Johan Gorski

I had served as the private medical counsel for the Huff family for five years, keeping their scandals buried and their blood pumping. But at the Cipriani gala, standing under a storm of camera flashes, I realized I was just a smudge of ink on their golden canvas. My twenty-year-old niece, Ainsley, looked me up and down with a sneer and pointed at my throat. She demanded I hand over the emerald pendant—the only thing my grandmother left me—because it would "pop" better against the gold gown of her father’s new media darling, Harlow. I turned to Grafton, the man whose neurodegenerative condition I had personally managed in secret, waiting for him to act like a human being. He didn't even blink. He just leaned in and hissed, "Give it to her, Katharina. Don't make a scene. Fix this." After I handed over the necklace and walked out, the retaliation was instant. Within ten minutes, my credit cards were declined, my biometric access was revoked, and the concierge I had tipped for a decade blocked me from entering my own home. Grafton told me I’d be destitute and starving within a week. They all thought I was a family charity case, a leech clinging to the Huff name for prestige. They had no idea that I had spent years quietly securing the intellectual property rights to their most profitable drugs under my maiden name. They didn't know that I was "The Broker," an underground medical legend with a bank account that dwarfed their trust funds. I watched from the shadows as Grafton’s health began to crumble without my specialized injections and their stock price went into a tailspin. They thought they could erase me, but you can't delete the person who holds the structural integrity of your life together. When the panicked calls finally started coming, I didn't answer. I wasn't interested in a settlement or an apology anymore. I was busy using my offshore funds to buy up their crashing shares, ready to take back the empire they thought they had kicked me out of.

Four years ago, I walked into liquid silver fire to drag the Alpha heir out of a burning wreck. The silver melted the skin off my back, leaving me a topographic nightmare of scars, while my inner wolf went dormant to survive the pain. I thought my sacrifice meant something. But when Julian finally woke from his coma, he didn't look at me with love. He looked at my burns with pure disgust. "Who let this broken Omega in here?" he sneered. He pulled Estelle—the woman who had fled the scene without a scratch—into his arms. "This," he declared, burying his face in her flawless neck, "is the scent of my savior. Not you. You smell like a chemical spill." He treated me like a leper in my own pack. He let his sister slash my dress to expose my "ugly" back to dinner guests. On the day he was forced to marry me for PR, he drove us to the altar with Estelle in the backseat. When she faked a panic attack, claiming the wolfsbane I warned her about was "anxiety," Julian slammed on the brakes in the middle of a storm. "Get out," he commanded, unlocking my door. "Julian, we're ten minutes from the wedding." "Estelle is dying! You selfish monster, get out!" He kicked me out of the Rolls Royce, leaving me standing in the mud in my white silk gown. As his taillights faded, I didn't cry. I closed my eyes and grabbed the frayed bond in my mind. "I, Ember Tucker, reject you, Julian Copeland." Snap. He thought he was discarding a broken toy. He didn't realize he had just rejected the legendary White Wolf—and his only chance at survival.

"Just sign the damn paper, Ava." Liam, the Alpha I had served and loved for three years, threw a confession across the table. He wanted me to admit to corporate espionage—a crime actually committed by his fragile, innocent mistress, Chloe. When I refused, Liam didn't hesitate. He pulled up a live feed of my dying mother in the pack hospital and held his finger over the 'Terminate Life Support' button. "She is pack property. Sign, or the machine turns off." To save my mother, I signed away my rank, my reputation, and my freedom. I became a Rogue. But taking the fall wasn't enough for them. Two days later, Chloe trapped me in the lab to steal my life's work. To cover her tracks, she sabotaged the servers and set the room on fire. When the flames roared to life, Liam burst in. He saw me trapped in a glass box, choking on poisonous fumes. He saw Chloe standing safely by the door, faking a sprained ankle. He looked at me. Then he looked at her. "I'm sorry," he mouthed. He scooped up the arsonist and ran, leaving me to be consumed by the inferno. As the fire melted my skin, the pathetic love I held for him finally died. But I didn't. Instead of turning to ash, an ancient, terrifying power exploded from my core. My eyes snapped open, glowing a blinding white. I reached out through the mind-link to the one man Liam feared most. "Ethan? I'm ready to burn the Blackwood Pack to the ground."

It was the night of the Winter Chalet Gala, the most prestigious event of the year and the night my life was officially supposed to begin. I was the perfect socialite, a Senator’s golden daughter, and the fiancée of Prince Clement. Then my sister, Bailee, handed me a glass of champagne with a sweet, innocent smile. "Just a sip for luck, big sister." Within minutes, my blood turned into liquid fire. In my past life, I didn't realize that "luck" was a drug designed to strip me of my dignity. I had stumbled into a hallway where a planted stranger waited for the paparazzi to catch us. The scandal was the first nail in my coffin. My family disowned me, my fiancé abandoned me for my sister, and I eventually ended the nightmare by jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge. I died in the freezing bay, realizing too late that my sister’s love was a death sentence and my parents had already replaced me. The betrayal felt like swallowing broken glass, a pain more suffocating than the salt water that eventually claimed my lungs. Why did the people I loved want me dismantled? Why was my suicide their only version of mercy? Opening my eyes again, I was back on that snowy balcony three years ago. The iridescent pearl manicure was back on my fingers, and the drug was already screaming in my veins. But I won't be the carcass for the vultures this time. I kicked off my heels and climbed the stone railing, looking toward the forbidden Royal Wing. I’m not going back to the trap. I’m going to the only man powerful enough to burn them all: King Ignatius Fisher.

For three years, I was married to a lie. The man I loved, the man whose name I carried, wasn't my husband. He was his identical twin brother. The truth shattered my perfect life on our anniversary. My real husband, Elliot, had swapped places with his volatile twin, Killian, all so he could be with another woman without the mess of a divorce. I was just a placeholder in their cruel game. Elliot stood by as his lover burned my hand, while Killian wore his face, whispering promises he never meant. But the final blow came when I found Killian's phone. In a group chat, he called me a "prize" he'd won from his brother, promising his friends they could have me once he was bored. That's when my heartbreak turned to ice. I filed for divorce, took everything the pre-nup promised, and fled to London. I thought I was free, but now they've followed me, determined to reclaim their favorite toy.

My fiancé has a twin brother. For the past year, the man I' ve shared a bed with wasn't my fiancé at all. I discovered the man I loved was just an actor, a stand-in. My real fiancé, Brandon, was secretly married to his adopted sister, Caryl. But their plan was far more sinister than just swapping places. They were going to let me marry the twin, then stage an "accident" to harvest my corneas for Caryl. When I discovered their plot, Caryl framed me for attacking her. Brandon, the man who swore to protect me, had me whipped until I was bleeding on the floor. Then she murdered his grandfather and blamed me. He didn't hesitate. He threw me into a psychiatric hospital to rot. He never once questioned her lies. He simply discarded me, the woman he claimed to love for five years. But they forgot one thing. I wasn't just Farah Moore, a helpless orphan. I am Aurora Valois, heiress to an empire. After being rescued from that hell, I faked my death and disappeared. Now, I'm back to start a new life, and this time, I'm living for myself.

I was Kennedy Hall, the rebellious journalist of a political dynasty. My only escape was a secret, passionate affair with Elliot Solis, a powerful CEO carved from ice and logic. He called me his "beautiful disaster," a storm contained within the walls of his penthouse. But our affair was built on a lie. I discovered he was only "taming" me as a favor to another woman, Camille-the fragile daughter of my father's chief of staff, to whom he owed an unpayable debt. He publicly chose her over me, wiping her tears with a tenderness he never showed me. He protected her, defended her, and when I was cornered by a predator, he abandoned me to rush to her side. The ultimate betrayal came when he had me thrown in jail and beaten, hissing that I needed to "learn my lesson." The final blow came during a car crash. Without a second's hesitation, he threw himself in front of Camille, shielding her with his body and leaving me to face the impact alone. I wasn't his love; I was a liability he was willing to sacrifice. Lying broken in a hospital bed, I finally understood. I wasn't his beautiful disaster; I was his fool. So I did the only thing I could. I burned his perfect world to the ground, accepted a marriage proposal from a kind billionaire who promised me peace, and walked away to start a new life, leaving the ashes of our love behind.

The day they buried my four-year-old son, Leo, killed by a hit-and-run, the driver, Karyn Morse, showed up at his grave. She smiled, dropped Leo' s favorite toy into his open casket, and called him a "clumsy little thing." My husband, District Attorney David Blair, the city' s pillar of strength, stood by, silent. I, an investigative journalist, knew I' d find justice. I had the evidence, the witness, a Pulitzer-winning track record. But Karyn Morse was different. The judge, beholden to her powerful father, dismissed everything. She walked free. Then, the bailiff called my name. "Eva Benton, you are under arrest." My own husband, Leo' s father, prosecuted me for criminal negligence. He twisted my grief, my frantic search for truth, into a paranoid obsession. My best friend, Cheri, testified against me, claiming I was unstable. The jury found me guilty. Three years in a maximum-security prison. For being a grieving mother. For losing my son. I lost another child in prison, a secret I buried deep. Why? Why did he do it? Why did he betray me? The day I was released, I found him at Leo' s grave, with Karyn and their son. "Daddy, can we go get ice cream now?" Karyn cooed, "We have to say hi to your brother." My world shattered. He hadn' t just framed me; he had replaced me. He had replaced our son. "Worried?" he said, when Karyn asked about me. "Why would I be? She' s nothing to me now." The thread snapped. I called Cheri. "I need your help, Cheri."

The call came at 7:05 PM on our tenth wedding anniversary. My husband, David, was in an accident. At the hospital, he was awake, but a young woman, his assistant Chloe, was holding his hand, acting like his wife. When I walked in, he looked at me, a blank stranger' s stare, then asked, "Who are you?" He laughed when I said I was his wife, then demanded security remove me, while Chloe, smiling, pretended to cry. It wasn't just memory loss; it was a cruel, targeted erasure. I tried proof, the marriage certificate, but he pushed it away as "just a piece of paper." Then Chloe waltzed in with his favorite soup, and he defended her when I confronted her. "She' s the only one who' s been here for me!" he screamed. He snarled that I was "exhausted, haggard," compared to Chloe, who was "kind and gentle." My wedding ring, a symbol of our forever, flew from my hand as he slapped it away, clinking under the bed. "Don' t come back," he said, turning his back on me to comfort Chloe. Later, I learned why: he had been having an affair with Chloe, his mother's 65th birthday ruined by his absence and her answering his phone. My world shattered when Mark Johnson, David's estranged best friend, told me what David said: "The fake amnesia was a stroke of genius, right? A clean break." My husband had faked a brain injury to throw me away. A car hit me, sending me to the hospital, and I knew what I had to do. When Mark came in, I looked at him, my face blank, then asked, "Are you… my husband?"

I knelt on one knee, velvet box in hand, ready to propose to the woman I loved, a rising star in the theater world. But instead of a yes, her cold voice cut through the silence: "I'm in love with someone else." Instantly, her aunt, Nicole Johns, stepped from the wings, claiming she'd harbored a crush on me for years, and married me within a month. Five years later, severely burned in a pyrotechnics "accident," I overheard Nicole, my wife, discussing my fate with the doctor. She ordered my healthy skin be given to her lover, the very man my ex-fiancée left me for, Matthew Blakely, for a cosmetic procedure. "For Ethan," she hissed, "use the experimental synthetic skin. It's cheaper." Then, unbelievably, she tried to have me sterilized while I was unconscious, revealing she'd aborted our children because they were an "inconvenient" distraction from her affair with Matthew. The "accident" and their fabricated story of my jealousy were all a setup. I later learned the deepest horror: she had staged Matthew's "attack" to steal my kidney, which he openly gloated about right after receiving it. They had a secret, sinister plan for my body. My world shattered beyond repair. I finally called my family' s ranch in Texas, ready to fight for my life.

I was just a 20-year-old NYU art history student, interning at my dad’s real estate firm. But my world privately revolved around Marcus Thorne—my father’s handsome, brilliant business partner. My crush on him was pure, all-consuming, utterly naive. He’d always been so kind, a true gentleman. At a charity gala, I watched Izzy Vance, Marcus’s associate, subtly ply him with drinks. When I tried to help him to his suite, Izzy "found" us, her perfectly timed gasp and a discreet phone flash sealing my fate. The next morning, headlines screamed: "NYU Intern Olivia Chen Caught in Compromising Position with Marcus Thorne." Blurry, damning photos accompanied them. Marcus’s icy call followed: "Izzy found you taking advantage of me! My reputation is in shreds because of your childish stunt!" He believed her. Completely. Whispers and hostile stares at my father’s office became unbearable. The kind man I’d adored now looked at me with absolute disgust. My dreams shattered. How could he be so blind? So cruel? This wasn't the Marcus I knew. This felt brutally unfair. That week, the naive girl who worshipped him died. In her place, a colder awareness dawned: the world was not kind, people not what they seemed. He thought I was playing games, but I was done. This was my turning point.

I posted my beautiful photos online. Someone commented below calling me a scammer. I thought it was a joke to get my attention, but when I came back, my social media was exploding. Hundreds of people were mentioning and messaging me to return their money. I was confused and when I checked the comments, there were already hundreds of them calling me a scammer. Someone even explained the situation and got a lot of likes: "This handsome guy and beautiful girl were in an online relationship and got scammed for 8500 yuan."

Everyone knew Kristine loved Colton. Still, his heart clung to a woman overseas-someone he spent most days with, now pregnant with his baby-and Kristine still asked him to marry her. On their registration day, however, he never came; his "true love" had flown back. Seven years of loyalty later, Kristine walked away, blocked him, and left his city. Colton didn't blink-until he saw her at the courthouse, arm-in-arm with another man, and the proud CEO went pale. He went after her, desperation overtaking him. "I'm sorry. Please give me another chance." She snapped, "Could you stop? I'm already married."

The heavy iron gates of the Wilderness Correction Camp groaned as they released me after three years of state-sponsored hell. I stood on the dirt road, clutching a plastic bag that held my entire life, waiting for the family that claimed they sent me there for "rehab." My brother, Brady, picked me up in a luxury SUV only to throw me out onto a deserted highway in the middle of a brewing storm. He told me I was a "public relations nightmare" and that the rain might finally wash the "stink" of the camp off me. He drove away, leaving me to limp miles through the mud on a snapped ankle. When I finally dragged myself to our family estate, my mother didn't offer a hug; she gasped in horror because my muddy clothes were ruining her Italian marble. They didn't give me my old room back. Instead, they banished me to a moldy gardener’s shack and hired a "babysitter" to make sure I didn't embarrass them further. My sister, Kaleigh, stood there in white cashmere, pretending to cry while clinging to her fiancé, Ambrose—the man who had once been mine. They all treated me like a volatile junkie, refusing to acknowledge that Kaleigh was the one who planted the drugs in my bag three years ago. They wanted to believe I was broken so they wouldn't have to feel guilty about the "wellness retreat" that was actually a torture chamber. I sat in the dark of that shed, feeling the cooling gel on the cigarette burns that covered my arms, and realized they had made a fatal mistake. They thought they had erased me, but I had returned with a roadmap of scars and a hidden satellite phone. At dinner, I didn't beg for their love. I simply rolled up my sleeves and showed them the price of their silence. As the wine spilled and the lies crumbled, I sent a single text to the only person I trusted: "I'm in. Let them simmer." The hunt was finally on.

I stood at my mother’s open grave in the freezing rain, my heels sinking into the mud. The space beside me was empty. My husband, Hilliard Holloway, had promised to cherish me in bad times, but apparently, burying my mother didn't fit into his busy schedule. While the priest’s voice droned on, a news alert lit up my phone. It was a livestream of the Metropolitan Charity Gala. There was Hilliard, looking impeccable in a custom tuxedo, with his ex-girlfriend Charla English draped over his arm. The headline read: "Holloway & English: A Power Couple Reunited?" When he finally returned to our penthouse at 2 AM, he didn't come alone—he brought Charla with him. He claimed she’d had a "medical emergency" at the gala and couldn't be left alone. I found a Tiffany diamond necklace on our coffee table meant for her birthday, and a smudge of her signature red lipstick on his collar. When I confronted him, he simply told me to stop being "hysterical" and "acting like a child." He had no idea I was seven months pregnant with his child. He thought so little of my grief that he didn't even bother to craft a convincing lie, laughing with his mistress in our home while I sat in the dark with a shattered heart and a secret life growing inside me. "He doesn't deserve us," I whispered to the darkness. I didn't scream or beg. I simply left a folder on his desk containing signed divorce papers and a forged medical report for a terminated pregnancy. I disappeared into the night, letting him believe he had successfully killed his own legacy through his neglect. Five years later, Hilliard walked into "The Vault," the city's most exclusive underground auction, looking for a broker to manage his estate. He didn't recognize me behind my Venetian mask, but he couldn't ignore the neon pink graffiti on his armored Maybach that read "DEADBEAT." He had no clue that the three brilliant triplets currently hacking his security system were the very children he thought had been erased years ago. This time, I wasn't just a wife in the way; I was the one holding all the cards.

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!"

"Stella once savored Marc's devotion, yet his covert cruelty cut deep. She torched their wedding portrait at his feet while he sent flirty messages to his mistress. With her chest tight and eyes blazing, Stella delivered a sharp slap. Then she deleted her identity, signed onto a classified research mission, vanished without a trace, and left him a hidden bombshell. On launch day she vanished; that same dawn Marc's empire crumbled. All he unearthed was her death certificate, and he shattered. When they met again, a gala spotlighted Stella beside a tycoon. Marc begged. With a smirk, she said, ""Out of your league, darling."

Today is October 14th, my birthday. I returned to New York after months away, dragging my suitcase through the biting wind, but the VIP pickup zone where my husband’s Maybach usually idled was empty. When I finally let myself into our Upper East Side penthouse, I didn’t find a cake or a "welcome home" banner. Instead, I found my husband, Caden, kneeling on the floor, helping our five-year-old daughter wrap a massive gift for my half-sister, Adalynn. Caden didn’t even look up when I walked in; he was too busy laughing with the girl who had already stolen my father’s legacy and was now moving in on my family. "Auntie Addie is a million times better than Mommy," my daughter Elara chirped, clutching a plush toy Caden had once forbidden me from buying for her. "Mommy is mean," she whispered loudly, while Caden just smirked, calling me a "drill sergeant" before whisking her off to Adalynn’s party without a second glance. Later that night, I saw a video Adalynn posted online where my husband and child laughed while mocking my "sensitive" nature, treating me like an inconvenient ghost in my own home. I had spent five years researching nutrition for Elara’s health and managing every detail of Caden’s empire, only to be discarded the moment I wasn't in the room. How could the man who set his safe combination to my birthday completely forget I even existed? The realization didn't break me; it turned me into ice. I didn't scream or beg for an explanation. I simply walked into the study, pulled out the divorce papers I’d drafted months ago, and took a black marker to the terms. I crossed out the alimony, the mansion, and even the custody clause—if they wanted a life without me, I would give them exactly what they asked for. I left my four-carat diamond ring on the console table and walked out into the rain with nothing but a heavily encrypted hard drive. The submissive Mrs. Holloway was gone, and "Ghost," the most lethal architect in the tech world, was finally back online to take back everything they thought I’d forgotten.

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."

Rain hammered against the asphalt as my sedan spun violently into the guardrail on the I-95. Blood trickled down my temple, stinging my eyes, while the rhythmic slap of the windshield wipers mocked my panic. Trembling, I dialed my husband, Clive. His executive assistant answered instead, his voice professional and utterly cold. "Mr. Wilson says to stop the theatrics. He said, and I quote, 'Hang up. Tell her I don’t have time for her emotional blackmail tonight.'" The line went dead while I was still trapped in the wreckage. At the hospital, I watched the news footage of Clive wrapping his jacket around his "fragile" ex-girlfriend, Angelena, shielding her from the storm I was currently bleeding in. When I returned to our penthouse, I found a prenatal ultrasound in his suit pocket, dated the day he claimed to be on a business trip. Instead of an apology, Clive met me with a sneer. He told me I was nothing but an "expensive decoration" his father bought to make him look stable. He froze my bank accounts and cut off my cards, waiting for the hunger to drive me back to his feet. I stared at the man I had loved for four years, realizing he didn't just want a wife; he wanted a prop he could switch off. He thought he could starve me into submission while he played father to another woman's child. But Clive forgot one thing. Before I was his trophy wife, I was Starfall—the legendary voice actress who vanished at the height of her fame. "I'm not jealous, Clive. I'm done." I grabbed my old microphone and walked out. I’m not just leaving him; I’m taking the lead role in the biggest saga in Hollywood—the one Angelena is desperate for. This time, the "decoration" is going to burn his world down.

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.

The heavy thud of the release stamp was the only goodbye I got from the warden after five years in federal prison. I stepped out into the blinding sun, expecting the same flash of paparazzi bulbs that had seen me dragged away in handcuffs, but there was only a single black limousine idling on the shoulder of the road. Inside sat my mother and sister, clutching champagne and looking at my frayed coat with pure disgust. They didn't offer a welcome home; instead, they tossed a thick legal document onto the table and told me I was dead to the city. "Gavin and I are getting engaged," my sister Mia sneered, flicking a credit card at me like I was a stray dog. "He doesn't need a convict ex-fiancée hanging around." Even after I saved their lives from an armed kidnapping attempt by ramming the attackers off the road, they rewarded me by leaving me stranded in the dirt. When I finally ran into Gavin, the man who had framed me, he pinned me against a wall and threatened to send me back to a cell if I ever dared to show my face at their wedding. They had stolen my biotech research, ruined my name, and let me rot for half a decade while they lived off my brilliance. They thought they had broken me, leaving me with nothing but an expired chapstick and a few old photos in a plastic bag. What they didn't know was that I had spent those five years becoming "Dr. X," a shadow consultant with five hundred million dollars in crypto and a secret that would bring the city to its knees. I wasn't just a victim anymore; I was a weapon, and I was pregnant with the heir they thought they had erased. I walked into the Melton estate and made an offer to the most powerful man in New York. "I'll save your grandfather's life," I told Horatio Melton, staring him down. "But the price is your last name. I'm taking back what's mine, and I'm starting with the man who thinks he's marrying my sister."