't have the chance to see her child. Resentment, betrayal, and disappointment filled her heart. She made up her mind to leave. When she came back like a phoenix rising from ashes, he realized that what a wrong decision he had made.

"No wolf. No family. Harmless. Useful. The second I am done with her, the Luna title is yours." Eira Crawford heard those words through her husband's office door. For four years, she had been Sebastian Vale's hidden mate. She managed his household, entertained his relatives, cleaned up his messes, and lived on the three thousand dollars he gave her each month like charity. Even buying a new coat required an explanation. But for his first love, he casually prepared three hundred thousand dollars in research funding. To Sebastian, Eira was nothing more than a wolfless Omega from an orphanage. A quiet, obedient wife with no pack, no power, and no value beyond being useful. He had never introduced her publicly as his Luna. His family treated her like a servant. His sweetheart mocked her as a woman who could only survive by clinging to an Alpha. So Eira stopped crying. She recorded the affair, filed for mate dissolution, and placed the divorce papers in front of Sebastian. Even then, he thought she was throwing a tantrum. He signed without hesitation, certain she would come crawling back once she realized no one else would want a discarded, wolfless Omega. He was wrong. The woman he left at home washing dishes was a Stanford-trained electrical engineer. The "useless" wife he ignored was the hidden chief engineer behind a national self-developed chip project. Her movements were classified. Her disappearance could alert the federal authorities. Her name, once revealed, was enough to shake the entire scientific community. And Sebastian knew nothing. After walking out of his house with nothing but her freedom, Eira crossed paths with Killian Sterling, the coldest and most powerful Alpha in the north. He did not know her name yet, but his wolf recognized something in her that everyone else had missed. Meanwhile, Sebastian finally realized that Eira was not bluffing. He searched the entire city like a madman. For the first time in four years, he publicly called her his wife. He demanded she return. He begged for another chance. But by then, Eira was no longer waiting in his house. She was seated at the Sterling Pack's dinner table, dressed with quiet confidence, while the most feared Alpha in North America stood beside her. In front of everyone, Killian Sterling placed his hand at her back and said coldly, "Eira is not anyone's discarded Omega." "She is my Luna."

I was waiting at the Registry Hall to formalize my mate bond with Gabe, my childhood sweetheart and the Alpha of our pack. He was thirty-two minutes late. When I finally found him in a private VIP lounge, his hands were buried in my cousin's hair, their lips locked together. Hailee was supposed to be my maid of honor. Instead of apologizing, Gabe looked me dead in the eye and used his Alpha authority to publicly reject me. The severing of our ten-year bond tore my soul apart, but the nightmare didn't stop there. My grandfather immediately called, demanding I clean up a mess Hailee had made. When I refused, he disowned me on the spot, froze every single one of my bank accounts, and stripped me of my family name. Within hours, my entire pack erased my existence, gleefully announcing Hailee as their new Luna. I had given my entire life to a family and a man who discarded me like worthless trash the second I became inconvenient. I was left broken, humiliated, and utterly penniless in the blink of an eye. But as I stumbled out of that sterile hall, a terrifyingly beautiful stranger stepped out of the shadows, radiating a primal power that made my knees weak. He was Caden Sinclair, the ruthless Lycan King, and he was dodging a forced political union of his own. "You need a shield. I need a wife. Marry me." Without hesitation, I signed the Eternal Vow.

"This is Virella, my wife." Three years. And that was all Alpha Kaelen gave me. No welcome. No touch. No recognition. Just another woman at his side, carrying his child. While I ruled in his absence, I was nothing more than a placeholder. A Luna he never chose. So I gave up. And I left. One rejection was all it took to break the bond. When I returned, I wasn't the Luna he abandoned. I was untouchable, respected, and feared. And no longer his to claim. Now he watches me like a man drowning... Because the woman he discarded came back as something far beyond his reach. And this time, I didn't come alone. The Alpha of Ebonmoon stands beside me, his presence crushing, and his hand firm on my waist... "Careful, Kaelen," his voice drops, dark with warning. "Rowena isn't yours anymore." His lips brush my temple, possessively. "She's mine. If you try to take her, I'll end you."

I was the wolfless disgrace of the pack, traded like cattle to a dying monster. When a royal decree stripped away my engagement, my own father gave my fiancé to my cruel sister, Charly. My punishment for being born without a wolf? A forced marriage to Demetri Contreras—the crippled, disgraced Alpha left to rot from silver poison. They threw me into a frozen, forgotten estate, waiting for my new husband to die so I could be buried as a silent widow. Charly laughed as she stole my life, my mate, and my future. My family discarded me, just like they murdered my mother years ago. They thought this exile would break me. They thought I was a helpless pawn. They didn't know that inside this fragile body lived the soul of the top interstellar miracle surgeon. Looking at the ruined, festering Alpha bleeding on my wedding bed, I didn't see a corpse. I saw the deadliest weapon in the realm. The fallen Alpha needs a miracle to survive. Lucky for him, I am the miracle. I will drag this monster back from the gates of hell—and together, we will burn my enemies to ash.

I was the wolfless twin. The rejected bride. The daughter marked for death. They didn't realize they weren't killing a girl-they were breaking a seal. ​On my wedding day, my fated mate didn't say "I do." He said, "I reject you." ​Luke Blackwood didn't want a Luna without a wolf, so he chose my twin sister instead. Humiliated and hunted by my own father, I was forced to flee into the territory of the one man my pack feared most: Aiden Stormrider, the ruthless Alpha King and billionaire CEO of Crescent ​Aiden thinks I'm a pawn to be used against my father. He thinks I'm a weak Omega seeking refuge. ​He's wrong. ​Deep inside me, something ancient is waking up. It's not just one wolf-it's five. Five fractured personalities, each with their own deadly powers, born from a prophecy that says I will end the age of Alphas. ​As the Dragon Wolf rises, I will reclaim my throne. My sister wants my legacy? She can have the ashes. My mate wants my forgiveness? He can beg while I burn his world down. ​Aiden Stormrider wants my heart... but he'll have to survive the five monsters living inside it first. ​They wanted a sacrifice. They got a Queen.

I was born a wolfless cripple in the Richmond Pack, but by royal decree, I was engaged to the kingdom's Champion Knight, Emory. During the winter banquet, my half-sister Dessie suddenly tilted backward into the royal ice pond, screaming that I pushed her. In my previous life, I reached out in panic to save her, only to be dragged down and framed for attempted murder. When Emory dove into the freezing water, he swam right past my sinking body to rescue her instead. Once ashore, my own father and my betrothed ignored my desperate pleas. They branded me a vicious, jealous traitor. Emory publicly broke our engagement to marry Dessie, while my father threw me to the executioner to wash away the family's shame with my blood. Until my head was on the chopping block, I didn't understand. Why did my own family want me dead just because I had no inner wolf? Why did the knight who swore to protect me conspire with my illegitimate sister to destroy my life? Opening my eyes again, I was back on the snow-dusted terrace, right as Dessie was setting up the exact same trap. "A wolfless cripple like you should crawl back to the gutter," she whispered, falling backward. This time, I didn't flinch or beg for help. Instead, my fingers shot out like iron clamps, grabbing her wrist, and I dragged her into the freezing depths with me.

During the party for her second wedding anniversary, Kylie stood quietly to one side and watched her Alpha kiss his childhood sweetheart. Her life felt like a trap. She had relinquished her Alpha blood for him, and that was what she got. Yet fate wasn't finished with her. An encounter with Alpha Logan gave her a way out she hadn't expected. As the Alpha of a powerful pack, he could help her get even with her cheating mate. There was just one catch. Kylie would have to spend a year as his Luna. Accepting his offer would be a dangerous gamble, but Kylie struggled to resist her attraction to the Alpha she couldn't quite figure out. Could she bring herself to agree to his terms? What would she do if her feelings for him grew too strong to push aside?

On the day I swallowed the lethal poison, my blind Alpha husband was accompanying his adopted sister to her prenatal checkup. For three years, I ruined my face and crippled my wolf to act as his secret blood bag, absorbing his deadly silver toxicity. Yet, upon hearing of her pregnancy, he brutally forced himself on me to vent his manic rut. And the moment she whined for him, he abandoned me without hesitation, leaving me bleeding and shattered on the cold floor. "Take the money and keep out of her sight." He sneered, throwing a black card at my battered face to buy my dignity. He didn't know I was dying. I didn't cry or argue. I calmly signed the mate rejection papers and swallowed a forbidden neurotoxin that induces absolute physiological death. A month later, his sight was finally restored. But instead of the devoted Luna he loved to torture, he found only a withered, stiff corpse on the bed. The ever-arrogant, ruthless Alpha completely shattered. In the dead silence, he fell to his knees and crushed my lifeless body into his arms. He pressed his quivering lips to mine, desperately sinking his fangs into my freezing scent gland as he sobbed in absolute agony: "Stop sleeping, Gianna, I can finally see you... I'll pay you back with my life, just don't throw me away."

Talia Ashford has spent fifteen years hiding behind a glamour charm that makes her look plain, weak, and forgettable. Her stepmother, Vivienne Cress, reduced her to a servant after her mother disappeared in a mysterious fire. The pack believes Talia is worthless. On the day the Alpha of Shadowfang arrives, Celeste hits Talia and blames her for bad luck. But when Talia is called to the bonding ceremony, the bonding stone reveals a shocking truth. Talia is already bonded to Kaelen Frost, the cold and powerful Alpha of the Shadowfang Pack. Now Talia must survive her stepmother's schemes, hide her true powers, and uncover the truth about her mother – all while convincing the most dangerous wolf in the territory that she is not the weakling everyone believes her to be.

I stood outside the Pack Registration Hall, waiting to bind my future with Mark, the man I had loved for five years. But instead of taking my hand, he stopped a foot away and publicly rejected me in front of the crowd. "I can't take on your family's endless medical bills. I need a real she-wolf for a mate, not some wolfless mutt." The onlookers snickered, their whispers feeling like physical blows. My heart shattered into pieces. My grandfather was in the hospital, relying on me to settle down so he could face his risky surgery with peace of mind. Now, I was left with nothing but humiliation and a mountain of debt I could never pay off. I stared at the man I had devoted my entire youth to, his face now completely foreign. Why was my lack of a wolf a sin? Why did my family's suffering make me a burden to be thrown away like trash? Just as I was about to break, I saw a tall, intimidating stranger across the plaza, swarmed by reporters after his own high-society fiancée publicly dumped him. Driven by sheer desperation for my grandfather's life, I wiped my tears, walked straight up to this terrifying man, and blocked his path. "You need a mate to save face, and I need a million dollars for medical bills. Marry me." I expected him to laugh and push me aside. Instead, a calculating smile touched his lips, and he handed me a black card.