Humming Byrd

On the night of her wedding anniversary and her husband's birthday, Zora rushes home, excited to surprise Zayn with news that could change everything-she's pregnant. But instead of celebration, Zayn hands her divorce papers, shattering her dreams of a future together. For three years, Zora has been devoted to her billionaire husband, hoping their childless marriage would heal with time. But now, Zayn's cold rejection and hints of infidelity with his ex push her to the brink. Refusing to give up on their vows, Zora fights for her marriage, unaware that Zayn is determined to walk away and disappear from her life entirely to be with Paige, his ex-girlfriend. What happens when it dawned on Zayn that his ex never meant good for him? Will he go back to his wife and will Zora even accept him?

"...Only if you could give me a second chance... But if you're happy, I'm happy. You're connected for life. I don't want to go through this and for it to come back on my kids, I want you to be in the best situation even if you don't love me anymore." ______ Six years ago, she was framed and banished from her pack for a crime she didn't commit. But now, she's a famous doctor with three cute babies and different people come to her for treatment. What happened the day Yvonne was presented with a medical case about her Alpha mate who rejected and banished her without carrying out a proper investigation? Will she treat him, then accept him back as her mate as he has realized his mistake or will she let him die of the disease as revenge for what he made her pass through and then go for her second chance mate?

Rex, an errand boy at a prestigious University, despised by his schoolmates for being poor, he runs errands for rich students just to meet ends and also to take care of his girlfriend, Cassandra. What happens when Rex finds out Cassandra cheated on him with one of the notorious big boys on campus? Just when he wanted to give up on life, he was revealed a hidden secret that left him stunned, and this elevated him to the top. Will Rex accept Cassandra back as he rose to power or will he make those who despised him hate life afterward including Cassandra?

Amelia sat alone at the City Marriage Bureau, watching the clock tick down to closing time. Fifteen minutes before the doors shut, a phone call shattered her last flicker of hope. Her fiancé, Kayson, wasn't coming. He had abandoned their wedding registration because Kamila-her stepsister-had twisted her ankle. It was his ninth broken promise. When Amelia returned home, there was no comfort. Her biological mother sneered at her humiliation, shielding the stepsister while ordering Amelia to apologize to Kayson. "Who would she marry without Kayson?" her mother mocked. "Let's see how long she survives out there without his money." Meanwhile, Kayson arrogantly dismissed her absence. Finding out she had vanished, he just laughed it off with his assistant. "It's just a tantrum to force my hand," Kayson smirked. "She still can't live without me." After nine years of absolute devotion, she was nothing but a convenient placeholder to the man she loved, and a worthless joke to her own family. The suffocating weight of their betrayal finally snapped something inside her. She packed a single suitcase, threw away nine years of anniversary gifts, and permanently blocked Kayson's number. Standing in the freezing wind, she pulled out her phone and dialed the private number of Kayson's biggest, most ruthless rival. "Mr. Thornton, what you said seven months ago... does the offer to marry me still stand?" Ten minutes later, a sleek black Maybach pulled up to the curb.

To help her husband build his business empire, Veyra worked two jobs, skipped meals, and sacrificed everything she had. When her mother desperately needed life-saving treatment, she couldn't even scrape together the money. Then, on a New Year's Eve flight, fate seated her beside her husband's mistress. That's when she discovered the cruel truth. Her husband had secretly amassed millions long ago. The wedding ring that belonged to Veyra now glittered on another woman's finger. The $500,000 that could have saved her mother's life had been spent instead on luxury gifts and pocket money for his lover. She lost her baby. She lost her mother. And finally, she lost every illusion about the man she'd loved for years. After leaving the airport, Veyra walked into a bar, kissed the most dangerous-looking stranger she could find, and spent one reckless night in his arms. By sunrise, she disappeared without leaving so much as her name. She thought it was nothing more than a farewell to her broken past. She was wrong. The stranger was Dorian-the most powerful, mysterious billionaire in the business world. Meanwhile, her cheating husband finally realized what he had thrown away. He begged on his knees, signed a postnuptial agreement worth billions, and swore he would give up everything if she would come back. But just as Veyra began plotting to reclaim everything that had been stolen from her, a mysterious car accident brought Dorian back into her life. Only then did she learn the truth. He wasn't a stranger at all. He was her ex-husband's older stepbrother. Now two powerful men are fighting for the same woman-one consumed by regret, the other determined to make her his. Sorry, cheating ex... I choose your brother.

I received a pornographic video. "Do you like this?" The man speaking in the video is my husband, Mark, whom I haven't seen for several months. He is naked, his shirt and pants scattered on the ground, thrusting forcefully on a woman whose face I can't see, her plump and round breasts bouncing vigorously. I can clearly hear the slapping sounds in the video, mixed with lustful moans and grunts. "Yes, yes, fuck me hard, baby," the woman screams ecstatically in response. "You naughty girl!" Mark stands up and flips her over, slapping her buttocks as he speaks. "Stick your ass up!" The woman giggles, turns around, sways her buttocks, and kneels on the bed. I feel like someone has poured a bucket of ice water on my head. It's bad enough that my husband is having an affair, but what's worse is that the other woman is my own sister, Bella. ************************************************************************************************************************ "I want to get a divorce, Mark," I repeated myself in case he didn't hear me the first time-even though I knew he'd heard me clearly. He stared at me with a frown before answering coldly, "It's not up to you! I'm very busy, don't waste my time with such boring topics, or try to attract my attention!" The last thing I was going to do was argue or bicker with him. "I will have the lawyer send you the divorce agreement," was all I said, as calmly as I could muster. He didn't even say another word after that and just went through the door he'd been standing in front of, slamming it harshly behind him. My eyes lingered on the knob of the door a bit absentmindedly before I pulled the wedding ring off my finger and placed it on the table. I grabbed my suitcase, which I'd already had my things packed in and headed out of the house.

One lab error. Two betrayals. And a billionaire who doesn't believe in accidents. Emily Vance thought she was carrying a miracle. After her fiancé, Julian, ended up in a coma following a horrific car crash, she underwent IVF to keep his legacy alive. It was supposed to be her anchor. Instead, a clinical mix-up reveals that the child in her womb isn't Julian's at all. It belongs to Alistair Wolfe, a man whose name is synonymous with ruthless power and a heart made of ice. The nightmare doesn't stop at the doctor's office. When Julian finally wakes up, he doesn't call for Emily. He calls for her stepsister, Chloe, revealing a secret affair that turns Emily's years of loyalty into a joke. Backed into a corner by a family ready to sell her to a predatory debt collector to save their failing business, Emily is left with a devastating choice. Her doctors warn her that this is her last chance at motherhood. To keep her baby and escape her family's reach, she has to make a deal with the wolf at the door. Alistair Wolfe wants his heir. Emily wants protection. No love. No strings. Just a temporary union until the child is born. But as Emily moves into Alistair's world, she quickly learns that playing the wife of a man like Alistair is a high-stakes game where the heart is the first thing you lose.

I was at my own engagement party at the Sterling estate when the world started tilting. Victoria Sterling, my future mother-in-law, smiled coldly as she watched me struggle with a cup of tea that had been drugged to ruin me. Before I could find my fiancé, Ryan, a waiter dragged me into the forbidden West Wing and locked me in a room with Julian Sterling, the family’s "fallen titan" who had been confined to a wheelchair for years. The door burst open to a frenzy of camera flashes and theatrical screams. Victoria framed me as a seductress caught in the act, and Ryan didn't even try to listen to my pleas, calling me "cheap leftovers" before walking away with his pregnant mistress. When I turned to my own family for help, my father signed a document severing our relationship for a five-million-dollar payout from Julian. They traded me like a commodity without a second thought. I didn't understand why my own parents were so eager to sell me, or how Ryan could look at me with such disgust after promising me forever. I was a sacrifice, a pawn used to protect the family's offshore accounts, and I couldn't fathom how every person I loved had a price tag for my destruction. With nowhere left to go, I married Julian in a bleak ceremony at City Hall. He slid a heavy diamond onto my finger and whispered, "We have a war to start." That night, inside his secret penthouse, I watched the paralyzed man stand up from his wheelchair and activate a screen filled with the Sterling family's darkest secrets. The execution had officially begun.

Ginny was chained to a concrete pillar in an abandoned warehouse, bleeding and betrayed by the two people she trusted most. Her fiancé, Brant, and her adopted sister, Coretta, had just slashed her face open. Brant coldly admitted she was nothing but a disposable key to a vault, right before he tossed a lighter onto the gasoline-soaked floor. As Ginny burned alive in the roaring inferno, the heavy iron doors were violently smashed open. Bedford Parks—the notoriously ruthless, germaphobic "monster" of Silicon Valley whom Ginny had always feared—charged straight into the flames. Ignoring the blistering heat, he shielded her charred body with his own. A massive steel beam collapsed, snapping his spine. "I love you." He coughed up blood, whispering his final words against her blackened skin before dying to protect her. Hovering as a ghost, Ginny's soul screamed in agonizing realization. She had spent her life terrified of Bedford, yet he was the only one who truly loved her, while her supposed family laughed at her gruesome murder. Suddenly, a blinding white light swallowed the warehouse. Ginny gasped for air, opening her eyes to find herself sitting in the back of a luxury Maybach. She was eighteen again, wearing the humiliating clown makeup Coretta had tricked her into wearing on the day she was brought back to the wealthy Steele estate. Ginny stared at her reflection, her dark eyes turning cold and sharp. This time, she would tear her betrayers apart piece by piece, and she would protect her "monster."

On my wedding day, my fiancé Connor received an urgent phone call. He told me a D-list actress had broken her leg on set, then abandoned me right at the altar. In my past life, I cried until my throat bled, begging him not to leave. But my tears only brought endless humiliation. My mother and adopted sister mocked me, framed me, and forged my signature to steal my multi-million dollar trust fund. They kicked me out of the family estate without a single dime. I ended up freezing to death in the minus-twenty-degree New York blizzard, listening to my mother's voicemail telling me to die in the street as long as I didn't bleed on her carpets. Until my last breath, I couldn't understand why my own blood relatives hated me so much, yet treated an adopted daughter like a precious princess. The only person who showed me any mercy—draping his wool coat over my frozen corpse and giving me a proper burial—was Connor's ruthless, untouchable uncle, Harding Snow. Opening my eyes again, I was back in the bridal suite, right as Connor was rushing out the door. This time, I didn't shed a single tear. I let him run to his actress, then walked straight into the VIP room to face the most feared billionaire on Wall Street. "The wedding proceeds as planned, but the groom's name changes to yours."

To revenge herself on her unfaithful fiancé Kevin, Isidora hides her striking beauty behind a plain disguise, and targets his uncle - the most formidable man Kevin fears. After one reckless night, Isidora leaves cash as payment and says lightly, "You were good last night." She tries to leave quietly, but is pulled into his arms. "You think you can walk away after this?" he says, his tone low and possessive. Cedrick is a feared, untouchable titan on Wall Street - elegant, aloof, and completely uninterested in women. Not even the most beautiful socialites in the city can catch his eye. When gossip spreads that he was seen pressing a woman against a wall and kissing her fiercely, no one believes it. When the rumors name Isidora, the crowd scoffs. He rejects even the most beautiful women, so why would he notice a plain girl like her? All doubt disappears when they see the dignified Cedrick drop to one knee to help Isidora with her shoe, pleading softly for just one kiss. When Kevin finally sees Isidora's true beauty and begs for forgiveness. But Cedrick kicks him out at once, slams a marriage certificate on the table, and says sharply. "Call her Aunt."

Being second best is practically in my DNA. My sister got the love, the attention, the spotlight. And now, even her damn fiancé. Technically, Rhys Granger was my fiancé now-billionaire, devastatingly hot, and a walking Wall Street wet dream. My parents shoved me into the engagement after Catherine disappeared, and honestly? I didn't mind. I'd crushed on Rhys for years. This was my chance, right? My turn to be the chosen one? Wrong. One night, he slapped me. Over a mug. A stupid, chipped, ugly mug my sister gave him years ago. That's when it hit me-he didn't love me. He didn't even see me. I was just a warm-bodied placeholder for the woman he actually wanted. And apparently, I wasn't even worth as much as a glorified coffee cup. So I slapped him right back, dumped his ass, and prepared for disaster-my parents losing their minds, Rhys throwing a billionaire tantrum, his terrifying family plotting my untimely demise. Obviously, I needed alcohol. A lot of alcohol. Enter him. Tall, dangerous, unfairly hot. The kind of man who makes you want to sin just by existing. I'd met him only once before, and that night, he just happened to be at the same bar as my drunk, self-pitying self. So I did the only logical thing: I dragged him into a hotel room and ripped off his clothes. It was reckless. It was stupid. It was completely ill-advised. But it was also: Best. Sex. Of. My. Life. And, as it turned out, the best decision I'd ever made. Because my one-night stand isn't just some random guy. He's richer than Rhys, more powerful than my entire family, and definitely more dangerous than I should be playing with. And now, he's not letting me go.

They say what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, mine didn't. I came back with a marriage certificate bearing a stranger's name, a ring worth more than my parents' love ever was, and a son whose father I've never seen, never known, never remembered. I went to Vegas for a racing competition. I won. I celebrated. And somewhere between the victory and the sunrise, my life changed forever. For six years, I've lived with the consequences of one reckless night. I built an empire. I raised my son. And I searched for the man who changed my life without even knowing it. Then fate laughed in my face. My sister married my ex-fiancé-the man I was promised to since childhood. The man I was supposed to become Mrs. Windsor for. The man who now wears my family name... and looks far too much like my child. Every time I'm near him, the past presses closer. Every glance feels like a question I'm terrified to ask. I shouldn't notice him. I shouldn't feel anything. He is my sister's husband. But some secrets refuse to stay buried. Because the truth about Vegas isn't just in the ring on my finger or the child in my arms. It's standing right in front of me. And when it finally comes out, it won't just destroy a marriage, it will burn an empire to the ground.