Herculie Dipietro

My brother hates me, he hates me. He can't accept having a sister with a mental illness. He often deliberately provokes me to have an episode in front of others. Making me look ugly. The most common phrase he says is: "Haylen， I really wish you were dead from your illness." Later, I really died. But he went crazy. Every day stubbornly imitating my ugly appearance when I have an episode. Begging me to appear in his dreams for a glance.

"Let' s get a divorce, Ava." My husband, Mark, said the words so calmly, pushing the papers across our dining room table, the morning light making the black letters sharp. He quickly added, "It' s a fake divorce. It' s for Clara. Lily needs to get into the school district here, and she can' t unless she' s living with my residency." He promised we' d remarry once it was done. He thought I was a fool. I signed the papers, my hands steady, the silence in the room heavy. That fake concern on his face. That smug confidence that he had me completely under his control. I had already seen the truth. Two weeks ago, tucked at the bottom of the trash bin in the guest bathroom Clara used, I' d found it. A pregnancy test. Two pink lines. It wasn' t Lily' s future Mark was securing. It was the future of his new family. I said nothing. Just nodded. The divorce was done, official. Outside the courthouse, I watched Mark walk quickly toward a car. Clara got out, then wrapped her arms around his neck, his hand resting protectively on her stomach. They looked like a real family. My phone buzzed. A message from Professor Thorne, my old mentor. "The lab door is always open for you, Ava." I took a deep breath, watched them drive away, and then turned to walk in the opposite direction. My pain was old, familiar. Now, it was time for change.

The first thing I felt was a dull ache and a blinding white light. I was in a hospital, my wrist bandaged, my mind a blank slate. Then I heard the voices: "The guy in 302, Ethan, tried it again." "The one married to CEO Sterling? This is what, the third time this year?" My stomach turned. They somehow thought I was Ethan, the pathetic, clingy husband of Sophia Sterling, the girl who was always out of my league in high school. And I had tried to kill myself over her. When a nurse confirmed it, revealing my arm was slit, a wave of nausea hit me. I stared at my older, gaunt reflection in the mirror, five years of my life vanished, all tied to this humiliating existence. How could I have become this person? This wasn't me. The desperate, attention-seeking man they described-the one who sent bleeding wrist selfies-was a stranger. I wanted nothing to do with him. So when Sophia, colder and more beautiful than ever, arrived to discharge me, I knew what I had to do. I wanted a divorce, and I would start shedding this unwanted life, piece by painful piece.

Three years ago, I was on top of the world. Engaged to Caleb Scott, pregnant with his child, I, an orphan from foster care, felt like I was living a fairytale at our Belle Meade mansion engagement party. Then, his childhood friend Jennifer Lawrence, a shadow lurking over our relationship, faked a deadly allergic reaction, screaming I had poisoned her drink. Caleb turned on me in an instant, his face contorted with rage, tearing my wedding dress to shreds, yelling for security to drag me out like trash. The next day, he forced me to abort our baby, spitting that a "venomous, scheming woman" like me was unfit to carry a Scott child. He slapped me with aggravated assault charges, leaving me utterly broken, homeless, and facing prison, a pariah in Nashville society. How could he believe such a monstrous lie? How could he destroy my life, our child, without a moment of doubt? Just as I lay shattered in a dark alley, a stranger offered a hand. Now, three years later, I' m back in Nashville, not as his victim, but as Mrs. Andrew Scott… Caleb' s aunt.

Eleven years. I dedicated them all to Wesley Scott, sacrificing my architect dreams to support his political ambitions. After a decade of being his unassuming small-town Texas girl, he finally proposed, not out of love, I suspected, but for his political image. Then, an anonymous email arrived with a photo: Wesley and his childhood friend, Gabrielle, smiling, holding a deed to a luxury Austin condo, purchased jointly under their names. Beneath it, Gabrielle' s chilling message: "Coming home for good." Wesley dismissed it as "just a favor," his casual use of "Gabby" a slap in the face. But the next day, the building manager casually confirmed Gabrielle was the primary owner, and I, his fiancée, was merely "the friend," a temporary guest. That night, at Gabrielle's welcome dinner, Wesley sat beside her, radiating ownership, as everyone toasted them as "the perfect couple." Then, a friend goaded them into a kiss, and Wesley, playing to the crowd, gave Gabrielle a soft, lingering kiss, a gesture of intimacy he never showed me. All eyes turned to me, expecting tears, a scene, but I just smiled. "If Gabrielle wants him," I said, my voice clear and calm, "she can have him." He dragged me out, furious, but a later anonymous message, a screenshot of their secret Instagram post-"To our future!" and his reply, "Whatever you want, you get. Always"-extinguished any lingering hope. It was the same day he'd asked me to move in, calling it "our first real step." His betrayal culminated when a mob of HOA women, spurred by Gabrielle, publicly assaulted me at the condo, and Wesley stood by, calculating the optics of defending me. I collapsed, humiliated, only to later see his reply on the HOA Facebook chat, throwing me under the bus: "The owner on the deed is the one who matters." He had confirmed I was nothing, a squatter to his entire world. When he abandoned me in the hospital for Gabrielle's fake allergic reaction, I knew. It was over. Three days later, at our lavish engagement party, instead of our romantic slideshow, I played the video of their kiss, the condo deed, and his damning words on the jumbo screens. His political career ignited in a glorious fireball. "Why, Wesley?" I told him calmly when he screamed down the phone. "I was just making way for the real couple. After all, the owner on the deed is the one who matters." I hung up and blocked him, and everyone from that life. I was free to build my own.

For three years, I' d been free from my toxic Appalachian family, living a new life built on respect, not obligation. Then, a call from my mother, soft and warm, inviting me to my brother Caleb's wedding, made me foolishly hope things had changed. I drove back to the mountains, a $25,000 peace offering for the wedding in my bag – $5,000 from me, and $20,000 from Ethan' s parents never touched since our own marriage – only to be greeted with cold demands for the "money I owed." They scoffed at my gift, then my father calmly declared they now wanted $80,000, and when I refused, my brother Caleb snatched my phone and keys, my parents locked me in the cold, spider-filled shed I' d known as a childhood prison, and commanded me to call my husband to wire the money. Beaten and terrified, I refused their extortion, but found a sliver of hope in a dusty window, determined to fight back against the family that wanted to break me.

I was Sarah Miller, publicly humiliated and discarded by NFL star Ethan Vance on his draft day. Branded a gold digger, I vanished, rebuilding my life and secretly marrying billionaire philanthropist Alexander Sterling. Five years of quiet happiness passed. But fate, it seemed, had a cruel sense of humor. While on a simple errand, I unexpectedly collided with Ethan and his arrogant fiancée, my former intern. Their taunts instantly dragged me back into the nightmare. My attempt to assert my new reality – that I was married – was met with cruel laughter. Ethan snatched my Sterling Foundation card, mocking it as a fake, calling me a delusional liar and a thief. His rage escalating, he brutally crushed my hand in a car door, then locked me in a stadium utility room. Later, he dragged my battered self onto a championship ballroom stage, publicly branding me a stalker and criminal, while displaying my bandaged hand. Why was this nightmare happening again? Was I destined to be forever haunted by my past, my worth shattered anew? But just as he prepared to deliver his final, devastating blow, the grand ballroom doors dramatically swung open. My husband, Alexander Sterling, stood there, a quiet force of nature. My past had tried to consume me, but it was about to meet its match.

I just closed a fifty-million-dollar deal for Innovatech Solutions, the company I co-founded with my wife, Jess. My team, the Trailblazers, cheered as Jess, our CEO, hugged me, promising a "really special bonus." That bonus was a crudely drawn Sharpie watch on my wrist and a flimsy "next year" promise. Later, my blood froze seeing Liam Walker, her incompetent "Executive Assistant," beaming with keys to a company-leased Porsche, courtesy of Jess. His Instagram: "Real love means exclusive pampering. #BestBoss." Humiliation burned as Jess frantically spun excuses, then offered me the baby I' d always wanted if I' d "unlike" the post. When I refused, she retaliated, punishing my loyal team while Liam' s cronies went untouched. "You'll get over it," she snapped, hanging up. The Porsche was just the latest, undeniable symbol of her two-faced hypocrisy and a years-long affair. My love for the woman I married had completely evaporated, replaced by a profound, weary exhaustion. I was done enabling her narcissism, done absorbing her endless betrayals. "Let's just get a divorce," I told her, my voice flat and final. Then, I called Innovatech' s biggest competitor, ready to secure not just my future, but my entire team's, forcing her to finally face the consequences.

I was a driven high school student, about to embark on the biggest national scholarship competition of my life in Washington D.C. It was a life-changing opportunity for everyone on our team, especially my boyfriend, Mark Olsen, and my seemingly sweet best friend, Jessie Evans. But that life ended in betrayal. A drink spiked with my fatal allergen, followed by swift anaphylactic shock. Mark and the others testified I drank it knowingly, painting me as a distraught villain. Jessie, playing the grieving friend, became a national sensation, a "survivor" online, while my Pulitzer-winning investigative journalist mother fought for justice. Jessie's powerful family allies launched a merciless smear campaign, shattering my mom's reputation, costing her job, and ultimately, her life to a stress-induced heart attack. After I died, the chilling truth unfurled: Jessie orchestrated my demise and my mother's ruin. Her motive? Pure, unadulterated revenge. My mother had exposed her CEO father's massive corporate fraud, sending him to prison, and Jessie wanted us both to pay. The injustice burned through me, leaving an icy trail of hate. Then, I woke up. The familiar lurch of the bus, Mark's voice arguing with the driver, demanding we wait for Jessie's "lucky locket"-the exact same words, the exact same moment. I was back, armed with the horrifying knowledge of what was to come, and a powerful secret: a full-ride Stanford scholarship I already secured. This competition was meaningless to me. This time, things would be different.

My husband, Marcus, was already late for our second anniversary dinner when he walked in, reeking of another woman's perfume. He introduced her as his "indispensable" new assistant, Chloe Sanders. My heart, already terminally ill, tightened further – a painful reminder of the lie I was living. He never truly saw me; he saw my dead twin sister, Eleanor, the woman he still claimed to love, the one he believed I, Tori, had killed. I, Eleanor, was forced to impersonate her after a tragic accident, trapped in a marriage where Marcus constantly abused me, seeking vengeance for a death I didn't cause. Then, he overheard a conversation that revealed the shocking truth: I wasn't Tori at all. I was Eleanor, his actual wife. I hoped this truth might change everything, but barely ten days later, a text from Chloe solidified his betrayal – a photo of her pregnant stomach, her message simple: "I'm pregnant with Marcus's child. He's known your real identity for weeks and told me everything." His brief, feigned kindness dissolved, confirming his calculated deceit. He continued his blatant affair, shamelessly using my terminal heart condition for a monumental P.R. stunt, playing the heartbreakingly devoted husband while his mistress smirked triumphantly. All the years of abuse, the forced identity, my dying heart – it had been for nothing. A cold, simmering rage ignited within me. He believed he was still in control, but I wouldn't die as his victim. I decided to play his game, but by my rules, turning his public display of affection into the perfect stage for ultimate retribution. I would use his own deceit to expose his entire empire, allied with a man connected to him in ways he never imagined.

For seven years, I played the perfect, hidden wife to billionaire August Chambers while working quietly as an ER nurse. Three days before our marriage contract expired, he stormed into my emergency room carrying a bleeding woman. It was Allena, his cousin's fiancée. She had suffered a ruptured corpus luteum from their violent, aggressive sex. Instead of hiding his affair, August ordered me to clear the floor and threw a massive check at my face to buy my silence. Later, his friends trapped me in a VIP club. When a waiter tripped, August violently shoved me aside just to protect Allena from a spilled cup of coffee. I crashed into a glass table, a sharp edge slicing deep into my arm. "Apologize to her, and I'll have my driver take you to the hospital." As my blood soaked into the white rug, he stood over me, demanding I get on my knees for his mistress. He didn't know I had faked a miscarriage five years ago to secretly raise our daughter far away from his cruelty. He also didn't know the money he flaunted was pocket change compared to my hidden AI tech empire. I calmly tied a tourniquet around my bleeding arm with my teeth and wiped my blood directly over his heart onto his custom suit. "I'm done with you." The submissive nurse was dead, and it was time to let him burn in the ruins of his own lies.

Cast out by an "elite" family and mocked by high society, Elena shocked everyone by marrying the most powerful man in town. They assumed it was a temporary arrangement-after all, he had said, "The agreement is for two years. After that, we're done." Yet after the wedding, he refused to let her go. "Elena, you can't leave me." As he doted on her, rumors shattered one by one. A renowned painter, top hacker, and tech mastermind-her true identities stunned the world. When a luxury empire announced their lost heiress, all eyes turned to her. "Why did she look exactly like Elena?"

My five-year-old daughter was dying in the ICU, her heartbeat replaced by the continuous, electronic scream of a flatline. I gripped her cold hand, my throat sealed shut by a terror so absolute I couldn't even cry out. I dialed my husband Grayson's private number, the one reserved only for me and his assistants. He declined the call instantly. A second later, a text buzzed against my palm: "In a meeting. Do not disturb. Stop calling." Five miles away, Grayson was at a luxury gala, adjusting his silk tie and laughing with Belle Escobar. He told her I was just being "dramatic" and using our daughter's "fever" as an excuse to avoid the event. He had no idea Effie's heart had already stopped. When I finally reached our penthouse, soaked from the rain and carrying Effie's small socks in a plastic bag, Grayson didn't even look at me. He snapped at me for ruining the hardwood floors and asked if I'd left Effie with the nanny just to "feel sorry for myself." Three days later, while I buried our daughter in a small, lonely ceremony, Grayson was at the Hamptons. Belle posted a photo of him golfing with the caption: "A mental health day with the boys." He didn't even attend the funeral, but he returned home demanding I clear out Effie's room to make a study for Belle's son. The injustice burned through me until there was nothing left. I swallowed a handful of sleeping pills, desperate to join my daughter. But instead of the darkness, I woke up to blinding lights and the scent of Grayson's expensive cologne. I was standing in a ballroom, wearing a blue silk dress I had already burned. Above me, a banner read: "Happy 5th Birthday Kaiden & Effie." I was back, exactly one year before the tragedy. This time, I wasn't going to be the grieving wife. I was going to be their worst nightmare.

Ashley gave Nicolas ten years of love and five years of loyalty as his perfect housewife, only to be repaid with betrayal, humiliation, and death at the hands of him and his mistress. After being reborn, she vowed to make them pay. She tore apart the mistress, kicked her useless husband aside, and returned as the heiress of a top-tier family. Surrounded by billions, luxury, and a parade of elite bachelors, Ashley became the woman everyone wanted-including a cold, powerful tycoon. When Nicolas came begging for forgiveness, she smiled coldly. "Fuck off! My man is worth a hundred of you."

Twenty minutes before the "Wedding of the Century" at The Plaza, I stood outside the Presidential Suite in a fifty-thousand-dollar Vera Wang gown. I was the girl from a West Virginia trailer park about to marry Hugh Maxwell, the golden heir to a billion-dollar defense empire. I pushed the door open only to find Hugh pinned against the bed with my own stepsister, Floy. She was wearing my bridal diamond necklace, and the sounds of their laughter scraped against my eardrums like sandpaper. I didn't scream; I listened as Hugh grunted that once the wedding was over and the trust fund unlocked, he’d dump "that hillbilly trash" on a bus back to the mountains. They weren't just cheating; they were planning to steal my family’s land deeds and leave me with nothing. When I set off the sprinklers and exposed their naked bodies to the paparazzi, the Maxwell family didn't apologize. They called me a "greedy peasant" and threatened to ruin my life unless I signed a new deal to save their crashing stock. I realized then that I was never a bride to them. I was a transaction, a rounding error in a ledger to be used and discarded. They thought my poverty made me weak and my silence made me a victim. "If we don't have a marriage certificate by midnight, the bank freezes thirty percent of our liquidity," their lawyer warned. So, I gave them exactly what they wanted. I used a loophole in their hundred-year-old family covenant and married the only other direct heir available. I didn't marry Hugh. I walked into the ICU and married his uncle, Fleet Maxwell—the legendary war hero who had been in a vegetative state for months. Now, I am the matriarch of the Maxwell dynasty. I’ve suspended Hugh’s executive powers, exiled my mother-in-law to the Swiss Alps, and taken control of the family vault. They think I’m just a gold-digger waiting for a "corpse" to die so I can collect a fifty-million-dollar widow's payout. But last night, as I lay beside my comatose husband, the man they called a vegetable gripped my hand back.

I went to the City Clerk's office for a routine copy of my marriage license to finalize a trust fund audit. I expected a simple piece of paper, but the clerk's pitying look told me my entire life was a lie. "The license was never finalized, Ms. Oliver. In the eyes of the state, you are single." The three-hundred-guest wedding at the Plaza and the Vogue features meant nothing. My husband, Gray Cooley, had intentionally filed the documents with a "procedural defect" so he could discard me without a legal divorce. Moments later, an iCloud invite titled "Our Little Secret" popped up on my screen. It was a photo of my best friend, Brylee, holding a positive pregnancy test at our Hamptons estate. Gray's text to her was the final blow: "Happy anniversary, babe. This baby is the best gift. Once the trust unlocks today, we're done with the charade." I soon discovered they were even stealing my career, reassigning my architectural masterpiece to Brylee while preparing my eviction notice. Gray's mother called me a "barren mule" in a leaked recording, mocking the infertility I suffered after saving Gray's life in a construction accident. I wasn't a wife; I was a three-year placeholder used to secure his inheritance. How could the man I bled for treat me like a disposable prop? How could my best friend carry his child while pretending to comfort me through my darkest moments? The betrayal burned until it turned into a cold, hard stone of fury. I didn't cry. Instead, I walked into the penthouse of the Barretts, the Cooleys' most powerful rivals. I signed a marriage contract with Kane Barrett, the man the tabloids called the "Beast of Wall Street." "I want a wedding," I told his father, my voice steady and lethal. "Bigger than the one I had with Gray." If they wanted me gone, they would have to watch me become the woman who owns their world.

I lived as the "scarred ghost" of the Stephens penthouse, a wife kept in the shadows because my facial burns offended my billionaire husband's aesthetic. For years, I endured Kason's coldness and my family's abuse, a submissive puppet who believed she had nowhere else to go. The end came with a blue folder tossed onto my silk sheets. Kason's mistress was back, and he wanted me out by sunset, offering a five-million-dollar "silence fee" to go hide my face in the countryside. The betrayal cut deep when I discovered my father had already traded my divorce for a corporate bailout. My step-sister mocked my "trashy" appearance at a high-end boutique, while the sales staff treated me like a common thief. At home, my father threatened to cut off my mother's life-saving medicine unless I crawled back to Kason to beg for a better deal. I was the girl who took the blame for a fire she didn't start, the wife who worshipped a man who never looked her in the eye, and the daughter used as a human bargaining chip. I was supposed to be broken, penniless, and desperate. But the woman who stood up wasn't the weak Elease Finch anymore; she was Phoenix, a tactical predator with a $500 million secret. I signed the divorce papers without a single tear, walked past my stunned husband, and wiped the Finch family's bank accounts clean with a few taps on my phone. "Your money is dirty," I told Kason with a cold smile. "I prefer clean hands." The cage is open, the hunt has begun, and I'm starting with the people who thought a scar made me weak.

For three quiet, patient years, Christina kept house, only to be coldly discarded by the man she once trusted. Instead, he paraded a new lover, making her the punchline of every town joke. Liberated, she honed her long-ignored gifts, astonishing the town with triumph after gleaming triumph. Upon discovering she'd been a treasure all along, her ex-husband's regret drove him to pursue her. "Honey, let's get back together!" With a cold smirk, Christina spat, "Fuck off." A silken-suited mogul slipped an arm around her waist. "She's married to me now. Guards, get him the hell out of here!"

Elliana, the unfavored "ugly duckling" of her family, was humiliated by her stepsister, Paige, who everyone admired. Paige, engaged to the CEO Cole, was the perfect woman-until Cole married Elliana on the day of the wedding. Shocked, everyone wondered why he chose the "ugly" woman. As they waited for her to be cast aside, Elliana stunned everyone by revealing her true identity: a miracle healer, financial mogul, appraisal prodigy, and AI genius. When her mistreatment became known, Cole revealed Elliana's stunning, makeup-free photo, sending shockwaves through the media. "My wife doesn't need anyone's approval."

I spent three years building my husband, Axel Farrell, into Silicon Valley's ultimate "family man." As his lead PR strategist, I carefully managed his public image, making sure the world saw him as a perfect, devoted husband while I worked in the shadows of our estate. The illusion shattered when he came home one night smelling of sandalwood and roses, with three deep fingernail scratches carved into his back. When I tried to check his phone, the passcode we had used for years-our wedding anniversary-had been changed. The betrayal got worse the next morning when his mother called me a "defective product" and tried to force me into a fertility clinic. Axel didn't defend me; instead, he shoved me against a marble bar at a public gala to protect his mistress in front of the world's elite. By the time I tried to leave, Axel had frozen my bank accounts and filed a forged legal petition to have me declared mentally incompetent. He planned to have me legally kidnapped and locked in a private psychiatric ward just to stop me from filing for divorce. He even blocked every major law firm in the city from taking my case, leaving me with no money, no identity, and no one to turn to. I couldn't understand how the man who "saved" me from the mud years ago could be the same monster now trying to legally erase my existence. Was our entire marriage just a grooming process to exploit my genius for his billion-dollar empire? As the deadline for my forced commitment approached, I stopped crying and opened my laptop. I leaked the video of his affair to every tech journalist in the country, watching his stock price crash in real-time. "Axel thinks starving me out will make me crawl back to him," I whispered as I walked into the headquarters of his biggest rival. "But he forgot that the most valuable part of his company is in my head." I was no longer the abandoned wife; I was the one who was going to take his throne and burn it to the ground.